Looking out the window at the indignant junior officers and citizens, and listening to the slogans of the Woo Yang Yang, the procession was squirming in the direction of the staff headquarters. Looking at such a popular program on weekdays, the bigwigs in the Navy Command Department are not in a relaxed mood at the moment, because the army horse manure is also a part of the imperial army, and it is so unbearable to be bullied by the China Defense Force, in the words of an American observer, "The scene of a super heavyweight boxing champion beating a child in a kindergarten has nothing to do with the aesthetics of violence, and everyone can watch it without the mood of watching a boxing match. You just have to guess if he's knocking out his opponent at the fifteenth or tenth second. ”

"Saito-chan has arrived." Everyone in the Military Command Department was stunned, and after the Siemens incident, Minoru Saito had faded out of the sight of everyone in the Naval Command Department. But at this moment, Saito is not in a good mood with Hu Hansan.

In fact, he and Admiral Yuzaburo Kato, who is currently the Minister of the Sea, and Admiral Shimamura Speedo, the head of the Naval Command, did not get along, because he had always suspected that these two were secretly working together after the Siemens incident. In fact, in the era of the captain, Shimamura had a marriage agreement with Ling Aiharuko, the commander of Lieutenant General Renli Jingfan. However, when Shimamura was studying in the UK, he fell off his horse, causing the sequelae of tinnitus and complications. This matter was exaggerated and reported to Japan, and there was no news about the marriage. Later, Haruko married General Minoru Saito. This hatred of taking his wife has made the estrangement between the two not a day or two, and Minoru Saito's visit at this moment is really shocking.

And Shimamura Suo was also very depressed, in fact, after the budget of the 88th Fleet was passed, he had already written to resign from the post of Minister of Military Orders, recommending Gentaro Yamashita to take over and become a military staff officer himself, but unfortunately he did not complete the procedures for the last imperial approval of the emperor, and had to manage the combined fleet for the fiasco of the army. Shimamura assumed command of the Second Fleet from Meiji 42 (1909), and in 1910 he commanded the cruiser Kurama and Tone to attend the coronation of King George V. In Meiji 44 (1911), the commander of the Sasebo town guard was inaugurated, and after repeated transfers, he returned to Tokyo in Taisho 3 (1914) and became the head of the Naval Education Headquarters, but due to the impact of the Siemens incident, a large number of high-ranking officials in the navy stepped down, and the head of the military order, Goro Ijiin, resigned, and he became the head of the military order, and the then minister of the navy was his friend Yuzaburo Kato, and the two worked together very happily. During his tenure as Minister of Military Order, Japan became the victor of World War I, and he himself was promoted to admiral. Smooth sailing, he thought he could arrive at the station safely, and washed his hands in the golden basin, but such a thing happened, although he didn't care about the kindergartens of the Chinese Navy, but he was very annoyed that he couldn't retire.

"It's a rice bucket! Are these patrol boats of the town guard house lazy, and they have actually laid anchor mines in front of their homes. "Shimamura, who was furious in the office, almost ate the staff officer who sent the telegram in. He got a report from Kure Zhenshoufu that the armored cruiser Izumo was hit by a mine and sank when it was leaving the port, and the quasi-dreadnought of the Aki was seriously injured and sat on the beach, and Sasebo, after receiving a warning from Kure Port, urgently stopped the fleet leaving the port and carried out minesweeping, as a result, a minesweeper was hit by an anchor mine and disintegrated on the spot, which frightened Sasebo's first fleet to be completely wooded, and the date of dispatch had to be postponed.

"Report, Minoru Saito is visiting, and I hope to meet Admiral Shimamura immediately." The guard came in to report to the staff officer on duty, and the staff officer couldn't help grinning, estimating that his slap was inevitable, and he didn't know if it was the messing around with the geisha that angered Amaterasu, why was he so unlucky. He went in again to report to General Shimamura, but he was lucky not to be rewarded with a three-pin meal. Shimamura actually felt that Minoru Saito should not have come to see his liveliness at this time, after all, they were all from the navy, and if there was a mistake in the combined fleet, he, the former sea minister, might not have a light on his face.

When the staff officer invited Saito in, Shimamura found that he had a document in his hand, and it seemed that the old enemy had indeed not come to see his jokes. The two didn't greet each other, in fact, they were very embarrassed to meet, but fortunately, Saito was in a hurry, so he simply single-handedly picked out the topic.

"Shimamura-kun, this is information provided by intelligence officers outside the Navy, but I think it may cause trouble for our Combined Fleet's sortie, so I sent it to you. If you are presumptuous, please also ask Haihan. Saito's words were quite good, and Shimamura nodded to accept the other party's kindness. When he opened the document and looked at it, Shimamura's face was wonderful, and he was both happy and angry, which made Saito feel a little panicked.

"Shimamura-kun, if you think this information is the other party's smoke, you don't have to..."

"No, I'm very grateful to Saito-kun for providing this important information in a public and selfless manner. Thank you! After saying that, he bowed to Saito, and Saito hurriedly returned the salute. However, Saito-kun, if your information had been delivered to me yesterday, the result would have been completely different. ”

"Oh, is it true that Kure Harbor was mined by the Shina Navy?"

"Yes, and not only Kure Harbor, but even Sasebo has been mined, I just received a report that the Izumo and Aki have been damaged by mines, and the most important thing is that our combined fleet is locked in a cage, if we can't ensure that the mines are cleared, the huge ships in our fleet that have embody the hard work of the people will be redeemed by a mine that is not enough for the price of a main gun shell. Just now, I thought it was because of the negligence of the town guards, which allowed the enemy's mine-laying ships to take advantage of the situation. Now it seems that it should be submarine mine-laying or, as your intelligence said, aviation mine-laying. ”

"Well, it seems that the intelligence is true." Saito didn't feel distressed when he heard that it was just an old warship that had been blown up and sunk, anyway, when he went to the United States at the end of this year to attend the naval reduction conference, these old ships could not escape the fate of dismantling, and now it is considered to make the best use of the mines for the younger generations. "If the minesweeping force is strengthened, I think it is still possible to just open up the shipping lane. Since the other side has made it clear that it wants to delay the dispatch of troops by the Combined Fleet with mines, we should strive to send troops as soon as possible, and we should not let the attempt of China succeed, and it is even worth sacrificing some old warships for this. ”

"What Saito-kun said is extremely true, and the other is suddenly opened." Shimamura Daiki, sure enough, is a veteran who has been a sea minister for many years, and the more the enemy wants to delay time, then it means that the other party's arrangements are not yet in place, or they want to trap the Japanese Navy in the harbor, so that they can deal with those army horse manure first. In this case, even if it costs a little to open up the waterway, sending troops as soon as possible is the most important rule that you should follow. In the face of the absolute muscles of the Combined Fleet, the ships of the Shina Navy are not enough to divide up Fuso, Yamashiro, Ise, and Hyuga, so as long as the Combined Fleet is allowed to gallop across the sea frontier, then the other side will find that none of these small tricks can prevent the victory of the Combined Fleet in the face of the strength advantage of the duel. This is what Chinese kung fu calls "one force down ten meetings".

"That's right, Shimamura-kun. There is also information from the same intelligence source that tells a strange thing, that the Chinese Navy had built a very large and complex cement structure three months earlier, which was very large and complex, and it was said that it was used to build an offshore dock, but the shipyard had installed steam turbines on these components, and he made a bold guess, could it be that these things were used to build a sea artillery platform? Here is a photo he took. ”

"Cement battleship?" Shimamura feels that his brain is not enough, and he has just come out with a submarine minelaying and aviation minelaying, which is understandable, but the cement battleship, hehe, not to mention the problem of self-weight and buoyancy, if it is loaded with a large-caliber main gun of more than 300 mm, it may be able to compete with the capital ship, but the huge hull, which is heavier than the steel platform, is equipped with power, and the speed must be miserable, such a platform is a super large target, and the cement is broken down or broken, I don't know what the other party uses to carry out damage management, is it possible that they still have a cement concrete station and a mason on the ship? Imagine that on the surface of the Yellow Sea, the combined fleet and the China fleet were bombarding each other on the battle line, and in the midst of the gunfire, thousands of laborers dragging pigs' tails on the 100,000-ton cement warship in China were holding large basins of cement and steel bars to plug leaks everywhere on the hull. "I think this may be a gimmick, maybe the other party is really building an island dry dock to repair damaged warships in time."

"Maybe I'm worried." Saito's temper has always been very good, he laughed at himself, and couldn't help but shake his head at the whimsical information provided by the intelligence officer, he was really concerned, Shimamura's analysis just now should be right, this kind of cement battleship is useless except for making the shelling difficult. Besides, how many main guns do such a large warship have to be installed to be cost-effective, and I haven't heard that China has imported battleship main guns or special steel pipes, so didn't this cement ship plan to install cannons in the first place?

A spirited Saito suddenly thought of a question, airplane mine? That's right, it's aviation minelaying. Could it be that these huge cement components are not dry docks or cement super battleships, but just an aviation platform in the middle of the sea, so that planes can take off and bomb from here, so that the problem of short legs of the aircraft is solved, and the planes can take this base as the center of the circle and lay mines in any sea area, in that case, even if the combined fleet goes to the sea, unless the formation is disbanded and a single ship departs, once it enters the coverage area of the other side, it will be quickly arranged by a group of aircraft inside and outside the sea area A mine minefield, Trapping the warships of the Combined Fleet at sea would have cost the Japanese Navy its own life. But should you tell Shimamura? If their guess is wrong, and the purpose of the Chinese is to prevent the timely dispatch of the combined fleet, then their guess will help them.

Saito, who left the contradictions, did not say that the demining efficiency of the combined fleet was very high, and soon the channel was cleared, and the fleets of Sasebo and Kure Port went to sea smoothly, and they slaughtered in the direction of Qingdao and Shanghai with great momentum, intending to use their main guns to tell those arrogant Shina people that with the combined fleet, the waters of the Far East would only be counted if Japan said it.