1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 2131
Compared with the several large-scale urban street battles that the Special Forces had experienced, the battle in Hirado was actually not too difficult.Whether it was the Battle of Hue in Annan in 1629, or the combat operations that went to Luzon Island to attack Manila early last year, the strength of resistance encountered by the Special Forces at that time was actually far better than that of the current Hirado Army. .

In addition, the Hirado Domain has another disadvantage that must be mentioned. Most of the houses in Japan are bamboo and wood structures, and the same is true in Hirado City. There are not many masonry structures, which makes it difficult for the defenders to rely on solid bunkers to fight The Haihan army circled around.

Although the fan army tried to delay the Haihan army's offensive by relying on private houses or barricades, the final effect was not satisfactory. Only a few areas where small groups of fan soldiers risked their lives and fought to the death could resist a little bit, but these Soldiers will lose the opportunity to evacuate because of this, and will soon be surrounded and killed by the Haihan army who is rapidly reinforcing.

The vanguard troops requisitioned a house belonging to a wealthy local businessman not far from the southern defense line, and set it up as a frontline headquarters, with Gao Qiaonan sitting here to command the operations.

Gao Qiaonan is now a senior general in charge of the Special Operations Regiment, and he basically won't roll up his sleeves to participate in the battle in person.Compared with killing the enemy with his own hands, the more important task for him is to ensure that the troops can complete the combat objectives.

The messengers kept coming in and out, sending the latest battle reports from the front line, and then taking the orders from the headquarters to the front line.Several staff officers sorted out these battle reports separately, immediately marked the current battle location on the big map, and reported all aspects of the battlefield information to Takahashi South.

Takahashi Minami must grasp as much real-time information as possible about the general strength, resistance, and casualties of the enemy's troops on the battlefield, as well as our army's attack direction, advance speed, and ammunition consumption, and make corresponding adjustments according to the battle situation.

Of course, the combat plan for attacking Hirado City was actually formulated long before the war. Although the speed of advancement has slowed down, because the battle situation is basically smooth, all that is needed is to respond to changes in the battlefield. Make small adjustments to the details of the deployment, slowly oppressing the opponent's room for movement.

If it is according to Takahashi Minami's early combat style, when it is confirmed that the opponent's strength is weaker than his own, he will definitely make great strides and defeat the opponent in one go.However, as the position got higher and higher, and the number of troops under his command increased, Takahashi Minami's command style gradually became more stable.

Part of the reason for this is that after many refresher trainings over the years, he has a deeper understanding of war, no longer easily chooses more radical combat methods, and is more willing to use safe tactics to win battles; in addition, there is a The reason why it is not humane is that the unit he commanded has already become the ace unit that Haihan Kingdom is proud of. One of the responsibilities of the commander.

Takahashi Minami listened carefully to the reports of the staff officers. Although the current advance speed is not ideal, judging from the battle reports, the enemy's resistance has gradually weakened, and the number of troops participating in the battle seems to be far smaller than previously expected.

"According to the battle report, the enemy's operations obviously lack unified scheduling, and most of the teams are fighting independently. I think this is because the enemy's lack of sufficient preparation for the step of the war to the street fighting in the city, so there is no It is due to the corresponding combat plan. Of course, even if their commander thought of this level, there must be no way to carry out the drill in advance, otherwise, before we come over, Hirado will be in chaos."

After Gao Qiaonan finished listening, he began to analyze the battle reports, and the staff officers also gathered around him, listening attentively to his interpretation of the information in the battle reports.

Most of these staff officers are selected from grassroots officers. Young officers with a certain cultural foundation and actual combat experience have received advanced training in command at the Army Academy in Sanya, and they have the opportunity to hear Takahashi in actual combat. It is a very rare experience for them to analyze the battle situation for an experienced general like Nan.

Hirado is one of the most important trading ports in Japan. Whether the current situation here is peaceful or not will have a direct impact on the maritime trade of the entire country of Japan.The Hirado clan has always insisted on making great efforts to build a navy force, one of the purposes is to ensure the peace of this place.But no matter how the Hirado Army trains their troops, it is obviously unlikely that they will practice street fighting in their own urban areas. In addition to interfering with the local trade environment, it is more likely to cause panic among the people.

Takahashi Minami has precisely judged this point, so he believes that the reason why the opponent's resistance operations lack command and dispatch is due to the inability to prepare for this special combat environment in advance.Although this is an unfamiliar environment for the special operations group, the troops can rely on the accumulated experience in urban street fighting in the past to deal with these mobs scattered in various places in the city.

"How to deal with such a small group of enemies in an urban combat environment, I think you have already learned the corresponding tactics during your advanced training, interspersed, cut, surrounded, and annihilated... Go and issue combat orders to the troops in charge, we We must try our best to control the urban area before dark... At least, we must cooperate with the navy to occupy the port area first, so that we can get supplies nearby." Gao Qiaonan once again emphasized the main attack direction to the combat staff.

In this attack on the city, each staff officer is responsible for the actions of a company, collects and organizes relevant battle reports, and at the same time conveys the latest combat instructions from the headquarters.Not all these orders were issued by Takahashi Minami himself. He now only needs to determine the general strategy and direction, while the specific instructions are formulated and distributed by these staff officers, and then the front-line troops are responsible for execution.

This method of combat keeps the information exchange between the headquarters and the front line efficient, and at the same time, the commander can also focus more on the direction of the entire battle situation, instead of spending a lot of energy on micro-manipulation of each squad and platoon. Fuck command.

In addition to improving the operational efficiency of the headquarters, the staff department is also cultivating a group of senior officers with coordinated command capabilities.After accumulating a certain amount of experience, most of these officers will return to combat units again and serve as commanders at the company and battalion level.

The order was quickly conveyed from the headquarters to the front-line combat troops. At this time, the line of fire had actually advanced to the southern end of the port area, which was only one street away from the port pier.

However, the former site of Hirado Castle, the mansion of the feudal lord and the residences of some retainers are also concentrated on the highlands facing the sea on the south side of the port area. He was not in a hurry to launch an attack on this area, but bypassed this place first and attacked the port where a large number of coastal fortifications were built.

At this time, the port defense area commanded by Lu Yuanlong had actually lost most of its combat capabilities, and only about four or five guns were left to continue firing at sea.However, it is difficult for these heavy artillery to turn around for a while, and there is an entire armed fleet outside the port, which may launch a landing operation at any time, so Lu Yuanlong did not dare to order people to turn these cannons to deal with them first. Enemies attacking from land.

In fact, Lu Yuanlong knew very well that, no matter on land or at sea, as long as one of the enemy forces captured the port, Hirado would definitely fall.But as the gunshots of the exchange of fire got closer and closer to the port, Lu Yuanlong's heart sank little by little. He knew that the last moment was coming, and the area he was responsible for guarding would face the sea. The frontal attack of the Han army.

The last combat order issued by Tian Chuansuke reached him an hour ago. There was no warrant, but just a message, ordering him to lead his troops to guard the port. If he still fell in the end, he could retreat to the mountains and forests to the north.

To the north of Tiansuke Bay where Amakusa Shiro swam ashore at the beginning, the northernmost tip of Hirado Island is a forest area with an area of ​​about six to seven square kilometers. There are not many people living in this area, and it is basically virgin forest, so it is also known as Tagawa regarded it as the last direction to retreat.The day before yesterday, when Tagawa Nanazaemon was quietly sent away, he went through this forest to a secret location on the north coast of the island, and let the Hirado Navy ship pick him up.

Lu Yuanlong understood that Tian Chuanjie asked him to stick to the port to buy more time for others to withdraw northward.Wait until the enemy army captures the port before withdrawing, it will definitely be impossible to leave.But even if he knew this, he didn't intend to give up the port and escape early, but decided to make a complete break with the Haihan people here.

Lu Yuanlong ordered to gather the remaining gunpowder from each fort, put them all in a fort on the innermost side of the port, and prepared the fuze.He planned to wait here for the Haihan army to attack, and when the surrounding area was full of Haihan soldiers, he would take the initiative to ignite the gunpowder and die with his opponent.

When the Haihan Army and the Fujian Navy jointly attacked Miyako Island, he was the only one in Lu Yuanlong's family who managed to escape, and his family's life and death were always uncertain, which made him always regret that he should have stayed on the island to share the hardships with his family.What has supported him all these years is the belief in revenge. He has always thought that one day he will defeat the Haihan Army and avenge Shibazhi. But this time he fought against the Haihan Army again, and he realized that his wish may not be realized at all. .

There is no other reason, but because he realizes that today's Haihan army is stronger and more difficult to defeat than it was back then. Say revenge.After this battle, Hirado will definitely be ransacked by the Haihan people, and the little wealth accumulated in the past few years will also be lost. Even if we can do it all over again, we still cannot defeat Haihan. Maybe a few years later, the strength of both sides The gap will become even bigger, and if the time comes to fight again, it will be just another abuse by the Haihan Army.

For Lu Yuanlong, the only thing he cared about in this world was revenge, but when he realized that revenge could not be realized, his heart felt ashamed, and living became a very tiring thing.To make a complete end in the battle of Hirado, he thought that maybe this was his best destination.

The first army to attack the port area was the first battalion commanded by Sun Zhen. This was not a very difficult task for him. The reason why it took an afternoon to break through the short distance from the southern defense line to the port area In many places, the main reason is to follow the command of the headquarters and avoid unnecessary casualties as much as possible, so it takes more time to clean up the houses along the way.

However, the headquarters also requested to take down the port before dark, so Sun Zhen hurriedly rushed, and finally reached this hurdle.Sun Zhen is not too afraid of the coastal defense artillery mentioned in the intelligence. He is well aware of how cumbersome these old coastal artillery are. Anti-turrets simply couldn't stop the infantry from rushing forward.

What Sun Zhen is interested in is who is the opponent's commander, who can train so many gunners in Hirado, and build coastal defense forts in the port, and command this line of defense to block the East China Sea Fleet at sea for several days. These achievements It's not something ordinary people can accomplish.He really wanted to capture this person alive and take him back for a proper trial, maybe there would be some special gains.

The battle to capture the port went much smoother than Sun Zhen expected. The soldiers took down several forts on the south side of the port with little effort.There are very few Hirado troops stationed at these forts, most of them are wounded soldiers who cannot move, and almost all those who can escape have escaped.

Then someone came to report that the enemy commander who was in charge of this area was found at another fort in the port. This news made Sun Zhen very excited. Even if he personally led the team to rush there, he would meet this person.

But when he arrived at the place, he was shocked to find that this formidable figure was already a corpse lying on the ground, with a row of prisoners kneeling beside him.

"What's going on here?" Sun Zhen asked another officer who arrived before him.

The officer paid a military salute to Sun Zhen, and then reported: "Battle Commander, according to these prisoners, this person is the officer in command of them. He is a Han named Lu Yuanlong. This person intends to ignite the gunpowder and die with us. These people under him If you don’t want to die, try to kill him first!”

Lu Yuanlong wanted to die, but his subordinates were unwilling to just bury him with him, so after discovering his intention, several subordinates wanted to live, but Lu Yuanlong refused to let them go, so in a hurry A few people simply took a ruthless hand and killed Lu Yuanlong.And they knew that they couldn't get out of Hirado, so they simply took it as a certificate of honor, hoping to get a way out in exchange.

Sun Zhen checked the several barrels of gunpowder that had been placed in the fort after listening to it, and he couldn't help but feel a little palpitated. If he wasn't lucky enough, he might have already flown into the sky at this time.

(End of this chapter)