It was getting dark, and according to the requirements of the Executive Committee, most of the people who were operating outside had returned to Base 1 or on the ship. Some idle young people set up a small stove at the entrance of the base, and while grilling the few pots of seafood and shellfish left over from today's cooking class chefs, they talked loudly about the battle that took place this afternoon. Although there were only a dozen people who really witnessed the battle, the mouth artillery strategists in the camp seemed to have been there and analyzed the gains and losses of the two armies in this battle.

The meeting in the prefabricated room was still going on, and at the end there was a briefing from the Military Police Department, which was undoubtedly the main concern of all the participants. As the first battle after coming to this plane, the military police department can be called excellent today, with a quick response and proper command, and it has also achieved excellent results in the subsequent counterattack. Although one person was unfortunately injured in the process, there was no obvious fault in the response of the Military Police Department, and the results were very impressive.

However, Yan Chujie's speech only mentioned the battle process in passing, and in his opinion, there was nothing worth mentioning about this one-sided battle, but the cross-interrogation of dozens of prisoners afterwards obtained a lot of valuable information.

"First of all, it's about the sea power of the Cliff City garrison, which is currently the one most likely to threaten our security. According to the confession of the captives, there are a total of 17 large and small ships in Yacheng Water Village, which are divided into Fu boats, grass skimming boats, Haicang boats, Cangshan boats, net shuttle boats, eagle boats and so on according to the tonnage of the hull and different purposes. However, several of these large ships were transferred to the direction of Qiongzhou some time ago to transport supplies, and at present, there are only two Haicang ships left in Shuizhai to support the façade, including the Haicang ship captured today. It is also worth noting that the weapons of these Ming soldiers are strict and lack of maintenance, especially those muskets, which I think are almost as rusty as unearthed cultural relics, and I am afraid that it is difficult to use them in actual combat. ”

“...... Regarding the military strength of Yazhou Shuizhai, it is organized as one general, one general member, two sentinels, 300 officers and soldiers, and 300 helmsmen. According to the confession of the captured officer Luo Shengdong, the actual strength of Shuizhai may be slightly lower than this number, but the difference is not very large......"

"Wait a minute. Tao Donglai interrupted Yan Chujie's words and asked, "Wasn't it quite common in the army at the end of the Ming Dynasty to eat empty salaries?

Yan Chujie had actually thought about this problem during the interrogation, but Ning Qi believed that the prisoner's confession was more credible, because the naval division unit was not as professional as the army, and it was almost impossible to replicate the army's method of temporarily catching a group of peasant soldiers when the camp was empty in peacetime, not to mention the peasants, even ordinary fishermen and sailors would not operate the warship, and it would be easy to expose the stuff if they were cheating.

Of course, there is another reason that the officer's self-confidence has obviously been severely attacked, and his psychological state is extremely uneasy, and both Yan Chujie and Ning Qi believe that this prisoner who has not received professional anti-interrogation training cannot make up lies in this mental state. After listening to the explanation, Tao Donglai also accepted it and showed Yan Chujie to continue.

"After the interrogation, our Military Police Department, together with the Maritime Department, conducted a comprehensive assessment of the military strength of Yazhou Shuizhai. Yan Chujie glanced down at the record he had made, and continued: "We believe that under the premise of not taking the initiative to attack, the current threat to us from Yazhou Water Village is extremely limited. Our leading edge in the military command system and in ordnance technology cannot be bridged by the small numerical gap between the two sides. Moreover, the scheduled itinerary of this group is half a month, and after being captured by us, there will be no more warships from the direction of Yazhou in the short term. ”

"Then what is the military strength of Yazhou City?" Tao Donglai asked noncommittally.

"The garrison of Yazhou City is a thousand households, and the number of people in the garrison should be about 1,700 people, but these garrisons belong to the military cantonment system, and a considerable part of the soldiers come from the local military households in Yazhou, who are responsible for farming and paying grain in peacetime, and organize to guard Yazhou City in wartime. Yan Chujie paused before continuing: "This is what we used to call peasant soldiers, most of the captives think that the combat effectiveness of these guards guarding the city is even below them, the will to fight and combat skills are quite lacking, and the number is greatly less than the establishment, it is estimated that a thousand people can be put together, thank God." ”

"The real five scum of war...... Tao Donglai couldn't help but sigh: "No wonder Hainan has been looted by pirates many times in history, and it is hell that this kind of soldier can hold the territory." ”

"At least for us the threat is reduced, which is not a bad thing. But we can't take that lightly because we have another opponent who hasn't shown up. ”

"Pirates?"

"That's right. Yan Chujie nodded and said: "When I led the team to Yulinjiao to reconnoiter in the morning, I found that there were still stone houses on the mountain, I asked the fishermen, it was a stronghold built by pirates in the past, and it is said that there are larger pirate dens on the Luhuitou Peninsula." We don't know now when they'll be here, how big they will be, the only thing we know for sure is that they will definitely appear to us in the near future. ”

"Surely?" someone in the executive committee chewed on the meaning of Yan Chujie's words.

The fishermen's statement is the same as that of the Yu family's father and son, and there are several pirates coming to this place in Yulin every year, so they are familiar with the way to flee as soon as they see our ship sailing into the harbor. Yan Chujie gave the evidence he knew with certainty.

"Then what is the solution of the military police department?"

I am afraid that at this stage we do not have the ability to take the initiative to deal with the external threat of force. But don't worry too much, we have already made a plan to deal with it. Yan Chujie responded with confidence: "As long as everyone cooperates with the work of the Military Police Department, we will definitely defeat any enemy who dares to attack!"

The response plan of the Military Police Department is mainly divided into three parts: First, establish a reasonable patrol system and patrol scope. In view of the unlikelihood that the threat of force would come from land, the Military Police Department planned to increase the scope of maritime patrols and expand from the existing Shengli Harbor to at least cover the bay between the southern tip of the Luhuitou Peninsula and the Hutouling Ridge in the east. At present, the crossing group has three sailing boats, which can keep two on duty and one on standby, plus iron-hulled fishing boats if necessary, so it is not too difficult to monitor the outer waters. After expanding the scope of maritime surveillance, in the face of the threat of an attack from the sea, it can at least gain an hour or so of early warning time, and this time is enough for the military and police department to mobilize manpower to wait at Victory Harbor.

As for taking care of the manpower occupation at the critical stage of the infrastructure project, the Military Police Department believes that this is extremely necessary, and this view is also supported by the Ministry of Shipping, which is holding back their efforts to train a few sailing captains among the crossing crowd as soon as possible. And Yan Chujie, of course, has his own little abacus about this, and the early stage of the group must be subject to military control, so the captains trained by the Ministry of Shipping will definitely be assigned to the command of the Military Police Department in wartime, and it is difficult to say that these personnel will be directly assigned to the navy in the future.

Second, establish a fixed observation post on the mountain ridge of Yulin Point. According to the field investigation of the Military Police Department, the sea surface visibility range can reach about 20 kilometers under good weather, and the fixed observation post and mobile sea patrol sailing boats make the early warning mechanism of the entire south foolproof. The Military Police Department has an establishment of three people per shift, changing shifts every two days, equipped with binoculars, firearms and military radios.

Third, some simple fortifications should be gradually built outside the No. 1 base of Shengli Port, such as trenches, defensive walls of civil engineering structures, and wartime communication roads connecting from Base No. 1 to the temporary wharf of Shengli Port. The reason for this is that if there is an extreme situation and the incoming pirates are too strong to settle the battle on the sea, then the traversers can also retreat to the land to defend, and the fortress-like bunkers and sharp firearms believe that relying on such a defense system can at least stop the attack of thousands of pirates.

The first two points of the military police department's response plan were approved without any objection, but the third point caused a lot of controversy, and the reason was naturally the allocation of human resources. How much labor will be required to build fortifications on the periphery of Base No. 1? Ning Qi, who is in charge of human resources, simply said that there is one life, but there is no labor.

Yan Chujie was so angry that he gritted his teeth: "Today's arrest of these dozens of people is all the credit of the Military Police Department, just now Liu Shanxia said that the Ministry of Construction wants labor, Sun Changmi said that the Ministry of Shipping wants sailors, and the labor and management didn't say a word, now I want labor to repair the fortifications, you will play this set for me?"

"Lao Yan, there are priorities!" Ning Qi could only be patient in persuasion: "You also listened to the situation reports of other departments just now, and now there are so many projects waiting to start, step by step!"

"The projects taken out by other departments are important, but isn't it important to build fortifications? I hope that all of you here will understand one thing, when it is really critical, fortifications are our last means of saving our lives!"

"Lao Yan, you don't need to say it, I think so, the fortifications must be repaired, but ......" Tao Donglai's tone changed: "...... The priority can be a little lower, and starting tomorrow, after dinner, the young people of various departments will be organized to volunteer for another hour, and the content is to build the fortifications that Lao Yan just mentioned. ”

Yan Chujie's face softened slightly, but he didn't give in at all: "You just perfunctory me, if something really happens, don't blame the military police department at that time!"

"Don't be angry, isn't it just to build a fortress? When our soil and cement workshop is put into operation in the future, we will build a string of cement bunkers along the coastline for you, and build Shengli Harbor into a fortress in the South China Sea, and then you can do whatever you want!" someone from the Ministry of Industry kindly comforted.

Yan Chujie couldn't laugh or cry when he heard it, but he also knew that the biggest difficulty facing the crossing crowd at present was the shortage of labor, so he didn't insist too much on this.