There is a saying that the saddest countries are the countries of the peninsula, because they will never get peace.

Look at the Balkan powder keg, from the Balkan war to the Kosovo war, there has been peace? Looking at the Arabian Peninsula again, the six Middle East wars have not been fought enough, and now they still have their brains out almost every day. And the place of right and wrong on this side of East Asia is naturally the Korean Peninsula.

The special location of the Korean Peninsula has made it a hot spot for tripartite rivalry among the Qing Dynasty, Russia, and Japan.

For the Qing state, Korea was a vassal state that would come to pay tribute, which in the eyes of the European powers was a source of resources and a market for commodities. But since Jiaqing Ye said, "The Celestial Empire is rich all over the world, why do you need some small goods in a small country?" Of course, we don't look down on North Korea's poor and sour place.

Not to mention what benefits are obtained from North Korea, they still want to reward something at every turn to show "China's material resources". However, for the "Celestial Empire" and the "Central Empire", this face issue is more important than anything else, so Korea is our traditional subject country, and no one can move it!

For the Russians, who had managed to snatch Vladivostok from the Qing Dynasty in the icy Siberia, and who were still in the grip of a 70-day freeze every year, North Korea meant a warm, ice-free port.

For Japan, which had just completed the Meiji Restoration and hoped to get its own piece of the cake in this era of colonial imperialism, Korea was an indispensable springboard to the East Asian continent.

As a result, North Korea, a narrow peninsula with little economic interest, became the trigger for war.

How important is North Korea to Japan? Hirobumi Ito once said, "North Korea is a sharp sword piercing Japan's abdomen." ”

Ever since the Mutiny in 1882, the Japanese have realized that they cannot bypass the Korean suzerain, the Qing Dynasty, on the Korean issue. Only by waging an all-out war with the Qing Kingdom can they achieve their goals, and the Japanese have this consciousness at this moment.

However, the Qing Dynasty considered itself the largest country in Asia, and Japan, a small country that had only been reformed for 30 years, had the courage to start a war with itself. In the Renwu Mutiny of 1882 and the Jiashen Coup of 1884, Japan's restraint and low posture in the face of the Qing army's troops made the Qing government relax its vigilance.

Beginning in 1882, the Japanese government's low profile was not without reason, and within six years, the six towns of Tokyo, Sendai, Nagoya, Osaka, Hiroshima, and Kumamoto were reorganized into the 1st to 6th Divisions. During the reorganization, Japan did not have the ability and determination to wage a war.

Beginning in 1887, the "Concept of the Great Operation of the Expedition to the Qing Dynasty" was formulated by Major General Kawagami Korokuro, deputy chief of the General Staff Headquarters, and Ogawa Matsuji, the second director of the General Staff Headquarters.

The army was in full swing of preparations, but as a result, the navy poured cold water on the army.

Although the Qing army has 980,000 troops, they are all scattered in various places and cannot be concentrated, and the combat capability of the Qing army is really hehe. Since it's hehe, Kawakami Caoliu is also very casual.

The six divisions and regiments of the Japanese army can completely concentrate superior forces to win the war, so the "Concept of the Great Operation of the Qing Army" said that it would be close to the Qing army, and the bayonets would be red, and they would fight all the way from Korea to Zhili, where they would fight a decisive battle with the Qing army, and the battle would be decided. Since then, Japan has been the hegemon of East Asia, and the various brain supplements omitted below can be written as a novel.

As a result, the navy was hehe, and the chief of the naval department's chief sedator, Gonbei Yamamoto, asked a question: "Does the Imperial Army have any excellent engineers?" ”

"The engineers of the Imperial Army are excellent." Kawakami replied.

"Well, let's build a bridge between Kyushu and Pusan from now on, otherwise the army won't be able to cross the sea."

Kawakami: "......"

Well, at this time, the army realized that it had made its own battle plan without taking into account the problems of the navy.

It seems that the history of the army's horse manure and the navy, you do yours, I do me, is really long, and the Japanese army built transport ships, destroyers, and aircraft carriers in World War II just to get rid of the navy and do it alone.

But now, the Japanese Army still has to look to the navy.

Yamamoto's words filled in an important link in the army's battle plan: "The conquest operation was a sea-crossing operation, and the army could not land without the escort of the navy. Before the navy gained control of the Yellow Sea, all the ships transporting troops and grain were under the threat of the Beiyang Naval Division, and once the Beiyang Naval Division cut off the army's supply lines of soldiers, munitions, grain and grass, no matter how many people landed in Korea, and no matter how good these people were, there was only defeat. ”

"Therefore, the biggest and ultimate task of the Navy in this operation is to act autonomously and seize and secure sea supremacy. The rest of the Army's transport and escort activities must not be an obstacle to the Navy's autonomous efforts to gain sea supremacy. ”

The Army, which had been taught a lesson by Yamamoto, began to face up to the role of the Navy in their own battle plans. Therefore, the "Concept of the Great Operation of the Qing Dynasty," which took four years to formulate, formulated three operational plans: the Japanese Navy obtains sea supremacy in the Yellow Sea and the Bohai Sea, neither the Japanese Navy nor the Beiyang Naval Division can obtain sea supremacy, and the Beiyang Naval Division will have sea supremacy.

When the army is ready, it's up to the navy.

The most important problem facing the Navy is how to get rid of the Dingzhen No. 2 ship.

The first time the Japanese Navy began to really discuss the question of how to sink Dingyuan was when the Beiyang Navy visited Yokohama on July 10, 1891, when the Beiyang Navy Division accompanied the Fuso as a reception ship, only a few hundred meters away.

At this time, the Erjing ship was not yet in service, and the Japanese Navy was powerless in the face of the 356 mm composite steel surface armor of the Dingzhen Second Ship, and unlike history, the defense capability of the current Dingzhen Second Ship was verified by the actual combat of the two naval battles of the Sino-French War.

The Dingzhen 2nd ship was hit many times by the French Navy's 239 mm main guns in the Battle of Dachen, but the damage was slight, and the most powerful naval gun of the Japanese Navy at this time was only the German-made 260 mm 35 times diameter frame on the Naniwa, and it is unknown what kind of damage it can cause to the Dingzhen 2nd ship

In fact, this is also the reason why the Japanese Navy does not look down on the Brandenburg-class battleships, because the main guns of the Brandenburg-class are also 260 mm, although the double diameter has increased and the rate of fire has increased, but the Japanese who have not actually used it naturally do not know what kind of expression they can have in actual combat.

Since you won't be able to get a larger caliber gun for a while, let's think about it from a different angle. In 1874, Gonbei Yamamoto, who had gone to Germany to study and was quite accomplished in artillery research, proposed to use medium-caliber rapid-fire guns to take advantage of the rate of fire and numerical superiority to hit as many shells as possible in a unit of time, destroy the enemy's superstructure, kill and injure personnel, affect command, and finally achieve the goal of making the opponent lose its combat effectiveness.

That is, the deck washing that military fans often said in later generations, and Yamamoto Gonbei can be said to be the founder of the deck washing party.

At this time, the Japanese Navy and the Beiyang Naval Division were still using sextants for ranging, and at a distance of 4,000 meters, the error of the sextant was 170 meters. In order to reduce the measurement error and improve the accuracy of the correction, Japan began to accurately measure the main ships of the Beiyang Naval Division while they were all visiting Japan.

In addition, in order to ensure the accuracy of the measurement numbers, the navy, the army, and the civil engineering departments of the government in Yokohama and Nagasaki measured separately.

The Japanese not only figured out the situation of their opponents, but also began to carefully select their own personnel. In 1892, Gonbei Yamamoto, with the support of Saigo Shomichi, began to organize the navy and laid off officers who were not fit for the navy.

Gonbei Yamamoto collected and compiled a list of 8 generals, 89 colonels and lieutenants, and decided to let them go. Among them, there are many veterans who have contributed to the Meiji Restoration, as well as seniors and fellow villagers of the Satsuma Domain.

Looking at this list, even Saigo, who was born in the army, couldn't make up his mind, and Yamamoto Gonbei's attitude was very resolute: "There are some people here who can't keep up with the times at all, and they are still stuck in the era of sail warships, and they don't even know how to use steam warships, which is a stumbling block to the progress of the navy, so it must be cleaned up." ”

So Saigo nodded from the road.

Yamamoto immediately cut through the mess with a short sword on his desk, met with the officers on the list one by one, and announced to them the decision to lay off. No matter whether it was the angry roar of "arrogance against chaos" or the bitter pleading, they were unmoved, and they completed the first "slimming operation" in the history of the Japanese Navy with a heart and heart.

And it was also during this reform that a number of important figures in the future navy, such as Heihachiro of Shandong Township, Minoru Saito, Keisuke Okada, and Gentaro Yamashita were given the opportunity to be promoted, and it was also at this time that Heihachiro Togo became the captain of the cruiser Naniwa.

The personnel problem has also been solved, and the next thing is the warship, although the design of the Erjing ship is crumbling, but the caliber of 320 mm still gives the Japanese a lot of courage.

The purchase of a large number of 150 mm rapid-fire guns from Germany and the replacement of old naval guns made the Japanese Navy's firepower increase rapidly. The Yoshino returned to China and the Hashidate was completed and put into service, which greatly strengthened the strength of the Japanese Navy's high-speed ship force.

At this time, the main combat forces in the hands of the Japanese Navy were the small boat cannon Nikei ships Matsushima and Itsukushima, the protective cruisers Naniwa and Takachiho, Yoshino, Hashidate, and Murasaki, the central artillery room ironclad ships Fuso, Akitsuzu, Chiyoda, Edogawa, the shipside artillery ironclad ships Kongo and Hiei, the gunboats Maya, Chokai, Atago, and Akagi, and the iron-ribbed wood-hulled cruisers Katsuragi, Yamato, and Musashi.

Although it still does not seem to have the astonishing momentum of the Eight Great Masters of the Beiyang Naval Division, the Japanese Navy is still not sure of winning a war with the Beiyang Naval Division, at least it is not so afraid.

However, the Japanese were still not satisfied with the cards in their hands, so they made the move to build two Suma-class protective cruisers and go to Europe to order two Fuji-class battleships.

It's a good thing to have more chips in your hand, but no, it's not that you can't play, at least the Japanese have the courage to do so now. Everything is ready, only the east wind is owed, and the opportunity is reserved for those who are prepared.

So the opportunity came.