The huge balloons, heated by the flames from the vents, slowly rose up, but they only rose into the air, hovering at a height of about three feet above the ground due to the rope tethering.

Looking at the hovering hot air balloons, Li Jiangkai's expression was a little excited, and now the entire front line is telling the legend - the bombing of Jingnan City by the balloon soldiers almost burned most of Jingnan City, burned tens of thousands of Jiannu, and did not have a single casualty.

"Oh, who would have thought that this hot air balloon could drop a bomb!"

Li Jiangkai's side, Song Dejie from "Ming Pao" sighed.

No one could have imagined that a hot air balloon, which could only be used for reconnaissance, could fly over the enemy's head with a bomb and drop it.

When the news came out. Like everyone else, even if you're used to seeing the world. Li Jiangkai was still stunned.

Who would have thought that one day, Da Ming would attack the enemy from the air.

From heaven!

This completely overturns everyone's perception of common sense. In the past, everyone thought that only immortals could go to heaven. Can a mortal go to heaven?

But now, when the news came, everyone was stunned. It is hard for them to imagine how the officers and soldiers could drop bombs from the sky. It's hard to imagine, but people always have a variety of imaginations. When they didn't want to come back, they were always discussing the usefulness of hot air balloons along the way, and they even imagined that one day, thousands of Ming officers and soldiers would take hot air balloons to attack the enemy's cities and easily capture those fortified cities.

Of course, this is both a fantasy and an imagination. When they actually see the hot air balloon after. All that's left is to marvel.

"Yes, Sun Tzu said, "The good attacker moves above the nine heavens", the world knows that he can't, and now, look at this balloon soldier, isn't it moving above the nine heavens......"

Li Jiangkai sighed as he walked over to the hot air balloon, and when he entered the balloon, he could see that the balloon soldiers were busy. They kept pouring fuel into the big tin cans and pumping gas into the tin cans.

"What are they doing here?"

General Li asked an officer accompanying him with some puzzlement.

"I'm pressurizing the fuel."

The officer explained.

"Just igniting the fuel, can not provide enough heat for such a large hot air balloon, so if you want it to fly, you have to find another way, you see that the oil, is the hot air balloon special, extracted from the oil, the smell is not good, but it is easy to ignite, pour it into the iron can, and then through the gas drum to the iron tank to pump and pressurize, after the pressure reaches a certain value, turn on the nozzle, the fuel can atomize out of the nozzle, you see......"

Pointing to the flames that were spewing from the gondola, the officer said with a smile.

"Now the flames are nearly two feet long, and if they are fully opened, they can shoot out about six feet of flames, and the hot air balloon is controlled by controlling the heat to rise or fall, and the most important thing is that these pressurized oil tanks have vents."

Even as an officer of the balloon unit, he didn't know what kind of trouble the division of Qinghe Academy had gone to when studying hot air balloons, although the principle of Kong Ming lanterns made them see the possibility of making hot air balloons, but what kind of fuel to use and how to provide enough heat for hot air balloons had always troubled them. Eventually, they were inspired by a gasoline blowtorch and three years ago they were able to develop a heater for hot air balloons, without which it would have been impossible to create a practical hot air balloon.

That's why. Even if there are principles and patterns of hot air balloons in the book, it is difficult for other countries to make practical hot air balloons. Technological backwardness has fundamentally limited other countries' attempts in this area.

Of course, at least until the Ming army bombed the Qing army with hot air balloons, no one would find hot air balloons of any use. Even now, I'm afraid that in the eyes of many people, hot air balloons are nothing more than big and useless waste.

"A hot air balloon wouldn't be able to fly without the heat they provide. In fact, hot air balloons are not complicated, the most important thing is the heater. ”

Graduated from Qinghe Academy in an interview, but Li Jiangkai is also unfamiliar with hot air balloons, and he occasionally asks the officer next to him some principles of hot air balloons. Originally, he wanted to include all of this in his reporting. But in the end, it was decided not to write about it, after all, most readers never cared about it, what did they care about?

It's nothing more than these hot air balloons, how to raze Jingnan City to the ground.

Finally came to the bottom of the hot air balloon and looked up at the huge hot air balloon, Li Jiangkai couldn't help but ask.

"Can we go up there?"

But everyone has a dream of flying, Li Jiangkai is no exception, he longs to be able to rise into the air with other balloon soldiers, looking down on the earth from the sky, he even hopes to be able to take a hot air balloon to Jingnan, and then drop a bomb in Jingnan himself. In this way, it can be regarded as revenge for the Li family's relatives and friends who died at the hands of the Qing captives.

However, wanting to take a hot air balloon ride was not as simple as he imagined, and although the officer did not directly refuse him, his words still made him feel that there was little hope.

"This, reporter Li, there are only six hot air balloons on the front line now, and they are used very frequently, so wait until you have the chance, if you have the chance, I will apply with the chief."

Although his wish to fly in a hot air balloon did not come true, he still got the opportunity to stand on the hot air balloon for a while, where the balloon soldier enthusiastically explained to him how to fly the hot air balloon.

"You see, there are four moorings tied to the four corners of this gondola, when it is released, my comrades and I stand diagonally, and then at the same time count down to cut the mooring rope with a knife, after the four moorings are cut, the hot air balloon can fly into the sky, and when we reach the target, we will also drop the bomb hanging outside the gondola at the same time."

While the balloon soldier explained the details of the balloon operation and bombing, Li Jiangkai looked at the hanging basket with great interest. The hanging basket is made of rattan and looks extremely simple, basically equivalent to a large basket.

"When you got into the air, you stood in this basket?"

Li Jiangkai asked curiously.

"Yes, don't look at this basket is made of rattan, but in fact, it is sturdy, and it is quite stable in the air, but in the past, we used it to stand in the air to reconnaisance and guard in the distance, and to use the telescope to condescend, and it is clear within a radius of dozens of miles, but now it is used for bombing, but we always feel that it is not enough."

The balloon soldier's explanation made General Li ask puzzled.

"Why is that?"

"Because the load capacity is too small, just like this balloon, it can only hold 700 pounds of things, except for us, at most it can only carry 200 pounds of bombs, just a little bit, fortunately the bomb is different from ordinary bombs, incendiary bombs ......"

The balloon soldier looked at the reporter in front of him, as if he was afraid that he hadn't heard of it, and deliberately explained.

"The incendiary bomb is specially used to burn things, mainly gasoline, which is the fuel used for hot air balloons, but the gasoline in the incendiary bomb is not liquid, but solid, and it explodes when it falls to the ground, and everything within a radius of more than ten zhang can be ignited, and the oil block that is blown out is like ointment, and it can't be shot off, and it can't be extinguished, and a large area of the house can be set on ......fire in a moment's effort."

Napalm is impossible to manufacture more than ten years ago, one is that there is not enough gasoline, and the other reason is that there is no suitable coagulant, but after planting rubber trees in Hainan and Nanyang Zhuxia 20 years ago, with the increase in rubber production, napalm with natural rubber as a coagulant has become the preferred filler for rockets, although its price exceeds gunpowder, but for the destruction of large targets like cities, far more than explosive warheads. After all, houses are easy to ignite. Once those houses are set on fire, a fire is formed. The all-engulfing flame becomes the best weapon.

However, despite the desire of the whole army to try the burning of the city, the weapon appeared too late to be used in the war. Even in this expedition to the west, the use was extremely limited. After all, most of the time, the Qing army did not choose to hold on at all.

Although the use of napalm has been subject to various restrictions, such as being launched only by rockets, it is still widely used in the military as a cost-effective weapon, and even the bombs dropped by hot air balloons are now modified from rocket warheads filled with napalm.

Although the number dropped from the air is far from comparable to the number of rockets launched. But it still made the Ming army get over the addiction of arson.

"That's a great thing!"

In addition to admiration, Li Jiangkai asked again.

"Then will we bomb Jingnan today?"

"Look at the weather......"

The Balloon Soldier didn't answer its question directly, but pointed to the sky.

"Now the wind speed is not too big or small, and the weather is so sunny, this is a rare good weather, I have to blow up again today, hey, there are too few hot air balloons, otherwise, maybe, Jingnan can really be blown into a flat land......

Too little?

From the night five days ago, when the hot air balloons quietly dropped bombs and burned down the grain depot, to three days ago, when the "bombing" was carried out during the daytime for the first time, and in the next three days, after four more bombings, the city of Jingnan has reached the point of being noisy.

Different from the usual laziness, the Qing army on the city wall kept looking at the sky from early in the morning, lest there be a trace of abnormality in the air.

Compared with artillery shells, the bombs falling from the sky, although the number is small, but the soldiers and civilians in the city deeply feel the threat of war, especially every bombardment, which will burn down a large number of houses.

"Hot Air Balloon ......"

Suddenly, when the Qing army on the city wall on the alert, after discovering the hot air balloon, shouted loudly in horror, the bell on the bell tower rang, which was originally just used to tell the time The bell became an alarm, so that the people in the city all looked up into the air, although their expressions were panicked, but most of them just stood there stunned, and there was no intention of dodging the bombing at all. It's not that they don't hide, it's because even if they dodge, they don't know where to hide.

"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid......"

Zhao Laosan comforted his son, he stared at the hot air balloon in the air, it was six black dots, it was drifting along the wind, its speed was neither fast nor slow, but everyone knew that it would not be long before it would arrive in Jingnan, and then like a hen laying eggs, it would drop the bomb in the city.

"Dad, why don't we hide......"

Pulling the lamb, the boy asked puzzled, his shoulders trembling from time to time, and his face turned pale, he could not be as calm as his father.

"Hide? Hide there, you see, this hot air balloon is so far away from us, at least 200 feet, our fire guns can't reach it, but the bomb it drops is not accurate, we just stare at it, we can always know where to hide, but hide, maybe the bomb burned our own house, I don't know if I burned to death in the house. ”

Although everyone was afraid of the bombs dropped by the hot air balloons, and the hot air balloons were like nightmares to them, in just a few days, they had already seen that the hot air balloons were not as powerful as they thought, at least the bombs they dropped were not accurate at all.

But even so, for the people in the city, when the hot air balloons began to be dropped, people still kept screaming in terror, and in the screams, the bombs drifted down from the air one by one, maybe it was the wind or some other reason,

"That's right, Dad, you see, the bomb just didn't have any ......."

Sure enough, just like Zhao Laosan said. When the bombs fell, they looked as if they were going to fall on their heads, but they always fell far away. But even so, the incendiary bombs that fell still caused a fire in the city.

However, when the incendiary bombs fall, the people in the city are often prepared. As a result, the limited number of incendiary bombs did not have the effect of the first bombardment.

But even so. Whenever incendiary bombs fell in the air, for the Manchu officials and citizens in the city. It still dealt an unprecedented blow to their psyche.

After all, in the face of bombs dropped by hot air balloons, they can often only passively endure passive beatings. I could only watch the bombs fall from the sky. Set fire to a few houses. Even if they did everything they could to put out the fire. It was also impossible to stop the Ming army from continuing to drop bombs.

When the sound of gongs and drums gradually disappeared from Jingnan City, breathing in the smell of burnt paste coming from the air, Zhao Laosan's expression looked a little strange. Finally, he let out another long sigh.

"Sooner or later, it's going to be over......"

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