Tan Tiyuan impatiently interrupted the two foreigners who were babbling in Dutch, and said directly to Van Basten: "Van Basten, don't say so much, tell him directly, this Borneo was originally called Boni Kingdom, and it has been a vassal state of my Chinese Celestial Empire since the Song and Yuan dynasties." Nowadays, a large number of Chinese compatriots have lived, and the Republic of Lanfang has been established, and this Republic of Lanfang has attached itself to the motherland and voluntarily become a vassal state of our Celestial Empire. Therefore, I declare that from now on, this Borneo is the territory of our Chinese Empire, and that if the Dutch soldiers remain on the land of Borneo, it will be an act of aggression, and if the Dutch do not want to cause war, they must leave as soon as possible. For Ma Chen and Sammarinda, in a month I will lead the Nanyang Fleet into the two places. ”

Tan Tiyuan has learned that there are two other treaty ports in Borneo, namely Ma Chen and Sammarinda. However, Machen was developed earlier, and there were many Chinese who made a living there, while Samarinda was a newly occupied place recently occupied by the Dutch, and the port and fortress had just been built, and they were recruiting laborers to develop it. However, for Tan Ti Yuan, the port of Sammarinda is more important because he is in the easternmost part of Borneo, and if he captures it, he will be able to occupy the nearby island of Sulawesi. According to his Dutch servant Van Basten, the island was not occupied by the Dutch, but only occupied a colonial stronghold called Hopeassar and most of the island was occupied by two small kingdoms called Bony and Gova.

Seeing that his master was impatient, Van Basten hurriedly agreed, and his attitude was not very good, not only relayed Tan Tiyuan's original words to Andersen, but also added fuel to Tan Tiyuan's one-month deadline to twenty days, and finally threatened: "If the two strongholds are not ceded to the Republic of Lanfang within twenty days, the Nanyang Fleet will directly attack and recover the Maluku Islands east of Lavesi." ”

Van Basten took the opportunity to take revenge, his grandfather was Dutch, since his father's generation lost the qualification of the first class, reduced to the second-class local indigenous white people, suffered from Andersen, a noble and superior person from the Netherlands, did not have a good impression of the Netherlands in the East Indies, and was able to drill camps, after understanding the strength of the Chinese Empire, and seeing the power of the warships and guns of the South Ocean Fleet, his mentality began to change, and it can be said that he wanted to make meritorious service wholeheartedly. I wish that the Chinese Empire would occupy the entire East Indies, and when the time comes, such a large territory will definitely need to be managed by people who are familiar with these places, and I am a reliable person who is familiar with these places.

Anderson's face changed drastically. He was really angry.

When will the Dutch kingdom in Europe be threatened by the backward Orientals? Or through himself, if this spreads, he will return to Europe in the future, and the whole family will be embarrassed.

But now that the kingdom had declined, King William III and his prime minister, Johann Tolbeck, were preoccupied with fiddling with their new representative government, believing that no one could threaten the East Indies with an agreement with Great Britain, and instead engaged in trade to extract wealth and send it to the kingdom itself to make up for the deficit in Europe. Unexpectedly, such a monster would emerge in this backward east, and it would have such strength to offend the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

Thanks to the old governor Rokote still thinking about letting these Orientals apologize and leave Borneo, without much investigation, Andersen felt that it was simply an irony!

It seems that they must be taught a lesson.

Anderson didn't care what the Governor said, what British might not be able to help, and now that the kingdom is underarmed in the East Indies, it is better not to act rashly? Everyone has bullied the kingdom! If you don't fight back, you'll be driven out of the East Indies!

Thinking of this, Andersen said angrily: "You are declaring war on the Kingdom of the Netherlands!" So there is nothing to say, you wait to be wiped out by the Dutch navy and sink to the bottom of the sea! ”

With that, Andersen turned around and wanted to leave.

Four soldiers of the captives stopped him.

After asking about Van Basten, Tan Tiyuan ordered Andersen to be detained, and the accompanying MP was released to bring the news back to Batavia. Tan Tiyuan doesn't understand any rules in Europe, since there is going to be a war, then directly detain this minister of war, and let the other party lose a little.

Anderson didn't expect Tan Tiyuan to do this, he yelled and was as irritable as thunder, but not only was it useless, but he was quickly gagged with rags, and he could only watch the frightened and pale MP leave.

Now that war has been declared, Tan Tiyuan no longer keeps his promise to give the Dutch a month to evacuate from the two places of Machen and Sammarinda. He immediately directly ordered that a leader of the Lanfang Republic named Guo Yazhen lead 2,000 Chinese elite to go to the south and east of Borneo with the special forces battalion of the 38th Division of the Synchronous Army to occupy Machen and Sammarinda. According to Guo Yazhen, Sanmarinda is a small town, only a few dozen Dutch soldiers are stationed, and it is easy to capture, while although Ma Chen has more than 100 Dutch soldiers stationed and built a fortress, there are still two or three thousand Chinese living there, as long as he Guo Yazhen goes to greet him, he will definitely be able to respond and assist in the siege.

The next step was to concentrate on the Dutch East Indies naval fleet. On the one hand, he sent someone to ask Andersen, who was detained, to tell him about the warship power of the fleet in Batavia, and on the other hand, he sent people to rush to Brunei Bay northeast of Sarawak to send a letter to the second fleet of the Kingdom of Brunei, asking them to rush to Pontianak to join forces. After all, although the scale of the foreigner's fleet is still very large, the number is not small, and after all, it was once a maritime power, and it is not to be underestimated that it can occupy this South Sea region for so long.

Dare to fight, does not mean indiscriminately. These warships are all Tan Tiyuan's treasures, and they are also the treasures of His Majesty the Emperor, although the emperor let him make his own decisions, but Tan Tiyuan did not dare to be careless at all.

In the end, after a violent beating, Andersen still honestly revealed the warships of the Dutch fleet, which was basically the same as what Van Basten had revealed, which made Tan Tiyuan further confirm that Van Basten was still reliable.

He originally wanted to unexpectedly lead the fleet into Batavia and attack that fleet directly, but thinking about the fact that there are only two sub-fleets now, even if the strength and firepower of the warships have a huge advantage, he is still worried that there will be big losses, and the foreigners' fleet is still based on the strength of the writing, not to mention that the fortress on the shore of Batavia also has batteries, and such an important place is only afraid that the defense will not be weak. Besides, who knows if Britain will intervene, even if they can't send troops on a large scale, a small navy can still be sent. Therefore, for the sake of prudence, Tan Tiyuan decided to wait for Pontianak to join the second fleet before confronting the enemy head-on.

Three days later, I received a report from the sentinel ship that there were warships outside a small fishing port called Songbai Port in the west of Pontianak, and it seemed that it was the second detachment of Lord Ding.

Tan Tiyuan suddenly became sensitive, Ding Ruchang and the second detachment of the second fleet have arrived? Could it be that it happened to collide with a Dutch warship?

Now that Ding Ruchang and the others have arrived, they can't send anyone to find out, whether they are Dutch or not, anyway, those who are enemies of the Second Fleet are the enemies of the Nanyang Fleet. He immediately ordered all the warships of the 1st and 3rd fleets, except for two warships to guard the estuary, and rushed in the direction of Songbai Harbor.

It was only an hour or two before bursts of shelling were heard. On the sea in the distance, a combined fleet composed of more than 10 warships was pursuing a small fleet, and the warship being pursued was very familiar, it was the second detachment of the Nanyang Fleet.

It's really the Dutch East Indies fleet stationed in Batavia! Looking through the telescope, a large warship led by the leader, similar to a cruiser, but slower than the average cruiser, but the deck gun doors are much opener, it seems that this is what Van Basten said, the Dutch battle cruiser with the most firepower.

However, Tan Tiyuan has already seen this kung fu. Although the second squadron seemed to be being chased and fought by the Dutch fleet, it was actually just a tactic of Ding Ruchang. The main warship of the Dutch fleet, the battle cruiser, and the two cruisers and the three frigates were all relatively slow, probably about 9-10 knots, and the speed of the four gunboats was about the same, only those few armed steamships could reach a speed of about 12, but because the firepower was too small, they did not dare to pursue excessively, so they could only protect their wings on both sides.

The five warships of the Second Squadron are all powered by new-type steam engines, and their speeds are about 12 knots, especially the flagship "Nanyang II", which is a fast warship with sails driven by steam engines, and has a speed of 13 knots. The "Nanyang No. 5" and a gunboat, which had a relatively slow speed of only 8 knots, did not follow, presumably because of the slow speed, and Ding Ruchang left them behind to guard those troop carriers.

In this way, the "Nanyang II" led the other four warships to take the Dutch warships around the sea, and from time to time took advantage of the opportunity of the ship's side to aim at the enemy ship when it turned a corner, and fired back with guns. Black smoke came from one of the cruisers in the Dutch fleet, presumably caused by a scorching iron bullet that caused the cabin to catch fire.

It may be that the lookout of the Dutch fleet has discovered the main force of the Nanyang Fleet rushing towards the southeast, and no longer pursues the second fleet, but shrinks the formation and prepares to retreat to the southwest, but Tan Tiyuan will not let go of such an excellent opportunity!

At the sound of an order, the First and Third Fleets spread out in two columns and cut diagonally to intercept the Dutch fleet. The second squadron also discovered the situation, turned around and began to attack back.

The speed advantage was soon revealed, and with a slight delay by the Third Squadron, it didn't take long for the Dutch fleet to be caught diagonally up and down by the Nanyang Fleet and into range.