Episode 90 Early Morning Fleet

At about 7 o'clock in the morning of the 9th, the Tianshu detachment sailed 40 nautical miles east of the Fujian coast.

Just after the fleet commander gave the order to turn the fleet, the lookout of a destroyer in front of the fleet noticed a thin white mark 3,000 meters in front of the port side. Take a closer look and judge it as a periscope.

This is certainly not a submarine of the Ming army. The Ming submarine should have surfaced a long time ago, and would not have spied on the friendly fleet at such a close distance. Moreover, it was the opponent's position, and the Ming fleet was in the position with the highest torpedo hit rate.

The destroyer's bridge horn screamed twice, turned the front main gun, and "dang" was a cannon. A column of water exploded on the sea in the distance, and then the periscope was retracted.

The Ming destroyer raised the alarm to the flagship, and at the same time accelerated sharply, the stern rolled up the rolling white waves, and the ship turned sideways, spewing black smoke and rushing towards the position of the submarine. The high-speed boiler roared, cleaving the waves, like a locomotive.

Immediately afterwards, the three aircraft carriers of the Ming army collectively turned around, and all aimed their sterns in the direction of the submarine, reducing the area that could be hit by torpedoes to a minimum. The three aircraft carriers, escorted by six destroyers, accelerated to the northwest and quickly distanced themselves from each other. The other two destroyers also rushed at high speed, and the three destroyers pulled out of their positions and searched the sea with great vigour.

The sailors at the stern of the ship flipped the handles, and the depth charges like large oil drums rolled off the shelves and into the sea, left behind by the high-speed destroyers. Soon, the sea behind the destroyer rose white "hill packs", and then in an instant, these hill packs exploded like volcanoes, and the snow-white sea water rushed into the sky dozens of meters with foam, and then fell like an avalanche, with a loud bang that shook the sea.

Depth charges rolled into the sea like this, sank and exploded. The entire sea surface turned over the river and the sea for a while, as if the sky was falling apart.

After driving at a high speed of several nautical miles to the northeast, the three aircraft carriers and six destroyers collectively turned due south again, formed a large circle outside the "hunting ground" where the submarine was hunted, circled back, continued to maintain a high speed, and took a step ahead of the southeast.

The three destroyers left behind remained unrelenting, with sonic detectors constantly detecting the submarine's position and dropping depth charges one after the other. There is also an incessant "avalanche" on the surface of the sea.

The purpose of this is to bomb and sink the enemy submarine, and even if it can't, it can force the enemy submarine to hide deep underwater, only care about saving its life, so that your main fleet has time to leave this dangerous sea area. When the main fleet is far away, the submarines can no longer catch up, and the destroyers left behind turn around to catch up.

It was fried like this for about an hour, and there were still no large oil slicks and debris floating up on the surface of the sea. This shows that the Japanese submarine has either slipped away or is hiding very well. It's far enough away from the main fleet now, it's time to rendezvous.

The three destroyers then stopped bombing, turned around, and pulled up high speed to catch up with the main fleet. As for the Japanese submarine, this time it narrowly escaped with its life.

……

If the Japanese submarine is not sunk, then it will soon float and pull up the antenna to report the position of the Ming aircraft carrier fleet. Now the destroyer pressed its head and blew it up for an hour, which was equivalent to buying an hour for the fleet, and the main fleet approached another 25 nautical miles to the target sea area.

At present, Japanese cruisers patrol almost every wide strait in the Japan-Ryukyu island chain. And the Japanese Navy anchored a battleship, the Hiei, at the Naha base on the island of Okinawa. The Hiei is a Kongo-class battleship with a maximum speed of a little more than 30 knots, which is a high-speed battleship.

Okinawa is located in the middle of the Ryukyu Island chain. As long as any Japanese plane or submarine spotted the Ming fleet and reported the course of the Ming fleet, the Hiei could rush to any strait in the island chain within ten hours at the earliest, and join up with the cruisers there to meet the Ming ships.

Although the main purpose of the Tianshu detachment was to sink the Japanese battleships, the Ming army preferred to eat one bite at a time. And in the strait selected by the Tianshu detachment, there were two heavy cruisers. At present, the Ming fleet was bent on rushing to the predetermined sea area as soon as possible, and concentrating on sinking the two Japanese cruisers before the battleship Hiei and the two heavy cruisers converged. Then, when the Hiei arrives, concentrate on sinking the Hiei.

In fact, even without this Japanese submarine, the whereabouts of the Tianshu detachment could not be concealed for long. Now that the sky is dawning, Japanese reconnaissance planes have begun to conduct frequent searches in the East China Sea. Even if it is not detected by submarines, it will soon be discovered by aircraft.

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Sure enough, just as the three destroyers caught up with the main fleet, a small black dot appeared in the sky far to the east. The Ming army lookout post did not need to identify the aircraft type at all, and it was determined that it was a Japanese reconnaissance plane just by the direction from which the other side was flying. The whole fleet was again alarmed, and all the main and auxiliary guns of light and heavy were loaded with anti-aircraft bombs and shook their muzzles.

After a while, the small black dot slowly grew larger, and the model could be identified with a telescope. Sure enough, it was a Japanese reconnaissance plane. It is estimated that it flew from the base in Okinawa.

The commander of the fleet gave the order to attack, and suddenly the twelve warships of the Ming army fired in unison, and the Japanese planes in the distance were surrounded by dense small black dots.

The Japanese reconnaissance plane suddenly accelerated and rushed towards the Ming fleet, without any fear at all. As the plane approached rapidly, the Ming artillery fire also shortened the firing range, and the black spots in the distance turned into black clouds in the near distance, and the sky was full of the muffled sound of ping-pong. At the same time, the 40-mm and 20-mm guns on the warship also spewed out tongues of fire, and tracer shells pulled out lines of fire in the air, like whips, and whipped at the planes.

The Japanese reconnaissance plane had apparently been hit more than once, and both engines were spewing flames backwards, dragging long plumes of smoke. When it grazed the bow of the Ming destroyer, countless bullets and shrunnel entered the plane, and the observer on the bridge of the Ming army could even hear the sound of "clanging".

Suddenly, a black object fell from under the belly of the Japanese reconnaissance plane and staggered into the sea, stirring up a column of water only a few meters away from the aircraft carrier Tianxuan.

It was a bomb. A bomb hanging under the belly of a Japanese reconnaissance plane.

As soon as the Japanese reconnaissance plane finished dropping the bomb, the entire fuselage disintegrated in the air. The wreckage dragged the fireball into the sea.

……

The officers and men of the Ming Dynasty were once again "played with a heartbeat" by the Japanese army, and the officers and men on the Tianxuan experienced the feeling of brushing shoulders with death. They all knew that this Japanese reconnaissance plane could have dodged from a distance after discovering the Ming fleet, it was a reconnaissance plane, not a bomber, and it was not its duty to attack the enemy fleet. But because of the bomb hanging on it, this plane rushed over like a madman, desperately trying to put the bomb on the Ming aircraft carrier because of the danger of being shot down.

Of course, it's just a little bit. If it was really thrown up, of course, the Tianxuan would not be sunk, and the hull would not be too seriously damaged. But its deck runway would have been badly damaged and would have been difficult to repair at sea. Then in the next mission, whether the carrier-based aircraft of the Tianxuan can play a role is another matter.

The officers and men of the Ming army were once again shocked. No one understands why the pilots of the Japanese army are so crazy. The thought of fighting such a crazy army made everyone's backs feel a chill.

In any case, the location of the Tianshu fleet has been exposed. It's time for the submarine just now to surface and send a telegram. And this reconnaissance plane must have reported back the position of the Ming fleet before it was shot down. Its pilots can come and drop bombs so without any scruples, they must have already completed their main mission.

At present, the Tianshu detachment is still about 100 nautical miles, or almost four hours, from the predetermined sea area between Taiwan Island and Diaoyu Island.

The commander of the fleet ordered the entire fleet to turn en masse and sail into the wind. Three aircraft carriers began to fly the first aircraft.

The task of this group of aircraft was to reconnoiter and determine the specific location of the two ground cruisers. An hour and a half later, the release of the attack aircraft group began.