Empire Conquest
Chapter 383 - 379: Driven by Interests

Chapter 383: Chapter 379: Driven by Interests

At lunchtime, Zhao Yu began complaining bitterly to Bai Zhizhan, but it seemed more like he was venting to someone.

Perhaps he couldn’t find anyone to confide in usually.

"I could call the Grand Secretary if you need," Bai Zhizhan tentatively suggested.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to help, but he knew that even if he did call Xue Yuanzheng, it might not solve the problems, as Xue Yuanzheng couldn’t handle everything.

After all, Xue Yuanzheng expected his subordinates to solve problems for him, not create them.

Bai Zhizhan had some influence, but not enough to make the Grand Secretary serve him.

Besides, Xue Yuanzheng didn’t understand the Navy.

If he were to get involved, he would have just asked Liu Changxun to step in, and Liu Changxun being a competitor of He Yongxing, could further complicate the situation.

Moreover, if approaching Xue Yuanzheng were effective, Zhao Yu would have sought him out already.

"This matter, no one can help. Honestly, this is also why I didn’t want to associate with the He Family, and initially advised you not to get involved with them."

Bai Zhizhan sighed bitterly with a wry smile.

Twenty years ago, Zhao Yu had told him over drinks that there was no difference between the He Family and the Liu Family; fundamentally speaking, in many aspects, they were even worse than the Liu Family.

The Liu Family was founded on the Navy: the Navy’s strength was the Liu Family’s prosperity, and the Navy’s decline spelled the Liu Family’s failure; thus, they always had the Navy’s interests in mind.

The He Family was different.

Though also originating from the Navy, after decades in the shipbuilding industry and controlling almost all of the Empire’s large shipyards, and extending their reach into upstream businesses, the He Family had already transformed into a genuine business dynasty, placing a greater emphasis on financial interests.

He Yongxing suppressing this issue was clearly driven by interests.

Personal grievances?

Give me a break!

No matter how petty He Yongxing was, he wouldn’t continue to bear a grudge against Bai Zhizhan, who was already the Imperial Prince Consort, the beloved brother-in-law of the reigning Holy Emperor.

If it were just about personal grievances, He Yongxing should rather be cozying up to Bai Zhizhan and, by extension, trying to please people close to Bai Zhizhan, like Zhao Yu.

Compared to the family’s core interests, personal grievances were nothing.

This issue actually involved the He Family’s core interests.

The reason was that Zhao Yu had suggested small shipyards build these small fleet carriers to alleviate pressure on the large shipyards.

When he made this recommendation, Zhao Yu hadn’t thought it through.

Of course, even if he had thought it through—assuming his brain wasn’t waterlogged—it might not immediately occur to him the implications.

Letting small shipyards build carriers?

What about the large shipyards controlled by the He Family?

If today they can build small carriers, tomorrow they might build large carriers!

Actually, a similar situation had already happened.

It was with the "Guangcheng" class long-range cruiser.

A battleship with the tonnage of a heavy cruiser, yet its main gun firepower was even inferior to a light cruiser. Its anti-air firepower far exceeded that of a heavy cruiser and wasn’t far from that of battleships. During the Northwest East Ocean Battle, the four "Guangcheng" class ships fully demonstrated their immense value.

Without these four "Guangcheng" class cruisers, the "Imperial Capital" and the "Peijing" would surely have been sunk.

Importantly, the cost of the "Guangcheng" class was only 60% of that of the same tonnage "Wuzhou" class.

Actually, the "Guangcheng" class used the hull of the "Wuzhou" class.

Although the Navy’s main reason given was the savings from not equipping 9 main guns of 200 mm, this reason was not at all convincing. Mainly because the number of high-altitude guns on the "Guangcheng" class was double that of the "Wuzhou" class, and the expenditure on purchasing naval guns was not significantly different between the two types of battleships.

The real reason lay in the shipyards.

Due to the crowded scheduling at large shipyards and the general perception that a battleship without main guns was not valuable, none of the large shipyards associated with the He Family showed much enthusiasm or even entered the bidding, ending up with a small shipyard in Wen City winning the contract.

Before this, the biggest vessel that this shipyard had built was a 1500-ton long-range fishing boat.

Thereafter, this shipyard, along with three other similar small shipyards, commenced construction.

The total contract value offered by the four small shipyards was only sixty percent of that for the "Wuzhou" class.

More importantly, they could still turn a profit!

According to audit reports from the tax department, the net profit for these four shipyards in building the "Guangcheng" class long-range cruisers ranged from 11% to 14%.

At that time, this nearly caused He Yongxing to lose face.

Especially since the large shipyard undertaking the construction of four "Wuzhou" class battleships reported a net profit of less than 5%!

It was only after Xue Yuanzheng personally intervened and the combat capabilities of the "Guangcheng" class were proven that the Navy placed a second order of 8 ships.

This also turned out to be the final order.

According to the new plan submitted by He Yongxing, there was no need to build the "Guangcheng" class, as they were too small for their main mission which overlapped with that of heavy cruisers, so it was more efficient to build more heavy cruisers instead and redesign the anti-air warships with a focus on increasing displacement.

Indeed, what was being designed was a large cruiser.

Because its standard displacement exceeded 30,000 tons, the design of this large cruiser, which was practically a replica of a battlecruiser, had to be constructed by a large shipyard.

Thus, it was evident how He Yongxing went to all lengths to protect family interests.

In Zhao Yu’s words, the large cruisers pushed by He Yongxing were essentially extravagant battleships that were neither practical nor affordable.

Simply put, with a standard displacement exceeding 30,000 tons, to emphasize its identity as a large cruiser, the main gun was an imported 54-caliber 280 mm naval gun from the Tiaoman Empire, and even its turrets were designed in imitation, arranged as three triple-gun turrets, two in the front and one at the back.

This tonnage could completely support three twin-gun 400 mm main gun turrets!

More importantly, even the Tiaoman Navy, which felt indifferent toward this neither-nor type of naval gun, was preparing to equip its next large cruiser with 380 mm naval guns, using three double-turret setups, having imported the production technology for 400 mm naval guns from the Empire.

This thing, deemed unpromising by the Tiaoman Navy, was treasured by He Yongxing!

Moreover, the protection of this large cruiser was only slightly better than that of a heavy cruiser and not on par with battleships; it was even inferior to battlecruisers now housed in museums.

Despite installing a lot of impractical features, the design estimate for this battleship reached 80% of that of the "Xu Sea" class.

The actual cost would certainly exceed that of the "Xu Sea" class.

If so, why not continue building the "Xu Sea" class?

In response to Zhao Yu’s question, He Yongxing’s reason was that two large cruisers could be built simultaneously on a single 50,000-ton dock.

Additionally, a 20,000-ton dock could also be utilized.

With a dock tonnage of less than 25,000 tons, it was feasible to also simultaneously construct two "Xu Sea" class ships on a 50,000-ton dock provided there were appropriate arrangements.

It was not difficult to slightly reduce protection and control the dock tonnage of the "Xu Sea" class to less than 20,000 tons.

When considering air defense and sea control, the "Xu Sea" class surpassed any cruiser and was the most powerful fast battleship of the day.

Of course, cost was key.

Zhao Yu estimated that the actual cost of the large cruiser might be only two-thirds of the quoted price.

Keeping the quotation at about half of the "Xu Sea" class would be reasonable.

As for where the extra money went, Zhao Yu need not elaborate.

With such massive interests at stake, how could He Yongxing let someone else handle the continuance of building dozens of small carrier fleets?