While the newspapers in London were still attacking each other over the "Lancet" incident, a secret experiment was underway on a small island near Scotland.

A small boat drove slowly by the side of the island, and a large orange iron ball with short steel tentacles on the surface with an anchor chain was thrown into the sea. The iron ball floated on the surface of the sea first, and fell along with the slight waves. Then, under the traction of the anchor chain, it sank suddenly, leaving only a small buoy floating on the surface.

Then the boat that had just dropped the iron ball accelerated away and sent a signal to the two waiting boats nearby.

"Let's go over. Be careful." On the other boat, Captain Kevin shouted to the sailors. So the paddle wheels on both sides of the boat turned, and the steamboat began to sail towards that side.

Behind the steamboat, a boat was towed with a cable. This ship has neither a mast nor a paddle wheel, but at the stern position, there is a steering wheel, where a person uses it to control the direction.

The steam ship cautiously passed by the buoy, the orange buoy swaying in the waves caused by the steam ship.

Captain Kevin knew that it was under the buoy, but at a depth of two meters, it was the iron ball with tentacles. Through the sea, Captain Kevin can clearly see it. Of course, just because the light is very good at this time, the sea is also very clear, and the iron ball is also painted a bright orange red.

Kevin also knew that the tentacles on the iron ball were a trigger fuze specially researched by the Navy. Among these lead tentacles was a small glass bottle with sulfuric acid inside. Once hit, the tentacles will be deformed and the glass will be broken, and then the sulfuric acid will flow out to trigger an electrochemical reaction and detonate the electric detonator (based on the trophies imitated in Ireland), and then the electric detonator will detonate the iron ball. Explosives just one such mine can even destroy a battleship. Of course, this experimental one will not, its charge has been reduced a lot.

But even so, once the mine exploded, it would be enough to destroy his little steam frigate. Because of this, all those who can go on the deck are on the deck, and those who cannot go on the deck, their escape routes to the deck have also been cleaned up.

In the rear, on the barge towed by the steamer, Captain Anderson gently turned the steering wheel and slammed into the buoy. His ship is a target ship used to test the effects of mines, and he alone controls the direction on board. Considering that the explosion point should be at the bow, his safety should be guaranteed. And he has already passed a life jacket, and there are ships nearby ready to rescue him. As long as he can completely complete the experiment, he might be able to get the opportunity to be promoted.

The bow of the barge hit the buoy, the ship continued to move forward, and then there was a huge explosion.

On the steam boat more than 300 meters away, Kevin felt that the whole boat seemed to jump, and at the same time he saw a huge water column rising high, completely blocking the boat behind.

After another while, the water column scattered into the sky and fell down. These water droplets fell cracklingly, and even a few hundred meters away Kevin fell on a lot of water droplets. Look at the barge behind it. Half of it has been blown up, and the remaining half is sinking quickly.

"Turn, turn! Go back and save people!" Kevin shouted, but he didn't even hear his own shout.

But the boat turned around and it was already prepared.

When the steamboat turned around, the barge had sunk completely, and various pieces of wood were floating on the sea. Everyone looked around and finally found an orange-red floating object among the broken pieces of wood.

"It's over there, get closer!"

The boat was lowered from the steamer, and the two sailors rowed over and picked up Captain Anderson, who was wearing an orange-red life jacket. Because of the shock in the explosion, he had passed out in a coma at this time. If he were not wearing a life jacket, he would have drowned. However, as far as he is now, he was saved before he was able to, and seeing the abnormal bending of his leg, he knew that his leg was definitely a comminuted fracture.

"Damn it? Didn't it mean that the charge has been reduced? How could it still be so powerful?" Kevin said in surprise.

In fact, this is not surprising, because the explosives used by the British are also nitrified starch technology bought from French merchants. One of the most obvious problems of nitrated starch is the unstable quality, and the power difference between one batch of products and another batch of products may be very large. The powerful ones can reach 1.3 or even 1.4 times the power of tnt, and the ones with poor power may not even have half of tnt. This mine may have reduced its charge, but it happened to hit the best explosive, and the result was naturally...

However, no matter how you look at it, this experiment was a huge success.

After the success of this experiment, the navy guys immediately proposed to the cabinet that this weapon could be used to block the Irish coast and block the Irish people’s access to aid, thereby eliminating them.

If this experiment was successful a few months ago, Prime Minister Addington would approve the action immediately without even thinking about it, but now he is a little bit hesitant, because if he approves such an action, it is likely to lead to war.

When the United Kingdom and France signed a peace agreement, everyone was actually the same and insincere about peace. They are all ready to catch their breath and continue to fight. At that time, if there is such a thing, I am afraid that the British will bite their teeth and kill the rebels in Ireland first.

But the situation is different now. After the signing of the peace agreement, because the European market reopened its doors to the United Kingdom, the British economy began to pick up. Some industries, especially the textile and steam engine manufacturing industries, were clearly booming. They brought more benefits to Britain, and also brought a lot of political and economic benefits to the Tory Party.

At this time, if there is a war, then there is no doubt that it will all be over.

Addington knows that because of the boom in the textile industry, many owners have expanded their production. In the past few months, the number of textile machines has increased by nearly a third, and the scale of the textile industry is still expanding.

Such rapid expansion, of course, requires financial intervention. The owners of those textile factories generally borrowed a lot of money from banks or raised a lot of funds through the stock market. Once war starts, these investments will naturally lose their money. Many factories will go bankrupt, and the money lent to them by the bank will naturally not get back. Then the bank may be dragged down by this and get into trouble or even go bankrupt. In addition, many industries, including steel, machinery manufacturing and other industries, have also made a lot of money through the expansion of the textile industry, and in response to the urgent expansion of the textile industry, they are also expanding their own production capacity. Will suffer losses, coupled with the internal problems caused by a large number of unemployed people, the entire British economy may immediately have serious problems. This makes Addington have to consider whether it is appropriate to take action at this time.

So Addington went to discuss with the former Prime Minister Pete.

After the resignation of little Pete, he is still the most important leader of the Tory Party. Because of his experience and talent, his influence in the Tory Party is still significantly greater than that of Addington. Even the king, who played a key role in the resignation of Little Pete, actually trusted Little Pete more between Addington and Little Pete. Therefore, when faced with such troubles, he must go to Little Pete for technical guidance.

In this regard, Little Pete's attitude is quite firm. He believes that unless the French give up their ambitions, there can be no real peace between Britain and France. And Ireland is so important to Britain.

"Ireland is not the same as North America. Abandoning North America will do little damage to our prestige; but giving up Ireland may cause us to be despised by the whole of Europe. Ireland is so close to us, under such circumstances, if we can't even calm the rebellion If they don't recognize their independence, what will other countries think of us?

The loss of reputation is nothing more than ~lightnovelpub.net~ Once Ireland becomes independent, it will definitely become our enemy. Those guys in North America have been malicious to us up to now. The Irish people only hate us more than the North American guys. Ireland is so close to us, and hates us so much, they will easily become other countries let us say a little more clearly, that is, the French threat us a tool.

Once the French and independent Ireland form an alliance, once the French army begins to deploy in Ireland, can we still sleep? Compared with this, what is the temporary economic difficulty? And as long as we are guided, we are not completely unable to reduce some losses. Besides, we also opened up the market to the French, which to some extent also brought losses to some of our other industries..."

But Prime Minister Addington still hesitated. Because his situation is different from that of Little Pete, after peace is achieved, Addington's approval rating has gradually increased thanks to the peace dividend. And the people who support him are mainly the textile mill owners and those who have made money in the trade with Europe. If you choose to support the navy's mine-laying operations, it means that you have betrayed your supporters, a politician who will betray your supporters, who will be supported in the future? This will almost ruin your political future!

Thinking of this, Prime Minister Addington began to doubt again. This suggestion of Little Pete has another unspoken goal, which is to get him down so that he can return to the position of Prime Minister again.