Seven Seas Beacon Fire

The observation conditions inside the command tower were not good. The few observation windows required one to stand on a platform to look out. This seemingly inconvenient design was actually to prevent shrapnel from directly killing personnel. Although Li Che thought that if shrapnel could actually fly through the observation window, being killed by it directly was much better than being killed by it bouncing around inside several times before being hit.

After entering the command tower, Li Che would always climb up to check the situation outside every now and then, only to be quickly pulled down by the staff officer next to him. After a while, he would climb up again to check the situation, and then be pulled down again. This went on and on, but Li Che didn't feel tired at all. On the contrary, he found it very novel.

Actually, you can't see anything by looking out through the few observation windows in the command tower. With both sides' fleets being of this size, once they start firing, a large amount of smoke will quickly form. Don't be fooled by the fact that they are now using smokeless gunpowder, which is in contrast to black powder. During the Battle of Jutland, the two sides had to temporarily stop firing to allow the smoke to dissipate because of the excessive smoke.

At that moment, Li Che suddenly felt the entire warship beneath his feet tremble. Then, a ringing sound drilled from his ears into the depths of his brain, causing him to frown and close his eyes. He knew that the warship had been hit, and such a sound must have come from a large-caliber shell. The shell must have hit some part of the hull. He didn't know if it had penetrated, but everyone in the command tower felt a noticeable tremor.

Li Che looked out again, this time with his binoculars in hand.

The wind wasn't too strong today. Although wind drift and waves had some impact on shooting, the wind also helped to disperse the smoke at sea. So Li Che could vaguely make out that what was passing them was a dreadnought—after all, the Federation's super dreadnoughts didn't have six turrets.

It looks like it hit a 12-inch shell? But it could also have been a 14-inch shell that went astray.

Li Che is now somewhat experiencing fear, a fear stemming from the unknown, because you don't know if the ship will explode into a firework like Hood in the next moment. However, this fear didn't linger in his mind for long, perhaps because he's a bit thick-skinned. He's actually feeling quite exhilarated right now.

That's how a real man should act!

Then he noticed that the Federation seemed to have placed all the super-dreadnoughts at the front of the fleet, while the dreadnoughts were placed at the rear. This arrangement was significantly different from that of the Tang army. Although the Tang army had two Dragon Thunder-class dreadnoughts leading the way, they were followed by eight super-dreadnoughts equipped with 330mm naval guns.

Following these 10 ships were other dreadnoughts.

At this moment, the entire fleet and the Federation forces had completed half of their counter-course maneuvering, and the two fleets were basically in a state of alignment. Just then, Liu Duncheng's voice came through the loudspeaker in the command tower.

Why would this veteran choose to speak on a public radio frequency at this time?

Now is not the time for pre-war mobilization, is it?

No, this can't even be considered pre-war mobilization, can it?

Do you want to try a classic motivational speech scene from a Hollywood blockbuster?

However, the next moment, Li Che realized that he was wrong.

Liu Duncheng spoke calmly, and his words were devoid of any emotion, because he was issuing combat orders via radio.

"...According to Operation Plan No. 4, all captains will personally take the helm and await my command. One minute countdown!"

what's the situation?

What exactly is Liu Duncheng trying to do now?

Operation Plan No. 4? Li Che began to try to recall the large number of various operational plans and action plans formulated by the Naval Staff before the war. He had seen some of these action plans and had not seen others. The one that Liu Duncheng mentioned seemed to be the one that he had not seen.

He then turned to a staff officer beside him and asked, "What exactly is this battle plan? What are we supposed to do now?"

"You'll find out soon enough!"

参谋的话音刚落，无线电当中就传来了刘敦诚读秒的倒计时：“10、9、8、7、6、5、4、3、2、1！所有舰艇，同时向右转16个罗经点！”

16 compass points, 180-degree turn.

Is this a major turnaround in front of the enemy?

No! Togo Heihachiro's large U-turn in front of the enemy meant all ships turned sequentially, but this is clearly incorrect. Li Che sensed the Dingyuan tilting noticeably and changing direction as it began to turn, while the Zhenyuan ahead and the Jingyuan behind were also turning simultaneously…

Isn't this the same skill Scheer demonstrated during the Battle of Jutland, where the entire fleet turned 180 degrees?

However, Sher used this tactic to escape, while Liu Duncheng did it for...

Tata is on!

The Z flag actually tells the other ships what tactics to use next!

turn!

Come on, Columbia! The game of the brave, round two! Co-pilot battle!

Chapter 154 The Veteran's Charge (3)

When the Tang army's fleet began to make a synchronized 180-degree turn, the Federation's artillery fire even temporarily thinned out.

This was partly because the Tang army's main warships, which were undergoing a collective turn, experienced significant changes in direction, distance, and speed within a short period of time. The fire control equipment of that era was unable to handle such a complex situation, so the Federation's main warships' gun firing rate slowed down considerably.

On the other hand, seeing someone actually dare to perform such a difficult large-formation maneuver on the battlefield, even from the perspective of the opponent or the enemy, one has to admire the opponent's skill and daring.

Inside the bridge of the USS Washington, almost everyone, including McGiffin, stared wide-eyed, somewhat incredulous, at the Tang army daring to perform such a difficult overall formation maneuver in the midst of such a decisive battle, with hundreds of heavy cannons from both fleets fiercely exchanging fire.

This is almost equivalent to someone actually using a cool maneuver like the Cobra to catch a window and kill someone in real combat during the jet age. Such a scenario should usually only exist in movies or literature!

Yes, that's right. The High Seas Fleet also conducted a similar maneuver during the Battle of Jutland, but the Leitanians did it to escape. No one can deny that a well-trained army can unleash 150% of its potential during an escape.

But the Tang army was using this kind of mobility to fight them to the death!

McGiffin wrote in his post-war report: "The Ming Empire was once a corrupt empire, but it possessed a navy that was disproportionate to its age and decay. If the Tang Dynasty and the Datong faction had been able to control the empire before this world war began, I think we might not have had the chance to gain so much benefit in this war."

After the Tang fleet finally completed its turn, the two sides had become engaged in a naval battle. The High Seas Fleet, which had been fighting in the Battle of Jutland, lost its will to fight the moment it saw the British Grand Fleet. So the High Seas Fleet immediately turned around and fled. Thus, the largest naval battle in human history ended in such a dismal fashion.

However, today, after the Tang army's fleet completed its turn, although they clearly outnumbered the enemy, the Federation people felt that the enemy's momentum was overwhelming.

This feeling is like in the movie "The Battle of Stalingrad," where the Soviet attacking troops crossing the river braved the fire unleashed by the Leitanians, smashing through the wall of fire with their bare bodies, their bodies ablaze as if returning from hell, filled with an aura that seemed to drag the Leitanians back to hell with them. At that time, the morale of the Leitanian soldiers holding machine guns in the trenches collapsed rapidly in the face of such a terrifying enemy.

While the Federal Navy may not be as formidable as the Lai Army in the movie, there is no doubt that the Dragon Flagship Fleet, through this maneuver, fully demonstrated the quality, capability, determination, and courage of its entire fleet of officers and men.

When the Tang army fired its first salvo after completing its turn, the sound of the cannons seemed to be questioning the Federal army—I can risk everything for victory, now it's your turn to prove it.

"Sir! What should we do now?"

Tang Jun's maneuver completely disrupted all of the Federal Army's previous plans. Inside the command tower of the USS Washington, the staff officer who raised the question was clearly flustered.

McGiffin sighed inwardly with some dissatisfaction at his subordinates' performance. In the end, the Federation Navy had not been able to withstand a single tough battle on its own in this war. Although the Federation possessed unparalleled production capacity and, looking to the future, the Federation Navy would inevitably become the world's largest naval force, its ability to withstand pressure in the face of a major war was simply not commensurate with the size of the Federation Navy.

USN still needs polishing.

"What's the panic?" McGiffin glanced at the staff officer. "Our current strength is at least 24:19. We have more super-dreadnoughts and more ships than them. They even have two battlecruisers among their battleships. How can we be at a disadvantage if we fight them fair and square?"

Magee's tone conveyed both pity and anger towards his subordinates for their misfortune and lack of resolve. Despite having the advantage in both the quantity and quality of his troops, the enemy's preemptive tactical maneuvers had shaken the confidence of some of his officers. Moreover, many of these officers had been basking in the glory of their victory in the Java Sea naval battle and held the Tang army in contempt.

It's as if the Royal Victorian Navy didn't help in that naval battle at all, and that they defeated the Ming army on their own.

Any officer who exhibits this shift in mindset from quick victory to quick defeat is clearly not a qualified soldier of the Federation of Colombia.

McGiffin's words were a wake-up call for the officers and men in the command tower of the USS Washington. "Yes, we still have the advantage! We not only have a numerical advantage, but we also have battleships with 15-inch guns!" If they dared not fight under such an advantage, they might as well go home and pick cotton.

At this time, corresponding to the USS Washington was a dreadnought of the Tang army with four turrets and 12 cannons. The Haiting-class was the most numerous capital ship built by the Ming Dynasty at that time. Apart from being slightly inferior in terms of firepower, which still used 280mm naval guns, its performance in all aspects was absolutely top-notch among dreadnoughts.

Therefore, all the existing Haiting-class battleships were divided into two sub-fleets, which were arranged at the front and rear of the formation respectively. The battleships that were facing them at this moment were originally at the back of the Tang army formation, but after the tactical maneuver just now, these ships have now become the main force ships at the front of the entire formation.

Behind these three Haiting were the third and fourth ships of the Haichang-class dreadnoughts—Haiqin and Haitao. These five dreadnoughts were actually facing off against the four battleships of the Federal Navy—the Washington, Colorado, Maryland, and West Virginia—equipped with 15-inch guns and currently the most capable of fighting to the death in the Federal Navy.

Although it was a four-on-five situation, the Federation forces had a clear advantage. While the Sea Thunder-class had a displacement of 2.4 tons (normal displacement), the Sea Chang-class, as the second type of dreadnought of the Ming Dynasty and the first battleship designed as a dreadnought from the outset, had a displacement of 1.5 tons, which was almost half that of a standard battleship. Compared with the Colorado-class, the current pinnacle of the Federation's standard battleships, it was really not good enough.

Behind these five ships, the Tang army's battle line was noticeably sparser than that of the Commonwealth. However, in general, the Commonwealth Navy's 10 super-dreadnoughts equipped with 14-inch guns—the Ohio (the fourth ship of the New Mexico class), Arizona, Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Mississippi, Idaho, New York, Texas, Indiana, and Massachusetts (the third/fourth ships of the New York class)—faced off against the Ming army's only two super-dreadnought formations: the Kaiyuan, Huaiyuan, Pingyuan, Ningyuan, Dingyuan, Zhenyuan, Jingyuan, and Laiyuan.

In terms of numbers, the Federation still had the upper hand on this section of the battle line. However, if you look closely, the Federation's newer standard battleships were positioned further forward, while they were matched with four Kaiyuan-class battleships, which were the first super-dreadnoughts of the Ming Dynasty Navy.

The Federation's first super-dreadnought, a total of four New York-class battleships, was matched against the Dingyuan-class, which could be considered the pinnacle of Ming Dynasty shipbuilding.

Further into these dreadnought battlefields, the remaining 10 dreadnoughts of the Commonwealth—four Wyoming-class: Wyoming, Arkansas, Illinois, and Kentucky; three Chirsar-class: Chirsar, Montana, and Oregon (the Chirsar-class is a minor modification of the Wyoming-class); and the Florida, North Dakota, and Michigan ships—faced four Seahawk-class and two Haiqi-class battlecruisers of the Tang Dynasty.

In this section of the battle line, the Federation also had a numerical advantage, and the numerical advantage was even more obvious than before. The only thing the Tang army could boast about was that they really had two super-dreadnoughts here.

On the battle line where the two sides were facing each other, the Federation held the advantage no matter how you looked at it from the front, middle and rear. At this moment, both sides knew very well that the key to breaking the deadlock lay in whether the four battlecruisers could arrive in time, and the outcome of the battle between the five high-speed ships of both sides that were far from the main battlefield.

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In the eastern capital, where the thunderous cannon fire of the Bashi Channel could not reach, a group of people anxiously awaited the outcome of this decisive naval battle.

At this moment, in the command post set up in an underground bank vault, anyone from the mainland would have noticed that, in addition to the generals of the Yanping local armed forces originally under the command of the Yanping Song Prince's Mansion, there were also several Tang army generals wearing Ming army uniforms with changed shoulder boards and chest badges.

Among these generals wearing Tang army uniforms, the one with the highest rank was Wu Yushan, who had once been a trusted and beloved general of Prince Jin, Li Zongdi.

He arrived in Yanping a few days ago in a submarine.

Li Zongdi sent his trusted general here, certainly not to seize power and allow Wu Yushan to directly command the defense of Luoyang.

Wu Yushan's task and role were merely to assess the battle situation at the front and the condition of the garrison in Yanping as a senior general before the main force of the Tang army arrived at Yanping.

His assessment report will directly affect how many combat troops the Tang Dynasty will send to Yanping after the naval battle ends.

At this moment, Wu Yushan, King Song, and General Li Yaguang, who had been in charge of the third defense of Dongdu, were all quietly gathered around a radio, anxiously waiting for new messages to come through.

The radio was buzzing with activity at that moment.

They now know that a decisive naval battle between the two countries is taking place in the Bashi Channel to their north, and the outcome of this naval battle will directly affect the progress of the subsequent Eastern Capital Campaign.

Now that the battle between the two sides' main warships has become fierce, many communications between the two sides no longer use code decoding. After all, timeliness is very important in war, and code decoding is a very time-consuming and labor-intensive task.

In direct combat situations like this, apart from the combat orders issued by the commanders of both sides, when each fleet or each suspends itself to report the situation to its superiors, it often sends messages directly in plain text. This saves time on translation, and it is often not a matter of whether the other party can hear the messages.

Therefore, at this moment, the people guarding the telegraph machine were able to directly learn about many developments on the battlefield, and the tense battle situation was on everyone's mind.

"When will those four battlecruisers arrive? I'm getting impatient!" King Song stamped his foot anxiously. Everyone could imagine the general situation on the battlefield. In terms of numbers, they were now almost one and a half fewer squadrons than the Federation, and the Federation also had 15-inch large tubes. It seemed that their fleet was in grave danger.

It was precisely because the situation was so perilous that the four ordinary dreadnought battlecruisers were given unprecedented high hopes. However, many people like Song Wang did not think carefully about how these first-generation battlecruisers, which were already somewhat outdated, could play their greatest role even if they arrived on the battlefield.

Should they directly join the battle line to alleviate the pressure?

“Your Highness, there’s no use in being anxious now.” Li Yaguang said in a hoarse voice, “I think that instead of waiting for the navy to decide the outcome, we should take advantage of the moment and launch a counterattack while the Federation’s main fleet is tied down.”

After saying that, Li Yaguang turned his gaze to Wu Yushan: "General Wu, I think it would be better to set off immediately now for the support you promised us. That way, the support troops can arrive at the designated position in the early morning of two days later and provide important fire support when we launch a counterattack."

Wu Yushan frowned. He knew what kind of support Li Yaguang was talking about. In fact, the general from Yanping had been asking him this question ever since he arrived in Dongdu.

This support consisted of four pre-dreadnoughts that were still in relatively good condition and were gathered in Leizhou Port, along with several last-generation armored cruisers that the navy had previously used for commerce raiding and were escorting these four dreadnoughts.

This unassuming fleet was the crucial support that the people and military of Dongdu had been eagerly awaiting.

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Chapter 155 The Veteran's Charge (4)

As the saying goes, artillery is the god of war. In wars of any era, artillery has always been one of the key factors that determine the outcome of the war.

Often, for both sides in a conflict, the key to the outcome of the battle lies in who can concentrate more artillery. In the Russo-Ukrainian War, one side accepted all the old-fashioned towed 105mm howitzers provided by NATO, while the other simply imported 170mm Koksan self-propelled howitzers from the Land of Light. The Koksan heavy artillery probably never imagined that before it could turn Seoul into a sea of ​​fire, it would first turn Dzerzhinsk into a sea of ​​fire.

On the entire front surrounding Dongdu in Yanping, neither the Federal Army nor the Song Army has the capacity to further enhance their artillery firepower. The Song Army can currently only guarantee a stable supply of 75mm field guns, and most of these guns are used to replenish losses in the battle. The total number of artillery pieces in the hands of the artillery, even after deducting the replenishment of losses, can still steadily increase. However, the number of heavy artillery pieces is decreasing, and the number of artillery pieces can only be supported by 75mm artillery pieces.

The Federation forces on the other side are also constrained by increasingly difficult supplies in the Pacific. The current Federation forces are becoming increasingly reliant on ammunition and do not have much transport capacity to significantly increase the size of their artillery units.

By October, the Federal Army had captured more than 85% of the Eastern Capital city, and they had even successfully planted the Stars and Stripes in the capital city of the Song Prince's Palace.

However, the Battle of Dongdu did not end with the raising of the Stars and Stripes over the capital city of Songwangfu. If you expand the focus of the battle line from the urban area of ​​Dongdu to the depths of Yanping Island in the east, you will find that the battle line formed by the combat troops of both sides extends all the way to the northeast of Dongdu, stretching for hundreds of kilometers around the foot of the Central Mountain Range.

This was the battle line formed by the continuous clashes between the two sides on the periphery during the Battle of Dongdu.

Li Yaguang considered himself a mediocre general, so he could only choose a mediocre approach to alleviate the pressure of the battle between the two cities. In fact, the Song army's counterattack had already begun several months earlier, and Li Yaguang had organized wave after wave of mobilized troops in the inland areas.

The training level and weaponry of these mobilized troops were actually very poor. To some extent, the combat effectiveness of these organized troops was even inferior to that of a Chinese army division in another world. After all, a division of these mobilized troops with the title of division-level organization only had five or six thousand people.

The firearms they were equipped with were either old-fashioned bolt-action rifles that fired round-nosed bullets from their stockpile, or "national defense rifles" made of spliced ​​wood and produced by the arsenal overtime. The former had almost lost their rifling, while the latter didn't even use wood for the stock; it was simply a stock made of bent sheet metal.

The weapons and equipment sent from the mainland were basically never used by these cannon fodder troops.

These troops launched attacks that were almost suicidal, with a very, very high exchange ratio with the Federation forces, sometimes reaching as high as 10:1. Even the Federation forces were very surprised that the enemy would mobilize such incompetent frontline troops for a pointless counterattack.

However, the Federation soon discovered the problem: the quality of these mobilized troops was indeed low, and their weapons and equipment were indeed inadequate. But the Song army had managed to maintain the proper standards in artillery. The enemy had clearly divided its troops into those that served as the main firepower and those that could be sacrificed as cannon fodder.

Therefore, the counterattack launched by these cannon fodder units is absolutely not to be ignored by the Federation Army, because these cannon fodder units are always trying to do one thing, which is to try to flank the Federation Army. If they succeed, even these cannon fodder units can cause heavy casualties to the Federation Army's front line.

Thus, in these repeated clashes, the two sides stretched the battle line over a hundred kilometers, tying down dozens of federal divisions on this long front.

In this process, Yanping naturally suffered heavy casualties, but Li Yaguang was convinced that he was right. In fact, the Federation only needed to deploy one or two more fully equipped infantry divisions in Dongdu to completely crush the Song army's last line of defense in the city. Unfortunately, due to the repeated counterattacks launched by the cannon fodder troops on the periphery, the Federation could only use its reserves to defend its ever-expanding flanks. They just couldn't spare one or two divisions to continue wrestling with Dongdu.

By now, Li Yaguang had amassed a considerable force behind the front lines. These troops included veterans who had recovered from their injuries and were now in newly formed units composed of retired veterans who had not been drafted due to their advanced age and were now donning military uniforms again after two or three decades. There were also garrison troops that had arrived in Yanping in the past two or three months via cruisers and destroyers.

These troops, originally belonging to the Prince of Jin's direct line, are now the regular army of the Tang Dynasty. Although they are still wearing uniforms with Ming Dynasty insignia, these training units, which have been mainly responsible for training in the past two or three months, have also been reorganized. This is because more troops from the mainland are expected to land on the island soon. They can now be transformed from training units into combat units, and these units are naturally the most elite combat force in the hands of the defenders on the Yanping battlefield.

Therefore, for both sides, the key to breaking through the battle lines lies in the coastal areas—relying on naval gun support to break through along the coastline, since most of the other heavy equipment of both sides has been deployed along the long battle lines, and offensive operations require the concentrated deployment of a large number of troops and firepower in a certain direction in a short period of time.

Troops have been stockpiled, but the heavy firepower needed for the attack cannot be produced. Therefore, the seemingly insignificant fleet in Leizhou Port is something that the front line of Dongdu is eagerly awaiting.

The question is which side will be able to provide such artillery support, which can only be determined after the outcome of the decisive naval battle between the two sides.

The progress of the naval battle was a constant source of anxiety for those who were guarding the radio.

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The engagement distance between the two sides has been reduced to 13,000 meters. After all, neither side wants to drag the battle into the night, as the Bashi Channel is not far from the torpedo boat forces of either side.

Once night falls, both sides will definitely deploy torpedo ships. At that time, distinguishing those ghostly figures in the dark sea from both sides will be a headache, let alone preventing the enemy from launching torpedo attacks at night.

Jericho spared Scheer because he was worried about being ambushed by Leitanian torpedo boats at night. Otherwise, it would have been impossible for the desperate attack launched by Hipper's battlecruisers to cover the retreat of the main force of the High Seas Fleet, which was almost entirely intact.

At this engagement distance, the Tang army's most pressured front line at this moment is actually the section where they have a numerical advantage, namely the five dreadnoughts at the very front of the entire battleship fleet.