In order to fully test how much of a threat the submarine would pose to the transport ship during the long voyage, the British drew up a meticulous plan for the entire exercise, in which the British simulated sending three fleets, each from a different place, namely Singapore, Palembang and Batavia. The size of the fleet is around 3-4 units, and transports departing from Singapore will be escorted by destroyers. The average speed of the entire fleet is around 7 to 8 knots, which is the standard ocean-going speed for most carriers. The three convoys will cross the entire South China Sea and the East China Sea, and eventually reach Yantai and other places.

In this exercise, the Chinese Navy can send six submarines to intercept and kill the British transport ship under sail, of course, the torpedo will not be charged, as long as it hits it, it will be sunk. In addition to the escort fleet, Britain can also deploy about 10 destroyers or light cruisers in the area, and the task of these warships is to hunt and kill submarines. The British are very interested in knowing what the anti-submarine capabilities of the Royal Navy are in the relatively vast sea! In order to make the exercise more challenging, the British said that they could reveal the port of departure to the Huaxia submarines participating in the exercise. to increase the difficulty.

According to the British thinking, submarines generally operate alone, and it is very difficult to search for each other's merchant ships in the vast sea. Moreover, if the submarine attacks underwater, its speed will inevitably be less than 5 knots, and as long as its fleet maintains a speed of 7 to 8 knots and constantly changes course, the submarine will have no chance. As for attacking from the water?

Hehe, the British arranged two pits for Huaxia. That is, although only one fleet has escort ships, it does not mean that the other fleets are not armed! The British specially equipped some transport ships with 12-pounder rapid-fire guns, if the opposing submarine dared to come. I'm afraid these cannons will surprise the other side! The other pit is that the speed of merchant ships in the memo is 7 to 8 knots, but the highest speed of these ships is 20 knots! In other words, if necessary, you can get rid of your opponent in a short time!

So the British sailed out of the harbor with confidence, and not long after they sailed out of Palembang, one of the ships in the fleet from Palembang ran into a mine that was not filled with explosives! The poor transport ship was only 200 meters out of port before being told it had "been sunk". It turned out that although the Huaxia Navy did not know the specific time when the other side would go to sea, before the exercise began, four submarines were already sitting at the bottom waiting near Palembang, and mine arrays were arranged on both sides of the narrow sea outlet. And then a transport ship crashed into it in a daze. Subsequently. The British began to send minesweepers to begin clearing mines, and transport ships in Palembang were forced to postpone their voyages.

While the British were clearing mines, except for a submarine that continued to track the transport fleet in Palembang. The remaining submarines immediately joined up with one of the submarines that were tracking the Singapore flotilla, where they were to launch a formal hunt with 4 transport ships and 2 destroyers. Commanded by Goodnow himself. And on their side are 5 submarines. The first head-on collision between the two sides is about to begin.

The speed of the submarine sailing on the surface of the water is much faster than these transport ships that are only about 7 knots, so since the fleet of the Singapore voyage sailed out of the port has been under the monitoring of the Huaxia submarine force, the No. 3 submarine followed far behind the transport fleet, and when the opponent's destroyer left the formation, it immediately dived, and 1 destroyer could not capture the opponent at all, after many cat-and-mouse games between the two sides, Goodnow finally gave up the plan to sink the opponent, but quietly guarded around the fleet.

"They're going to attack at night. Under the cover of night, the small size of the submarine will completely blend into the night. They could even float up and fire torpedoes, and our 12-pounder guns had a hard time hitting their opponents even with the help of searchlights. So we must be extra careful. On the first night, Goodnow reminded.

"They're still following us, yesterday they tried to attack, but fortunately we were well guarded, so they didn't return, but today, yes, today, they're definitely going to attack." On the second night, Goodnow felt a little weak.

Day 3, Day 4. The submarine behind was still following unhurriedly, but the other side seemed to be very patient, but followed behind but did not attack, and sometimes Goodnow could even use a telescope on the mast to see the other party's crossing and take turns to rest on the submarine deck. And what about the British crew? How to say that these days have been quite sad, the work during the day can not be less, and at night they have to take turns standing on the deck with the naked eye to search for submarines that may be close, sometimes the other party will suddenly approach the fleet, but in the eyes of the British, this is at most just harassment and temptation, when the British searchlight turns and sweeps the sea, they will dive into the water again, and at night the two sides keep a distance of no more than 3KM.

"We tried to get rid of our opponents by means of light control and maneuvering, and in the dark we couldn't see each other, so we believed that they couldn't see us either, but we were disappointed, and when the sun rose the next morning, the submarine reappeared behind us like a ghost! We don't know how they managed to keep track of them in the darkness of the night! Goodnow wrote in his diary.

In Xu Jie's plane, the Japanese Navy had a special class of troops in World War II, which was commonly known as cat's eye, which was to select some abnormal night vision ability, and supplemented by special drugs and diet (such as cod liver oil products) to improve night vision. Of course, there is a limit to this improvement, there are often situations where you can't see clearly or see wrong, but in the current situation, it is also easier to use, first of all, the submarine tracking distance is closer, and the British see closer at night, and secondly, in this sea area in addition to the submarine is the British ship, basically there will be no mistake. The distance between the two sides is generally about 1 nautical mile, and the possibility of encountering ships from other countries in this case is too low!

Goodnow's "prophecy" finally came true on the fifth day, a night close to the full moon, with the bright moonlight shining on the sea. At about 2 o'clock in the middle of the night, two destroyers in Goodno's fleet simultaneously spotted two submarines in both directions of the flotilla at 5 o'clock and 8 o'clock! They sailed fast on the surface and rushed straight to the convoy of transports that were staggering through the night!

Goodnow immediately ordered the two destroyers to expel each other, not to sink each other, but to keep them out of the effective range of the torpedoes, and the two destroyers turned on all their searchlights to search the sea. In the swirling pillars of light, two submarines loomed in the light, and the British filled the barrels of the guns with a training shell, and the water columns exploded on the sea gate. The two submarines had been trying to find each other's loopholes, but Goodnow's destroyer had a good job of protecting the front and back of the fleet, so that the submarines could not succeed.

"That's not right! If the submarine wants to launch a torpedo attack, they must dive to approach, and the underwater speed of the trailing submarine obviously cannot achieve this purpose! Suddenly, Goodnow seemed to think about something, and just as he was about to order the fleet to evade, the fleet in front of him suddenly lit up with a red signal light, which according to the regulations was the signal after the transport ship was sentenced to "sink". In an instant, Goodnow finally figured out that it was all decoy, and the other side used a submarine to track it, and then the other submarines intercepted the convoy from the front.

"There must be a lot of submarines on the other side, at least two, and they fired a large number of torpedoes in a very short time, forming a fan of lightning strikes from the left and right sides, and we couldn't dodge them in a hurry." Afterwards, the captain of the merchant ship said so. In less than 10 minutes, the British Navy lost 4 transports and a destroyer, this destroyer was hit by a torpedo fired by another submarine while chasing one of the submarines, under the cover of night, the effective range of the guns was not far from the submarine's torpedoes, and the two sides were almost always engaged in hand-to-hand combat with bayonets.

"If this were a real battle, we would have lost 20,000 tons of ship tonnage in one night. As well as the goods stored on it. Goodnow said with some concern. No, major, you are not completely speaking, the other two flotillas lost one transport ship each the night before, and we lost 6 ships in one night, estimated at about 30,000 tons. And all this is caused by nothing more than 6 submarines with a gross tonnage of less than 4000 tons! An officer added. So far, we have a total of 11 transport ships, and there are only 3 left! The good news, though, is that we destroyed a submarine. ”

A single submarine can also cause some damage to an unescorted merchant fleet, usually by setting up an ambush in advance on the route of a low-speed fleet by navigating at high speed on the sea. If the other party doesn't have a little weapon, he can also use deck guns to attack, one of the Huaxia submarines thought so, but when this submarine rushed up, I saw the British on the deck laughing at this open canvas, and then several black holes pointed at the submarine, and then? A submarine fired a torpedo, taking away a transport ship "before it was sunk".

In the end, only 2 transport ships successfully reached the port, and 9 of the 11 transport ships were destroyed in this exercise. The total tonnage reached nearly 50,000 tons. And such a high rate of loss naturally made the British feel unacceptable. When Jericho sent a report of the exercise to the UK, Fisher decided to set up a special escort agency to deal with the threat posed by submarine warfare. Subsequently, the British government also felt that it was necessary to pay some "appropriate" price in exchange for cooperation with the Chinese government.

Thanks to the book friend zhouyu1976 for the tip~~~. Recommended this afternoon~~. There will be a more later, I hope you will support more ~~. (To be continued......)