After Chinese New Year's Eve, and after another fifteen, Zhou Lang's military operation began.

It is very low-key, others can only see the fleet build-up, see the military movement, but do not know the situation.

However, there is also gossip that the Generalissimo is going on a northern expedition, because a large number of leaflets were commissioned by the local printing workshop to be printed with movable type, although the workshop was strictly ordered to keep it secret, but to achieve complete secrecy, that is not possible.

However, in the Qing Dynasty, although the Northern Expedition was mentioned, it was not said where the Northern Expedition was, so a very small number of well-informed people could not actually judge where Zhou Lang would fight, and they could not even judge the truth or falsehood of the rumors, after all, in this troubled world, there were too many true and false news, and some time ago there were rumors that the White Lotus Sect captured Wuchang, but it was later confirmed to be false, but under the blow of the Qing army, the White Lotus Sect was driven out of Hubei.

In order to fight the White Lotus Sect, the Qing court dispatched a large number of troops from Beijing, which gave Zhou Lang the opportunity to raid Beijing.

Zhou Lang's military strength is already quite strong, the infantry of the twelve armies are all equipped with European-style rifles, the four armies with the strongest combat effectiveness are still equipped with the best quality French rifles, and the remaining 80,000 people use the most easy-to-produce Indian brown bes.

A thousand-mile expedition, it is unrealistic to use too many troops, and Zhou Lang will mobilize the most elite 40,000 veterans to act.

Moreover, out of the importance of action, his own battalion will be the vanguard force, and the battalion will cooperate with the sailors in actions such as landing on the beach.

In fact, the main force of the first battle had to rely on the sailors, and the size of Zhou Lang's fleet was now very large, with a total of 100 old lock ships and two third-class battleships, which gave him the ability to send trade fleets to India, Burma, and Japan, while still firmly controlling the sea power.

But there was a problem, the warship did not nominally belong to Zhou Lang, but the China (East India) company he formed, and the supreme command was nominally in the hands of the management committee, which has now been moved from Taiwan to Xiamen, where is also the headquarters of the fleet.

Henry Pitt was in charge personally, although Zhou Lang's mobilization of the fleet was not a problem, but according to the regulations at the time, he would report to the management committee every time, and of course there were disagreements, such as the time when he sent troops to Guangzhou.

Since the fleet is built with the company's funds and is procedurally owned by the company, Henry Pitt has had many disagreements with Zhou Lang. But now in the comparison of strength, Henry Pitt can no longer affect Zhou Lang's actions.

But Zhou Lang also understands that the benefits brought to him by the company's structure have begun to be insufficient to compensate for the negative impact of this structure. Before the end of the year, Zhou Lang negotiated with Henry Pitt to return the company's fleet to the Fujian government.

To make amends, Zhou Lang granted the China (East India) Company a trading franchise between Fujian and India for a period of ten years.

At the current scale, by shipping tea to India, it can make millions of taels a year, or 10 million in ten years. Moreover, the scale of trade will gradually expand with development, so this transaction is very cost-effective.

After Zhou Lang took back the fleet, the fleet was called the Outer Naval Division, to distinguish it from the traditional naval divisions that could only operate in the coastal sea, and if necessary in the future, an inland naval division would be formed.

This change is only a change at the top, to put it bluntly, it is a matter of a document between Zhou Lang and Henry Pitt, and it will not affect anything.

One hundred old lock ships, each with an average of 20 naval guns, armed with 24-, 18-, 12-pounder and 6-pounder guns, with a total of 2,000 cannons, such firepower is enough to crush all the maritime powers in China's waters.

In this military operation, Zhou Lang gathered all the fleets, in addition to attaching importance to it, in fact, it had the purpose of showing its might, it was originally a deterrent military operation, and it was aimed at striking at the enemy's prestige and increasing his own prestige for the purpose of the operation.

In addition, 200 other ships will participate as auxiliary ships, and these ships will be used as support ships, including large fortune ships purchased from local shipyards, and pirate ships left behind by the Toucheng pirates, which will participate in the operation as logistics ships and hospital ships.

The forward 30 warships set out on the 18th of the first month, and they will break through the coastal barrier and sail directly to Tianjin, followed by the same number of logistics ships, fully guaranteeing the supply of their long-distance voyage. The preparations on the route were also sufficient, Zhou Lang even asked for a chart to go north through the East India Company last year, and it was the chart drawn by the Magalny mission, not only the hydrological situation along the way, but even the hydrology of the inland river in Tianjin, they measured it. Later, during the Opium War, the British still used these charts as references.

Of course, the East India Company would not give Zhou Lang a fair hand, and asked Zhou Lang to allow the East India Company to have the right of priority in trade once he opened up the northern base.

These charts were available from Guangdong to Tianjin, China, so the East India Company did not link Zhou Lang's request for charts with the Northern Expedition, only thinking that Zhou Lang was probably preparing for the north, as for where to go north, they did not know, at this time, no one could have imagined that Zhou Lang would go thousands of miles to Beijing, even Qianlong could not have imagined, otherwise they would never dare to send out the Beijing camp.

This kind of surprise is precisely the most favorable condition.

Zhou Lang has expanded to the elite of an army's battalion, escorted by the advance fleet commanded by Lin Fazhi, and set sail from Xiamen in a low-key manner, and go north.

The waters of northern Zhejiang are already under the control of the Qing army, but the Qing court sailors usually only retreat in the offshore sea and ports, and they do not dare to confront the huge fleet in the outer oceans, and they don't even know whether they have discovered it.

The fleet approached the north, and it took half a month to finally sail to the sea off Tianjin, and it was only then that the Qing court discovered them.

However, it was already too late, and Tianjin's defense was very lax, which was related to the military laxity in the general environment, and also related to the outdated military concept, even if they sent a cadre to rectify the coastal defense, they would not be able to do it well, because the Qing court could not find a person who knew how to defend against attacks on the open sea. Four hundred years have passed since the Waiko Rebellion, and the experience of this kind of defense from sea attacks can only be obtained from books, and the knowledge of 400 years ago in the books is outdated. Tianjin's current coastal defense situation is still the same way as in the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, which is to build a fortress and garrison fortification.

Historically, until 1841, in order to prevent the West from becoming more and more powerful naval forces, after several years of operation, 5 large forts, 12 earthen forts, and 13 earthen forts were built in the Dagukou Fort to form the Dagu Fort Group, and now there are none, only some earthen cannons, installed on the castle of the Ming Dynasty model, at best, they are watchtowers, and they can't even directly bombard the fleet at sea, mainly to prevent the Japanese from landing on a foothold.

Under such a defensive force, the forward fleet did not need to make a detour, and went straight to the mouth of the White River, and under the cover of gunboats, the elite of the Shuai battalion called the small boat landing, advanced to the pillboxes beyond the reach of the naval guns, and conquered them one by one with infantry guns.

They felt that it was easier than attacking the Tiger Gate. The fighting will of the Qing army garrisoned in Tianjin, which defended the Dagu Pass, was even inferior to that of the Guangdong army. It took one day to occupy Dagukou, the second day to march for one day, and the third day to attack outside Tianjin.

Half a day is used to fight, and there is still half a day left to appease the people.

By the time the main fleet arrived three days later, the entire port was under control, and the vanguard had even recruited enough dock porters for them to load and unload supplies.

When the news of the Battle of Tianjin reached Fujian, the propaganda work was immediately launched, and Wang Fuqian ran non-stop around Fujian, meeting with the wealthy families with the surname, and asking the various government officials to announce the generalissimo's Northern Expedition to Beijing.

The Northern Expedition was plastered all over Fujian, and it continued to be vigorously printed, and it was also distributed to Guangdong and Jiangxi. Efforts should be made to transform the prestige of this military operation into the confidence of the landlord clique in Zhou Lang, so that they would support Zhou Lang, take refuge in Zhou Lang, and use their strength to expand their own strength and foundation.

At the same time, he also sent secret representatives to Jiangxi and Guangdong to lobby the local famous families and landlords with big surnames, if they could revolt from behind and then surrender to Zhou Lang, which would of course be even more wonderful.

There is an agreement with Changlin, Jiangxi is too chaotic, so the secret representatives he sent, except for a very few who were tied up by those stubborn landlords and handed over to the government, most of them successfully conveyed Fujian's sincerity to the local local elites, of course, the cluster response did not appear, most of the landlords did not even give any reply, a small number expressed goodwill, a very small number expressed their loyalty, only three really took action, they sent a few of their sons and nephews to take refuge in Zhou Lang, which is considered to be a bet on Zhou Lang.

The news of the Northern Expedition spread all over the southeast even faster than it reached Beijing, because the Manchu court severely blocked the news, but there were many rumors in Beijing, and for a time people were panicked, and the ignorant people rumored that heaven and earth would call, which was to avenge Chongzhen Ye, but some said that Chongzhen Ye was killed by a thief, so there were rumors that Heaven and Earth would come to avenge King Li Chuang, and the rumors were three sides a day, and Beijing was shocked three times a day.

The people panicked, and the court was also frightened by Zhou Lang's sneak attack on Tianjin.

With the change of the war situation, a large number of courtiers began to think that Zhou Lang, who was entrenched in Fujian to win people's hearts, was more dangerous than Chen Zhouquan, but they had no choice, Zhou Lang hid behind Chen Zhouquan and couldn't fight Wuyi Mountain at all. The strength of the naval division is not good, and even Chen Zhouquan, who is entrenched in southern Zhejiang, can't suppress it, so he can only block the other party from going north to northern Zhejiang, so it is impossible to attack Fujian from the sea.

As for Guangdong, if Zhou Lang did not fight Guangdong, the Qing court would be very lucky, and it could not expect the Cantonese soldiers, who were known for their weakness, to be able to confront the Fujian soldiers who sent troops with barbarism.

But now the imperial court has not sent troops to suppress the thieves, but the thieves have hit Tianjin, how is this good.

Fukangan is already dead, the Manchu Dynasty civil and military forces can't come up with a feasible plan, the military has withered to this point, people are helpless, the highest military body, among the three ministers of the Military Aircraft Department, it is actually headed by a figure like He Shen, how to fight this battle?