Chapter Sixteen: The Trump Card (Part Two)

  Only stopped for a day and found signs of disconnection, I flipped through several chapters in one breath and still remembered the previous clues. Rushed to finish this poor chapter, hurriedly brought up the Skyrim dish, well, Mr. Summer finally mixed into the people's public servant team, estimated that the Industrial and Commercial Enforcement Brigade is more powerful than my "Urban Management" brigade!

  After several calls to HMS Royal Princess went unanswered, senior officers of the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron began to realize that something was amiss. The headquarters of the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron carefully concealed the fact that HMS Royal Princess had lost contact and, under the pretext of searching for sixteen missing sailors, captured German sailors who fell into the water, extracted some useful intelligence from their mouths, and sent the 1st and 2nd Destroyer Squadrons to the combat area on a "rescue" mission.

  Before Commander-in-Chief C-D Roper RN sent back a confirming message, the Royal Navy had every reason to believe that HMS Royal Princess was merely suffering from damaged wireless aerials and not from shell holes through the plotting room alongside the conning tower or even more catastrophically an explosion of the magazine.

  At 18:52, the Second Destroyer Flotilla, which was clearing the battlefield, reported to the flagship Lion that German light vessels had been spotted in the combat area. Within minutes, small-calibre shells replaced those with calibres of over 300 mm, crackling away on the calm surface of the North Sea as British destroyers, led by a cruiser, engaged in a pointless minor skirmish with a German destroyer flotilla.

  The battlefield was 200 miles away from the Heligoland Bight, a defensive circle of German patrol boats. It was clear that the Germans would not dare to venture out at night along the Danish coast, so Beatty could almost be certain that his enemy, Hipper and his First Scouting Group, had not gone far. Weighing his options on this tightrope between boldness and recklessness, Beatty gave the order to turn away.

  Although the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron had not yet joined up with the 2nd Battlecruiser Squadron and was out of touch with the Lion, the German battlecruisers were already badly damaged, and the captain of the New Zealand would stake his professional career that the Derfflinger was no longer in fighting trim. Four to four, Admiral von Mühlheim's 2nd Battlecruiser Squadron was just astern, Beatty made up his mind to form line of battle once more and fight it out!

  The order to turn away had just been given, and the small-scale artillery duel in the rear was hastily ended. "The Germans seem to have lost their nerve, they are not eager to fight, and they retreated in a sorry state after less than five minutes of contact", the news of the disappearance of HMS Princess Royal was concealed, the damage suffered by SMS Derfflinger was exaggerated, and as a result, the morale of the First Battlecruiser Squadron was boosted. The telegram from the Second Destroyer Flotilla was written in a relaxed and elegant tone, but the good mood of the British ended there.

  At 19:22, the first destroyer squadron sent out to search for missing sailors returned. Ten small ones with a displacement of less than a thousand tons were scattered on one side of the Lion-class battlecruiser, and only the leading ship slowly came alongside.

  The sailors on the port side of the Lion battlecruiser did not have time to confirm the smell of gunpowder and the two or three bullet holes on the destroyers, nor was it clear where the more than 200 people wrapped in tattered blankets came from, who were crowded on the narrow deck of the destroyer. The spiritless sailors seemed to be from nowhere. At this moment, the leading ship of the First Destroyer Flotilla, HMS Fearless, sent a request for assistance by signal lamp, and the bewildered sailors of the Lion battlecruiser threw down thick ropes, allowing Commander C.D. Roper, RN, commanding the destroyer flotilla, to climb up the gangway.

  "Commander, the Royal Princess has sunk!"

  In the hidden commander's cabin, the flame of the cigar silently went out, and the person holding the cigarette was completely unaware. After a long time, Betty gritted her teeth and spat out a few words: "The life of the British boy is not to be desecrated, I swear in the name of God, Sylam, you must pay the price for this!"

  The name of Vice Admiral David Beatty was well-known to Captain C.D. Roper for his bravery. The captain had a strange feeling in his heart, fearing that General Beatty would act impulsively. From the just-concluded sea battle, it seemed that the British main battleships with an advantage in main gun numbers and caliber were not a match for the Germans under equal conditions! The German war cruiser "Deutschland" lost its combat effectiveness to the new Royal Navy war cruiser, while the "perfect cat", HMS Princess Royal, sank after its ammunition depot exploded. This huge contrast is the best annotation!

  "Keep the First Battle Cruiser Squadron on course!" Betty looked down at her watch, which had momentarily stopped at 7:44 PM, and struggled to suppress her inner anger. "Send a message to General Muir, asking him to meet me before 8:30 PM sharp!"

  ****

  At 7:50 pm, the main fleet was racing towards Skagerrak at a speed of 25 knots under the cover of night.

  "Commander, the results of the engagement are in..." In the radio room of HMS Queen Elizabeth's command tower, a communications officer with a knotted brow repeated the just-ended battle report to Rear Admiral Moore: "We heavily damaged Deutschland and Seydlitz; Indomitable, Intrepid, and Tiger suffered only minor damage. However, Lion was heavily damaged, and the First Battlecruiser Squadron's HMS Princess Royal has lost contact."

  "Huh?" Colonel Mu's aged face flickered with a hint of hesitation, but he forced himself to appear composed in front of his subordinates, asking nonchalantly: "What else did the Deputy Commander say in the telegram?"

  "The deputy commander ordered us to report the location of the Second Battle Cruiser Squadron and to rendezvous with them before 2030!" As he said this, the signalman's eyes gleamed with a hint of expectation.

  "20:30?" Betty's reasonable order became an unconditional joke in front of the presumptuous Lieutenant General Muir. The old general trembled slightly, then turned his head stubbornly and said, "Alright, report our plan to the deputy commander: the maximum speed of the Second Battle Cruiser Squadron is limited, and it's really impossible to keep up with the pace of the First Battle Cruiser Squadron. In order to achieve the ultimate goal of annihilating the First Reconnaissance Fleet, the Second Battle Cruiser Squadron has decided to rush straight into the Skagerrak Strait, and pincer attack the First Battle Cruiser Squadron from north and south with the deputy commander!"

  Just as Mulder was finishing his words, the lookout on the mainmast of the Queen Elizabeth reported a huge shadow in the direction of due east.

  "Notify the Second Battle Cruiser Squadron to pay attention to light control, continue to closely monitor the opponent from the lookout tower, and send naval cryptograms to the opponent from the telegraph room!" Admiral Muellner gave a contradictory order with a dizzy head, and the officer had to execute the seemingly absurd directive after repeated confirmation.

  The telegraph room staff member smiled wryly at the fleet navigation officer, turned back to the telegraph room, and after a moment of grinding, separately reported the message to the flagship Lion of the First Battle Cruiser Squadron and other ships of the Second Battle Cruiser Squadron, as well as sending the Royal Navy's cryptic language to that shadow. The navigation officer led several staff members into the chart room for map work.

  The message of the enemy's silence was relayed back to the telegraph room through the ship's internal telephone system. The fleet navigation officer finally completed his chart work, casually dropping the pencil in his hand and handing over a rough and disorganized sea chart to General Muir, explaining: "The First Battle Cruiser Squadron and the German First Scouting Group opened fire around 17:50, almost due east, and advanced at maximum speed for half an hour, about 13 miles. Around 18:24, both fleets lost their targets, the First Battle Cruiser Squadron's course after breaking off combat was northeast by north 40 degrees, while we were in a northeasterly direction..."

  "In other words, we won't be encountering the First Battle Cruiser Squadron!" The outcome was already a foregone conclusion, and Muul murmured dejectedly.

  "They're Germans!" The senior officers in the command tower became excited, after all, the idea of attacking first had been ingrained in their bones as a naval tradition! The Royal Navy men looked at him with eager eyes, expecting him to intercept the first scouting fleet and achieve the redemption of the British Empire's navy, but the old general's lips trembled for half a day without uttering a single positive word.

  At this time, the intelligence staff officer walked in with a frown, his cold eyes scanning the faces of the naval officers, and pulled General Mu to one side, whispering: "General, the situation is not good, the flagship Lion has sent a secret telegram, the Royal Princess has unfortunately sunk in the just-ended sea battle!"

  Despite the steam age, fully enclosed turrets, ammunition hoists and loading tubes, rangefinders and ballistic computers, wireless telegraphy, etc. The technology was widely used to continuously improve the automation of warships, but the morale of officers and soldiers still had a significant impact on naval battles. Intelligence staff worked hard to conceal intelligence and ensure the high morale of the Second Cruiser Squadron, but Admiral Moore did not understand the situation at all, and even took it as the best annotation!

  "Gentlemen, I regret to inform you that the Royal Princess has sunk!" General Muir gave a peremptory order that would be much disputed in later years: "So my decision is..."

  ****

  "Ciphered telegram?" Wang Haitian had seen such a complex combination of encrypted telegrams before, and with the air of an old general who had been through many battles, he quickly drew two red lines on the map to encircle the route of the first reconnaissance fleet marked in black.

  "Gentlemen, I have a piece of good news and a piece of bad news to announce to everyone..." Wang Haiting, barely concealing her fatigue, gently put down the telegram in her hand and said with a playful tone.

  "Let's get the bad news out of the way..." Colonel Lauren, famous for leading a Marine Corps landing on British soil on both sides of the North Sea, chuckled.

  "The bad news is that the shadow heading northeast in a northwest direction is the British Second Battle Cruiser Squadron, which means we are surrounded by two fast British fleets..." Wang Haitian calmly recounted the precarious situation facing the First Scout Fleet.

  "What's the good news?" Captain Lauren's face showed no fear, for their commander was Heidi Syleham, nicknamed the Navy's Invincible Ares!

  "The good news is that the British have split their ten capital ships perfectly, and any one of their battlecruiser squadrons isn't a match for us!" Wang Haitian said with a self-deprecating tone, unconsciously clenching his fists. "The cards that both sides had arranged before the war have all been revealed, and the trump card will be revealed at the latest by tomorrow morning, and the good show has just begun!"