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Chapter 406 Hakata landing

In the 14th year of Guanghua, the Chinese Imperial Navy, under the call of Emperor Wang Chenhao, established an aircraft carrier battle group in the true sense. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 info (Baidu search "Net", watch the latest update of this book)

Aircraft carrier battle group, as the name suggests. With a large aircraft carrier as the core, it integrates naval aviation, surface warships, and submarines, and is an integrated naval and air mobile combat force with a high degree of combination of air, surface, and underwater combat forces.

In the war against the Japanese state, the aircraft carrier of the Chinese Imperial Navy shook the world for the first time, and since then the aircraft carrier has been recognized within the imperial navy, and under the great praise of the emperor, it can even be equal to the status of the traditional capital battleship.

Since His Majesty the Emperor strongly supported the establishment of an aircraft carrier battle group, the Admiralty had to act on orders, and the plan for the formation of an aircraft carrier battle group was soon promulgated.

One of the items allocated by the Imperial Congress to the Navy is to allocate 60 million dragon coins to form six aircraft carrier battle groups as a supplement to the main fleet of the Navy.

Each carrier battle group includes one capital aircraft carrier, four escort aircraft carriers, four heavy cruisers, eight light cruisers, sixteen destroyers, four submarines, two large supply ships.

Among them, the main aircraft carriers of the first and second aircraft carrier battle groups are Huangshan and Lushan respectively, and they are also the flagships of their respective aircraft carrier battle groups.

The fleet flagships of the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth four aircraft carrier battle groups are four Emeishan-class aircraft carriers, named after the four famous mountains of Chinese Buddhism, namely Emeishan [CV-28], Wutaishan [CV-29], Putuoshan [CV-30] and Jiuhuashan [CV-31].

The Emeishan-class aircraft carrier is a first-class aircraft carrier built by the Imperial Chinese Navy in order to further expand the naval aviation force. The purpose of the Navy's top brass is to break the balance of forces among the navy, the army, and the air force, and to weaken the influence of the Air Force by building aircraft carrier battle groups and increasing the number of carrier-based combat aircraft.

The Emeishan-class aircraft carrier began to be designed and developed as early as the beginning of the 11th year of Guanghua when the Huangshan-class aircraft carrier was completed, and at the end of the 12th year of Guanghua, the Admiralty approved the start of construction by using the remaining balance of the Yuan-class battleship and embezzling part of the Ming-class battleship's money. At that time, only one Emeishan was started, and the following year, Congress did not approve the Navy to continue to build capital battleships, so the Navy hyped up the role of aircraft carriers, and the Eastern Ocean Naval Battle showed the power of aircraft carriers, so it persuaded Congress to approve the construction budget of three additional Emeishan-class aircraft carriers.

In March of the 14th year of Guanghua, the Emeishan-class aircraft carrier No. 1 Emeishan was completed, and the overall layout of the ship was similar to that of the Huangshan-class aircraft carrier, following the characteristic layout of the Chinese Imperial aircraft carrier, which was an enlarged and improved version of the Huangshan-class.

The right-angled beveled flight deck was lengthened to 212 meters, 41 meters wide, and had a draft of 9.6 meters in order to carry more combat aircraft. The flight deck was lengthened to 202 meters and 67 meters wide to allow for the new H2N1 bomber. The aircraft carrier can be equipped with 135 new Thunderbolt carrier-based fighters. The hangars were changed to four, each with a capacity of 25 aircraft, and 35 aircraft in the open air on the flight deck, or 18 H2N1 large bombers.

The position of the island has changed slightly, concentrating on the starboard side. The middle and upper part of the island is the regular octagonal bridge command room, which is different from the Huangshan-class aircraft carrier, which is designed on the island of the Ming-class battleship and is equipped with a ship-borne sea-to-sea search radar, which can detect surface ships within 70 nautical miles.

The powertrain has been further improved, with less space, less weight and higher efficiency. The main engine adopts 8 oil-fired boilers and 4 sets of Parsons gear-driven steam turbine units of Beiyang Power Company, with a total power of 130,000 horsepower, a maximum speed of 30.5 knots, and a cruising range of 13,000 nautical miles/20 knots. "Net" t "Net" //

In order to prevent other countries from returning the favor to the other, the Imperial Chinese Navy has replaced all capital ships with anti-aircraft rapid-fire guns and rapid-fire machine guns, so the Emeishan-class aircraft carrier is no exception, eight twin 127 mm 55 times extended-to-air rapid-fire guns, four triple 47 mm 60 times extended-speed fire guns are installed around the island, and two to three M2 12.7 mm anti-aircraft heavy machine guns are installed on each floor of the middle and upper part of the island.

Except for the No. 1 ship, Emeishan, which was officially commissioned in April of the 14th year of Guanghua, the other three ships will all be commissioned in the summer and autumn of next year.

As the first-class escort combat ship of the aircraft carrier battle group, the original heavy cruiser of the Imperial Chinese Navy has undergone tremendous changes. On the basis of the original heavy cruisers of the Imperial Chinese Navy, the heavy cruisers that provided escort fire support for the aircraft carrier battle group have been greatly refitted, with the prominent purpose of meeting the needs of the fleet's air defense.

The heavy cruisers in service in the Imperial Chinese Navy were renamed from the large armored cruisers of the early Imperial Navy, including the large armored cruisers captured from the Russian Navy and the first-class cruisers captured by the British Royal Navy, a total of 32 large warships of 10,000 tons.

These heavy cruisers were a bit of a nuisance for the defense of the home fleet, they could not compete with the enemy's capital ships, and they were too luxurious to serve as patrol duty, and light cruisers and hunting ships were sufficient.

Therefore, the Imperial Navy decided to select 24 of these heavy cruisers for large-scale refit and use them as fleet air defense combat ships for aircraft carrier battle groups.

The Great War in Europe, as well as the Sino-Japanese War, showed that fighter jets and bombers in the air have seriously changed the mode of warfare in the world, and the importance of air defense has become prominent. As the world's largest aviation power, the Chinese Empire was prepared for danger in times of peace, and naturally set strict requirements for air defense preparations.

As the air defense frigate of the aircraft carrier battle group, the main guns, secondary guns, third and fourth class guns of the 24 converted heavy cruisers were all replaced with rapid-fire gun systems below 240 mm. Among them, the 152-mm secondary artillery system was completely dismantled and converted into a turret-type twin 50-fold extension 127-mm high-level rapid-fire gun, and the third-level gun and fourth-level artillery were converted into 88-mm 55-fold and 47-mm 60-fold anti-aircraft guns respectively, and a large number of 12.7mm M2 anti-aircraft machine guns were also equipped.

Take the heavy cruiser Sihan (British first-class cruiser Warrior) as an example, before the refit, its standard displacement was 13,550 tons, the speed was 23.5 knots, 6x9.2-inch guns, 4x7.5-inch guns, 26x3-pounder guns, and 3x18-inch torpedoes. After the modification, the standard displacement reached 14,520 tons, the speed was 24.5 knots, 2 twin 240-mm 45-fold extension main guns (rapid-fire type, maximum elevation angle 40 degrees), 4 twin 127-mm 50-fold extension secondary guns (high-level dual-purpose rapid-fire guns), 8 twin 88-mm 55-fold extension anti-aircraft guns, 8 twin 47-mm 60-fold extension anti-aircraft guns, 40 M2 12.7-mm anti-aircraft heavy machine guns, 3 21-inch torpedo tubes, sonar arrays and 2 anti-submarine projectiles.

It can be said that the converted Sihan heavy cruiser has turned into a cruiser with powerful anti-aircraft firepower, and the empire officially calls it a fleet air defense cruiser, but the Navy is used to calling her a heavy cruiser.

The other 23 heavy cruisers were basically the same as the Sihan heavy cruiser, with the difference that the heavy cruisers of Russian origin were thickly armored and relatively slow, while the heavy cruisers of British origin were thinly armored and relatively fast.

The light cruisers of the aircraft carrier battle group are all using the Fairy-class, and a large number of anti-aircraft rapid-fire guns have been added to the original firepower of the Fairy-class, and taking into account the displacement of the Fairy-class light cruisers, six twin 47-mm 60-fold extension anti-aircraft guns and 20 M2 anti-aircraft heavy machine guns have been added without affecting the speed.

The escort destroyer adopts the Rainstorm class, and two twin 47-mm 60-fold anti-aircraft guns and 10 M2 anti-aircraft heavy machine guns are added to the original base, and other weapons and equipment remain unchanged.

The submarines of the aircraft carrier battle group are all powerful Tang-class submarines, but the Admiralty has not really assigned the submarines to the jurisdiction of the aircraft carrier battle group, and they are still under the unified dispatch of the submarine fleet, and will only be seconded to the command of the aircraft carrier battle group when necessary.

The establishment of six aircraft carrier battle groups by the Imperial Chinese Navy has not been made public, and the mainstream media under the official leadership still reports on the battleships as the dominant force at sea, deliberately ignoring the aircraft carrier battle groups and downplaying the influence of aircraft carriers on naval warfare.

At the same time, the war plan against Japan, which had been dragging its feet, finally surfaced. The Chinese Empire simulated more than a dozen large-scale landing exercises on Miyakojima in the Ryukyus, and finally determined the most effective landing operation plan. The naval fleet also obtained a new type of artillery shell equipped with a delayed detonation fuse specially developed by Beiyang Ordnance Heavy Industry Co., Ltd., which was used as the navy's fire support for the landing force.

On June 5, the 14th year of Guanghua, the General Staff of the Chinese Empire gathered 180,000 troops on Tsushima Island and Fujiang Islands, including the Sixth Army of the Imperial Chinese Army, the First and Third Marine Divisions, and the First and Second Armies of the Korean Imperial Allied Army, including 100,000 Korean Imperial Allied Army.

The reason why the Korean Imperial Allied Army was sent to the war was because the General Staff of the Chinese Empire knew that the Japanese ** team had deployed the main force of five divisions in Kyushu, and there were also countless auxiliary defense troops. The General Staff believed that the resistance of the Japanese army must be very fierce, so the landing operation would be very costly, so some officials suggested that the Korean Imperial Allied Army should be used as cannon fodder.

Before the start of the landing campaign, the Chinese Empire released a lot of false news in order to confuse the judgment of the Japanese army and make it impossible for them to know where the Chinese Emperor ** really carried out the landing.

There were more than a dozen possible landing sites, forcing the Japanese defense forces to disperse among the various false landing sites.

In the end, the Chinese Emperor's ** Operational Command against Japan chose to carry out the landing at Hakata Port in Fukuoka Prefecture.

Seven days before the start of the main landing offensive in Hakata, the First and Second Armies of the Imperial Allied Army of Korea, under the cover of the powerful artillery fire of three aircraft carrier battle groups and more than 20 capital warships of the Chinese Empire, carried out a landing operation in Kumamoto Port, 500 kilometers away from Hakata Port, and quickly attracted the strength of the three Japanese divisions.

At the same time, the Chinese Emperor ** and the Central Intelligence Agency organized a military intelligence reconnaissance operation and sent a group of special combat teams to Bodo to conduct secret reconnaissance. The crew, led by Navy Lieutenant Li Xiaojun, landed at Mt. Myoki at the entrance to the port, where they sent the information back to the command.

In the months leading up to the landing, CIA agents had infiltrated the area and gathered information from local residents about the tides, mudflats, seawalls, and enemy fortifications in Hakata Bay.

One of the most important contributions of the agents and the special forces was the reopening of the lighthouse on Noh Kwu Island, located in the middle of Hakata Bay and serving as a beacon for key shipping lanes, which contributed to the subsequent landing of the Chinese Emperor**. When the Japanese discovered that the intelligence officers of the Chinese Emperor had entered the area, they sent more than 100 infantry to carry out a sweep, and Li Xiaojun and the special combat team set up machine guns and sniper rifles on a sampan and sank the attacking Japanese boats. In retaliation, the Japanese killed more than 50 Japanese civilians who had helped agents of the Chinese Empire.

As the Chinese Empire had been preparing for five or six months, a series of training and experiments were conducted on the terrain of Miyakojima in the Ryukyus before the landing campaign, and a great deal of experience in landing operations was accumulated.

As the landing force approached, several cruisers and hunting ships of the Imperial Chinese Navy used naval guns to bombard Okashima Island and clear the mines in the Hakata Bay Channel, the 12 aircraft carriers of the 3rd Carrier Battle Group dispatched more than 200 aircraft to carry out combat cover, blockade and ground attack missions, and the 9th Destroyer Squadron braved enemy fire to sail into the South Passage and into Hakata Port, the attack had already indicated that a large-scale landing operation was about to begin, and the Japanese garrison in Hakata Bay informed its superiors, However, at this time, the Japanese army was busy blocking the landing operations of the Chinese Empire in the Kumamoto area, so it was not taken seriously.

In order to complete this huge amphibious landing, the new supreme commander, Admiral Xu Bangjie, called for the use of the Sixth Army, one of the most elite armies of the Chinese Empire. This unit had experience in naval landing operations during the Sino-Spanish War, which had captured Puerto Rico, and the 3rd Marine Division, which was part of the Atlantic Fleet, which had experience in landing operations in Cape Town during the Sino-British War.

The landing plan for Hakata initially made the other generals very skeptical of its chances of success, because of the unpredictable natural environment of Hakata and the very strong fortifications built by the Japanese army. There are two shipping lanes into Hakata, the South Passage and the North Passage, which are easily blocked by mines, the flow of the channel is very fast and dangerous (knots 3 to 8), and the anchorage is very small and the harbor is surrounded by a high seawall.

In Xu Bangjie's post-war diary, he wrote: "We made a list of every natural and geographical obstacle, but all the items that appeared in Hakata were listed on the walls of the war room of the headquarters. ”

At 6:30 a.m. on June 12, 1914, the vanguard of the 6th Army of the Chinese Empire landed in the No. 1 shoal in the north of Nenggu Island, and the landing force also included the 3rd Battalion of the 5th Marine Regiment, including 10 M10 tanks, and a tank equipped with a flame shooter, and two other tanks equipped with bulldozer heads, the battle on Nenggu Island did not take much energy, and it was occupied before sunrise, and the Chinese Emperor ** only 14 people were killed and wounded, and the Japanese casualties exceeded 200 people, and 136 people were captured.

The landing force at Beach 1 waited until the tide rose at 7:50 p.m., acting as a deterrent to the Japanese and allowing the other troops to continue the landing. During this time, naval and naval aviation carried out large-scale artillery and bombardment along the beachhead covered with anti-landing piles and mines to stop the Japanese counteroffensive.

The Japanese army did not expect the Chinese Emperor ** to attack Hakata, and before the battle at the No. 1 shoal, the Japanese army was deceived by the false news deliberately released by the Chinese Empire, thinking that the main attack of the Chinese Emperor ** would be directed to Kumamoto, and as a result, only a small number of troops were sent to Hakata, and they came too late, and the Chinese Emperor ** had already launched an operation. Under the fierce attack of hundreds of aircraft and dozens of warships of the Chinese Empire, the ground defenders of Hakata were unable to reinforce like the beachhead, and their firepower was suppressed. Before this, agents and special combat teams of the Chinese Empire infiltrated Hakata and destroyed Hakata's power stations, telephone lines and other communication systems, and the special combat team guided the aerial bombers to accurately destroy the Japanese ammunition depots, oil depots, granaries, barracks and other key military facilities, resulting in the failure of the Japanese army to assemble in time for anti-landing battles.

The 5th Regiment of the Imperial Chinese Marine Corps, which landed on Beachhead No. 2, used ladders to climb the seawall of Hakata Port, and after suppressing the resistance of the Japanese, they opened the causeway to Nohgu Island, allowing the first batch of tanks to land on Beachhead No. 1 to join the battle, and the troops who landed on Beachhead No. 2 killed and wounded a total of 8 people and 28 wounded.

With the rapid construction of the beachhead after the landing of the Chinese Emperor ** at the No. 1 and No. 2 beachheads, after the Japanese resistance in Hakata was cleared, the replenishment and reinforcement operations began immediately, and the naval engineering battalion and the underwater demolition brigade had arrived with the Marines to build a pontoon dock at the No. 1 beachhead and remove the wreckage from the water, so that more ships could come in and dock directly.

Later in the day, the Japanese army in Hakata attempted to counterattack, mobilizing the forces of a garrison wing to carry out a counter-charge against the landing force of the Chinese Emperor, intending to prevent the landing. Subsequently, under the blow of the powerful naval and air forces of the Chinese Empire, the Japanese army suffered heavy casualties, and the attack was unsuccessful for 3 hours, and had to retreat.

At dawn the next day, the 3rd Battalion of the Chinese Emperor's ** Advance Force, advancing eastward along the Zhihe Peninsula, quickly broke through the defensive position that the Japanese considered impossible to break through under the opening of 10 M10 tanks, and attacked Hakata Port from the flank.

On 14 June, the 6th Marine Regiment of the 3rd Marine Division of the Imperial Chinese Navy completed the landing and quickly penetrated into the depth of Hakata, intending to outflank the remnants of Hakata's Japanese retreat. The Japanese garrison was forced to abandon Hakata and retreat 80 kilometers to form a second line of defense.

The next day, the Chinese Emperor ** occupied Hakata and cleared the mines, hidden piles and iron locks in Hakata Bay.

On the 16th, the troop carrier of the Chinese Emperor sailed into the port of Hakata, and a large number of the Chinese Emperor's convoy was able to land smoothly.