The weather approaching late autumn is getting cooler and cooler for the north, and the entire Liaodong Peninsula to North Korea has already looked like winter.

On the surface of the Yellow Sea, the Liaohai Detachment followed the orders of the command of the three eastern provinces to escort a batch of military supplies to Nanpu.

Since the Air Marines and the Marines met in Nanpu and captured the Shariyuan, Nanpu has been an important battlefield for China and Japan to be in the rear. Japan is very clear that since the Chinese team occupied the Shariyuan and opened up a battlefield behind enemy lines, the Nanpu port closest to the Shariyuan is China's only logistics transportation line.

Therefore, after the loss of Shaliyuan, the Japanese army continued to launch a counterattack to suppress Nanpu Port.

Similarly, the Chinese team will not ignore the importance of Nanpu. Now Shaliyuan is in a situation of attacking front and back. If Nanpu is lost, the life channel of Nanpu, the troops of the five brigades will be trapped here sooner or later.

Even though they braved the strong firepower of the Japanese army's large units, the Marine Corps and the Air Marine Corps were still strictly guarding and investing two brigades of troops to stop the Japanese counterattack.

From late October to early November, after more than 20 days of fierce fighting, China and Japan remained deadlocked in Nanpu. Japan controlled some counties in the north bank of Nanpu and the east bank of Nanpu, while China firmly defended the south bank of Nanpu.

Although the area on the south bank of Nanpu is limited, it has at least defended the land of ties with the navy and will not completely cut off the coastline by the Japanese army. The war between China and Japan continues in the inland areas west of Nanpu, and the situation is sometimes good and sometimes bad.

For the Chinese team, they lack effective heavy firepower. Occasionally, when the navy arrives, they can only rely on naval artillery to suppress the enemy. Most of the time, only mortars and small-caliber howitzers are left.

However, on the other hand, when the Japanese Navy arrives in Nanpu, it will also bring a strong round of suppression to the Chinese team.

The Liaohai Detachment went to Nanpu to receive the latest information from the Japanese Navy. The Nanqing Fleet had returned to Japan three days ago and was preparing to coordinate the transportation of Japanese soldiers to reinforce North Korea. After finally avoiding the strong Japanese army, it was naturally necessary to seize this opportunity to provide assistance to the Saliyuan.

The flagship "Zhonghua" armored cruiser of the Liaohai Detachment was leading the way. At this time, the commander-in-chief of the Liaohai Detachment, Sa Zhenbing, was standing behind the bridge's fence, with a look of thought, as if he was worried. As one of the joint chiefs of staff of the Ministry of Defense and the Navy Department, he did not intend to lead this temporary fleet at the beginning of the establishment of the Liaohai Detachment. Even though the Liaohai Detachment was equipped with the most advanced and largest tonnage warships in China, it was still a hot potato in political sense.

The most obvious truth is that this fleet is not own, and once it joins this fleet, it belongs to the fleet. As a person who has retained the old ideas since the Beiyang period, this truth is difficult to convince himself.

If it weren't for the war, I might have really refused this position.

Even if we put aside political reasons, the Liaohai Detachment is a too young fleet. China has not operated large warships above 4,000 tons for a long time. Now the armored warships of the former Japanese Second Fleet in the Liaohai Detachment have almost gathered all the talents of the current Chinese Navy. However, due to political reasons, the commanders of these warships are all the heads of state, such as Du Xigui, Gao Guangzheng, Ren Zongyuan and other young generals.

Regarding the candidates for the Liaohai Detachment, he personally called Fengtian Camp and recommended several naval generals with rich experience and qualifications. Although the head of state responded to the telegram, the informed situation was that the Chinese navy needed to cultivate fresh blood.

Sa Zhenbing knew very well that as the record and honor after the Qingdao War, the head of state did not want to leave it to outsiders to touch it.

He sighed slightly. He no longer thought about these trivial matters. The Republic of China is no longer what it used to be, and the person who holds the power of the world is no longer the same as before. Just like the slowly shaking waves on the sea, the waves pushing the waves forward, as long as this pace is still moving forward, it can give himself more or less comfort.

Just as he was about to turn around and return to the bridge command room, a loud shout from the post of the watchtower suddenly came from the watchtower: "The enemy ship was found ahead, the enemy ship was found ahead, and the port side was about twenty degrees and twenty nautical miles."

Sa Zhenbing immediately frowned, and at this time he discovered the enemy navy? How could this be possible? The information has confirmed that the Southern Qing fleet returned to Japan three days ago. Why would an enemy fleet suddenly appear?

In just a moment, the alarm sounded, and the "China" immediately entered the state of war. All the combat personnel ran out of the cabin and took their positions. Several officers ran to the front of the deck and picked up high-power telescopes to observe the sea forward. Not long after, the adjutant of Sa Zhenbing ran up from the deck and said a little nervously: "Commander, it is indeed the Japanese fleet."

Sa Zhenbing kept calm and asked coldly: "Is it the Nanqing Fleet?"

The adjutant quickly replied: "At present, we can see that there are twelve warships. Perhaps there are other ships behind them. Judging from the navigation speed and outline, the tonnage of each warship should be more than 4,000, and there are even two heavy warships with a volume of two to three times that of other warships. The Nanqing Fleet does not have such large warships, maybe... maybe it is the first fleet."

Sa Zhenbing felt cold. It is reported that the First Fleet returned to Japan from Taiwan two weeks ago. The latest information received yesterday showed that the First Fleet's main task was to escort three Japanese local divisions to reinforce North Korea. How could it suddenly appear in the Yellow Sea? However, he knew that these issues were not considered now, and no matter what, this was a major mistake by the intelligence department.

The sentry on the watchtower shouted again: "It has approached, the enemy ship is approaching, about fifteen nautical miles, and has entered its maximum range!"

Sa Zhenbing immediately issued an order: "Notify the cargo ships in the rear to evacuate from the Yellow Sea at full speed, and our fleet will enter the battle formation."

Although the adjutant wanted to tell Sa Zhenbing that with the combat effectiveness and number of warships of the Liaohai Detachment, it was impossible for him to be the opponent of the Japanese First Fleet, but he knew that since both sides had entered the maximum range, it was impossible to turn around and retreat now.

Before the adjutant responded, Sa Zhenbing immediately explained: "Send a radio to Weihaiwei to inform us of the situation of the fleet. We will try our best to cover the retreat of the merchant ship, and then retreat quickly when the wind direction and the sky change."

The adjutant responded solemnly: "Yes."

However, the signals of ship-based radios are now unstable and are often affected by weather changes. According to the communication records that used to use radio, almost 20% of telecommunications were lost, 30% of telecommunications were incomplete, and most radios would have different degrees of delay. The latest one was when the fleet arrived at the port.

The flag words on the flagship "China" quickly spread throughout the Liaohai Detachment, and the twelve warships immediately formed a formation according to the instructions.

Since the Liaohai Detachment has a small number of warships and is escorting, the fleet has advanced in a "man"-shaped queue from the beginning, and the warships in the forefront are used for reconnaissance. Unfortunately, the reconnaissance distance is always too short, and the weather and wind direction make the Japanese fleet realize it only after entering the maximum range.

At this time, in order to deal with the oncoming enemy troops, the fleet directly switched from a "man"-shaped queue to a horizontal attack, intending to take the lead in the offensive formation.

However, the combat formation has not been adjusted yet, and the Japanese fleet in front suddenly divided a column of three warships and four destroyers, running quickly towards the southwest side of the Liaohai Detachment.

Sa Zhenbing realized that the Japanese army wanted to seize the best combat position from the front and flanks by relying on the advantage of the number of warships.

In this way, not only can it be arranged in a tactical formation of "t" to meet the enemy, but it may even lead to the Liaohai Detachment becoming an unfavorable horizontal combat position. The worst thing is to be sandwiched between two Japanese columns.

In the early 20th century, naval formations usually made fleets line up in several parallel columns, which were relatively more maneuverable. Several shorter columns could turn faster than the Snake formation, and could also send the signals of the flagship (usually at the head of the central column) to the entire fleet faster through searchlights or flags. In the Snake formation, the signals sent by the flagship at the head of the column often took 10 minutes or even more time to be transmitted to the last ship of the column. This is because the black smoke from the chimney of the warship makes it difficult for people to recognize the signals sent before and after, and each ship had to repeatedly send the messages they received to the ship behind it (or in front). Since many messages must be confirmed by each ship before they can be implemented, the time wasted may double.

In actual combat, fleets often line up in columns to fight enemy ships before the fire exchange. This requires each column to lead the ships led by them to turn left or right to form a suitable formation. Since the fleets of both sides of the war are traveling at high speed, fleet commanders need to send a reconnaissance fleet (usually composed of battle cruisers and cruisers) to report the enemy's position, speed, heading and other information, so that the fleet can line up in the most favorable formation as soon as possible to face enemy ships. The reconnaissance fleet also needs to avoid the opponent's reconnaissance fleet obtaining similar information.

The ideal situation is that the column formed by one side is just horizontally on the opponent's fleet's forward route, forming a T-shaped or T-shaped shape (the fleet is located at the T-shaped horizontal position), so that all the front and rear main guns and all the side guns on one side can aim at the opponent, while the opponent only has the main guns in the front of the ship in the front of the column to fight back. However, a large part of the plan to form a T-shaped formation depends on luck: since both sides are moving at high speed, it is very likely that because the timing is not well controlled, it will turn from the horizontal to the T-shaped horizontal, thus being passively beaten.

The officers in the bridge immediately started to sweat. Now they were telling the voyage that they could not change the formation at will, not to mention that the number of Japanese warships was obviously for their own side. If this continues, they would inevitably fall into a dead end.

At this moment, Sa Zhenbing immediately made a bold decision, and ordered: "Tell the fleet to stop changing its formation, and be headed by the 'Nanjing', to keep the current formation moving forward at full speed, pass through the gap between the two columns of the enemy ship, and then deviate to the rear of the enemy ship to reorganize the formation."

This is an extremely bold decision, which is to use the situation where both fleets are telling the driving situation. When the enemy ships have no time to adjust their direction, they use the maneuverability of straight-line navigation to take advantage of the situation. But this also requires some luck. If the enemy ship's light ship reacts quickly and blocks this gap from the flank or in front, the Liaohai Detachment will inevitably plunge into the enemy's encirclement like asking you to get into the trap.
Chapter completed!