Chapter 489 Eagle over North Africa (Season 5)

@@@@@@@@@2 two o'clock in the morning.

Fifty kilometers east of Trik Island, south of Rhode Island, six Ottoman ships sped by like ghosts.

After the light control, the fleet can no longer see any light except the dark anti-collision lights.

Wu Yingke sat in a separate room specially opened for him by the flagship Izmail. He couldn't concentrate his thoughts on the chart for a long time, because he found that there was a big problem with the combat efficiency of the Ottoman navy. Not to mention the quality of the soldiers, the diffuse war-weariness alone made him feel very uncomfortable.

In addition to these, what is more tricky is the low intelligence efficiency of the Ottomans. Before the departure of the fleet, what he got was still the reconnaissance information provided by Nujiang not long ago, and the Italians dispatched five old-fashioned battleships.

Because the Yarlung Zangbo River returned home overnight with the gold and sterling cash delivered by the Ottomans, only the Nujiang and the Snow Sculpture of the Naval Intelligence Department have been providing intelligence support in the Mediterranean, but it is similar to the Southern Ocean, with many islands, and the most important target, the Dante, has not been found so far.

The Dante is the only new battleship in Italy at present. Because Britain and Germany took the lead in breaking through the technology, coupled with the stimulus of Osman's purchase of the Izmer, Italy realized the lack of naval strength, accelerated the research of the new battleship, and built the battleship in the shortest time.

From the perspective of his domestic spoiledness, the Dante is also a very good battleship. The four-door triple-piece 305mm/46x caliber gun arranged on the central axis has a very strong destructive power and a full displacement of 21,800 tons, which also enables the hull to have enough impact resistance. The speed of 22 knots has reached the level of battleships of the same level in the world.

If you want to talk about weakness, it is its thin armor and endurance. The thickest part of the main armor is only 250 mm, the thinnest is only 76 mm, the horizontal deck is only 30 mm, and the endurance is 10 knots / 5000 nautical miles.

If the main task of the Italian navy is to defend the Mediterranean Sea, and its endurance is not a big problem, its armor will become a fatal injury. Especially after entering the long-distance running war, China has begun to soar the thickness of the horizontal deck. If he has a Dalian-class heavy cruiser in his hand at this time, he can at least guarantee heavy damage. The other party.

But not now!

With the combat capability of the Italian navy, if he encounters Dante, he can only choose to escape, so he mainly focuses on the five old battleships.

What the emperor said to him before leaving is still lingering in his ears. As the top military strategist in everyone's mind, the emperor has pointed out the important surname of the Ottoman Empire to Xinhua many times.

It can be said that if conditions permit, even if there is a war with the world, Xinhua will protect the Ottoman Empire!

The previous argument of the emperor was still puzable, but as more and more deductions and wars exercised everyone's gradually broadened vision, everyone gradually understood that in addition to the Suez Canal, which is known as the world's artery, the Osmen Empire and Persia were too important to Xinhua!

First of all, once you control here, even if you are stationed, you can threaten the whole of West Asia and South Asia, including India, from the flank. Even if you don't want an African couple, you can radiate the core of Central Asia, which is equivalent to a sword that can be stabbed at any time, and all European countries, including Russia, at once. The connection between home and Asia is cut off!

However, the current Xinhua Navy cannot enter this area blatantly, but its influence must come early. In addition to means such as economic manufacturing influence, nothing is more direct than military help!

This is also the main reason why the emperor let him come to Ottoman.

"Help Osman, let them know our ability, and help the empire expand its influence in this region to ensure that in the event of a war, it can cut off all links between Europe and Asia!"

This is the emperor's original words, but it is not easy to do this. First of all, Britain is currently in its heyday. Almost all of Persia and Africa are their colonies and protectories. Even the previous Kuwait and Basra oil fields have been repeatedly threatened by the British.

Secondly, to let Osman know the power of Xinhua, we must help them win at least one decent naval victory, even if they all retreat behind the Darnier Strait.

But Osman also can't be too strong. It is necessary to maintain the weakness of this ancient empire. Only in this way can they continue to cling to Xinhua, which puts forward a high demand for him.

Help Osman win a victory and then let it fail!

Is it possible?

The aggressive Italian fleet is in front of it. There is no aircraft reconnaissance, no radio detector, and the intelligence is even more unsightly. The low enthusiasm for fighting makes him feel more difficult than the scene of dealing with Japan in those years!

Wu Yingke shook his head, put aside his complicated thoughts, and looked at the chart again. The first thing he had to do was to find the Italian fleet, otherwise everything was empty talk.

Just as he was about to consider where the Italian fleet would be at this moment, there was a sudden knock on the door outside the hatch.

"Come in."

As soon as Wu Yingke spoke, a Xinhua Imperial Navy correspondent with a portable radio on his back rushed into the hatch: "Report, the Nujiang sent a telegram. Their detectors found unknown warships off the coast of Castelli, south of Trik Island, with more than four at a speed of 12 knots, but the night was too dark to get up. Fly reconnaissance."

This deliberately left correspondent was the only reconnaissance method that Wu Yingke could rely on, because only he could contact the nearby Nujiang, so when he brought the news, he immediately climbed to the map and found the farthest place in the western section of Trik Island.

120 nautical miles away from yourself!

Wu Yingke immediately looked at the watch. Although the current technology of the detector could not distinguish the correct number and type of the enemy fleet, he was almost sure that it was the Italian fleet. The only problem was that Dante was not among them!

After thinking about it, Wu Yingke quickly dressed and knocked on the hatch of General Hakan, the captain and commander of the fleet, with the correspondent and a defending imperial soldier.

"Mr. Commander, you must put the fleet into combat immediately. We are going to encounter the enemy!"

"What!" The sleepy-eyed Hakan was stunned for a long time before he suddenly understood Wu Yingke's words. He looked at the telegraphman behind him and took out his pocket watch to have a look. He had some doubts that even if Xinhua had a plane, how could they find the Italian fleet in the middle of the night now?

However, Hakan was not a fool after all. He knew that if the other party did not have accurate information, he would not disturb his good dreams in the middle of the night, so he immediately dressed up and walked into the command tower with Wu Yingke.

At three o'clock in the morning, the old Ottoman fleet finally woke up from sleep and made pre-war preparations--

The fish white in the east woke all the soldiers of the Nujiang from their sleep. The crane slowly put Fan Wu and his Osprey on the sea. When the crane returned to its original position, he saw the comrades-in-arms on the deck who gave him a thumbs up.

The last incident made him scolded, but the captain's smile that could not be covered up in the corners of his eyes and his comrades-in-arms praised him excitedly, which completely changed the taste of the scolding.

But today is different, because the neutral flag has been raised on the mast of the Nujiang, which means that I can't fool around when I see the Italian fleet and aircraft. I can only forward the information and news I saw by the Nujiang by radio.

The throttle rod pushed slowly, and the speed of the propeller became faster and faster. He pulled the osprey and began to slide at high speed on the surface of the water. When the head of the plane uncontrollably jumped, he gently pulled up the plane.

According to the rules, after hovering over the warship, he flew to the broken island in the distance.

After quickly crossing the Cyclades Islands belonging to Greece, the beautiful Aegean Sea appeared in front of Fan Wu. In order to get a better observation view, he gradually raised the plane to a height of 1,000 meters before grabbing the telescope tied to him and searching around.

This is the natural advantage of the aircraft. No matter how high the mast is, it can only help the observer see the distance of about 30 kilometers at most, but he can easily monitor the range of nearly 100 kilometers. From the telescope, the horizon sinks to both ends like a beautiful and curved arc.

Suddenly, a black spot caught his attention. He only saw that the Italian biplane, which was almost forced to land not long ago, was quickly launched from the Aegean Sea. However, due to insufficient power, its speed was too slow and could not rise to such a height to challenge itself.

Just as Fan Wu was licking his lips and considering whether he was violating an order and forcing this guy down again, a large stock of thick smoke suddenly appeared in the east. At the same time, more than a dozen black ship shadows appeared in the west.

When the thick smoke in the east became clearer, the low-flying Italian plane also found the target. After turning a corner, it quickly flew to the fleet. Just as Fan Wu began to report the situation of the Italian fleet with a walkie-talkie, the Italian plane also circled the fleet a few times and threw down a small thing. .

Fan Wu sip his lips. You don't need to look at it to know what it is.

This is the pain of not having a radio! --

"They have found us 30 nautical miles away!"

"Two main battleships of the San Giorgio class, two battleships of the Queen Elena, one of the Queen Margaret and two armored cruisers."

"There is no Dante!"

Wu Yingke took the telegram forwarded from the Nujiang. Seeing that there was no Dante, he was immediately relieved and looked at Admiral Hakan. The Admiral of the Ottoman Empire did not dare to hesitate any more and immediately began to adjust the formation.

Looking at his hurried and even at a loss, Wu Yingke frowned and suddenly said boldly, "Your Excellency, with your permission, I think I can command!"

This sentence quickly quieted the conning tower of the Izmir, and all eyes were focused on the middle-aged man with a correspondent and a guard in a straight posture.

He wants to command the fleet of the Ottoman Empire?!

Hand over a country's strongest fleet to a stranger who has only been here for a few days? Is this a joke?

Admiral Hakan stared at Wu Yingke. For him, this sentence was like a provocation, a mockery of his incompetence, and a distrust of the Ottoman Empire! At that moment, he even had the impulse to kick a guy with his head held high into the sea.

But from the bottom of his heart, he really admires the staff officer of the Xinhua Imperial Navy. Although he usually laughs, in fact, he knows the problems of the Ottoman navy better than anyone else. The ills in it can't be changed by a few battleships, so after thinking about it, he pointed to Wu Yingke and said, "I can't command my fleet. But you can be my deputy to power!"

Full deputy?

Wu Yingke can't help but admire this old and crafty guy. In this way, after the victory, the credit is all his. If he fails, he will be a scapegoat, and he can also take over the whole fleet. It's really a very wise decision.

"Commander, my first suggestion is to let my people take over the flagship No. 1 turret!"

"I agree."

With Hakan's words, a strange command brain was formed. Wu Yingke could not control so much at this time. For him, mastering a naval gun made by his own veterans is far better than letting veterans scattered everywhere to guide the Ottoman sailors.

In fact, something happened later, which proved the valid surname of this method.

At 6:30, the Ottoman fleet was quickly prepared under the command of Wu Yingke's clear and quick "help". At the same time, a large amount of black smoke had risen in the sky.

Without optical aiming and fire control, Wu Yingke is almost sure that this is a close encounter, but the problem is that he can't follow the rhythm of the Italians and must take enough distance. Otherwise, even if he has enough firepower advantages, the quality of the Italian navy can guarantee to tear up these Ottoman masters. Soldiers.

"28,000 yards."

The captain of the Ottoman navy held up the telescope and began to shout. Wu Yingke frowned. He was not used to using codes to express distance. After all, the Xinhua Navy used metric meters.

Fortunately, the British system was not very strange, so he immediately calculated the approximate distance between the two sides, but a detail attracted his attention.

Speed!

The speed of the Italian fleet began to improve, almost all of which were maintained at 20 knots. Although the Izmail and three Dukes on their side could also maintain 20 knots, the two former German Navy Brandenburg-class Barbarrosa and Reese had only 16 knots, so the speed of the formation could not be unified!

In the battle, the capital ship must maintain the same speed, otherwise there will be a big problem!

6:40, when he was worried about how to respond to the war, the Snow Sculpture sent information about the discovery of the Dante and another battleship 70 nautical miles west of Trik Island, which made his eyes light up and he immediately made a decision that the Ottomans didn't understand.

He ordered to keep 16 voyages while turning left to the west of Crete.

This decision almost triggered a riot of the Ottomans. Seeing that the Italian fleet was in front, it suddenly turned around. What else could it do besides making the Italians laugh at Osman's timidity?

The bigger problem is that the five battleships and two cruisers of the Italian fleet remain at about 20 knots. Unless you throw away two Barbarossa-class battleships on your side, you can only leave your buttocks to the Italian cannon to kiss!

But this issue stopped the controversy after Wu Yingke drew a few lines.

The Italian fleet in the distance saw that Osman fled without a fight, and the direction of escape was still ambushed on the position of the outer Dante, and immediately chased after him with full power.

"20,000 yards."

"19,000 yards."

The captain of the seaman shouted one after another, but Wu Yingke still lowered his head and lay on the chart table. After all, the naval battle is a math game. It takes at least three hours for Dante to block himself, and the Italian fleet can close the distance to 10,000 meters in an hour, so in the middle There is still a two-hour time difference!

Enough to complete a big counterattack!

What's more, the Italians didn't expect that after they had a pair of eyes in the sky, they also quietly grasped the higher eyes.

"15,000 yards!"

This time, when the captain of the sea reported the number again, Wu Yingke shook off the pen fiercely: "Left, 90 degrees!"

Ten minutes later, with the Izmail taking the lead in completing the steering, a standard and perfect T appeared on the sea 40 kilometers north of Trik Island.

"Fire!"

When 26 305mm/45x naval guns and two Babarosa-class 128 280mm main guns roared at the same time, all the Ottoman officers in the flagship conning tower all cast the five-body throw that looked short and small and forcibly seized command in their own name. Earth, because he used a fake escape to lure the Italian fleet that was eager to destroy himself, and then used a perfect cross-cutting, seemingly passive, but actually actively grabbed the vital T-position!

The rumbling gunfire tore through the calm of the Mediterranean Sea. The Italian fleet did not expect that the Ottoman fleet was on its way to escape. When it was about to be attacked on both sides, it suddenly turned around. It not only grabbed the T position, but also took the lead in a round of salvo!

The naval gun was shooting crazily at a speed of one shot per minute. After a few minutes of chaos, the Italian fleet also began to fight back with the bow main gun. At this time, Wu Yingke was not only not happy with his small scheme, but his eyebrows were deeper.

Because of the full five rounds of shelling, they all missed!

"Damn it, I'm blind!"

In the sky, Fan Wu saw the Ottoman fleet opening fire first. Before he waved his fists a few times excitedly, he found that all the shells were outrageous. He hammered the cabin angrily, grabbed the microphone and shouted, "Nujiang, this is Eagle Eye, all of them are biased!" Damn, it's all off. The coordinate scale is five degrees, and the distance extends 400 meters forward!"

In the cabin, Fan Wu was very busy. While he wanted to fly the plane, he had to take out the sextant positioning and report it through the radio. He almost wanted to come out with three heads and six arms.

Fortunately, another Osprey came to help at this time, and the two of them worked together to solve the problem.

They are simple. It's troublesome for the Italian pigeon below. Because the capital ship is opening fire and lacks radio contact, they can only keep flying around to drop small notes for contact. By the time his first coordinate note is dropped, the Ottoman fleet has already left its original position.

"Go to turret No. 1!" The continuous numbers sent made Wu Yingke unable to deal with them, mainly because there was no unified command system on these warships, so they could only rush the telegraphman directly to the No. 1 turret controlled by their own people, and the gunners directly shelled digitally according to the coordinates, saving the intermediate process.

Five minutes later, the good news finally came. The old Xinhua gunners in the turret of the Izmer No. 1 lived up to expectations, and a shell hit the battleship Roma 10,000 meters away like long eyes.

The heavy and huge 305mm shell drilled through the thin bow armor of the Roma, and the violent explosion caused the battleship's bow with a standard displacement of 12,880 tons to suddenly press down, with a large crack of one meter wide.

The inlet of the bow caused Rome to quickly lose its speed. At this time, the Xinhua gunners distributed on the other three Dukes immediately saw the opportunity and asked the Ottoman gunners to adjust the order of shelling and concentrated all the firepower on Rome.

I don't know whether the first hit awakened the courage of the Ottoman sailors, and the shells suddenly fell around the Roma like eyes.

8:20 points, after another round of straddle shots, the Izmail announced the death penalty of the Rome. This time, it was the Izmail No. 1 turret. The two shells fired accurately penetrated the main armor behind the first chimney of the Rome, entered the boiler chamber and triggered a big explosion. The violent explosion made Rome The hull quickly tilted and was torpedoed by the Italian navy that afternoon.

Looking at the slow tilt of the Roma, Wu Yingke was a little relieved and felt a little sorry. Judging from the effect, Osman's shells were obviously the same as that of Russia. If it was replaced with Xinhua's armor-piercing shells, the first shot could directly sink the other party by detonating the ammunition depot of the turret of the Roma just now.

At 8:30, after the second maneuver, the last Barbarossa-class battleship Reese was hit hard by a 305mm shell, causing the central turret to explode. If it hadn't been for the Germans's protection, it was estimated that the end would not be much better than Rome.

31 points, Wu Yingke ordered two Barbarossa-class battleships to withdraw from the battle and retreat to the Ottoman coast, while he continued to bombard with the Izmail and three Ducts.

50 points, after the Duke-class battleship Akashi was removed from the front mast by a 305mm shell, the Ottoman fleet achieved the second and last result.

The Italian battleship Queen Margaret was jointly hit by the original Akashi and Tsugaru in the process of formation maneuvering. This time, it was the Ottoman gunners who made contributions. Their super-level performance led to a big explosion of the strongest battleship in Italy before the Dante. A few minutes later, thick smoke rolled out of armor. It rose under the board and devoured the battleship with a load of nearly 15,000 tons.

Two battleships were lost in a row, which made the Italian navy panic. They immediately sent four torpedo ships to disturb, and took the initiative to wait for the arrival of the Dante, which had reached 30 nautical miles away.

But how could Wu Yingke, who had been informed for a long time, satisfy them? He immediately ordered to turn around and speeded up to 22 knots, flying towards the Ottoman coastline with four capital ships.

A day later, when General Hakan returned to Istanbul with the six capital ships with one seriously injured and four minor injuries in exchange for the sinking of two Italian battleships, the victorious carnival almost flooded the ancient city, but this was only the last joy.

Shortly after the Ottoman fleet crossed the Dardanelles, Italy's most powerful capital ship Dante arrived outside the strait with the remaining four battleships, launching nearly two hours of shelling on the strait in retaliation!

At the same time, a bad news calmed down Muhammad V from the cheers of naval victory. Four Italian airships attacked the Turkish army position in Tripoli, killing a full of 600 soldiers.

Tripoli fell!

The great power of the airship made Osman anxious. Due to the lack of North African garrisons and the lack of countermeasures against Italian airships and aircraft, the Italian army was defeated under the guidance of the former. In this case, Muhammad V finally made up his mind to accept Wu Yingke's suggestion with 100 dollars a day. At a sky-high price, they hired "fans" and their planes from the Xinhua Empire who were flying inland in Bengazi (formerly known as Cyrenaica City).

Because the strait was blocked by the Italian navy, he transported another 20,000 rifles to Benghazi (formerly known as Cyrenaica City) in the hands of Enver, a radical member of Al-Shabaab, who was organizing defense there, to organize the locals to rebel against the Italian army on the spot...

(to be continued)