Chapter 20: The Decisive Battle at Sea (4)

This is a decisive battle in the true sense. The British Royal Navy's 34 Fearless Class Battleships, 20 Battlecruisers, 6 Light Cruisers, 17 Cruisers, and 56 destroyers are a huge special-mix fleet consisting of 30 battleships, 22 Battlecruisers, 8 Light Cruisers, 15 Cruisers, and 70 destroyers.

This is an inevitable decisive battle, and it will determine who the new maritime overlord is!.

At the beginning of the showdown, the British Navy encountered a little trouble. Because of the fierce pursuit of Deng Shichang's squadron, the main fleet of the Chinese Navy was waiting there, and early occupied the Chinese Navy's front, and bombarded the British fleet with the most violent artillery fire with 27 battleships within a distance of 7 nautical miles. Due to the fierce pursuit of the British fleet, the entire fleet's formation did not adjust for the time being, and it was in a slightly passive situation when it came up.

But the British Navy is worthy of being the overlord of the sea in recent hundreds of years. They have the best commanders, the best officers, and the best soldiers. After discovering the main fleet of the Chinese Navy, General Evans immediately made adjustments and ordered the battleships to quickly occupy the front of the character "t". In just 10 minutes, the British fleet had already adjusted its disadvantaged position and bombarded the Chinese fleet with the most violent artillery fire. As for Deng Shichang's squadron, he had already made a big detour along the right side of the Chinese fleet before he could enter the battle.

The 10 minutes on the battlefield are too precious. In these 10 minutes, the Chinese fleet used dense artillery fire to exchange for certain results in their active position. Since it was a friendly country with Germany, China and Germany also had a lot of exchanges in the field of military and technical. The Chinese warship was also equipped with a unified directional shooting command system for the entire ship introduced from Germany. Within 10 minutes, the "Knight" battleship with a displacement of 29,000 tons of the British fleet was hit by two armor-piercing bombs. The "Knight" made a thunderous sound, and a series of astonishing explosions continued. The "Knight" and the 1,825 officers and soldiers on the warship sank like the sea.

After the "Knight" sank, Liu Buchan ordered all the battleships of the fleet to take advantage of the British's opportunity to concentrate more than half of the artillery fire of the battleship "London" that was adjusting their positions. In just three minutes, the "London" actually hit more than 30 artillery shells. The Fearless Class Battleship with a displacement of 32,500 tons was blown into two sections. What's worse was that some of the officers and soldiers on the warship were instantly blown into meat mud by artillery fire. Major General Ai's ship, the "Strong" battleship, was also seriously hit. One artillery shell fell accurately on the turret of the front main gun of the "Strong". The 405mm armor-piercing shell was easily torn apart.

With the protection of the turret, a huge explosion lifted the entire turret into the air. The dozen soldiers in the artillery area were immediately shattered, and their arms and legs were broken everywhere. The disaster of the "Strong" was not over yet. Another shell hit the vicinity of the command cabin, and the explosion cut off half of the command cabin. Major General Ai was shocked and flew up, plunged to the glass window directly in front of him, bleeding and suddenly fell into a coma. The "Strong" was hit by this and basically lost its combat effectiveness. Under the command of the deputy captain, he could only barely avoid the shells flying everywhere on the battlefield. After sending a signal to Evans's warship, he tried hard to escape the battlefield.

In just 10 minutes, the British Navy's battleships sank and one injured, and their morale was also degraded. However, the British Navy was a powerful brigade who had been through many battles. After the adjustment, it began to fight back against the Chinese fleet with fierce artillery fire. At this time, Evans found with great distress that two more cruisers were hit, one was already sinking, and the other was forced to retreat. At this time, the battlefield situation was basically evenly matched.

The Chinese fleet, which had benefited from the first battle, can be said to be the morale of the Chinese fleet. Although the Chinese Navy had a history of defeating the British Navy, it was all based on the sneak attacks of submarines. At that time, the British Navy's anti-submarine power had not yet been formed. This was the first time that the battleship formations of both sides had a decisive battle in the true sense. Liu Buchan was on the flagship "Dingyuan", a coal-fired battleship with a displacement of 35,000 tons. Seeing that the British fleet had adjusted its formation, Liu Buchan shouted loudly: "Brothers! The Chinese Navy is invincible. Our leader once said in front of the British that the brave will win when they meet on a narrow road! Now let's inherit the belief that the Chinese Navy will win with actions!"

"The Chinese Navy is invincible! The brave ones win when they meet on a narrow road!" For a moment, such a roar broke out from the ships at the same time. With this roar, a series of shells were loaded into cannons and flew mercilessly to the enemy ships. With this roar, fires were extinguished. With the roar, the soldiers did not hesitate to use their bodies to plug the loopholes.

After the two sides formed a confrontation, the battle became more intense. Countless shells whistled around the sea. Both sides knew that this was a duel about life and death, and neither side would take a step back. On September 11, 1896, history will always remember this day.

At 3:5 pm, half an hour after the war started, the battleship of the Chinese fleet, the "Dayu" battleship was hit by three shells, and one shell hit the ammunition compartment, and a huge hole was blown out on the right side of the warship. Three minutes later, the "Dayu" signaled: "The warship is irrescueable, we will all abandon the ship!" At 3:6 pm, the battleship cruiser "Dingbian" caught fire, and the hull was shot in many places and was forced to evacuate the battlefield!

The morale of the British fleet that had succeeded continuously increased again. With the excited cheers of the soldiers, Evans ordered: "Concentrate the firepower for me! Fight their flagship Dingyuan!"

Since the battle, Liu Buchan, the main general, has been standing straight in the command cabin, letting the shells roar in his ears whistling, and his face remained unchanged. At 3:10, a shell hit the Zuoxian of the Dingyuan. The shell caused a fire on the Dingyuan. A shrapnel even hit the door of the command cabin, making a buzzing sound. At 3:11, just one minute later, another shell hit the middle section of the Dingyuan, knocking down the entire watchtower. The glass in front was shattered, and the command cabin was smashed to a large piece. Liu Buchan calmly kicked open the door and said, "Communication officer, come with me!" Liu Buchan walked out of the command cabin and stood directly in front of the command cabin, commanding openly.

"Communication Officer!Communication Officer!" Liu Buchan called twice, but didn't see the answer. He turned his head and saw that the communication officer who had been following him had fallen in a pool of blood. A shrapnel pierced into his lower abdomen, and a large amount of blood was pouring out.

Liu Buchan was about to call the sanitary officer, but found that the sanitary officer had already rushed up, and without saying a word, bandage the communication officer. At this time, the clerk on the ship stood silently beside Liu Buchan and acted as a temporary communication officer.

The shells from both sides came and went. At 3:15, the British battleship "Urqu" was hit in succession, and the warship was bombed with six or seven words. The "Urqu" could no longer fight, and he tilted his body and began to run away.

At 3:40, another shell hit the mast of the Dingyuan. The front mast was blown into two sections and hit the battleship hard. The splashed fragments hit the back of Liu Buchan's head. Liu Buchan suddenly felt blood flowing and fell down.

The "Dingyuan" was shot, and the command flag on the ship was also knocked down. The British fleet cheered, and even more violent artillery fire came towards the Chinese fleet. Just as the British fleet was cheering, a shell hit Evans' flagship "Duke of Windsor". This was a heavy shell with a caliber of 500 mm. The explosion of the shell turned the entire front deck of the "Duke of Windsor" into a sea of ​​fire.

A huge warship hung high with a flag and came out of the slant. It hit the Duke of Windsor with one shot. It was the battleship "Feiyang" that just detoured, and Deng Shichang led the 20 battleships of the squadron to turn around.

The "Feiyang" appeared in time, severely hitting the British flagship, and immediately aroused the slightly affected fleet morale again. Deng Shichang hung up the command of the commander of Liu Buchan, and the Chinese fleet restored its high fighting spirit.

Although the "Duke of Windsor" was so bad that it was severely damaged, Evans still ordered his men to quickly put out the fire and rescue the fort. At this time, Evans knew clearly that he could never retreat, and even if the warship was sunk, he could never retreat. After extinguishing the fire, the former main gun quickly rang out again. The British officers and soldiers were encouraged by Evans, and their morale rebounded again.

The sound of cannons roared and explosions continued. The smoke of gunpowder was filled with the Arabian Sea. Both fleets attacked each other with the momentum of a decisive battle to the end. The casualties of both sides continued to rise. At 6:30 pm, 7 battleships of the British fleet were sunk, 11 battlecruisers sank, 6 cruisers sank into the sea, and two battleships were injured and retreated, 1 battlecruisers and 4 cruisers quit the battlefield. Ten destroyers were sunk, and there were no statistics on the injured.

The Chinese fleet is relatively cheaper than the British fleet. Due to the use of a unified directional shooting command system for the entire ship, the artillery fire of Chinese warships is more lethal. However, under the fierce attack of the British fleet, the Chinese fleet also suffered a lot of losses. Five battleships sank, three battleships were seriously injured and forced to retreat. I don’t know if they can return smoothly. Ten battleships were sunk, seven were withdrawn from combat, six cruisers sank, five were forced to retreat, and 12 destroyers were sunk, and other battleships were sunk to varying degrees of minor and serious injuries.

The sunset insisted on shining on the Arabian Sea, and the blood-red sunset set off the heroic debris everywhere on the sea surface. Since the squadron exchange of fire, the two fleets have been fighting fiercely for more than 5 hours.

Seeing that the sky was dim, Evans ordered the entire fleet to continue fighting, and Deng Shichang refused to let go of his opponent. Everyone knows that once he missed this opportunity, it would be too difficult to seize the opponent. Both sides wanted to take this opportunity to completely eliminate the opponent, and at least the opponent he had to fight was powerless to fight again.

The sea was soon illuminated by countless flares as in the daytime. The destroyers of both sides began to move forward in the night, trying to attack their opponents with torpedoes. The remaining large warships on both sides were still confronting each other, constantly trying to use cannons to make their opponents surrender.

Looking at the daytime sea surface and watching the destroyers on both sides fighting, Evans suddenly felt something was wrong, and always felt that he had forgotten something? And the forgotten thing was so important.

Suddenly! Evans shouted, "Oh God! Where are the Chinese submarines?" After shouting, Evans immediately ordered, "All fleets should pay attention to anti-submarines! Be careful of submarines!"

Evans' reminder seemed a little too late. At this time, submarines on the sea were already approaching with deep-water bombs falling and rushed towards the British fleet from all directions. There were not many submarines, and there were exactly 220. The entire Chinese submarine formation stationed in the Arabian Sea was all arrived. This is the killer weapon of the Chinese fleet, and this is the fatal killing move of the Chinese fleet.

Hundreds of submarines fired torpedoes together, and a spectacular scene suddenly appeared on the sea. When hundreds of torpedoes rushed towards the British warships fiercely, the British deep-water bombs were already constantly exploding. Chinese submarines were like a group of dead soldiers, fearlessly approaching and constantly firing torpedoes. At this time, Deng Shichang also ordered the fleet to shoot desperately and use artillery fire to cover the charge of the submarines, and the submarine formation was also bravely advancing at the risk of being hit by their own artillery fire.

"Boom", "Boom", "Boom..." The explosions continued to appear one after another. At this time, General Evans on the "Duke of Windsor" felt like he had fallen into an ice hole. It was over! Everything was over! The wise man filtered thousands of times, and he finally lost it. Evans was always on guard against Chinese submarines, but he did not expect that the Chinese submarines would dare to fight up at this time, and China completed a fatal blow to the British fleet.

At this point, the Chinese Navy's combat plan was fully realized. First, the British Navy was tempted to lure the British Navy to fight to the decisive battle. When both sides were scarred, the submarines attacked by suicide charges.

On the front of the "T", which is more than 20,000 meters long, the battle cruiser of the "Black Prince" became the first victim. Three torpedoes plunged into his hull. After three explosions, the "Black Prince" was broken into several sections and immediately sank. Then the "Princess Mary"! and five other battleships were hit by multiple torpedoes, and the British fleet finally couldn't support it.

Evans looked solemn and gave the last order in an extremely painful voice: "All warships turn 180 degrees and retreat at full speed!" As soon as this order was issued, four torpedoes plunged into the "Duke of Windsor"! The torpedo hit the engine compartment and detonated the boiler. Evans and 1,920 officers and soldiers all sank into the sea.

The British fleet was defeated! It was completely defeated! It was very miserable! The defeat was unwilling! But failure was failure, and the winners still chased the losers mercilessly. Seeing that the submarines succeeded one after another, the Chinese fleet immediately pushed forward. After losing the commander-in-chief, the British fleet, which had no fighting spirit, broke the rear with a destroyer. Regardless of the water and the submarines under the ground were still attacking with torpedoes, rushed towards the Chinese fleet that rushed forward, and under the cover of the night, they continued to use torpedoes to counterattack.

Under the desperate entanglement of the destroyer, the Chinese fleet may have been careless. The "Warrior" battleship was hit by a torpedo and the front cabin was blown out. Fortunately, the rescue was timely, so it barely sank and left the battlefield crookedly.

Seeing this, Deng Shichang immediately ordered the fleet to stop pursuing, and the fierce naval battle was over.

The British Navy suffered an unprecedented defeat, which was the first time the British Navy suffered since defeating the Spaniards. 14 battleships were sunk, 17 cruisers sank into the sea, and there were only 10 battleships, 8 battleships, 3 cruisers, and 40 destroyers that fled back to Djibouti. For this victory, the Chinese Navy submarine force paid the price of 65 submarines being sunk.

After this decisive battle at sea, the comparison of world naval forces was reversed, the British navy's advantage disappeared, and the status of the maritime overlord was gone forever!

After this battle, the Chinese Navy established its position as the world's largest naval power!

"Beijing! The command of the three armies, the head of state President Yang, and the department Deng Shichang led all the joint fleet to congratulate! The British were severely damaged by us. Our navy soldiers bravely killed the enemy and sunk more than 70 enemy ships, winning a great victory! Here is a message to congratulate! Long live the Chinese nation! Long live the head of state! Deng Shichang, commander of the joint fleet, 1896, 20:22!"

The news of victory flew over the sea and spread to Beijing. When Yang Yi received the news of victory, tears couldn't help but fall quietly, and he murmured in a low voice: "We won! Our navy finally won!"

The good news spread, and the whole country was joking. The China Times printed 100,000 copies overnight, and distributed them everywhere on the streets of Shanghai using several trucks. Beijing, Shanghai and other big cities held a grand celebration parade! The cable radio on the street kept broadcasting the good news of victory! People cheered Yang Yi's name and rushed to the streets, and people shouted "Long live the head of state!" and ran around to tell each other. The wine in the tavern, whether good or bad, was sold out, and some tavern owners even announced: "The wine today is free!" The good news of victory made the whole of China boil, making countless cities another sleepless night.

When the news reached the Far East, thousands of cannons from our Far East Corps fired at the Russian positions together to celebrate this unprecedented victory! Let the Russian army tremble in front of my powerful army! Let the Allies bow their heads before my brilliant victory.

When the news reached the world, the allies cheered. Germany and Austria jointly sent a congratulatory message to celebrate the great victory of the Chinese Navy! They highly praised the Chinese Navy's heroic and tenacious fighting will and highly praised the beautiful friendship between China, Germany and Austria. Even the British Prime Minister had to admit that "this is a catastrophic failure!"

With the change of maritime power, the Allies' failure has accelerated!
Chapter completed!