Chapter 368 Safety First

Not only is the size of the fleet small, but there are not many army units that Lin Xiao brought with him on this trip.

Since Zhang Chenfeng's cavalry regiment and Duan Zhenghong's special task force had not yet completed their training, only the special operations brigade directly under the headquarters was accompanied by He Shouxin's guard company, half a machine gun company, and Wang Dong's juvenile battalion, with a total of less than 700 people.

Even if you add a squadron of sailors on each battleship, the total strength is only about 1,500 people.

However, in addition, Lin Xiao also brought a mercenary battalion composed of 500 soldiers - the "Franc Machine Battalion".

Hiring foreign soldiers to work for themselves was a strange subject for Lin Xiao and them.

The benefits are not mentionable, but problems such as discipline issues, lack of effort, and the potential risk of rebellion must be guarded against.

In order to strengthen his control over these people, Lin Xiao used his brains at the beginning.

At the beginning of the formation of this mercenary battalion, Lin Xiao asked Hu Zizheng to transfer soldiers and sent a platoon to this battalion, nominally called the "logistics platoon", which was responsible for the logistics management of the whole battalion.

In fact, the soldiers of this platoon are all veterans and control the distribution of food and ammunition, so they actually play the role of a war overseer.

At the same time, there are almost no officers in this mercenary battalion, and the training is led by 10 sergeant majors, and the food and supplies they consume every day are also received directly from the logistics platoon by the sergeant majors.

Before the battle, Lin Xiao had only two officers for them - Colonel Eric Mendoza, who returned from injury after being captured, and Marcelo Lucas, the major officer.

Obviously, these two people are only nominal leaders, and because they are usually not allowed to participate in the training, it is almost impossible for them to cultivate their own small group, and they cannot play the role of spiritual leaders.

Now, Lin Xiao already knew that the major officer had a young wife who knew how to heal, named Isabella Lucas.

Because of this, Lin Xiao specially allowed more than a dozen foreign women led by Isabella to act with the army, specializing in cooking and field medical care.

It is necessary to mention that after being successfully elected as the new president of the Haojing Chamber of Commerce, the performance of the wealthy businessman Jack Lee is still quite good.

He not only organized a large fleet of ships and worked very hard to continuously deliver construction materials to Hong Kong, but also took the initiative to provide interpreters for this battalion.

Therefore, Xiao Lizi, the guy that Lin Xiao admired more, took a few guys who could speak Portuguese to the Franc Camp and embarked on the road of joining the army.

……

At mid-morning, the fleet was gathered and everything was ready.

With Lin Xiao's order, the "Longsheng" took the lead in piloting, and after the "Qinzhou" was broken, the fleet slowly left the port.

However, as soon as he sailed out of the port, Lin Xiao found that it was really a fortunate move not to let Chen Qice's sailor fleet go east together.

Because, due to the influence of the monsoon from the western Pacific Ocean, the meteorological conditions on the sea surface are very bad.

In addition to the annoying showers began to fall again, the wind at sea is getting stronger and stronger, Lin Xiao visually measured, the wind force is more than six degrees, the wave height is more than three meters, the maximum wave height is about five meters, at a glance, the white ocean surface of the huge waves are surging, everywhere is flying white foam.

Although the sailing fleet of this era could only sail along the coastline due to the lack of reliable navigation, and the wind and waves were far less than those of the far sea, however, Lin Xiao found that in such sea conditions, his flagship "Qinzhou" was much more bumpy than he had imagined.

When a big wave hit, the bow of the "Qinzhou" was immediately beaten and sank suddenly, and the wave shield on the foredeck was rattled by the impact.

Sometimes, a torrent crashes at you, and the tip of the wave even crosses the main deck, from the bow to the stern, which is dozens of meters away!

Just as Lin Xiao was holding on to the handrail and his stomach began to feel uncomfortable, the newly appointed captain loudly ordered the sails to be retracted and sailed, and ordered the engine room to increase horsepower.

According to the regulations, in such sea conditions, even large sail warships of more than 1,000 tons must sail with their sails down, and warships of less than 500 tons will be extremely dangerous and basically not suitable for long-distance voyages.

Lin Xiao looked back and even saw bursts of black smoke coming out of the stern, which came from the bilge diesel engine.

Lin Xiao was secretly frightened, it was not good, after this mission, this diesel engine would have to be scrapped.

In later generations, Lin Xiao's Jiaolong special combat team belonged to the Marine Corps, and they often had to take warships for training or missions, not to mention escorting merchant ships in the Gulf of Aden later, so the sea conditions at this level could be said to be very ordinary for him.

However, how can the "Qinzhou's" ability to resist wind and waves be compared with the steel warships of more than 5,000 tons in later generations, she is just a wooden sailing ship of only more than 1,000 tons!

Compared with the busy sailors, because the wind and waves were too strong, the sailors in the cabin couldn't help but vomit because of the violent turbulence......

Lin Xiao endured his stomach and looked into the distance, in front of the power of nature, the four pirate ships that usually looked quite majestic, but at this time, they were like a flat boat, constantly rising and falling in the wind and waves, struggling hard.

Lin Xiao frowned slightly, these ships are pure sailboats, and their ability to fight with the wind and waves is naturally far inferior to the machine-powered "Qinzhou", he is very worried, in case of a capsizing accident, then his sin will be great.

The best performance is the "Longsheng", which leads the way.

This 10,000-ton giant ship fully showed her advantages at this time, although it was also up and down at a glance, but judging from the track, she was quite stable.

Lin Xiao was secretly glad that fortunately, in addition to the special combat team, He Shouxin accompanied Master Qu and led the rest of the troops almost all on this giant ship.

Otherwise, after entering the Taiwan Strait, once they encounter the Dutch fleet, I am afraid that the exhausted soldiers will not be able to prepare for battle in time.

At this time, another torrent came, Lin Xiao almost fell out, and the duty officer next to him hurriedly handed him two ropes and motioned for him to tie himself to the handrail.

Lin Xiao turned his head and saw that every officer on duty in the stern was like this, with a rope tied to his body and a bag in his hand, and he vomited for a while if he couldn't stand it.

The duty officer said that when encountering such sea conditions, he should enter a certain harbor as soon as possible to take refuge, but now he has just gone to sea, so he has to run slowly against the wind and waves.

"Is there a danger of capsizing?"

Lin Xiao couldn't help but ask worriedly.

"It's not enough to capsize, it's just that it can't run fast, and people will be more uncomfortable."

The official was also pale, and replied with a smile.

"This ...... What is the speed? ”

Looking at the figure of the "Dragon Ascension" in front of him, Lin Xiao frowned and asked.

"Almost...... Three to five quarters, it can't be any faster. ”

"Five knots?"

Lin Xiao's heart sank, and he quickly calculated with a bitter face.

From Hong Kong to Xiamen, even if you take a straight line, there is a distance of nearly 300 nautical miles, and at this snail-like speed, even if you don't stop halfway, I am afraid that you will not be able to catch up in three days.

"Commander-in-chief, don't worry, it won't be too long in such sea conditions,"

The duty officer looked at Lin Xiao's expression and comforted, "As long as the weather improves, it will be accelerated to nearly ten knots ...... soon."

"Well, let's take a look again, if it really doesn't work, let's find a port along the way to shelter from the wind and waves......"

Lin Xiao nodded and said in a deep voice, "It's still safety first!" ”

Thanks for the tip of "5 and a half lemon C"! Thank you dear!

(End of chapter)