After the Opium War, with the decline of the Qing Dynasty's policy of closing the country to the outside world, the gunboats of the imperialist powers began to appear in Chinese waters, carried out their "gunboat diplomacy", and set up bases in China for a long time, and finally formed the so-called "fleet in China".

After the First Sino-Japanese War, as the last fig leaf of the Qing Dynasty was stripped off by the Japanese, the power of the imperialist powers gradually penetrated from the coast into the interior.6 The Yangtze River valley gradually became a major power, because it was the "back garden" of the British navy.

In order to adapt to the characteristics of China's waters, especially the Yangtze River basin, where there are many shallow reefs and vast areas, these gunboats of the great powers operating in China often need to be specially designed and built, and even form a unique type of ship in the history of the navy -- because they are not really ocean-going fleets, but ships specially designed to sail on inland waterways, which look flat and fat, have shallow drafts, have a very flat bottom, are flexible and easy to maintain, have high horsepower, light and flexible, low freeboard, long endurance, and perfect living facilities. Mobile Consulate" to use the common features.

These small boats, which are only a few hundred tons or dozens of tons, can only sail in the calm Yangtze River, and cannot withstand the stormy waves that cross half the world. Therefore, in the fleets of the great powers in China at that time, a considerable number of shallow gunboats even had to be disassembled into parts and transported to China for reassembly. The fact that the Saphiroth completed its round-the-world journey with a mere 600-ton tonnage was actually a crazy act in this era, and even so, the Sephiroth was maintained in shipyards in Japan and the United States for a long time during its round-the-world journey.

In the British Navy at that time, there was even a "Yangtze River Fleet". For most of the Republic of China, it was based in Hankou and Shanghai, and regarded the entire Yangtze River as its own backyard. Pursuing the British Empire's "gunboat policy" - in the eyes of the Chinese at the time, these gunboats were like evil invaders from alien planets, invading their familiar homeland. Bringing endless death, humiliation, and ruin.

During the Republic of China, the most dazzling sight on the Bund riverside in Shanghai was the towering chimneys and cold turrets on these foreign ships -- in that era when the weak and the strong preyed, these small gunboats were powerful weapons for the great powers to show off their force and intimidate the Chinese people. In the old movie footage of this era, which reflects China, small river gunboats can often be seen haunting the Yangtze River. After the outbreak of the anti-imperialist patriotic movement in any place. These gunboats will rush to suppress it as soon as possible, mercilessly pouring artillery fire on the Chinese. For example, the famous Wanxian tragedy, the Nanjing tragedy and so on.

Beginning of the twentieth century. Until the end of the entire Republic of China era. The fleet with the rice flag and the star-striped flag has always had complete freedom of action on the Yangtze River, and the Japanese river fleet in China, flying the sun flag, has also been frequently seen on the Yangtze River.

In September 1934, the autumn offensive of the Red Army. The main force of He Jian was completely annihilated within five days. This achievement caused quite a stir throughout the Western world. The British, who regard the Yangtze River as their own home, are the most vigilant.

In the past two years, the vigorous development of the Red Army's power in Jiangxi and Hunan has already made the British feel uneasy. The middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. For example, they were all British spheres of influence. In 1932, the Nanjing Nationalist Government suffered a crushing defeat in the Fourth Encirclement and Suppression Campaign, and the Jiangxi Red Army seized almost the entire territory of Jiangxi and successfully joined forces with the Hunan Red Army.

Honghu Lake, which is adjacent to the Yangtze River, is the most famous base of the Hunan Red Army, since the merging of the Jiangxi Red Army and the Hunan Red Army here, after the Xianning of Hunan fell into the hands of the Red Army, from Xianning to Honghu City, a fairly long section of the Yangtze River waterway, the north and south banks have completely become the Red Army's sphere of influence. Because the power of the artillery party in Jiangxi was close to collapse, it could barely hold a very small area from Jiujiang to Nanchang. A large area along the southern line of the Yangtze River from Jiujiang to Honghu was completely liberated by the Red Army since 1933. The power of the artillery party is not left here.

In 1933, because the Red Army was not yet "ready", for the time being, it could only endure the arrogant foreign ships that were raging on the Yangtze River. In the year 1933, British and Japanese warships repeatedly provoked in the Honghu section of the Yangtze River, and because the Red Army lacked heavy artillery for the opposing ships, they could only let the British ships wreak havoc on the Yangtze River. He Jian, who was trapped in Hunan, was also Yueyang, which was close to the Yangtze River waterway, and received supplies from the outside world in a steady stream.

In 1934, when the Red Army launched the autumn offensive in September, He Jian, who was in a hurry to go to the hospital, rushed to the rescue in a hurry. At this time, the British were stationed in several inland shallow gunboats on the Yangtze River, and their base was in Hankou. However, at the outbreak of the war, there was only one gunboat in the Hankou base, the Tern and the Falcon were in Shanghai, and the Harrier Eagle was transferred to Hong Kong.

When the Red Army launched a general offensive on the whole front on September 1, the British, who received the news, did not want to intervene, but moved a little slowly. As for the "warlord civil war" (the British view) born in China, the British were originally purely monkey plays, so that they did not react immediately.

It was not until September 3rd, when the Red Army attacked the city of Changsha, and when He Jian begged his grandfather and grandmother for help all over the world, the British consul in China then lazily discussed whether to send warships to Yueyang to "protect overseas Chinese".

At this time, when the British decided to send the Gannets to Yueyang to "protect overseas Chinese," it was already the afternoon of September 3. Since the crew of the Gannet happened to be scattered all over Wuhan for a "vacation" at this time, the captain spent nearly a day recalling the crew. The navy of the British Empire, which was accustomed to arrogance in the Yangtze River, also suffered from laziness at this time. Then it dragged on in Hanyang for another night, and it was not until 8 a.m. on September 5 that the Gannet slowly sailed away from Hanyang for Yueyang City.

And this time happened to be the time when Yueyang's defenders raised the white flag against the Red Army.

At twelve o'clock, Alger, the captain of the Gannet, received a telegram from the ship that Yueyang had surrendered to the Red Army, and he sent a telegram to the commander of the Yangtze River Fleet in Shanghai to inquire about the next course of action, and received a reply that he would "continue to carry out the task of protecting overseas Chinese."

At ten o'clock in the evening of the same day, when the Gannet sailed to the Honghu section of the Yangtze River, which was still 200 kilometers away from Yueyang, the strong light of a searchlight suddenly came from the north bank of the Yangtze River. Someone used an international light signal to warn the Gannet: "There is a war zone ahead, please stop your ship."

Although Captain Alger, who was full of self-confidence, was surprised that "those red Bolshevik bandits suddenly understood the language of the navy's light signals", he insisted on the pride of the "British Imperial Navy", and ordered the sailors to reply with the unique arrogance of the British, "This is the Gannets of the Yangtze River Fleet of the British Empire, and our side is carrying out the task of protecting overseas Chinese", and at the same time responded arrogantly, "According to the XX Treaty, our ship has the right of free passage in the Yangtze River valley".

The time is a little worse, this chapter is too late to be written before twelve o'clock, first more part, there are about 600 words left, and it is being written, and it will be corrected in twenty minutes. I'm going to write all night tonight, and I guess there will be a shift around three o'clock. In fact, I didn't mean to repeat the repetition of last night's incident, when I wrote in one breath until half past three, and people's eyes couldn't open. At that time, I changed the old text after changing it, but I didn't expect a mistake at the starting point, and I was about to fall asleep at the time, so I didn't go to the test, so there would be such an oolong incident. I'm really sorry for everyone.

The time is a little worse, this chapter is too late to be written before twelve o'clock, first more part, there are about 600 words left, and it is being written, and it will be corrected in twenty minutes. I'm going to write all night tonight, and I guess there will be a shift around three o'clock. In fact, I didn't mean to repeat the repetition of last night's incident, when I wrote in one breath until half past three, and people's eyes couldn't open. At that time, I changed the old text after changing it, but I didn't expect a mistake at the starting point, and I was about to fall asleep at the time, so I didn't go to the test, so there would be such an oolong incident. I'm really sorry for everyone.

The time is a little worse, this chapter is too late to be written before twelve o'clock, first more part, there are about 600 words left, and it is being written, and it will be corrected in twenty minutes. I'm going to write all night tonight, and I guess there will be a shift around three o'clock. In fact, I didn't mean to repeat the repetition of last night's incident, when I wrote in one breath until half past three, and people's eyes couldn't open. At that time, I changed the old text after changing it, but I didn't expect a mistake at the starting point, and I was about to fall asleep at the time, so I didn't go to the test, so there would be such an oolong incident. I'm really sorry for everyone.

The time is a little worse, this chapter is too late to be written before twelve o'clock, first more part, there are about 600 words left, and it is being written, and it will be corrected in twenty minutes. I'm going to write all night tonight, and I guess there will be a shift around three o'clock. In fact, I didn't mean to repeat the repetition of last night's incident, when I wrote in one breath until half past three, and people's eyes couldn't open. At that time, I changed the old text after changing it, but I didn't expect a mistake at the starting point, and I was about to fall asleep at the time, so I didn't go to the test, so there would be such an oolong incident. I'm really sorry for everyone.

The time is a little worse, this chapter is too late to be written before twelve o'clock, first more part, there are about 600 words left, and it is being written, and it will be corrected in twenty minutes. I'm going to write all night tonight, and I guess there will be a shift around three o'clock. In fact, I didn't mean to repeat the repetition of last night's incident, when I wrote in one breath until half past three, and people's eyes couldn't open. At that time, I changed the old text after changing it, but I didn't expect a mistake at the starting point, and I was about to fall asleep at the time, so I didn't go to the test, so there would be such an oolong incident. I'm so sorry everyone...... (To be continued......)

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