Hanaya continued.

"Although we don't have a gunner for this kind of heavy artillery, it doesn't matter, the principle of all guns is the same, we have 75mm field gunners. Of course, they need to be trained to get acquainted with it, which is why we originally scheduled the incident for September 28. At that time, the gunners have been trained, and the sorghum and corn have been harvested, and the firing range will be good. ”

Hanayamasa's words surprised Tsuchihara again.

"Originally scheduled for September 28? Then why did it change to September 18, shortened by ten days, isn't this a hurry? ”

Regarding Tu Feiyuan's question, Hua Gu couldn't help but blush. This reminded him of some ugly things that had happened in the past few days.

The news that had come back from the country made Hayashi Kujiro, the consul general of the city in Mukden, very uneasy, because he had heard that news had been circulating in Tokyo since around 5 September that the Kwantung Army was going to launch an incident in northeastern China. On September 15, after some inquiry, Hayashi Kujiro sent a secret telegram to Foreign Minister Kishigero Bihara: "The Kwantung Army has gathered troops, brought out supplies and ammunition, and has recently taken military action. After Kishigero Bihara received the secret telegram, at the cabinet meeting on the same day, Bihara questioned Minamijiro Rikuhara. When most of the cabinet members heard about this, they also expressed their resolute opposition and demanded that Minamijiro resolutely suppress and control the radicals of the Kwantung Army.

Although Nanjiro didn't know what Itagaki and the others' plan looked like, he still had some feelings from the ambiguous attitude of Miji Kenkawa, Nagata Tetsuyama, Koiso Kuniaki and others towards this rumor.

Nanjiro not only did not feel a trace of dissatisfaction with his subordinates who wanted to launch an incident in Manchuria in advance behind his back, but on the contrary, he was secretly happy.

If the incident fails, it will be a matter for the Kwantung Army, and the commander of the Kwantung Army, Shigeru Honjo, will be primarily responsible. If the incident succeeds, it will be time to advance the plan for a year later, and the cabinet politicians who are looking ahead will have to bite the bullet and clean up the mess. Although he still has to bear some responsibilities, in order to gain the lifeline of the Great Empire, it is worth it for him to lose more.

However, after all, he is the Minister of War, and he still has to "do" about the cabinet's decision.

In order to clear his shoulders, Minamijiro told the cabinet that he would consult with the chief of staff, Kanaya Bunzo, on the grounds that he had directly sent personnel to interfere with the troops stationed abroad as land minister and exceeded his authority, and then Kanaya Bunzo would send someone to Manchuria.

Kanaya Fanzo, who was completely kept in the dark, sent Miji Kenkawa, chief of operations of the General Staff Headquarters, to the northeast to stop the Kwantung Army's actions, and sent a telegram to the commander of the Kwantung Army, Honjo Shigeru, solemnly telling Honjo Shigeru, "I want him to suppress some restless Kwantung Army Shaozhuang faction officers, not to provoke any trouble in the northeast within a year, let alone to act without approval." ”

Because Miji Kenkawa had long understood and approved of the plan to occupy the Northeast by force, before leaving, Miji Jianchuan deliberately revealed the decision of the military headquarters to Shingoro Hashimoto, and Hashimoto immediately sent three secret telegrams to Itagaki one after another, revealing to him the situation in his own country and urging him to act as soon as possible.

After receiving a telegram from Kanaya Fanzo, Honjo Shigeru did not dare to suppress the telegram, and immediately ordered the chief of staff, Miyake Koji, to convey the contents of the telegram to all the middle and senior officers of the Kwantung Army, and made a stern request.

This couldn't help but make Itagaki very angry, and he questioned the core people involved in the project one by one how the news came out.

Hanaya had no choice but to admit that in order to raise money for the incident in Tokyo, he used alcohol to tell the secret.

In order to ensure that it would not fall short, Ishihara and Itagaki agreed and said to Hanayamasa, "The 'wicker lake plan' in late September will not be carried out." ”

So, on the evening of September 15, Itagaki, Ishihara, Hanaya Masa, Mitani Kiyoshi, Imada Shintaro, Kawashima, Ono, Kojima, Nakura and others gathered again at the Mukden secret service, and Hanaya Masashi first read out three telegrams sent by Shingoro Hashimoto from Tokyo one after another, which said: "Defeated, Kenkawa will do it before he goes." ”

Mitani, Imada and others strongly advocated that the orders of the military headquarters should be ignored and decisive action should be taken; And Hanaya was a little retracted at this time, advocating that since the staff headquarters was opposed, it would be useless to make a move, so it was better to give up, find another opportunity, or wait until he saw Jianchuan, and then decide whether to continue to act according to Jianchuan Miji's attitude.

What everyone didn't expect was that the masterminds of this secret plan, Itagaki and Ishihara Waner, also agreed with Hanaya Masa's opinion, and Mitani Kiyoshi, Imada Shintaro, Kawashima, Ono and others who were in the dark had to leave angrily.

But just a few hours later, in addition to Hanaya Masa, who was not regarded as a "dangerous element" by Itagaki, Shintaro Imada, Kawashima and others were called by Ishihara and told them that they had finally decided to do it on September 18, and Imada was very excited when he heard the news.

It wasn't until this morning that Shintaro Imada came to tell Hanaya Masashi about his new decision on the 18th according to Itagaki's meaning.

Although Hanaya Masashi was annoyed that Itagaki and Ishihara Waner intended to hide the change plan from him, he also knew that he was wrong, so he had to hurry up and start the arrangement urgently.

Seeing that Hanaya was embarrassed to continue, Itagaki said with a solemn expression: "Although Your Excellency Jianchuan supports us, after all, he came to Mukden to stop our actions on the orders of His Excellency Nanjiro and His Excellency Kanaya, and we can't let His Excellency Jianchuan bear too much responsibility. That's why we decided to move forward the plan by 10 days. ”

"When will Your Excellency Jianchuan arrive in Mukden?" Dohihara asked with a little worry.

Regarding the question of Tohihara, Itagaki smiled meaningfully and said: "Your Excellency Kenchuan said that he had fought in Korea and Manchuria during the Russian War, and he was eager to see the scenery of these places again, so he did not take a plane from Tokyo, but entered Manchuria by land through Korea. Kanda Masasa in North Korea has already called us to inform us that His Excellency Kenchuan will board the train tomorrow morning, and if everything is normal, he will arrive at Benxihu Station at 11:30 a.m. tomorrow and will arrive in Mukden on time at 7 p.m. ”

Obviously, he could rush to Fengtian on the day of the plane, but Jianchuan was as slow as he went, and it took more than three days to arrive in Fengtian, which was obviously buying time for Itagaki and others.

"Good!"

Dohihara said solemnly: "Itagaki-kun, Ishihara-kun, and Hanaya-kun, I have decided to join your great plan to expand the territory of the Great Empire. ”

"Mixi!"

Itagaki, Ishihara Wan'er, Hanayamasa, and Tsuchihara laughed at the same time.

Dohihara put away his smile and said, "After listening to Itagaki-kun's analysis, I also think that it is not difficult for us to defeat the Northeast Army and occupy Manchuria. ”

"But I still have worries, and my worries are the same as the Cabinet's worries, that is, after we occupy Manchuria, we will inevitably invite the intervention of the United States and the Soviet Union, which is better said, that is a matter for the Cabinet. However, for the possible counterattack of Zhang Xueliang and Chiang Kai-shek, the existing strength of our Kwantung Army is still insufficient, and we must let the military headquarters increase the number of troops in Manchuria as soon as possible. ”

Ishihara, who was already in a much better mood, said with a smile: "Tufeiyuan-kun, it is necessary to increase the number of troops in Manchuria, but the increase in troops is not to prevent the interference and attack of the United States and the Soviet Union, Chiang Kai-shek, and Zhang Xueliang, but so that we can control the entire territory of Manchuria as soon as possible and completely drive the Northeast Army out of Shanhaiguan." ”

"Oh! Why is that? Could it be that Ishihara judged that the United States and the Soviet Union would not interfere with us? Even Chiang Kai-shek and Zhang Xueliang will not send troops to recover Manchuria, which we occupy? ”

Tu Feiyuan asked puzzled.

"Yes."

Ishihara nodded affirmatively and said: "The United States has learned the lessons of its participation in World War I, and now they are pursuing isolationism, and they will never take any substantive action against our occupation of Manchuria except for verbal condemnation, as long as the cabinet deals with them." ”

"Because of the Middle Road incident, the Soviet political axe has decided that Zhang Xueliang and his Northeast Army are very hostile to them, and the Soviet Union will never help Zhang Xueliang. Moreover, now the main force of the Soviet Far Eastern Army is fighting bitterly with the Chinese in Outer Mongolia, and the Soviet Union not only does not have the energy to interfere in our military operations in Manchuria, I am afraid that he will be afraid that we will covet their Siberia. ”

"So I think the Soviets would even welcome our military action in Manchuria, and then let us engage in a large-scale battle with Zhang Xueliang and the army of the Chinese political axe. In that way, it will not only contain the Chinese and prevent them from sending reinforcements north to Outer Mongolia, but also make our empire unable to look east to their Siberia, and it will also prevent us from competing with them for Northern Mongolia. ”

"Also, Chiang Kai-shek is now busy dealing with the rebellion of Wang Ching-wei's Canton political axe and the GCD in Kiangsi, and pacifying the self-respecting warlords in China, and he is simply not capable of sending heavy troops into Manchuria."

"As for Zhang Xueliang, this young master!"

Ishihara said in a very contemptuous tone: "Not to mention, as long as we quickly occupy Mukden and cut off his connection with the two provinces of Jihei, he will only be left with part of western Liao, and he will lose his most important supply of finance, taxes, soldiers, weapons and equipment, and even he will basically lose control of the two provinces, and his strength will be greatly damaged." ”

"With Zhang Xueliang's surname, he will only endure humiliation and bear heavy burdens, preserve the strength of the remaining Northeast Army, and never dare to fight against our Imperial Army. At that time, Kawamoto Dazuo blew up Zhang Xueliang's father Zhang Zuolin in Huanggutun, Zhang Xueliang endured it, and this time our Kwantung Army really used force, he was likely to be frightened, withdraw from Shanhaiguan in embarrassment, and give Manchuria to us. ”

Ishihara's words drew laughter from the four of them.

Tu Feiyuan smiled and said: "Ishihara-kun's analysis is very thorough, I think Ishihara-kun can be called a real China expert." However, Ishihara-kun has a different view on the issue of the political axe in Guangzhou. ”

(To be continued)