Chapter 23: The Port Arthur Fireworks Show

Port Arthur, the target the Japanese had marked for their surprise attack, was nothing less than the single most important strategic point of the Russo-Japanese War.

Port Arthur sits northwest of the Korean Peninsula, at the very tip of Manchuria’s Liaodong Peninsula.

Naturally, as long as Port Arthur stood, Japan could not sustain its supply lines even if it landed troops in Manchuria, and even its operations in Joseon would be hamstrung.

On top of that, Russia’s Pacific Fleet lay at anchor in Port Arthur, so for Japan to secure command of the sea, blockading Port Arthur was not a choice but a necessity.

In other words, the surprise attack without a declaration of war, the thing Japan did best, was no accident but an inevitability.

The men who had originally held the posts of Pacific Fleet commander and Port Arthur commander were useless wretches who ignored even this self-evident logic.

But the men newly appointed in their place were genuine talents, that rare Russian breed possessing both diligence and ability.

“…His Majesty has sent a directive in secret.”

“I received one as well, General. He promises the widest possible latitude, but says this one instruction must be followed without fail.”

After all, in Russia, could a man who rose to high office without corruption, without flattering his superiors or greasing palms, possibly be lacking in ability?

These two had no difficulty reading the true intent behind the secret orders the Tsar had sent down.

They were merely dumbstruck for a moment at an insight so utterly unlike the Emperor they had always heard described.

“Er… Your Excellency, Admiral Makarov, did His Majesty not always dismiss Japan out of hand?”

“General Kondratenko, that is the view not only of His Majesty but of most of Russia’s high officials. Yet His Majesty must judge that Britain, standing behind Japan, cannot be taken lightly.”

“True enough… In fact, the mere fact that he sacked every one of our idiot predecessors leaves no room to doubt His Majesty’s judgement.”

“Haha, quite so. And his insistence on joint operations between the Pacific Fleet and the Port Arthur fortress is further proof of His Majesty’s keen judgement.”

Nicholas II had appointed Vice Admiral Makarov to the Pacific Fleet and Major General Kondratenko as commander of the Port Arthur fortress, and had issued several orders of grave importance.

Since the Tsar himself had made these appointments, the two men were to cooperate seamlessly in meeting the war.

And, Japan would certainly attempt a surprise attack, so they were to prepare for it.

Enclosed, even, was an Okhrana intelligence report stating that the attack would come within two days of the severing of diplomatic relations.

“To actually hold a banquet as a deception operation… I never imagined he would be this thorough.”

“Your Excellency, do you know what the funny part is? If that creature Stoessel were still fortress commander, he would have thrown the banquet for real. The man had a disease where he’d die without a party.”

Had any other country done this, one would call it far too obvious an act, but astonishingly, this was simply how Russia had always been.

Why, just last month, when reports came in of the Japanese navy prowling the waters off Joseon, Port Arthur had stubbornly gone ahead and thrown a party anyway.

“If His Majesty took even that into account….”

“Then the rumours that have circulated until now must have been lies concocted by power-mad schemers.”

How could a Tsar who saw through everything, even from Petersburg, so far removed from the Far East, possibly be incompetent?

“Well then, shall we go prepare a banquet?”

“Let us. If we’re doing this at all, let’s throw a proper party.”

If only to prove that the Tsar’s choice had not been wrong, they would give their lives to fulfil this duty.

The two commanders rose from their seats, hearts set with iron resolve.

It was roughly 3 weeks before Japan’s surprise attack on Port Arthur.

* * *

February 8th, 1904.

In the outer harbour of Port Arthur, sunk in a blackness so total one could not see an inch ahead, the battleships and cruisers of the Russian Pacific Fleet lay densely at anchor.

From deep within the harbour, the lights of a banquet spilled out brightly; seen from the open sea, it looked for all the world like a drinking party in full swing.

Under cover of darkness, 10 destroyers of the Japanese fleet under Admiral Togo crept toward Port Arthur’s outer harbour.

“So the intelligence about the banquet was true.”

Not a single searchlight burned on the coastal batteries, and not even the shadow of a patrol ship was in sight.

“Good. If it’s like this….”

On the bridge of the flagship Mikasa, the corner of Togo’s mouth twitched as he stared ahead.

Wasn’t this far easier than expected?

Following the destroyers, he sent even a battleship deep into the outer harbour.

The enemy, drunk on their banquet, showed no reaction even as the destroyers closed to torpedo range.

If they were this slack, one might well send the entire Pacific Fleet to the bottom of the sea.

“All destroyers, prepare to fire torpedoes.”

At the very moment he was about to sink into rapture, thinking the day Manchuria and Joseon fell into the hands of the Imperial Nation was near at hand.

Boom!

A destroyer at the head of the line suddenly heeled over amid a pillar of water.

“A mine!”

“Evade! Evasive action!”

Mines laid at the mouth of Port Arthur’s outer harbour would be nothing strange.

But something felt wrong.

There should have been no mines in the channel marked on the nautical charts.

The Russian ships coming in and out of the harbour used this very channel.

Ka-BOOM!

A second explosion erupted.

This time it was one of the Russian ships anchored in the outer harbour that struck a mine, spewing a column of fire as it toppled onto its side.

“Wh… what! An enemy ship hit a mine too?”

“Heh heh heh, those morons. Did they just scatter their mines around at random?”

The officers’ sneering rang in his ears.

But Togo’s eyes were fixed on something unnatural about the listing Russian ship.

No. Was that even a real ship?

Not a single sailor was escaping from it.

The ship was burning, and yet no one was leaping from her decks.

“…It’s an empty ship.”

A ship with no one aboard.

What was more, now that the flames gave him visibility, he could make out the crude camouflage screen rigged to make it look like a warship only from the outside.

“Don’t tell me they deliberately planted bait, meant to strike a mine and sink….”

KA-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM!

In the instant his foreboding was hardening into certainty, the coastal batteries of Port Arthur erupted as one.

The batteries’ searchlights snapped on simultaneously, lighting the entire outer harbour bright as noon.

In place of the banquet’s dim spilling glow, the light of despair announcing battle flooded in from every direction.

“All ships, withdraw! Withdraw immediately!”

Togo’s order came down, but how could a fleet already deep inside the outer harbour simply come about?

Above all, the channel was far too narrow for so many ships to move in good order.

Caught between the minefield and the crossfire of the coastal batteries, the destroyers were the first to fall into chaos.

Ka-BOOM!

“Aaargh!”

“The ship… the ship!”

“Admiral! It’s an enemy ambush!”

A third destroyer struck a mine and was disabled, and the battleship Hatsuse, coming in behind, took concentrated fire from the coastal batteries and caught fire.

“Hatsuse hit! Struck on the port armour belt, fire on board!”

“Risk of sinking?”

“Unknown! The armour held, but her speed has dropped by half!”

Moderately damaged at the very least.

Losing a few destroyers to mines could be swallowed, but a battleship taking a hit was a problem of an entirely different order.

If she ended up heavily damaged, this would no longer be something that could be written off as a mere failed operation.

“…All ships, break away at maximum speed. We withdraw while screening the Hatsuse.”

Togo’s voice was calm, but the veins stood out on the back of the hand gripping the bridge rail.

All the while they cleared the outer harbour, the coastal batteries’ fire kept pouring down.

KA-BOOM-BOOM!

“Aaaaargh!”

“S-save me!”

“Don’t leave us behind! Please!”

The banquet lights came back on only after the Japanese fleet had vanished from sight.

As if nothing had happened at all.

A low groan escaped Togo’s lips as he stood alone on the bridge.

“…So it was a trap.”

The banquet had been bait.

The minefield and the coastal batteries had been laid out so that their fields of fire overlapped with precision.

They had even planted empty ships disguised as warships to cloud his judgement.

There was no possibility this was an improvised defence.

It was a hellish trap, prepared from the start in the knowledge that Japan would come with a surprise attack.

“But how on earth… They predicted we would strike Port Arthur the moment diplomatic relations were severed?”

He could not understand it.

Faced with something incomprehensible, his flesh crawled until cold sweat ran down his spine.

“What is the damage?”

“5 destroyers lost, 4 heavily damaged. And 1 battleship moderately damaged.”

“Whew….”

A crushing defeat.

It could not be called damage severe enough to make the war unsustainable, but there was no denying it was an agonizingly painful loss.

And while they had suffered casualties this heavy, wasn’t the Russian fleet at Port Arthur still sitting there untouched?

Having failed to secure command of the sea, from this moment the Japanese army’s plans for a Manchurian landing had all effectively gone back to a blank page.

“Admiral….”

“Say nothing. Right now, damage control comes first.”

Above all… they had launched a surprise attack without even a declaration of war, and had been mauled to pieces in return.

How would this outcome look to the international community?

More than the failure to secure command of the sea, more even than losing the battle itself, it was this wretched label that pressed heavy on Admiral Togo’s heart.

* * *

The Great Victory at Port Arthur.

News of this historic triumph reached Petersburg exactly two days later.

[Japanese fleet launches surprise attack on Port Arthur, repelled by the joint operation of Admiral Makarov and General Kondratenko!]

[4 enemy destroyers heavily damaged, 1 battleship moderately damaged! Our fleet suffered no losses whatsoever!]

Every newspaper worthy of the name printed an extra edition, and cheers erupted in every street.

“With his keen eye, His Majesty the Emperor swept away the incompetence of the Grand Duke faction and elevated true talent!”

“Long live the Tsar! Long live Russia!”

The mood inside the palace burned several times hotter than the streets.

Nobles came calling almost daily to sing the Emperor’s praises, and Nicholas II, savouring the first dopamine shower of his entire life, was quite beside himself.

Perhaps that was why, the moment I stepped into the audience chamber, the Tsar came running with arms spread wide and swept me into a crushing hug.

“Hahaha, my Misha, you’ve come!”

-Oh boy, at this rate you’ll be getting showered with kisses too.

It was a bit much, but let’s be understanding.

Had my old man ever, even once in his life, had a day where his subjects heaped this much praise on him?

“Misha! Makarov did it! Kondratenko too! The men you recommended actually did it!”

“I only recommended them. The one who appointed them was you, Your Majesty.”

“How does he manage to say such lovely things?”

He was so overjoyed his eyes were actually welling up, enough to make me feel a little sorry for him.

For the 10 years since his accession, all the man had ever heard was that he was indecisive or weak; how overwhelming must this moment be?

“Truly, you are a gift from God, given to me. Yes! Yes indeed.”

“No, Your Majesty. It was all thanks to the materials that Section Chief Yakov and the Okhrana worked so hard to compile. I just looked through them with him and picked out some good people.”

“Misha, on a day this fine, you’re allowed to preen a little. Hahaha!”

Section Chief Yakov, who had been watching the Tsar’s jubilation from the side, stepped forward and bowed his head.

“Your Majesty, as you say, the credit belongs far more to the Young Master than to me. I merely organised the files; without the Young Master’s intuition, the appointments would never have been made at all.”

“Yes, yes. You’ve both done splendid work!”

The Tsar roared with laughter and scooped me up in his arms again.

Please, just put me down.

After a long stretch of giddy laughter, the Tsar abruptly tossed out a remark.

“At this point, we’ve as good as won the war already, wouldn’t you say?”

Right, yes, I take back that “feel sorry for him” immediately.

Trust our Niki to come out with something this clueless, right on cue.

“With Port Arthur held, how could those wretches ever covet Manchuria? Just like the inferior Japanese, daring to challenge our great Russia. Kwahahaha!”

We had reversed a defeat that, in the original course of things, would have crippled the Pacific Fleet, so yes, this was undeniably a brilliant victory.

But Japan’s naval strength still outmatched Russia’s, and one failed surprise attack was not going to end this war.

With Port Arthur alive, Japan would struggle to keep Manchuria supplied, and as long as they failed to take Port Arthur they could never fully seize command of the sea; that was all the new state of play amounted to.

-If things run their course from here, the realistic script is a dragging war of attrition ending in some half-baked peace treaty.

Even so, listening to the Tsar’s booming laughter as he beamed at the heavens made my head spin, but it wasn’t as if I could tell him to stop talking nonsense, could I?

For now, all I could do was play along and keep quiet.

But if Niki never came to his senses and kept blundering about, this arrangement we’d barely managed to construct could collapse in an instant.

“Your Majesty, but is crushing Japan really the right answer?”

“Hm? What do you mean by that?”

“Japan dared to draw its sword against Your great Majesty. If we simply crush them, it ends as an ordinary victory, that’s what I was thinking. Wouldn’t it be more fitting, as the true victor’s privilege that Your Majesty deserves, to turn Japan into an international laughingstock instead…?”

Crushing Japan outright was impossible, but then again, did victory have to be military to count as true victory?

I dressed up the strategy Russia needed to pursue in a story tailored exactly to Niki’s view of the world, and mercifully, his eyes began to sparkle with interest.

“Oho, a laughingstock, you say?”

“Yes. So you must not say that valiant generals, acting on Your Majesty’s great orders, prepared thoroughly and repelled Japan’s surprise attack.”

“Why not? Is that not the truth?”

“But abroad, the story should spread the other way around. If they launched a surprise attack, without even a declaration of war, on a Russian army that was throwing a banquet and playing around, and still got beaten, how pathetic would that make them look?”

Section Chief Yakov understood what I was getting at and burst out laughing behind his hand.

War in the 20th century is not waged with guns and swords alone.

The most important thing in a war is the capital that makes the war possible.

The very reason Japan could fight Russia at all was the massive foreign loans it had drawn from Britain and America.

In other words, however strong the Japanese fleet might be, without money the act of continuing the war itself becomes impossible.

“So we make Japan a laughingstock before the entire world?”

They launched a surprise attack without a declaration of war, and got mauled like dogs and sent running by men who were busy partying in their fortress?

The old sneer, that Asians will be Asians, was bound to come out all on its own.

With rumours like that blanketing the financial districts, could Japan really keep raising funds properly?

“Kwahahaha, yes. Yes! Now that I think on it, that would be far more satisfying. And it would be amusing to watch just how low the world’s opinion of the Japanese can sink.”

Rather than simply trampling an enemy, watching that enemy put on a desperate show as it sinks into the swamp feels several times better.

Seeing a radiant grin spread across the Tsar’s face, a smile crept onto my lips as well, entirely on its own.

Well then, let’s sit back and watch.

Just how ugly the flailing gets when Japan finds its money spigot shut off the moment the war begins.

~~~

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