On Saturday, March 9th, not long after going to work, Xiaohu and Xiaoyu came in together, saying that the 15 brothers and sisters from Phoenix Village had completed their training and reported to the headquarters......

Li Junhao immediately thought about this matter, and asked them to arrange it and go to meet them himself.

A few minutes later, in the conference room, he saw 15 young people, 10 men and 5 women, the youngest was 17 years old, the oldest was 21 years old, and the average age was only 19 years old.

Seeing them, Li Junhao felt a sense of intimacy in his heart, mainly because of Xiaoyu and Xiaohu, and also because he had contact with the people in Phoenix Village when he first came to this world, plus the age of these people is younger brothers and sisters, he is very kind when he speaks, and after chatting for a while, he assigned them a job.

Of the five girls, one was assigned to Zheng Pingru, who was on duty at the police station, two were assigned to Li Xiaoyu, who is now also the director of telecommunications, and two were assigned to assistant Xiaoyu; All ten boys are handed over to Xiaohu to be in charge, and let him pay attention to what strengths they have, which can be adjusted in the future.

After spending an hour with the young people, Li Junhao was in a good mood, humming a little song and returning to the office, and as soon as he sat down, he received a call from Colonel Rupp, the commander of the 15th Infantry Regiment.

Rupp said on the phone that he had received a message: An old comrade-in-arms of his stationed in the Philippines revealed that two days ago, Admiral Thomas Hart, commander of the Asian Fleet, had a dispute with Vice Admiral Douglas MacArthur, commander-in-chief of the US Far East and commander-in-chief of the Far East Army, because he intended to move his headquarters to Shanghai or Hong Kong Island, and the two broke up unhappily!

Just yesterday, Admiral Hart simply telegraphed the Far East Command and left the port of Manila with some of the main warships of the 5th Task Force, allegedly to inspect Hong Kong Island and the Shanghai Sea......

This news immediately aroused the interest of Li Junhao, who asked Rupp to continue to pay attention to the news from the Philippine side, and then immediately contacted the U.S. consulate on Hong Kong Island, asking him to notify the Shanghai side after Admiral Hart's arrival.

Subsequently, he checked the map, Manila, Philippines is about 650 nautical miles from Hong Kong Island, considering the route, the direct distance should be 700 nautical miles, according to the cruising speed of 15 knots, it can be reached in about two days...... Of course, it cannot be ruled out that the fleet will speed up or slow down, and this is in the hands of Admiral Hart.

Next, I don't know how many days Hart will stay on Hong Kong Island, and the sea mileage from Hong Kong Island to Shanghai Sea is more than 900 nautical miles, and if he does not stop in the middle, the voyage will take nearly three days.

In other words, if it is fast, Admiral Hart's fleet will reach the Shanghai Sea in about a week at the earliest, of course, this time is not certain, it is unlikely that it will be early, and it should arrive in late March at the latest...... It's a fun time!

He was thinking that it would be possible to leave the main force of the Asian fleet in the Shanghai Sea. If it can really stay, then the power of the concession is not just as simple as a surge, but it really has the ability to resist the Japanese army and navy, which is not insignificant!

At present, there is only one permanent US warship stationed in the Shanghai Sea, the river gunboat Wick, with a displacement of only 500 tons, which is just placed in the Shanghai Sea by the Yangtze River Fleet as a symbolic existence. Li Junhao felt that even if only half of the ships of the US Asian Fleet were transferred to the Shanghai Sea, small Japan would have to think about it.

Li Junhao didn't know if Colonel Rupp had also thought of this—if he really thought of it, then this person was talented! But the news he told himself was undoubtedly extremely important, and it also opened up a train of thought for him, that is, not always focus on the Shanghai Sea, but on a broader area, in addition to the situation in the European battlefield, as well as the current situation in the Far East.

——

Two days later, news came from Hong Kong that Admiral Thomas Hart had arrived in Hong Kong under the command of the 5th Task Force, the main force of the Asian Fleet, whose flagship was the Northampton-class heavy cruiser Houston, and two light cruisers (the Omaha-class Concord and the Brooklyn-class Savannah, which had joined the Asian Fleet after escorting new recruits to the Shanghai Sea last time), and eight Clemson-class destroyers, which had brought out most of the Asian Fleet.

A simple calculation shows that there is only one Omaha-class Mapohide and 5 Clemson-class destroyers left in Cavite, Philippines, all of which are old types of submarine forces (28 ships, 6 old S-class, 7 P-class, 16 new S-class) and naval air force (31 airships, 1 seaplane carrier, 32 Catalina seaplanes).

Admiral Hart's gesture seemed to be a genuine intention to move the base.

——

Li Junhao didn't know when Admiral Hart would arrive in Huhai, so he was still busy with his own business first.

On the morning of Friday, March 15, on the bank of a deserted river on the Bund of the former French Concession, 500 tobacco dealers who had been escorted here by hundreds of riot police dug a large pit 50 meters long, 10 meters wide, and 2 meters deep on the river beach.

At first, these tobacco dealers were frightened, thinking that they would be buried alive, and refused to work, so they all knelt on the ground and cried and begged for mercy, making the police cry and laugh, and finally explained that the pit was not dug for these people, but that there was something to be disposed of......

What happened on the riverbank attracted the attention of the citizens of the concession, and under word of mouth, more and more people's eyes focused on the riverside, ready to see what they were doing.

Near noon, the pit was dug and 500 tobacco dealers were driven to the side to stand in a line, followed by dozens of military trucks, loaded with large wooden boxes of almost the same size. Many cigarette dealers looked familiar, waiting for the truck to come closer, and they determined that these were the boxes of tobacco!

The trucks lined up to drive to the big pit, and the 300 laborers were already ready, and immediately stepped forward to start unloading the trucks, and threw these boxes of tobacco into the big pit dug before, and many of the boxes were broken, revealing pieces of tobacco wrapped in oiled paper......

The onlookers who were separated by the police on duty in the distance of the big pit also saw what it was, and immediately made an uproar......

It didn't take too long, more than 3,000 boxes of tobacco and soil were thrown into the pit, and then, two special fire hose trucks drove over, stopped at both ends of the pit, pulled out the water hose, and several people pressed the booster wrench together, and the water dragon sprayed out towards the pit...... Oh, it's kerosene!

Everyone who saw this scene was sure at this time, this was really going to burn such a large amount of smoke!

There was no need for the police to say anything, and everyone in the audience was boiling......

(End of chapter)