Chapter 144: The Three Men on Deck

According to the new regulations for naming combat and exercise operations, naval exercises would be named after oceans, army exercises after land features, and joint army-navy exercises after islands, followed by the Gregorian year. The Grand Library had already prepared over twenty thousand names for the Fubo Army to randomly select from.

“Begin the second phase of the exercise,” Fu Sansi ordered. The men on the bridge raised their binoculars in unison.

Three signal rockets soared into the sky from the Flashing Lightning. The ships and personnel, which had been quiet, became busy again.

The engineer corps began to mark out different channels and areas on the beach with colored flags of various colors. Soldiers were busy constructing a landing site.

The newly built and launched EMS and TNT of the Harmony-class H800 also participated in the exercise. The EMS was mainly responsible for landing and unloading exercises at port facilities, while the TNT was mainly responsible for landing and unloading exercises without port facilities.

As a newly designed standard transport ship, besides the standard cargo holds, it was equipped with shipboard cranes, and even a towed steam-powered crane and a special crane for launching and recovering small boats.

The steam-driven crane, with a roar, lifted one-ton crates and pallets to the deck, and then hoisted them onto the two-wheeled handcarts on the pier. Although the Zidian was a wheelbarrow with strong passability, its carrying capacity was not high. The vehicle factory then, following the model of the US military’s two-wheeled dump handcart, imitated a new type of handcart, named “Gale.”

Zidian and Gale flowed endlessly from the 6-meter-wide simple pier, transporting various supplies ashore. On the second pier, engineers were laying light rails. This light, hastily built rail system was first used in the landing operation at Sanya during Operation Giant. The technology and application were already very mature.

To prevent the wheels of the transport vehicles from getting stuck in the sand, the beach was covered with reusable standard bamboo slat panels, extending from the temporarily built simple pier to the temporary stacking area on the sandy ground more than 100 meters away.

Since Operation Engine involved landings in Taiwan, Jeju, and Shandong, where there were basically no existing port facilities, they could only rely on small boats for transshipment. Therefore, the technical personnel of the Joint Logistics Headquarters and the industrial sector had been studying how to quickly construct piers and wharves. The requirement was that the part extending into the sea at low tide still had a water depth of 4-5 meters, convenient for docking and unloading. In the end, everyone chose to build a floating pier with prefabricated concrete barges, while the permanent pier would use the gravity-type pier, which had the lowest technical difficulty.

Li Yan watched the bustling crowd from the Flashing Lightning with a leisurely air. He even took a chair and sat on the deck, enjoying the sea breeze. From time to time, he would use his binoculars to observe the situation on the beach and the sea.

Li Yan was here to observe the Penglai 1631 exercise as the head of the intelligence department. The purpose was to “coordinate intelligence work in Operation Engine.”

He glanced at Wu Mu, who was also sitting on the deck “observing” with a blank expression. The Yuanen and naturalized citizen cadres in the General Political Security Bureau, except for Zhao Manxiong, all had such a stern and unsmiling expression. This strange phenomenon made Li Yan very curious.

Wu Mu wore a white standard-issue shirt, and the special blue collar tabs indicated that he was a member of the “sword and shield of the Yuanen Senate,” the General Political Security Bureau.

Both of them were here to attend the joint intelligence and security meeting on the reform of the military intelligence and political security system held at Ma Niao Fort. At this two-day meeting, the young and vigorous faction among the Yuanen military officers, instigated by the Young Officers’ Club, proposed the establishment of a military intelligence bureau and a military political security department.

With the expansion of the army and the specialization of its divisions, the calls for establishing an independent military intelligence bureau to meet the growing needs of military and geographical intelligence collection, prisoner interrogation, and so on, were getting louder. A part of the Yuanen military officers demanded that the ten-man group organization within the army be completely under the jurisdiction of the military, and that a political security department be established—with a general political department set up within the army to manage these affairs. Some even proposed that the Special Reconnaissance Command should also be commanded by the military.

“Hmph, a fool’s dream,” Li Yan thought with a cold smile, watching all this with a smile on his face. Not to mention the overly inflated power of the military after doing so, the current limited resources and manpower made it impossible to set up more redundant agencies.

The intentions of this group from the Young Officers’ Club were too obvious. For one thing, the Special Reconnaissance Command and the ten-man group system within the army were important forces cultivated by the Executive Committee to maintain internal stability. How could they be handed over to the military to control?

Therefore, the proposal was naturally rejected at the joint meeting. Although Wei Aiwen said he would submit the proposal to the Yuanen Senate for discussion, the opposition to the proposal among the general Yuanen was also very high. Moreover, the main senior officers in the military themselves had little interest in this reform. So, even if the “reform of the military intelligence and political security system” initiated by the Young Officers’ Club could enter the proposal procedure, it would not enter the discussion procedure of the Yuanen Senate because it would not reach the statutory number of supporting votes. There was little suspense in this.

The only result of this joint meeting was that the Foreign Intelligence Bureau agreed to set up a special military intelligence department internally, absorbing several active army and navy intelligence officers to be responsible for military intelligence—this was an existing fact, just re-emphasized. Now it was just a matter of preparing to absorb another Yuanen intelligence officer from the army system. The Foreign Intelligence Bureau would also train several more military intelligence personnel for the army and navy.

As for the General Political Security Bureau, Zhao Manxiong, as usual, did not show up—he never showed up at meetings. Even at the enlarged meetings of the Executive Committee, it was often the acting director Ma Jia or the office director Wu Mu who attended on his behalf. Of course, at the meeting, Wu Mu, besides reiterating with a cold expression the principle that the General Political Security Bureau would not hand over the ten-man group system within the army—unless this transfer order came from the Yuanen Senate—stated that the General Political Security Bureau would continue to regularly send copies of the ten-man group reports to the Fubo Army General Staff. Of course, Li Yan knew that the word “all” was missing from this sentence.

On the bridge, several Yuanen military officers were chatting, surrounded by their orderlies, messengers, and guards. Wu Mu glanced at them. A few of the otaku-turned-Yuanen military officers, after fighting a few battles, had acquired a bit of a military air and no longer looked like the poor, short, and ugly otaku of the old world.

As one of the heads of internal security, Wu Mu was familiar with most of the Yuanen and had read their files. After Zhao Manxiong became the first deputy director, he ordered that the movements of each Yuanen should no longer be specifically collected. Instead, they would only accept reports from the ten-man group members within each department. Since the reporting principle of the ten-man group was that everything, big or small, should be reported, many of the deeds of the Yuanen were also reported along with them.

Wu Mu looked at Thorpe, who was sitting next to him, looking down at a document. He was not very familiar with Thorpe. Thorpe had gained some fame after D-Day because he had brought several hundred mechanical watches of various styles with him in his luggage. According to Thorpe, these mechanical watches would be more valuable than diamonds in the new world.

Wu Mu had just seen a naturalized citizen logistics officer at the beachhead command post wearing a mechanical watch, which was undoubtedly a product of the old world. And Wu Mu remembered that the Executive Committee had never issued any of the stocked mechanical watches to any naturalized citizens. This watch could only have come from Thorpe’s private gift. Had this matter been reported? Wu Mu remembered that he hadn’t read the regular reports of the ten-man group for a long time—he had been too busy lately. He reminded himself to look at them when he got back.

Thorpe felt Wu Mu’s gaze and looked up with a smile. “Want to go to the Baitu camp and get a good spot? The environment here in Baitu is not bad, at least it’s quiet, not as noisy as Bairen City.”

“No, I have a lot to do tomorrow,” Wu Mu said. “There’s too much work, I can’t keep up.”

“You’ve been working hard too.” Thorpe knew that the Yuanen from the General Political Security Bureau and the Foreign Intelligence Bureau never talked about their specific work content and movements to others. He couldn’t help but admire them secretly—they were indeed professional. In contrast, many of the civilian-born Yuanen officers in the army and navy were typical big mouths.

“You guys are the ones who are really working hard.” Wu Mu knew that the logistical pressure of this Operation Engine was very great, and it was also the first appearance of the Joint Logistics Headquarters after its establishment, so there was no room for error. Hong Huangnan, as the overall person in charge, was in Hong Kong directing the logistical support work. Thorpe would be responsible for the collection and transportation of materials in Lin’gao. The purpose of the logistics training detachment set up by the General Staff at Ma Niao Fort was self-evident.

Even so, the logistical work was difficult for the Joint Logistics Headquarters to bear alone. Wu De’s Planning Office would also undertake a part of the logistical work.

“Oh? The militia has been mobilized too?” Li Yan said in surprise, looking at the beach through his binoculars. He saw a group of militiamen carrying second-generation standard pikes disembarking in formation.

“Yes, a part of the militia has been mobilized,” Thorpe said, glancing at the beach. “In the past, when we mobilized village militias, we always drew from the most reliable villages like Yanchang Village. This time, the mobilized militias are from the large clan villages like Huangjiazhai. Sending them out is a good opportunity to break them down and educate them outside, and also to let them see the strength of the Yuanen Senate.”

“I see some of them won’t be returning to Lin’gao,” Li Yan said with a smile.

“Of course, those who perform well, we will arrange for them to serve as grassroots cadres in Taiwan or Jeju Island. It’s a better prospect than what they have in Qiongzhou,” Thorpe said with a smile. “Let them be so happy they forget to return home. As for their families, we’ll send them over later. Let them put down roots completely.”

Wu Mu nodded. This was using the mobilization opportunity of this Operation Engine to start dealing with the clan forces in Lin’gao and other places, a trick of pulling the rug out from under the feet of the clan gentry and landlords.