Chapter 669 Special Soul Fleet (II)

The destroyer fleet that was rushing to reinforce was a little different from the cruiser fleet led by Cheng Biguang. The destroyers are all equipped with all 'colored' domestically produced destroyers, which are not only fast in speed but also have fierce firepower, and are currently the most advanced destroyers in the world; they are designed by German shipbuilding experts and supervise the construction of warships throughout the whole process; the engines of the warships are made of original German cargo; although the voyage range is short, it is more than enough to attack the waters near Taiwan.

The commander who led the destroyer fleet to reinforce Cheng Biguang Special Soul Fleet was Navy Colonel Shen Honglie, who was a native of Hubei Tian'men', Xiucai was born, and had worked as an instructor in Fuxue, and then signed up for the Hubei New Army in 1904, serving as the secretary of the artillery standard, and was immediately transferred to the junior officer cram school as a cultural teacher, and went to Japan in 1906 to study military at the Japanese Naval School, and joined the League in Japan Army. Later, the North and the South negotiated peace, the Beiyang government recruited naval talents, Shen Honglie was able to join the cruiser fleet, as an alternate officer, although diligent and studious, single-minded, but helpless he is not Fujian, Shandong background, has always been the navy in the Fujian system, Lu Department of exclusion, depressed, so he was distracted, but before he submitted his resignation, the North and South Henan War broke out, as a naval alternate officer, Shen Honglie followed the Beiyang Cruiser Fleet south to the Yangtze River, he planned to use this opportunity to instigate a naval uprising, but did not wait for him to do it, There were already people in the navy who were ahead of him, and they were still senior officers, so he missed out on the "heroes of the uprising" and was not promoted in the first place.

However, Shen Honglie did not fall for long, after the United Front came to power, the new president Zhao Bei transferred Shen Honglie to the Admiralty as a staff officer, and met with the president several times, and had a question and answer. Quite favored by the president, after that, Shen Honglie was sent by the Admiralty to Guangdong, rectify the local navy in Guangdong, and then suggested that the center abolish the establishment of the Guangdong Naval Division, after the disbandment of the Guangdong Naval Division, Shen Honglie led a group of selected qualified officers to Tianjin in the north, and joined the naval fleet, and worked in the fleet for several years, during which he successively served as the captain of cruisers such as "Feihong" and "Haichen", performed well, and was finally promoted to the rank of colonel by the center, after that, the president ordered Shen Honglie to leave the fleet, When the construction of the first batch of destroyers was completed, Shen Honglie was appointed by the Admiralty as the commander of the destroyer fleet, led the fleet to be stationed in Guangdong for a long time, and during this period commanded the destroyer to tour the South China Sea Islands. The declaration of sovereignty was appreciated by the center, and he was later appointed commander of the South China Sea Garrison.

This time, the Special Soul Fleet attacked the East China Sea and attacked the Japanese sea routes, and Shen Honglie was also ordered to attack at the same time to reinforce the Special Soul Fleet, and at the same time, as the deputy commander of the Special Soul Fleet, assisted Cheng Biguang, the commander of the Special Soul Fleet, in commanding the fleet to fight.

Now, Shen Honglie is standing on the 'exposed' sky bridge of a destroyer, holding a telescope, looking north, looking for a trace of the special soul fleet.

This destroyer, number 501, named "Narujo", is the lead ship of the "Narujo-class" destroyers.

"Naruto class" destroyer by the German shipbuilding experts presided over the design, Chinese shipbuilding technicians to assist in the design, a total of seven have been built, all by Shanghai, Fuzhou shipbuilding enterprises in the German shipbuilding experts and German technicians and mechanics under the guidance of the construction, this class of destroyers are all named after the famous battle in ancient China, the first ship "Narutiao" is named after the Xia and Shang dynasties Ding Revolution period of the key battle "Ming Tiao Battle", the second ship is taken from the Shang and Zhou dynasties Ding Revolution period of the key battle "Muye Battle" and named "Muye", By analogy, the later the completion of a warship, the later the historical era ranking of the ship's name.

The "Narujo-class" destroyers have a standard displacement of 900 tons, and are mainly armed with two 'guns' of 105 mm, which are placed in the bow and stern, with semi-open gun covers, and manpower rotation, which can simultaneously fire 'fire' at one side, except for these two 'guns' main guns. In addition, there are two 'guns' of 75 mm secondary guns, four 'guns' of 47 mm high-level dual-purpose guns, two 'guns' of 20 mm high 'shot' guns, and four torpedo 'firing tubes', which are respectively arranged on the left and right sides of the ship, which can be mechanically rotated to carry out torpedo attacks on targets on the side of the ship, and two other depth charge droppers are set up in the stern of the ship to attack submarines.

In any respect, the "Narujo-class" destroyers can be regarded as advanced warships, and although their displacement is not large, their combat effectiveness cannot be underestimated, and because of the use of German-made steam turbines, the maximum speed of this class of destroyers has reached an astonishing 35 knots, and they can play an important role in both antisubmarine and escort operations.

It is precisely because of this class of destroyers that the Admiralty ordered eleven in one go, and seven have now been completed and put into service.

As the supervisor of the whole process of the construction of the "Narutiao-class" destroyers, Shen Honglie knew the whole thing about this class of destroyers, and it was most suitable for him to be the commander of the destroyer, but Shen Honglie himself preferred to command cruisers, or heavier warships. For example, the two maritime assault ships "Green Forest" and "Red Eyebrow" built by American shipyards.

However, since the center values his command ability, Shen Honglie can only temporarily serve as the commander of the destroyer fleet, and he is also confident that he will lead this destroyer fleet to complete the tasks assigned by the center, win glory for the navy, and serve the country.

This time to reinforce the special soul fleet, Shen Honglie did not bring all seven "Mingtiao-class" destroyers in one go, he only brought five, namely "Mingtiao", "Muye", "Chengpu", "Xiaqiu", and "Guiling", this is not that he underestimated the enemy, and the other two "Mingtiao-class" destroyers are now carrying out a vigilance mission in the Bohai Sea, and it is impossible for them to fight south for the time being.

Five domestic destroyers went into battle at the same time. This is already very remarkable, you know, a few years ago, China could not even build a slightly larger gunboat on its own, if it were not for the United Front in power, China's shipbuilding industry would not have achieved such brilliant results, of course, there are also German shipbuilding experts and German technicians and German steel factories The credit is also very good, so whether it is Shen Honglie or the Admiralty, they all have a good impression of Germany, and the Navy is also an important force that actively promotes the alliance between China and Germany, the same as the German Navy, China's admirals have a strong desire to change the backward appearance of the navy in a short period of time, and they all hope that China's ocean-going fleet will be able to make a foreign prestige like the German high seas fleet.

Of course, ideals are only ideals after all, and sometimes, ideals are basically no different from delusions, and although the central government has a somewhat surplus in finance, it is necessary to take care of the air force and the army first, and the navy is still a "forgotten service", and before the central government changes the current "discriminatory 'sexual' fiscal policy", the navy's desire for the ocean-going fleet may only stay on the admiralty's offshore naval development plan, and it is already very good for the navy to have a number of new destroyers.

Shen Honglie carefully looked at the sea with a telescope, he knew very well that the important thing in this sortie in the East China Sea was not how many Japanese warships, merchant ships, and cargo ships were sunk, but how much of a role it could play at the entire strategic level. He should have seen the Spirit Fleet half an hour ago.

"Commander! Just received a telegram from the Spirit Fleet asking where my fleet is now? ”

Just as Shen Honglie was looking around with a telescope, an adjutant hurried to the bridge with a copy of a telegram.

"Call back, our fleet is speeding up, the current location, ××× degrees east longitude, ××× degrees north latitude."

Shen Honglie was a little anxious, a few minutes ago, he had just measured the current fleet position, and it was indeed too far behind the scheduled plan, he knew Cheng Biguang's 'character' very well, in terms of military rank, Cheng Biguang was his superior, in terms of position, Cheng Biguang was his boss, if Cheng Biguang lost his temper with him because of being late, he could only endure it.

The adjutant hurried to the telegraph room to send a telegram to Cheng Biguang, while Shen Honglie continued to stand on the 'Lu' Sky Bridge, searching the sea with a telescope.

More than ten minutes later, some soot vaguely appeared in the lens of the telescope, and Shen Honglie hurriedly ordered to prepare for battle, there was no problem for destroyers to attack the destroyers and gunboats of the Japanese Navy, but if they encountered Japanese cruisers or heavy warships of the cruiser level or above, there was only one way to turn around and retreat.

Fortunately, it was not the Japanese fleet, but the Special Soul Fleet that Shen Honglie had been searching for a long time on the sea, but the two sides were now far apart, and they had to continue to travel north in order to get supplies.

In order to ensure the speed, the "Narutiao-class" destroyers use the most advanced heavy oil boilers in the current naval technology, using heavy oil as fuel, which is very different from other warships in China, China's oil industry is underdeveloped, and it is impossible to guarantee the production of heavy oil, therefore, the vast majority of warships use coal-fired boilers, only the "Narutiao-class" destroyers use boilers with full heavy oil fuel, in order to ensure the supply of fuel for destroyers, the Admiralty not only stockpiled a large amount of heavy oil fuel before the war, but also Shaanxi, All the heavy oil produced by the oil fields in Gansu and other regions was transferred to the Jiangyin fortress to be used as backup naval fuel.

Due to the limited range of the "Narujo-class" destroyers, it is impossible to compare them with cruisers, so the fuel loaded by the "Partridge" supply ship in this sortie in the East China Sea is mainly heavy oil, which is the fuel specially prepared by the "gate" for the destroyer fleet, otherwise, the destroyer fleet will not be able to follow the special soul fleet to complete this combat cruise.

Coming from Guangdong, a part of the heavy fuel oil fuel was consumed on the way, considering that if you go further east, you will enter the cruising area of the Japanese warships, so you must replenish the heavy fuel oil before continuing to advance eastward, and the reason why Shen Honglie was in a hurry just now was because the destroyer fleet was late, and on the other hand, it was also for the sake of this fuel, if the heavy fuel oil could not be replenished in time, the speed of the fleet would have to be further reduced.

Finally, an hour later, Shen Honglie led the destroyer fleet to join the special soul fleet led by Cheng Biguang, and immediately sent a signal to the "Partridge" sea supply ship that "our ship needs fuel supply".

At the same time, Shen Honglie also sent a telegram to Cheng Biguang, explaining the tardiness of the destroyer fleet, and also asked for punishment.

Cheng Biguang's call back was not so murderous, he just said "go back and talk about it".

The sea supply ship "Partridge" turned around in parallel with the destroyer fleet and soon sent the supply cables. Shot to a destroyer, and then, an oil pipe was pulled from the cable by the destroyer's sailors, these skilled sailors quickly replenished the fuel for the warship, but at the same time, the navigation of the whole fleet was not affected, only the speed was reduced, but still maintained the course, but the special soul fleet from the north ran to the south to go around in a circle, turned around and caught up with the destroyer fleet from behind, and finally, the two fleets sailed north in two columns.

At the same time, the "Partridge" sea supply ship transferred the two seaplanes to the sea surface with a crane and conducted a successful seaplane take-off training.

Just after the two seaplanes took off, a large plane flew over from the west, only 500 meters above the sea, and the two seaplanes quickly met them, and all the warships also sounded the battle alarm at the same time, and the high-altitude "fire" guns on the warships immediately raised their muzzles and aimed at the planes that were getting closer and closer, until they saw the eye-catching red "color" battle flag on the wings of the planes, and the air defense alarm was lifted.

Sitting on the flagship, Cheng Biguang carefully observed the large plane that flew over the fleet with a telescope, and he found that this large plane actually had four engines, and he immediately remembered the telegram sent from the Admiralty the day before yesterday; in order to prevent accidental attacks, the General Staff Headquarters officially lifted part of the intelligence blockade on the "Vulture" heavy bomber after the Lushun air raid, and ordered the War Department and the Admiralty Department to notify the troops separately and inform the units of the news of the existence of this heavy bomber.

"That's the 'vulture', right? It's a big plane, so it's no wonder it can throw torpedoes. ”

Looking at the heavy bomber that was gradually moving away, Cheng Biguang was very emotional: Because the range of ordinary reconnaissance planes is limited, and the aerial reconnaissance of Taiwan Island is limited to the western coastal area and cannot penetrate deep into the east, the Admiralty asked the Air Force to transfer "vultures" to assist, and now it seems that this "vulture" is probably transferred from the north, and it is very likely that it took part in the air raid on the Japanese First Squadron stationed in Port Arthur.

"In this war against Japan, the air force has been out of the limelight, but our navy is unknown, this time to attack the East China Sea, the navy must achieve results no matter what! Otherwise, in the future, the center will only despise the navy even more. ”

With a decision in his heart, Cheng Biguang immediately issued his order to all the captains of the fleet through wireless telegraph.

"Once the destroyer fleet is fully fueled, all the warships follow the flagship, turn around and sail southeast. This battle is related to the future of the navy, but also to the future of China. ”

A few minutes later, the flagship "Haiqi" sounded its whistle, and at the same time raised the huge battle flag on the mainmast, hunting in the wind.

Then, all the warships sounded their whistles at the same time, and the surface of the East China Sea suddenly became murderous.