Chapter 151: War and Peace

London

By the time news of the defeat of the Hong Kong fleet arrived, the protest procession had already arrived at Downing Street.

Unlike the Boer War thirty years ago, it was a more "symmetrical" victory, although it cost Britain a greater price.

First, a huge price, in exchange for a huge return, the Boers were finally forced to sign an agreement to annex the two republics of Transvaal and Orench to Britain, although it cost a huge price of nearly 100,000 casualties, but in the eyes of the British people, it was a successful war against the 'provocateurs', because it was the same as the previous imperial wars, and finally won the final victory.

Secondly, it was a 'symmetrical' war. Behind the Boers were the Germans, and even from rifles to artillery, the Germans were behind them. Moreover, in the eyes of the English cattle, the Boers were of noble blood, they were descendants of the Dutch, pure white Europa. It is a war between civilized people.

However, what is China?

China was the Far Eastern hunting ground of the empire. From the Opium War in 184o, the empire conquered this ancient country in the Far East. There the empire could arbitrarily claim and even remove the priceless so-called national treasures from their palaces, and load the essence of national culture that symbolizes the inheritance of ancient civilizations back to Britain in a car, and put them in exquisite cabinets as a testimony to the achievements of the British Empire in colonizing the world.

However, in the past decade or so, Britain has continued to suffer from this opponent who used to bully in the past.

In the Sino-Burmese War, the political axe's explanation was that the imperial army was unable to carry out expeditions, logistics were cut off, and insufficient preparation led to failure.

The task force led by the deputy commander of the Far East Fleet was killed by an iron bullet dropped by a group of Chinese fighters, and the political axe explained that the Chinese dud bombs mistakenly hit the captain of the Royal Navy, and they shamefully stained the light of the land-based air force, and those combat planes, which they portrayed as shameful sold by the Germans to the Chinese.

Until the outbreak of the war in Hong Kong, the political axe first announced that all this was provoked by the Chinese, and it was the Chinese who were unwilling to be leased to Hong Kong, and they created an incident and provoked a war. When Hong Kong was occupied, they said that this was due to the lack of military spending, which led to too few troops in Hong Kong, and the empire needed more troops.

However, after one of the Hong Kong fleets was captured, one surrendered, and one was sunk, the British gentlemen could no longer remain calm.

They came to Downing Street, and some of them even wanted to take the opportunity to see France as embarrassed as it had been during the Sino-French War.

People shouted about the Interior's majesty, shouted all kinds of political slogans, and they even wanted to see each other.

As they wished, they met with the British Prime Minister, Mr. MacDonald.

"Citizens of London, not long ago I received a report from the Far East. In the report, the brave cruiser captain, Lieutenant Commander Dorrens, sent us back one last telegram with some key points.

The temporary defeat of the war is already difficult to change, so let me have the honour to read aloud to all gentlemen and ladies this thought-provoking telegram of the last return of the heroes of the Royal Navy.

Honorable Mr. First Sea Lord, Honorable Lord of the Admiralty, it is unfortunate that we will suffer an uncontainable defeat in this local war. The warriors of the empire have fought the most stubborn battles, but we are still being attacked by Chinese planes from every direction in the sky.

It is unbelievable that our ears are filled with the loud noise of aircraft dives and the screaming of pounds of heavy aerial bombs breaking through the air, but we have to admit that the despicable Chinese, like the great Royal Navy, have aircraft carriers that can fight near the sea. For the first time, their planes could take off from aircraft carriers to bomb our battleships. And the three Imperial warships, including the Warrior, lacked sufficiently effective means of air defense.

Here I would like to suggest to the two ministers that some of the guilty officers be exempted from their posts, and it is they who put us on the warships of the Far East, even with only four or five anti-aircraft guns. It was they who stubbornly believed that there was no air force in the Far East that dared to launch a sneak attack on the imperial warships, and as a result, we could only wait on the Far Eastern seas, alone and waiting to be bombed by Chinese aircraft.

It's so sad that we can never use the guns that symbolize the majesty of a battleship to hit the planes that fill the sky......"

With great grief and a tone of regret, MacDonald slowly read the letter, 'Lieutenant Colonel the Warrior Dorrens has returned'.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I think that at this moment, you are as angry as I am. In order to recognize the brave Lieutenant Colonel Dorrens for his bravery, we will do everything in our power to rescue him back home, and, following his advice, we will make an unprecedented personnel change to the relevant Admiralty officers. Next week you will see the list of appointments and dismissals, and we will publish them in the newspapers.

In addition, I will announce an important decision that our war with the Chinese will continue. At the same time, we will start building more battleships, more aircraft carriers, and we will prove to the world that the great British Royal Navy will not only have the world's first battleship, but we will also have the world's first aircraft carrier. I believe that when the battleships and aircraft carriers are perfectly arranged, it will be difficult for Chinese or anyone to stop the powerful fleet of the Reich......"

After making empty promises to the crowd, MacDonald finally used his performance to disperse the crowd and even cheered at the end.

However, when he walked back to the Prime Minister's Mansion at 1Downing Street, he frowned, listening to the reports of the First Sea Lord and a lieutenant general of the War Department next to him, and had already forgotten about the damn blackout.

When Lieutenant Commander Dorrens was about to surrender, in addition to suggesting that the Royal Navy build more aircraft carriers, he was more desperate to ask for help, telling how he fought bravely, how he missed his wife and children in London, and he strongly asked the British Empire to save him from the East as soon as possible.

"According to intelligence analysis, the Chinese have a task force fleet including two aircraft carriers, this fleet is not like the traditional fleet, they do not pursue large displacement and the most large-caliber main guns, by our classification standards, they have a maximum of several destroyers and a few cruisers. In this naval battle, the real threat to us was the carrier-based aircraft on board the two medium-sized aircraft carriers. Through the intelligence collected from all sides, we have to admit that the Chinese have already walked in the forefront of the world in the field of aircraft, and their level of development will not be much worse than that of our Imperial Air Force. "The Minister of the Sea carefully reported that he had sought to minimize the responsibility of the Navy.

"Baron Chatfield, if I'm not mistaken, I received a report from you a few days ago on your request to increase the cost of building naval battleships. Could it be that the Imperial Navy was really difficult to fight against the weak Chinese? "It's hard for MacDonald to imagine that the battleship has lost its effect on the Chinese.

The Minister of the Sea had to explain, "The battleships could only try to shell their coastal cities except to block their routes, but, unfortunately, according to the intelligence, the Chinese seem to have radars, comparable to the radar technology we are equipping, which are set up in high mountains and can appear in advance of ships coming from the sea." And even more damningly, in several key coastal cities, such as their Fangchenggang and the coast of Guangdong, there are Haiphong airfields, according to the power outages of the suicide Colonel Sim and the surrendered Lieutenant Colonel Dorrens, they originally tried to approach the Chinese coast and shell those cities that were booming, but the Chinese air force was focusing on dismissing this idea. Just as in the days when artillery batteries were built to blockade the sea, land-based aviation is also a killer of the coastal fleet. ”

"That means we can only try to block their sea trade, or get lucky enough to sneak up on some coastal cities, and we can't send the main force of the Far East Fleet to fight them in a decisive battle?"

"Yes, honorable minister, if the fleet is bombarded in a decisive battle, it is likely that the Far Eastern Fleet will suffer even greater losses. And at present, the aircraft carriers of the Imperial Navy are still in the establishment of the home fleet. And they have a limited number of carrier aircraft. ”

What the baron did not say was that compared with other countries, the level of aircraft carrier exhibition in Britain could only be said to be average.

MacDonald, "I will try to order two aircraft carriers to go to the Far East, and even if there is no larger naval battle in the end, Britain will need to have a certain number of aircraft carriers in the Far East." The shameless behavior of the Chinese proves the value of aircraft carriers. ”

"Yes, wise minister-sama."

MacDonald turned and asked the lieutenant general, "I heard that the Chinese are massing troops on the China-Burma border, has the intelligence been confirmed?" ”

"Well, the information has been confirmed. Judging from the information provided to us by Chiang Kai-shek, at least two main Chinese divisions have already moved to the Ruili area, and there are traces of movement of their second-level main division (garrison division). According to Mr. Chiang Kai-shek's intelligence, there may be a larger plan for a larger movement in southwest China. The lieutenant general faithfully answered Xiang's question.

"Could it be that the war at sea is not over yet, and there is another war on land?" MacDonald felt a little headache, if the war broke out in Europe, or in the Mediterranean, it would not be so difficult, but it could explode in the Far East, which was only a line away from India, the most important colony of the empire.

"Judging by the current situation, the Chinese have no reason to take the initiative to go to war. However, if the situation changes, they may take a step forward. ”

MacDonald, "Can three divisions in Burma hold off the Chinese?" Perhaps, counting two divisions in eastern India? ”

"If there are only two Chinese main divisions, we may have a chance to ......" The words of the lieutenant general of the army were already very reluctant, he knew that during the Sino-Burmese War, the British ** team also had several divisions, and the result was that they could not defeat their two main divisions.

He never thought that after all these years, the British ** team there would become good at fighting, nor did he think that their equipment had made a qualitative leap. Because he knows that looking at the entire British Army, except for the damn inadequacy is still insufficient.

All because the damned navy needs to keep getting stronger, keep building warships, and maybe now, the prime minister needs to worry about how to stop the enemy from the land attacking the British colonies.

"I need further intelligence, and at the same time a steady diplomat, to go to the southwest and test the bottom line of the Chinese." MacDonald knew it was too early to say anything, but he thought in his heart that a negotiation would definitely be better than a sea war and an even more worrying land war that might not be fought at all.

At the same time, he couldn't help but think of another thing, "Maybe people should meet Chiang Kai-shek in Nanjing, this person is very active in opposing the southwest, and is very consistent with us." ”

When the war was not over, the British were already preparing for negotiations, but in southwest China, thousands of miles away, Zhang Shusheng was reading a detailed piece of information in his hand.

"Good, well done. According to the plan, let's cooperate with the next actions of the War Department. ”

Zhao Ziyun said immediately, "Teacher, through the information we deliberately revealed, several secret spies of Chiang Kai-shek that had been lurking in our southwest for a long time were finally exposed. ”

Zhang Shusheng smiled, "He will be satisfied with anything that can weaken the southwest, not to mention, this kind of thing can greatly please the British." The follow-up reorganization plan of the Kuomintang troops had to rely on the powerful countries with deep pockets. ”

Zhao Ziyun: "Chiang Kai-shek likes to engage in some intrigues. Some time ago, didn't there be a case that the Kuomintang agents intended to use gold bars to buy the southwestern grassroots officers in the border zone between the two armies, and the ridiculous thing is that the officers not only did not bring people to surrender with guns, but instead deceived the gold bars back and handed them over to the troops, which were included in the food subsidy. ”

"Hehe, you don't know, this Chiang Kai-shek has done more than that." Zhang Shusheng recalled the original history of Chiang Kai-shek, the so-called merits and demerits are difficult to determine, but he really did a lot of things that made future generations laugh and be generous, regardless of the position and victory or defeat, being called the logistics and transportation captain of a certain army is an example.

But this time, his idea was right, and he repeatedly made moves, all of which were aimed at the West, and he actually let him deceive the second batch of integrated equipment from the Three Kingdoms. Even if it is a semi-eliminated equipment from Britain and France, it is stronger than the original equipment of the local army, at least artillery and the like, but it has added a lot.

Obviously, this crisis between the South-West and the British once again provided him with an opportunity. This is also the reason why he did not stand still, but lobbied the British to increase their support for him.

"Yes. Teacher"

Zhang Shusheng nodded to Zhao Ziyun of the Special Intelligence Department, signaling that he could go out. Called the operational secretary: "Draw up an order, let the 3rd and 6th divisions march to Longling, Yongde line, and form an all-out threat to the British on the opposite side"

"Yes"

(To be continued)