Chapter 674: Wolves (II)

Faced with a sudden submarine attack. The Japanese convoy and convoy were taken by surprise, and the Japanese Navy's ocean-going gunboat "Saga", which was a ceremonial ship to see off the convoy and convoy, witnessed the impressive underwater attack throughout the whole process.

"Saga" is a large ocean-going gunship, completed at the end of 1912, with a standard displacement of 785 tons, equipped with one 120 mm main gun and three 80 mm secondary guns.

Although it was a gunboat, the "Saga" looked very much like a shrunken cruiser in terms of the appearance of the warship, and although it was slightly lacking in power, it could still maintain a speed of more than 15 knots when sailing on the sea.

Most of the steamers used by the Japanese transport fleet were civilian merchant ships and passenger ships, and their sailing speed was not high, and after sailing out of the Sasebo Military Port, they could only sail at an average speed of nine knots, which slowed down the speed of the entire escort fleet. In the same way, the gunboat "Saga" never exceeded nine knots.

When the convoy sailed out of the military port, the "Saga" was at the forefront of the convoy, but when it joined the convoy, the "Saga" was sandwiched between the convoy formation and the convoy, and after that, the ceremonial ship that saw off the expeditionary force began to gradually slow down, and the high-ranking Japanese politicians on the gunboats stood on the deck of the warship, facing the convoy, watching the convoy go away, watching the transport ships pass by the warships and sail towards the unknown road of war.

It is precisely for this reason that when the first torpedo hit a transport ship in front of it, most of the people on the "Saga" saw the huge "waves" and "flowers" splashed by the torpedo when it exploded, as well as the dull and shocking explosion.

"What's going on? Did you run into a mine laid by the Navy? ”

Because he stood on the "Lu" Sky Bridge and could see far away, Prince Zaihito of the Idle Yuan Palace was the first to notice the sudden situation of the transport fleet, and was the first to ask the captain of the "Saga" standing beside him.

Prince Zaihito of the Imperial Palace of Kanin is very reasonable, since the start of the war, the Sasebo military port has been ordered to enter a state of war, and the Japanese Navy has laid a minefield near the military port, although it is unlikely that the mines will run to the fairway, but before 'figuring' what happened, Prince Zaihito of the Imperial Palace can only speculate that the transport ship ran into the mines laid by the Japanese Navy, in fact, not only he thinks so, most Japanese politicians and elders also guess so. Even the captain of the "Saga" had the same idea, and it was not until the second torpedo hit the target that they changed their misconceptions.

The second torpedo hit the battlecruiser "Hiei", which was the second ship of the "Kongo-class" battlecruiser, which started construction at the end of 1911, and completed the hull construction at the end of 1912, after which it entered the long outfitting construction, due to lack of funds, the outfitting was not nearly finished until the beginning of this year, but until the Sino-Japanese war, the "Hiei" had just completed the test work of the last main turret, and at that time, the latest warship had not yet developed a plan for sea trials, but war waited for no one, especially whenAfter the news came that the battlecruiser "Kongo" had been sunk by the Chinese Air Force in Port Arthur, the Japanese Navy's Command Department hastily ordered the "Hiei" to leave the shipyard and sail to Sasebo, ready to attack the Yellow Sea at any time and join the main fleet of the Combined Fleet. And it served as a flagship, escorting the convoy to the southern coast of North Korea, where it eventually joined the combined fleet.

Because it is a battle cruiser, in order to emphasize the speed and firepower, the "Hiei", like other battle cruisers in Britain and Japan, has weakened the armor protection of the warship and reduced the number of watertight compartments, which directly leads to the reduction of the protection of this class of battleships, especially for the defense of underwater attack weapons, which is not at the same level as the battleship, although it is slightly better than the anti-sinking "performance" of the old battleship, but it is not much better.

Therefore, when the torpedo hit the hull of the "Hiei" four meters below the waterline, the new warship, which had just been built and put into service for only a few days, revealed its fragile protective power, and soon after the mine, the hull began to tilt to one side.

The violent explosion on the side of the "Hiei" startled Prince Zaihito of Kanin Miyajihito and a group of Japanese politicians and veterans, and they came back to their senses that they had not encountered mines laid by the Japanese Navy, but were attacked by torpedoes from below the surface of the sea.

But even more surprising things were yet to come, for in the short period of a minute and a half after the transport ship and the battleship "Hiei" were hit, several more torpedoes hit several battleships and transports, and all the torpedo attacks together were nine times in total.

"Nine torpedoes! Your Highness, we are under intensive torpedo attack! This is a submarine, it must be a submarine! ”

The captain of the "Saga" was very well trained, and not only reacted immediately, but immediately issued a warning to all those standing on the high ground of the warship, asking them to search the surface of the sea with binoculars.

Hearing the captain's out-of-tune shouts, the stunned 'chicken' spectators on the deck woke up from their astonishment. Then, some reporters raised their cameras, while others, like the civilians who had been invited to see off the Army, fainted on the spot, and a few dazed began to grab the lifebuoys hanging from the guardrails of the warships.

Compared with the "chaotic" and noisy civilians, the old and important ministers of the Meiji era seemed relatively calm, except for some civil officials who were nervous, most of them remained standing, and some of them who reacted quickly even raised their binoculars and looked out to sea.

"Why don't you change the formation yet! Do you want to wait for the submarines to wipe us out? Inform the fleet and military ports, prepare for anti-submarine warfare! And rescue the officers and soldiers of the army who fell into the water! ”

Shimamura Speedo, a member of Japan's wartime base camp and head of naval command, shouted angrily at the captain of the "Saga"; although the "Saga" is not the flagship of the escort fleet, the passengers on board are all big figures in Japanese political circles, and in an emergency, it can completely replace the flagship "Hiei."

The "Hiei" was already overwhelmed by mines, and now was the time for the gunboat "Saga" to take over the command.

In fact, there was no need for Shimamura to remind the captain of the "Saga" or anyone else that after the series of torpedo attacks, the entire escort fleet began to evade the torpedo attacks on its own, but due to the lack of unified command, the rudder angles of the warships were not consistent. This immediately caused chaos and directly threatened the safety of the Saga.

At the same time that Shimamura was shouting at the captain of the "Saga", some reporters on the foredeck began to shout.

"Get out of the way! Get out of the way! ”

"It's going to crash! It's going to crash! ”

At the same time, the spectators who had been standing on the foredeck quickly retreated to the aft deck, and Shimamura looked ahead of the starboard side of the warship and saw a battlecruiser "Kurama" that had been sailing next to the "Saga" turn around and ram into the starboard side of the "Saga".

The convoy was divided into two groups, north and south, sailing to the south and north of the convoy respectively, and at this time the convoy was torpedoed, and the warships of the convoy sailing to the north of the convoy began to make tactical maneuvers, and most of the warships turned their rudder to the right in accordance with the combat regulations, but the "Kurama" did not turn the rudder to the right. Instead, he turned his rudder to the left and crashed straight into the "Saga", which was sailing side by side.

The "Kurama" battlecruiser has a standard displacement of 14,000 tons and a total length of more than 130 meters, which is a behemoth on the sea, and a huge weight means a huge inertia.

In fact, this is not the responsibility of the captain of the "Kurama", just after the "Hiei" hit the mine, the "Kurama" battlecruiser also ate a torpedo, this torpedo came from the side and back, right in the stern of the warship, the shock 'wave' of the explosion immediately destroyed the steering rod, twisted the rudder to the side, stuck there, it was under the "automatic navigation" of the rudder that the battleship would turn to the left rudder and hit the "Saga" head-on.

In fact, after the mid-thunder, the Kurama began to deviate to the left, but the passengers on the Saga had not yet fully come to their senses, so it was only then that the people realized that the Kurama was rushing towards them.

"Left full rudder!"

The captain of the "Saga" rushed into the cockpit and shouted at the pilots, while ringing the bell and giving orders to the engine room through the intercom, so that the engineers quickly reversed.

Standing on the deck, looking at the "Kurama" that pressed over like a mountain, most of the people on the "Saga" closed their eyes in despair, and only a few soldiers still held binoculars and searched the sea.

The torpedo attacks just now were all concentrated in the starboard direction of the fleet, which shows that the submarine that 'fired' the torpedo was in the north of the fleet, and it was the submarines that these soldiers wanted to search for that launched the torpedo attack.

Torpedo attacks were launched continuously, concentrated in a minute and a half, taking into account the current level of development of submarine technology, as well as torpedo technology. These torpedoes could never have been 'fired' by one submarine, at least two or more submarines, although judging by the number of explosions, a total of nine torpedoes hit the target, but given the hit rate of the torpedoes, perhaps these nine torpedoes were only a part of all the torpedoes that were 'fired'.

It is already clear that there are two or more Chinese submarines in this area, and it was they who launched this torpedo attack.

This fact was confirmed not only by the Japanese naval officers, but also by the British, French, and Russian military attachés who accompanied the foreign officers on the "Saga," and they soon found their target in the northern seas.