In the middle of the night on January 13, 1940, the 1st Italian Cruiser Detachment, accompanied by the 9th Destroyer Detachment, quietly left the port of Taranto to carry out an order to disrupt the British sea lines of communication. Zhang Jun sent three groups of reconnaissance planes, each of which had a **-29 air tanker, and four "six masters" cruised at high altitude in the Italian fleet throughout the whole process.

The 1st cruiser detachment consisted of 3 heavy cruisers of the Zara-class class, namely "Zara", "Fum" and "Bora". The 9th destroyer detachment consisted of 4 Oriani-class destroyers, namely "Oriani", "Giobetti", "Alfieri" and "Karducci". They were all under the command of Rear Admiral Cataño, commander of the 1st Cruiser Detachment. This is the only remaining naval power of the Italian Navy.

The plan for this battle was the result of a compromise between the Italian military and the Germans. Italy demanded that the Italian fleet should be cut off from the sea route for British reinforcements to Greece and annihilated a British fleet with the air support of an air force provided by the Luftwaffe. The report of the German SS Air Corps inflicting heavy damage on two British battleships in Crete on 14 January made the Italian Navy, which had always been lacking in confidence, think that it was possible to change the passive situation.

As a result, Admiral Ricca, the new chief of staff of the Italian navy, formulated a battle plan, which was arranged as follows: the Italian navy would organize four fleets to set off from four ports separately, and after the rendezvous, Admiral Aquino would be under the unified command to sweep the eastern Mediterranean, which was all the belongings of the Italian navy, and Mussolini also began to gamble on his entire navy, just for the sake of face, which was extremely stupid.

On the morning of January 17, sea fog filled the western part of the Strait of Messina. At about 11 o'clock, four fleets appeared on time in the scheduled assembly area. According to the plan, a large number of German aircraft should arrive at this time to conduct an escort exercise in order to facilitate mutual identification and cooperation in future coordinated operations. But after waiting for a long time, the Italians did not wait for the German planes, which had long been cruising at their high altitudes, they just did not show up, and the SS Air Force was waiting for the appearance of the British ** ship. The Italian Navy waited for a British Sunderland reconnaissance plane at 12:20 p.m. Admiral Aquino believed that the fleet's whereabouts had been revealed and requested that the plan be cancelled, but was denied by Admiral Ricard in Rome, and Admiral Aquino had no choice but to continue with the plan, although his deep sense of unease grew stronger.

On the 18th, the Italian fleet advanced in three directions along a 130-degree course southwest of the island of Galdos. The Cataño squadron and Vice Admiral Legnani's squadron were combined into one and were in the northernmost part of the formation. At 6:43, the Italian RO43 reconnaissance plane spotted the British cruiser, and the Italians immediately accelerated to 30 knots and headed towards the British. At 8 o'clock, the Sanseniti detachment in the center visually spotted the enemy ship and opened fire 12 minutes later. At 8:55 a.m., the Sanseniti detachment began to retreat** the British cruiser fleet in pursuit. At this time, Cataño's detachment had been facing north, ready to cut off the retreat of the British fleet at the right opportunity without taking part in the battle. As a result of the British Air Force attack at 10:58, the Italian fleet had to retreat again along a 300-degree course.

At 15:30 p.m., the hapless Italians began to run their bad luck when the flagship "Veneto" (the only battleship in the fleet) was hit by a mine in an air raid. Aquino believed that only the destroyer fleet of the British could pursue him at night, and that the other threat was an air raid the next day, so he decided to have the entire fleet join up to protect "Veneto". The Cataño and Legnani squadrons separated and were closely aligned on the starboard side of the "Veneto".

At dusk, the Italians spotted eight British planes circling in the rear of the fleet, which had taken off from the aircraft carrier "Dreadnought" at 17:30. However, the British pilots did not attack immediately, and they waited in circles for the light to be darker before attacking, so that it would be difficult for the Italians to see the planes clearly. At 19:15, the last ray of light was also swallowed up by the night, and the Shaolin abbot of Yaqi after the 80s forced the British plane to abandon the plan of a group attack at a distance of 3,000 yards. They first withdrew from the battle, and then spread out outside the fire network and attacked independently by single aircraft to disperse the anti-aircraft fire of the fleet. However, the destroyer detachments began to cast thick smoke screens and turned on searchlights, covering the British planes with intense and dazzling beams. All this made the British pilots dizzy, so the first 7 aircraft got nothing. The last one to enter the attack path was C? Lieutenant Williams, because most of the British aircraft had begun to evacuate, the fleet anti-aircraft fire was relatively sparse. He broke through the defenses at a height close to the surface of the sea and approached the right flotilla. He chose the nearest big ship, which was none other than the "Bola". At 19:45, the torpedo was thrown and rushed towards the "Bora".

The darkness of the night really affected the effect of the visual sight of the Italians, and the captain of the "Bora" M? Morality? Colonel Pisa found out that it was too late when the British planes dropped bombs. Although Admiral Aquino, hailed as an outstanding commander, urgently ordered the rudder to be turned, the torpedo plane that flew so low was too close to drop the mine, and the huge body of the "Bora" did not turn easily, and one minute later everyone watched as the torpedo hit the area between the starboard engine room and the boiler room. It was a fatal blow, the huge explosion caused flesh and blood to fly in the main engine room and boiler room, the main engine stopped running, and the power equipment of the whole ship was paralyzed. Soon, raging sea water rushed into the three fireproof chambers, filling them up. The main engine stalled and the "Bora" lost power, the huge hull slowly stopped, unable to move like a dead fish, and the failure of the electrical equipment made the warship lose its ability to save itself. At this point, the stubborn m? Morality? Colonel Pisa had to give the order to abandon the ship. Nearly 800 officers and men scrambled to jump into the sea to survive, and only 257 people, including the deputy captain, remained on the "Bora" and waited for rescue from both their own men and the British.

Interestingly, under normal circumstances, the personnel on the shipwrecked ship either became panicked and fled for their lives, or they made a last-ditch effort to save the ship. The Italian sailors, on the other hand, behaved in a way that made people laugh and cry, and the discipline of the sailors who remained on the ship was gone, and they rushed into the officers' cabins with strange screams, smashed open the officers' lockers, threw things everywhere, took out bottles of fine wine, and poured them into their mouths. Soon, most of them became drunk, some talking nonsense, some humming decadent tunes. Oh! Lovely Italian naval soldiers, the British Navy likes opponents like you, so loving.

The news of the complete loss of power of the "Bora" reached Admiral Aquino at 20:15. At the moment he felt distraught, because the battle had not been going well. Three minutes later, he signaled Rear Admiral Cataño to lead the First Cruiser Squadron to the rescue. However, according to naval practice, such tasks are usually entrusted to destroyers. So, Rear Admiral Cataño immediately expressed his opinion with a signal - sending cruisers was a luxury, and only 2 destroyers would be enough. Although Admiral Aquino took into account the opinions of his subordinates, in the end he insisted on his point of view, and at 20:38 he signaled a detailed explanation to Major General Cataño. Because he felt that in the face of such a situation as the "Bola", it was necessary for the commander of the general fleet to have sufficient authority and qualifications to assess the extent of the damage to the Bora and the time required to repair it, and to make a plan to deal with it on the spot. The order came into effect at 21 o'clock, and Rear Admiral Cataño, in obedience to the soldiers, accepted the order and led his detachment out of the main array, advancing in a column at a speed of 16 knots to the southeast.

At 20:14, poor "Bora" was spotted by the British cruiser "Orion", which was equipped with a sea search radar. Twenty-six minutes later, Vice Admiral Wippert, commander of the British cruiser detachment, reported to the flagship: "The situation is unknown for the ship, 240 degrees in azimuth and 5 nautical miles away. There has been a clear stagnation. My location is 35 degrees 21 minutes north latitude and 21 degrees 5 minutes east longitude. Admiral Cunningham, commander of the British fleet, thought that this might be the battleship "Veneto", which had been damaged in a previous air raid, and immediately led the main forces to rush in a murderous manner. "Bora" became a wailing cub in a trap and was attracting hunters and more prey.

At about 22 o'clock, the main British fleet approached him from the northeast direction of the "Bola". Four large ships formed a horizontal column, from south to north were the battleship "Barham", the aircraft carrier "Dreadsome", the battleship "Warrior" and the battleship "Warweary". At 22:03, the figure of "Bola" appeared on the screen of the 279 radar on the "Warrior". According to the signal, the radar commander judged that the distance was about 6 nautical miles, and it was a large ship more than 600 feet long. Seven minutes later, Admiral Cunningham, who received the radar report, was very excited and directed the fleet into the shelling. At 22:20, the radar of the "Warrior" locked on the "Bora" again, and obtained tactical data of 191 azimuth and 4.5 nautical miles away. Since the "Bora" was located on the port side of the British fleet, at this time, the destroyers on the port side were asked to begin to shift positions to the starboard side in order to free up space for the battleship to fire. And the "Dreadful" also received an order to leave the queue.

However, just as the British destroyer received the order to transfer, the destroyer "Stuart", located on the starboard side, raised the alarm at 22:23, because he was about 2 nautical miles away from 250 degrees from the bow of the ship and spotted the shadows of six warships moving from port to starboard in the night. The second and third ships are large ships, and the rest are small ships. At 22:25, the chief of staff of the British fleet, Brigadier Admiral Edelston, observed the shadows with a telescope, and he calmly issued almost the same report. And Lieutenant Colonel Bauer, an expert in the contour identification of warships who had been the captain of a submarine, judged with a keen eye that the two large ships were Zara-class heavy cruisers with a main gun caliber of 8 inches.

The British reacted extremely quickly, and Admiral Cunningham quickly ordered the fleet to form a column through an ultra-short-wave transmitter. At the same time, the artillery began to turn in the direction of the enemy ship. Since the distance was about 4000 yards, it was suitable for close-range flat fire, so the British guns were shaken to the flat firing position. (To be continued.) )