1627 Rise of the South China Sea

Chapter 709 Capture Penghu
Although the death squad sent by Zheng Zhilong is still determined to fight, there are still irreparable gaps between the two sides in terms of ship performance, weapon power, and combat methods. It is not enough to reverse the unfavorable passive situation during the battle.Although it did play a role in delaying the advance of the enemy fleet, it was basically obtained in exchange for the sacrifice of human lives.And the speed at which the coalition forces slaughtered them made such a huge payment seem very uneconomical.

Although the pirates were already fighting desperately, they did not spend any longer fighting with the coalition fleet than the previous defeated pirate fleet. In less than an hour, there were no intact sailing ships in the pirate fleet.And most of the pirate ships that approached the Haihan warships and tried to use the gang-jumping tactics to kill them had already sunk or capsized due to the approaching bombardment by artillery fire.

On the surface of the sea with a radius of about three to four nautical miles, there are ship fragments and pirate corpses floating everywhere. There are at least a dozen pirate ships that are still burning, but no one cares about these sailing ships that are sinking slowly. Is there still alive.

It was already evening, and the sun was slowly setting towards the sea level. For the coalition fleet, it was necessary to complete the first wave of attack on Magong Port before nightfall, and strive to seize the beachhead for landing.Otherwise, after nightfall, it would be extremely dangerous for such a huge fleet to settle down on the sea only about ten nautical miles away from the enemy.

"Let the Fujian Navy come back to clean up the battlefield, and our fleet will re-form as soon as possible. Before dark, I will set foot on the land of Penghu!" Wang Tom was also very anxious at this time.He was not very worried about whether his fleet could successfully capture the landing point, but he was afraid that Shibazhi had already completed the transfer of large troops during this period.Although the military is indeed carrying out this battle with the idea of ​​driving away rather than exterminating them, if the main force of Shibazhi is allowed to withdraw unscathed, it is actually a kind of dereliction of duty by the military.Moreover, the blame for this operational error must be borne by the navy. After all, the army has hardly participated in the battle so far.

Half an hour later, Tom Wang received news from Shi Diwen on the radio that a large fleet of ships was pouring out of Magong Port. This is what the coalition forces expected to see.

"Shi Diwen's Department and Roger's Department are responsible for blocking the entry and exit channels of the port, and other ships will accompany our department to launch a landing operation at the predetermined location!" Yan Chujie, as the commander-in-chief of this operation, issued a general offensive operation to the other two fleets through the radio instruction.

The harbor exit of Magong Port happened to face west, and the coalition fleet came from west to east. Both sides discovered the existence of each other at a relatively long distance.The panicked pirate fleet collided head-on with the war-intensive coalition fleet, and was easily cut apart like tofu cut by a sharp blade.And Shibazhi's side seems to have completely lost its command system. In this chaotic scene, no one organized a decent resistance, and everyone was trying to escape from the battlefield as soon as possible.

The landing site chosen by Wang Tom before the war was located on the peninsula north of Magong Port. Everyone had cheered up in advance to prepare for a fierce battle, but the actual situation was that the fleet in charge of covering was unable to perform at all. Here There are no shore defense measures at all, and no organized armed personnel can be seen operating on the shore from the telescope.The troop carrier that arrived later landed almost without hindrance, and there was no blockage from Shibazhi as expected.

"It seems that we think the battle is too difficult?" Wang Tom was also a little surprised and helpless at such a scene.

Before the start of the war, Haihan did a lot of preparatory work, and even specially carried out hull modification and landing exercises in order to implement the landing operation, which cost a lot of manpower, material and financial resources.However, judging from the current situation, these preparations seem to be a bit redundant.The second troop carrier has landed smoothly. When the two companies of the army went down to the shore and erected a peripheral defense line, it is almost certain that Shibazhi will find it difficult to organize an effective counterattack to drive the Haihan militia into the sea again. .

"I think this may be because the main fighting force of Shibazhi has been withdrawn." Qian Tiandun expressed his opinion: "Presumably Zheng Zhilong is no longer in Magong Port, otherwise the chaos would not be like this. The scene where the trees fell and the monkeys scattered."

Qian Tiandun's expectations were indeed correct. Zheng Zhilong left Magong Port not long after he dispatched the second fleet.However, he did not go out to sea by boat from here, but turned to the inland of Penghu Island. After crossing Penghu, he took a boat out to sea in Baikeng fishing village at the northeast end of the island.

The reason why Zheng Zhilong chose this troublesome evacuation method was also because of his own safety considerations.First of all, if he leaves from Magong Port in full view, there will undoubtedly be a feeling of being abandoned for those who have not had time to evacuate, and it will easily cause great chaos. image can also be negatively affected.Secondly, he was very worried that the opponent's fleet would arrive at Magong Port at any time. Even if the ship had already sailed to sea, it would be difficult to escape the pursuit of the high-speed warships of the Haihan people. Therefore, he chose to sail from the other side of Penghu Island. , After leaving the Penghu waters, seek a rendezvous with the large forces.

Fortunately, although the two blocking fleets sent by Zheng Zhilong were quickly defeated, they did win a very precious period of time for Shibazhi to evacuate. Almost all the young and strong on the island had already evacuated an hour before the arrival of the coalition fleet. After arriving at Magong Port, they fled north as fast as they could.Almost all those blocked by the coalition fleet at Magong Port were stragglers and ships carrying idlers.

"Chasing?" Tom Wang looked at the setting sun that had touched the sea level, and asked Yan Chujie and Qian Tiandun for their opinions.

"Forget it, safety first. Let's clean up Magong Port today, and then send a fleet to chase Shibazhi's ass tomorrow." Yan Chujie hesitated for a while, and finally chose to give up the pursuit.

Qian Tiandun also took a more cautious attitude towards this: "There are many islands here, and we are not familiar with the waters near Penghu. It is too risky to fight at night, and there is no need to take this risk. Let's take it easy and wait until tomorrow." Let the fleet clear the surrounding waters."

Both colleagues suggested to deal with it cautiously, and Tom Wang would not insist on taking risks, so he immediately notified the other two fleets through the radio, asking them to gather their teams and start cleaning up the Magong Port Wharf.At the same time, a ship was sent to notify the Fujian navy to send ships to search along the coastline in both north and south directions to see if there were any pirate fleets along the coast of Penghu Island that had not yet had time to evacuate.

After realizing that the general situation was over, the thousands of people who were stranded in Magong Port and failed to evacuate in time did not put up unnecessary resistance. About one-third of them chose to surrender on the spot, and the rest retreated to the After leaving the inland, it is expected that the enemy's attack on Penghu will only be a short-term action, and they will withdraw to the mainland after this wave is over.

Yan Chujie was not in a hurry to let the troops search and arrest overnight, but delineated a garrison area in Magong Port, so that troop carriers and cargo ships could occasionally enter the port as soon as possible.In this joint operation, the Haihan and Fujian military invested a total of nearly [-] combat personnel, and also mobilized almost the same number of civilians to be responsible for the logistics.However, all the worries before the start of the war seem to have disappeared now. Shibazhi's tricks of throwing cars to protect the commander in succession have shown that they have no intention of organizing a decent resistance on Penghu Island.In this way, it is very easy for the coalition forces to realize their combat intention of occupying Penghu, as long as they clean up island by island.

When the officers went ashore to enjoy dinner, the Fujian Navy sent another message. According to the account of the pirates captured in the previous naval battle, the second wave of pirate ships that fought at sea in the afternoon was commanded by Zheng Zhiwan, one of the leaders of Shibazhi. , and Zheng Zhiwan's own ship was sunk by the Haihan fleet during the battle, so it is unlikely that he survived.So far, three of the leaders of Shibazhi have died in battle, and three have been captured. This result is enough for the Fujian government to explain to the court and the Ministry of War.

After nightfall, the high-level officials of the Fujian military headed by Xu Xinsu also landed at Magong Port and discussed with the Haihan command staff about the next action arrangement.

"Tomorrow we will send two fleets to continue the pursuit to the north to prevent the possibility of Shibazhi turning back." Yan Chujie said succinctly: "In addition, I hope that the Ming army can cooperate with us to carry out a carpet search on the island and hide the possibility on the island. Clean up any pirate remnants on board."

"General Yan, don't worry, although the navy will not be able to do much in the naval battle, I will personally supervise the hunt for pirates on the island, so as to wipe out all the remnants of the enemy!" Xu Xinsu immediately patted his chest and expressed his opinion.

Although the two sides organized the joint fleet in a mixed way this time, only a few new warships purchased from Haihan participated in the battle on the front line when the battle actually started, while the other ships of the Ming Army Navy were only on the front line. The peripheral control field picks up leaks.Xu Xinsu's contribution of money and effort is also with the idea of ​​training himself as a pro-military, but the main force of Shibazhi has already escaped, and obviously there will be no big battles to train soldiers in the future, so he can only take this errand of searching the island as his main task.

That night, more people rushed to the coalition garrison in Magong Port to surrender, including several spies from the Fujian government on the Penghu side.According to the information provided by these people, the coalition command can basically determine that the main force of Shibazhi has withdrawn from Penghu and headed north by boat to an island in Ryukyu.At present, there are at least 5000 Shibazhi personnel still stranded on the Penghu Islands.However, there are not many vicious people among the remaining people, and it is difficult for any decent resistance to appear in the absence of organization.

In the early morning of May 5, Shi Diwen and Roger each led their fleets out of Magong Port. Their task was to pursue Shibazhi's fleet northwards and ensure that they would not return to their carbine halfway.But because one night has passed, Shibazhi's fleet has escaped at least fifty or sixty nautical miles away. Rao Haihan's fleet is faster, and it is impossible to catch up with Shibazhi's fleet in a short time. Not realistic anymore.Therefore, the task Tom Wang gave them was not to chase after them, but to draw a certain distance. When they reached this distance, they chose to turn back and not aim at killing the enemy.The Ming army navy was responsible for clearing and suppressing the surrounding small islands in the Penghu Islands. The coalition command believed that this low-intensity combat mission was just right for their level of combat effectiveness.

After the fleet set off, the army and the Ming army also began to march eastward to clean up Penghu Island.The main stronghold of Shibazhi is just a few miles away from Magong Port. Hundreds of diehards occupied this small castle built by the Dutch during their occupation, and tried to resist stubbornly by using weapons such as earthen guns and bird guns.However, after the Haihan Army dragged out four 12-pound guns and blasted the gate of the castle to pieces, the pirates inside immediately chose to surrender.

The situation in the castle was as chaotic as yesterday's Magong Port. There were all kinds of items dropped by Shibazhi when he evacuated, but the troops did not find anything particularly valuable after searching.According to the captives, there was not much food left in the castle, which had been divided up during yesterday's chaos.As for the earth cannons erected on the wall, in fact, most of them were scrapped and could not be fired at all. This also discouraged the militia army who thought they were about to fight a tough battle.

After all, the navy has fought two battles more or less, no matter how bad it is, it is already at the bottom of the battle.However, since the army landed yesterday, it hasn't even had a decent battle. It finally came across a fort that was defended, and finally surrendered after firing two rounds of artillery.If the army continues to fight like this, I am afraid that it will not gain any military merits. Before the battle, the officers laughed at the navy as only a transport team, but they were slapped in the face at this time.

Gao Qiaonan immediately selected 20 prisoners at random, escorted them to the side and divided them into two teams for interrogation.He needs to know where there are pirate strongholds on the island so that he can rush to kill them as soon as possible.If he was slow and the Ming army took the lead, then he would really be ashamed to explain to Qian Tiandun.

After chopping off the heads of three unwilling cooperators in front of the captives, the rest of the captives were terrified and wished they could recite the genealogy of eighteen generations of their ancestors.Gao Qiaonan is not worried that his actions will be sued. His method is simple and crude but extremely effective. He used this method to obtain important information many times when he was fighting in Annan, and the top military officials also He has always been very laissez-faire to use more violent and bloody means to obtain wartime intelligence.After all, on the battlefield, we only ask about the results of the battle, not about the process, and no one cares how high the enemy's death rate is.

(End of this chapter)