Although Chen Yuechuan did not know Russian, he also knew the basic etiquette of surrender, and he took the command knife of this Russian officer and announced his formal acceptance of the surrender of the Russian army in Port Bide.

In the past ten days or so, the resistance of the Russians was quite stubborn, relying on the original fortifications and even the ruins of the city, fighting with the Chinese army for every inch of land, until the ammunition and food were exhausted, and most of the personnel were killed and wounded before they had to surrender.

Half of the more than 2,100 Russian troops and more than 200 Russian militiamen who participated in the battle were killed, and the rest, including the wounded, were taken prisoner.

Although this street battle was supported by the fire of their own naval guns, the casualties were still heavy, more than 250 soldiers were killed, and nearly 400 others were wounded, although the total number of casualties was less than that of the Russians, but it was quite a lot.

Fortunately, despite the heavy casualties, the Port of Peter was finally taken, and the capture of Port Bred, an ice-free port on the coast of the North Pacific, was of great strategic significance for the Imperial Navy to take control of the North Pacific, enter the Aleutian Sea, and land in Alaska.

The Battle of Port Bide is also a very obvious sign of the Sino-Russian border war that has lasted for many years, and it can even be regarded as a major stage victory in the war for many years.

Although the scale of the battle of Port Bide was small, with two or three thousand men on both sides, the scale of the border conflict between China and Russia was never too large.

A few years ago, they fought several battles with thousands of troops in Central Asia, and after the three Central Asian countries were finished, China and Russia basically stopped large-scale military conflicts in Central Asia. Everyone is busy digesting the fruits of victory.

As for the Outer Mongolian direction, there had been no large-scale battles between the two sides. In the first few years it was after the rebellion of the Mongol princes was suppressed by paying the local mongol princes, and later these princely rebellions were suppressed. There have never been large-scale battles between the two sides, and occasionally there have been skirmishes of several dozen or hundreds of people.

The conflicts in the Far East are more frequent, basically a few times a year, but limited by the local climate and geographical factors, the forces of both sides are basically separated in a thousand-mile-long battlefield, and the battles between the two sides are mainly around some military or colonial strongholds, and the scale of the battle is mainly hundreds of people, except for the Chinese army that year mobilized nearly 3,000 soldiers when it attacked Temple Street. Neither side has fought a battle of several thousand men in the Far East.

Therefore, this Battle of Port Bide is already a rare large-scale battle for the Sino-Russian border conflict in recent years.

What's even more tragic is that because Port Bide is located in the Far East and is an isolated city, no relevant information can be obtained in Russia until after the fall of Port Bide.

In the end, it was the Russian diplomats in China who got the relevant news from the Chinese side and urgently reported it to Russia. That's when I got the news.

Later, there was gossip that the fall of Port Bide was greatly shaken in Russia!

Because the strategy of the port of Bide is quite important for the Russian Far East, it is one of the several major strongholds. And now, after the fall of Port Bide, the Russians can already imagine the scene of the subsequent capture of coastal strongholds such as Ayan.

I won't say how Russia reacted at home, but I said it was within the empire. Although the Imperial fleet had not yet returned from the port of Bide, it had only sent a communication ship from the port of Bide back to Wakkanai Port in Japan. The relevant war situation was then transmitted to the country by telegram.

Therefore, Nanjing soon got the relevant news, and Lin Zhe saw the military's battle report. Although there are some frowns about the casualties, on the whole, I am quite satisfied with the actions of the military.

This expedition to the sea, which was able to capture Port Bred in one blow, was of great positive significance for the future strategy of the Empire.

For this reason, Lin Zhe subsequently summoned the top officials of the army and navy, and personally gave instructions, asking the military to take advantage of the current good fortune to continue, continue to display the spirit of heroic fighting, conquer Ayan and other Russian strongholds in the North Pacific as soon as possible, completely drive the Russians back to the interior of Siberia, and prevent the Russians from having a sampan to enter the Pacific Ocean.

After waiting for the high-ranking generals of the Navy and Army to leave, Lin Zhe looked back at the huge world map in his office, although the Siberian region on the map still belongs to Russia, but in the near future, this vast area will completely belong to the empire.

Thinking of this, Lin Zhe's mood will be very comfortable.

As the ruler of the empire, Lin Zhe is not pursuing much now, except for the lifelong pursuit of consolidating power, the rest is nothing more than expanding the territory and cleaning up a few Western powers when he has the opportunity.

However, Lin Zhe also knew that even if the Imperial military won the victory in Port Bide and had a large strategic advantage in the North Sea coastal area by using naval superiority, it would be difficult to completely force the Russians to submit.

The territorial conflict between the empire and Russia is deep-rooted and irreconcilable, and the current Battle of Port Bide is actually nothing in the many years of border conflict between China and Russia, and it is impossible to fundamentally resolve the conflict between China and Russia.

If peace on the northern border is to be completely obtained, at least in the short term, there is no hope, and at most it will make the Russians fearful.

After all, whether for the empire or for Russia, in fact, the border conflict between the two sides is serious and serious, but it is not important or important, no matter how fierce the fight on the border side is, it will not be able to damage the foundation of the two countries.

The core of Russian rule is in Europe, and Central Asia is also an important region, as for Siberia, although the place is actually right, the center of gravity of the Russians has never been placed here.

In the same way, the core of the empire's rule is also fought in the domestic region, Central Asia, Siberia and the Far East, but whether it wins or loses, it cannot have any fundamental impact on the empire.

This is the inevitable consequence of the border conflict between the two countries with huge territories, which is difficult to make the other side suffer actual damage, even if a battle is lost, the loss of tens of thousands of troops, but for China and Russia is nothing, it will not take a few months to be able to draw more troops to reinforce it,

If we want to completely solve the problem of the northern border and force the Russians to submit, it is unrealistic to rely only on the current military action, and the truly effective means must rely on ourselves, first build the railway, and then we can support more troops, and then emigrate there, so that the fundamental way to solve the northern border trouble, the current military action is only a small fight.

It's just that the construction of railways in China is still too slow, especially the railways leading to the border, and I don't know when it will be completed.

The time for the empire to build railways is not short, starting from the most built Xuzhou Railway, and then the Tangshan Railway, Zhuping Railway, the above three railways are the earliest railways, and they are all mining area railways, mainly for coal export services, with a strong experimental nature.

The first commercial, passenger and freight combined large-scale railway, or belongs to the Nanjing-Shanghai railway, this railway from Shanghai in the south, through Zhenjiang, Nanjing, and then all the way to Dangtu, connecting Dangtu this important steel heavy industry base and Shanghai, China's largest industrial city, also through Nanjing, the capital, through the southern Jiangsu counties are also economically developed cities.

After the official opening and operation, the profitability of the Nanjing-Shanghai Railway exceeded the imagination of outsiders, so that it set off a climax of railway construction in China.

Unfortunately, the Empire has not been allowed to build railways by the private sector, and only the Imperial Railways can build railways.

However, in order to reduce the financial pressure, the Imperial Railway Company also widely attracted private capital in the subsequent construction of railways such as the Tianjin-Pudong Railway, so that private funds had the opportunity to participate in the railway industry.

In recent years, the main energy of the China Imperial Railway Company has been on the extension of the Nanjing-Shanghai Railway and the construction of the Jinpu Line.

The extension of the Nanjing-Shanghai line, part of which extends from Shanghai to Hangzhou, and the last road extends to Ningbo, is mainly to connect the three major cities of Shanghai, Hangzhou and Ningbo, and also to better promote the economic development of the prefectures and counties along the way.

You must know that this area is currently the most economically developed area in China, and the search for railway transportation is very huge, and the construction of the railway will greatly alleviate the traffic problems in this area, and at the same time drive the better development of the local economy.

This section of the railway in the Nanjing-Shanghai railway opened to traffic is to start construction, after more than two years of construction, has completed the construction of part of the railway line, is still in the intense construction, and is a section of construction, but due to the Qiantang River and Cao'e River blocked, now the imperial railway company is headache how to solve the bridge problem.

It also belongs to the extension of the Nanjing-Shanghai Railway, that is, the railway line from Dangtu to Wuchang, but this railway line is only planned to be built to Jiujiang for the time being, and the progress of this section of the railway is relatively slow.

In addition to the related railways on the Nanjing-Shanghai line, the main funds of the Imperial Railway in the past two years have been invested in the construction of the Jinpu line, which is a huge north-south artery railway from Tianjin in the north to Pukou in Nanjing in the south.

In addition to this main line, there will also be Shandong Railway Branch, Zhangjiakou Railway Branch, Northeast Railway Branch, etc.

At present, the construction of the Jinpu line is being carried out from multiple locations at the same time, and more than tens of thousands of workers of the Imperial Railway Company and a large number of temporary agricultural workers along the railway are being built, and at its peak, more than 100,000 people are working on the railway line.

At the same time, the Imperial Railway Company has been conducting preliminary surveys on many branch lines connecting the Jinpu line, and it is expected that by next year, the branch line from Haizhou to Xuzhou and Kaifeng will take the lead in preliminary construction, in order to communicate the hinterland of the Central Plains, and provide a new outlet for products in the Central Plains and other places, that is, Haizhou.

If the section from Kaifeng to Haizhou of the Jinpu and Longhai lines can be successfully constructed, then a huge cross-cutting railway network will appear on the land of China north of the Yangtze River, and the economic and military value will be considerable.

According to the planning of the Railway Division, the Longhai Line will be further extended to the west in the future, and the Shandong Branch, Northeast Branch, and Mongolia Branch of the Jinpu Line will continue to be built, plus the railways along the Yangtze River represented by the Nanjing-Shanghai Line, as well as the railway from Guangzhou to Wuchang and the railway line to Nanchang that are still being planned.

Once completed, these rail networks will provide the empire with the transportation infrastructure for economic growth! (To be continued.) )