In the melodious whistle, sailors in white sailor suits, air crews in colorful training uniforms, pilots in leather jackets, and officers with well-groomed instruments stood on the side of the board to greet Chen Shaokuan and his entourage. Pen? Interesting? Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 After all, he has served as the secretary of the Navy for ten years, and Chen Shaokuan is still revered by the officers and men of the Navy.

"Prepare, start." After the whistle sounded three times, the officer on duty saw that Chen Shaokuan, Zhou Yingcong and others had already boarded the deck, and saluted each other with the captain of the ship, Colonel Fang Ying, and immediately shouted 'Ready' at the top of his voice. Accompanied by the captain Fang Ying, Chen Shaokuan, who was in the sound of military music, walked on the red carpet to review the honor guard, and his expression could not hide his excitement.

"It's not easy! It's not easy. Walking down the deck and entering the chief's room, Chen Shaokuan's body trembled a little, and his tone was also choked. However, after a while, he found a problem: there was no flag of the Kuomintang in the governor's office, nor was there a blue sky and white sun flag, let alone the portrait of the former premier Sun Yat-sen. Lin Xianxi was in charge of this work, and General Chen Jiliang had a silent attitude towards it.

"This is ......" Chen Shaokuan looked at the empty wall and began to ask knowingly.

"Oh," Fang Ying glanced at him and said with a smile, "The Navy doesn't intervene in partisan disputes, so everyone quits the party." ”

"Then why is there no blue sky and white sun flag?" Chen Shaokuan continued to ask, he didn't expect Fang Ying's excuse to be so high-sounding.

"The blue sky and white sun flag is not the national flag stipulated in the Constitution of the Republic of China, but the national flag formulated by the Kuomintang Party. In order to show that the Navy is not involved in partisan disputes, the Office of Naval Reconstruction has decided not to use the Blue Sky and White Sun flag unless it is recognized by the national constitution. Fang Ying went on to explain that this was not the first time he had been questioned.

"You ......" Chen Shaokuan looked at Fang Ying's calm face, he was glad that Lin Sen was still in Washington, and he didn't rush to visit the training aircraft carrier like him. He sighed, and finally said, "Doesn't the government have a covenant law?" The blue sky and white sun flag is the internationally recognized national flag of the Republic of China, what flag is used without the blue sky and white sun flag? ”

"The covenant is only a one-party covenant of the Kuomintang Party, not a covenant law agreed upon by the representatives of the provinces." Fang Ying continued to answer according to the external tone drawn up by the New York Navy Office. Seeing Chen Shaokuan ask what kind of national flag to use, he motioned to his adjutant to take out a flag from behind his desk, but when it was unfolded, it was an iron-blooded eighteen-star flag that had long been lost to history. "By order of the New York Office of Naval Reconstruction, the new Navy will have the iron-blooded eighteen-star flag as the national flag. In the past, the Manchus enslaved the Han Chinese, and the righteous soldiers of the eighteen provinces rose up to resist and overthrow the Manchus; Today, the Japanese invaders poison China, and the righteous people of the eighteen provinces still want to drive out the Japanese and restore China. ”

"You guys are fooling around!!" Chen Shaokuan's eyes instantly became redder than the iron-blooded eighteen-star flag, he didn't expect that the new navy didn't even recognize the national flag, and his anger was uncontrollable, and the chief's room was full of his roar. "Now that the War of Resistance is difficult, the situation is unpredictable, and you are doing this to put the government on the ground?! Where are 40,000 people?! The navy must be the navy of the Republic of China, not anyone's private army! ”

Fang Ying and others thought that Chen Shaokuan would like this iron-blooded eighteen-star flag - Fuzhou was recovered by the righteous army holding this iron-blooded eighteen-star flag in the Xinhai year, and Fuzhou was restored, and then the whole province of Fujian was recovered. The Manchurians of the past and the Japanese people today are the mortal enemies of the Fujian people, and it is reasonable for him to hold the eighteen-star flag to resist the war. I didn't expect Chen Shaokuan's reaction to see this flag so big, he rarely lost his temper like this.

Captain Yan Shouhua, the captain of another aircraft carrier training ship, Yingrui (the Great Buffalo cruise ship, which belongs to the Cleveland-Buffalo Company, which went bankrupt in 1939 and was purchased in October this year, but was not launched) was also greeted by Chen Shaokuan, who was also trained as the captain of the aircraft carrier, Colonel Ouyang Ji, Colonel Lin Jinghuan, Lieutenant Commander Chen Bingqing, Lieutenant Commander Lu Shufen, and Lieutenant Colonel Qi Cuiying. At first, they were also a little uncomfortable with changing the flag, but after the New York Massacre, everyone hated Chongqing, and no one wanted to hang the blue sky and white sun flag again.

"Minister, the Republic of China is the Republic of China, and the Guoli Party is the Guoli Party, we don't recognize the Republic of China, we just don't recognize the Guoli Party." After a long silence, Colonel Yan Shouhua, who was the oldest in qualifications, spoke up.

"Nonsense! You guys are fooling around. The party is the country, and the country is also the party, without the party, would there be the Republic of China? "Chen Shaokuan is still angry, but what he said is not right, before 1928, the Republic of China of the Beiyang government existed as well." Now in the War of Resistance Against Japan, even the Communist Party is united in resisting Japan under the leadership of the Standing Chairman, and the Navy is now unique, which is sabotaging the War of Resistance and will only make the relatives and enemies happy. ”

Chen Shaokuan Jiwei was still there, Yan Shouhua didn't dare to say more after he defended himself, and the others were silent. Fang Ying had to ask someone to put away the iron-blooded eighteen-star flag. However, the atmosphere in the chief's room suddenly became strange, and in front of everyone was the fact that Admiral Chen Shaokuan, the former Minister of the Navy, was not a member of the new navy, and his current status was only the representative of Chongqing to New York -- although Lin Sen stressed several times that he wanted to rebuild the Admiralty, Chang Kaishen only agreed in principle, but did not announce the order of the Nationalist Government to rebuild the Admiralty. Just now, Fang Ying welcomed Chen Shaokuan and his party with the highest naval courtesy, but now because of the flag, he was unhappy, and for a while, everyone didn't know what position to get along with the former minister.

Chen Shaokuan also felt that everyone was at a loss, he stood in the middle of everyone, looked around and said: "From the beginning of the establishment of the navy, its responsibility is to protect the homeland and defend the country, Jinghai and clear the territory, starting from the Majiang River, this is the third time that the Chinese navy has been destroyed, but once it is destroyed and rebuilt, we will never compromise with the enemy." The Navy can have this Tongji training aircraft carrier in the Great Lakes today, and everyone has made great contributions. It's not that with these merits, you can forget your roots, and you can't obey the orders of the government.

The navy is the navy of the country, the navy of the national government, not the private navy of any of us. Failing to do so would be treasonous and criminal......"

From the moment he saw Li Kongrong answering reporters' questions in Singapore, Chen Shaokuan was holding back a wave of anger in his stomach, and today he finally broke out on the Tongji aircraft carrier training ship. He felt that Li Kongrong's comparison of the new navy to Zheng Zhilong's fleet was deviant, and that the fleet's failure to hang the blue sky and white sun flag and the portrait of the former prime minister was a treasonous crime, and he never knew that Li Kongrong and others had already committed treason.

Chen Shaokuan seldom lectured, and this time he was angry in his heart, but he always avoided the assassination in New York and the death of Chen Jiliang, a force of the 1st Fleet, which was an irreconcilable contradiction between the navy and the Nationalist government in Chongqing.

From the moment Chen Shaokuan boarded the ship, the Tongji training ship sailed away from the Chicago dock. Following a converted icebreaker, the 7,500-ton training aircraft carrier bowed through the calm waters of Lake Michigan and headed for a remote body of water, a training ground for naval aviation.

After a lengthy lecture, Chen Shaokuan, accompanied by Fang Ying, visited the entire aircraft carrier, and the first thing to visit was the carrier-based aircraft on the flight deck.

"This is the Grumman F5F carrier-based fighter, we all call it a rocket." Major Chen Qiguang was the chief training officer on the Tongji training aircraft carrier, and he naturally introduced the carrier-based aircraft. "The engine horsepower is 1,800 horsepower, which is twice that of the Japanese aircraft, the maximum speed is more than 600 kilometers, the climbing speed is 17.8 meters per second, and it can climb to 6,000 meters in seven minutes.

In order to increase the number of aircraft carried by the carrier, the wings of both carrier-based aircraft are foldable. The width of the rocket fighter is thirteen meters without folding, and only 4.93 meters after folding; The saboteur attack aircraft produced by the Douglas company was nearly 15 meters wide, only 6.85 meters after folding, and the height of the aircraft was 4.75 meters at first, and the hangar could not fit at all, but they finally made an improvement, adding a collapsible joint to the landing gear, reducing the height to 4.5 meters, so that the problem was completely solved. ”

For the convenience of introduction, an F5F Sky Rocket fighter and a saboteur attack aircraft were parked side by side on the deck, both planes were painted in blue camouflage, and the sides of the fuselage and wings had black, yellow and red eighteen-star logos, Chen Shaokuan's eyes were red again. Fortunately, he had already reprimanded him just now, and even if the fleet wanted to change, it would be too late to change it, so he could only endure it this time. "What about the torpedo machine?" He asked. "Why don't you see the torpedo machine?"

"Attack planes are torpedo planes." Chen Qiguang said. "Commander Li said that merging dive bombers and torpedo bombers into one type of aircraft will not only reduce the difficulty of air service operations on ships, but will also make it very convenient to increase or decrease the carrying capacity of bombs and torpedoes.

"That's right." Chen Shaokuan pondered for a moment, but he didn't expect it to be this way of thinking. "How many fighters and how many attack planes can that aircraft carrier carry?"

Chen Qiguang is only a combat officer, and the first aircraft carrier has not yet been launched, so he has no idea how many planes an aircraft carrier can carry. Seeing this, Fang Ying said: "This looks at the size of the aircraft carrier. According to the design of the Ninghai, excluding spare aircraft, the aircraft carrier should be able to carry three squadrons of combat aircraft, one squadron is a fighter, one dive attack aircraft, and one torpedo attack aircraft. A squadron of twenty-four aircraft, that is, seventy-two altogether. ”

"There are so many?" Chen Shaokuan was taken aback, although he had proposed the construction of aircraft carriers, his understanding of aircraft carriers was not specific. The 30,000-ton Kaga carrier-based aircraft has only 50 or 60 aircraft, but its own aircraft carrier has 72 aircraft.

"Yes. We pack a lot. Fang Ying said with a smile. The wings of our aircraft are foldable, the wings of Japanese naval aircraft are not foldable. The three aircraft carrier hangars built in the dock are of the same design, all double-deck hangars, with the upper deck 169 meters long, 16 meters wide and 4.64 meters high, and the lower deck 143 meters long and 4.65 meters wide and 4.65 meters wide and high. Because the upper deck is a broadside lift, only the upper hangar has to subtract the lift area, and the total hangar area is 4,576 square meters.

The lower hangar can hold 31 attack planes, and the upper hangar can put 33 attack planes, which is 64 planes, but because the hangar still needs to put some spare planes and parts, the two-story hangar is only intended to put 48 attack planes, and the other 24 fighters are all placed on the deck. ”

"With spare aircraft, how many aircraft can an aircraft carrier carry?" Chen Shaokuan asked.

"About 90 planes, Hansheng said the more planes, the better." Fang Ying said. "This is the Ninghai class, and the two ships that were docked in September belong to the same class as her, and the number of aircraft on board is the same. The other two large aircraft carriers do not know, more than a hundred is a certainty, most likely up to one hundred and thirty. The hangar is mostly equipped because the hangar is specially designed for these two types of aircraft, with a width of 16 meters, and the method of placing it side by side from head to tail can be placed, and the fighters can be placed in four rows, and the attack aircraft can be placed in three rows, and it is not easy to put other planes. ”

An aircraft carrier is essentially a mobile airfield at sea, and the design of an aircraft carrier is entirely centered around aircraft. Whether it is the Ninghai or the other two German cruise ships, their side widths are about 20 meters. The hangar of the Ninghai class is very small compared with the Canglong class, which has a similar tonnage and also uses a double-decker hangar, and although the length of this type of aircraft carrier hangar is comparable to that of the Ninghai class, the width is 18.2 meters, which is 2.2 meters wider than the Ninghai class.

The size of the hangar, the size of the deck, the size of the elevator, and how the carrier-based aircraft are arranged, these questions have been tormenting the nerves of the designers and Fang Ying and others a few months ago, but fortunately, the carrier-based aircraft are specially designed, and the aircraft carrier only uses these carrier-based aircraft to fight, so this problem is simple.

Chen Shaokuan didn't go through such torture, he was just surprised that the Ninghai-class aircraft carrier could be loaded with so many planes, and after listening to Fang Ying's explanation, he suddenly realized that it was not because there were too many hangars, but because there was a squadron of fighters on the flight deck.

"Is the plane on deck?" Chen Shaokuan's aircraft carrier planes were all stored in the hangar, and he had never seen them on the deck.

"There's no big problem, Hansheng said that the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier is also put in this way." Fang Ying replied. "Aircraft carriers fight planes, and the more planes, the more deadly; The flight deck should also be wide and slender, so that more aircraft can take off at a time. Hansheng also said that the battleship engagement was two eggs colliding, and the strength and the thickness of the eggshell determined the victory; In aircraft carrier combat, two blindfolded swordsmen are stabbing each other, and victory depends not only on who unveils the blindfold first to see the other party, but also on whose sword is sharper, because as long as it is injured, that side will completely lose its offensive ability and have to sit and wait for death. ”