Thus, Russia was absolutely a force that no government could afford to overlook at present. Under normal circumstances, it would inevitably return to the ranks of the world's great naval powers within twenty or thirty years.
Strictly speaking, the Russian navy had never truly fallen out of the ranks of the world's naval powers. Even after losing nearly half its fleet in the Russo-Japanese War, it remained one of the strongest navies in the world.
Before the First World War in the previous life, the Russian navy had recovered to nearly 700,000 tons, second only to Japan. Its scale far surpassed that of Italy and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. One had to know that Italy in the previous life had also been among the great powers, and its naval strength had been quite respectable.
Among the world's great powers at present, East Africa had effectively taken Italy's place—and it was an upgraded version of Italy. As for the current Kingdom of Italy, it belonged to the same category as Belgium: a mid-tier European industrial power.
This brought up the capabilities of the Italian government. Even after suffering severe setbacks in the previous century, it had recovered swiftly. It was not something an incompetent government like Portugal's could compare with. After all, the current Italian government was not weak to begin with; the previous generation of Italian government had come within a hair's breadth of unifying the entire peninsula.
It was worth mentioning that the Italian Navy was also developing well. Its total naval tonnage exceeded 100,000 tons. Though it was less than half that of its sworn enemy, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, it was still a compact yet formidable navy by European and global standards.
After saying all this, it was clear that the British Royal Navy faced far fiercer competition than