Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 539 Concentrated Escort ([-])

"Play music!" As the officers and soldiers of the First Fleet of the Navy set foot on the military dock of Dongfang Port, the military band immediately played cheerful music.Even though he was quite displeased with this kind of ostentation, Lieutenant Colonel Lu Ming couldn't take everyone's heart away, so he buried his thoughts deep in his heart, put on a smile, and cheerfully accepted the invitation from the military department and the executive committee. Congratulations from the officials.

"This land-sea joint attack on the port of Buenos Aires wiped out the enemy's La Plata fleet, sank five enemy ships, captured three ships below the enemy's flagship, and nearly 200 naval officers and soldiers. This is the greatest victory in a naval battle since then. Commander Lu, this battle is meticulously planned and commanded freely, and this is the first credit." Liao Meng, Minister of the Army, who is acting as the chief of the general staff of the National Armed Forces, tightly held Lu Ming's hands, with an enthusiastic expression on his face. Said.

"Chief of Staff Liao praised it. This battle depends on the lives of the soldiers. Especially the army soldiers who captured the fort, they captured the Spanish fort regardless of casualties, and turned their guns to bombard the military port, causing the Spaniards to be in chaos and two ships to run aground , The momentum of rushing forward in a group was also broken up by the arson boat floating down from the upper reaches. Therefore, I really dare not take the lead, and Chief of Staff Liao can understand." Lu Ming gently pulled out his hand, shook his head and said with a smile.

"Commander Lu is really humble." Liao Meng smiled awkwardly, and then said, "Anyway, now that the Spanish fleet has been destroyed, our ships can cross the Rio de la Plata without anyone being able to stop them. We can do it in the next step." Mobilize heavy troops to completely occupy the entire La Plata region including Asunción, and then threaten the Spanish silver mines in Potosí."

"It's easy to start a war, but it's hard to end it." Lu Ming no longer had a perfunctory smile on his face. He sighed and said, "The Spaniards' war potential is far greater than ours. They have more than four hundred people in the Old Continent." million people; they have multiple shipyards in Seville, Barcelona, ​​Valencia, Cadiz, Havana, Veracruz, Cartagena, Lima, etc., with countless technicians and workers; they are in New Spain China, Peru, and Chalkas have multiple gold and silver mines; they also have a vote of Catholic allies; this kind of strength is not comparable to the weak east coast. Even if we win for a while, so what, the Spaniards can escalate the war! Spain Whether people are willing to end the war depends on their mood, can our East Coast Republic really control our own destiny in this war? I don't see it!"

Watching Lu Ming board the carriage, he headed towards the city without looking back.Liao Meng's face was gloomy at first, but he quickly adjusted his mood again, and continued to meet the naval officers who came over one by one with a smile on his face.The ages of these officers vary, and their origins are also quite complicated. Some of them are pirates recruited in the Caribbean, some are poor guys from Shandong fishermen, some are officers from a nautical school, and some are naval cadets trained by Corps Fort. No matter where they come from, There is a huge difference in background. At this moment, although each of them is accepting the Shangguan's praise with a tense face, the look of excitement in their eyes is fully revealed.

Once the La Plata fleet is destroyed, the dominance of this sea area will be firmly in the hands of the people on the east coast.No, within half a month since October, a large number of small inland steamboats have been dispatched to the La Plata and Parana River basins in the country to transport spoils, materials and personnel.According to statistics, the inland water transport company has dispatched about 40 small 72-ton inland river steamers to the above-mentioned two places to undertake transportation tasks, and this has naturally led to an extreme shortage of domestic transportation capacity. Various materials such as coal, building materials, wood, etc. The flow of grain and cotton began to slow down.The war has just begun, and the negative effects on the economy have slowly begun to emerge.

Since the relationship with the Spaniards has tightened, the domestic production capacity of three shipyards has been expanded again.Currently the largest Zhenhai Shipyard has 9 slipways, Dayuhe Naval Shipyard has 6 slipways, and Hyundai Special Shipyard has 5 slipways. At the same time, it has also recruited a large number of junior high school graduates. Graduates also joined in, plus a small number of ordinary craftsmen with little technical culture, and only then did the three factories barely operate.

The berths of the three factories are currently almost all types of steam engine sailing ships, because only this kind of ships can get rid of the tracking and attacks of hostile sea forces - relying on their impressive speed.Among them, there are three steam engine sailboats for immigration, three special immigration ships, and three large flying shear transport ships (the "Scud" modification with steam engines); two ammunition supply ships for the First Fleet, two A water supply ship, a troop carrier, a coal carrier, and a repair ship; in addition, the executive committee used the few remaining Brazilian mahogany to start building a battleship again, and used the wood brought back by Xinhua Construction began on two frigate gunboats; of course, a dredger and a whaling ship were built for domestic development - even in the war years, it cannot be said that construction was not carried out.

In order to make up for the sailors needed by these ships, the executive committee asked the 36th Bingtuanbao students who were supposed to graduate at the end of the year to graduate early. There are about 200 of them are specially trained sailors; The gates for the Malays to enter the mainland on the east coast were opened, and about 300 Malay sailors who were considered qualified after a long investigation were granted official identification. They will join the newly launched transport ships as bottom sailors; A small number of fishermen and sailors, the new graduates of Dayuhe Nautical School and the new graduates of Luocha Seaman School, total about [-] people; and then randomly recruit some young people who have been on ships as trainee sailors , can barely fool it.

So far, the executive committee has almost spent all the funds at hand.If the trade is cut off next year, the country will be in trouble. We can't support war with war, right?

And when all shipyards and technicians are concentrating on building these big ships, they naturally have no spare capacity to build small inland river steamboats that are also in great domestic demand.At present, there are 72 small inland river steamships sailing in various canals, lakes, and offshore waters in China, all of which are 66 tons in size. They undertake the extremely heavy inland river transportation tasks in China.It's just that almost 40 ships have been transferred to the La Plata River and the Parana River to transport materials and personnel, so the domestic transportation capacity is seriously insufficient.Insufficient transport capacity affects all aspects of the economy, in short, it is harmful.

The carriage carrying Lu Ming quickly entered the administrative building of the Executive Committee in the city.After thanking the coachman, Lu Ming went up to the second floor and entered the conference room surrounded by his secretary and guards.At this time, the conference room was filled with smoke, and a meeting related to future decision-making was going on.The meeting had already entered the middle stage. At this time, after seeing Lu Ming enter the venue, the 11 members of the Central Committee headed by the chairman of the executive committee Liu Weimin and some ministers and directors present stood up and applauded, applauding for the man who annihilated Spain. The commander-in-chief of the La Plata fleet applauded.

Lu Ming smiled unnaturally, and after the military salute, he found a seat in the back row and sat down.Not long after he disembarked, he was notified to attend a meeting of the executive committee, saying that Chairman Liu of the executive committee had some "very important" questions to consult with him.

But as soon as he sat down, Liu Weimin cleared his throat and said: "As for the planned production management committee's plan to re-use the sealed 35-ton old-style steamboat and the plan to build a new No. 2 blast furnace in Ping'an Iron and Steel Plant, everyone No objection? Then let’s discuss the next topic, the transfer of the battleship Bayezid to the Ottoman Empire.”

In recent months, there has been a lot of ups and downs about the battleship "Bayezid".There were calls within the Ministry of the Navy to temporarily detain the warship and undergo a major steam reform to join the East Coast Navy. However, the Executive Committee rejected the request of the Ministry of the Navy after careful consideration.On the one hand, the sailors sent by the Ottoman Empire to pick up the ship have already stationed in Dongfang Port. You directly confiscated the guys who eat, so it’s no wonder if there is no trouble; It is obviously extremely unwise to offend the Ottoman Empire, the first trading partner of the East Coast Republic.Under such circumstances, the executive committee decided to hand over the warship to the Ottomans.

It's just that handing over the battleship is handing over the battleship, and it's over if they drive back by themselves?Of course things are not that simple!

It has been more than a month since the official war with the Spaniards, and the Spaniards’ ships to deliver news to the mainland should have set off long ago. At most, the king of Spain will learn about the ongoing war in the New World by mid-to-late December.At this time, merchant ships heading to the Old Continent on the east coast were in danger of being attacked by the Spanish navy. Therefore, the centralized escort system was mentioned again, and it was quickly approved by the Executive Committee.

The so-called centralized escort means that all merchant ships gather at a designated location, and then go to their destination under the escort of naval warships.In this way, the safety factor is greatly improved, and the danger of a single ship being attacked by hostile forces at sea is avoided, because it is obviously impossible for the navy to equip every transport ship with a warship escort.Of course, the size of the fleet under the centralized escort system will also become very large, and it will easily attract the attention of the enemy's navy, resulting in a large-scale naval battle, but this is also impossible.

Right now, there are many merchant ships moored in Dongfang Port waiting to depart. They have already loaded their cargo, but they have not been allowed to leave the port. The reason is that the main force of the Navy's First Fleet has not yet returned from La Plata.Now that the Navy has returned with a big victory, it is natural to set off for the Old Continent.The destination of their trip is the port of Smyrna in the Ottoman Empire, and they will go on the same road with the battleship "Bayezid", and they can set off together.

(End of this chapter)