【2nd Update】

“…… Any attempt by any country to prevent China's peaceful rise will will be destroyed by the strong will of the 60,000,000 Chinese people, and China will never allow any power to provoke ...... in order to seek the country's stability and development."

In the early morning of July 21, Zhou Ruidong, on behalf of the government, issued the "National Letter to the People on China's Participation in the War", announcing that the country had entered a state of war readiness, and at the same time issued a conscription order, calling on young people in the country who are interested in dedicating themselves to the country to join the army, and conscripting reserve officers to return to the army! On the same day, the Cabinet meeting approved a plan for the management of wartime materials and a temporary additional issuance of 20 billion yuan of war bonds.

On the same day, the National Assembly convened an emergency vote to approve the cabinet bond proposal, and passed the motion, in order to deal with wartime emergencies, the cabinet was authorized to handle the wartime special proposal, and after receiving the authorization, Zhou Ruidong immediately convened a special cabinet meeting to agree to the "Army and Navy Expansion Proposal" put forward by the Ministry of Military Affairs, and planned to expand the existing 75 army divisions to 170 army divisions within one year.

At the same time, the Ministry of Military Affairs invited tenders for the construction of 30 battleships, 5 aircraft carriers, and 150 destroyers from domestic shipbuilding enterprises, including the four major heavy industries.

On the 22nd, under the leadership of the government, large-scale mass demonstrations broke out in the entire Greater China region, including the Federal Republic, in support of the government's declaration of war against the United States and Britain. In major cities and towns across the country, young people have come to the recruitment offices to sign up for the army.

But. The situation of domestic support for the front line did not change the situation in the Pacific in the slightest, and it has been a full 50 hours. Edward? The main force of the US Pacific Fleet under Vice Admiral Abel disappeared like steam in the waters east of Brisbane, and reconnaissance planes from the South China Theater of Operations departed from North Australia and New Guinea searched everywhere, but never found any trace of the Americans during the voyage.

In the past three days, hanging on the chart of the staff office of the South China Theater Command in Subic Bay, the huge concentric circle of the enemy's range has covered the entire North Australia region and the entire territory of New Guinea at the farthest point...... But. But the enemy never appeared!

This made Lieutenant General Chen Ming, who was in charge of the overall situation, also a headache, and the Yankees' action this time, at least from now on, seems to have been done perfectly. Although no definite information was obtained from the Abel fleet, a large amount of reconnaissance intelligence was obtained, and important information was obtained......

None of the ships or airships departing from Cana Harbour, the southernmost tip of Northern Australia, have found any trace of the enemy, which at least supports one point. Although Abel had the Army on hand. But he apparently had no plans to attack North Australia, and at the same time, the Americans did not attack the trading ports of New Guinea that were close at hand, and the Chilean warships cruising the South Pacific were not nowhere to be found.

Chen Ming had been standing in the staff room since early in the morning and pondering this question, and after carefully scrutinizing and measuring the possible routes, he realized that his judgment should be accurate -- the Americans went north! As for the purpose of Abel's northward journey, it became a little confusing. But Chen Ming was very decisive in the end and gave his own verdict.

At 10:17 a.m., Lu Han listened to the deduction report of the staff room in the war room. He immediately sent a telegram to He Rin, the commander of the home fleet who was on standby in the Sulu Sea, and at the same time informed the 2nd Squadron under the jurisdiction of Tangzhen and the 1st Squadron under the jurisdiction of Liuhetu -- the US fleet was trying to cut into the waters north of the Solomon Islands and seek an opportunity to attack the Chinese fleet!

In this sea area, the best target for attack is undoubtedly Guam, where the Pacific Second Fleet is stationed, 1,700 kilometers away from the Solomon Islands, which is convenient for replenishment, 6,000 kilometers away from the Hawaii Naval Base, 2,600 kilometers away from the home fleet's defense area, and at the same time, it is also nearly 1,700 kilometers away from the port of New Guinea that can provide maritime attack assistance.

Tang Zhen got a telegram from the theater command while he was having lunch, which made him immediately get up and turn around a few times excitedly,...... The Yankees are likely to come at him, this is really a pie-in-the-sky thing...... No, shouldn't the Americans be trapped!

After carefully mapping the charts in the flagship command room for two hours, he immediately realized a prediction that surprised him: If there had been no obvious mistakes in the previous continuous reconnaissance by the Navy from North Australia and New Guinea, and the Americans had chosen to circumvent the Solomon Islands for a large-scale maneuver, they would have chosen the extreme distance of the Lae base in New Guinea to avoid detection.

Then, taking the route of New Caledonia-Port Vila-Nauru is obviously the best route for the Americans, and they can also get coal and fresh water supplies from the ports of the British territories on the way, theoretically speaking, only one replenishment can increase the cruising range of the fleet by more than 50%, in that case, the long 7,000-kilometer route from Brisbane to Guam is also within the range of the Americans!

What makes Tang Zhen even more excited is that his fleet is searching all the way east from the Bismarck Sea, and it is less than 700 kilometers away from Nauru at the moment, which means that the Americans are also willing to be able to take Nauru as the center point, within a concentric circle of about 700-1000 kilometers, as for where the American fleet will be, whether the Americans have resupplied Port Vila or entered Nauru to resupply, will be the decisive factor.

"Send an order to the aircraft carrier Shandong, and immediately send a reconnaissance plane to reconnoiter in the direction of Nauru! At the same time, the 3rd destroyer detachment was ordered to search for the enemy in the southeast, due east, and to report every 15 minutes! Tang Zhen naturally would not let go of this opportunity, one order after another was issued immediately, the enemy may be in front of him, and he will definitely not allow the defeat of losing the opportunity.

As the commander of the fleet, he naturally knew the pros and cons of Guam's defense; although it had a natural harbor and the arch of the bay battery, Guam's port obviously lacked the weakness of depth, so that the warships were moored in the harbor, and it was impossible to avoid long-range shelling of more than 20,000 meters at the moment, but it might encounter a passive situation of being blocked in the bay.

Therefore, he did not hesitate to choose to attack the enemy, with the advanced battleships Shanxi and Shandong aircraft carriers, there is no doubt that it is the trump card at hand, in addition, although the number of main battleships in the second fleet is not much, but it is definitely an elite formation in the navy, the combination of the battleship Guangzhou and the dreadnought battleship makes Tang Zhen able to come up with a formation speed of 25 knots at hand.

In addition, the Qin-class battle cruiser Sky Wolf, which is still in service today, although it is an old battle cruiser with an age of more than 10 years, but after modernization, although the projection firepower cannot reach the effectiveness of the 10 main guns of the dreadnought, the 6 13.5-inch main guns are combined with the latest Tamron II series integrated fire control platform, and this battle cruiser undoubtedly still has strong combat effectiveness.

What's more, the Pacific Ocean is definitely China's home turf, and even if the Yankees have twice as many battleships as themselves, the destroyers supported by the Second Fleet and the submarine forces supported by the Second Fleet can obviously still contain some of the opponent's forces...... Therefore, for the head-on conflict that may break out soon, Tang Zhen not only did not have any fear, but was full of expectations.

At 1:35 p.m., Tang Zhen's prediction telegram about the Alber fleet arrived on the flagship of the home fleet, the Chiyou, which was also sailing eastward, and the fleet commander He Rin quickly verified his fellow student's prediction from the charts, which was indeed a very prescient inference, and he could even foresee the decisive battle in the vicinity of the British overseas colonies...... And the time given to him is clearly not enough.

As a defensive force, the combat effectiveness of the local fleet is completely at the bottom of the three major fleets in the South China Theater, but the tradition of the navy has never only looked at warships, excellent command ability and powerful auxiliary warships, can still exert amazing combat effectiveness! It's just that he has a voyage of more than 2,600 kilometers from the battlefield speculated by Tang Zhen, which is nearly 3 days.

For a whole day on the 22nd, a large number of Chinese Navy reconnaissance planes and destroyer detachments carried out overwhelming reconnaissance around the waters north of the Solomons, but ...... As a result, it was still depressing, and the fleet under Albert's command still did not appear in any predicted direction, seeing that the sky was getting darker and darker, Tang Zhen on the combat flagship Shanxi couldn't help but start muttering!

Did you make a complete mistake in your judgment? Or did the Yankees not go north at all and went home halfway? He had to stand by the charts and sketch the possible routes and possible points of rendezvous on the charts with pencils over and over again, but almost all of his inferences proved that he was able to search for the American fleet in the waters off Nauru, but the reality seemed to be completely different......

"General, report! There are urgent encrypted messages! ”

At this moment, the telegraph operator suddenly rushed into the command tower, put a telegram marked as top secret in his hand, and when Tang Zhen opened the telegram, he was immediately pleasantly surprised by the latest news provided by the telegram.

A Chinese submarine C173 that departed from New Guinea and operated near the Solomon Islands was originally only a training mission, but unexpectedly received a telegram from the military region overseas and was temporarily transferred to a combat readiness force, and Sun Xiao, the captain of the original training officer, was transferred to the commander, considering that there were only three long-range torpedoes on the ship, so Sun Xiao decided to temporarily return to resupply.

As a result, before nightfall, the C173 submarine accidentally spotted a formation of American destroyers passing less than 5,000 meters in front of him, which immediately aroused Sun Xiao's interest. (To be continued.) )