Chapter 145: A Thorny Bucket

In the following days, Liu Hou had nothing to do again, and after the newspaper matter was taken over by Liu Yan, the propaganda offensive of Shu was really much more violent.

Liu Yan's breadth of communication and strong communication ability far exceeded Liu Hou's expectations. Needless to say, Dongwu, which is now an honorary ally, wrote several letters to some famous people in Dongwu, and even went over in person, hooking up some famous people in Dongwu, and asking them to write articles in the "Dahan Daily".

He also set up a branch of a newspaper office in Jianye, the capital of Soochow, and openly distributed newspapers in Soochow. Although the articles written by these Dongwu people may not all scold Cao Wei and support Shu Han, at least one point, their articles scolding Shu Han will definitely not appear in the newspapers. The key is that through their active participation in contributions, the influence of Dahan Bao in Soochow has been growing day by day.

The public opinion situation in the entire Eastern Wu was almost completely tilted towards Shu Han. Even in the Wei State, Liu Yan did not let go, and he also wrote a lot of letters and sent people to send them to the famous scholars and scholars of the Wei State, asking them for manuscripts. These celebrities and scholars were very tempted to have their articles published and distributed all over the world, but they did not dare to act rashly because of Wei's severe suppression policy against the "Dahan Daily".

However, not daring to write an article does not mean that they dare not secretly circulate it, these celebrities were aroused by Liu Yan's secret letters, their channels are always more than ordinary people, and Liu Yan increased the number of "Dahan Bao" secretly placed in Wei, making it easier for literati in Wei to get a copy of "Dahan Bao", which also made Wei's public opinion seriously affected by Shu.

The Wei court did not think of following the trend to publish a newspaper, and even they even thought of the name of the newspaper, which was called "Great Wei Bao", but they did not master the printing technology, and each newspaper could only be copied by hand, so that both the layout size and circulation of the newspaper were very small, and its influence was basically negligible.

Seeing that Liu Yan did a good job, Liu Hou was relieved to let him do it. However, pig's feet are always idle, and things are always looking for pig's feet. After Liu Hou and Zhou Xue lived a month of stable and sweet life in Jingzhou, Liu Hou occasionally heard Guan Gong complain at a banquet that there were too many warships in Soochow, blocking the Yangtze River waterway and affecting the traffic of merchant ships.

Under Liu Hou's questioning, Guan Gong revealed the truth, it turned out that since Liu Hou sent troops, Dongwu, an honorary ally, was not enough friends, and they dispatched thousands of warships to garrison the border of the Yangtze River, coercing Jingzhou, so that Guan Gong's garrison army could not act rashly.

Originally, it was not a big deal for them to be stationed there, as long as they did not take the initiative to attack Jingzhou, they could be left alone. And Jingzhou City, which was defended with the assistance of firearms troops, was not afraid of the attack of the Eastern Wu army at all.

However, thousands of warships stopped on the Yangtze River waterway, which frightened the merchant ships that came and went did not dare to pass, which seriously affected Jingzhou's commerce, and then also affected Guan Gong's tax revenue, so it provoked Guan Gong's complaints.

When Liu Hou heard it, he was annoyed! The people of Dongwu are so bold, this Sun Quan is so uninteresting, and he dares to use the fleet to display the border to coerce us, Shu Huang can bear it, and my aunt can't bear it. Since you are in the first year of junior high school, don't blame me for being the fifteenth. After knowing this, Liu Hou immediately withdrew from the state of vacation and tried to find a way to teach the people of Dongwu a lesson.

Now Soochow is still an ally on the surface, although they have displayed thousands of warships on the border to hold a ship exhibition, but after all, they have not really attacked the territory of Shu Han, and the two sides have not openly torn their faces, so it is impossible for the two countries to openly go to war.

Otherwise, whoever is the first to do it will be said by the people of the world to be a treacherous and spurned, of course, when it is really time to fight the whole country, no one will care about the covenant that is thinner than the ugly cloth, at that time, it is necessary to tear the face or tear the face, but it is indeed not time yet, Shu Han is not ready to kill Wu.

What is needed to defeat Wu is a large number of naval forces, although the current naval army of Shu Han has two super warships, but the other ships are still pitiful, and they cannot meet the needs of the comprehensive defeat of Wu. That is to say, now we have to teach Wu a lesson, but we can't be too blatant, at least it is not possible to send super warships to bombard Wu's fleet.

So what to do? This kind of thing is far less headache than meeting Sima Yi, and it is not difficult for Liu Hou at all, he just thought about it a little and then came up with an idea. Liu Hou came up with a very simple way to teach the people of Eastern Wu, that is, to use the gadgets he wanted to make a long time ago-**.

**In fact, it was made out by Shu craftsmen a long time ago, and it was used to blow up the reefs on the Yangtze River waterway, but at that time it was not called**, it was called underwater regular explosion # bomb, but in fact, the principle is almost the same, as long as it is slightly changed. Just do it, Liu Hou immediately called the relevant craftsmen and researchers to discuss the development of the first class with them.

Based on the previous underwater timed bomb # bomb, it is not difficult to build. **The same need for waterproofing, or the old way, use a wooden barrel or clay pot to fill the explosive# and cover it with a sealed lid.

As for the control of the timing of the explosion, it is clear that it cannot be triggered by a collision, because a sensitive collision trigger device has not yet been developed. There is another reason, ** swaying with the breaking waves in the water, if the trigger device is used, then how can this trigger device distinguish whether it hits the battleship or hits the waves? You know, if the boat is parked there, the two may hit with the same force.

If in the later generations, there are methods to trigger the fuse, in addition to the collision trigger, because the ships in the later generations are made of steel, they can also be triggered by magnetism, in addition, there are also some triggers with noise, water pressure and other factors.

But at this time, Liu Hou didn't have any ruts, even a ** as simple as a trigger device, those researchers didn't come up with it for so long, don't say **, even if it's a grenade # bomb, the kind of device that lights up as soon as the rope is pulled hasn't been made yet, can they be expected to make a more complex **?

So, I still use the old method to put a long lead on the upper part of the explosive# medicine barrel to make it in the form of a timed explosion # bomb. However, this lead is really long enough, and even one layer is not enough to make several layers, because the delay time is very long, and even one or two hours have to be delayed.

Because ** is to be released by the waters of Shu, let them float down the river to the downstream Dongwu fleet group and then explode, and in order not to be seen by the Dongwu people to release the ** ship, so that they can catch the pigtails of Shu, then the ** boat should be far enough away from the fleet of Dongwu, far enough that they can't see it, so it is very likely that this ** will float in the water for a long time.

**There is a very different place from the underwater bomb # bomb, that is** it needs to be able to float on the water surface, at least half sinking and half floating, which requires that the container containing the explosive # charge should not be too full, and enough space should be left to come out, so that the buoyancy is enough to support its weight. It just so happens that now this part of the space can be used to accommodate long fuses.

The problems of sealing waterproof, floating and delayed explosion have been solved, and this ** is basically completed, but it is not perfect. There has to be a way to keep it firmly on the enemy's ship to be considered a success**.

In later generations, it is very simple to deal with steel ships, just use magnets, as long as the ship passes next to **, the magnet will be firmly attached to the iron hull of the hull. The ships are now made of wood, and the magnets obviously do not work.

Liu Hou's thought of a very simple solution, he asked people to add a few long, thin, and sharp steel needles around the explosive# medicine barrel, so that the final ** was like a monster covered in thorns.

With these steel needles, once it collides with the wooden ship of Soochow, it will be nailed to the hull of the ship, and it will not fall off for a while, and then quietly wait there for the fuse to burn out, and finally with a "boom", the ship attached to it will blow out a big hole.

It only took half a day for Liu Hou and a group of firearms researchers to complete the design work, and the next day, the craftsmen made several samples.

The samples were remodeled from buckets that looked like buckets with lids and spikes. There is a plug at the top of it, after pulling out the plug, a small section of the fuse is exposed inside, after lighting the fuse, and then plugging the stopper, this ** is in the active state, and it will explode after a quarter of an hour.

Then the craftsman threw the large bucket into the river, and saw it float half-floating and half-sinking downstream, and about fifty paces downstream a wrecked boat had already been prepared to be used as a target. The ship was very small, only about five meters long, and the tattered one had lost its maintenance value, except that it could float on the water, and it was almost unrecognizable as a ship, and Liu Hou was also very curious, where did they find this broken ship as a target.

Since it was only fifty paces, ** quickly floated in front of the broken ship, and then hit the side of the ship with a "bang", the force of the impact was not large, but the steel needle was sharp enough to pierce the plank of the hull, and ** was hung on the ship. With the undulation of the waves, ** crumbling, but never falling out.

Finally, when the fuse burned out, there was a "boom", and the small wrecked ship was blown to pieces. Researchers and craftsmen watching the effects from the shore let out a cheer. Liu Hou and Zhou Xue were also present, but Zhou Xue was silent, probably because she also knew that her husband had made this thing to deal with the fleet that her father once commanded.

Next, the effect of the test on the ship in motion, the test method is also very simple, the target ship is still a tattered boat, when the ** touches it, and sticks to it, a ship clipper with a long rope drags it at full speed on the river surface. The purpose of this test is to test the firmness of the steel needle on the ship.

It's a pity that everyone was disappointed, and after being dragged for about a quarter of an hour, the ** nailed to the broken boat finally fell off under the wash of the waves and floated downstream. Since this time it is not to test the explosive performance, but to test the effectiveness of the steel needle, there is no gun# powder in this **, but some sediment of the same weight is used instead, so there is no need to worry about it hurting the flowers and plants downstream.

Maybe it's because the ship is too fast, and the rapid progress makes the ** withstand the impact of the water flow is also large, and the depth of the steel needle piercing the hull is very shallow, which is simply not enough to support the long-term impact of the water current, so it was washed down by the water in only a quarter of an hour.