1890 King of Southeast Asia

"Earthquake? When did it happen?" Liu Yiming stood up.

The Fourth Army Base is stationed in Madang City in northeastern Guinea. The headquarters of the Guinea Construction Corps is also here, and the home port of the South Pacific Fleet is also here.

This is the core area where the Huaxia Empire controls Guinea and the surrounding islands including the Marshall Islands, and it controls the South Pacific.

As for Port Moresby in the south of Guinea Island, it is indeed a natural harbor, but because South China was still very weak when the base was set up, it needed to consider the British's ideas, so it was not far from here.

In recent years, some small earthquakes have occurred from time to time around Guinea Island, and Liu Yiming has also considered the issue of relocation.

But on the one hand, South China has been very busy, and before the war, South China did not have enough money to relocate.

Secondly, the strategic location of Guinea and the surrounding islands is extremely important. Controlling it means controlling the South Pacific route and strangling Australia's neck.

And if you want to change places, you can't find a better place to change.

You said that islands with similar strategic locations can definitely be found, but similar conditions are not necessarily.

There are millions of Chinese people on the island of Guinea. Under the organization of the Construction Corps, they not only reclaimed fertile land, but also built many factories to provide supporting facilities for the base. The existence of the naval and land bases also promoted consumption and promoted industrial upgrading.

If you change to other places, there will be no such good conditions.

"Last night, fortunately, it was New Year's Eve, and people were staying up all night. The army was either on duty or doing activities. The response was quick and there were not many casualties."

The news just came. As the left-behind personnel, Wang Yang and Huang Keqiang were drinking tea and listening to opera at the time, and the telegram suddenly arrived.

Then, the two hurriedly took the telegram, called the naval and land staff respectively, and ran here.

"What is the current situation? Can we contact the base?" Liu Yiming felt a little relieved.

After the earthquake, the power system will definitely have problems, but as long as the army's backup generators and radio stations are not problematic, they can still keep in touch.

"Yes, but due to the failure of the radio tower, we can only use military channels to communicate. The communication troops are repairing the radio tower, and civilian communications will be restored soon." Wang Yang comforted.

"It's New Year's Day, ah..." Liu Yiming was relieved and rubbed his hair when he heard this.

"Use my radio here to contact Ye Huaixiang and ask about the casualties and the situation of the South Pacific Fleet." Liu Yiming was not in the mood to go home for dinner now.

"Yes!"

"Your Majesty, Chief of Staff Gu is here."

"Let him in."

Liu Yiming waved his hand, and the artillery was as expected. Gu Fan only knew that there was an earthquake, and the loss statistics had not yet been released.

Looking at the anxious group of people in the room, Wang Linhai served tea with great tact and went to find someone to prepare lunch.

It seems that these people will not be able to leave in a short time.

More than an hour later, a response telegram was received.

"Your Majesty, this earthquake is quite large, but fortunately everyone is awake, and because many people are playing outside the house during the New Year, there are not many casualties." Huang Keqiang said happily.

"One person died in the Fourth Army and more than 60 were injured. The death toll of the Ma'an Construction Corps is currently seven, all of whom are elderly people with limited mobility, but the number of injured is more than 1,000."

"No one died in the Navy, but four destroyers collided and one of them leaked, and the leak is currently being plugged." Gu Fan breathed a sigh of relief.

As for the injured, the Navy has not had time to count them yet, and they are all rescuing supplies and equipment. In addition to warships, there are also a large number of supplies in the onshore warehouses and equipment in the shipyard.

"Huh~ That's not bad." Liu Yiming nodded thankfully and breathed a sigh of relief.

"After the earthquake, there will definitely be a tsunami. Let all departments prepare and civilians move to higher places."

"Draw materials nearby and send them to the disaster area as soon as possible. In addition, let other areas affected by the earthquake and tsunami report the disaster situation."

"Except for the gendarmerie to maintain order in the Fourth Army, all other officers and soldiers are involved in disaster relief."

Hearing that the situation was still under control, Liu Yiming breathed a sigh of relief and properly arranged the follow-up matters.

This earthquake was a magnitude 2 earthquake, with the center 25 kilometers northeast of Madang and a focal depth of 17 kilometers, which can be considered a major earthquake.

And because it is an undersea earthquake, it is not over after the earthquake. It is likely to be accompanied by a tsunami.

And generally, there will be strong winds, heavy rains, and fog after an earthquake, so the post-earthquake rescue work will be more difficult.

"Your Majesty, the geological conditions of Madang are not suitable for a military base and logistics industrial base. At most, it can be used as a mining and plantation base."

"In this way, there is no need to concentrate the population to form a large city, which is safer and can also utilize the resources of these areas."

Gu Fan and Wang Yang need to consider strategic matters, but Huang Keqiang does not consider so much.

"The geological structure of Southwest Guinea Island will be more stable. I will gradually transfer the South Pacific Fleet base to the southwest." Liu Yiming just smiled at this.

"Your Majesty, I know, isn't it just that the geographical location of this place is good? I have an idea." Huang Keqiang did not give up, and coughed, walked to the wall and opened the curtain.

Behind the curtain is a map, a huge map.

"The South Pacific Fleet's base is far away in Guinea. One reason is to maintain control over the various island groups, and the other is to control the Pacific Ocean, especially the South Pacific Ocean, and to coordinate with Hawaii."

"We can do it in another place."

"Aren't the British negotiating with us? Just now they said they had just suffered a defeat. Then one of our conditions is to rent a port in Australia."

"Anyway, we have already opened mines and factories in Australia, so we don't need this port."

"Besides, it was able to rent our Hong Kong Island in the beginning, and it has been shameless until now, so we can also rent from them."

"We will not give up Madang. We will use it as a supply port and berth, and the Fourth Army will not have to withdraw."

"The scale of the shipyard can be smaller, just building small boats and repairing ships, so other factories can also be smaller."

"After the fleet moves away, demand will decrease, and we can also move the factory to other places, such as South Guinea and West Guinea, to share the risk."

"If there is an earthquake in the future, it will be better to have someone to take care of it, which is better than being wiped out. The same is true in the military."

Huang Keqiang's idea is very simple. The core is risk sharing. After all, it is difficult to find a place around here without earthquakes and tsunamis, so just share it.

Even if they are not on the same island, they can't all be affected, right? As long as there are no victims, we can provide assistance and rescue as soon as possible.

Like this earthquake, the direct casualties caused by the earthquake are not large, but the material losses are not small, and many necessary materials have been buried.

The tsunami will come at any time, and the risk of excavation is not small. Except for some shallow materials, the remaining material gaps can only be made up by allocation.

The ship came very slowly. Not only was it slow, but under the tsunami, the ship could no longer dock in the east. It could only stop at the western port to unload and then transport it to the east.

If it were separated, the army's reserves could be mobilized at the first time, and both the navy and the army had transport airships that could be transported by air.

Hearing Huang Keqiang's idea, Liu Yiming couldn't help but raise his mouth. This idea is very good. Setting up the South Pacific base in Australia is undoubtedly the best choice, but Huang Keqiang's idea is too simple.

Just renting a port, the British will definitely not agree. Let alone the sovereignty issue, the merged Huaxia Empire is what the British don't want to see.

If it weren't for the European war that involved most of Britain's energy, it would have targeted the Huaxia Empire long ago.

Liu Yiming was sure that Britain would definitely cause trouble for the Huaxia Empire in all directions, including the plateau, the Western Regions, Japan, the United States, Australia, and so on.

Even though the war in Europe was fierce, Britain had tried more than once to put pressure on the Huaxia Empire to stop the war with Japan.

It was just that Liu Yiming ignored him. Anyway, as long as you talk about war, I will talk about the Huaxia Empire. If you don't recognize the Huaxia Empire as an entity, there is no goal of mediation.

"I have thought about this idea. One day, the base of the South Pacific Fleet will stop there." Liu Yiming patted Huang Keqiang on the shoulder and smiled at him.

"But not now. What we have to do now is still construction and internal cultivation." Liu Yiming turned his head and looked at Wang Yang again.

Wang Yang will be transferred to the National Defense Security Committee after the New Year, and Huang Keqiang will be his deputy.

This committee has a big name, but its current task is actually to conduct reserve military training for Huaxia.

They need to be responsible for the construction of the reserve recruitment and training plan for the Corps, workers, and farmers, and complete the construction of the reserve together with the Boy Scout system.

Liu Yiming's goal is to complete the construction of 30 million reserve forces before 1920.

Reserve forces refer to reserve forces that have military skills and can be deployed to the battlefield immediately after simple training.

Conscripts are mobilized soldiers, who need to undergo a cycle of intensive training, which is generally three months to six months, but when mobilized soldiers are actually used, they are often unable to train for so long.

Just like France some time ago, mobilized soldiers only knew how to shoot guns and were sent to the trenches without any training.

1920 was the day when the third phase of Liu Yiming's plan began.

"Your Majesty, fighting with Japan is completely unprofitable. Why don't we stop and use the money we save to do something else." Huang Keqiang nodded excitedly after getting approval.

Wang Yang and Gu Fan looked at each other and smiled.

Of the 800 million expenditures last year, 400 million were spent on the military, not military expenses, but war additional expenses. Of course, Zhao Jiaxing also included the money for the two new battleships.

After all, in this way, the navy can save the military expenses for shipbuilding next year.

"Japan? We only need to spend a little military money to trap them to death, why not?" Liu Yiming gently explained the cause and effect to him...