Chapter 530 The Admiral's Decision

The garrison fleet on alert for the ‘jump exit point’ had confirmed communications with the federal fleet several times in the previous few days.

This confirmation communication, which has exceeded the normal confirmation frequency, also made Major General Kimmel, the commander of the galaxy garrison fleet, very unhappy.

In his opinion, the commanders of the federal fleet hiding in the distance are not so much ‘veterans’ who have fought all the way since the war began, but rather a group of guys who are frightened by the war.

Except for a few large colonies and industrial satellite cities, the space of the Rubion galaxy is currently basically in the hands of the galaxy garrison fleet. Theoretically, there will be no hidden dangers.

Moreover, the other side is two full-strength main fleets of the federal navy, not a tourist group carrying a bunch of rich old men and women. If there is any problem, the thousands of heavy particle cannons in the two fleets are not used to set off fireworks.

Although Kimmel has repeatedly complained to the autonomous government that the federal fleet is doing useless work, after dragging the main force of the garrison fleet here, not only will the rebellious warships become more and more daring, but they will also be unable to form an effective deterrent to the Atlas fleet.

However, the autonomous government still repeatedly emphasized that the garrison fleet must act in accordance with the instructions of the federal fleet, and warned Major General Kimmel not to act on his own.

Because Secretary of State Davis was attacked on Rubion V, it has not been found out who did it, and the backgrounds and identities of the soldiers killed in the anti-aircraft vehicle are completely unknown.

It is even a bit abnormal.

Therefore, the Rubion Autonomous Government is still digging for clues, and even actively invited the Federal Central Intelligence Agency to participate in the investigation to prove its innocence.

And this is just one of the "combination punches" that Alex, the chief executive of the Rubion Galaxy, threw to prove his innocence.

After the incident, he contacted the federal government to explain as soon as possible, and then he lowered his posture significantly, fearing that if something went wrong, the federal government would call him directly.

So for Major General Kimmel's complaints, he directly scolded back in the precious encrypted real-time communication of the channel.

The Federation had never dispelled its suspicion of the Autonomous Government. You did not follow their request at this time, but instead kept letting the other party's fleet enter directly. It would be funny if the Federal Government thought that the garrison fleet was planning to "take you into a trap".

——

"How long is it until the next agreed communication confirmation time?"

"One hour and twenty-eight minutes, General!"

After hearing the answer from the captain of the flagship under his feet, the fleet commander Kimmel was first slightly relieved because of the shortened time, and then felt secretly happy because of the title of "General".

Especially this title was given by his previous "old rival" - another officer of the same period who competed with him for the commander of the Rubion Galaxy Garrison Fleet.

Both of them were colonels of battleships in the garrison fleet at the time, and were also one of the two candidates finally finalized by the Autonomous Government.

However, because Kimmel was good at dealing with things and was close to some major officials in the autonomous government, including Alex, the responsibility of the fleet commander finally fell on him.

"'General'. What a wonderful title~"

Kimmel smiled in his heart, and he didn't think there was anything wrong with his methods.

To be fair, there was no difference in business ability between him and his competitors, and it didn't matter who was in power to the garrison fleet.

And he thought that the interpersonal relationship management within the autonomous government was also a skill that the fleet commander should have, otherwise why would so much funding be allocated to the fleet every year?

After a short period of secret joy, Kimmel returned to his state. After being nervous for two and a half hours, but still not finding the shadow of the Atlas Group Fleet, the commander of the garrison fleet slowly let go of his heart.

He even began to doubt whether the other party had already jumped out of the galaxy. After all, the scale of the Atlas Group Fleet that came to the Rubion galaxy was so large that it was like hitting a stone with an egg when facing two federal main fleets and a galaxy garrison fleet.

Moreover, he believed that with the intelligence acquisition ability of the Atlas Group that could monitor the whole world in the "rumor", it must have obtained the news that the federal fleet was about to arrive.

So the other party was very likely to decide to withdraw the fleet at the last minute, otherwise it would not be so easy to leave after the federal fleet arrived.

Thinking of this, the commander made a decision in his heart:

"Notify the various clearing squadrons in the orbit of Rubion V to conduct another reconnaissance of the area between the "Earth and the Moon" and the lunar orbit, don't..."

But before he finished his order, he heard the tactical information coordinator issued a warning.

"Report! The long-wave radar has found a large number of unidentified units in the G9 area! The distance is too far to be identified with the feature library for the time being, but the shipborne control personality judges that it is suspected to be a large fleet!"

After hearing this, the captain next to Kimmel immediately turned his head and looked at him. Although he was a little unhappy about losing to Kimmel in the competition, the captain still maintained 100% cooperation in the battle.

"Did the optical, infrared/ultraviolet surveillance images find anything?"

"Sorry, General! This area is facing the star 'Big Rubion', and the optical, infrared/ultraviolet surveillance units are temporarily unable to identify it!"

Upon hearing this, Kimmel immediately looked at the holographic projection platform in the center of the bridge. The three-dimensional model above had already marked a yellow mark representing 'unknown unit' in the G9 area.

The garrison fleet, the yellow mark, and the large Rubin star were also exactly at three o'clock and one line at this time, so the cosmic background captured by the optical and infrared sensors was not cold and black, but as large as a large searchlight. Lubion'.

In addition, under the influence of the light radiation emitted by the star, the surfaces of these 'unknown units' will also heat up rapidly, which also causes the identification effect to become extremely limited.

"A large fleet. Could it be that Atlas's main fleet arrived early?" The flagship captain on the side suddenly asked at this time.

Faced with this question, Kimmel could not give an accurate answer now, so he could only shake his head helplessly:

"I can't give a definite answer without conclusive evidence, but from an analytical perspective, it is indeed possible."

Kimmel paused for a moment, seeming to think about the countermeasures for a few seconds, and then directly gave the order from the 'Fleet Commander's' seat:

"Synchronize the information, and at the same time, the second escort detachment breaks away from the fleet formation, approaches the G9 area and is on guard! The entire fleet adjusts its formation to a box formation, the course remains unchanged, and the ship axis is adjusted 30 degrees toward the target area."

Under Kimmel's order, the main force of the garrison fleet, which was originally cruising on a fixed route, came to life again and adjusted its formation like a school of sardines in the sea.

Almost at the same time that the entire garrison fleet completed the axial adjustment, the tactical information coordination officer also reported a new message:

"The Fourth Clearance Squadron reported that they discovered a communication relay satellite disguised as a wreckage in the high orbit of Lubion 5 and intercepted a communication from the Atlas fleet!"

Kimmel's eyes lit up when he heard the news: "Has the decryption been completed?"

"Report to the general, the Fourth Suppression Squadron has violently decrypted part of the information through the 'parallel' decryption method of the shipboard control personality!"

"read."

"Flagship Assault. Stellar Backlight Attack Feint Direction Plan C"

The tactical information coordinator reported a series of intermittent keywords. Although it became completely incomprehensible after the report, the previously decrypted keywords still made the expressions of Kimmel and the flagship captain beside him become more and more complex. Getting more serious.

"Are you really going to attack us?" the flagship captain asked.

"The premise is that the camouflaged satellite discovered by the squadron is real, and the intercepted communication is also real."

Kimmel squeezed out the word "Chuan" between his eyebrows, and at the same time, he always felt that something was wrong:

"Don't you think that the process of intercepting this communication and decrypting it was a little too smooth? And it is such an important combat deployment, and it was discovered so easily by us?"

The flagship captain also nodded: "It is indeed too easy, and it happens to be stuck at this point in time. Is there really such a coincidence?"

Kimmel’s ‘defeated general’ also realized that something was not right, but before he could continue to think about it, he heard Kimmel suddenly say:

"Palau, what did we do after discovering the unknown target?"

"You sent a escort detachment forward for reconnaissance, and at the same time ordered the fleet to adjust its formation, adjust the battleship's axis without changing its course, etc.!"

The flagship captain, who was called Palau, suddenly realized something. He suddenly looked at the three-dimensional model on the holographic projection platform, and immediately asked the shipboard control personality to substitute some parameters for calculations.

Soon, a red virtual route began to extend from the direction of Rubian 5, and with a less obvious arc, it hit the blue battleship logo representing the garrison fleet.

Judging from the last known position of the Atlas fleet, assuming that the opponent is maneuvering in this direction after entering the covert action state, it can detour to the scheduled jump away during the period after losing the trace. Click 'nearby.

Looking at the trajectory calculated on the holographic projection platform based on the personality of the shipboard controller, the flagship captain looked at Kimmel again:

"General, if this intercepted communication is used to confuse us, then it is very likely that the direction of the Grand Rubian is the feint attack direction that attracts our attention, and the direction the fleet just faced is the enemy's real main attack direction!"

After hearing Palau's words, Kimmel did not immediately express his affirmation, but instead issued a new order:

"Communications staff, synchronize the calculated enemy's predicted track to the squadron on the left wing, ask them to readjust the axis of the battleship back, and then release tactical probes to form a detection matrix to conduct reconnaissance in the direction of the track line!"

"Yes, General!

Attention Second Squadron, this is the flagship ‘Balkan’.”

The communications staff responsible for fleet communications immediately synchronized the relevant information, and then conveyed the instructions from the fleet commander to the second squadron on the left wing in the pointing communication channel.

Kimmel also displayed on the huge screen on the side of the command level of the bridge the images synthesized by the processing of the optical, infrared sensors and synthetic aperture radar detection units on the left side of the flagship.

After multiple zooms, everyone on the bridge quickly saw the ships of the Second Squadron slowly turning in the designated direction as if they were spinning in circles, and then once again widened the distance between the ships.

Immediately afterwards, each 'green triangle' was released from inside the battleship, and formed matrices near their respective battleships.

Although everyone could only see the signs automatically marked by these systems, they also knew that this was the Second Squadron deploying a fleet-level detection matrix.

This large matrix, composed of all the battleship detection units of the squadron and the released combat probes, shines in front of the "pitch black" like a quickly assembled flashlight.

The detection accuracy of this fleet-level detection matrix cannot be said to be very high, but the extremely high detection distance and large detection area still make it a good helper for independent fleets when guarding unknown airspace.

Because this long-distance alert is more about allowing the fleet to find targets at long distances and be prepared to deal with emergencies, rather than locking in the specific location of the target.

And as the distance gets closer, other more targeted sensors and detection units equipped on the warship will also enter their "comfort zone" and then gradually come in handy.

Soon, the Second Squadron sent back news that made Kimmel and Palau somewhat excited.

"The Second Squadron reported that a large number of unknown units suspected of being a fleet were detected in the V6 area, and judging from the echo characteristics, it seems to be a fleet pointing axially towards us!"

At the same time as the tactical information coordination officer reported, the radar imaging picture returned by the detection matrix of the Second Squadron also appeared on a screen on the bridge simultaneously.

Those white patterns that are highly similar to the features of the projection surface directly in front or behind the battleship are densely packed all over the screen.

"really."

Kimmel couldn't help clenching his fists. If he hadn't noticed the problem, he might have been fooled by the opponent just now, and then exposed the flank of the entire fleet to the enemy's guns.

He didn't even dare to think about what kind of disaster his fleet would suffer.

And Palau next to him also let out a sigh of relief. Fortunately, Kimmel noticed something was wrong in advance, and then continued to say:

"General, this scale is much higher than the number of Atlas fleets we detected before. Is it really their support fleet that arrived early?"

"I don't know. After all, we have not detected the arrival of the opponent's support fleet, but we cannot rule out the possibility that the opponent has indeed secretly entered the scene."

Kimmel opened his mouth to answer Palau's question, but in fact, he began to struggle with new questions in his heart.

What if that intercepted communication was genuine?

What if Atlas's battle fleet really attacks from the direction of Grand Rubian with backlight?

What if the opponent's commander is a master of psychological warfare and 'prejudges' his own 'prejudgement' in advance and deliberately sets this trap waiting for him to step into it?

When such questions came to mind, Kimmel immediately began to become a little uncertain.

He found himself doing a 'choice question' that was related to the life and death of the fleet.

If you make the right choice, then the pre-war game of this battle will most likely be written into the textbooks of future generations, and you will also leave your name in history.

If you choose wrong.

It will still "leave its name in history", but it will become the background of the Atlas fleet.

Kimmel did not realize at this time that he was putting pressure on himself. He just felt that his choice and subsequent orders would become extremely important.

At this moment, the newly promoted major general finally felt what it was like to experience the legendary 'Admiral's Decision' - this critical moment that haunts all naval commanders.

On the bridge of the Balkans, the flagship of the Lubion Galaxy Guard Fleet, everyone realized that now was a critical moment that could determine everyone's future.

They all unanimously turned their attention to Kimmel, who was in the most conspicuous place on the bridge. The entire bridge suddenly became quiet, with only the sound of some instruments running.

I don’t know how long this atmosphere that was so tense that it made the air freeze lasted, after some crew members had unconsciously held their breath under the influence of this atmosphere.

Fleet Commander Kimmel finally made his decision.

"The second drive escort detachment maintains vigilance in the G9 area and provides early warning of unknown units in the G9 area in the flank direction. The other fleets adjust their axes to keep pace with the second squadron."

Having said this, Kimmel paused and then said word by word:

"Release General Quarters"

When this short phrase engraved in the bones of all navies appeared, the bridge of the Balkans exploded immediately like a set of high explosives being thrown into a calm lake.

Everyone immediately entered another state, focusing entirely on the workbench in front of them, and the sound coming from the ship-wide broadcast of all the warships in the garrison instantly made everyone on the ship All tightened.

"All personnel are on combat readiness, all personnel are on combat readiness, and everyone is on combat duty. We are about to make contact with a target suspected of being an enemy fleet."