Chapter 2125
If the capture of Tagawa Nanzaemon cannot be completed, it will be difficult for the war launched by Kaihan to achieve all its intended goals. Even if most of the armed forces of the Hirado Domain are eliminated, there will still be people left behind. Worrying about the consequences is not perfect after all.
Shi Diwen is currently unable to verify whether the information confessed by Shota Ishimura is completely true, but he intuitively believes that the credibility should be quite high. And logically speaking, it was precisely because Tagawasuke sent Tagawa Nanzaemon and his son out of Hirado overnight that Wei Zhi realized that Hirado was in danger under the Kaihan offensive, so he took the risk and tried to lure him away. The Kaihan Fleet was launched to relieve the pressure on Hirado Port. If not, the Hirado Navy could continue to hide in the secret port on Shanda Island in the north and wait patiently for a better time to go to war.
However, the Hirado Navy took the risk and paid a heavy price to try to lure the Haihan Fleet away from the Hirado Strait. Shi Diwen believed that this seemed to prove the opponent's incompetence. If the Hirado clan still had some killer moves on the island that it had not used yet, it probably would not have released its navy to carry out such a mission that was tantamount to seeking death.
However, we cannot be completely optimistic about the trend of the war because of this. It is not clear whether Tagawa Nanzaemon, who was sent to Kyushu overnight, is responsible for the task of moving rescue troops. If Kyushu organizes troops to come to rescue Hirado, Size is also a problem for the coalition forces.
Although there is a big gap between the armed level and combat capabilities of these Japanese armies compared to Haihan, Haihan had no plans to fight Japan in the first place, and further expanding the scale of the war was not what Haihan wanted. Moreover, this place is a rootless place for the Haehan Army. Most of the combat supplies have to be transferred from Jeju Seogwipo Port hundreds of miles away and then transported here. If the war process is slowed down, the combat pressure on the coalition forces will It will get bigger and bigger, and eventually it may even be forced to retreat on its own.
Since there is currently no feasible means to immediately capture Tagawa mother and son from Kyushu, in order to guard against this possibility that is detrimental to the coalition forces, Shi Diwen believes that the next military operation must be accelerated.
That afternoon, Shi Diwen took a small boat and landed near Onomura on the east coast of Hirado Island. Along with him were Simang and Shen Xueyi, who were watching the battle on the flagship today. They were allowed to observe most of the combat meetings in this operation. Naturally, they also wanted to know the next steps Haihan would take after today's victory over the Hirado Navy. Therefore, they knew that Shi Diwen was going to fight with Qian Tiandun. After meeting to discuss the next battle plan, they all followed.
After Shi Diwen and Qian Tiandun met, they first informed each other of the immediate war situation on the east and west coasts and on land. When Shi Diwen learned that the main force of the Hirado Navy had appeared on the west coast today, he immediately understood why his opponent would first send a fleet to the east coast to show off.
"They took a dozen boats out as bait and wanted us to focus all our attention on the Hirado Strait...The opponent is planning to steal your army's retreat!" Shi Diwen said with a smile: "But they I probably didn't expect that we still have an armed fleet ambushing in the west. It's a pity that Xu Yuzhuo was a little slow, otherwise we would have taken over the Hirado navy today with a two-pronged attack on the east and west coasts. "
Qian Tiandun said: "Judging from the movements on the west coast, I don't think the Japanese want you to destroy those dozens of ships and sacrifice them. It's just an operational error. I didn't expect you to chase them out in one go." After dozens of miles, luring the enemy turned into delivering food to your door, allowing you to harvest a lot.”
Shi Diwen thought about it and readily admitted that Qian Tiandun's speculation should be closer to the truth. The main force of the Hirado naval force appeared on the west coast to counterattack Boxiang Bay and sneak attack on the coalition's logistics supply line. However, although there was another fleet attracting firepower on the east coast, this main fleet, said to be commanded by the Eighteen Shiba Yu Party, was still very powerful. Be careful, if you realize something is wrong, you won't even try to engage in battle, but just turn around and run away.
With such a cautious performance, it is obvious that the commander of the Hirado navy has not made up his mind to fight to the death with the coalition forces, so there is no reason to let the fleet responsible for luring the enemy on the eastern front die in vain. This is actually consistent with Shi Diwen's previous interrogation of Shota Ishimura. The confessions obtained were consistent. From this point of view, the East China Sea Fleet was able to achieve this result in the morning, indeed thanks to Shi Diwen's decisive decision, so that the naval fleet that originally only planned to take a circle outside the Hirado Strait was beaten and unable to find its way north. .
Qian Tiandun then said: "But that kid, Tagawa...what the hell."
"Tagawa Nanzaemon." Takahashi Minami reminded softly.
He has always stood beside Qian Tiandun. Even though he is fully qualified to have a chair of his own in a combat meeting of this level, he still sticks to his years of habit, calling himself an adjutant and insisting on participating in the meeting standing up.
Of course, as the leader of the special operations group, he was standing in the meeting. It was natural that other naturalized officers with the same rank and position as him would not be able to sit down. So in the meeting tent, except for Qian Tiandun and Shi Diwen, In addition, only Xi Mang and Shen Xueyi, who were observing as military observers, were sitting, while everyone else was standing.
Qian Tiandun suddenly understood, nodded and said: "This man escaped to Kyushu. It is estimated that it will be difficult for us to catch him this time. The top priority is to try to solve the problem in Hirado City as soon as possible. If we can do our best, After wiping out the effective strength of the Hirado clan army and clearing out the other Eighteen Shiba Remaining Party members, even if one Tagawa Nanzaemon escapes, he should not have enough strength to make a comeback.”
Shi Diwen said: "The leader of the navy captured today, he handed over a list of important figures in the Hirado clan. We can combine it with the information we currently have and use it during the subsequent arrest process."
Through the reconnaissance operations on the Hirado Domain before the war began, Amakusa Shiro had collected a list of important local figures in the Hirado city area for the purpose of capturing targets when attacking the Hirado Domain. After that, a coup occurred in Hirado. After Tagawasuke took office, he first purged a group of retainers loyal to the previous feudal lord, and then supported a group of his own subordinates to rise to power. Therefore, the list of important figures has actually been made during this period. There have been changes, and the list obtained by Shi Diwen through interrogation is undoubtedly more timely.
Shi Diwen handed the transcribed list to Qian Tiandun. The list not only contained the names and positions of the target persons, but also specifically marked those who were from Shibazhi. It can be seen that Shi Diwen was interrogating the prisoners today. A lot of thought was put into the process. Qian Tiandun looked at the list carefully. There were more than 20 people listed on it, including the current feudal lord Tagawasuke, who were all civil and military officials in charge of various affairs. Among them, the special personnel whose origins were marked accounted for more than half of the total, which shows how much Tagawasuke relied on these 18 Shi Yu Party members. Given time, it is not impossible for these people to turn the Hirado Domain into the second Shiba Shiba.
However, they were still a little too hasty. If they lurk for a few more years, stay in Japan and slowly recruit troops to expand their strength, and try not to let Haihan notice their existence, they may indeed be able to take the initiative to provoke Haihan in the future, but now Even though he was still a fledgling, he was already attacked by the Fujian Xu family army gathered by Haihan. The strength of both sides is clear. Regardless of whether Tagawa Shichizaemon is eventually caught, in fact, the possibility of the Hirado Domain's comeback is extremely slim.
"Since our opponents have already started to run away, let's launch a general attack as soon as possible to avoid long nights and unforeseen consequences. If it takes a little longer for Tagawa Suke to escape with his people," Qian Tiandun expressed his intention after reading the list. Opinion: "It's getting late today. Let's make preparations and launch an attack early tomorrow morning!"
"Then I will show my true skills tomorrow and won't save my strength!" After Shi Diwen won a big victory today, he was planning to pursue the victory and immediately agreed with Qian Tiandun's proposal.
The East China Sea Fleet's offensive against Hirado Port has never used all its strength, but deliberately used this method to drag down the opponent so that the army could calmly implement the landing. The East China Sea Fleet maintained pressure on Hirado Port, and the Hirado clan army did not dare to easily transfer the artillery deployed at the port to other battlefields. This also reduced the combat risk of the special battle group in disguise.
Although Shi Diwen said that he would show his true capabilities, it will still be difficult for the navy to attack Hirado Port. Although the performance of the coastal defense guns deployed by the Hirado clan at the port is limited, they can still attack the sea at close range. The Han warships caused relatively large damage, and this would be a unnecessary battle loss for Haihan. Therefore, the special forces under Qian Tiandun will actually be responsible for the main attack mission next. As long as they attack the Hirado Port area from land, they will not attack the coastal defense fortifications to resist the Haihan Army from landing at the port. Broken.
After setting the general direction, the next step is to deploy specific combat plans for each force. Currently there are two battalions of the Special Forces Regiment stationed in Ono Village, serving as the main force heading north along the official road to attack Hirado City. Another battalion of the special operations group stationed near Boxiang Bay will pass through the mountains and forests north of Hirado City, launch an offensive from north to south, and form a north-south pincer attack with the troops starting from Ono Village. However, due to the limited marching environment of the Northern Route Army, it was difficult for heavy weapons such as artillery to move with the army.
The Fujian Navy in charge of the west coast will continue to perform its current mission and guard Boxiang Bay without leaving the Hirado Navy an opportunity to launch a counterattack. This is probably not good news for Xu Yuzhuo, but if the Hirado navy is not wiped out for a day, the coalition forces will not dare to be careless for a day. They still have to leave enough maneuverability to prevent the opponent from suddenly coming out at a certain moment.
Simang once again reminded the two Haihan generals at the end of the meeting, hoping that they could protect the local Portuguese people after conquering Hirado City and avoid being directly involved in the war as much as possible.
Although the shogunate had previously restricted the Portuguese to leave Hirado and could only go to Nagasaki to engage in foreign trade activities, in fact there were still some Portuguese who had settled in Hirado for a long time and did not choose to leave. These people continued to carry out trading activities more or less secretly, and were still of relatively important value to the Portuguese colonial authorities.
Since Haihan had already made it clear that he would not occupy Hirado after the war, the Portuguese colonial authorities believed that preserving the local Portuguese people would be conducive to obtaining more benefits from the local area after the war, not only economic gains, but also It may be benefits from the political field, such as getting some commitments and concessions from the Hirado domain officials who are eager to implement post-war reconstruction and stabilize the foreign trade market, allowing Portugal to obtain more trade shares and special treatment from Hirado. .
If we think further, the purpose of Kaihan's trip is to attack the Eighteen Shiba Yu Party and the Hirado clan official who colluded with it. After these people who gained the power of rule are defeated by Kaihan, there will definitely be a certain degree of chaos in Hirado. A power vacuum. Perhaps the Portuguese colonial authorities could take advantage of this gap and support pro-Portuguese candidates to take over Hirado.
Of course, in order to take measures in this relatively sensitive area, Ximang had to find time to communicate with the two Haihan generals alone. If he failed to get the nod of approval from the Haihan people, then Ximang would not dare to carry out such an operation without authorization, lest he offend his allies.
In comparison, Shen Xueyi does not have any special tasks. There are no Korean businessmen in Hirado, and there is no actual interest for the North Korean country. Shen Xueyi does not need to provide special protection to someone in this place, or Strive for some special treatment for North Korea. With nothing to do, Shen Xueyi was happy to sit on the sidelines and concentrate on studying the tactics of the Haihan Army.
However, he also noticed that even if he attended the combat meeting of the Haihan Army, it was difficult to simply imitate the tactics adopted. The Haihan Army can control a large area with an organization similar to a platoon or a company, but this is difficult for the North Korean army to do. Once the combatants are dispersed, it is unlikely that the Haihan Army can still guarantee Fighting ability.
Due to various reasons, Shen Xueyi was not among the first batch of officers sent by North Korea to study in Haihan, but he had a special background. If he was only considering his future career, he would not have to go all the way to Haihan to get gold. However, after staying in the Haihan Army for a long time, Shen Xueyi gradually felt that his knowledge was insufficient and he could not fully understand and appreciate the essence of the Haihan Army's tactical command system. He knew that these things could only be learned by studying abroad in Haihan Country, so it seemed that he had to find a way to arrange them.
In the afternoon of that day, the Haihan Army stationed in Ono Village advanced about three or four miles north. The main purpose of taking this action was to test the enemy's defense range and strength. However, the Hirado clan army did not make a relatively strong resistance. They only sent a few hundred people to symbolically try to stop the Haihan army with bows, arrows and muskets. advance, but such measures obviously cannot deter the well-informed special operations group.
(End of chapter)