1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 2110
Although they were fighting in a completely unfamiliar environment, the Ming troops who landed quickly demonstrated their professionalism. About 200 people were assigned to build a beachhead near the landing site to prevent the main force from leaving the landing site and entering the interior. After landing, the enemy launched a counterattack here.At the same time, several small teams were sent east and south from the landing point to investigate the enemy's situation in the nearby area, and early warning and observation posts were established outside the landing point.

In the future, a batch of materials will be transferred ashore to ensure that the landing troops need to fight in the nearby area. Therefore, a defense system must be established at this landing point to prevent the troops entering the inland from being cut off from the supply line.

After the main force was assembled, it was divided into three teams, front, middle and back, and set off from the landing point in batches to the target in the southwest direction.In this way, even if there is an enemy situation during the march, different combat methods can be selected according to the situation.

Although it is basically certain that there is still a gap between the opponent's strength and our own, the Ming army's offensive is still very cautious. It did not rush forward because of the smooth landing process, and still acted step by step according to the predetermined combat plan.

Do not advance aggressively in victory, do not retreat in defeat, and can respond to various situations in the combat process in a reasonable way. The military quality embodied is also part of the military strength of an army.The elite troops under Xu Xinsu's command are almost all trained according to Haihan's military model, and their combat methods are more inclined to standardized operations. In Daming, it can be regarded as a first-class strong army, and it is naturally no problem to use it to deal with the civilian armed forces on Fujiang Island.

Since this area is almost all farmland, the field of vision is almost unobstructed, and it is difficult for the armed personnel on the island to organize defenses during the advance of the Ming army. The Ming army arrived at the target area smoothly and found that the shipyard here There are also two large warships that have not yet been completed.However, there was no one in the dock, and it was obvious that a collective evacuation was organized before the arrival of the Ming army.

"Burn this place!" The order from the leading officer was short and clear.

At present, the whereabouts of the coalition troops have been exposed, and there is no need to worry about setting a big fire here to let the opponent know where they are.And setting fire to the opponent's shipyard, casting this signal can also have the effect of psychologically attacking the opponent.If the opponents can't stand this stimulus and gather together to confront the Ming army head-on, that would be exactly what the Ming army wanted.

There are too many firelights in the shipbuilding area. For example, the shavings produced by processing wood can be seen everywhere. Soon the soldiers found a lot of dry firewood from the back of the kitchen here, and some lighting. Oil, and then according to the commander's order, began to ignite fires in various places inside and outside the shipyard.Especially for the two unfinished warships in the dock, firelighters were placed on the bow, stern and deck to ensure that they could be burned clean.

Soon the shipyard was on fire, and the thick smoke rose as high as hundreds of feet. It is estimated that it would be difficult not to notice this conspicuous signal within a radius of ten miles.

The first target in the operation was successfully won in this way, which also made the Ming army quite excited and had more confidence in the next battle.

The next second target is a port located about three miles west of the shipyard, which is located at the end of this winding bay.If it hadn't been for Yuan Zhi's field reconnaissance before, it would have been hard for the Ming army to imagine that there was a small port hidden in the depths of the bay.According to the information provided by the Haihan Army, several warships were moored at the target location. If the Ming army who landed confirmed that these warships were still there, they must try to destroy them.In order to prevent these warships from escaping from the bay, the coalition warships responsible for attacking Fukue Island have sealed off the passages in and out of the bay from the sea, so as to catch the turtle in the urn.

However, the shortest route from the shipyard to this port is the water surface. The flat terrain along the coast ends at the shipyard, and further inland is a large area of ​​mountains. If you want to go around by land, you have to make a detour It can only be reached in a large circle, and the distance is at least a dozen miles.

The commander was not in a hurry to order to rush to the next target, because he noticed that there was no ship activity in this bay at all, and if the opponent's warship was still in the bay, it should have appeared near the shipyard at this time. On the surface of the sea, it is appropriate to use shipboard firepower to fight the Ming army attacking the shipyard.So he has reason to suspect that before the coalition fleet arrived at Fukue Island, the warships mentioned in the intelligence that were docked in the bay had already been moved to other places.

To verify this conclusion, it is actually not necessary to march more than ten miles to see the situation of the port. It is only necessary to send someone with a telescope to the nearby high mountain to check the situation of the destination.

So a small team immediately set off from the fire site, followed the mountains next to the bay to a high place, and looked for an observation point with a better view to look at the destination.Their actions quickly achieved results. According to the agreement, they fired a signal flare from the top of the mountain, and informed the large troops waiting for news near the shipyard of the reconnaissance results-the port at the end of the bay did not have the warship they were looking for. Not even two small sampans.

This reconnaissance result also confirmed the commander's previous guess. The opponent had transferred the local warships to other places before that, leaving only an undefended shipyard of the Ming army to attack.Although the task at this stage was successfully completed, the commander knew that the opponent's vitality had not been hurt so far, and he needed to find and eliminate the opponent's main force on the island.

However, regarding the situation in other areas of the island, the intelligence information obtained by the Ming army was extremely limited.They only have the military map provided by Haihan, and the areas where there will be people inhabited. As for where the opponent's armed personnel are hiding, they can only find out slowly.

However, they don't have to rely entirely on walking to screen the entire island. The flat and habitable areas on the island are basically concentrated in a few coastal plains, and it is much faster to go to other areas to be checked by boat than on foot.However, such terrain also brought great difficulties to their combat objectives. Although the armed personnel on the island may not be their opponents at all, the more than 1000 Ming troops who landed on the island alone want to attack the land with an area of ​​more than [-] square kilometers. Completing the search in Fukue Island is basically an impossible task.

For the current plan, we can only rely on the advantages of the surface ships, first investigate several key areas on the island, and try our best to eliminate as many enemy troops as we can find.

At this time, in the waters of Naliu Island, about [-] miles away from Fukue Island, another small fleet from the coalition fleet is launching an attack on a bay port on the island.In fact, the information provided by the reconnaissance force only shows that there is a port in this bay, but it cannot be determined whether there are opponents' armed personnel stationed on the island.The coalition forces, on the other hand, have the idea of ​​shooting whether there is a date or not. In short, they first send people to the island to search the populated areas.

If someone jumps out to resist, then of course, needless to say, the resisters will be wiped out.In fact, the military is also very clear that taking such an action is very likely to encounter resistance. After all, the Wudao Islands have been a nest of Japanese pirates for a long time in the past. With inextricable connections, it is impossible to choose to submit obediently in front of external forces.

Compared with Fukue Island, the other four main islands of the Goto Islands are much smaller in size, and the combined livable areas on the islands are not comparable to Fukue Island, so the resident population is much smaller.According to the estimates of the coalition's staff department, apart from Fukue Island, the populations of the other islands should all be within a thousand people, so it won't be too difficult to solve.

The only more troublesome thing is that the coastlines of these islands are tortuous, and there are many hidden small bays. The coalition fleet had to separate several small teams to clean up these target areas separately.

The troops attacking Naliu Island did not encounter decent resistance during the landing. After the vanguard landed, a group of armed ronin rushed out to try to drive the outsiders off the beach, but their bravery had no room for musketry. As a warm-up activity, the soldiers of the special operations group disintegrated the bluffing offensive of the Ronin with only one round of salvo.After realizing what happened, the few guys who escaped this round of bullets left the casualties without hesitation and fled without looking back.

This small port did not have the warships that the coalition forces expected to encounter. There were only a few small fishing boats moored on the shore. It seemed that there would not be too many enemies here.

The Haihan army that landed swept up the fishing village next to the port as quickly as possible. Perhaps the uncooled ronin corpses in the port acted as a deterrent. The subsequent actions did not encounter organized resistance. More than 300 local people were very happy. Soon to be driven out from their respective homes, gathered together at the port.And the initial search did not find many standard weapons from these houses, and the few Japanese knives found were also rusty, and it was obvious that they had not been used for many years.

According to the confessions of the people, there are no organized armed personnel stationed in the local area, and the ronin who resisted the landing of the Haihan army at the port are basically young and strong locals, but these people know that their actions have caused a catastrophe, so they all fled at this time Into the forest.

The combat mission of the Special Forces is not to wipe out fishermen and farmers from house to house. Since there is no evidence of organized armed forces on the island, there is no need to stay on Naliu Island.A group of people came and went in a hurry, and it took less than two hours from landing on the island to leaving the island.But the islanders who died at gunpoint due to resistance during this period can only consider themselves unlucky.

A few hours later, in the battle on Zhongtong Island, he finally met the true master.The coalition fleet found two warships trying to leave the port in the bay north of Zhongtong Island, and then unceremoniously and quickly sank them with artillery fire less than a mile from the coast.

The sailors on the ship found that the strength of the two sides was very different. They were unable to resist the shelling from the sea at all. They quickly chose to jump off the ship to escape, abandoning the warship that had begun to sink into the water.

But the coalition fleet did not leave after killing the two warships, but immediately organized a landing and carried out a surprise attack on the port town here.Although the resulting battle was not too intense, it finally got the special operations team to cheer up and deal with it seriously.

About 100 armed men huddled in the town, using guns, bows and arrows and other weapons to attack the Haihan army trying to break into the town.However, their defensive methods were too single, and their battle lines lacked depth. After being attacked by the Haihan army, they quickly lost coordination.

It took about 10 minutes after the two sides fought, the Haihan army tore through the opponent's weak defense line, broke into the town and cut apart the opponent's combat units, and then annihilated them separately.

At this stage of the battle, the gap between the military quality and combat experience between the army and the civilian armed forces became more prominent. The special operations group was familiar with this kind of combat method of cutting the enemy's formation, while the resisting side had no corresponding combat plan at all. After discovering that there are enemies on the flanks or even behind him, he panics, fearing that he will be surrounded by opponents and can no longer concentrate on fighting.

Fighting against an elite unit like the Heyhunt, once confidence and focus start to waver, it is only a matter of time before they are defeated.

While the Ming army on Fujiang Island was still searching for the next target, the battles on Naliu Island and Zhongtong Island had already ended.However, in addition to the stronger combat effectiveness of the Haihan Special Forces, it is also related to the specific conditions of each island. If the missions of the two sides are exchanged and the special forces are responsible for clearing the enemies on Fujiang Island, then they The operational efficiency of the Ming army will not be much higher than that of the Ming army, and it will not take too much time for the Ming army to attack the ports of Naliu Island and Zhongtong Island.

The Special Forces captured a total of more than forty people in the port and small town of Zhongtong Island. After the prisoners were concentrated in the port for a surprise interrogation, they were detained on several troop carriers.Haihan didn't intend to stay on the island for too long. From the confession of the captives, he knew that there were not many enemies on the island, and most of them had been wiped out by Haihan in the battle just now. Not enough to pose a threat to the coalition fleet.

These fleeing people will definitely find a way to notify Hirado, so the soldiers are very fast, and the coalition fleet must try their best to attack Hirado Island before Hirado receives the alarm.Moreover, these islands in the Wudao Archipelago don't have many resources, and there is basically no danger to defend, so Haihan has no interest in occupying these places. After cleaning up the targets and eliminating hidden dangers, he voluntarily evacuated.

From Zhongtong Island, the northernmost point of the Goto Islands, to the southernmost point of Hirado Island, the voyage in between is only more than 40 miles. With the sailing speed of the Haihan Fleet, it will take less than half a day to complete this voyage.

(End of this chapter)