Chapter 145： Strange order (1/2)
”Your Royal Highness, the mid-year bonus you gave me will probably be doubled.” One day before Ruprecht left Berlin, Prince Ruprecht met his gold medalist, known as the Bavarian banknote printing machine. Baron Vittorio. And the first words of the baron made the prince very upset! After all, Ruprecht is now considered a capitalist, and what capitalists in this era like to do most is to squeeze employees!
”Brazil, you know? Brazil! They actually want to order warships from us?” the baron said excitedly. ”I always thought that this vast country is not interested in the navy at all.”
”This is really surprising.” Ruprecht is also very curious. After all, he has gone through Conway countless times, but he is very clear that the largest warship ordered by the Brazilian Navy in the 90s in the pre-fearless era was a 4,700 tons. The protective cruiser is equipped with 10 6-inch guns and 2 4.7-inch guns.
And on this plane, they actually ordered 2 warships from themselves! The two 10,000-ton-class armored cruisers do make Ruprecht feel a little confused. It is said that the competition between Argentina and Chile has nothing to do with Brazil. This buddy was very honest in the fearless era. After all, as the largest country in South America, South America at this time could not threaten his existence. The navy has hardly been built. The visual gross tonnage is not as good as the Beiyang Navy in its heyday...
”Yeah, I am also very surprised. The Brazilian navy building does not care at all. If it is only to respond to the naval arms race between Chile and Argentina, they can buy two Munich-class armored cruisers, but this time, they Actually ordered two Russian-class armored cruisers! Do they also want to join the fight for South American sea power?” said the baron. Because the 10,000-ton-class armored cruiser numbered ACR1 is specially designed for Russia, the name of this warship is Russian class. And when the Baron said this, Ruprecht suddenly fainted. This amount of information is a bit big for Ruprecht....
”It's impossible!” Only these words popped out of Ruprecht's mind!
”This is a copy of the bank draft. You can take a look. The entire contract totals 1.95 million pounds. They require the use of British 10-inch L40 artillery and 8-inch L40 artillery. The first capital of 350,000 pounds has been paid, and they demanded as soon as possible. The work started, and they have very strict requirements on time, requiring us to complete the work before March 1898. We now have only 30 months.” said the baron.
”There will be no problems with the contract, right?” Ruprecht asked after looking at the copy of the check.
”There is absolutely no problem. They did not refute our terms and almost accepted them as they were ordered. As you know this contract, there are almost no loopholes in the current legal framework.” said the baron. ”You seem to be very worried about this contract?”
”I am a little worried about Brazil's original intention to buy this class of warship.” Ruprecht said.
”This is probably to deal with Chile and Argentina. And as businessmen, as long as we can make money, there is no need to consider other things. Anyway, whether it is Brazil, Chile, or Argentina, it is very far away from us.” The Baron saw this. It's very open.