Chapter 14: Return to the German Navy

Versailles Treaty prohibited the German Navy from possessing submarines, but the German military was well aware of the value of this weapon. During World War I, the German Navy achieved remarkable success relying on these primitive and crude underwater killers.

After World War I, the entire German Navy was almost completely divided among the Allied powers, but Germany remained unshakable as the world's center for submarine development. The United States, Britain, France, Italy, and Japan all studied German submarines obtained as war reparations, while other countries like the Soviet Union and Argentina imported relevant technology by purchasing German submarine blueprints and hiring German submarine experts.

During this period, German shipyards in Hamburg, Kiel, and Bremen secretly sold blueprints to Japan, while Argentina invited Krupp experts to assist in building a submarine fleet starting from 1921. Italy, Sweden, Spain, Turkey, and other countries also expressed interest in purchasing submarines or submarine blueprints from Germany.

On one hand, the German military actively met the demands of these countries to obtain funds, and on the other hand, to consolidate its leading position in submarine engineering. To make these submarine transactions appear more legitimate—since according to Article 191 of the Versailles Treaty: "Germany is prohibited from participating in the manufacture of submarines and obtaining submarines from abroad, even for commercial purposes"—the German military established the "Shipbuilding Engineering Office" in The Hague, the Netherlands in July 1922, circumventing the treaty, to professionally design and manufacture submarines for these countries.

This so-called Engineering Office for submarines had submarine slips in shipyards such as Vulkan in Hamburg, Krupp, Germania, and Weser in Bremen. Initially, it attempted to operate commercially, but from 1925 onwards, a staff group led by Walter Roman, a senior staff officer of the Naval Command, was established to develop submarines and related technologies without violating the treaty, forming a "Technical Consulting and Supply Limited Company" specifically for the navy, providing extensive assistance to this enterprise. The fundamental purpose was to conduct research and reserve technology for the development of a new generation of submarines for the German Navy.

Furthermore, Germans secretly established a submarine school in Kiel, utilizing opportunities to train their own students through trials and debugging of submarines built for countries like Turkey and Finland. Their intention was obvious—Germany was on the brink of rebuilding its submarine fleet.

However, this operation, which bypassed the Treaty Supervision Committee and even the activities of the parliament, did not last long. In early 1928, rumors spread to those in Germany who opposed military expansion, prompting the parliament to establish a special investigation committee. Soon, the truth was revealed, and those involved had to resign, marking the second "major cleansing" within the German Navy in eight years. Colonel Walter Roman, Admiral Adolf Zengler, and a large number of related personnel were replaced. Erich Rader, who was highly respected within the navy, took over immediately.

The incident was quickly quelled, and under Rader's efforts, officials eliminated dissatisfaction with the "Roman Plan" and recognized the importance of the plan. More importantly, the government specifically passed a secret appropriation bill to fund the plan through some relatively discreet channels. In Rader's own words, this achieved "some degree of legitimacy."

As the new Chief Intelligence Officer for the Americas region of the German Navy, Conrad Patzsch returned to Brazil and brought two pieces of good news to Zhang Hainuo: firstly, Rader was promoted to Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, taking charge of all naval affairs in Germany; secondly, regarding submarines, after learning that Schneider Shipyard was building large submarines for Chile, Rader secretly dispatched a group of experts and technicians from the "Shipbuilding Engineering Office" to support them.

In fact, there were more than just these two pieces of good news. As a loyal subordinate of Rader, Patzsch taking over the German Navy's intelligence network in the Americas was exactly what Zhang Hainuo had been expecting. During the war, Germany's intelligence network in the Americas had at most over 120 intelligence officers and personnel, operating in various disguises such as diplomats or businessmen in countries throughout the Americas, especially in the United States. However, with Germany's defeat and the sharp reduction in naval forces, this espionage network now had less than 30 personnel. Patzsch's task was to integrate them and rebuild the intelligence system in the Americas. The infiltration personnel prepared by Zhang Hainuo would be responsible for rebuilding the German Navy's intelligence network in Brazil under Patzsch's leadership, which was a common agreement between Rader and Patzsch.

After consulting with Patzsch, Zhang Hainuo accepted this restructuring plan. As long as Rader remained in his position as Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, he would be able to continuously obtain valuable commercial and military intelligence through this intelligence network, which was his original intention.

Shortly thereafter, the expert group sent by Rader arrived in Brazil. Initially, Zhang Hainuo intended to restrict their contact with his core technical personnel due to concerns about reliability and mobility. However, he quickly found that this method was impractical because many of these German submarine experts had previously worked together. For example, Dr. Kliest, the chief submarine engineer at Schneider Shipyard, had worked with Brandon, the technical director of the aid expert group. Foster found his "senior brother" in the expert group. This situation was prevalent. Therefore, Zhang Hainuo had to come up with another solution, which was to keep these supporting experts and technicians in the shipyard for as long as possible. With Rader's support, he effortlessly arranged for their families to be brought from Germany and handled immigration matters.

After 10 months of construction, the first submarine built by Schneider Shipyard for the Chilean Navy was finally completed. Its internal designation in the shipyard was ZN-01. The submarine had a surface displacement of 1645 tons and a submerged displacement of 2010 tons, with a length of 90.5 meters, a width of 9.3 meters, and a height of 4.86 meters. It was equipped with twin propeller shafts. During trials, it reached a maximum surface speed of 16.6 knots and a maximum submerged speed of 8.3 knots. The maximum designed diving depth was 50 meters, which was successfully reached during trials. The submarine had a theoretical range of 8500 nautical miles at a cruising speed of 8 knots. It was armed with six 500mm torpedo tubes and carried 16 reserve torpedoes, all of the German G7 type. In accordance with the requirements of the Chilean military, the submarine was equipped with one 120mm deck gun on the fore and aft decks each.

Finally, the submarine was fully staffed with 54 crew members.

After the completion of ZN-01, a special evaluation team from the Chilean Navy participated in sea trials of the submarine. The results showed that apart from some adjustments needed for the machinery, the submarine's performance exceeded expectations in all aspects. Due to the success of this class of submarines using German technology, Zhang Hainuo successfully persuaded the Chilean military to hire "former German Navy submarine personnel" to train submariners. While the Chilean Navy dispatched personnel to receive the submarine, they also officially placed orders for two more submarines of the same class from Schneider Shipyard.

These two submarines were already 70% complete and were expected to be commissioned by the end of the year.

Within just two years, Schneider Shipyard had made a leap from constructing 500-ton to 2000-ton submarines, and the strength of the shipyard in submarine construction delighted everyone. Zhang Hainuo was well aware that the success of these submarines was largely attributed to their predecessor, U-148, which provided Kluest and other technical experts with a wealth of firsthand information. Coincidentally, the submarines ordered by the Chilean Navy were of a similar class. Therefore, apart from being slightly smaller in size compared to U-148, ZN-01 had many design similarities. Thus, the achievements of Schneider Shipyard in submarine construction were far from reaching their peak. The focus of future development would still be on building submarines of various classes, developing weapons and equipment, and radio and sonar devices.

After receiving the formal order from the Chilean Navy, Zhang Hainuo immediately allocated manpower to accelerate the construction of the follow-up two submarines, ZN-02 and ZN-03. Furthermore, due to the expected performance level of this class of submarines, he quickly ordered the construction of the fourth and fifth submarines.

As Zhang Hainuo anticipated, upon learning that Schneider Shipyard had successfully passed the acceptance inspection of the new submarines by the Chilean Navy, senior officials from the Brazilian Navy visited Salvador for inspection. This time, it was led by General Schmidt, the Brazilian Navy Minister, personally leading the delegation, and Koby did not show up. Zhang Hainuo guessed that this pro-British Deputy Navy Minister must be extremely frustrated now.

Due to previous cooperation and negotiations, Schneider Shipyard accepted the Brazilian Navy's urgent order for a ZN submarine, with the full price of 1.2 million US dollars being paid in installments. One-third of the total amount was paid in advance, with the remaining two-thirds to be paid within two years of completion, allowing for up to sixty percent of the cost to be paid in the form of materials. Besides coffee beans and rubber resources, Brazil also had abundant reserves of bauxite, manganese, chromium, and nickel ores. Although foreign companies controlled most of the country's mineral resources, the government still owned a portion of them. Furthermore, due to the 1921 economic crisis, the Brazilian government established a system domestically aimed at safeguarding coffee bean prices. When coffee bean market prices were low, the government raised market prices by purchasing coffee beans at high prices. Over the years, the government had stored a large amount of coffee beans!

Seizing the opportunity to attend the official commissioning ceremony of the Chilean Navy's new submarine in Santiago, Zhang Hainuo, representing Schneider Shipyard and the Chilean government, signed a specific payment agreement regarding the payment of submarine construction costs. The unit price of the submarine was 1.2 million US dollars, and after deducting the 200,000 US dollars already paid during the construction process, the Chilean government still owed 3.4 million US dollars. According to the pre-agreed terms, 1 million US dollars would be paid in cash, and the remaining 2.4 million US dollars would be offset in kind, both of which needed to be fully paid within six years.

As early as 1869, Chile became the world's largest copper producer. In 1915, the famous giant open-pit copper mine Chuquicamata entered the mining phase, further increasing Chile's copper ore production. However, like Brazil, most of the country's mineral resources were controlled by foreign capitalists, with state-owned enterprises accounting for a relatively small proportion. Therefore, in the payment agreement signed between the Chilean government and Schneider Shipyard, the government could only provide copper ore, iron ore, and coal, which accounted for less than five percent of the total national exports annually. The shortfall was filled by nitrate— with the development of synthetic nitrate technology, the competitiveness of natural nitrate in the market had significantly declined.

Even though it was only five percent of the total national exports, it still amounted to over 400,000 tons per year! With the signing of this agreement, the task of transporting ore fell on the long-distance fleet under Schneider Shipyard. By the mid-1928s, Zhang Hainuo's Plan A had five 10,000-tonnage freighters, four medium-sized freighters ranging from 5,000 to 8,000 tons, and sixteen small freighters, with a total registered tonnage of nearly 100,000 tons. In addition, two new 15,000-ton ocean freighters were under construction on Schneider Shipyard's slipway.

In Zhang Hainuo's plan, the iron ore and coal provided by the Chilean government would be directly transported from Chile to Rio de Janeiro for use by the Royal Ironworks to offset part of the payment for steel ordered by Schneider Shipyard. The nitrate and copper ore would be shipped back to Germany. The nitrate could be sold at a discount, while the copper ore could be refined by German metallurgical enterprises and sold as refined copper or converted into material reserves. On the return journey, the ships would transport chemical and mechanical products that were relatively lacking in South American countries from Germany.

In Santiago, Zhang Hainuo and Parzych became the guests of honor for the Chilean Navy officials and frequently attended various gatherings hosted by the elite. They were even invited to witness the Chilean Navy's most powerful warship to date — the "Admiral Latorre." Learning that the Chilean Navy planned to send this formidable battleship to British shipyards for major repairs and modernization in 1929, Zhang Hainuo felt that Schneider Shipyard also needed to build a larger dry dock capable of accommodating large battleships for repairs because the maintenance of the six battleships collectively owned by the top three South American powers would be a significant business.

If granted permission to repair large warships for these countries, experts from the shipyard could also obtain valuable first-hand information on British and American battleships through their inspections. Since the end of the Great War, German battleship technology had stagnated. Although the Schanhorst class and Bismarck class built during World War II had made significant improvements in armor, welding, and electronic equipment, their overall design concept largely followed the designs of the last few classes of battleships and battle cruisers of the German Empire, failing to keep up with the times!

After returning to Schneider Shipyard, Zhang Hainuo immediately convened relevant personnel to discuss the construction of a giant dry dock. This time, they would not be fighting alone. With the secret support of the German Navy, even if they could not immediately obtain large-scale financial assistance, they could still receive support in terms of personnel, technology, and policies.

After internal discussions at the shipyard, Zhang Hainuo instructed the experts to draft a detailed plan for the construction of the dry dock and personally formulated a plan aimed at "building large warships for the German Navy when the time is right." Then, armed with these two important documents, he boarded the "New America," a fast liner operated by the North German Lloyd, and returned to Germany.

Although they had the opportunity to meet almost every year, this time, standing in front of Redel, Zhang Hainuo suddenly felt that his longtime friend had matured a lot. Wearing the uniform of a naval admiral, he matched the historical photos Zhang Hainuo had seen many years ago in both appearance and demeanor. Seeing everything in the naval staff office organized so meticulously, he deeply realized that Redel's era in the navy had officially begun!

"Different from building submarines, if we were to secretly build large warships for the German Navy in Brazil, I think there would be some troubles: First, the identity of the buyer. Germany obviously cannot openly purchase large warships due to the restrictions of the Treaty of Versailles, so it would inevitably involve foreign governments. I don't think any country currently has both the means to afford large warships and a sincere willingness to cooperate with Germany. Second, the navy has no surplus funds. The construction of the Deutschland-class battleships has already consumed most of the navy's budget. Moreover, using the government's fiscal budget to order large warships from a Brazilian shipyard would definitely provoke strong protests from domestic shipbuilding professionals. Finally, the honor of the German Navy destined that officers and sailors would be unwilling to accept a purchased capital ship, which would most likely affect the overall wartime readiness of the entire ship!"

After reviewing the plans brought back by Zhang Hainuo regarding the construction of a large military dock at Schneider Shipyard, Redel agreed with his suggestion to use the opportunity of repairing large warships for South American countries to acquire British and American shipbuilding technology. However, he still told him explicitly, "Even if the time is right, it would be difficult for the German Navy to order large warships from Schneider Shipyard!"

Initially surprised by Redel's response, after carefully considering the points raised by him, Zhang Hainuo had to admit that perhaps it was due to the success of building new submarines that made himself overly confident. The plans for the giant dry dock and future construction of large warships for the German Navy were not only rushed but also failed to consider all factors. Therefore, despite looking good on paper, the plans lacked feasibility as Redel had evaluated. After pondering for a while, he said:

"I understand. The contribution Schneider Shipyard can make to the German Navy is to use its Brazilian identity to conduct research and relevant experiments for the German Navy, while large-scale production should still be left to shipyards in Germany!"

"Yes! The rebuilding of the navy must be based on the recovery of the domestic shipbuilding industry. This is why the navy must spare no effort to support domestic shipyards! Oh, by the way, Hainuo, I carefully read the summary of the carrier-based aircraft experiments brought back by Topaczi last time. It was a significant attempt. Unfortunately, the German Navy cannot conduct such experiments domestically at present. Therefore, I plan to transfer some secret experiments of the naval aviation to Brazil! I have some confidential information here. I believe you will be inspired after reading it!"

Redel had his assistant fetch a document from the confidential archives and asked Zhang Hainuo to sit on the sofa opposite his desk to read it, while he continued to review documents behind the desk. It seemed that he thought Zhang Hainuo needed a lot of time to read the report in its entirety. In fact, Zhang Hainuo was already familiar with the contents of the document; it was the famous "Bombing Test at Pisco Bay" — on July 21, 1921, in Pisco Bay on the west coast of the United States, eight "Martin MB-2" biplane bombers from the U.S. Army Air Service bombed and sank the German battleship "Ostfriesland" and two other light German destroyers using 123-kilogram aerial bombs. Its significance lay in persuading officials within the U.S. military who opposed naval aviation and aircraft carriers, paving the way for the development of U.S. naval aviation and aircraft carriers.

Closing the document, Zhang Hainuo heaved a sigh of relief. Considering Germany's strategic and resource situation, the balance between surface combatants, aircraft carriers, and submarines had always been a question he had been considering. However, one thing that could be determined was that unless there was a significant change in the situation, Germany's investment in the navy would be difficult to exceed historical levels — Germany's geopolitical situation determined that it still primarily focused on land. Without a strong army and air force, Germany could not achieve the lightning victories of history. Without dealing with enemies on land, Germany's maritime power would be meaningless!

"Erich, I want to return to the German Navy!"

Although facing an admiral of the German Navy, Zhang Hainuo still addressed him directly by his name, indicating their unique relationship.

"What?" Redel raised his head, seemingly not reacting immediately.

"General, Herr Zhang Hainuo von Finkenstein requests to rejoin the German Navy and dedicate himself to it again!" Zhang Hainuo said confidently, lifting his head and chest high with pride, then he blinked at Redel, "General, I believe you need a navy captain who dares to challenge the sky and the deep sea!"

After a moment, Redel stood up and said in the same tone, "Mr. Zhang Hainuo von Finkenstein, are you sure you want to rejoin the German Navy, dedicate yourself to it, remain forever loyal to it, and even be willing to sacrifice your life for it?"

"For honor!" Even though it had been ten years since he left the navy, Zhang Hainuo was somewhat unfamiliar with naval etiquette. Nonetheless, he was eager to raise his right hand to the level of his brow.

"And what about your men, Captain von Finkenstein?" Redel asked, "Will they also rejoin the German Navy?"

Without hesitation, Zhang Hainuo replied, "They will always be the most loyal warriors of the navy, ready to answer the call of the German Navy at any time!"