As the saying goes, even a skinny camel is bigger than a horse. The combat effectiveness of the French army and navy is still excellent and certainly more powerful compared to Spain.

Although Spain’s shipyards have designed the Rejuvenation-class Ironclad, which is a quite advanced and powerful class of ironclads with the full effort of the nation, the Royal Guanizuo Shipyard still has no clue about designing the latest ironclad in the years that followed.

The ironclads designed either do not have much advancement in firepower, armor, and speed or have significant flaws in some aspects. Overall, there hasn’t been a more refined new design yet.

The development of the navy is changing rapidly, and Spain’s navy definitely cannot stand still.

The Rejuvenation-class Ironclad was indeed a very powerful design a few years ago, with even the hope of ranking among the top five ironclad designs in Europe.

But after a few years, the Ironclad Sharp series of the British Empire has long been updated, and the French have also designed the latest ironclads. The Rejuvenation-class Ironclad has already dropped from a top-five design in Europe to the top ten.

Although the top ten designs in Europe are still advanced, the ranking will continue to drop lower in the future.

For Spain, it is very necessary to continue designing a more powerful ironclad. This not only showcases Spain’s strong foundation and capability in naval design but also enhances the national pride of the Spaniards.

Only when a person is proud of their homeland can they develop a strong patriotic sentiment. Currently, the Spaniards are still quite fond of their country, and Carlo will absolutely not damage the relationship between the Spaniards and the nation.

Since ties with France have already been strengthened, it is undoubtedly the time to embrace this alliance with France.

France still possesses relatively excellent capability in naval design. Although Germany’s overall strength has surpassed that of France, in naval aspects, France remains the second naval power in Europe and even the world.

It is no exaggeration to say that only the French navy can currently pose a threat to the United Kingdom in naval matters.

However, the French navy is merely able to pose a threat and is far from being able to defeat the British navy.

For Spain at the moment, France is indeed the only reliable partner, capable of jointly developing a more powerful ironclad.

The British have naturally more excellent naval design capabilities, but they definitely cannot be as reliable. Furthermore, the relationship between Spain and the United Kingdom is not very good, and cooperation between Spain and the United Kingdom is almost impossible.

After making the decision, the Spanish Government immediately began contacting the French ambassador in Spain to explore the possibility of cooperation in developing ironclads between the two countries.

Although Spain’s overall strength is not strong, its naval strength still ranks in the top five in Europe. Although the reason for this is largely due to the foundation of Spain’s past eras, the top five in Europe is still the top five in Europe, and this cannot be disputed.

Collaborating with Spain is not too much of a loss for France, and it could even ensure the security of France’s southern border by drawing closer relations with Spain.

As expected, when the French ambassador reported the Spanish Government’s request to Paris, the French Government immediately agreed to the Spanish Government’s request.

The two sides communicated through diplomatic ambassadors and agreed to collaborate on developing the most advanced ironclad design.

Because it is a joint collaboration, once the ironclad design is freshly completed, both France and Spain will receive the complete ironclad design information.

Subsequent improvements to the ironclad will be fully shared between the two parties, with one exception: when either France or Spain completes the improvement of the warship on their own.

Aside from this, it is also agreed that the initial version of the warship will not be sold externally after being designed.

If the shipyards of the two countries wish to sell the jointly designed warship, they should conduct a second modification to ensure that relevant data on the initial version of the warship is not disclosed.

With the willingness of both parties to cooperate, the governments of the two countries quickly reached an agreement and immediately began collaboration on warship development.

The French hope to draw closer relations with the Spanish Government through this cooperation, while Spain hopes to leverage the French’s warship design capabilities to design more powerful ironclads for Spain.

Driven by mutual interests, the Spanish shipyard also dispatched a large number of experts to the French shipyard, where they will study the latest warship designs for a long period and jointly discuss the reasonable and unreasonable aspects of warship design.

Before these experts set off for France, Carlo specially received them and encouraged them.

Many of these experts participated in the design of the Rejuvenation-class Ironclad, and their warship design capabilities are certainly excellent, ranking top-notch in Spain.

This trip to France to collaborate with French warship design experts will also allow them to access mainstream French design ideas and enrich their resource pool.

Warship design is not based on pure imagination but should be comprehensively considered based on the specific needs of the two countries and the advantages and disadvantages of the commissioned battleships, to design an ironclad that combines the strengths of all warships and meets the needs of both countries.

This also means that these experts will have the opportunity to see the design blueprints of currently commissioned French ironclads, which will be an extremely valuable asset.