Five, five, six, the opponent's goal?

After making contact with the settlement and confirming that they were not in any danger, Qionghai had the heart to carefully consider the purpose of the Dutch's surprise attack and the shape they were currently facing.

It stands to reason that the Dutch acted in every way of a flawless act -- as previously analyzed: they had now lost all their support positions in East Asia, and even if a dozen or so new warships were transferred from the mainland, they would not be able to support themselves for long without regular logistical support.

Besides, with the Qiong Navy here, even if they defeat the Zheng family, they still can't gain a foothold in the South China Sea.

And the Zheng family is also puzzled by this point - this time their losses are particularly large, a big factor is that they are very lax in their thinking - according to the unwritten agreement between the two sides, the South China Sea has always been the territory of the Qiong Navy, and they always think that when the sky falls, there is also a tall man like the Qiong Navy, and they can't press on their heads. But they didn't expect that this time they were staring at their Zheng family, and there was no defense in Xiamen Port.

For this reason, although Zheng Zhihu did not find a dismissal in Shandong, he has not left, which is quite a bit of "you have to give me an explanation". In the following days, Fujian, Guangdong, and other coastal prefectures and counties also reported that Hongyi gunboats had harassed and robbed several villages along the coast, and that some fishing boats and merchant ships had been hijacked. The damage was not too great, some chickens, cattle, fish and rice were looted, but the ship and personnel were later released, and even the non-food goods were not even carried. According to the people who put it back, those Hongyi seemed to have scruples this time and didn't dare to hurt people.

But several coastal prefectures and counties are still angry, after all, they have just become accustomed to a safe maritime environment, and the fishing and commerce in the coastal areas have begun to develop gradually. The businesses that can make their business big in these years have people behind them. As soon as several local celebrities or old officials ran to the yamen of the state capital, many local officials began to write chapters to impeach Qiong Haijun.

-- This is not because they want to get along with the Qiong Navy, but because of the most basic principle of officialdom: when they are in trouble, they must quickly push the blame out. And it is very easy to shirk responsibility in this matter - when the imperial court recruited An, it was said well: Shorthair is responsible for dealing with the Western-Yi, and now it has only been a few years since it stopped, and Hongyi has come to invade the realm again, in any case, the charge of "dereliction of duty" must be right!

There are also some officials who have a good relationship with them, and they are not in a hurry to go to the book first, but find a way to come over and ask what the hell is going on? Do you shorthairs have the ability to calm things down? If we can calm it down as much as possible, then we will take some risks here to help you press it first, if it can't be solved, then I can't say it, brother, I can only take care of myself first......

As a result, several urgent telegrams were sent from various coastal contact points, and the headquarters of Hainan Island was also in a hurry, and now several military commanders were not at home, and Ao Sayan was temporarily in charge of this work. He could only send out three more speedboats, including the "Snow Wind" that had just arrived at home, and continue to carry out the search mission on the southeast coast together with the two ships "White Horse" and "Feiyan" that had already been outside, but the target was changed to the fleet looking for the Dutch. As long as you find the position of the other party, let the clippers keep an eye on them from afar, and turn around and transfer the main fleet of Luzon to clean them up.

But rather than simply finding and destroying them, the Committee wondered why the Dutch did this. It is understandable that the Dutch East India Company was unwilling to lose the large market of East Asia, China and China, but if it thought that it could regain control of this sea area by relying on a dozen or so medium-sized sailing ships...... Those veteran businessmen who are good at weighing are not so naïve, right?

The previous battle in the Qiongzhou Strait should have taught them enough lessons. If not enough, there is the next war on the island of Taiwan -- after these two wars, no matter how arrogant those Europeans are, they must know that the weapons here are much more advanced than theirs. And it is precisely with this advantage that they dare to plunder everywhere in the world.

"It's about figuring out what they're thinking."

Such words have been discussed in the committee many times, and as two recognized thinkers in the Qiong Navy, Pang Yu and Zhao Lide have also received telegrams from the headquarters, hoping that they will help analyze the opponent's thoughts.

However, their responses were much the same - any correct judgment must be based on sufficient information, and the only news they had received was that a medium-sized Dutch fleet had suddenly appeared off the coast of Fujian and attacked a number of ports, including Xiamen, and there was no further information. The intelligence is insufficient, and even if some guesses can be made, its accuracy cannot be guaranteed, and it is even more unrealistic to use this as a basis to determine the plan.

So at the moment, they can only make some relatively simple conjectures, and dare not say anything big.

Obviously, the people at the headquarters also knew that this was a bit excessive, so they continued to send all kinds of information to Shandong and Luzon as quickly as possible. Including all kinds of new news sent by the Zheng family......

-- suffered this stuffy stick for no reason, and the losses were very heavy, Zheng Zhilong was like thunder. As a generation of heroes, he certainly can't pin all his hopes of revenge on his allies. On the one hand, he asked Zheng Zhihu to go to the Qiong Navy to ask for help, and on the other hand, their own manpower was also dispatched, and they spilled a lot of the money they had earned over the years, gathered heroes from all walks of life on land and sea, promised heavy rewards, and prepared to fight to the death with the red-haired ghosts!

However, if you want to fight the opponent, you must first be able to find the opponent's position, and Zheng Zhilong is even more rewarding for this. Compared with the clueless search of the Qiong Navy on the sea with flying clippers, their Zheng family has been crisscrossing Fujian and Zhejiang for many years, and the rich contacts they have accumulated seem to be more effective. Most of the ports on the southeast coast have their informants, and even if they don't, as long as they are willing to spend money, they can easily buy news.

Relying on the advantages of the land snakes, the Zheng family soon learned a lot of gossip about the attack, the most useful of which was that the Dutch were not completely alone, and they had the help of local people here. And the one who helped them was the old rival of the Zheng family and the Qiong Navy, the big pirate Liu Xiang gang who used to be almost equal to the Zheng group, but in recent years, it has basically disappeared!

"No wonder they dared to come to this area......"

After getting this information, both the Zheng family and the Qiong Navy had a sense of abruptness. The Zheng family had been suspicious for a long time -- no matter how lax the guard in the port of Xiamen was, after all, it was not crowded with rest and recuperation ships every day. How could the Hongyi fleet come from afar be so coincidental? Launching a surprise attack when there are the most ships in the harbor?

Sure enough, someone reported the news! Zheng Zhilong first suspected that there was something wrong with the insiders, so he investigated it thoroughly, but when the name of Liu Xiang, an old rival, appeared, he stopped doubting his own people - Liu Xiang, like him, was also a deep-rooted maritime businessman, and it was not surprising that there was a cross-party eyeliner in Xiamen Port. Moreover, even if the Liu Xiang group is now in decline, it is still possible to arrange some manpower in a remote fishing village by the sea to provide food and fresh water for the red-haired boats once or twice.

Now that I have a clue, the direction of the investigation is much clearer. Once the Zheng family launched a raid, its efficiency was also quite terrifying - in just a few days, they found clues from the bulk purchase of grain, vegetables and other daily necessities, and Zheng Zhibao personally led a team to raid a remote fishing village, and tortured more information from the captives - the red-haired boat had been replenished and rested here! It didn't take long to stay and drive away.

After that, one after another, several hidden piles of Liu Xiang Group on the mainland were destroyed, which can be regarded as a hidden danger. It's just that Zheng Zhilong has always been very dissatisfied--after a long time, he has cleaned up all the Chinese pirates, and for the real culprit, the red-haired fleet, except for some outdated news, they have never been able to find them--the Zheng family has gone out after getting clues about the Dutch fleet, and has turned over the entire coastal area of Fujian, along with the adjacent coastal areas of Zhejiang and Guangdong...... But I just can't find it.

All this news, the Zheng family informed the Qiong Navy as soon as possible, and now Zheng Zhilong has a radio station and relevant personnel by his side to ensure that he can contact the Qiong Navy at any time. They were responsible for searching in the coastal waters, while the Joan Navy used the clipper fleet to search the outer ocean, and the five clippers were scattered to form a very large search county, and several nearby routes were sorted out from south to north, but still no shadow of those Dutch ships could be found.

"The other party should have left immediately after attacking Xiamen...... The goal was very certain, coupled with the fact that they had robbed merchant ships but only food and no goods...... They definitely have a very clear plan! ”

The coastal search was fruitless, and Zhao Lide made a preliminary judgment by calculating the speed of those sailing ships, but he still had no clue about the goal of the Dutch.

A few days later, however, the Dutch answered his question with action - Wang Haiyang sent a telegram saying that the northern part of Taiwan, which was controlled by the Zheng family, had been suddenly attacked by Dutch ships and troops, and that the other party had captured a castle that had been built by the Spaniards, and that there seemed to be an idea of re-establishing a colony there.

The head of Taipei's Zheng Jiajun fled to Tainan to ask for help from his allies, and Wang Haiyang was of course obliged to do so, but before sending troops, he had to inform the rear.

And the headquarters of Hainan Island was also greatly relieved after receiving this news -- they were not afraid of the Dutch attacking, but they were afraid that they would never show their faces. No wonder they couldn't find it along the coast, it turned out that they went directly to Taiwan. But since these people have shown their traces, especially if they are stupid enough to still want to occupy territory? Then there is nothing to say -- the mobilization of troops in the past, whether it is a land battle or a naval battle, is bound to make those Westerners taste the humiliation of defeat again.

But the Dutch must have expected this, too—almost at the same time as Wang Haiyang sent the telegram, a rather ordinary merchant ship sailed outside the port of Qiongzhou on Hainan Island, and suddenly changed its flag to the East India Company's "V" flag. The ship was rightly immediately charged, but a group of Europeans claiming to be emissaries of the East India Company appeared on board, using a leather merchant named Diego as an interpreter and introducer, to ask for negotiations with the Qionghai Trading Company. RO