The surrender of the Spanish Treasure Fleet brought a huge surprise to the Northern Expeditionary Fleet, not only because of the 850,000 taels of American silver on the six Great Galenic warships, but also because of the six Great Galenic warships themselves. and more than two thousand captured crew members.
Although Jinghua's warships have their own unique features and performed well in this actual battle, as the saying goes, a stone from a mountain can attack a jade. For a study and comparison of directly capturing Spain's first-rate warships, Gao Zhenxin, the commander of the Beiyang Fleet, Have a very clear understanding of this. He knew that attaching great importance to "Red Fans" with high pragmatism would be a great achievement.
Of course, to a certain extent, these six large galleons themselves are also a considerable fortune. Although it is unclear how much the Spanish spent on building these warships, according to Jinghua's own situation, the 1,200-ton Galen is equivalent to a first-class cruiser, and the cost of a single ship is as high as 160,000 taels of silver - these six ships Itself is not even cheaper than the American silver it brought!
Of course, they are all in a "bad" state now, and it will probably cost a lot of money to repair them, but Beiyang will definitely not have to pay for this money.
It's a huge profit...especially when this battle is actually fought by the Beiyang Fleet itself. Although the representatives sent by the major nobles are very greedy, they can't ask for a share of the profits.
However, Gao Zhenxin knew the importance of the "United Fleet" after all, and adhering to Gao's pragmatic thinking, he estimated that the master would not completely monopolize the money - of course, the "money" was only the 850,000 taels of American silver seized. Therefore, after Gao Zhenxin arranged the relevant custody matters, he told the representatives of the nobles that he would ask the master for instructions on how to divide the money.
In short, his meaning is very simple. This money cannot be distributed by him and must be handed over to the Sea Trade Alliance for decision.
All distinguished representatives were very satisfied with this. Although everyone knew that it was Gao Situ who had revealed the truth to the Sea Trade Alliance, Gao Situ's reputation was good enough, and everyone felt that the decision by the Sea Trade Alliance was the most reasonable arrangement.
Jinghua must have taken the six large Galen warships himself. This is what Gao Zhenxin is most concerned about now - without him, Gao Zhenxin hopes that these ships will directly enter the service of the Beiyang Fleet, which will greatly strengthen the combat strength of the Beiyang Fleet.
However, when he went to see the "San Antonio" in person, he had some doubts. Because the shipbuilding ideas of these six ships gave him a little headache.
Jinghua's shipbuilding idea is very clear. The transport ship is only an armed transport ship. No matter how it changes, its tonnage is basically the same, which is 1600 materials (800 tons). At most, it is to make some internal cabin adjustments based on customer needs for export ships.
Their main mission is of course transportation, and their armament is mainly to deter pirates and cooperate with the operations of the two ocean fleets when necessary.
In addition to the armed transport ships, there is a pure battleship system. According to the highly pragmatic plan, in addition to the existing third-level battleships, first-level cruisers, and second-level cruisers, Jinghua's battleship system also has second-level battleships and first-level battleships. However, the latter two have not yet completed development, let alone started construction. Fortunately, Gao Pragmatic has no mandatory time requirements for these two classes of battleships. It can only be said to be a long-term plan.
But in any case, the missions of warships at all levels under the battleship system are very clear. They are basically only responsible for fighting. Although they also have a certain loading capacity, they are prepared to transport the Marine Corps - and in fact, this time the expedition company The Marines were not loaded on several battleships because the number of armed transport ships was sufficient.
So when comparing the Spanish's Great Galen, the difference between the two sides is obvious: Although the Spanish's Great Galen is also a warship, due to the different tactical systems of the two sides, the shipbuilding ideas are also very different.
In Gao Zhenxin's view, these six large Galen ships are actually "enlarged versions of armed transport ships." Since they had to transport cargo across oceans, they had a lot of cargo holds, and because the Spanish Navy tended to engage in follow-up warfare, the troop compartments were also very large and numerous.
This resulted in the fact that they were soft-sail warships that required more manpower to operate, but their actual sailors were no different from the number of sailors on Jinghua warships of the same tonnage.
According to Takagi San's face-to-face report to him after the battle, the enemy ship's combat effectiveness dropped quickly after being hit. It is probably related to this - the professional deck personnel were lost but there were not enough professional manpower to replace them. Of course it would Combat effectiveness decreases.
Based on these judgments, Gao Zhenxin felt that although these six warships were very good in themselves, they seemed to be a bit unsure of their positioning when incorporated into Beiyang. What's more, they are still soft-sailed warships, which are a bit incompatible with Jinghua's current hard-sailed warship system. At the same time, when marshalling them, you have to consider the issue of varying speeds - for example, they may go too fast downwind and need to furl some of their sails, but they may go against the wind. Not on the Grand Fleet.
"Is the commander thinking about what to do with these ships now?" Gao Musan had a lot of experience after all. He guessed Gao Zhenxin's thoughts by observing his words and asked from the side.
Of course Gao Zhenxin would not hide it from him. He nodded and said: "These are soft sailing ships. Our people may not be able to operate them skillfully. If they are taken all the way to Manila, it is hard to say whether they will be effective. But if their marines are guarded and replaced with If our people go to supervise the operation of their sailors, there is no guarantee that these people will be able to join us in the attack on Manila...
However, if I send people to escort these ships back now, I can't just rely on the Marines. I will definitely have to send ships to follow. But we still have to fight next. Even if our maritime strength is sufficient and we can allocate part of it, the Marines must not be allocated casually. After all, if the attack on Manila is restricted, this expedition will not be considered perfect. "
Takagi San nodded and said: "The commander is thinking about it, but my subordinates think that we can think differently. For example, these six ships were not in our plan originally, and the attack on Manila has nothing to do with them... "
"Oh, I know what you mean." Gao Zhenxin reacted quickly and immediately said: "You are saying that we don't need to consider how taking them to Manila will improve our combat effectiveness. Bringing them there is just to save trouble. Is that what you mean? ?”
"Yes, that's what I mean. In addition, my subordinates think that taking them to Manila has another benefit." Takagi San blinked and said: "There are nearly 2,000 Spaniards on these six large treasure ships, and There are only about 2,000 Spanish people in Manila.
Commander, just imagine what the feeling of the Philippine Governor-General would be like when these six large Spanish treasure ships appeared outside Manila under our guard and two thousand prisoners under our guard. "
Gao Zhenxin's eyes lit up and he praised: "You Takagi San, you have some skills in this mental attack!" He became happy and walked quickly on the sidewalk: "I heard from the master that the mainland of Spain should be counted as at least two A union of two countries, one is called Castile and the other is called Aragon. And these two countries combined have a total population of just over six million. Calculating it this way, even if Castile is stronger, it is amazing Count it at four million people.
What use are four million people? There are more than this number in Annan [Note: Annan originally had a population of about 5 million, but after Beijing’s vigorous immigration, it now has nearly 6 million]! Since their population is so small, the lives of 2,000 naval personnel must not be taken lightly. I even doubt... whether these two thousand people can be used to discuss a deal with the Philippine Governor-General, such as the peaceful dedication of the city. "
Gao Musan originally just thought of using the capture of six large Galen ships to shock the Philippine Governor-General. Who knew that Gao Zhenxin thought further and actually thought of exchanging prisoners for the city of Manila.
To be honest, this idea seems quite magical to Takagi San. After all, in the Ming Dynasty, compared to a mere two thousand people and an important stronghold-type city, it was not on the same level at all. Many times in Chinese history, it was common for hundreds of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians to be killed or injured in order to defend certain important cities.
As the center of Spanish rule in the Philippines, would Manila really be abandoned for a mere two thousand people? Takagi San was a little skeptical about this. But after he thought about it, he felt that what Gao Zhenxin said made sense. After all, the population of Spain - oh, Castile is really too small.
The Ming Dynasty had hundreds of millions of people, so the loss of two thousand was indeed a small amount of trouble, but Castile only had four million people, so the death of two thousand people would certainly be very painful - this may be equivalent to the Ming Dynasty losing a hundred thousand troops in the first battle.
An army of 100,000. If the Ming Dynasty suffered such losses in a battle, a series of generals would be killed. Is it different in Castile?
When Takagi San thought about it, he felt that although the commander's idea was a bit magical, he might as well give it a try. After all, in his view, although the Philippines is important, it is not the Spanish homeland after all. Its status is at best equivalent to that of Korea to the Ming Dynasty (this is not accurate, but it can only be compared in this way in Takagizo's thinking).
So Takagi San also expressed support for Gao Zhenxin's idea, and Gao Zhenxin made up his mind. He first discussed with Gao Yimin and asked him to send the Marines to the Spanish warships to supervise the sailors to continue sailing. Then he sent people to transfer American silver and other cargo from the Spanish treasure fleet to ten armed ships in Beijing. On the transport ship - these ten ships will not return home yet, but will still fight with the large fleet, but they will no longer undertake front-line combat missions.
Next, he went to meet with Silva and other important prisoners.
Silva's sword had already been handed over to him at the time of surrender, and now the commander of the Spanish Treasure Fleet and the six captains were imprisoned in a cabin on the "Liu Rengui". When Gao Zhenxin, Gao Yimin, Gao Musan and others passed by, there was some noise inside.
Gao Zhenxin asked the sailor of the supervising team who was guarding them at the door: "What's going on inside?"
A leader of the supervising team smiled bitterly and said: "The interpreter went in and asked, and these people said that they are all nobles and asked us to provide treatment commensurate with their status - they asked to live in a single cabin."
Gao Zhenxin and the other three looked at each other and were speechless. Takagi San cursed angrily: "Damn it, a group of prisoners still dare to make demands? They are not living in a large cabin now, and they think the treatment is not good!"
Gao Zhenxin remembered some of the European traditions that Gao Pragmatic mentioned when he "trained" them individually, and suddenly said: "Oh, these Spanish officers are all nobles, right? You first ask the interpreter to ask them whose title they are. Supreme, let the person with the highest status and the commander of the fleet come out and talk to me."
The interpreter was quickly called, and he went in for questioning. Takagi Sanze asked in surprise: "Isn't the commander of their fleet the one with the highest title?"
Gao Zhenxin shook his head and said: "This is not accurate. It's just like...if our master leads an army on an expedition, it wouldn't be surprising if he has several distinguished commanders under his command."
Oh, that's true. Takagi San nodded suddenly.
Not long after, the interpreter brought out two people from the cabin - coincidentally, it was Silva and Echevari. It turns out that although Silva comes from a distinguished family, he is not the eldest son, his father has not found another title for him, and he has no such military exploits, while Echevari is a legitimate viscount.
As soon as the two sides met, Silva protested loudly and chattered for a long time. It's a pity that none of the three Gao family members can understand Castilian - in fact, what they speak is not Castilian, but French.
"What did he say?" Although Gao Zhenxin and the other three were the victors, it was obvious that due to Gao's pragmatic habits, the servant leaders did not always have the habit of having people kneel down to speak when facing prisoners of war, and they just talked about business first.
The interpreter listened for a while and replied: "He said that he wanted to accuse us of attacking their fleet for no reason, which was an act of war against the Kingdom of Castile. He also said... He also said that our behavior was just like pirates. "
The pirates must have meant that Jinghua directly emptied the six large Galen ships of American silver and other cargo, but Gao Zhenxin rolled his eyes and said: "Tell him that we warned them to stop the ship for inspection, but they refused to stop the ship. Hou Jian, this is what led to the fighting, and they should bear full responsibility for this."
The interpreter negotiated with Silva, and then said: "He said that we have no right to inspect the naval warships of the Kingdom of Castile, and believe that this is the territorial waters of the Philippine Governor's Office of the Kingdom of Castile."
"Huh? The territorial waters of the Philippine Governor's Office?" Gao Zhenxin sneered: "Tell him, Luzon paid tribute in the third year of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty. It is a vassal state of the Ming Dynasty, and the Ming Dynasty is the master of this territorial sea. As for the Governor-General of the Philippines in Castile... Huh, as the suzerain of Luzon, my country, the Ming Dynasty, has never recognized this illegal organization."
As soon as these words were relayed by the interpreter, Silva was obviously in a daze. He muttered to Echevar beside him for a long time before he spoke back to the interpreter.
The interpreter smiled bitterly and said to Gao Zhenxin: "They said that the legal status of the Philippine Governor's Palace can only be finalized after discussion between the Emperor of Ming Dynasty and the King of Castile. They are 'willing' to put aside the dispute for the time being and discuss 'pirate-style' plundering first." behavior. And said that if we do not accept the statement of pirates, we should first return the ships and cargo of the Kingdom of Castile, including the silver."
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