Chapter 165: Military Honor
"The safest way is to return to the transit island, wait for the 61st task force to arrive, and then consider the matter of a decisive battle with the Newland fleet."
Although his eyes were always on the chart, and he was also concentrating, Bai Huawei's mind was not on this at all.
As for Liu Zunling's tactical analysis, he didn't listen to it at all.
It's easy to go back, but it's not so easy to make adjustments after going back.
The point is, no matter where you go, it takes time.
Although the fleet has a strong ability to maneuver and was once upon a time a unique strategic assault force, the ability to maneuver itself is relative. In the past, compared with the army, the superiority was definitely outstanding, but now compared with the air force, this bit of the fleet's mobility capability is not worth mentioning at all.
The fleet sails for 1 day, and the plane only needs to fly for 1 hour!
In addition, strategic bombers have long had the ability to fly across the ocean.
As for the striking ability, it is needless to say, naturally.
Not long ago, the Yamaman Air Force proved with its operations in the heart of the Eastern Continent that strategic bombers possess a very powerful ability to strike at the sea. With ultra-long-range anti-ship missiles, bombers can attack from hundreds of kilometers away, and only 20 bombers are needed to reach the scale of a saturation attack.
Relatively speaking, the anti-ship combat effectiveness ratio of bombers exceeds that of all ships of the Navy.
The total value of 20 bombers, plus 120 long-range anti-ship missiles, is not as cheap as 1 aircraft carrier, or even 1 cruise missile submarine with hundreds of missiles on board.
Obviously, the speed of the fleet is simply too slow compared to aviation.
It is precisely for this that the commander must think carefully when carrying out a large-scale maneuver. In other words, commanders must think long-term about each deployment adjustment, if not the impact on the final outcome or the potential harm.
Bai Huawei is thinking about this problem.
The biggest advantage of bringing the fleet back to the transit island is nothing more than uniting the 61st Task Force and fighting a decisive battle with the Nuland fleet.
However, this severely limited the tactical flexibility of Task Force 41.
To put it bluntly, after returning to Transit Island and joining up with Task Force 61, Bai Huawei's only choice was to take the fleet to the Guia Ocean to find the Newland fleet for a decisive battle.
So, is this the most desirable option?
In Bai Huawei's view, since the commander of the Nuland fleet dared to make a desperate gamble and send all five aircraft carriers to the North and East to look into the ocean, he must be completely sure. In addition to deciding that the Imperial Navy would not immediately send a fleet to the Northern Eastern Ocean, it was also prepared for a decisive battle with the Imperial Fleet in the Northern Eastern Ocean.
In fact, from the point of view of time, it is not so suitable to go to the Guia Ocean to find the Newland fleet for a decisive battle.
As mentioned earlier, the shore-based air forces in the Howaii Islands will be incapacitated around 15 October, and Task Force 61 will not arrive until 16 October.
In addition, the defenders of the transit island could only hold out until October 17.
In other words, when it comes time to join Task Force 61 and enter the Guia together, they will have to deal with the Nuland forces deployed on the transit islands, such as shore-based aviation, and they will not be able to get support from the Howaii Islands when they are fighting in the Guia.
Of course, don't count on the Aliu Islands either.
Even if Task Force 41 returned early, it would be able to provide support to the troops guarding the transit island, allowing them to hold out longer. However, even if the transit island does not fall after being attacked, it is impossible to immediately deploy shore-based aviation forces to the transit island.
It can be seen that if it really wants to come to this point, the Imperial Navy does not have much chance of winning.
There is no doubt that the next decisive battle of the fleet will decide everything.
Desperate to fight the Nuland fleet?
If you win, you can naturally say anything.
However, if the war is lost, it will definitely lose the Khowaii Islands, and thus lose the strategic initiative in the Guia Ocean.
In terms of the key hand, compared to the Nuland Navy, which is already desperate and has no way out, the situation of the Imperial Navy is more passive.
For Bai Huawei, this is even more so.
If you don't consider the damage to your personal reputation, in front of Bai Huawei, there is actually a more appropriate choice.
Around the Transit Island, fight a war of attrition with the Nuland Navy!
To put it bluntly, after the arrival of Task Force 61, it remained to the west of the transit island, dispatching carrier-based aircraft to support the defenders of the transit island and bombing the landing Nuland troops. It is also necessary to keep a sufficient distance from the transit island, and try to avoid entering the strike range of the Nuland fleet.
As for the decisive battle of the fleet, it will be until the end of the year at the earliest, and after the three supercarriers that are still under maintenance return to the team.
If necessary, it can also be postponed until the beginning of next year, when a large number of mothballed large aircraft carriers are back in service and have an absolute superiority in forces.
It's a hard way to play, but it's useful.
It won't take half a year, as long as it drags on for 3 months, I'm afraid that before the Imperial Navy launches a counteroffensive, the Nuland Navy will take the initiative to withdraw.
It's just that Bai Huawei can't accept this choice.
Although he has passed the age of not being confused, and his personal ability has been recognized, in the eyes of others, his surname is Bai and he is the son of Marshal Bai Zhizhan.
As the saying goes, a tiger father has no dog son.
Even if everyone knows that it may not be until 100 years later that there will be a handsome talent who surpasses Bai Zhizhan, it still can't change the expectation of Bai Huawei.
It seems that in the Imperial Navy, Bai Huawei is the strongest existence today.
If anything, there's nothing wrong with that.
At least in the Imperial Navy, Bai Huawei was the most prominent of the generals of the Young Zhuang faction, and was frequently proven in fleet confrontation exercises.
However, this could not hide a thing that made Bai Huawei feel very embarrassed.
In terms of command style, he did not bear any resemblance to his father, but in many ways, he was closer to Marshal Liu Xiangzhen, who fought against Bai Zhizhan back then.
Actually, there is nothing surprising about this.
Liu Xiangzhen served as the principal of the Imperial Naval Academy for 30 years, until Bai Zhizhan retired, he returned to the naval headquarters and served as the interim commander-in-chief for a few months, and then after Li Mingbo was appointed as the commander-in-chief of the Navy by the first assistant, he chose to retire like Bai Zhizhan, and Bai Huawei studied at the Imperial Naval Academy during his tenure as president, so he was deeply influenced by Liu Xiangzhen in many ways.
From another point of view, this is not Liu Xiangzhen's pot.
After the end of World War II, the Imperial Navy was not only the largest in the world, but also dominated the world's oceans, and did not even have an enemy worthy of serious confronting.
Crucially, the expansion of the Imperial Navy has come to an end.
It is precisely in this way that the mission of the Imperial Navy has changed from expanding to defending, that is, how to protect the interests distributed around the world.
In this way, it is naturally necessary to make adjustments to military thinking, that is, to change from offense to defense.
If anything, the transformation of the Imperial Navy did not come fast enough.
In the post-war era, it was not Liu Xiangzhen, who was the president of the academy, who dominated the imperial navy, but Bai Zhizhan, who commanded the command in the naval headquarters.
Because of the relationship between the two during the war, many people felt that Liu Xiangzhen was deliberately contradicting Bai Zhizhan.
In this way, his ideas are even more unpopular.
That is, under the impetus of the White Stop War, the Imperial Navy still maintained an active offensive posture after the war.
As a result, the Imperial Navy actively promoted and participated in the Polish-Iraqi War, and paid a terrible price for the disastrous defeat of the war.
Although no one felt that the White Stop War was to blame for the Polish-Iraqi War, from a strategic point of view, the White War was indeed the main driving force behind the Empire's participation in the war.
In the current situation, the reason for Bai Zhizhan to do this was not only to maintain close relations with the authorities of the Republic of There, but also to maintain the dominance of the navy. At least in the post-war years, the Navy was far more important than the Army and Air Force, and became the first branch of the Imperial Service.
To maintain this status, or to get enough grants, it is necessary not only to maintain a strong fleet, but also to prove that it makes sense.
Directly, there is the need to demonstrate the ability to defend the core interests of the Empire.
Then, a war that is not too difficult and nine out of ten is naturally the most ideal choice.
In fact, this kind of decision-making based on the interests of the military and arms also determined that the empire would inevitably suffer a crushing defeat in the Polish-Iranian war.
If nothing else, at least in the early days of the war, the Imperial Army and Air Force were not very powerful.
In hindsight, at least for the first six months, neither the Army nor the Air Force were willing to send troops into the war, but due to other factors, they did not want to stand up and contradict the Navy. For example, Li Yunxiang, commander-in-chief of the Air Force, is a friend of life and death in Bai Zhizhan, and he will definitely not work against Bai Zhizhan. On the Army side, because Lian Xusheng lost the election, he was unwilling to cooperate with the elected civilian chief assistant on military issues.
Affected by these factors, the empire missed the initial, and most favorable, half a year.
If this half-year period is fully utilized, at least the rebellion in the Boi region can be quelled, and the Nuland Republic will not be given the opportunity to manipulate behind its back. As long as the situation stabilizes, then in a few years, at most, through a referendum, will allow the Poi region to become an independent state. At that time, even if the Boi country still threw itself into the arms of the Newland Republic, it would never be so hostile to the empire as it is now.
Crucially, without the crushing defeat of the Polish-Iranian War, the empire would have been able to maintain its power for at least 10 years.
In the next 10 years, unless the Xilu Group falls apart due to the economic crisis, a three-legged situation may be formed.
In this way, the situation can be more or less peaceful for at least another few decades.
Of course, if the Empire had not been involved in the war for independence in the Boi region from the beginning, but had intervened as a third party to mediate and mediate, it would have been possible to maintain the situation for a few more years, so that the Boi region could decide whether to remain in the Republic of There through a referendum.
It can be seen that there were extremely serious contradictions within the empire at that time.
As the saying goes, flies don't bite seamless eggs.
In fact, judging from some semi-official information disclosed later, that is, the disorder of the Empire's policy in the Boi region, to be precise, the internal struggle was too serious, which allowed the Nuland Republic to take advantage of the situation and put the Boe region on the road of armed struggle by providing weapons and equipment.
At least initially, the Nuland regime did not want to get involved in the conflict in the Boi region, or did not have the courage to challenge the empire.
But that's all for later.
As far as Bai Huawei is concerned, what he hates the most is that others compare him with his father, and he has developed a habit.
Most of the time, he will deliberately show his own existence, or go against public opinion.
Specifically, when commanding the fleet to fight, he will be relatively low-key, and will often focus on passive defense in the early stage.
But the problem is that he is fundamentally more willing to be recognized.
In this way, the situation will be changed, or when the time is right, the passive will turn into the initiative, and the final victory will be achieved through a hearty attack.
Anyway, Bai Huawei is a person who cares about face very much.
To put it nicely, it means having a strong sense of honor.
Not only him, but other soldiers from families are actually the same, they love face very much, and they attach great importance to honor.
Then let him go back and lead two task forces with a total of 5 aircraft carriers, and when the enemy has already landed on the transit island, it is definitely a very shameful thing to confront the Nuland fleet, which also has only 5 aircraft carriers and 2 task forces.
Fight a war of attrition, who wouldn't?
Not to mention Bai Huawei, Bai Zhizhan's youngest son, just find a second lieutenant officer who graduated from the Imperial Naval Academy, and he can command such a battle.
The difficult thing is to win more with less, to win by surprise, and to defeat a strong opponent at a very small cost.
The reason why Bai Zhizhan is the god of war of the Imperial Navy and the undefeated god of war recognized by the whole world is because he has fought countless such battles, and he has won all of them without exception. Even in the same era, Liu Xiangzhen, who is closest to him, is not invincible.
It is precisely because of this that Bai Huawei never considered going back to fight a war of attrition.
There is no need to think about it, when it really comes to the point where there is no other choice, Bai Huawei will naturally do it.
In fact, what Bai Huawei has been thinking about is still the opponent, that is, the commander of the Nuland fleet.
Although after the Second Global War, the Nuland Navy was almost completely wiped out, and it took almost 20 years to recover a little, and there was no amazing performance in the entire post-war period, the most representative is to carry the Marine Corps to overthrow the regime of a Caribbean country that does not even have a regular army, but as a country bordering two oceans and far away from the world island, the Nuland Republic has all the conditions needed to develop the navy, and also has the basis for the development of the navy, such as the rare naval talent in the land power.
Fundamentally, it is actually a military ideology based on the sea.
It is precisely because of this that the Nuland Navy has never lacked generals, especially among the young and strong officers, and several outstanding talents will emerge in almost every era.
In fact, Spu, who fought fiercely with Bai Zhizhan at the beginning, was also an officer of the Shaozhuang faction. If it weren't for the "20-year truce", Sp would have at least appeared as a rear admiral. In fact, the White War was also affected by this, and at the outbreak of the Great War was only a commodore admiral.
If you measure your opponent by rank, it is a low-level mistake.
In the current Nuland Navy, there are indeed a few talented young Zhuang officers, and they all have their own merits.
So, who exactly is commanding the Nuland fleet?
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