Empire Conquest
Chapter 325 - 321: Breaking Off Relations and Escorting

Chapter 325: Chapter 321: Breaking Off Relations and Escorting

In the early morning in West East Ocean, aboard the "Longxing" battleship.

Zhang Guozhu had already spent the entire night in the command bridge. Aside from occasionally receiving messages from the cruisers sent out on reconnaissance, nothing had happened.

Now, he was the acting commander of the Fourth Fleet and also served as the commander of the 42nd Special Mixed Fleet.

After Gui Boyong went to the Navy headquarter to take up the position of Chief of Naval Staff, Zhang Guozhu became the acting commander of the Domestic Fleet. When the fleet was restructured, he did not become the commander of the East Ocean Fleet, but instead volunteered to go to the Fourth Fleet, thus becoming its first commander.

According to the new rules, the first half-year was a probationary period, after which the "acting" prefix would be removed from his title.

It seemed like a demotion, but in reality, it was not so.

The East Ocean Fleet nominally inherited the mantle of the Domestic Fleet, but in actuality, it was nothing more than an empty shell with no real power to move or command.

Under the new organizational system, both the "East Ocean Fleet" and the "Fan Flame Ocean Fleet" fell under the Navy headquarter, responsible solely for personnel management and functioning as civil service organizations. To put it bluntly, they were akin to the personnel department of the Navy headquarter, just with a more prominent name.

Although the Fourth Fleet was only responsible for the combat operations in the West East Ocean, it had the real authority to move battleships and command fleets, and it also directly participated in combat operations.

Crucially, the acting commander of the Second Fleet, responsible for the combat operations in the North East Ocean, was Vice Admiral Guan Zhenping.

This man was from the Southern Fleet, with seniority and status comparable to Zhang Guozhu’s.

This all the more necessitated Zhang Guozhu’s transfer to the Fourth Fleet.

In He Yongxing’s words, there was no one more suitable than Zhang Guozhu.

Regarding this, Zhang Guozhu had nothing much to say.

His achievements today were all thanks to He Yongxing’s promotion.

But personally, Zhang Guozhu felt that Bai Zhizhan should command the Fourth Fleet, given Bai Zhizhan’s evident talent and capability.

If anything, it was just that Bai Zhizhan lacked a bit in seniority.

Before becoming a fleet commander, Bai Zhizhan had never served as a captain, having worked for only a few months as a supervisor on the "Longjiang" ship before spending the rest of his time in the Fleet headquarter as a staff officer. According to traditional views, commanders with a staff background were unsuited for commanding fleet operations.

Starting with Chen Bingxun, all commanders of the Empire’s fleets had served as captains of main battleships.

When the special mixed fleets were assigned, Zhang Guozhu did not contend with Bai Zhizhan for the command of the 41st Special Mixed Fleet.

Of course, he could not have won anyway.

Bai Zhizhan was given the command of the 41st Special Mixed Fleet by Liu Changxun. Under the current organizational structure, the Navy headquarter had absolute authority over personnel appointments.

Because of this, Zhang Guozhu came to the 42nd Special Mixed Fleet, with the "Longxing" ship as the flagship.

Indeed, the "Longxing" has always been a symbol of the Domestic Fleet.

Since being transferred from the Southern Fleet to the Domestic Fleet in the last year of the previous war, the "Longxing" had been the flagship of the Domestic Fleet for decades.

Zhang Guozhu was more than familiar with this imposing battleship.

In fact, he was just as familiar with the other battleships of the 42nd Special Mixed Fleet.

The greatest advantage of the new organizational structure was that training and combat did not interfere with administrative management, allowing the fleet’s composition to be adjusted based on actual needs.

The four "Longxing" class ships were just one subdivision of the 42nd Special Mixed Fleet, namely the 42.1 Subsquad. Besides this, there was the 42.2 Subsquad composed of four "Zizhou" class ships, the 42.3 Subsquad of four light cruisers, and the 42.4 and 42.5 Subsquads, each with four destroyers.

Furthermore, the four fleet oilers designated as the 42.6 Subsquad remained at Liuhuang Island.

If necessary, detachments or battleships could be transferred from other Special Mixed Fleets, or even other fleets, to be incorporated into the 42nd Special Mixed Fleet.

Now, the 42.2 Subsquad was about twenty kilometers ahead, and the 42.4 Subsquad was on alert to the east.

Last night, the 42.3 Subsquad along with the 42.5 Subsquad had already accelerated to move ahead and intercept those Newland vessels still heading west.

To be precise, they were there to support the commerce cruisers that were registered under the Second Fleet.

According to the plans of the Chief of Naval Staff, the Second Fleet had assembled more than ten commerce cruisers, forming a blockade line 1500 kilometers east of the Saiyi mainland. But compared to the hundred-plus Newland merchant ships heading west, a dozen commerce cruisers were most certainly insufficient.

Moreover, intelligence indicated that there were armed merchant ships among the Newland fleet.

One could say that commerce cruisers and armed merchant ships were essentially the same type of ship.

Both were converted from merchant ships, and although there were some differences—such as commerce cruisers focusing on speed while armed merchant ships emphasized firepower—the basics were largely the same.

In the North Sunset Ocean, the Bulan Royal Navy had already followed the precedent of the last great war, outfitting its merchant ships with armaments for convoy escort duty.

Although initially achieving some surprising successes, once Tiaoman submarines changed their tactics and no longer aimed to capture merchant ships, Bulan’s armed merchant vessels became virtually useless. By now, some had been converted into seaplane mother ships.

The Newland Federation also modified a batch of merchant ships, specifically for carrying and operating seaplanes, responsible for distant anti-submarine search during escort missions.

However, at present, all these ships were flying the flags of the Bulan Kingdom.

Interestingly, the Tiaoman Empire was copying this approach.

Before the outbreak of the war, in addition to the commerce raiding fleet sent to the South Sunset Ocean, the Tiaoman Empire had also issued an order for all merchant ships that could not return to the homeland in time to undergo armed conversion in friendly country ports and, after the outbreak of war, to put out to sea to perform raiding missions.

A total of twelve Tiaoman merchant ships were armed thus.

Subsequently, these merchant ships all became commerce cruisers, mostly deployed to the Fan Flame Ocean and Sunset Ocean.

At the onset of the war, the exploits of these commerce cruisers could be described as "heroic."

In just the first month, they captured more than thirty Bulan Kingdom merchant ships, and even converted several of the faster ships into commerce cruisers themselves.

Unfortunately, this success was short-lived as the Bulan Royal Navy swiftly deployed light cruisers, sinking the majority of the commerce cruisers within two months. The survivors could only hide in the Northwest, with several disarming in Neutral Countries’ ports as per international law.

Now, there are no more than five commerce cruisers still active on the seas flying the Tiaoman Empire’s flag.

Lacking supplies and daring not to risk going to Neutral Countries’ ports, the fate of these armed merchant ships was certainly not looking promising.

In the West East Ocean, armed merchant ships were also active.

Last month, a commerce cruiser from the Second Fleet sank a Newland vessel suspected of being an armed merchant ship and captured a group of crew members.

Although through interrogation, information from these crewmen was obtained, including the captain who died in combat, many were retired military personnel from the Newland Navy. But since the merchant ship had been sunk and the rescued sailors were not active military, they couldn’t be used as evidence of the Newland Federation violating neutrality principles.

The Newland Federation had not deployed many armed merchant ships in the East Ocean precisely because of their fear of the Imperial Navy’s fleet.

In the face of warships, both armed merchant ships and commerce cruisers were utterly vulnerable.

In fact, this was also key to why the 42nd Special Mixed Fleet had sent out two subdivisions.

If the Newland Navy dispatched battleships to escort the convoy, the intercepting commerce cruisers would definitely have to retreat, necessitating that fleets take their place.

Indeed, the first to charge forward were battleships from the Newland Navy!