Chapter 633 Fight (2)

How to deal with the current unfavorable situation, the "Otter" and Brouwer at least still have a choice, but the "Victor" and Spikes, whose main mast was broken, have no second choice - in

Under the current war situation, it is almost impossible to escape from here under the fire of coastal defense artillery.

However, Spikes is also an officer who has served in the East India Company for many years. After traveling all over the country for so many years, he has seen a lot of strong winds and waves. Although the current situation is critical, he has not lost his mind because of it. He once participated in the incident seven years ago.

Compared with the siege suffered at that time, the battle between Penghu and the Ming army was not that terrible. The Dutch who were stationed at Magong Port in Penghu thought they were besieged by the Ming army that was ten times their size.

He had no chance to escape. Although the current battle situation was passive, Spikes noticed that the opponent's offensive was only limited to more than a dozen forts on the shore, and there was no matching outflank at sea. Moreover, on the shore

Apart from the firepower of the fort, I didn't see any other movements from the opponent at all.

Spikes believes that there are two possibilities for this. One is that the opponent believes that the fleet can be defeated by the superiority of artillery fire alone and does not bother to use other means to fight. However, this possibility should be very low. As long as the opponent's commander

If your brain is not convulsed, you should not use such a stupid move. Another possibility is that the opponent's strength is limited, and there is no further means of attack except the firepower of the turret. This is interrupted by the opponent's artillery fire.

The main mast of the "Victor" immediately turned to focus fire on the "Otter", and it seemed that there were some clues.

"Send the boat and let the soldiers land!" Spikes made a very bold decision at this juncture: "Send a signal to the Otter and let them land by force!" He did not choose to retreat, but ordered the abandonment

The ship landed and advanced instead of retreating.

Brower on the other boat soon saw the flag signal on his companion's boat. He immediately understood the other party's intention and loudly issued an order to the crew: "Don't stop, keep moving forward! The infantry are ready to land.

!Send a signal to Van Longen behind to move his ship to the side to attract fire!"

Van Longen's several armed merchant ships were originally slightly behind, and the artillery fire fired from the port forts was not aimed at his ships. After the war started, his ships fired a few symbolic cannons, and they were still in a state of soy sauce.

But at this moment, the troop transport ship sent an order for him to move forward. This really made Fan Longgen's heart feel like ten thousand grass and mud horses galloping past - Brother, this is a merchant ship, not a warship!

Resentment is resentment, and Van Longen did not dare to just order his ship to escape first. If he did that, he would have to go to a military court after returning to Batavia, and it would probably affect his family's influence in the Far East.

Van Longen could not bear this big pot of interests. Therefore, he could only follow Brouwer's instructions and order the fleet to cut across the north side of the two troop carriers, so that a gap could be formed between the coastal firepower and the troop carriers.

An obstacle - to put it bluntly, it serves as a shield for the two troop transport ships, giving them a chance to land ashore.

The consequences of this are not difficult to foresee. When an armed merchant ship, which has less firepower and ship plate thickness than a warship, faces this ferocious coastal defense fire, the damage to the ship and personnel will be more serious. However, the military order is like a mountain.

When the battlefield requires these ships to become cannon fodder, the sailors can only move forward with all their lives.

Before the "Otter" was crippled by coastal defense artillery fire, the merchant fleet finally intervened in the middle in time, providing a mobile protective wall for the warship. Van Longen looked at the front row with a heart-wrenching heart.

The ship was hit by cannonballs and saw chips flying everywhere. The ship was an old companion he brought with him from the Netherlands when he came to the Far East more than ten years ago. It had always been very well maintained. Van Longen thought it could still run at sea for at least ten more years.

years, but after this battle, the ship would have to undergo a complete overhaul even if it was not directly scrapped.

Van Longen was anxious. In fact, Mu Xiabai, the commander of the Haihan Militia on the shore, was more anxious than he was. It must be said that the Dutch's response was a little beyond his expectation. He originally thought that under such a fierce artillery attack, the firepower would be obvious.

The disadvantaged Dutch fleet will choose to retreat to preserve its strength. After all, the situation on the shore is still a mystery to the Dutch. They should be more cautious before they find out who their opponent is and how strong they are. But there is absolutely no way.

Thinking of how brave the Dutch were, instead of being frustrated by the artillery fire, they swarmed towards the shore.

Such a reaction greatly disrupted Mu Xiabai's tactical arrangements. He could vaguely feel that he had made mistakes in his previous preparations. Perhaps he should not have cleared the port area in advance, but should have allowed the Dutch fleet to dock first.

Stop the ship on the shore and then launch an attack when it is unprepared. It will not be so easy for the fleet that has lowered its sails and anchored to organize an effective resistance.

But now that the matter has come to this, Mu Xiabai does not expect to have any regrets. At present, the Dutch have made it clear that they are trying to land for combat, and all the Haihan Militia Army, which is not dominant in strength, can do now is to try its best.

The ground will cause more damage to the opponent during the landing phase.

"Order! From Fort No. 6 to No. 6, target those small boats. From Fort No. 6 to No. 12, attack nearby!" Mu Xiabai made a decisive decision and immediately began to change the tactics of the coastal defense fort.

But at this time, the ships struggling to reach the shore have turned into several small boats. With the defender's existing artillery accuracy and firing speed, hitting such a small moving target mainly depends on luck. And this

This time luck did not seem to be on Haihan's side any longer, as all the shells hit the water.

The distance from the paralyzed "Victor" to the shore was only more than 200 meters. It took the Dutch a very short time to complete this thrilling voyage through artillery fire. The first small boat carried 19 Dutch soldiers.

When they arrived at the shore, they scrambled onto the trestle, then rushed to the nearest fort with matchlock guns and long knives, shouting.

Of course, Mu Xiabai was not stupid enough to deploy only artillery for each fort without arranging infantry for cover. In fact, he arranged three platoons of troops in advance and dispersed them to the positions of each fort as guards. On average, each fort

There is a squad of troops everywhere.

This kind of deployment of troops is understandable, because in Mu Xiabai's plan, the opponent probably will not have a good landing opportunity, and even if it does, it will only be a sporadic personnel, and it is unlikely to take advantage of the firepower of the militia at the squad and platoon level.

Cheap. But the Dutch's fighting method really made him stupefied as soon as he came up. Not only did the opponent not retreat in the face of the artillery fire, but someone quickly successfully landed ashore.

The place where the Dutch landed was less than fifty meters away from the nearest fort. Since there were only a dozen Haihan infantry guards here, there was no rotating formation to kill, and the only chance for them to shoot was only one round.

Time. Fortunately, the squad leader who led the troops did not panic. He just asked his subordinates to line up in advance according to the usual training, raised their guns and aimed, and let the Dutch who were charging forward enter the thirty-meter area before giving the order to fire.

As a row of bullets was fired, four or five people fell in the Dutch team, but the remaining people did not stop. These soldiers were not rookies. They had served in the East India Company for many years, and many of them had participated.

Similar to the Battle of Penghu, the Battle of Batavia, and many armed conflicts with the Portuguese for colonies in Southeast Asia, they have rich combat experience. Apart from weapons, their individual combat strength is actually not much worse than that of the Haihan Militia.

Although it seemed that the pirate opponents were surprised to have so many muskets, these people also knew that if they hesitated during the charge, they would leave an opportunity for their opponents to reload, and they would be unlucky then.

Instead, people will be themselves. After charging directly, the musket is actually similar to a fire stick in a face-to-face confrontation, and the chance of killing the opponent is much greater.

After completing the shooting, Officer Haihan immediately ordered everyone to fix their bayonets and maintain their formation to prepare for fighting. The six gunners on the fort also stopped shooting at the sea and turned around to assist the infantry in dealing with this wave of people rushing ashore.

enemy.

The individual weapon used by the artillerymen is a one-foot-two-foot long wooden iron spear. This cold weapon is also a standard weapon and is specially used for close defense after the artillery fire is broken through. The reason why it is not distributed to the artillerymen

Muskets, firstly, considering that the corresponding tactical training of artillery requires a lot of resources, and the cost will be a figure that cannot be ignored, secondly, the staff believes that the enemy who can break through the artillery fire is likely to be a cavalry unit, at close range

A spear is far more convenient for dealing with enemies on horseback than a rifle with a bayonet. Although the war situation on Ambuna Island was not what the staff expected, the close combat combination of a rifle bayonet and a spear is quite effective.

It does work quite well.

The Dutch fired their matchlocks at a distance of twenty meters, but only hit three Haihan soldiers. Although the result was not ideal, they could only bite the bullet and continue to charge forward. At this time,

The Haihan soldiers told them with facts, what it means to be an inch longer and an inch stronger. The Dutch swords were at a disadvantage in front of Haihan's bayonets and spears, and they had no chance to rush to their opponents to fight. Moreover, the Haihan militiamen

The infantrymen have been systematically trained in bayonet fighting. In this kind of chaotic battle, small cooperation of two or three people is obviously more effective than fighting alone. Although the tall and powerful Dutch have an absolute advantage in physical condition,

Still unable to stop this group of enemies with an average height of just over 1.6 meters, they stabbed their bodies with the weapons in their hands.

Just as the first batch of landing Dutch soldiers and the Haihan soldiers were fighting together, the following small boats launched from the "Victor" also arrived at the coast carrying more Dutch people. Mu Xiabai saw this

, had to dispatch the reserve company lurking behind the first line of fire.

But at this time, the Dutch who came ashore had already formed a superior force on the fort that was first besieged. The fort defenders, who only had more than ten people, could only retreat back to the fort first, using the height of the terrain to resist the force that had tripled their strength.

The enemy troops besieged us. When the gap in strength widened to a certain extent, the Haihan Militia's advantages in weapons and tactics were evened out. Soldiers continued to be injured and fell to the ground under the strong attack of the Dutch.

At this time, another Dutch troop transport ship, the "Otter", also stumbled to the shore under the cover of several merchant ships. Two washbasin-sized holes were made by shells near the waterline on the starboard side of the ship.

, with the continuous influx of seawater, the hull of the ship had already tilted significantly. Brouwer drew out his sword and loudly ordered his men to jump directly from the side of the ship into the waist-deep water, and then waded ashore to fight.

The fort where Mu Xia Bai was located was the farthest place from the Dutch landing point, and he could have a panoramic view of the entire battlefield, so he set up his headquarters here. Watching the Dutch continue to come ashore, Mu Xia Bai knew that

The tactics they arranged have failed. The only option now is to abandon the shore defenses and retreat to the second line of defense.

Although the two nearby forts on the left and right had turned their guns in an attempt to provide fire support to the besieged fort, they soon discovered that more and more Dutch appeared on the shore, and had used the nearby forts as

The next attack target.

In order to consider the fire coverage and shooting angle, the twelve forts were arranged along the coastline of the harbor, with a distance of about one kilometer from north to south. However, the strength of the island-defending troops was not enough to carry out such a long fire line.

A full-line defense can only disperse the troops. Judging from today's battle situation, the consequences of this are undoubtedly quite unsuccessful. As long as the enemy lands and breaks through one of the forts, it is almost equivalent to breaking through the entire line of defense.

This serious mistake in tactical arrangement is not Mu Xiabai's fault alone, because the initial defensive arrangement was not his personal intention, but was decided by the staff after considering the local geographical environment and conducting tactical deductions.

Come down, the design plan and tactical arrangements of the fort were all arranged before the attack here, and Mu Xiabai just followed the military orders. But this was undoubtedly a major mistake by the military. The scattered forts wasted lives and money.

It failed to prevent enemy troops from landing, but instead spread the already thin troops defending the island even thinner.

"Send the signal to retreat across the board and move to the second line of defense. The second company will be responsible for the rear!" Mu Xiabo paused and continued: "Dispose of all weapons and ammunition when the artillery withdraws!"

Artillery weighing hundreds of kilograms obviously cannot be evacuated smoothly with the troops, and these things must not fall into the hands of the Dutch, otherwise they will immediately become weapons for the opponent, so Mu Xiabai ordered the artillery.

Get rid of the equipment first and then retreat.
Chapter completed!