The night before the departure of the Taiping Fleet, the smoke from the ignition of the boilers of the Russian ships was observed by a Japanese* ship outside the mouth of Arthur, so the captain immediately reported to the flagship of the Combined Fleet, the Mikasa. And after discussing with Heihachiro Togo and Shinyuki Akiyama, it was judged that the Pacific Fleet was likely to break through.

Of course, this is good news for the Combined Fleet, because the Pacific Fleet is hiding in the harbor, and the Combined Fleet really has no way to deal with them, and can only rely on the land to capture Arthur from the land in order to annihilate the Pacific Fleet. In the First Sino-Japanese War 10 years ago, the Beiyang Fleet, which lost the Battle of Dadonggou, was also hiding in the Liugongdao Military Port in Weihaiwei, and the Combined Fleet was also at a loss, and finally the army conquered Weihaiwei and bombarded the Beiyang warships in the harbor with Weihaiwei's batteries, which annihilated the Beiyang Fleet.

However, before the annihilation of the Beiyang Fleet, the Combined Fleet won the Battle of Dadonggou after all, and so far in this battle, the Combined Fleet has not achieved a decent victory, so if it can rely on the strength of the army to annihilate the Pacific Fleet this time, then the navy will not be able to raise its head in front of the army in the future.

Now that the Pacific Fleet wants to break through the encirclement, it will sail out of Port Arthur, so it is just the right opportunity to take this opportunity to engage in a decisive battle with the Pacific Fleet, and strive to completely annihilate or inflict heavy damage on the Pacific Fleet.

Akiyama Shinyuki also calculated the comparison of the strength of the two sides, and now the Pacific Fleet has a total of 6 battleships, 1 armored cruiser, 3 protective cruisers, and a total of 16 destroyers and boats; while the Combined Fleet can only dispatch 4 battleships, 2 armored cruisers, 8 protective cruisers, and 40 destroyers and * boats due to the withdrawal of the 2nd Squadron to protect the sea line. In terms of the number of boats, the combined fleet has a clear advantage. Therefore, Akiyama Shinyuki believes that if the two sides engage in a decisive battle at sea, the victory rate of the combined fleet will be more than 70%, and it is expected to achieve another naval victory in the Great Eastern Trench. And from the point of view of location, it is similar to the battlefield of that year, which is in the sea area between the Liaodong Peninsula and the Korean Peninsula.

So Heihachiro Togo immediately ordered the fleet to attack, rushed to the Yellow Sea outside the Liaodong Peninsula, blocked the outer main channel, and prepared to meet the enemy. And before leaving, a telegram was also sent to the East China government, indicating that the Combined Fleet had attacked again.

Since the East China Government has made considerable concessions to Japan on the issue of the formation of a joint command between the two sides, Japan does not want to have a stalemate with the East China Government in other areas, and since it is in the area of reporting on major operations and notifying the East China Government in advance, it will have no impact on Japan's operations, because after all, Japan still hopes that the East China Government will continue to provide itself with supplies. The three blockade operations and the attack of the Russian Vladivostok detachment have caused Japan to lose nearly 90,000 tons of transport ships, accounting for about 10 percent of Japan's total transport ships, and this has also brought considerable pressure to Japan's maritime transportation.

The East China government can not only provide Japan with a large number of materials, but also deliver them to the door, which can greatly ease the pressure on Japan's transportation. Therefore, the Japanese government did not want to lose this collaborator at present, so the Military Command Department simply asked the Combined Fleet to take the initiative to report to the East China Government before each sortie, so as not to pass through the Tokyo side and delay the time.

In fact, without the report of the Combined Fleet, the East China Government had long known about the movements of the Russian army, because several commercial houses set up by the East China Government in Lushun had been actively active, collecting intelligence and monitoring the movements of the Russian army.

Because at this time, the East China government was still sending supplies to the trading houses in Lushun, and the Japanese warships did not intercept the transport ships of the East China government when they saw them, so during the war, several trading houses opened by the East China government in Lushun still had sufficient supplies of goods, and when both the sea and land lines of Lushun were cut off by the Japanese army, the commercial houses of the East China government were almost the only commercial houses with relatively sufficient commodities.

Moreover, the firm now has taken credit to the Russian army, as well as the companies and shops opened by important Russian personnel, which has won a lot of goodwill, and the Russian side also knows that this is the only window to the outside world in Lushun, so it has carried out key protection for the firm of the East China government, and sent a company of troops to guard the perimeter of the firm to prevent anyone from looting.

At present, the business personnel of the East China Government are very comfortable in Lushun, and they have made friends with many important members of the Russian army, and they can easily obtain a large amount of useful intelligence information, so the major operations of the Russian army are basically under the control of the East China Government, and there are two radio stations in the commercial bank, and there is no need to go to the telegraph office to send telegrams to disturb the direct contact with Qingdao, and the East China Government's grasp of information and intelligence is much faster than that of Japan.

The intelligence personnel of the East China Government had known for a long time that the Pacific Fleet had made the decision to break out, and the families of some Pacific Fleet officers had also decided to break through with the fleet.

And the family members of the officers want to go together, naturally they will not be empty-handed, and they pack a lot of large bags and small bags, and they also make the dock and port very lively, so that passers-by know about it, of course, they can't hide it, but the Pacific Fleet has no intention of hiding it, they have to leave anyway, and they don't care about anything.

After receiving the news from Qingdao, Wang Hailong, commander of the First Battleship Detachment, together with several other fleet commanders, suggested to the Admiralty that the People's Army Navy could no longer sit idly by and ignore the breakthrough battle of the Pacific Fleet, but should actively take action.

It turned out that Wang Hailong had carefully studied the process of the Russo-Japanese War in the old time and space, in the old time and space, although the Pacific Fleet's breakthrough battle failed, but it did not lose a single warship, except for some warships retreated to Port Arthur, there were more than 10 warships scattered and fled on the battlefield, only one warship was captured by Japan, and the rest of the warships fled to the ports of neutral countries, were disarmed, and did not return to Russia until the end of the Russo-Japanese War. Most of these warships stayed in Chinese ports, such as Weihai, Qingdao, Shanghai and other places. The furthest even ran to Vietnam.

Wang Hailong believes that although now is not the time for the East China Government to enter the war, it should also do something; it can dispatch a fleet to intercept the Russian ships that have escaped in the waters outside Qingdao; first, it can temper the fleet's coordination ability, test the results of the training conducted some time ago, and increase the actual combat experience of the officers and men of the fleet; and second, if it can intercept and capture a few Russian ships, it can also supplement the strength of the navy.

Because Port Arthur is located in an almost closed sea area, the encirclement formed by Chinese mainland and the Korean Peninsula determines that ships coming out of Port Arthur can only cross the Yellow Sea south before going north through the Korean Strait or the Tsushima Strait, or continue to go south along the southeast coast of China, so this also creates very convenient conditions for intercepting Russian warships.

The naval officers' proposals were sent to the Military Commission and were quickly approved by the Military Commission, but now the East China Government has not officially entered the war, so this trip cannot be decided by the military, but must be formally approved by the Executive Yuan.

The Executive Yuan also discussed the proposal overnight, and finally decided that this plan was feasible, and although the East China government did not officially enter the war, it had "take any action" in the statement issued at the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War Moreover, the purpose of this sortie is to intercept Russian ships, and considering the international environment that Russia is now facing, it is estimated that no country will have any strong reaction; of course, Japan may be a little uncomfortable; after all, the East China Government is suspected of stealing merit by doing so, but the East China Government has already made major concessions before, and Japan can only accept this result.

In addition, the Russo-Japanese War lasted for half a year, and the stern statements issued by the East China government against both Japan and Russia were in stark contrast to the Qing court's strict neutrality, and it also triggered a wave of public opinion for a period of time, but now the strong indignation of public opinion has gradually subsided, and the situation is diversified. In addition to some people who continued to criticize the Qing court, there were also some people who calmly and admittedly held that Japan and Russia were both big powers, and that the Qing court was powerless to confront the two countries at all, and that the East China government was still based on a short foothold and had insufficient foundation, so it was not appropriate to provoke Japan and Russia at this time, and that it was a completely correct decision to remain neutral; there was also a voice that supported Japan, believing that Japan was fighting on behalf of Asia and Russia, and that the Qing court, which was also an Asian country, should share weal and woe and hatred for the enemy, so the Qing court should support Japan in fighting against Russia and give it the necessary help。

In the midst of the diversification of public opinion, there are also voices attacking the East China Government: First, they accuse the East China Government of speaking beautifully, but after more than half a year, there has not been any actual action to protect Northeast China; and second, some people have reported that the East China Government is providing supplies to Japan, accusing the East China Government of actually colluding with Japan.

Of course, the East China Government will not allow public opinion to criticize it, and it has responded and clarified in a very timely manner, saying that the Qing court is now the legitimate government of China, but it has done nothing in the Russo-Japanese war, and has also demarcated a war zone, and this has brought great difficulties to the East China Government's actions, but the East China Government will still not allow Japan and Russia to act recklessly on China's territory, and is actively preparing for it, and will take action at the right time; as for the East China Government's supply of supplies to Japan, it resolutely denies it, claiming that this is a slander against the East China Government, and that everything the East China Government has done since its return to China is for the same purposeWe will never do anything to betray China's interests.

Of course, judging from the overall guidance of public opinion, it is still quite beneficial to the East China government, after all, the East China government has done everything in the past few years, and the people have not forgotten it. Just can't be too careless. And if the East China government can intercept, whether it is capturing or sinking a few Russian ships, then in terms of public opinion, there will also be some topics that can be handled.

The Military Commission also officially named this operation "Operation Fisherman". Of course, the fishermen are fishing, and an important goal of this operation is to catch the fish that have slipped through the net of the Russian fleet.