Seven Seas Beacon Fire

"How exactly did the Crown Prince come up with these tactics?" Sa Dingming couldn't suppress his curiosity any longer. Although talent is something that can't be hidden, just like pregnancy, he had never seen anyone who was already eight months pregnant!

"Uh...sometimes I read some books for leisure, including some technical and military publications, but mainly I draw on the experience of the enemy and our forces from the Sulu Sea Battle to the Java Sea Battle that General Sa mentioned before." Li Che said some nonsense that he himself did not believe.

Sa Dingming wanted to say that the navy itself had reviewed these naval battles many times, so why couldn't we summarize these experiences so quickly?

Just like submarines, our submarines took down a Federation battlecruiser, and we also had a damaged battleship that was taken out of the battle and fell into the hands of Federation submarines. But people often think about how to use submarines to assist the fleet in the decisive battle. Who would think of having these submarines communicate by radio and, at night, sail at high speed on the surface to attack the merchant fleet and wreak havoc?

These days, submarines are essentially ships that can dive. Although their surface speed is much higher than their underwater speed, they are too vulnerable on the surface. When they encounter enemy ships, they naturally have to dive as much as possible to avoid them.

Launching a large-scale attack while navigating on the surface sounds far-fetched, but it seems highly feasible at night! A submarine's low-slung hull makes it incredibly difficult to detect!

"So the Crown Prince is also planning to use submarines to attack the United States' landing site at Wonsan?"

"We are preparing to launch an attack using submarines, but not solely using submarines, and submarines will not be the main force." Li Che shook his head: "Our navy only has a total of over 100 submarines, and the number of ocean-going submarines is not large, so they are not very suitable as the main force to launch an attack on the Wonsan landing site."

"Then, Your Highness, what is the main force you're referring to?"

"General Sa, have you ever heard of the ancient Romans' ability to sail on dry land?"

Li Che's question left Sa Dingming somewhat puzzled.

"Land cruisers?" Does the grandson mean land cruisers? Like those water tanks the British built during the World Wars?

However, Li Che's next question made Sa Dingming feel as if every pore on his scalp stood on end.

"General Sa, how many of our torpedo boats can be transported by rail?"

"There are many torpedo boats. As long as they are no more than 30 meters in length, they can be transported by rail. One railway trailer can transport one torpedo boat under 14 meters, and two trailers can transport one torpedo boat over 14 meters."

Sa Dingming swallowed hard. He had a vague idea of ​​Li Che's plan, but he still continued, "There are probably more than 300 of these torpedo boats in total. Where does Your Highness plan to transport them?"

A slight smile curved Li Che's lips as he pronounced the place name, word by word: "Vladivostok!"

Chapter Seventeen: The Sakura Girl of the Tokugawa Family

Sa Dingming left with great joy, carrying the battle plan proposed by Li Che. The battle plan put forward by this grandson of the emperor was highly feasible. Sa Dingming had heard of Li Che's talent before, but now it seemed that the rumors were too conservative.

He's truly a genius!

The rat transport strategy he proposed was ultimately just a passive support strategy, and it was destined that it would be impossible to gain the initiative at sea by adopting this method.

However, by launching an offensive to disrupt diplomatic relations, we might be able to regain control of the seas.

After all, the West was the one that truly crossed oceans, especially the massive offensive launched by the United States Army. The million-strong army they had deployed throughout Southeast Asia relied on the world's largest merchant fleet, built up over several years in the Pacific Ocean by the entire nation, for support. It looked impressive, but the pressure was immense.

If the Union army could sink a large number of its merchant ships in the Pacific Ocean, it would be unable to maintain its increasingly aggressive offensive in East and Southeast Asia.

As for the annihilation battle to be prepared in the near future around the Wonsan area, using a large number of torpedo boats on land is indeed more promising than letting those old ships in Vladivostok harbor run aground and be used as fixed gun emplacements!

After all, the Federation troops had suffered setbacks on the Silla battlefield due to their overconfidence and recklessness, and were eager to withdraw their troops besieged in Wonsan and then deploy them to other battlefields as needed.

For example, they might deploy troops to Busan to try to push back, or they might simply abandon the confrontation on the mainland and instead concentrate their forces to the south to seize Luzon and Yeonpyeong.

Although the old ships that have run aground will not be sunk again, if the Federation deploys battleships after dawn, they can still destroy these grounded warships and render them combat ineffective through close-range firing.

After all, using old ships to beach themselves is essentially about buying a few days' window of opportunity to try and win a decisive battle against the United States forces within the encirclement.

However, with a large number of torpedo boats, the margin for error is much higher. Now that Yuanshan is completely surrounded, the United States Army and some of the Yingzhou Army within the encirclement can only retreat by sea. If the Federation's ships and warships used for evacuation can be decisively destroyed, then these besieged United States Army soldiers will not be able to leave for a short period of time.

Given the current state of these United States troops, if they cannot withdraw within two months, they will likely collapse without a fight.

Although this is only a preliminary strategic concept at present, how many torpedo boats are needed to completely destroy the enemy's landing zone? How many torpedo boats can be mobilized and transported to Vladivostok in a little over a month? These questions do not have answers yet, but Sa Dingming knows that now is the time to investigate and implement them as soon as possible.

This is a race against time that is being waged simultaneously by both sides.

After Sa Dingming took his leave, Li Che originally wanted to leave with the other senior officers who had dined with him, but to his dismay, his grandfather kept him behind again, and his father was also sitting motionless in his seat. It was clear that the three of them had some things to say behind closed doors.

Li Che was not unaware that some of his actions today might seem exaggerated or even abnormal in the eyes of his father and grandfather.

Professional knowledge is indeed hard to explain how it suddenly appeared in one's mind, but just like the stubborn thing Yunyun always said when playing games in another time and space—you don't really think I can't have an epiphany, do you?

Well, if they ask, then I'll have an epiphany.

Although Li Che sometimes inadvertently displayed information and abilities gained from another world, and became famous for his intelligence at a young age, he always kept a relatively low profile. The "foresight" and knowledge he displayed that amazed people were actually more of a "show of talent" under a cover.

This time, however, he was not going to cover it up like before, or rather, he felt he could no longer cover it up like that.

He used to have a carefree attitude towards everything in his life. His consciousness or soul could "travel" between two bodies in two different worlds from time to time. In his eyes, this was a treasure bestowed upon him by God. However, he never thought about how to make good use of this treasure.

After all, he didn't need to gain anything from this treasure. With his family background and status, even the emperor wouldn't necessarily be as happy as him these days.

However, in the past year or so, due to the rapid deterioration of the situation on the battlefield, he could feel that this nearly 600-year-old dynasty, this once great country, was gradually heading towards the abyss. Although he had seen all of this in the past, he remained unmoved.

Because he has a wise and capable grandfather, a shrewd and resourceful father, and two capable and brave uncles, his elders will hold up the sky if it falls!

However, after traveling to the Middle East as a volunteer in another world and witnessing firsthand the living conditions of the people of Gaza, and seeing how Western media and politicians, who habitually wave the banner of human rights and humanitarianism, turned a blind eye to the tragic situation there, he began to realize that perhaps he should do something.

After all, although the histories of the two worlds are different, after experiencing Gaza firsthand, Lee Cheh absolutely could not accept that the people on his own country's land would suffer such torment.

And the Jedam that fell at the last moment from his own world's consciousness told him the truth that runs through both worlds in the most straightforward way—the law of the jungle is the eternal law of survival.

You can maintain high moral standards, but you must never abandon your bestiality and cunning.

Therefore, no matter what questions his grandfather and father might ask him, Li Che was fully prepared...

"Father, the navy's plan to take people away from Yingtian Prefecture...aren't you going to get involved?" Li Renzhi's question left Li Che somewhat puzzled.

The Navy plans to evacuate people? Whom are they evacuating?

"There are so many things to do these days, and I have to take care of everything. Am I here to be a housekeeper?"

Li Che looked at his father and grandfather with some confusion. You didn't keep me here to question me about my somewhat "outrageous" behavior today?

Now that it's just the three of us here, let's be more direct and stop beating around the bush.

"She's just a princess, after all." Li Zongdi waved his hand dismissively. "You should know that the navy isn't a monolithic entity. I know Sa Dingming; he's a rather pure soldier. He shouldn't know about this kind of thing. This is probably the work of the Prince of Chao... If it's going to rain, it'll rain; if a mother wants to remarry, she'll remarry. Let them be."

Li Che understood what was going on from the side. It seemed that some people within the navy were planning to secretly send the former Ming princess away. However, it seemed that the secrecy measures were not very good. Based on the situation described by General Sa Dingming, this was just the navy's intelligence department performing its normal function.

The Jinyiwei, the original military intelligence agency of the Ming Dynasty, had already sided with Prince Jin before he launched his rebellion. The fact that Prince Jin's rebellion went exceptionally smoothly was also inseparable from the cooperation of the Jinyiwei.

Generally speaking, a country's intelligence agency is often the purest and most loyal part of that country. The Jinyiwei initially obeyed the provisional government, but unfortunately, the provisional government's actions were too despicable, and they probably knew that what they were doing was despicable. Therefore, the provisional government at the time prepared to dismantle the Jinyiwei to a certain extent.

Just like the dismantling of the KGB before the collapse of the Soviet Union, the plan was to first render the country's intelligence and security agencies ineffective. However, the Embroidered Uniform Guard did not sit idly by like the KGB; they directly contacted Li Zongdi and together they destroyed the provisional government.

Li Renchi is currently in charge of the Embroidered Uniform Guard. The commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard probably knows that although the Embroidered Uniform Guard has contributed a lot to the Prince of Jin's rebellion, its actions are chilling to any central government. Although this time it has the name of national righteousness, it is obviously very much feared by the government.

Therefore, the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard took the initiative to resign after the Prince of Jin entered the capital. He did this to prove that his actions were entirely for the benefit of the country, and not political opportunism for personal wealth and glory.

The intelligence agency left behind by the Ming Dynasty, which can be described as the world's largest and oldest, is still very capable. Before entering the capital, Li Renzhi had already learned about the ulterior motives of some people in the navy who were in contact with the Prince of Chao. He had already reported the relevant situation to Li Zongdi, but now it seems that his father doesn't care about it at all.

However, it seems there's really no need to make a fuss. After all, even if the Prince of Chao took the princess over, could he really support her as an empress? After Wu Zetian, there has never been an empress in the Celestial Empire, and the Ming Dynasty's reputation couldn't be upheld by a little girl.

Moreover, with a formidable enemy at hand, although Luzon and Yeonpyeong still operate under the banner of the Ming Dynasty and are nominally two vassal states under the Ming Dynasty, their subordinate relationship during the provisional government period was somewhat delicate. Although the current relationship is even more difficult to discuss, everyone shares the same enemy.

Just like Emperor Longwu back then, it is precisely at times like these that everyone must be patient and forgiving for the sake of the country.

"Then why did you keep me here, Grandpa?"

"Kid, I'm going to give you a task." Li Zongdi smiled and stared at his great-grandson: "If you do a good job, Grandpa will reward you, but you'll need to sacrifice yourself a little."

???

Li Che suddenly had a bad feeling. Thinking of the princess mentioned earlier, could his grandfather be having some audacious idea? The key is that he still doesn't know the princess's height, weight, personality, or anything like that. Could the old man be trying to force a marriage between them?

"The Tokugawa family sent people to find me several months ago."

"The Tokugawa family? The Tokugawa family of the Tokugawa Shogunate in Yingzhou?"

“Otherwise, which Tokugawa family could it be?” Li Zongdi sneered. “Eldest brother, you’ve been the one making the connections for the Tokugawa shogunate lately. Why don’t you talk to your eldest son about it?”

Li Renchi coughed lightly: "Zhi'er, as you know, the Tokugawa family has always been very friendly to China. When the Ming army was betrayed by the royalists in Yingzhou, the Tokugawa shogunate always stood on our side, and in the end, it withdrew to Silla along with the Ming army stationed in Yingzhou."

The Tokugawa clan is now essentially a regime in exile. Aside from the ten thousand or so shogunate soldiers who were initially withdrawn, and some other related personnel, they have no one else to rely on. They are essentially adrift on the mainland, and therefore hope to find a foothold to anchor themselves in.

"What does this have to do with me?" Li Che spread his hands: "Isn't Tokugawa just trying to find a powerful figure to cling to? Dad, do you think my legs are that thick? If they want to cling to someone, they'll definitely cling to Grandpa's leg."

"The Tokugawa family has come to us seeking their help, but we cannot view them that way. We cannot treat them as poor relatives who have nowhere else to turn and have come to us for refuge," Li Zongdi said solemnly.

“They were willing to stand firmly with us even when the Emperor of Yingzhou and the samurai clan betrayed us, and even led their entire clan and the last remaining shogunate army to retreat to Silla with the Ming army. We must treat them as our own people. The actions of the Tokugawa family are worthy of that.”

“I understand. We need to be generous in our dealings with Tokugawa. If we don't treat Tokugawa well like this, the remaining parts of the Three Proclamations and Six Pacifications that we still control will likely be difficult to stabilize.” Lee Cheol immediately grasped the key point: “But I still feel that such national affairs don't have much to do with me right now. I'm just a small…”

"Tokugawa Ietatsu is preparing to give you his youngest daughter," Li Zongdi said succinctly.

Li Che: ?

"The young lady has already been sent to your mother. Your father and I have both seen her photo; her appearance is impeccable, and your mother is very satisfied with her personality. In a few days, she will arrive in Yingtian Prefecture with the officials entering the pass, and then he will go directly to your..."

"Wait! Wait!" Li Che quickly interrupted his grandfather, "Tokugawa Ietatsu is, after all, the Shogun, isn't he? What does he mean by giving me his youngest daughter? Besides, Grandpa, I'm currently serving in the army with a military rank. You can't expect me to bring a girl into the army, can you? Wouldn't that be setting a bad example of violating military discipline? Even if you wanted to execute your grandson, you didn't have to set me up like this, did you?"

Chapter Eighteen Jiangnan Shipyard

It's a night of flowers and candles in the bridal chamber, and it's time to inscribe names on the gold medal list.

There is no greater joy in life than this.

Although Li Che didn't quite experience the joys of a wedding night or the glory of passing the imperial examination, by a round number, a beautiful but unseen woman from Yingzhou was supposedly being sent to him, and a position with more power and authority than his original position as deputy colonel and staff officer awaited him.

He just doesn't feel any joy or celebration at all right now.

After waking up from his cot, Li Che pounded his head hard. For the past few nights, he had been trying to send his soul to the body in the other world, just like before. Throughout the day, although he appeared normal in front of almost everyone, the Jedam that had fallen at the last moment of his consciousness in the other world kept haunting him.

However, his attempts over the past few nights have yielded no results. Although he hadn't always succeeded in trying to travel to that world before, since acquiring this special ability, he had never been completely unable to sense anything like he had been after falling asleep last night.

Before, when he couldn't travel through time, it was like a person closing their eyes. Although they couldn't see anything, they still had some sense of light. But now, he felt like he was truly blind. It wasn't that he went from being able to see all colors to only being able to see black—he couldn't even see black anymore. A truly blind person experiences nothingness; even darkness doesn't exist.

Li Che realized that he might have lost that girl forever.

After sitting up in bed, Li Che went to the clothes rack and began to pack his clothes. He planned to go to Songjiang Prefecture today because the Tokugawa family's Sakura girl would be arriving in Yingtian Prefecture in two days.

However, he doesn't want to see that Japanese girl right now. It's not that he's like some girls in other worlds who like to read romance novels, unable to accept other girls after their "childhood sweetheart" dies—it's just that he's in a bad mood right now and doesn't know how to deal with a girl who has suddenly entered his life.

This move by the Tokugawa Shogunate was naturally a purely political marriage. In fact, when he learned that the Tokugawa Shogunate was going to send him a girl without making any explicit demands for her status, he knew that the Tokugawa Shogunate's purpose was not to send a bed warmer to the Prince of Jin's grandson, but to send a concubine to the future potential crown prince.

Li Che disliked and was not good at handling political marriages, so he was now preparing to go to Songjiang Prefecture with the view that "escaping is shameful but very useful". His military uniform had been changed from the army uniform to the navy uniform, and even his rank had changed from the former army deputy captain to the navy captain (the rank titles of the army and navy in the Ming army were different). He jumped four ranks overnight and even changed his "specialty". Of course, this was due to "nepotism" and "cronyism".

However, this was also a helpless move by his grandfather. The Prince of Jin was not the type to give his grandson such an exaggerated promotion in order to gild his resume on the battlefield. The main reason why Li Zongdi did this was that the Prince of Jin faction could not find a professional in the navy before.

The country is currently in a delicate transitional phase. The Prince of Jin and the Navy are the two major shareholder groups in the country. Although one side holds a dominant position, the relative independence of the other side is beyond question.

Whether from the perspective of joint operations or from the perspective of further controlling the entire naval system in the future, now is a very suitable opportunity to infiltrate the navy. Li Zongdi originally planned to select some young officers with higher education from the army, take off their army uniforms and put on naval uniforms, but now he obviously has a better choice, which is his grandson.

There are a few high-speed railways connecting Yingtian Prefecture and Songjiang Prefecture in the Ming Dynasty. However, the speed of the so-called high-speed railway in this era is only 120 kilometers per hour, which is similar to the green train in another world. However, this speed is enough for him to take a train from Yingtian Prefecture in the morning and have lunch in Songjiang Prefecture at noon.

In the past few days, Li Che's proposed battle plan has been opposed by several veteran admirals in small-scale discussions among several high-ranking naval officers. Their reason for opposition is that if torpedo boats are used to launch an attack, then at least 300 torpedo boats would be needed to achieve decisive damage and casualties to the landing site of Wonsan Port and the surrounding landing fleet and escort fleet.

The Ming Dynasty Royal Navy certainly had more than 300 torpedo boats, but it did not have more than 300 torpedo boats that could be transported by rail.

If torpedo boats were to be transported by train, their size would have to be limited to the limits of railway transport, thus excluding large ocean-going torpedo boats. As a typical Pacific Ocean navy, the Ming Dynasty Royal Navy naturally prioritized indicators such as the range of its ships, and even torpedo boats were expected to travel further. Therefore, a considerable portion of the torpedo boats in service with the Ming Dynasty Royal Navy were large torpedo boats.

These torpedo boats, some even equipped with 88mm naval guns and triple or quadruple 450mm torpedo launchers, are obviously not transportable by rail, much like miniature destroyers. Therefore, the number of torpedo boats that can be transported by rail is at most 200.

Of course, this number is already quite large. All the torpedo boats in the Leitania High Seas Fleet combined are roughly this number. If we also consider issues such as serviceability, then this number would probably drop even further.

Li Che naturally scoffed at the veterans' claims. In his view, they were just excuses. Perhaps these old guys still felt that he was unworthy of his reputation and that the battle plans he had proposed earlier were probably devised by other professionals behind the scenes. So they were trying to use such reasons and excuses to evade responsibility.

These old guys were simply afraid that they could actually achieve results with light ships. They were worried that if they could successfully defeat the Federation Navy fleet near Yuanshan Port with some small torpedo boats and submarines in front of Prince Jin, who came from the army, then it was hard to guarantee that the court would change its mind and think that these small ships could achieve great things with little money, thus reducing the navy's investment in large surface combat ships.

In the eyes of these veterans, it was as terrifying as the sky falling and the earth collapsing.

These words might work to fool his grandfather, but they wouldn't be so easy to fool Li Che.

The number of active torpedo boats is not enough? Li Che believed that, but the problem was that if the number of small torpedo boats was not enough, then build new ones. A month was too short to build them.

That's pure nonsense. Even during World War II, many torpedo boats were built using plywood, such as the famous PT boats of the Federals. The operational plan did not require these torpedo boats to be durable. You could just take wooden planks, assemble the hull, add an internal combustion engine to the back, and build it like a "big flying boat" from the early 20th century.

As for torpedoes? They don't even need launch tubes; they can just be dropped into the water from the sides of the hull.

It doesn't matter if the torpedoes are poorly made, and it's not a problem if they are launched like this with a low hit rate.

This thing is a "large armed aircraft" weighing tens of tons. It's impossible that those old generals couldn't have thought of this. If one person couldn't think of it, surely everyone could.

Li Che wasn't angry with these veteran generals. His trip to Songjiang Prefecture wasn't to argue with them, use his grandfather's influence to intimidate them, or act like a bully using someone else's power.

He was going to reassure these old generals.

Upon arriving in Songjiang Prefecture, his first stop was not to visit the veteran generals, nor to report to the Navy Ministry immediately. Instead, he traveled directly to the suburbs, where a famous shipyard was located.

Jiangnan Shipyard.

As one of the world's largest shipyards in terms of annual shipbuilding tonnage before the outbreak of war, Jiangnan Shipyard could easily produce a batch of small torpedo boats that could be transported by rail wagons within a month. However, Li Che was more concerned about the two giant ships under construction in the No. 3 and No. 4 docks of Jiangnan Shipyard.

Although you may have imagined what these two giant ships would look like on the way there, it is only when you actually stand in front of these magnificent hulls that you can feel that what you actually see is different from the cold, hard numbers you have read before.