1825 My New Daming

Chapter 289 Only Airships?It seems that Daming has fallen behind! (seeking subscription and monthly ticket)
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Even if the entire landing force is wiped out, as long as the main offensive momentum is displayed, the Ming side can be convinced that the main force of the Royal Navy of the Indian Empire is in the Gulf of Oman, and the goal of the Battle of Muscat will be achieved.

As for the sacrifice of the Indian warriors who landed, who cares?Even if it is the lives of a small number of white-skinned officers and mercenaries, those high-ranking rulers of the British Empire will not care.

Because the British Empire in this era is a bourgeois government through and through. The House of Commons in power is voted by 10,000+ wealthy people in the United Kingdom. These people occupy most of the land in the British Isles and almost all of the UK. Factories and banks, controlling finance and overseas trade.

Most of them will never enter the barracks at all-there is no compulsory military service in the UK, and only some shield nobles who have been in the army for generations will become officers among the upper class, and most of the officer positions in the UK can be qualified What the aristocratic young people buy with money is donating classes!
Ordinary people, except for those who are too poor to tell the truth, few people would join the army for those few soldiers who are not generously paid.And those who believe in social Darwinism (in fact, social Darwinism exists in the bone marrow of the Anza people, which appeared earlier than Darwin) and the upper class of Anza (in fact, they are descendants of the Normans) would not care about these betrayals. The life and death of the bottom poor who went to the battlefield with a few pennies, otherwise the British Empire in history would not have caused the Great Irish Famine in its glorious and prosperous era.
In addition, there is another purpose of initiating the Muscat landing battle, which is to explore the cards in Daming's hands.

Those torpedo boats that attacked just now and the "long-range high-speed torpedoes" they launched were the trump cards in Daming's hand!
However, what Emperor William and Marquis Nelson are most interested in and also most worried about is the air weapon of the Ming Empire—no matter how powerful the torpedo boats of the Ming Dynasty are, they can only launch a sneak attack in the offshore, and it is impossible to use them on the ocean.And even if the large fleet is fighting in the offshore, it is not difficult to defend against torpedo boats. Just build more gunboats. The British Empire has long had speedboats that use steam turbines and can run at more than 30 knots.

But if the Ming Empire had a manned gliding torpedo, then Emperor William's decisive battle plan would not be able to be carried out. Thinking about it, the manned gliding torpedo is better than the manned gliding bomb!
So when Codrington said "not afraid of sacrifice", he was actually very worried in his heart. He was afraid that dozens of airships would come flying back to throw gliding torpedoes, which would be a big trouble.

"Admiral, the Urgent armored cruiser is sending an urgent message! Dozens of small airships have been spotted flying towards the coast of Muscat from the direction of Ras Al Khaimah!"

When the early morning sun fell on the beach of Muscat, the armored cruiser Arrogant, which was cruising in the northern Gulf of Oman, sent an urgent message about the discovery of the Ming army airship group!

Admiral Codrington was holding up his binoculars at this moment, concentrating on the ongoing landing operation.

Although the torpedo boat attack of the Ming army sank two armored cruisers, two second- and third-class cruisers of two large Indian fleets, and severely damaged a second-class cruiser, but for the large Indian fleet with dozens of old ships However, this loss is still bearable.

The landing operation was not greatly affected.The dozens of troop carriers on the sea still followed the original plan, and under the cover of a dozen destroyers and gunboats, small boats were sent to carry the officers and soldiers of the British and Indian troops who had landed on the beach of Muscat one after another. go.

The terrain near Muscat is not conducive to landing battles. This area goes northwest, and there is a long and gentle coastline.The Ming army simply didn't have enough troops to defend, and the population of the Sultanate of Oman was not large, so it couldn't support the Continental Army either.So they have been guarding Muscat and some nearby ports for a long time. When they are strong, they take the sea to expand outwards, and when they are downwind, they shrink into the nearby Hajar Mountains.

With the strength of the Ming army in the Persian Gulf, when the Indian Empire showed the greatest determination to launch an offensive, it could only retreat to the Hajar Mountains, Ras Al Khaimah, and Qeshm Island, and get stuck in the Strait of Hormuz and the future. It is a protracted war against the attacker.

Therefore, when the defenders found that the torpedo boat attack could not scare the opponent away, they did not insist on the beachhead. They just bombarded the beachhead where the British and Indian troops landed with 155mm cannons for a while. The base within has been transferred.

Sultan Sultan of Muscat, Sultan of Oman, has long led his men to manage Zanzibar, Oman's territory in Africa. Zanzibar in later generations is just an island, but in its heyday, it included Africa. The "big land" along the east coastline and the northern part of Madagascar (by the sea) is quite promising.

After hearing the news of the airship's attack, Admiral Codrington immediately became nervous—after the Battle of the Kii Sea, the invincible British Royal Navy had already become a bit phobic about Ming airships!
Dozens of airships arrived, and each airship must have 10 man-operated glider bombs or man-operated glider torpedoes, that's a few hundred!

Moreover, the latest version of the British Army's man-operated glide bomb has been installed with a 30-horsepower five-cylinder rotary radial engine. If Daming also has the same equipment, it will only be more powerful!

Thinking of this, Admiral Codrington immediately issued an order: "Suspend landing operations. All ships, immediately form an air defense formation!"

"Yes, sir!"

The so-called air defense formation is a big ship and transport ship as the center, surrounded by destroyers, second-class and third-class cruisers or gunboats. The big ship and transport ship take a zigzag evasive route inside, while the small ships use anti-aircraft artillery and anti-aircraft artillery on the outside. Raise the gun and hit the airship.

This kind of air defense tactics has been practiced by the British and Indian navies in the past two years. After Admiral Codrington gave the order, every moment, more than [-] "small circles" have been set up off the coast of Muscat. ", all kinds of anti-aircraft artillery and anti-aircraft guns were all set up.

If the airships in the sky dare to lower their heights to bomb, they will be live targets!

However, Admiral Codrington still did not dare to take it lightly. He just stood at the window of the bridge and looked at the sky through the telescope for about half an hour. "Little bit".

"airship!"

"It looks small, not as big as Wyvern III."

"This should be Daming's new airship, right?"

The staff and staff around Codrington are already talking about it.

And Codrington himself also found that the airships in the air were different from the big Wyvern III. They seemed to be much smaller in size, and the cockpit under the gas cabin was also smaller, and there should be no internal magazines.There are also two flying wings on both sides of the cockpit, and an engine and a propeller are hung under each flying wing, as if there are two bombs.
Dozens of airships have formed a relatively dense formation in the air, and it looks like they are ready to bomb!
Codrington breathed a sigh of relief, and said with a smile: "It seems that only airships are used, and no one uses gliding bombs or gliding torpedoes. It seems that Ming has fallen behind our British Empire in the sky!"

(End of this chapter)