With Vézé's order, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs completed the preparations for the trip within ten days. It was naturally impossible for the foreign minister to travel on a warship, and China currently did not have regular passenger ships to Europe. When Li Xin learned that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs received the treatment of a dedicated passenger ship, he was really shocked.
On July 15th, more than 40 people from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs saw the passenger ship on the Nanjing dock. It was a five-thousand-ton milky-white painted ship with a very comfortable appearance. It had a high freeboard and tall buildings. After boarding the passenger ship along the gangway, the personnel of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not go straight to the cabin, nor did they look around. Everyone rushed to the front deck. A fleet was sailing out of the dock and passing through the waters in front of the passenger ship …
The Chinese Navy's cruiser no longer needed to hide its appearance. It had a slender hull, gray paint, and a turret covered with grass green canvas. Other than some personnel in charge of entering and exiting the port, there were no other soldiers on the warship. The young people of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs desperately cheered and waved to the warship. Regardless of the views of the members of the Military Commission on the recent work of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the successive victories of the Liberation Army had indeed greatly improved China's status in the world. The political propaganda and the performance of the army in disaster relief had indeed made the image of the people's army deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. It was not only the Ministry of Foreign Affairs who greeted the soldiers when they saw them. The personnel on other ships were also waving to the army.
Li Xin carefully looked at the Chinese Navy that had recently shocked the world. Because of the different construction purposes, the four-thousand-ton warship appeared slimmer and narrower. From the appearance, the five-thousand-ton passenger ship on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was almost twice the size of the four-thousand-ton warship. The milky-white passenger ship seemed to highlight its existence, and the gray paint of the warship gave off an inconspicuous feeling.
The inconspicuous warship sailed very quietly, but in the blink of an eye, the fleet had already gone far away. Looking at the back of the warship, the members of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs began to discuss where they were going. Some said that the fleet was going to Fujian, some said that the fleet was going to Ryukyu, and some insisted that the fleet was going to Alaska, the new land of China. But no one guessed the true destination of the fleet, Xiao Zun in the Republic of Prawn.
At the end of June, 12 newly completed cruisers joined the Navy. The Navy removed the previous designation of warzones, and the 24 cruisers were divided into four fleets. The fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh fleets were formed. Each fleet now had six cruisers.
The Marines wondered why the first three were empty. Vézé replied, "The numbering one to three easily reminds us of the number one to three at the end of the competition. When we decided on the numbering, we didn't think about it at all. Since that's the case, let's start with four. This way, everyone won't have to fight over it. Everyone knows that a number is just a number and has no other meaning. "
From then on, not only the Navy, but all other forces also followed this instruction.
The Fourth Fleet used Cam Lan Bay as its main port and Java as its secondary port. The Fifth Fleet used Luzon as its base and Lanfang as its secondary port. The Sixth Fleet's main port was Vladivostok, with Lushun, Dalian, and Alaska as auxiliary ports. The Seventh Fleet used Fuzhou as its home port and Ningbo as its secondary port.
Twenty-four cruisers gathered together seemed like a lot, but when they were scattered across the vast sea, there were actually very few. However, this was only China's idea. In this era of low productivity, foreign countries generally believed that at least twice the number of ironclads of the Chinese Navy was needed to have the ability to fight against the Chinese Navy. In other words, to deal with China's six cruisers, they would need at least 12 ironclads of equivalent tonnage. Aside from England, there was no other country on Earth that could maintain a navy of this scale. When six China cruisers were dispatched together, no country, including England, would not feel nervous.
The new Sixth Fleet departed from Nanjing. They planned to first go to Lushun, then Juwen Island, and finally escort the transport ship to Xiao Zun. In the short term, it was impossible for England to send a fleet to Japan. More importantly, England would not send warships to attack China in the short term. The pressure on China's coastal defense was greatly reduced. That was why they had the time to send a fleet to escort a large number of supplies to the Republic of Prawn.
The Navy had already sent a telegram to the headquarters of the China Dispatch Army in Sapporo, the capital of the Republic of Prawn. Commander Zhou Xinhua simply replied, "Received. We will send people to welcome them." He did not say anything else.
Weapons and ammunition were important, but the Republic of Prawn had passed this stage. What the Republic of Prawn needed the most now was not military strength, but institutional strength.
At the military conference on July 16th, Zhou Xinhua once again made his suggestion. "Set up a complete political staff in the army and implement the system of political commissars. This matter cannot be delayed any longer!"
The upper echelons of Japan did not immediately respond to Zhou Xinhua's suggestion. There was a long silence. The President of the Republic of Prawn? Finally, Ben Takeo spoke, "Mr. Zhou, we are irreconcilable with the enemy, but we are still the people of the Emperor of Japan. If the political work system you mentioned is established, we will no longer have to serve the Emperor of Japan. This matter is too big. Can we delay it? "
"Almost 200,000 people have died. How are you going to delay it?" Zhou Xinhua asked in a tough tone.
?\ Ben Takeo was silent for a while, but Zhou Xinhua had no intention of staying silent. He continued, "Everyone, I am not asking you to leave Japan. However, the three million people under the Republic of Prawn are also human beings. The Emperor of Japan is indeed respected in the eyes of the Japanese, but I do not think that when it comes to the lives of the people, this factor should be put first."
At this time, there were many changes in the personnel of the Ministry of Defense. In addition to the original personnel who established the Republic of Prawn, many young and new faces appeared at the meeting. After listening to Zhou Xinhua's words, these young new personnel could not help but look sad and indignant.
The process of the war was far more tragic than they had imagined. Although the Republic of Prawn claimed to have millions of soldiers, these troops were not so much an army, but more like the Wasteland Reclamation Regiment. The reason why the people fled to the Republic of Prawn was that they could no longer survive under the rule of the Meiji government. After arriving in the Republic of Prawn, they had food to eat and land to farm, so they could continue to live. In the Republic of Prawn, where every citizen was a soldier, people did participate in military training. However, participating in military training was not necessarily related to becoming a soldier. Military training improved military skills and combat ability, but becoming a soldier was a kind of self-awareness.
The army that attacked the Republic of Prawn was led by the aristocrats under the rule of the Meiji government. Inheriting one's occupation and family salary was one of the fundamental privileges of the gentry. During the era of the old shogunate, family salary was linked to "serving the feudal lord". Serving the feudal lord was to fulfill a feudal obligation to the feudal lord and undertake a certain amount of work, while family salary was the right given by the feudal lord. The two were interdependent. Family salary was inherited from generation to generation, and so was work and position.
The Meiji government tried to establish a new centralized government. After the old feudal system was abolished, the object of the aristocrats' loyalty was changed from the lord to the emperor, and the original family salary paid by the lord was borne by the government. In the sixth year of Meiji in 1873, the government's income from land rent was 60,000 yen, and the family salary expenditure was 1840,000 yen, which was the largest part of the government's expenditure, so the government was obviously not running well. The Meiji government had a lot of opinions on the family salary expenditure of nearly 20,000 yen a year, so they simply diverted the trouble to the north, gave the aristocrats a big piece of land, and sent them to the land of the Republic of Prawn.
The Meiji government's wishful thinking was very simple. Since the aristocrats wanted to play the feudal game, then let them do it in Hokkaido, which was getting richer day by day. The family salary paid by the government would be converted into land, and these burdens would be sent to Hokkaido. On the one hand, they could rely on the aristocrats to destroy the Republic of Prawn that occupied Hokkaido, and on the other hand, they could also get rid of the heavy financial burden on the government.
Being a soldier was an ancestral profession for the aristocrats, and they began to learn war techniques from a young age. Now, war techniques were developing very quickly, and their ancestral techniques were a little outdated, but the military education these people received from a young age was not outdated. Before they were proficient in using weapons, they received the education of killing the enemy and making meritorious contributions. This included the beautification of dying on the battlefield, and the edification of destroying the enemy as the best way to protect oneself. Compared to the defense army of the Republic of Prawn, which was made up of peasants, the aristocrats' army that ascended Hokkaido was made up of soldiers.
The Republic of Prawn's old army was no more than 5,000, and including the army dispatched by China, there were only about 10,000 people. These core troops suffered heavy casualties in the Battle of Hakodate in 1874. In 1875, the aristocrats' army ascended the eastern part of Hokkaido, which had flat terrain. Compared to the aristocrats who joined the army in this era, the strongest resistance these obedient commoners took was only to choose to escape. A hundred thousand soldiers, with the aristocrats as the core, wreaked havoc in the Republic of Prawn like a flood.
The line of defense from Otaru to Muran could stop the army from Hakodate, but it was helpless against the aristocrats' army that ascended the east coast. China's navy was at war with the British Royal Navy at that time, so it was impossible for them to send any warships to support the Republic of Prawn. The aristocrats' army became more and more courageous, and the Meiji Army's spies in the Republic of Prawn's army also used the name of the Emperor of Japan to carry out various incitement activities, and a large number of commoners surrendered to the Meiji government's army.
The reason for the reversal of the situation was laughable. After the old officers died in battle or escaped, China's dispatch army officially took over the Shrimp Island defense army, and began to establish a political system in the Shrimp Island defense army. The political system informed the defense army that the enemy's objective was not to occupy the Republic of Prawn, but to kill all the people in Hokkaido.
Many people in the defense army were skeptical of this, but some of them saw their relatives and friends killed by the aristocrats' army, and their fighting spirit was stimulated. Under the command of China's dispatch army, they began to fight and counterattack. It was not until the discovery of the dozens of mass graves created by the aristocrats' army when they massacred the local commoners, that the desperate commoners finally understood the situation.
The two sides fought fiercely for more than two months, and the aristocrats went from being invincible to being evenly matched, and then they were besieged by the superior forces of the Shrimp Island defense army. Now, the aristocrats' army was surrounded by two large encirclements around the east coast of Hokkaido and Hakodate.
Just when the Ministry of National Defense of the Republic of Prawn was about to issue the order to "give the last blow to the traitors", Zhou Xinhua raised a request to improve the political system. This request had been discussed several times, and the foundation of the political system was the political party system. Although the political parties in the Republic of Prawn had not been developed, the electoral system had been in place for a few years.
Now, the commoners' attitude was simple and unified. Since the Emperor had ordered to kill everyone in Hokkaido, then there was no reason for them to be subjects of the Emperor. The conclusion of a referendum not long ago was quite unanimous. The Republic of Prawn was now completely independent, and Japan could do whatever it wanted, and the Republic of Prawn would no longer be a part of Japan.
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