After the commander of the Russian First Pacific Fleet, Makarov, left the Governor's Mansion after Willistov, the commander of the defense of Vladivostok and the commander of the Fourth Army, was sent by Alekseev, the Governor of the Far East, to find the Governor's Palace.

After Makarov came all the way to the port of Vladivostok, at this time the remnants of the Russian First Pacific Fleet warships were docked here, the original mighty fleet, after 2 bombardments by airships, now only 5 seriously damaged capital warships, the Borodino-class all-steel battleships Duke Suvorov and Borodino with a displacement of 13,500 tons, and the Retvizan-class all-steel battleship Fyodor with a displacement of 12,912 tons, With a displacement of 11,092 tons, the Joan of Arc class large fast armored armored cruisers Mavrusa and Plaskovia, as well as 3 protective cruisers, 20 torpedo boats, 7 small gunboats and more than 30 transport ships.

But the combined displacement of these warships already accounts for more than half of the entire Russian Navy after the crushing defeat, and now Makarov has come to personally order these warships, which occupy more than half of the current Russian Navy, to sink to the bottom of the sea in the harbor.

Governor Alekseev told Sù Makarov that he was ready to surrender to the Dingbei Army, but before that, the Governor ordered him to sink all the warships in the port of Vladivostok, and Alekseev had also served in the Russian Navy for many years, and he absolutely did not want these warships, which represented the glory of the Russian Navy, to become the trophies of the Northeast Navy, which would be an eternal shame for the Russian Navy.

After Makarov came to the port, he immediately gathered the captains of the various warships and said in a low tone: "Everyone knows the news of the crushing defeat of the Second Siberian Front, and His Excellency Governor Alekseev has decided to surrender to the Dingbei Army besieging our Vladivostok, but before that, all the warships of our First Pacific Fleet will carry out self-sinking operations, so as not to let these warships built by the empire at great cost fall into the hands of our enemies, for the honor of our Russian Navy, Let's start your self-sinking plan now! ”

When these captains of the Russian Navy heard this, they couldn't help but look gloomy, no one wanted to sink their beloved warship into the icy water, but with the strength of the First Pacific Fleet in the port now, there was no hope of breaking out at all, and in the face of the Northeast Navy besieging the port, there was no difference between breaking through and sending them to death. Now Governor Alekseev is willing to surrender to the Dingbei Army, at least the lives of their officers and men are saved, and as for the warships, if they do not sink themselves, they will be left to the enemy of the Russian Navy, which is an outcome that the entire Russian Navy does not want to see.

At 10 o'clock in the morning of April 10, nearly 7,000 surviving naval officers and sailors of the Russian Pacific First Fleet held the last flag-raising ceremony on the Russian warships in the port, and then sailed all the warships and transport ships to the sea several hundred meters away from the pier. Dozens of Russian warships that had opened the watertight doors slowly sank to the bottom of the harbor in the bleak whistle.

There were even several captains of Russian warships, after the last flag-raising ceremony, did not leave the warship, and chose to return to the sea with their beloved warships.

The First Pacific Fleet of the Russian Navy, which can be called powerful, has been completely wiped out without engaging the Northeast Navy.

On the day the warship sank, a colonel of the Russian army, a representative of Vladivostok, entered the camp of the Dingbei Army opposite the mountain fortifications on the outskirts of Vladivostok and made it clear that he represented Alekseev, the Russian Governor-General of the Far East, to discuss the surrender of the naval and land armies in Vladivostok.

As the temporary commander of several divisions besieging Vladivostok on land, Wang Hongjun, the commander of the 2nd Division, was overjoyed when he heard that the Russians in Vladivostok were going to surrender, and told the Russian colonel that the Dingbei Army was willing to accept the surrender of the Russian army in Vladivostok, but demanded that the Russians maintain the status quo in Vladivostok and not allow the destruction of various fortifications and battery facilities in Vladivostok, as well as the warships in the port of Vladivostok.

The Russian colonel shrugged his shoulders and said: "We will deliver all kinds of fortifications and battery facilities in Vladivostok to you in good condition, but the warships in the port of Vladivostok have all sunk themselves in the port according to the order of Governor Aleksayev, and we can't do this." ”

Wang Hongjun's brows furrowed, he didn't expect that the Russians were about to surrender, and the navy was still so strong, and it actually carried out a tragic self-sinking operation, and he Wang Hongjun had a little admiration in his heart.

Although the Russians sank all the warships in the port of Vladivostok, the Dingbei Army still accepted the surrender of the Russian naval and land officers and men in Vladivostok, and promised to guarantee the personal safety of the surrendered Russian officers and soldiers and not to confiscate their personal property.

Beginning at 8 a.m. on April 13, the Russian officers and men on the more than 30 mountain fortifications on the outskirts of Vladivostok, under the orders of Vladivostok City Defense Commander and Commander of the Fourth Army Willistov, walked out of the strong fortifications, handed over the fortifications to the Dingbei officers and soldiers who had already walked up the mountain, handed over their weapons, and surrendered.

After receiving the mountain fortifications on the outskirts of Vladivostok, several divisions of the Dingbei Army continued to advance into the city of Vladivostok, and by 4 p.m., the whole of Vladivostok, including the port batteries, was in the hands of the Dingbei Army.

Alekseev, the Russian governor of the Far East, personally handed over his swords and spears to Wang Hongjun, the commander of the Second Division, and the Vladivostok fortress built by Russia at a huge cost completely became the trophy of the Northern Army under Lin Daxin.

The First Fleet of the Northeast Navy also entered the port of Vladivostok through the passage of the mine array with the mine layout map given by the Russians, but unfortunately all the Russian warships in the port sank by themselves, otherwise the Northeast Navy would have gotten a batch of warships that did not need money for nothing.

Lin Daxin, who was in the Shenyang Governor's Palace, was pleasantly surprised when he received the news of Vladivostok's surrender, he originally thought that the Russians in Vladivostok would be able to hold out for at least 1 or 2 months, but he did not expect to surrender now.

However, all the Russian warships in the port of Vladivostok sank by themselves, which made Lin Daxin a little pity, but as a soldier who has been in contact with the navy since childhood and studied the navy, Lin Daxin can still understand the tragic behavior of the Russian Navy officers and soldiers, they use self-sinking to defend the glory of the Russian Navy and the honor of their naval soldiers.

Lin Daxin ordered the second division to garrison Vladivostok, set up a prisoner of war camp in Vladivostok, and held more than 200,000 prisoners of war of the Russian navy and land army who surrendered, and ordered the fourth division, the eleventh division, and most of the guards division to withdraw to the vicinity of Shenyang.

Lin Daxin ordered the First Fleet to be stationed at the port of Vladivostok, and at the same time began to clear a large number of mines outside the port of Vladivostok according to the Russian mine layout map, while the Second and Third Fleets returned to the Arthur Naval Base to rest.

Before surrendering, the Governor-General of the Far East, Alekseev, personally sent a final telegram to Tsar Nicholas II, describing the difficulties of Vladivostok, which basically means that there were no reinforcements outside Vladivostok, and he was faced with food exhaustion, military instability, popular unrest, and various difficulties in breaking through, so he had to choose to surrender to the Dingbei Army besieging Vladivostok after sinking all the naval ships.

And Alekseev put forward at the end of the telegram that he hoped that Tsar Nicholas II would consider a decent end to the war with the forces under Lin Daxin, and that in the war for most of the year, the Russian Navy was almost completely buried in the hands of the Northeast Navy and the Northeast Airship, and the Russian Army lost more than 1.5 million troops one after another, and if you add the more than 200,000 troops in Vladivostok into the prisoner of war camp of the Dingbei Army, it is equivalent to the Russian Army has lost as many as 1.7 million people.

Moreover, the process of the war told the Russians, the navy did not need to mention, that is, as the proud army of Russia, it could not take any advantage in front of the Dingbei Army, and it was very disadvantaged, you must know that the Dingbei Army lost 1.7 million people to the Russian Army, and the total loss of the Dingbei Army may be less than 100,000 people, or even less.

Alekseev told Tsar Nicholas II that although the Dingbei Army now has a complete advantage in the whole situation, the Russian army is still hoarding troops around the city of Haktu and the city of Traders in Outer Mongolia, which is an important weight for negotiations with Lin Daxin.

Now that the Siberian Second Front Army has been defeated, and the Vladivostok defenders led by themselves are also forced to choose to surrender, the strength of the Dingbei Army will become more abundant, and the strength of the Dingbei Army in Outer Mongolia will continue to be strengthened.

In the Kremlin in St. Petersburg, the Russian Tsar Nicholas II held a telegram from his own uncle, Alekseev, the Governor-General of the Far East, read it no less than five times, and finally sighed a long sigh and ordered several important ministers of the Russian Empire to be summoned to the palace.

Soon after, Russia's Minister of Finance Witte, Admiralty Archduke Vich, and Chief of the Army General Staff Gorrosky, three important confidants of Tsar Nicholas II, who were currently in St. Petersburg, entered the Kremlin.

The three looked at Tsar Nicholas II's listless appearance, looked at each other, and from the look in their eyes, they already knew that there was bad news again.

Since the war with Lin Daxin's forces, the Russian high-level people have become accustomed to every once in a while, a bad news will come to St. Petersburg, I don't know what kind of bad news this time is, St. Petersburg has received too much bad news recently.

However, the Chief of the General Staff of the Army, Gorrosky, already had some premonitions in his heart, since he sent a telegram to Alekseyev, the Governor-General of the Far East in Vladivostok, asking the Vladivostok troops to break through on their own, he was worried that the troops in Vladivostok would not be able to break through at all, and Alekseev was likely to follow the example of Oleglev, the deputy commander of the Siberian theater of operations, and chose to surrender directly to the Dingbei Army besieging Vladivostok. When Gorrosky saw Tsar Nicholas II as he was, he guessed in his heart that his premonition might well have come true.

What Gorrosky was even more helpless was that if Vladivostok surrendered now, then the Dingbei Army besieging Vladivostok would be freed, and the Dingbei Army would be able to invest part of its rich forces in Outer Mongolia, which would be even worse for the Siberian theater.

And now there are not many troops that Russia and Europe can send to the Siberian theater of operations, after all, Russia and Europe also need troops to guard.

Originally, Russia was going to carry out the second phase of the wartime mobilization and expansion of 1 million troops, but because the Russian treasury did not have money, and Tsar Nicholas II was unwilling to take money from his own private treasury, this expansion plan has been shelved.

In this way, the strength of the Dingbei Army in Outer Mongolia will continue to increase, while the Siberian theater will not receive European reinforcements.

Russian Tsar Nicholas II saw that his three important ministers were coming, and sighed and said: "Aleksayev, the governor of the Far East in Vladivostok, has sent a telegram that he is about to lead the sea and land forces in Vladivostok, and after sinking all the warships in the port, choose to surrender to the Dingbei army besieging Vladivostok!" ”

The Chief of the General Staff of the Army, Gorrosky, heard that it was the same as his own conjecture, and couldn't help but sigh secretly, the other two important ministers of the Russian Empire, the Minister of Finance Witte and the Minister of the Navy, Grand Duke Vich, looked at each other and smiled bitterly, in fact, they were not surprised in their hearts, the situation in Vladivostok was there, there were no reinforcements, and the food would run out, although Tsar Nicholas II had asked the Governor of the Far East, Alekseev, to lead the naval and land armies in Vladivostok to break through, but they wanted to break through the many blockades of the Dingbei Army, Fleeing to the area controlled by the Siberian theater of operations thousands of kilometers away is not easy to say, not to mention that there will be a large army of the Dingbei Army to encircle and intercept it along the way, but the supply problem of fleeing for thousands of kilometers is a big problem, and thinking about it from another position, that is, they are in the position of Alekseev, the governor of the Far East, and surrender is also the wisest choice.

Tsar Nicholas II of Russia looked at the expressions of the three important ministers of the empire without surprise, and couldn't help but sigh secretly, in fact, even Nicholas II himself was not surprised by the surrender of Vladivostok. R1152