Chapter 133: Negligence

On August 28, the landing fleet arriving in Micronesia was fully launched, and on the same day it controlled most of the islands that were settled. Because the Federated States of Micronesia did not participate in the war and had long declared neutrality, the Chinese army was only temporarily stationed.

Fortunately, Micronesia has no army, only a police force with less than 500 people, and it is distributed on dozens of islands of all sizes.

In order to avoid troubles from foreign countries, the Chinese Consul General in Micronesia issued a foreign country note on the 27th, demanding that the Federated States of Micronesia provide convenience for the Chinese army, and China will bear all the expenses of the garrison and compensate Micronesia for the losses suffered as a result.

With troops at the gates, the Micronesian authorities had no choice.

On the morning of the 28th, Micronesia declared itself an unguarded country and declared that it would continue to remain neutral.

In fact, at this time, the Chinese Marine Corps had boarded several islands in the country and confiscated police guns and ammunitions.

In the afternoon of that day, the Second Fleet had already passed through Micronesia and headed towards the Bismarck Islands.

According to Mu Haoyang's deployment, the Second Fleet will patrol the northeast of the Bismarck Islands, and the First Fleet will remain about 800 kilometers behind. If the US military takes the initiative to fight, it will first encounter the Second Fleet and will not pose a serious threat to the First Fleet.

On the same day, Mu Haoyang received information from the Military Intelligence Agency that three aircraft carriers of the US Fifth Fleet had arrived in San Diego.

In other words, only the U.S. Third Fleet was active on the ocean.

That night, Major General Tong Shaoyun also received a very important piece of intelligence, that is, the U.S. Third Fleet appeared in the Chesterfield Islands and was sailing northward. A few hours later, the intelligence provided by the Military Intelligence Agency proved that the U.S. Third Fleet had entered the Coral Sea.

The first to discover the U.S. third fleet was a submarine operating in the Coral Sea.

This "Stingray" class fully electric submarine set off on August 16th and headed to the Coral Sea to carry out a mission to break through the anti-submarine blockade line set up by the US military in the Solo Islands and enter the Coral Sea, and they have to live a nervous life, because there are hundreds of US anti-submarine ships and hundreds of anti-submarine patrol aircraft in the largest sea in the world. What's more, even if you take the shortest route, the "Stingray" class has only one week of activity in the Coral Sea. That is to say, after a week of patrol, you have to break through the US military's anti-submarine blockade line and return to Anathahan Island.

At that time, the Chinese submarine captain was regarded as a "devil mission" by going to the Coral Sea.

Only the captain who is bravest and least afraid of death is willing to perform such a task.

There is no doubt that the greater the risk, the greater the reward.

On August 26, the submarine named "Tanshui Ray" entered the Coral Sea, and on the same day it sank three small cargo ships, attacked a US fleet on the 27th, and sank two of them. In order to avoid the US anti-submarine ships and anti-submarine patrol aircraft, the "Tanshui Ray" did not sail north, but sailed southward abnormally, and arrived to the west of the Chesterfield Islands on the morning of the 28th. This is already the southern part of the Coral Sea, and further south is the Tasman Sea. The remaining electricity of the "Tanshui Ray" is only enough for it to return to Anathahan Island.

That is, when the Tamsui Ray was about to return, she encountered the US fleet heading north.

Because the battery is not much power and is not enough to perform fast tactical avoidance, the Tamsui Ray did not send a telegram immediately, but waited until the US fleet left and sent it in the afternoon of the same day. Then, the submarine embarked on a journey back.

In fact, the US military also intercepted the telegram sent by the submarine at that time.

However, Major General Nixon did not make any special arrangements.

From an after-the-scene perspective, perhaps the Chinese submarines have never appeared in this sea area, and the electromagnetic bo signal intercepted by the US military is very weak, so Major General Nixon felt that it was not a big problem, so he did not send anti-submarine patrol aircraft to search for the submarine.

In fact, the telegram from the "Tanshui Ray" was not sent to Anathahan Island, but to the Chinese Consulate in New Caledonia, and then forwarded to the Navy Command by the Foreign Ministry. You should know that New Caledonia is an overseas territory of France, while France is still a neutral country.

This is also true that the "Tanshui Ray" uses short-range communication stations, not long-distance communication stations.

According to the information after the war, the United States had already known at that time that France was secretly releasing water, that is, allowing the Chinese Consulate in New Caledonia to engage in matters that undermine its interstellar status, such as helping submarines forward telegraphs, etc., and the US State Department had sent foreign protests to the French authorities. But interestingly, these matters were not reported to the Pentagon, that is, the US military did not know the specific situation.

Judging from the situation at that time, the US State Department did not inform the Pentagon, mainly because it was worried that the US military would use this as an excuse to send troops to New Caledonia, thereby causing France to turn to China. You should know that the first war plan formulated by the US military mentioned New Caledonia. Moreover, in 2052, General Jordan repeatedly proposed to control New Caledonia and improve the defense deployment in the southwestern Pacific. However, General Jordan was staring at Okinawa at that time and did not consider too much strategic defense issues, so the matter was left unresolved.

Of course, the responsibility is not entirely dependent on the U.S. State Department.

You should know that after occupying Anathahan Island, the Chinese Navy began to send fully electric submarines to the Coral Sea, and achieved a lot of results. There were more than 30 US transport ships sunk alone, which has attracted the attention of the US military. Moreover, the US Navy judged through telegrams to Chinese submarines that these messages were sent to a nearby radio station, and the most likely one was the New Caledonian Consulate. The problem is that the US Navy did not pay attention to this, and even believed that this was just a radio station of Chinese submarines was not very reliable.

It can be seen how careless the US Navy is.

What happened next proves that Major General Nixon was too careless.

That morning, less than two hours after being discovered by the Tamsui Ray, the U.S. Third Fleet encountered a freighter flying the French flag, and the freighter was sailing to Noumea, New Caledonia, carrying cargo loaded at the Port of Dili.

According to the US Navy's rules of war, if you encounter a hostile country or a pro-hostile country ship, in addition to directly sinking, you will be captured, and personnel will be arranged to escort the ship to a port controlled by the US military, and you can only be released after it does not affect the fleet's operations.

Before this, the US Navy had seized more than a dozen French cargo ships, but they were all released in the end.

Because of these things, France has repeatedly protested to the United States that the US military has no reason to seize French unarmed merchant ships on the high seas.

Logically speaking, Nixon should detain the French freighter and take it to Brisbane, and wait until the Third Fleet completes its combat mission before releasing it. However, Nixon did not do this, just sent Marines to board the freighter, checked the cargo, and confirmed that it was carrying palm oil and released it, because in the US authorities' wartime embargo list, palm oil is civilian supplies and is not within the embargo range.

It is undoubtedly an extremely wrong decision.

The actual owner of this cargo ship, called "Avalon", is China Shipping Company. Its main task is to perform reconnaissance missions on the route from Dili to Noumea. At that time, there were four seamen from East Timor on board, but the real identities of these four seamen were all agents of the Military Intelligence Bureau.

As a result, the Avalon sent a telegram at 1:00 p.m.

Interestingly, the U.S. Third Fleet also intercepted the telegram from the "Avalon", and after comparison, it is basically certain that the Chinese intelligence agency's password was used. Although it cannot be deciphered, at least it is certain that the "Avalon" was a commercial spy ship. However, by this time, Nixon did not take any action. Not only did he not send a warship to recover the "Avalon" and interrogate the spy personnel on the ship, and did not even change the course of the fleet, but only asked the staff to record this matter in the navigation log.

By this time, there is no secret of the whereabouts of the US Third Fleet.

According to the intelligence provided by submarines and spy ships, the U.S. Third Fleet is sailing to the Solo Islands, and the destination is likely to be Honiara. Because there are no transport ships in the fleet and there are no transport fleets nearby, it can be concluded that the U.S. Third Fleet is not performing an escort mission.

Since it was not an escort mission and was rushing to Honiara, it was definitely carrying out combat missions.

From a time perspective, if Tong Shaoyun takes action immediately, on the night of August 30, the Second Fleet will be able to shell the U.S. third Fleet near Honiara on the east side of the Bismarck Islands, which is near New Ireland, and will unexpectedly win the naval battle.

The problem is that Tong Shaoyun did not seize this opportunity.

In fact, it would be impossible for someone else to seize this opportunity, because no one could believe that the US Third Fleet would be so careless.

In Tong Shaoyun's opinion, this is an absolute trap.

You should know that since the US Third Fleet is carrying out combat missions and its target is the Chinese fleet, it will try every means to introduce the Chinese fleet to the battlefield.

The result was that Tong Shaoyun made the Second Fleet turn to Kaping Amaranyi Atoll that night.

Here, it is almost 1,400 kilometers away from Honiara.

It seemed that it was not very safe, Tong Shaoyun led the Second Fleet to the north of Kaping Amaranyi Atoll on the night of the 29th.

At that time, Tong Shaoyun had contacted four submarines and replenished electricity for the four submarines, allowing them to patrol between the Kaping Amarani Atoll and the New Ireland Islands. According to Tong Shaoyun's deployment, unless the US Third Fleet came to the north of the Solo Islands, he would not take the initiative to fight with it.
Chapter completed!