The flagship of the "First Air War" is the aircraft-carrying battlecruiser Shu Zhongwang.
"Military Gate, the Hongwu Emperor called an urgent call and discovered the Yingyi battleship formation and airship formation in the Great Strait. The battleship formation consists of 10 new battleships with five turrets, which should be the ones often mentioned in the Yingyi equipment report. Victory level. Guan Junmen reminds us to be careful..."
Within the bridge, Guo Xiaobao, chief staff officer of the First Air War, was reporting to Zhuge Weidao with the telegram he had just received. Zhuge Weidao, on the other hand, held up a large pair of binoculars to look at the big, fat airship in the sky with the eye-catching "cross-red stripe" logo on its tail.
This airship flew a little too high, and it couldn't be hit by anti-aircraft guns or 20mm anti-aircraft cannons. Although the ship-borne 75mm guns and 155mm guns are sufficient, there are currently no radio proximity fuses and fixed-altitude fuses, so they have to be directly hit to shoot them down. It's not easy!
As for using a plane to fight...it seems a little out of reach. It seems that the next step is to increase the practical ceiling of the aircraft and develop a height-fixing fuse.
Zhuge Weidao was thinking about his own thoughts and listened to Guo Xiaobao's report. He didn't seem to pay much attention to the warships and airships that appeared in the Tregg Strait. He just put down the telescope and asked: "How far are we from the Tregg Strait?" ?”
"About 50 nautical miles," the fleet's navigator replied.
Ma Xuchen, Chief of Staff of the First Air Warfare, asked: "Military Gate, do you want to send a battle patrol detachment to test it out?"
"No need." Zhuge Weidao shook his head, "They have 10 cutting-edge battleships...mostly using 12-inch guns, a total of 100! The battle patrol unit is 8x4, a total of 32 300mm guns The cannon is only 30% of the opponent's strength, so it can't be defeated."
In fact, the Victory-class can only put up to eight 12-inch guns on one side, while the four turrets of the Chung-oh class can all be pointed to one side, and they also have eight 300-mm guns. So the firepower of the two is almost equal...but 4 to 10, the advantage is still on the enemy's side.
Although the Zhongwang class is very fast, with a rated speed of 24 knots, it can run 26 knots with forced ventilation. But the British new battleships will not be too slow. They are definitely rated at 20 knots. There should be no problem with 2 knots of forced ventilation. The speed advantage of only three quarters is of little use when fighting in formation, and cannot reverse the huge disadvantage in numbers.
Moreover, the British have at least 10 battleships, who knows where they are? If someone breaks out and escapes, the trouble will be big.
Zhuge Weidao thought about it and said: "Now that the enemy is strong and we are weak, we cannot rush to a decisive battle... However, everything has advantages and disadvantages. There is also an advantage to us meeting the main force of the British and Indian fleets west of the Strait of Malacca. This shows that Persia Gulf Fleet is safe now!
As long as we can maintain our presence to the west of the Strait of Malacca with high speed and are not driven away or defeated by the British and barbarians, the British and barbarian fleets will not dare to easily enter the Strait of Malacca and have a decisive battle at Guanjunmen. Moreover, we can also use planes to bomb the logistics supply fleet of the British and Indian fleets... Such a huge fleet must have carried a large number of ammunition ships, coal ships, and supply ships. The British and Yi have not invested much in high-speed transport ships in the past two years, so most of those ships are slow. We can go around the British while looking for opportunities to air attack them.
And we don’t need to stay in this area for too long. As long as it takes a few days, Guanjunmen will be able to use shallow-water heavy artillery ships and mines to block the relatively narrow middle section of the Malacca Strait... By then, Danmasi Island and Malacca The waterway communication between the city and the outside world will be cut off, and the British and Indian troops in Malaya will be attacked from both sides!
If we fight for another two months at most, the Nanyang Army will be able to capture the entire Malay Peninsula. Once we win the Malay Peninsula, everything will be fine for us! "
After hearing Zhuge Weidao's analysis, Ma Xuchen, Guo Xiaobao, and Wang Wen all frowned slightly.
The First Air Battle has high speeds and aircraft. It is no problem to deal with the British fleet east of the Strait of Malacca and wait for opportunities to send aircraft to attack their supply fleet. Isn't this what the First Air Battle is for?
As for Guan Tianpei commanding the main force of the Nanyang Fleet to block the middle section of the Malacca Strait, the waters near Luba Island, where the Nanyang Fleet severely attacked the British armored cruiser formation a few days ago, are not open and are only 37 kilometers wide. There is no problem in blocking them with mines, shallow water gunboats, torpedo boats, etc. .
But...can the army take the Malay Peninsula in 2 months?
The blockade established by the Nanyang Fleet on Luba Island can at most cut off the waterway traffic between Malacca City and Damasik Island, but it cannot cut off the entire logistics line of the Malay, British and Indian armies... They can still use Penang, Klang, Ports such as Parit Buntar, Dagang, and Banting provide logistical supplies for Malaya’s hundreds of thousands of troops!
This battle...is a bit difficult!
...
"Order the Royal Navy Air Force to attack!"
On the Victory, Lieutenant General James Hood read the telegram sent by George Elliot and immediately made the decision to launch an air strike!
"Is the attack discovered now?"
"Lieutenant General, the distance is still too far... Even if we send a destroyer to rush over immediately, it will take an hour and a half to arrive. I'm afraid our pilot will have to soak in the sea for an hour or two before he can be rescued."
In fact, the person who said this knows very well how low the probability of "falling into the sea and being rescued" is... Unless you fly next to your own ship and fall into the sea, then the people on the ship will come to rescue you quickly, and it won't be a big problem. .
Otherwise, you have to soak in the water for an hour or two... Not to mention feeding the sharks. Even if the sharks in the Indian Ocean have no appetite today, it will be difficult for the destroyers that arrive later to find the flying warriors soaking in the water in the vast ocean.
So...Hood actually sent his men on a suicide mission!
"Then stay for an hour or two!" James Hood said very firmly, "We can't wait any longer...The enemy has already discovered us, and they probably know that we have discovered them. So they will speed up at any time. Escape! The Chinese's steam engines and steam turbines have always been better than ours! So their cutting-edge battleships must be very fast and we can't catch up. If we can't use human-operated gliding bombs to damage them to slow down their speed, what's next? A fleet with high-speed battleships as the main force will become a nightmare for our rear lines!"
Hood glanced at the surrounding staff and said: "Give me the order... Also, tell the boys in the airship unit that the British Empire needs them to defend it!"
"Yes, sir!"
.......
Hood's order was quickly sent via radio waves to George Elliot and the 15 airships in the sky filled with "suicide glide bombs"!
And the "bombing pilots" on the airships are all good guys recruited from Ireland with high salaries. Although they have not studied much, they all love the British Empire and Emperor William...even if they are both Catholics and Irish, but determined to defend their motherland with their lives!
Of course, the British Empire would not let them defend in vain...the military pay and the additional rewards given by the Emperor of the Indian Empire were sufficient. If they could make it back to Ireland alive, that would be enough to live out their lives as country gentlemen.
Besides, these awesome guys have no idea how hard it is to fish people out of the ocean. In previous trainings, very few of them were missing. The salvage team sent by the airship mothership will almost 100% fish them out of the warm sea, and no sharks have been seen...
Therefore, these good guys are all very motivated, and they are all a little eager to try when they see the "first voyage battle" in formation sailing on the sea thirty nautical miles away.
The officers of the airship force are all Northern Irish Protestants who "like" the Irish the most...At this time, they told these "great guys" in an encouraging tone, "His Majesty the Emperor has prepared every preparation for you." A bonus of 1,000 pounds! Anyone who successfully hits an enemy battleship will receive another 3,000 pounds! Major General Yilu is watching you from the sky... Do your best! God bless you, set off now!"
"Yes, sir!"
The "bomb operators" with high morale were fooled into getting into the "magazine compartment" of the unfolded "glide bomb", and then one after another they were pushed out of the cabin by the airship soldiers and began to soar in the air. It also scared the airship soldiers of the Ming army who were following these airships to investigate!
"Oh my God! Then, what is that? There seems to be a bomb under the hang glider! There is someone piloting it!"
"It's a suicide glide bomb... Send a telegram quickly, the British are crazy! They have suicide planes!"
