afterglow

Chapter 370: Outnumbered and outnumbered, [-]-[-]; chase!Chase!

Although the courses of both sides were roughly the same, they were not parallel. After a period of fighting on the same flight, they became farther and farther apart.

The Ming destroyers, who were almost fighting in close combat, were outnumbered. The current battle situation was eight versus four, and they had to change their course to increase the distance.

The Taram River light cruiser simply stopped attacking the enemy light cruiser and instead targeted the enemy destroyers, hoping to suppress the coalition fleet destroyers that had a numerical advantage.

In this way, the Nujiang light cruiser can deal with the enemy light cruiser one against three.

Seeing the Ming army's destroyers retreating, the eight coalition destroyers, which became more and more courageous in the Vietnam War, tried to pursue the victory. They involuntarily turned around one after another and approached the Ming army's fleet at high speed.

At 5:10 in the morning, the Talam River was damaged by two near-missile bomb attacks. The two 152mm conventional bombs fell into the sea at four meters and seven meters respectively, causing water to enter multiple cabins to varying degrees.

Immediately afterwards, she was hit by a 120mm armor-piercing round. The shell hit the chimney. However, the dumb bomb did not explode. It just pierced two holes and fell into the sea on the other side.

About 20 seconds later, she was so lucky that she launched a fatal attack.

The four twin-mounted turrets roared in unison. The slender barrel with a diameter of 54 times gave the shells excellent ballistic performance, just like a laser cannon in such medium and close artillery battles.

Three of the eight 144mm armor-piercing rounds hit the Royal Navy light cruiser HMS Emerald, one on the bridge and one on the stern.

The deadliest one penetrated the middle of the hull, passed through two cabins, and exploded in the boiler room!
"Boom! Zizizi——"

Several boiler soldiers were killed on the spot, and the rest of the wounded but not dead were not much better.

High-pressure superheated steam with a pressure of twenty atmospheres and more than 300 degrees was sprayed out from the damaged boiler, and the cabin was suddenly filled with clouds and fog, but this white cloud was deadly.

In an instant, the skin was scalded with blood blisters by the gushing steam, and the respiratory tract was severely burned.

Their skin was bruised by the fall, but they were unable to speak. Because their respiratory tracts were severely swollen, they could only howl miserably.

The air was mixed with the smell of gunpowder smoke and the weird smell of meat, and the horrific scene was horrifying.

Five of the eight boilers failed, and the speed of the two steam turbines suddenly slowed down. The Emerald light cruiser lost most of its power, and its speed dropped sharply.

With raging fire and thick black-gray smoke behind her, she turned to the left and barely managed to get out of the formation and escape the battle.

Although the Ming warships counterattacked very fiercely, they were still at a disadvantage overall - the most important thing was the heavy cruisers on both sides, but the Yinshan was one against two.

Although the Cornwall has lost one of its main turrets, the remaining six 203mm naval guns can still fire normally. Together with the Canberra, which is in good condition, the Yinshan, whose boiler and engine room was damaged, needs to use her eight guns. against fourteen guns.

The continuous fierce fighting at night makes the situation more and more uncontrollable. Communication equipment may be damaged, signal transmission may be wrong, and people's bodies and minds will be tired. Various factors make the battle situation more chaotic.

As a powerful super destroyer, Tongcheng naturally assumed the leading role, but she temporarily lost contact after a 152mm shell destroyed her radio equipment.

A large hole was torn open at the back of the bridge, and the smell of gunpowder smoke lingered here. Various equipment, tables, chairs, and pieces of paper were scattered on the floor. Several wounded soldiers who were not dead were helping each other to evacuate to the next door.

The Guantong soldiers who came as substitutes began to set up temporary communication equipment, but this took time.

At 5:21 a.m., in order to dodge two torpedoes whose courses were intersecting, the captain of Tongcheng ordered a large left turn to evade, and the entire battleship tilted as much as [-] degrees.

The other destroyers were confused when they saw this. The Leping did not notice the light signal of the Tongcheng, so it followed the turn without knowing why.

The Luxi's crew misunderstood the signal, so the destroyer also began to turn. However, the captain immediately realized that the Tongcheng was only making tactical evasive maneuvers and stopped following.

Only the Pingyao correctly recognized the light signal from the beginning, so there was no change and it still maintained its original course and status.

This series of changes disrupted the Ming army's destroyer fleet, which maintained the Fuzong formation while fighting and sailing, and the situation was in chaos for a while.

The heavy responsibility of decision suddenly fell on Shen Mingxun's shoulders - do we still want to continue fighting now?

According to the latest telecommunications, after more than an hour of high-speed sailing, the two battlecruisers and three destroyers that came to the rescue had traveled more than 70 kilometers, and only half of the journey was left.

The sunrise time here in Bali is about 25:[-], and by then the two Taiweiyuan-class aircraft carriers of the C-[-] air attack fleet will also release carrier-based aircraft.

"Captain, this situation is not good for us. If we delay it any longer, we will only suffer losses!" The navigator diagonally behind looked at him with a complex expression.

Although the fight between the weak and the strong has been back and forth for the time being, the decline has been obvious, and it will definitely suffer losses if it continues.

Shen Mingxun originally wanted to fight for another quarter of an hour, but he quickly gave up the idea - either retreat decisively or persist to the end. There was no point in staying for more than ten minutes.

But what really prompted him to give the order was the warning from the lookout post.

"Report! Enemy torpedo boats were spotted in direction [-]! About ten of them."

Everyone turned their attention and saw a row of small boats approaching from the southwest in a neat formation.

Those torpedo boats sailing at high speed left long tracks on the sea. The bows of the boats were raised, and the front half of the bottom of the boat jumped out of the sea.

"Instructions are given for all destroyers to release smoke and mines in the directions of [-] and [-], and get out of the battle as soon as possible; this ship and the other ships will turn to course [-] and maintain the same speed as our own ship."

As the order was issued, the Ming warships participating in the battle began to change course one after another, turn on smoke generators, and launch remaining torpedoes.

Soon, several thick smoke walls were formed on the sea, and the Ming fleet was hidden in them, making it impossible for the officers and soldiers of the coalition fleet to distinguish them.

Those scattered torpedoes were clearly visible, and the warships had to carefully dodge these high-risk and deadly gadgets.

On the bridge of the flagship Tromp light cruiser, the captain was a little excited. He suggested: "Your Excellency, Commander, I think we can try to pursue and destroy their transport ships."

Helfrich immediately waved his hand and refused, "Don't forget our responsibilities, Colonel. The sun will rise soon and we must leave this place."

If everything went as planned, the fleet would have already passed through the Lombok Strait and entered the Savu Sea and flew away.

It won't be long before dawn, and the scary Ming army planes will definitely come, and there is no telling when the Ming army warships that will move forward to support will arrive after hearing the news.

Helfrich, who looked worried, couldn't help but sigh. This encounter was really hasty, and there were also quite a few problems with the BDA coalition's communication and cooperation. The combat efficiency was low, making it impossible to take advantage of the enemy with more troops and less troops. Cheap.

The Ming army escort detachment calmly withdrew from the battle, but did not return directly to the port. Instead, it cruised in a circle about [-] kilometers away with the transport fleet.After our own reinforcements arrive, the battle situation will definitely be one-sided without any suspense, so the landing on Bali can still continue.

The coalition fleet had no intention of staying at this moment. They had no time to rescue the sailors who fell into the water, so they took the time to pass through the Lombok Strait.

Sailors from both sides were floating on the sea in Kali rafts, lifebuoys and lifejackets, paddling towards Bali not far away with the rising tide.

It was at this time that a seaplane ejected from the battlecruiser Yongyuan arrived in this sea area.

Because the sun has not yet risen and it is the darkest time before dawn, the pilot cannot see clearly what is going on below and can only see sporadic lights.

He took the risk and flew a further distance, then dropped an aviation flare over the strait.

"Pfft--"

Instantly, the scene below came into view - twenty to thirty ships of various sizes, sailing south in a long snake formation.

Immediately afterwards, a series of anti-aircraft machine gun bullets and anti-aircraft gun shells were fired at the seaplane.

As he accelerated away from the plane, he turned back to the radio operator and rear seat gunner and said: "Quickly send a signal and report!"

"...The enemy's main fleet is escaping south through the Lombok Strait, with a speed of 16 knots and a heading of 175 degrees. Five hours and forty-three."

At this moment, the two battle cruisers and three destroyers coming to help were only more than 30 kilometers away from here.

If it is daytime with good visibility, you can almost see the other party's mast and gray smoke from this distance.

Because they had suffered more or less damage in previous battles, most of the BDA coalition warships could not reach their maximum speed, and there were many low-speed ships such as minelayers and minesweepers in the fleet.

Under such circumstances, it was only a matter of time before they were caught up.

The speed difference between the two sides was close to 30km/h, and one hour was enough for the Ming army's reinforcements, which were pursuing at high speed, to catch up with the allied fleet that was dragging their families and their families to escape.

At 6:35 in the morning, the fiery red sun completely jumped out of the sea level. The breeze blew and sparkling waves appeared on the water of the Lombok Strait.

Many sailors from both sides who abandoned their ships and fell into the water in previous naval battles have successfully reached the shore. More than 200 naval officers and soldiers from sunken battleships such as the Pitt-Hein, Forester, and Tangyin encountered defenses as soon as they landed. Dutch and Indian troops in Bali.

Only a handful of Ming army sailors went to the weapons room to get submachine guns or automatic guns when they abandoned the ship. The rest were almost all unarmed, so they were captured with basically no resistance.

However, everyone did not have any psychological burden, and they also knew that it would not be long before these Dutch and Indian troops were defeated.

Captain Zhang Mian of the destroyer Tangyin was scratched on the thigh by a flying piece of steel in the previous fierce battle. The wound was so deep that the bone was visible.

Facing Henriquez, the commander of the 16st Regiment of the 31th Dutch-Indian Brigade, he persuaded him very calmly: "Our reinforcements have arrived, and your fleet will be wiped out while fleeing. When the landing troops come ashore, you will be the same." He will become our prisoner, so why not surrender now?"

At this moment, the Yongyuan and Yuanxing sailed through the Lombok Strait at high speed. Everyone on the island could clearly see the two giant ships and the four triple-mounted main guns.

The native Javanese soldiers had little morale at all. Seeing the Ming warships approaching and menacingly chasing the fleeing coalition fleet, fear could be seen in their eyes.

Lieutenant Colonel Henriquez knew that defeat was inevitable, and it was not the kind of defeat that occurred after united efforts and tenacious resistance, but the kind of defeat that occurred when his soldiers rushed into chaos soon after the war began.

He felt that such a failure was no different from voluntary surrender. It was both disgraceful, so he might as well just surrender.

So after weighing the situation, Henriquez handed over his gun to Zhang Mian and led his troops to surrender.

More than 1000 soldiers stationed in Bali put down their weapons like a child's play. More than 75 Ming army sailors suddenly transformed from prisoners, and seized more than [-] rifles, light machine guns, heavy machine guns, and more than a dozen mortars intact. With four [-]mm field guns.

Not long after, the two Ming army battlecruisers following the pursuit fired the first and a half salvos from the two front turrets.

The sailors were extremely excited - they had been gearing up for so long, let's die!
The triple-mounted 320mm main guns of Yongyuan and Yuanxing roared in unison, aiming directly at the minesweeper Siska 22 kilometers away.

More than 40 seconds later, armor-piercing bullets with dye-marked hoods were dropped one after another!

The strong impact caused the prefabricated cutout of the hood to crack, and the dye filled inside burst out instantly, and the water column splashed by the cannonball was dyed into the corresponding color.

This is done when multiple warships focus fire on the same target, so that the shells fired by each can be easily distinguished, and then corrected according to the impact point without confusion.

The dye-marked bombs launched by the Wing Yuan were yellow, and the light yellow water columns soaring into the sky soaked the clothes of the panicked Dutch sailors in yellow.

Shortly afterwards, Yuanxing's third and a half salvo from such a long distance successfully hit.

For this kind of almost unprotected auxiliary ship, the 320㎜ explosive bomb is highly lethal. The 48㎏ TNT explosive exploded inside it, and flames shot out from everywhere!

Both fleets were sailing at a fast pace, and the distance of more than 128 kilometers made it impossible for the destroyers' [-]mm naval guns to reach them.

The three accompanying destroyers could only watch helplessly as the two battle cruisers rained down artillery fire on the embarrassed enemy fleet, but they also wanted to beat up the drowned dog.

Later, after receiving approval, they eagerly overloaded the engines and caught up at a speed of over 35 knots.

As the distance between the two sides continued to approach, the BDA coalition warships were able to fire back, but to no avail.

The two British destroyers turned around and fired all their remaining torpedoes while releasing a smoke screen. Their actions forced the two battlecruisers to turn to the left to avoid the attack.

The two destroyers sometimes slowed down and fired guns, and sometimes accelerated diagonally to release smoke screens, trying their best to cause trouble for the Ming army's battle patrol.

However, this approach had little effect. The D-class destroyer Diamond was instantly killed by a 320mm shot - the shell detonated the depth charge she carried, directly blowing up the entire stern of the ship.

The gunnery officer of the Yongyuan let out a "ha" and said disdainfully: "The mantis' arm is used as a chariot. It's courageous, but what's the use?"

About half an hour later, a carrier-based aircraft formation taking off from the Taiwei Zuoyuan and Taiwei Youyuan also arrived here.

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[The points for chapter subscription are one for every 200 words. I am used to controlling it to 4000-4199 words for a chapter, which is 20 points, but it is often more, so I will try to delete, delete, modify and shorten it.After thinking about it, I might as well just post a few hundred more words in this chapter or what the writer said. 】

(End of this chapter)