Since the First Opium War, when the British forced the Qing Dynasty to sign the Treaty of Nanjing, and thus occupied Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong Island has become a British colony and has been developed for more than 20 years.

However, much of this development is limited to infrastructure, especially military installations.

In fact, in 1866, Hong Kong Island is still only a barren land, nor is it a big trading city, and its biggest role for Britain is to serve as a supply port for naval warships, and it has little commercial value.

Because Hong Kong is so close to Guangzhou, which has always been a major city for China's foreign trade, many foreign merchant ships generally go directly to Guangzhou after heading north from the South China Sea, and rarely trade on Hong Kong Island near Guangzhou.

This was even more evident after the establishment of the Chinese Empire and the further opening up of foreign trade.

Before the establishment of the empire, although the Qing court was forced to open Guangzhou, in fact, until the Second Opium War, that is, before 1858, foreigners were still unable to enter the city of Guangzhou for trade, so that Hong Kong Island had a trace of role as a transit port.

However, after 1858, after the signing of trade treaties between the empire and Britain, France, etc., the city of Guangzhou was officially opened as a treaty port, and those foreigners officially entered Guangzhou on a large scale for trade.

As a result, Hong Kong's trade role has declined rapidly.

Historically, until the end of World War II, Hong Kong played a small role, at most it was a military port for the British army. The reason why Hong Kong became the Four Tigers in later generations was purely because it was blocked by Western countries after the founding of New China. Hong Kong was left as a pitiful window for foreign exchanges, thus making Hong Kong a transit point for exchanges between New China and the Western world. It is this political advantage that has allowed Hong Kong to develop into the Tigers.

When this political advantage is lost, Hong Kong has completely lost the impetus for development, and since the beginning of the 21 st century, Hong Kong's development has been sluggish, and it can only rely on blood transfusion from the mainland to barely maintain its reputation as a developed city.

Geographically, Hong Kong's importance is quite limited, apart from its military value.

Hong Kong in 1866 was far more of a military value to China and Britain than it was economic.

For the Chinese Empire, Hong Kong, occupied by the British, was like a spike stuck in the throat of China's southern coast. It has seriously affected the security of China's southern coastal areas, and once a war with China and Britain develops, the British will be able to directly use Hong Kong as a challenge, and then kill the mainland from the Kowloon Peninsula, and even directly land in Guangzhou.

And this is also the reason why Lin Zhe wants to take back Hong Kong, what territorial sovereignty, economic interests and the like are not worth mentioning, what is really important is that after taking back Hong Kong, it will be able to cut off the forward position of Britain towards the hinterland of China.

Also for this reason. The Empire would have thought of taking Hong Kong down before the British reinforcement fleet arrived!

Why?

Because if Hong Kong were taken now, then the British would not be able to obtain a well-developed port supply base in the coastal areas of China, and Hong Kong would be lost, and the closest port to China for the British would be Singapore. Or borrowing the port of Gia Dinh province in the Nam Ki region of Vietnam, well, this place is now renamed Saigon by the French. That is, Ho Chi Minh City in later generations.

And even from the nearest port of Saigon, it is more than 1,000 kilometers away from the southern coast of China!

This distance is perhaps nothing for an ocean voyage. After all, although the speed of ships is quite slow these days, there are many things to sail across the ocean. If the Chinese navy wants to go to Hawaii, it will have to travel tens of thousands of kilometers from Shanghai.

However, the situation cannot be seen so simply, because if the British set off from Singapore and other ports to come to Hong Kong, it will not be a simple voyage at that time, and they will have to bring a large number of soldiers and horses with them.

If the British had made up their minds to go to war, they would have to send not only a large number of warships, but also a large number of land forces, otherwise why not attack Hong Kong or Canton altogether?

Considering the number and combat effectiveness of the Royal Army of the Chinese Empire, the British would have to send at least 20,000 or 30,000 men to have the possibility of a successful landing, and if they wanted to force the Chinese Empire to submit in the future, they would need 50,000 or 60,000 or even more troops.

And to maintain such a large number of troops to land in China and fight, and also lose Hong Kong, a forward supply position, even the British world boss has to numb the scalp, which is very difficult.

Therefore, although he knew that attacking Hong Kong now might cause a strong backlash from the British, Lin Zhe still planned to take the risk, as long as he took Hong Kong in advance, he would be sure of a war with the British in the future.

Take 10,000 steps back, even if the navy is defeated in a decisive battle, as long as the hundreds of thousands of troops of the Imperial Army are undefeated, then in this war, the empire will always be able to remain undefeated.

Therefore, the risk of retaking Hong Kong is there, but it is controllable!

As for the long-term blockade, this point is unavoidable, but it is also necessary to take into account another point, that is, once Britain completely blockades China's coastal trade, then there will be great losses for the Chinese Empire, but the British themselves will not be comfortable.

You must know that the British opened China's door to do business through two wars, and only then did they obtain the right to import a large amount of tea, porcelain and raw silk from China.

At present, the trade share between the Chinese Empire and the British is very huge, and the Chinese Empire imports a large number of machinery and equipment, cotton, coal, woolen wool, rubber and other materials to Britain every year, and the British also imports a large number of raw silk, tea, porcelain and other products to China.

The annual import and export trade between the two countries has reached more than 80 million pounds, such a huge trade volume not only feeds a large number of factories and merchants in the Chinese Empire, but also feeds many British enterprises and merchants.

Some Britons engaged in international trade have regarded the Chinese market as the fastest growing market and the largest potential market in the world at present, and its potential trade profits are immeasurable, and its importance is no less than that of the European continent and the United States.

In this case, there will naturally be a large number of British businessmen to exert influence, and it is impossible for a complete blockade to last too long, otherwise, the British-funded enterprises such as Jardine Matheson and Shun Tak will also have to go bankrupt, and the number of unemployed workers will be tens of thousands.

Lin Zhe has considered in detail the various possibilities arising from the Hong Kong issue, and it is after careful consideration that he has made the reason to follow the tension in Hawaii and then recover Hong Kong.

Therefore, all kinds of circumstances indicate that there is a certain risk in the recovery of Hong Kong, but this risk is manageable, and the risk is significantly greater than the potential return.

After all considerations, Lin Zhecai made the final decision.

It can be said that the real reason for Lin Zhe's recovery of Hong Kong is not the self-esteem of the country and the nation, if the British pay a sufficient price, it is not impossible for Lin Zhe to give up Hong Kong, but it is clear that the British will not pay a huge price for Hong Kong.

It's a pure scramble of interests!

And in the end, this scramble will turn into war!

On 19 March, under the cover of the ships of the Imperial Navy's First Fleet, the 42nd Brigade of the Army began to cross the waters of Tsim Sha Tsui (Victoria Harbour) in various boats, and then landed on the southern shore of the harbour, where Hong Kong Island is located.

Because the ocean surface of Tsim Sha Tsui is not wide, it is generally between more than 1,000 meters and more than 2,000 meters, and this width is not even as wide as that of the lower reaches of the Yangtze River.

Therefore, to cross this part of the port area, the ships used are also very simple, and there is no need for large ocean-going transport ships, any sampan boat or even bamboo rafts and the like can cross the river.

At the same time as the 42nd Brigade of the Army crossed the river on a large scale, many small boats were also lowered on many warships of the Navy, and the soldiers of the Marine Corps climbed into the small boats and rowed directly towards Hong Kong Island.

For a time, thousands of sails were racing on the ocean of Tsim Sha Tsui, and the oars were dancing with the rumbling cannons, and there were shells fired by the British batteries on the shore that fell on the sea, stirring up water droplets.

However, the weak resistance of the British army was completely unable to stop the landing of the Empire's naval and land armies!

For this landing, the Imperial Navy poured out of the nest, most of the capital ships of the First Fleet, and at the same time a number of offshore ironclad ships belonging to the Nanyang Fleet and the Oriental Fleet, including two Female Snail-class ironclad ships.

These warships formed a temporary combined fleet, divided into several fleets, of which the Nu Snail and Bi Fang were the mainstays, and the third detachment consisting of three Zhenguang-class small ironclad ships and a number of wooden gunboats was the landing support fleet, and the task of the detachment was to directly support the landing of the army and marines.

At the same time, a number of capital ships in the navy, mainly those ironclad ships, formed two subfleets, with two Yandi-class as the core, and three Pangu-class ironclad ships, forming the first sub-fleet, which is the essence of the imperial navy, and one Pangu-class ironclad ship, the Fuxi, which was in service, together with the other three wooden cruisers, formed the second sub-fleet.

The above three detachments were all the belongings of the Imperial Navy to prepare for the British reinforcement fleet.

And today, they are going to train the British Chinese fleet stationed in Hong Kong first!

Before the official landing of the army, the fleet of the Imperial Navy had already entered the waters of Tsim Sha Tsui and fought the British fleet, and after repelling the counterattack of the British fleet, it began to carry out a large-scale artillery bombardment of the facilities near the coast on Hong Kong Island.

And after the shelling, the army began a large-scale landing! (To be continued.) )

PS: There is one more chapter later