"Your Excellency, has Your Excellency the Admiral agreed to our plan?" In the headquarters of the Russian Baltic Fleet in Helsingfors (now Helsinki), looking at the fleet commander who walked into the office, Colonel Kolchak, the chief of fleet operations, hurriedly asked.

Essen, who had a straight face, walked back to the desk without saying a word, sat down heavily, and then took off the military hat on his head and buckled it on the table very unproductively: "Your Excellency the Admiral forbids us to engage in any battles, every capital ship of the Baltic Fleet is a valuable force to protect the Gulf of Finland, to protect St. Petersburg, and to protect His Majesty the Tsar, and it is strictly forbidden to do anything that may lead to losses." ”

"If the capital ships can't be dispatched, what about the cruiser fleet at Reval (present-day Tallinn)? It's always okay to send a cruiser or a lightning striker, right? Lieutenant General Kanin, commander of the Lightning Strike Corps, hurriedly asked.

"No way!" Essen said hatefully: "If we take the initiative to attack, it is very likely that the German Navy will be tempted to transfer their capital ships into the Baltic Sea, and then we will have to be forced to fight, which will still cause losses to the capital ships." ”

"What kind of fallacy is this?!" Vice Admiral Kerber, chief of staff of the fleet, also called out: "If the Germans want to launch an offensive from the Baltic direction, they will inevitably move the battleships, don't we take the initiative to provoke them and they won't come?" If they don't come, we don't do anything? Fleet simply doesn't know how to use a fleet! Why is he pointing fingers at us? ”

"Be careful!" Essen drank low. Although the office is full of his own people, this kind of attack on Shangguan is absolutely unacceptable. And even further to the top, who put the command of the Baltic Fleet under the Sixth Army? And who approved this order?

Although some people have shut up. However, Essen could still see from the faces of the three people that they were dissatisfied with General Frete. Kolchak was just a colonel, and he didn't dare to speak ill of a general in front of a general and two lieutenant generals. But the expression on his face was clearly in deep agreement with Kelber's words.

Long before the escalation of events in the Balkans, Kolchak proposed to raise the level of mine defense in the Gulf of Finland. However, Essen's messages requesting the implementation of this programme were invariably rejected. Until the situation escalated and the war became irretrievable, Kolchak had to desperately admonish, and finally made Essen decide to act on his own and mobilize in general. On the same day that the order was issued, Kanin was ordered to direct mine-laying operations on the so-called "central positions" of the Gulf of Finland defense near the islands of Nargen and Pokhara in the Gulf of Finland, laying 2,119 mines in just four hours. And made 8 coastal defense artillery batteries on the coast combat-ready. Just one day later, traces of German torpedo boats and minehunters appeared outside the Gulf of Finland.

If it hadn't been for the quick action, it would have been necessary to wait for the Germans to appear outside the Gulf of Finland before slowly starting to lay mines. God knows what the consequences will be. If small German surface ships rush desperately into the Gulf of Finland and then drop dozens of mines outside the port of Reval before they are annihilated by their own side, then the fun will be great.

Most of the light ships of the Baltic Fleet were in Reval, and if Reval was blocked by German mines. Then before clearing the Germans of the mines. The Russian Navy's own defensive mine-laying work was almost at a standstill, and the Gulf of Finland really became a pond for the Germans to come and go as they wanted. Kolchak was therefore equally dissatisfied with Admiral Freter's attitude towards naval operations.

However, if Kolchak had known that it was not only the small surface ships of the German Navy that were swaying outside the Gulf of Finland at that time, but also that there were submarines looking for opportunities underwater, he would probably have broken out in a cold sweat.

It was precisely because of the speed with which the Russians laid mines that the German submarine captains were able to go around the Gulf of Finland instead of diving directly into the Gulf of Finland to see if they could try their luck in the harbors of Reval, Helsingfors, Kronstadt or even St. Petersburg.

"Your Excellency, this is the only chance we have to act. We have 3 battleships, 7 cruisers, 36 fleet minelayers, 11 submarines and 6 minelayers. The Germans had only two cruisers, 16 fleet mine-strike ships, and a number of torpedo boats and submarines in the Baltic, if they waited for the Germans to start mobilizing their forces. We don't have a chance. Kolchak said anxiously.

Because the outcome of the Russo-Japanese War was different from history, the Tsarist Russian Navy, which was not a complete defeat, still maintained a Pacific Fleet with some strength, and the ships that had originally traveled thousands of miles and traveled half the world to the Far East were asked by Emperor Nicholas II to join the reorganized Pacific Fleet, instead of returning to the Baltic Sea thousands of miles away. In addition, after the war, there was not enough money to purchase large ships like Rurik (second generation), and the strength of the Baltic Fleet at this time was much weaker than in history.

Medium and large surface ships consist of only 2 Pavel I-class and 1 Glory, three Dreadnoughts, 3 copies of the German-made Grumbowie's Bayan armored cruiser, 2 Parada-class and 2 Warrior-class protective cruisers.

However, this is still much stronger than the Germans left in the Baltic, and the ships left in the Baltic by the German Navy, not to mention large surface ships, even medium surface ships are far inferior to history. Historically, the German East Sea Fleet (the German name for the Baltic Fleet) also had 1 armored cruiser, 2 large protective cruisers, 5 Gazelle-class small cruisers, 1 Kolberg-class small cruiser, and 1 Magdeburg-class light cruiser.

However, now, because the original Gazelle class has become a 5,000-ton light cruiser with a speed of more than 23 knots and a 150-mm gun under the intervention of Jochen, although the ship is older, it is still left in the North Sea by the Navy as a relatively new warship, and the newer light cruisers are not as good as the East China Sea Fleet.

The only two large ships in the fleet were Victoria, who were transferred to the East China Sea Fleet after returning from service in the Far East Fleet, and served as training ships? Luiser class light cruisers.

Although the number and quality of the destroyer fleet are higher than the 10 large torpedo boats in history, this is still the earliest German Type 1889 destroyer, although it has a slight advantage in quality, but it is an absolute disadvantage in quantity. Moreover, with the imitation of the destroyer Novik, with a tonnage of 1,260 tons and a speed of 37.3 knots, which Russia ordered from the Volkeng shipyard in 1910, the quality advantage of the German destroyer will gradually disappear. And the German high-speed torpedo boats and submarine forces have not yet proven their lethality and are therefore considered not worth mentioning.

In this way, Kolchak was convinced of the strength of the Baltic Fleet at this time, and in his opinion, it should not be possible to teach the small ships of the German Navy that were wandering outside a lesson before the main force of the German Navy was transferred to the Baltic Sea, and then use this gap to cause some trouble for the Germans.

And the chief of staff of the fleet, Kerber, strongly supported the opinion of the chief of operations as his subordinate: "Now is the time when the Baltic Fleet is the most free to move, and even if we do not take the initiative to attack the German ships, we can take some more proactive actions to cause trouble for the Germans, and we can also make more adequate preparations for the main force of the German Navy to enter the Baltic Sea in the future." ”

"Of course I understand what you're saying." Essen frowned and said, as an admiral who led the cruiser fleet to take the initiative in the Russo-Japanese War and defended the last bit of face of the Tsarist Navy, how could he not know that this was the best time for the Baltic Fleet to take an offensive posture?

"We declared war on Germany, the Swedes were ostensibly neutral, but in fact they cut off the shipping lines with us, the so-called 20 degrees east longitude blockade line of the Germans was simply a decoration, the Swedes really wanted to enter, and we could drive the German torpedo boats away with a few mine-striking ships.

And the routes between Germany and Sweden for the transportation of 6 million tons of iron ore and other supplies per year were not hindered in the slightest, and if our fleet could be dispatched and expand the range of activities, it would be able to deal a major blow to the German transport lines! Essen, who climbed to his current position by playing the battle, of course, also hoped to break the engagement against the Germans, but the problem now is that it is useless to know: "The problem is that all our combat ships are forbidden to go out without permission!" ”

The official was crushed to death, and the general pressed a general who didn't understand anything, which made the four people in the office fall silent for a while.

"Admiral Fret forbids our ships to attack the Germans on their own initiative, as long as this order is not violated, is there no problem?" Kolchak suddenly looked up and asked.

"Alexander, what do you mean by that?" Kerber turned his head and stared at Kolchak.

"If our ships only go out at night and return before dawn the next day, neither the Germans nor Admiral Fret will know what we have done. And we only need to use high-speed ships with mines to lay mines in areas such as Danzig, Memel (near Klaipeda) and the shipping lanes to Sweden, then it can also play the role of disrupting the German sea lines of communication. We did not take the initiative to 'attack', and naturally did not violate the orders of the generals. Kolchak reminded him of the word "offense".

"That's a good idea, and we can also use all the drifting mines, even if General Fret asks about it, we can completely excuse the fact that the mines were carried away by the waves, and he must not understand the mine technology." Kanin added in a somewhat amused tone.

"And we still have mines like the Л-13, so we don't have to worry about drifting mines being easily detected and cleared by the Germans." Kolchak added. The L-13 float mine is different from the general floating mine floating on the water surface or relying on buoys to stay underwater, the use of electric floats can make the mine stay at a fixed depth underwater, so it greatly improves the concealment, which is also a major achievement of the Russians after the crazy mine technology tree.

"Okay, let's try it first, and if it works well, I want the entire Lightning Strike Corps to get involved!" Essen made up his mind to make up his mind. (To be continued.) )