Chapter Thirteen: Those Fake Nobles (Five)

  I'm really tired and thinking about whether I should take a break for a day.

  "Judging from the British Navy's previous two North Sea battles, their usual route of action is to slip out of the harbor under the cover of night, quickly passing through the vast central part of the North Sea to approach the outer perimeter of Helgoland Bay, and then return along the Jutland coast line under the cover of night. The main fleet usually meets them in the southern part of the Scandinavian Peninsula, or outside the Skagerrak Strait. As the sorrow and loneliness of the Aegean Sea gradually faded away, Queen Heidie dared to collect her expression and emerged from the darkness, using a trembling hand to heavily knock on the table, and drew a line on the blurry Baltic Sea map: "General Maas was right, even if our High Seas Fleet sails day and night at full speed, we cannot intercept the British fast fleet retreating along the Jutland coast line before dark on March 3rd. Or, in the spring night, fog, and storm surge, we found them, but we cannot eat them up in the first time, and may even be entangled by them, encountering the pincer attack of the main force battleships. Unfortunately..."

  "Commander, it's 6:27. The Lützow and Derfflinger have completed lighting fires and are ready for battle. The three battlecruisers of the First Scouting Group have set off towards the Swedish coast. Colonel von Ingenohl, Chief of Staff, inquires about further actions."

  The senior officers in the chart room fixed their eyes on Wang Haitao, eagerly awaiting the commander's bold and unconventional order that went against the traditional moral code.

  "Unfortunately, we didn't take the Kattegat and Skagerrak route, but instead took the Kiel Canal!" Wang Haitian pulled out his pocket watch to check the time. His rough fingers moved from the blurry Baltic Sea along the Kiel Canal to the depths of Heligoland Bay, ignoring the astonished gazes of the officers as he quickly said: "Third time's the charm, I understand David-Betty just like David-Betty understands me. He won't underestimate my intelligence and definitely wouldn't let his route be exposed in front of me. So I'm sure he'll change tactics and slip in from the Jutland coast, taking a shortcut back to Scapa Bay."

  The great war is imminent, and the generals present are already excited about the victory of the Battle of Mudsros Bay. The upcoming North Sea battle in 1915 will make their blood and passion burn even more. Except for General Behrnik, who is cautious and hesitant, everyone else is waiting for Admiral von Hipper's order. And indeed, Admiral von Hipper, who has been criticized by the conservative Junker landlords as a "clown" who destroys the German spirit, does not disappoint them. He turns to the intelligence officer of the blockade fleet and says bluntly: "Order! The First Reconnaissance Squadron will enter a state of war immediately. Lützow and Derfflinger will set sail in three minutes, heading southwest. Vice-Admiral Levetzow will lead Seydlitz, Moltke, and Deutschland from Kattengat Strait to the south, and we will meet at Holtenau Locks on the Kiel Canal at dawn on the 3rd! General Maas, what is your choice?"

  "The Second Scouting Group has two Graudenz and two Magdeburg-class light cruisers following the First Scouting Group!" said his old partner, Admiral Masu, standing up with a sharp gaze and firm tone.

  "But, gentlemen, you don't have the orders of the naval staff!" The newly appointed commander of the Baltic blockade fleet, Admiral Behncke, couldn't help but lose his flagship. Although he admired Queen Hedwig's personal prospects for gaining a strategic advantage for the empire, he was still bound by conventional thinking and his words came out in a dispirited tone.

  "An order from the Admiralty Staff?" Wang Haitie stepped forward and patted the shoulder of the new commander of the blockade fleet he had recommended to the Navy Department, the stubborn and principled General Behanek, and said with a distant tone: "There will be!"

  ****

  Between the Orkney and Shetland Islands, a hundred-mile gap was filled with scattered icebergs and storm surges. The violent spring gales of the North Atlantic easily whipped up waves several meters high, constantly pounding against the bow of the Lion war cruiser, sending spray flying and water columns churning, turning the deck where life rafts, rigging, and cables were stored into a veritable purgatory. Tens of thousands of tons of steel giant ships seemed like toys in front of nature, or like duckweed on the ocean, shaking violently, so that sailors had to tie themselves to their workstations with ropes, struggling to operate the warship in the harsh environment.

  At 11:10 on March 2, 1915, five battlecruisers in line ahead formation sped through the over 100-mile-wide gap between the Orkney and Shetland Islands into the even more hostile North Sea at a speed of 20 knots. Commander-in-Chief David Beatty stood on the bridge of Lion, facing the raging North Sea, letting the spray soak his cap.

  "Rampart, to be honest I'm delighted..." Betty turned her head and wrote to the hastily approaching Vice Admiral Rampart: "Because in my hands is one of the world's most excellent striking forces!"

  Ten capital ships, more than the combined total of any other major navy in the world; to put this into perspective, the Royal Navy's arch-rival, the Hochseeflotte, had only five battlecruisers, and Japan's four Kongō-class vessels brought the total to nine.

  In fact, Lieutenant General Rommel, who possessed a poetic and romantic temperament, was more self-assured than his superior, David Beatty, but now was not the time to relax.

  "Commander, this is the rapid fleet route chart drafted by the staff room." Rao was a wandering son who had been drifting on the ocean for a long time, and the madness of the North Sea was still not something that Lanpad could bear. Lanpad walked over to the commander's tower, holding onto the armored wall for support, and handed over a detailed plan book. "Commander, the plans of the chief of staff and the navigator are..."

  "No, even if we only have two North Sea cruises, that route has already been exposed." Betty stretched out her hand to interrupt Ah Jiang's words, and handed the plan book back without looking at it. Taking advantage of the gap in the howling wind and waves, she whispered to Lampard: "This time I won't follow the usual convention, but instead of entering from the central North Sea into the outer perimeter of Helgoland Bay, I'll slip in from the Jutland coast and return home from the Jutland coast!"

  ****

  Here is the translation:

  " Above is General von Spee's judgment on the British route to the south. Below is the Operations Department's specific plan for the High Seas Fleet: It is predicted that Admiral David Beatty's fast fleet will receive massive support from light vessels in Scapa Flow and Firth of Forth during the night of 2nd to 3rd, and arrive at Heligoland Bight's two-hundred-mile defense circle around 12-17 hours on the 3rd. According to the British naval tradition of radio silence, the High Seas Fleet can quietly exit Jade Bay from dawn on the 3rd and lie in ambush south of Dogger Bank, while General von Spee's First Reconnaissance Squadron crosses Kiel Canal at dawn on the 3rd, takes advantage of the night and receives support from North Sea light vessels to head deep into the North Sea. When Beatty emerges from the Jutland coast to sweep the North Sea, the High Seas Fleet main force and the First Reconnaissance Squadron can attack him from both sides and annihilate him in the central region of the North Sea!"

  March 2nd, 8pm, Berlin Naval Headquarters.

  When Oberst Erich Raeder, head of the Operations Division, received a mysterious telegram marked "Deutschland Siegt", the office of the head of the Operations Division was closed. Colonel Raeder, who had served in intelligence and commanded warships, wrote on a small blackboard to explain the North Sea interception plan he had devised with Heidkamp to his enthusiastic subordinates, until his mouth was dry and his tongue was sore, then put down the pen, waved his hand in the air, grasped at nothing, and made a powerful gesture.

  "Tonight, the officer on duty at the Navy General Staff is Admiral Pole. Everyone knows that the old general has long been suffering from neurasthenia and can hardly stay up all night, while the second officer on duty is me. In this way, we can easily bypass the Chief of the General Staff and secretly send out an order that will decide the outcome..."

  ****

  "Are you suffering from a long-term case of neurasthenia?" General Pole gazed at the little devil who had slipped over from the Operations Section of the Staff Office, and with an entirely natural motion unscrewed his pillbox, swallowed several sedatives in succession, and washed them down with warm water. "Hah! In this vigorous and flourishing country, encountering an absurd emperor - perhaps neurasthenia is my best life companion!"

  "Should the Chief of Staff intervene?" General Pole's words were somewhat ambiguous, and Noel, the operations staff officer who was acting as a mole, couldn't understand the depth of his words due to his age and experience. He shook his head, trying to brush off the unconditional trust that his superior, Redel, had in him and the anxiety in his heart, and asked in a low voice.

  "Neuer, although I'm not very capable, I'm still not senile yet!" General Pol picked up the blanket from the long sofa in the Chief of Staff's office and lay down comfortably. Along with Neuer's astonished gaze, the old general pointed to the desk lamp that was still on and said softly: "Young man, I'm just a neurotic old man who should be resting early, aren't I?"

  ****

  Scapa Flow at 2200 hours on the 2nd day.

  "The failure of the Dardanelles campaign has made our First Lord, Mr. Churchill, unreasonable; General Beatty's Heligoland Bight sweep plan may not have been without its reward for his kindness to him, but the greedy knight actually wanted the Grand Fleet to pull chestnuts out of the fire for his shaky throne!" Rear Admiral Charles Madden, Chief of Staff of the Grand Fleet, was furious about the temporary change in the Heligoland sweep plan by Admiral Sturdee, Chief of Naval Staff.

  When Beatty submitted the Heligoland Bight sweep plan to the Admiralty, the Board of Admiralty agreed in principle, but when news of the disastrous outcome at the Battle of Moudros reached Churchill's desk, the Admiralty got cold feet and made significant changes to Beatty's plan, requiring his fast force to lure the High Seas Fleet out of Heligoland Bight and ambush it off the west coast of Jutland.

  "Admiral Madden! The political storm brought by the Mudros Bay tragedy, as a senior officer of the Royal Navy, no one can avoid it! No matter how much we have been at odds with Mr. Churchill, after all, we are all on the same boat, so please put aside those narrow and shallow factional views!" Because of insisting on the long-range blockade strategy, the conservative controversy surrounding Admiral John Jellicoe, as a member of the "Fisher Clique" who had been jealous of Churchill for many years, showed military dignity and integrity in this crisis. It was a kind of solemnity different from the sharpness and flashiness of politicians, but sincere enough, perhaps it was the profound reason why professional soldiers could not compete with politicians who had been flowing with despicable and dirty blood for thousands of years. "The Grand Fleet agrees in principle with the strategic objectives of the Admiralty, but we will not go to the Scandinavian Peninsula, but to the central North Sea..."

  Meeting Madden's puzzled gaze, Jellicoe turned his back to the direction of Beatty's fleet and said with a burning gaze: "In 1915, the fast fleet was unprecedentedly powerful, while the Grand Fleet was weak. The upcoming North Sea showdown, if we can't lure Scheer's battlecruiser squadron out of Heligoland Bay and separate it from the main force of the High Seas Fleet, then the Grand Fleet with only twenty capital ships will not be able to shake the High Seas Fleet with seventeen capital ships, and our strategic goal will not be achieved. The Grand Fleet goes to the central North Sea, to mislead the main force of the High Seas Fleet's vision, making them think that the rendezvous point is in the central North Sea. In this way, Scheer's five battlecruisers, whether they emerge from the Skagerrak Strait or rush out from a corner of the west coast of Jutland to intercept, or pursue out of Heligoland Bay, will inevitably suffer a major defeat!