Travel through the Qing Dynasty and become emperor

Chapter 696
As soon as he finished speaking, he heard a huge explosion coming from the direction of the hangar.A sudden realization dawned on Binash's face, and he said loudly, "Don't bother, this is a Chinese plane, and what it dropped was a bomb!"

After saying this, he immediately rushed out of the room, went straight to the telecommunications room at the other end of the corridor, and immediately ordered all the staff on duty to send a message in plain code: "The Mannar military port was attacked by air, this is not a drill! I will say it again."

As the dive bombers roared down, Binash called his boss, General Sotheby: "The Chinese are launching an attack!" But his boss said suspiciously: "You shouldn't take this kind of attack." Just kidding about it." It took a lot of talking for Binash to convince Sotheby that he wasn't joking.Immediately after being persuaded, Sotheby yelled at Lieutenant Colonel Cohen, his combat planning staff, "Go, go to the headquarters!"

"General, let me put on my pants anyway." Cohen said while busy putting on his pants.

Sotheby drove away like a bat out of hell.In the sky, there are more and more Chinese war eagles covering the sky and the sun.In just a few minutes, dive bombers destroyed nearly half of the coalition carrier-based aircraft on Adam's Bridge, leaving the hangar in ruins.Coalition soldiers near the airport witnessed the horrific scene: burning planes, hangars burning like forest fires, and hardly a single intact plane left on the tarmac.

When the dive bombers roared towards Adam Bridge, it also attracted the attention of Mountbatten, Commander-in-Chief of the Allied Fleet.He was walking on the quarterdeck of the minelayer USS Oglala, waiting for breakfast before leading the fleet.When he saw a plane flying over and a black object fell from the bomb launcher, he said to himself: "What a stupid and careless pilot, he can't take good care of the bomb launcher."

The bombs dropped from the plane exploded near the water's edge at the southwestern end of Adam's Bridge, causing no damage other than a large splash of mud.However, when the pilot turned sharply to the left and accelerated, Mountbatten saw the sign on the plane. He reacted immediately and shouted: "It's Chinese! Everyone take their places!"

Give an order, and the "Oglala" immediately issued an alarm: "All ships in the port are attacking!"

At this time, the 3rd and 4th Swordfish torpedo fleets launched by the Imperial Navy's "Flying Dragon" and "Cangryu" had already flown directly to the southwest of Adam Bridge.A few seconds later, a pair of torpedoes raced through the shallow water towards the Allied light cruiser "Rayleigh" and the target ship "Longley".With a loud bang, the "Langley" tilted heavily to port and began to capsize.

The commander-in-chief of the light cruiser "Rayleigh" at first thought it was a routine air strike exercise and ordered the anti-aircraft gunners to prepare for battle. However, at this moment, a torpedo hit the ship's waterline steel plate, Seawater poured into the former engine room and boiler rooms 1 and 2.The captain was awakened by the sound of the explosion. Wearing red pajamas, he rushed to the rear deck, and the first thing he saw were those big red balls.He quickly understood what had happened, and ordered the anti-aircraft guns on the "Rayleigh" to fire.At this time, the "Rayleigh" began to tilt heavily to the port side, and after anti-overturning water injection, the ship continued to tilt.The captain immediately organized rescue to prevent capsizing.

At 8:[-], another torpedo splashed down between the French warships "Marseille" and "Rayleigh". Fortunately, the torpedo plunged into the mud without causing any harm.Gao Zhihang flew over the Adam Bridge, trying to hit the French ship "Konya" in the dock.However, when he saw that the mooring slipway might block the torpedo, he threw the torpedo at the "Oglala", as if to make up for the mistake of not hitting the "Marseille" just now, the torpedo was thrown from the "Oglala". "" passed through the bottom of the ship, hit the light cruiser "Helena" and exploded, and a torpedo damaged two warships at the same time.

The powerful explosive force lifted the metal floor of the boiler room of the "Oglala", tore the port hull, and the torpedo exploded three times in succession under the "Helena".A strong explosion on the starboard side shook the hull back and forth.

At this time, the combat duty officer was making a brief report to Abhishek, commander of the Indian Naval Command in Mannar, when a sergeant suddenly rushed into Abhishek's office and shouted: "The signal tower is signaling that the Chinese are attacking Manar." Nar Naval Port!"

Abhishek's heart rose to his throat, and he rushed out of the house, buttoning up his white military jacket as he ran.On the lawn next to Abhishek's office, the battleship group in the opposite harbor can be clearly seen.Abhishek stood there dumbfounded and watched, only to see the Chinese aircraft circle in a figure-eight shape and throw torpedoes at the warship.He could clearly see the five-clawed golden dragon logo on the wing of the plane.Abhishek's face showed an unbelievable and shocked expression. His distorted face was as pale as the white uniform on his body, and he murmured: "This is not a whim launched by some trek planes." The sky is densely packed with enemy planes."

He stared in the direction of his beloved warships as Chinese bombers swooped past them like bats.He saw the terrifying scene of the "Rahiva" being thrown out of the water and then sinking again. Like a movie out of control, scenes flashed before Abhishek's eyes at such a fast speed that people couldn't see clearly and had no time to think. .

In this sneak attack on Mannar, China identified the main targets of the attack as the aircraft carrier and battleships of the United Fleet. Since the aircraft carrier was not in the port, the eight battleships parked in the port became the targets of concentrated attack by aircraft. Seven of the eight battleships are moored on the channel called "Battleship Avenue" between Adam Bridge and the Indian Navy Factory. From southwest to northeast, they are: "Marseille", "Rayleigh" and "Konya" , "Oglala" and "Helena", "Manchester", "Liverpool".

The other battleship was Abhishek's flagship, the Rahiva, moored in the southern Naval Shipyard dock.In the north and west of Adam Bridge, there are light and heavy cruisers, destroyers, and various work ships.

The Swordfish torpedo fleet approached the "Battleship Avenue" at an ultra-low altitude, and carried out close-in bombing of the giant battleships lying quietly on the water.I saw an aerial warhawk flying across the sea surface, firing special shallow-water torpedoes with stable tail fins one after another at a very low altitude from the sea surface, and saw blue and white mine trails criss-crossing on the sea surface, galloping towards the parked battleship.Immediately, there was a continuous bang from the side of the ship, water jets rose everywhere, and flames shot up into the sky!

Five minutes after the air strike started, the coalition warships and the anti-aircraft guns on the coast began to fight back, and the dense artillery fire formed a dense barrage in front of the fighter plane's course.At this time, Shen Debian led the horizontal bomber team to the sky above the port. He suddenly felt his plane shake as if hit by a big stick, and hurriedly asked what was going on.The observer sitting in the back reported: "The left side of the fuselage was pierced by shrapnel, half of the rudder was damaged, but it can still fly."

At the risk of the plane crashing, Shen Debian still instructed the guide plane to target the battleship "Liverpool", which was parked on the inside and could not be attacked by torpedoes.After giving the order to drop the bomb, he decided to observe the bombing effect himself.At this moment, he forgot that he was commanding the whole army to fight, and also forgot to avoid the enemy's anti-aircraft artillery fire. He was fascinated by the thrill of that moment.He saw that shortly after the bomb left the plane, it became smaller than a bean and finally disappeared.Looking at the deck of the "Liverpool", it was as big as a laundry tub, and then, like dust bouncing off a carpet, two puffs of white smoke rose from the deck.

"Two bombs hit!" Shen Debian shouted excitedly.

Under the crazily onslaught of the Chinese warhawks, the eight battleships, the backbone of the United Fleet, suffered fatal blows: the battleship "Liverpool" was hit by two armor-piercing bombs with delayed fuzes. There are large layers of ripples.As the two bombs penetrated the armor and exploded inside the ship, the ship suffered considerable damage.The hull tilted 8 meters, a fire ignited on the ship, and thick smoke billowed.

Under the concentrated attack of the torpedo fleet, the "Rayleigh" was hit by 12 torpedoes one after another. Lie down and plunge into the water.Many sailors lay prone on the hard-to-stand hull, afraid of falling into the burning sea of ​​fire.Fortunately, there was the "Liverpool" beside the ship's side. Although the ship had also been shot and burned, it had not yet capsized. Therefore, many people lying on the hull of the "Rayleigh" climbed onto the "Liverpool" with the help of their partners. number, but more people sank to the bottom of the sea with the ship.On the second day after the ship sank, ambulance personnel used welding torches and steam hammers to open several gaps in the hull of the overturned "Rayleigh", rescued the crew trapped in the cabin, and rescued 32 people. However, although those crew members who were far away from the gap shouted in the cabin, the ambulance personnel outside could not hear them.When they realized that outsiders could not come to save them, they wrote their names and suicide notes on the partition with chalk, and then died slowly and painfully.

The "Konya" was hit by two torpedoes, and the heavy oil depot on the ship caught fire. In order to prevent the ammunition depot from exploding, the captain ordered the ammunition depot to be filled with water.Unexpectedly, this action exacerbated the heeling and sinking of the giant ship.In desperation, the captain ordered to abandon the ship.However, how to leave the ship has become a big problem, because on the water surface around the "Konya", a layer of heavy oil up to 30 centimeters thick is burning. Without being burned to death, you can only swim out under the oil layer, which is difficult for ordinary people to do.As the "Konya" slowly sank, most of the crew members struggling in the sea of ​​​​fire were burned to death.

(End of this chapter)