ALL NOVEL Chapter 197 Military Planning
Chapter 197 Military Planning
Dakshin Bhartiya Empire, Vijayanagar state, capital city Hampi, the royal palace.
Vijay is sitting in the royal palace, facing Marshal Kiran Pujari and Admiral Gangadhar. A maid comes in, offering them beverages and snacks, including some biscuits. The maid leaves the room, gently closing the door.
"So, gentlemen, what do you think?" Vijay asked as he forwarded the intelligence from the Ottoman Empire, provided by Leonardo, to both the marshal and admiral. First, it was Kiran Pujari who opened his mouth, "Your Majesty, can this intelligence be trusted?"
Vijay nodded his head in acknowledgement. He had also thought about the issue of whether the intelligence could be trusted, as it was obtained from the Venetians. Still, he concluded that Bharat did not have any other choice but to trust the Venetians as they had no opposing interests. Moreover, the Venetians needed a lot of help from the Dakshin Bhartiya Empire. The only other place they could go for the same kind of help would be the Chinese Qing dynasty. Unfortunately, as the Qing Empire was newly established, there was a lot of internal strife among its people, so Vijay was happy to ignore that option.
Kiran Pujari started to speak, "Assuming that the intelligence was true, Your Majesty, I do not know much about naval warfare. Still, if these 10 battleships manage to dock in a port or locate their own natural port to invade the Dakshin Bharatiya Empire, we will quickly receive this news through our intelligence channels. If our Navy is incapable of fighting these 10 battleships, we can go inland and wait it out until they take the initiative to attack. As we are already self-sufficient and could afford to wait, it will be easy to defeat them then."
Vijay nodded, agreeing with the conservative assessment put forward by Kiran. However, Admiral Gangadhar frowned, as he did not like the plan even a little bit. Marshall Kiran Pujari's plan portrayed the Navy of Dakshin Bharat as incapable. Although they did not have the power to defeat 10 battleships in frontal combat, the navy was not so helpless that they would have to give up the coastal region and seek protection from the army. What a disgrace.
Vijay put forward his own opinions, "What Marshall Kiran Pujari said is indeed the truth. We face no existential threat to the empire if the danger comes from the Navy. We have a vast expanse of flat and fertile lands to feed our people, but the option of abandoning the coastal region should be the final-case scenario. If we do go inland, we will be blocked off from the outside world. The trade with Europe that we have worked so hard to establish will be destroyed. The Mughal Empire could become their trading partner. Although the Mughals did not know how to conduct business, simple transactions could still be done. This could also bring our blooming economy to a standstill and increase the strength of the Mughals in turn. Also, most financial capitals of various states are large port cities. If these cities fall, the economies of these states will take a massive hit. I do not want that to happen. In fact, I do not even want the war to come to our coast.
"So, Admiral Gangadhar," Vijay said as he turned toward the admiral and ordered, "Marshall Kiran Pujari will be used as the last line of defence in the empire. All major ports will be fortified by the 30 kg calibre naval guns mounted on the walls. I need you to come up with a probable attack plan as we know that these 10 ships would be transported out of the Red Sea and would soon move to the Arabian Sea with the destination of Gujarat port. I do not want these 10 ships to be successful in reaching their destination. We have two such battleships captured by the Dutch, and I have recently expanded the strength of the navy to 220 Hampi class sloops and 40 Vinayaka class frigates. From this arsenal, I need you to come up with a battle plan."
Admiral Gangadhar was overjoyed; he was thrilled that his Majesty Vijay had not given up hope on the Navy as soon as he heard about the 10 battleship fleet. Not only had His Majesty not given up, but he had also increased the number of ships in the fleet. Now, he had to come up with a solution for this problem. He clenched his fists in determination as he quickly got up and saluted in acknowledgement of Vijay's orders, willing to come up with suitable plans without fail. Kiran Pujari also did the same as he left the palace to get the fortifications underway.
Dakshin Bhartiya Empire, Vijayanagar State, Mangaluru, Raya Shipyard.
Devendra, the manager of the shipyard, had been busy since his posting, and the work was fulfilling. The greatest joy in his life was to see all the docks in the shipyard filled with ships being built. The shipyard had become the cradle of the empire's military warships. Until now, two types of warships had been constructed in the Devaraya Shipyard—from the very first Hampi-class sloop to the Dana-class armed merchant ship and now the recent Vinayaka-class frigate. He was happy because he received eight orders for the Vinayaka-class frigate, and two ships were being constructed simultaneously. However, suddenly a letter came from His Majesty to transfer the orders of civilian vessels to some other shipyards.
He was shocked by this order. The bulk of orders received by the shipyard were from civilian backgrounds, with most of them being for the Dana-class armed merchant ships. Even the Shetty family had ordered 5 more Dana-class armed merchant ships last month.
However, he could not defy His Majesty's direct order and reassigned the old orders that had yet to start construction to other shipyards while halting new orders. The next contents of another letter from the government he received made him understand why His Majesty ordered the transfer of civilian ships. He got an order for 35 Hampi-class sloops and an order for 8 more Vinayaka-class frigates, both with a tight deadline of 50 days. The deadline seemed a little tight, so Devendra frowned, but it was nothing he could not handle. Now that the civilian ships under construction will be completed and delivered to the customers within this week, all 10 dry docks will be available for use. He planned to use these docks to build 10 ships at a time. It should be doable.
Orders from Vijay had caused a storm in the marine industry. It was chaotic at the beginning as suddenly all four shipyards rejected any civilian orders. The supporting industries thought that the shipping industry was dying down. However, suddenly the next day, a storm of new orders poured in. What's more, these orders were for much more expensive military-grade products. The industry knew that something big was about to happen, as they learned through some channels that Manager Devendra got 35 orders for sloops, Manager Sudhakar from Chola Shipyard got 25 orders, Nitin from Ashoka got 20, and Pankaj from Shivaji Shipyard got 20.
With the four main shipyards of the Dakshin Bharatiya Empire completely occupied by military orders, the small and medium-sized shipyards, privately owned by families, seized this opportunity and snatched up all the civilian boat orders. There were still a few shipyards that had poached skilled technicians from the main shipyards. One among them, in particular, was capable of manufacturing a 130-ton merchant ship they designed in-house, completely different from the Bosswell Design Bureau. It was called the Berunda Design Bureau, owned by the Berunda shipyard. This ship was quite popular with merchants because although it did not have the defensive capabilities of the Dhana class or the speed and durability, it was much cheaper for small-time merchants to afford, and the coastal waters were very safe because of the coast guard. So, with this gap created by the four large shipyards, the Berunda shipyard expanded heavily, taking orders from left, right, and centre. A new project was also put forward by the patriarch of the family, Gana Prabu Berunda, for the designers to create an ambitious 350-ton merchant ship codenamed the Samudra Bandhu class.
Everyone in the Empire was working at breakneck speeds as they had targets to achieve, whether it was a worker assigned a certain amount of work or a contractor tasked with completing a specific length of roads. The Dakshin Bharatiya Empire was bustling with activity. While all this was happening, the three ministers of finance, trade and commerce, along with the judiciary, had been working on forming the framework for business reforms. All the necessary information had been provided by His Majesty the Emperor; it was just that the task was extensive and involved a multitude of small details. The three men had been working on this for a few days. Mohan and Rajesh knew that His Majesty considered this an urgent matter, so they fully utilized the resources of their respective ministries to tackle the task.
Kishore Balabhadra was also preparing for the upcoming elections. As the elections were approaching, he had to get ready again. His list of candidates with nobility titles was also nearing completion; he was just waiting for the list from the Nobility Bureau in the military to submit a consolidated report to His Majesty.
Currently, his focus was on election preparations, whether it was reviewing each candidate along with their assigned symbols or ensuring there were enough materials to ensure the smooth conduct of the elections. Due to him, there was a small storm in the artisan circles of Hampi, as thousands of ballot boxes were suddenly ordered, albeit with a demand for a faster delivery time. All in all, everyone was busy with their own affairs, including Vijay, who was also occupied with exercises alongside Kavya.