In August of the twenty-sixth year of Qian Sheng, the senior naval officers of the Daheng Empire were extremely busy, especially the staff officers in the Naval Staff Department, who were even more busy.
As the highest military command organization of the huge Daheng Empire Navy, the Naval Staff is fully responsible for the formulation and implementation of Plan 18.
In order to ensure the smooth implementation of Plan 18, the Imperial Navy had actually started making various preparations half a year ago.
The most important of these is naturally to arrange combat readiness duty, battleship maintenance, upgrades and modifications in advance, so that when the 18th Plan is implemented, the Daheng Empire Navy can come up with the strongest and most complete lineup to participate in the war.
It's not that the battle plan is about to be implemented and the warships are temporarily mobilized. If this is really done, this will be a problem for the Daheng Empire Navy, which is currently operating in all sea areas around the world and performing a series of escort, hunting and other tasks. It is simply impossible to assemble a strong enough main fleet in a short period of time.
After all, if you want to successfully implement Operation Plan No. 18, seize control of the sea west of Kingdom Island, and directly extend the maritime front to the home coastal waters of Kingdom Island, you need not just a few or dozens of warships, but There are hundreds of battleships, among which only the capital ships need to be assembled to do dozens.
In order to ensure that such a large fleet can be assembled when the plan is launched, the Daheng Empire needs to prepare months or even more than half a year in advance.
After half a year of preparations for the mobilization of battleships, the Daheng Empire Navy has secretly assembled thirty-four battleships, eight battlecruisers, and four at several major naval bases on the east coast of the mainland for Plan 18. Aircraft carriers, fifteen heavy cruisers, twenty-three light cruisers between 7,000 tons and 10,000 tons, in addition to more than 200 light cruisers and destroyers below 5,000 tons.
The total tonnage exceeds two million tons!
This tonnage only refers to combat ships and does not include various types of naval auxiliary warships and various types of ordinary civilian transport ships under the jurisdiction or requisition of the Joint Logistics Command.
For example, there are dozens of various types of maritime supply ships that provide maritime supply support to the naval combat fleet. Among them, there are even more than ten fast supply ships with a speed of more than 20 knots and a full load of more than 15,000 tons, which are enough to accompany the navy. operate a fast mobile fleet and provide fuel, ammunition, and food supplies to warships at sea.
There are also hundreds of transport ships of various types prepared for landing on Dongji Island, including a group of temporarily requisitioned large luxury cruise ships to serve as troop transport ships. These are also big guys weighing 20,000 to 30,000 tons at a time.
As for the specific landing force, there will be a Marine Corps of the Navy, with three Marine Divisions and a Marine Armored Brigade and Artillery Brigade, with a total strength of 80,000.
However, the Marine Corps of the Navy is only responsible for the early landing operations. If the landing on Dongji Island is successful, the Army will be responsible for the subsequent ground operations. For this reason, the Army has already prepared in advance at various reserve ports on the east coast of the mainland. Millions of troops.
At the same time, if these one million troops are not enough and the navy can ensure maritime transportation of supplies, the army can also mobilize more than 1.5 million troops to participate in the war at any time.
Of course, there is a high probability that this will not be used, and even the millions of troops in the early stage will not be used.
On the one hand, the Kingdom of Krul has not deployed hundreds of thousands or even millions of troops on the East Pole Island.
On the other hand, even if it is as powerful as the Daheng Empire, it is impossible to send millions of troops across thousands of kilometers to Dongji Island as soon as the war begins, nor can it maintain their combat needs.
The Daheng Empire's maritime transportation capabilities are also limited.
What's more, it is difficult for the Daheng Empire Navy to boast that it can ensure the safety of maritime transportation.
The enemy that the Daheng Empire Navy faces is a huge enemy Kruer Kingdom Navy that is not weaker than the Daheng Empire Navy in terms of total tonnage of various warships.
That is a powerful navy with dozens of battleships, battlecruisers, and hundreds of battleships of various types!
The advantage of the Daheng Empire's navy is actually not in quantity, but in the performance of its cutting-edge warships.
Four Daheng-class super battleships, two Royal Princess-class battlecruisers, and a total of six 40,000-ton super battleships are the core pillars of the Daheng Empire's preparations for this strategic decisive battle.
In addition, four aircraft carriers, plus a large number of seaplanes carried on medium and large battleships, as well as several seaplane carriers converted from old cruisers, will provide the Daheng Empire Navy with powerful maritime air reconnaissance capabilities.
, and at the same time, it can also provide air combat for each battleship and provide air anti-submarine warfare.
After last year's Battle of Andoria, the Daheng Empire Navy has equipped most of its refittable battleships with seaplanes. In addition, while building regular aircraft carriers, it has also refitted a number of old cruisers or high-speed cargo ships.
It is a seaplane carrier to enhance the navy's air capabilities.
However, even with the advantages of new warships and air superiority, the Daheng Empire Navy is not sure that it can completely stop the Krul Kingdom Navy and protect the safety of the rear transport fleet.
Well, even if the Krul Kingdom Navy suffered heavy losses in this battle, as long as a few battleships are allowed to break through the blockade and enter the transport fleet, it will be a super disaster.
To say the least, even if their battleships and the like are completely lost, if the Krul Kingdom Navy still has extremely large types of light battleships and even submarines, bypassing the battlefield and directly attacking the transport fleet, it will not be possible.
It will give the Daheng Empire Navy a headache.
Therefore, in the No. 18 Operation Plan, although the Army stated that it can prepare an army of one million in the early stage, it can also prepare an army of more than 1.5 million in the middle and later stages.
But the navy never thought of letting the army invest so many troops in Dongji Island from the beginning.
If we really do this, it is estimated that half of the troops will die on the way...
Therefore, the early landing operations will still be based on the Marine Corps of the Navy, and the Army will be able to send more than 200,000 people casually.
If 200,000 to 300,000 troops land, it is estimated that the Kingdom of Krul will not be able to sit still, and a super naval showdown will begin.
After killing the main fleet of the Krul Kingdom Navy, you can continue to increase the number of troops depending on the situation.
When everything was ready, Lin Ziran also formally signed the order of the No. 18 combat plan, and the navy began to formally mobilize the participating fleets to prepare to leave the port.
The ground combat troops preparing to land also boarded a large number of transport ships from several ports.
Naturally, such a huge move by the Daheng Empire cannot be hidden from the intelligence personnel of the Kingdom of Krul. They don't even need to conduct so-called spying on intelligence. As long as they look outside several major ports, they can see densely packed various
Ships of this kind are leaving the port one after another, almost filling the entire harbor.
All fools know that the Daheng Empire Navy will make big moves!
The Kingdom of Krul soon received the news, and they began to urgently analyze the intentions of the Daheng Empire. At the same time, they also began to urgently assemble their main naval force.
No matter what Hengmanzi does, it is always right to assemble the main fleet to the western waters of Kingdom Island first!
Under such circumstances, the main naval forces of both sides began to gather towards the East China Sea Islands and Dongji Island!
Against this background, the Daheng Empire finally stopped being secretive and officially declared war on the Kingdom of Krul.
Just an hour later, the Krul Kingdom also declared war on the Daheng Empire!
As the second largest empire in the world, the Daheng Empire finally officially launched a full-scale war against the world's largest kingdom, the Kingdom of Krul, for world hegemony!