Volume 4: Hot! The whole world is a warring state Chapter 770: Forced to Turn in Front of the Enemy
"Sir, the Ottomans sent a telegram saying that three of the six boilers of the Umar were destroyed and the speed dropped to six knots. They requested to withdraw from the battle line."
"This idiot!" After swearing, Garcia adjusted his expression and said, "We agree to withdraw from the battle line. The fleet commander suggested that they withdraw directly from the battlefield and go to Calcutta Port. There are complete maintenance facilities there, and they can be repaired there."
"yes!"
Watching the communications officer hurriedly leaving, Garcia took a deep breath and asked, "How is the heavy cruiser doing now?"
"Of our thirty-three heavy cruisers, thirteen were lightly damaged and two were severely damaged. The enemy's twenty-five heavy cruisers were all hit to varying degrees by us, but a rough estimate shows that only two were severely damaged."
"Were the heavy losses we suffered caused by the enemy's heavy cruisers?"
"Yes, both sides have a tacit understanding on this point."
The so-called tacit understanding is: battleships attack battleships, heavy cruisers attack heavy cruisers, and unless absolutely necessary, our battleships will not attack the opponent's heavy cruisers.
The reason for this is not the so-called chivalry, but if the battleships of our side focus their fire on the enemy's heavy cruisers, then the enemy's battleships will either also focus their fire on our heavy cruisers, or let the heavy cruisers hide behind the battleships.
If both sides' battleships focus their fire on the other side's heavy cruisers, then, with a high probability, the heavy cruisers of both sides will hide behind the battleships. In this way, sooner or later, the battleships will bombard each other.
Moreover, as long as the enemy's heavy cruiser array still exists, the light cruiser destroyer formation of our side will still be unable to launch a torpedo attack - at least on the Western Austrian side, since there is no internal combustion engine, their torpedoes are still slow white-headed torpedoes. If there are not dozens of destroyers firing hundreds of torpedoes at the same time, the hit rate will definitely be zero. However, as long as the enemy's heavy cruiser array is still there, how many of the more than 1,000-ton destroyers can reach the position to launch torpedoes after rushing forward: the range of the white-headed torpedo is only 700 to 800 meters.
Therefore, at the beginning of this naval battle, Inukai Toji and Garcia very tacitly adopted a double-array formation: the two sides bombarded each other under basically fair conditions, and whoever's battleship could not hold on, or whose heavy cruiser suffered heavy losses first, would be the loser.
Although it was fair, the Western-Ottoman coalition had a 9 to 7 advantage in terms of the number of battleships. So when the two Ottoman battleships were obviously not good at maneuvering, Garcia ordered the Berkel and the Omer to join the battle against the enemy heavy cruisers.
"Were the two heavy cruisers we severely damaged the enemy hit by the Ottomans?"
"Absolutely not!"
"Oh, my God, these incompetent Ottomans, it's ok that they can't hit a battleship seven or eight kilometers away, but they can't hit a heavy cruiser five or six kilometers away?"
Garcia finished his temper and was about to ask his adjutant to get him a glass of water when the heavy hatch of the command tower was pushed open: "Sir, the watchtower reports that the enemy fleet is speeding up."
"What?"
After running out of the control tower and observing through the telescope on the observation deck, Garcia's face instantly became extremely ugly.
In this naval battle, although the Ming Dynasty knew the number of battleships of the Western Austrian coalition through Richelieu's intelligence, Spain also calculated the number of battleships of the Ming Dynasty through channels such as Huaiyang merchants within the Ming Dynasty and based on Ming Dynasty newspapers. However, this was only the number of battleships. As for the specific parameters of the other side's battleships, no one was so clear.
But now, after the two sides fought for more than two hours, Inukai Touji slowly began to see the clues.
The slowest of the seven Ming battleships was Cao Sanxi, commissioned in 1643, with a maximum speed of 15 knots. On the Western Austrian side, the slowest Duke, commissioned in 1639, could only run at 13.5 knots.
At the beginning of the naval battle, both sides were advancing from south to north at a speed of 13 knots and firing at each other. When the Lian Po of the Ming army was hit by bullets one after another at the rear, Inukai Toji ordered the Lian Po to increase its speed to 16 knots in order to avoid damage to the stern rudder.
However, the Lian Po had been running at a speed of 16 knots for quite some time, but the Spanish battleships, although still pouring firepower towards the Lian Po, did not speed up?
Seeing this, Inukai Touji reacted immediately. Then he issued an order for the entire fleet to speed up: All our warships, keep the same route, and increase the speed from 13 knots to 15 knots!
When the Ming army sped up, Garcia suddenly felt overwhelmed: the fleets of both sides, the Ming side was heading from south to north, slightly west, while the coalition side was heading from south to north, slightly east. In other words, if the two sides maintained their inconvenient course, the distance between them would become shorter and shorter, and they would intersect sooner or later.
It was nothing that both sides were advancing at 13 knots. As the distance between the two sides narrowed, the coalition forces, which had more warships and a higher hit rate than the other side, would definitely have the advantage.
But now the Ming Dynasty is speeding up?
"Sir, we have just made a preliminary calculation. If the Chinese maintain this speed, in an hour and a half, they will be the first to reach the intersection. In other words, they will get to the T-head first."
"Maldita Sea!" He looked at his watch. "It's only 4:40 now. In an hour and a half, it will be 6:10. The sun won't be in the sea yet, right?"
"Yes, sir. The latitude here is low, and the sunset time is around 7:30 now."
"Doesn't that mean we will be bombarded by the enemy for more than an hour without the T-head?"
"Sir, in order to avoid this situation, either have the Duke withdraw from the battle line or change direction in advance."
"It's unrealistic to ask the Duke to withdraw from the battle line. His speed is indeed very slow. But the De Bazin and Barcelo in our fleet can't run more than 15 knots. The speed of the Chinese on the opposite side should be 15 knots, right?"
"Yes, sir. A rough calculation shows that it will never be less than 15 knots."
"...Well, then we have no choice but to turn ahead. Order..." Garcia raised his head with difficulty, and his voice suddenly became a little weak: "All warships, follow the flagship's turn, left rudder ten."
When the coalition forces were forced to turn early in order to avoid losing the T-head and being passively attacked, the Ming commanders on the opposite side all breathed a sigh of relief after seeing this scene.
"The general is indeed very sharp-eyed. He immediately saw through the strengths and weaknesses of the Western bandits ."
"Hahaha, no, no, I was too cautious. I should have thought from the beginning that the Western bandits had battleships many years earlier than our Ming Dynasty, and there must be some old ships here that can't keep up with us. Well, the opportunity has come, and we won't have much time. Order the entire army to concentrate fire on the enemy's heavy cruiser array!"
"yes!"
When the two sides were advancing almost parallel, if one side's battleships broke the tacit agreement and concentrated fire on the other side's heavy cruisers, then the other side's heavy cruisers would either evade or the other side's battleships would also concentrate fire on their own heavy cruisers. But now it was different: the coalition fleet was turning in front of the enemy, and at this time, not only could the coalition heavy cruisers not hide behind their own battleships, but even their own battleships had at least one turret that could not fire at the Ming army's warships.
Therefore, in the short twenty minutes or so when the Allied warships turned, the main guns of the Ming Navy ships fired fiercely at the Allied heavy cruiser formations.
At 4:52, an armor-piercing shell from the Baiqi hit the Spanish Navy's Andalusia heavy cruiser. The shell opened a large hole below its waterline, and after the turbulent seawater poured in, the Andalusia quickly tilted heavily. After the captain injected nearly a thousand tons of water into the other side of the hull, the tilt was alleviated, but the deck of the entire warship was almost level with the sea level...
At 4:58, the main guns of Yu Dayou and Deng Zilong hit the heavy cruiser Aragon in succession. After being hit by two heavy artillery shells, the 5,500-ton Aragon lay motionless on the sea, dying...
At five o'clock, the Basque was hit by several 150mm cannons fired by the Ming Navy's heavy cruisers and the main guns on the Li Mu and Wang Jian. In the end, the entire warship exploded in the ammunition depot due to the raging fire. After a loud bang, the Basque broke into two parts and sank rapidly. In less than five minutes, it disappeared from the sea.
At 5:06, the Galicia, which had finally completed the turn and was forced by the huge water columns splashing around it, was trying to pass through the gap between the Duke and the Burkle and hide behind the battleship. However, due to poor communication with the Burkle, the foreign aid warship, the two ships collided directly with each other: after three minutes of teeth-grinding creaking sounds and dull sounds of metal collision, the entire bow of the 6,000-ton Galicia was hit and disappeared. And a large hole was opened on the side of the 12,000-ton Burkle...
"Sir, the turn is complete. There is no way the Chinese can get to the T-head before dark."
"It's true that the Chinese can't get the T-head, but..." Garcia said bitterly with a miserable face: "How much damage did the heavy cruiser array suffer during our turn this time?"
"Uh." The young staff officer paused, "Four ships sunk, six severely damaged. In addition, the Burkel is also severely damaged now."
"Alas, we went out to sea to meet the Ottomans without even a single joint training exercise. This was an unforgivable mistake I made. In this naval battle, the Ottomans played no role other than holding us back."
"Sir, how is this your fault? When you led the main fleet from Suez through the Persian Gulf, you asked the Ottoman warships to move forward with us. But the Ottomans refused. These five warships arrived in Chennai only half a month ago. They had almost no communication with us because of issues of faith and diet..."
"Okay, let's stop talking about these useless things. Now, although we have suffered more losses than the Chinese, our main force is still there. Martinez, notify the entire army to keep fighting!"
"yes!"
Just as the staff officer named Martinez was about to go to the telecommunications room to send a message, a surprised voice came from the copper tube specially connected to the watchtower: "Commander, our airship troops have arrived!"
