"Marshal, this is a war report from the General Staff, and the navy is ready to launch a campaign to recover Liuqiu." Outside Yizhou City, just after converging the Modao Battalion that had returned from the fierce battle, Wan Yi received a war briefing from the base camp, and the General Staff sent the actions and plans of the Navy to the northwest. The system of reporting on the war situation is a concept brought by Li Xuanqing from later generations, and when conditions permit, the General Staff Headquarters must inform the military commanders of the group army and above of the military operations that have taken place or are about to take place in the whole region, so as to facilitate the necessary coordination and containment of the commanders of the front line at the strategic level, and it also gives these generals a right to know about the entire military operations of the Tiance Army. Of course, under special conditions, the General Assembly may choose to report afterwards or not to report it according to the situation, but generally this situation will be filed with Li Xuanqing in advance, and this is also a way to restrain the power of the General Staff.

Wan Yi took the battle report handed over by Liu Xuan and frowned after reading it: "The navy chose to act at this time, but I am afraid that it is also thoughtful, and the arrangement of Xuan Yingwei on Qian Di's side can allow the navy and the marine troops to quickly calm down the flow." It's just that I'm afraid that this year's military spending of our Tiance Mansion will exceed expectations again, and if we add the march into Tibetan areas and the recovery of Sanhan, this is not a good thing. "After Li Xuanqing brought the budget system from later generations, generals like Wan Yi, who are all suspended in the General Staff Headquarters, will basically know that the Tiance Army's annual investment in military and political affairs is basically planned in advance, although there is a special budget to ensure that the army can have the financial resources and ability to assemble troops to deal with emergencies, but to carry out a major war in four directions at the same time is not only a matter of military and political affairs, but I am afraid that it will also implicate the expenditure of the civil affairs side. Although the empire's annual financial revenue is growing rapidly, the total amount is certain, and the military and political expenditures are too large to inevitably squeeze the funds on the civil affairs side, although the cabinet has launched the method of the Tang currency circle proposed by the Ministry of Finance and the money bank at the beginning of the imperial meeting at the beginning of the year, but at this time it has just entered April, and it is only afraid that it will have little effect, and it will rashly start a big war, and the financial pressure will be too great, and the unification of the empire will only take four years in total, and a large number of funds are urgently needed for the development of wars in various places. Countless people of the empire need the help of the empire to embark on the road out of poverty and war. Therefore, Wan Yi did not agree with this method of attacking from all sides, and felt that the General Staff was too impatient.

"Actually, don't worry, the deputy prime minister's side has actually launched the plan for the Tang currency settlement circle. I have heard before that there is already a branch of the Tang Dynasty in Khotan, and I believe that our Tang coins will soon be able to be popularized in Khotan and even in the entire Western Regions. Moreover, I heard that the money bank has stopped the direct deposit and exchange of Tang coins and gold and silver, which means that gold and silver are about to withdraw from circulation. Compared with Wan Yi, a pure military general, who doesn't know much about civil affairs, especially finance, Liu Xuan has his own experience in Qianzhuang, so after seeing Wan Yi's expression, he smiled and said: "Khotan has been extremely rich since ancient times, as long as the Tang currency can be promoted, it will inevitably gather a large amount of gold and silver in a short period of time and transport it back to Chang'an." Moreover, the transport team of the logistics department has already begun to carry the loot captured in Khotan, and the entire treasury of Khotan has been taken by the Third Corps, but I am afraid that all the military expenses spent in our northwest will be made up for this time. ”

"Then inform the armies that in the future battles they must ensure that the gold, silver, and money in the treasury of each place are included in the list of seizures. Liuqiu is still in a period of recklessness, so let's save some military funds for the navy. Wan Yi's eyes lit up after listening to Liu Xuan's story, and he turned his head and said with a smile: "Tell the soldiers that these are useless for them to hold, and those who hand over or seize the gold and silver in the treasury can be counted in the war merits." "At present, the basic implementation of the Western Expeditionary Army is to incorporate it into the imperial territory wherever it hits, and all civil affairs measures and departments in the rear are also stationed under the arrangement of Tuoba Siji, and those who are unable to take care of it for the time being will also choose military management and hand it over to Yang Yi's National Guard. Therefore, the soldiers of the Tiance Army were particularly unaccustomed to the Tang coins in their hands after they arrived in the northwest, and at the same time, this also made the soldiers of the various armies lose interest in gold and silver, after all, when gold and silver cannot be used as circulating currency in their hands, their role is greatly reduced. Moreover, every month's salary is all settled in Tang currency, and even in the places where the money bank is popular, cash will not be issued, but military exchange tickets will be issued directly, and the soldiers will go to the money bank to withdraw it by themselves. Therefore, many soldiers were not even willing to ask for exchange tickets, and threw them directly to the logistics quartermaster department, so that they could directly transfer them to their accounts in the bank. Therefore, a strange phenomenon has been formed, every month the money bank needs to communicate with the military in advance about the military and political expenditure, even if the account information of the army officers and soldiers is transmitted to the Qian Zhuang branch near the military station, so that they can cooperate with the payment of salaries as soon as possible. Therefore, after the Quartermaster Department and Qianzhuang discussed it, the salary of the Tiance Army was changed to be paid once a year, and the Quartermaster Department transferred the salary of the previous year's soldiers to the Qianzhuang at the beginning of each year, and then the Qianzhuang transferred it to the accounts of each soldier. This has also led to improvements in information sharing during the laying process. Today's money banks have been able to send the information of the six major money banks of the empire to the processing center in a timely manner, and then summarize it, even if it is transmitted to the various branches of the subordinates, it can be updated in time. After the six processing centers summarize and process, they will return to the Chang'an headquarters, and the headquarters will make the final summary and make a national sub-ledger classification. It can be said that before the innovation of electronic information sharing and transmission means, Datang Qianzhuang has formed a rigorous and fast classification and, transmission and summary in this regard, so as to ensure that it can handle the basic requirements of each terminal transmission in the shortest possible time.

That's why there was this conversation between Wan Yi and Liu Xuan, but when Wan Yi was worried that the military expenditure would exceed the budget and was thinking about how to bring more captures to the military in the northwest, in fact, the naval battle in the southeast had entered the final decisive stage. Although Qian Biao personally led the main force of his fleet to rush to support the detachment in the north of Liuqiu in time, under the personal command of Guo Chongtao, all seven battleships of the Izumo-class and three Fuxing-class ironclad arrays blocked the impact of Qian Biao's wooden sailing fleet, and the combat power that burst out under the command of the unified signal flag formed by these battleships formed a battle line was blinded by Qian Biao in the first wave, and three sailing ships were hit in the first round of artillery fire. In the case that the flowering shell has developed the second generation, the wooden sailing ship will basically lose its combat power as long as it hits a shot, and it will sink almost with one hit.

In the first round, the results of effectively sinking three ships were achieved, and even Guo Chongtao himself was a little surprised, because although the artillery of the Tiance Navy warship at this time already had the most primitive aiming means, and it was also equipped with a long-distance observation method of Qianli Realm, but the problem of the difficulty and accuracy of the initial artillery aiming still bothered them, and the most important thing was that unlike the army artillery, at least there was a stable launch platform on land, even the current displacement of 2,000 tons of Izumo-class was still up and down on the sea surface. Naval guns are very difficult to aim, and unless there are elite-level gunners, the artillery hit rate can reach 10%.

However, in the ensuing naval battle, Guo Chongtao still found that the artillery hit rate of his fleet was basically stable, and every round of shelling could maintain one shell to hit the opponent, so that Qian Biao's huge dozens of warships became lambs to be slaughtered in front of Guo Chongtao. Moreover, because of the continuous losses, Qian Biao could not play the restraint methods he came up with, and the countermeasures were impossible to talk about because he could not get close to the other party in a short period of time, and what was even worse was that the warships of the Tiance Army were lined up in battle lines for shelling, and they themselves were constantly moving, and they always kept facing themselves from the side, to put it bluntly, they were constantly moving on their periphery, so that they finally took advantage of the increasing speed of the monsoon and soon lost their usefulness. The artillery fire of the Tiance army began to be launched from all directions around their fleet, and after the sailboats were hit and caught fire and then sank in all directions, the combat strength and morale of Qian Biao's fleet began to fall rapidly, and these naval soldiers were already weak in the face of these steel giants floating on the water like a hill to fight against themselves, plus the opponent's weapons could hit themselves at a long distance, and almost as long as one shot hit the warship under their feet, it would be destroyed, Hardly anyone can face this situation without fear and fear. In addition, he was almost powerless in the face of the opponent's attack, so less than an hour after the start of the war, Qian Biao's naval fleet began to gradually collapse, and some soldiers and generals on the frightened ships began to turn a blind eye to the orders from the flagship, and even the three sailing ships facing the artillery fire of the Tiance Army at the forefront even directly raised white flags and prepared to surrender.

"After naming, the tail revival class cut up, and the sailboat escorting these avatars docked and handed over to the marines who stayed behind to deal with it." Guo Chongtao immediately sent an order to a Fuxing-class battleship dragged behind the line-shaped fleet, asking it to quickly step forward and beckon the opposing ship to quickly approach the mouth of the Tamsui River and hand it over to Chen Yu of the Marine Corps to deal with.

With these leaders, in the next half an hour, there were constantly sailing ships leaving the formation and going to the mouth of the Tamsui River with the Fuxing-class warships, and the marines over there also quickly sent people to board these approaching sailboats after receiving the signal from the Fuxing-class, and then escorted all the men inside out of the ships to the shore to be guarded, before the war was over, these people could only stay in the barracks and be guarded as prisoners of war, but Chen Yu also told them that the Tiance Army would not harm them, and they would be settled as civilians on the spot after the war ended. And enjoy all the treatment of the people of the empire. As for those generals, they also got Chen Yu's reply, if they can pass the assessment of the recruits of the Tiance Army after the war, they can also join the Tiance Army, and guarantee that as long as they can pass the assessment, the Tiance Army will definitely treat them equally and will not discriminate against them. And at this time, Chen Yu also connected with Xuan Yingwei's infiltration personnel, in addition to understanding the movements of Qian Biao's army, some of the infiltrators also lurked in Qian Biao's fleet at the same time, and in the subsequent naval battles, they continued to mobilize and rebel against the ships to surrender, and after going ashore, they cooperated with Chen Yu to pacify and control these Qian Biao army officers and soldiers.

However, although many warships could not withstand this endless blow and chose to surrender, but after all, Qian Biao's fleet had dozens of warships, so when Guo Chongtao readjusted his position to the northeast of Qian Biao at sunset, Qian Biao still had more than 20 warships without loss, and these were basically Qian Biao's henchmen, and there was basically no possibility of surrender, and at this time, the Fuxing-class battleships basically did not have much coal and ammunition and needed supplies. Therefore, Guo Chongtao decisively led seven Izumo-class battleships to press up, leaving the Fuxing-class to quickly approach the supply transport ship.

And in order to cover the withdrawn Fuxing-class, the seven Izumo-class battleships instantly put their firepower output to the maximum, and the twenty-one artillery pieces launched shelling almost non-stop, and when the slow speed was adjusted to the maximum at this time because of the concern for the life of the gun barrel and the problem of heating, the sea surface was almost instantly shrouded in the splashes and waves set off by the explosion of these shells in the water, and those sailboats that were hit were also directly sent to the bottom of the sea for the first time. Countless soldiers of the Qian Biao Army who escaped by swimming on the sea began to desperately go to the shore in the distance, but were immediately captured alive by the Marines who were waiting for them.

Guo Chongtao's all-out launch immediately gave Qian Biao the greatest pressure, among which I don't know which battleship fired a shell even crossed several warships in front of him and exploded near Qian Biao's flagship, and the huge splash and the water column that rose into the sky even directly made several unstable sailor soldiers on the flagship fall directly into the water. This change also made Qian Biao wake up from his previous state, and if he continued to fight, he was afraid that the naval army he had accumulated in the past two years would be completely buried in the hands of the other party.

So almost as soon as Guo Chongtao led the Izumo to rush up first, Qian Biao immediately began to arrange a retreat. It's just that although China's sailing ships use hard sails, the use of wind power can almost reach 360 degrees without dead ends, but it is too difficult to withdraw in an eagerness to withdraw, and it is also against the wind, although Qian Biao's flagship on the various signal flags continue to wave and the sound of horns continues to come out, hurriedly summoning his warships to quickly evacuate the battlering area, but because there is no detailed retreat plan arranged in advance, at this moment Qian Biao ordered the retreat and suddenly caused a huge chaos, The fleet, which had been battered but could still maintain its basic formation, was in disarray, and all the sailing ships began to turn their rudders according to the understanding of their respective captains, heading southeast towards the rear at the fastest speed.

And Guo Chongtao also accurately seized this rare fighter, and ordered his Izumo-class battleships to disband the formation and choose their own targets to bombard, and for a while, seven battleships chased these scattered and fled wooden sailing ships to chase up, and there were constantly sailboats that were hit and caught fire, but there were still some sailboats that escaped from the Izumo-class fire circle in time, after all, the number gap between the two sides was too large, and Guo Chongtao began to collect his warships after chasing a certain distance, after all, there were still very important things to do behind the navy. In fact, although Guo Chongtao did not continue the pursuit, Qian Biao only brought back less than ten sailing ships when he returned to his base in Phoenix, and none of the others returned.