Chapter 3617
From the first day of this civil war, the battle over control of the Kanmon Strait has never stopped.
In order to win the naval battle, in addition to mobilizing all the warships under their command, both warring parties also purchased a large number of warships from Haihan and put them into battle. According to incomplete statistics, there are probably hundreds of warships that have been sunk in the waters of the Kanmon Strait since the war began, and a considerable number of them are the Haihan warships that they purchased with a lot of money.
However, in the competition of financial, human and material resources, after all, the shogunate had the advantage. The number of ships the shogunate army invested in the Strait battlefield was obviously one level more than that of the Kyushu Allied Forces. Therefore, it slowly gained the upper hand in the war of attrition and gradually controlled the Kanmon Strait. And pushed the front to the land of Kitakyushu.
The fleet of the Kyushu Allied Forces is limited in size, and the speed of replenishing warships from Haihan is slow. In a war of attrition, they will ultimately be unable to defeat their opponents. In order to preserve their strength, the Kyushu Allied Forces could only choose to withdraw the remaining combat ships and only perform some tasks of delivering troops and long-range raids, and no longer entered the strait to confront the shogunate forces head-on.
At this stage of the war, the shogunate army has become accustomed to treating the Kanmon Strait as its own control area. However, the Kyushu Allied Forces suddenly gathered the main force of the fleet to fight back here again. And judging from this menacing posture, it seems that they are going to start a fight with the shogunate army. Decisive battle at sea.
This unusual movement of the Kyushu Allied Forces was naturally linked by the generals of the Shogunate Army to the current situation, and the conclusion drawn from it also made them shudder - the other party is now desperately trying to consume the maritime power of the Shogunate Army, with only one purpose. , that is, cutting off the Kanmon Strait waterway so that the shogunate army can no longer mobilize troops across the strait.
To put it more bluntly, the Kyushu Allied Forces' charge regardless of the cost was to cut off the retreat route of the shogunate troops stationed in Kitakyushu.
After realizing this possibility, the shogunate army in the Kitakyushu camp suddenly became commotion. Let’s not talk about whether we can withdraw to Honshu across the strait. Even the current combat supplies all need to be transported across the strait. Once the strait channel is interrupted, the camp’s supplies can only last ten days and a half at most.
As for whether the Kyushu Allied Forces really have the strength to destroy the maritime power deployed by the shogunate army here, not many people will think about it at this juncture. After all, these warships and cargo ships were all mobilized from various vassals in the country, and most of them were not under the jurisdiction of the shogunate. Now that the Tokugawa Ietsuna has lost contact, their owners will inevitably have thoughts of preserving their strength.
At this time, it was not only the shogunate troops on both sides of the strait who were paying attention to the battle at sea. Shi Diwen and his son, who came to the front line to watch the battle, and several Kyushu daimyo were also very nervous.
The goal of this battle was very clear, which was to cause panic in the shogunate army. However, Shi Diwen and several daimyo were not completely sure whether they could repel the enemy fleet near the strait.
If the shogunate's fleet was not affected by these previous rumors and wanted to fight to the death with the Kyushu Allied Forces, then the few dozen remaining warships of the Kyushu Allied Forces might all be handed over here. Before receiving the next batch of warships from Haihan, the Kyushu Allied Forces will lose the ability to fight at sea, which is equivalent to opening the entire Kyushu coastline to the shogunate army.
But if you don't take this risk, you will miss the great opportunity to defeat the shogunate army. Once Tokugawa Ietsuna responds to this series of measures to demoralize the military and allows the shogunate army to re-adjust their state, it will be difficult for the Kyushu Allied Forces to create such a fighter plane again.
Fortunately, the shogunate army was obviously no longer monolithic after losing Tokugawa Ietsuna's command. Seeing the Kyushu Allied Forces entering the strait, some warships not only did not take the initiative to engage in the battle, but began to turn around and withdraw from the battlefield. .
Even if the Tokugawa family's warships waved flags and asked the entire army to attack, there were still many warships belonging to other feudal lords who deliberately pretended to be blind and only circled around the outside of the battlefield without any intention of going forward to fight. In the current environment, as long as someone takes the initiative, others will soon follow. It is clear that the shogunate army has hundreds of ships with combat capabilities inside and outside the strait, but at this time, there are only more than 20 ships flying the Tokugawa flag taking the initiative to fight. The other ships are deliberately dragging behind to wait and see the situation.
This strange situation was of course also reflected in the eyes of the shogunate troops watching the battle on both sides of the strait. Thousands of people witnessed the blatant division of their own camp. I don’t know how many people had the idea of retreating at this moment.
On the other hand, the morale of the Kyushu Allied Forces has been greatly boosted. The situation in front of them is just as what the various daimyo said to them before going to the battle. Although the shogunate fleet is larger, the army is distracted at the moment and does not have much thought to devote to the battle. As long as it fights to the death, This battle can completely defeat the shogunate fleet.
For the Kyushu Allied Forces, there is no retreat option in this battle, and all the famous names have promised huge profits before the battle. As long as this battle is won, all the naval officers and soldiers participating in the battle will receive generous rewards.
When they meet on a narrow road, the brave will win. With the huge difference in morale between the two sides, the balance of the battle has clearly shifted towards the side of the Kyushu Allied Forces regardless of the cost.
The warships of the Kyushu Allied Forces almost all rushed directly into the formation of the shogunate fleet, frantically getting close to the opponent's warships and firing, completely ignoring their own damage. And this crazy life-fighting tactic made it even more difficult for the shogunate fleet, which was already worried, to resist.
Seeing the warships of the shogunate fleet being hit by artillery fire one after another, the ships watching on the periphery lost the desire to step forward to help in the battle. The advanced warships purchased from Haihan could not withstand such a level of firefight, and their old-fashioned Anzhai ships were only used to deliver food.
After losing seven or eight ships one after another, the shogunate fleet realized that the friendly forces would not participate in the battle and could no longer withstand the crazy offensive of the Kyushu Allied Forces, so they decisively chose to retreat from the battlefield.
As the shogunate fleet withdrew, the friendly forces who were watching the situation did not dare to fall behind and quickly turned around and sailed out of the strait to avoid becoming the culprit who helped the shogunate fleet fall behind.
The Kyushu Allied Forces pursued the enemy retreating from the west side of the strait for dozens of miles. Seeing that the enemy still had no intention of turning back and fighting, they raised a signal flag and retreated.
The most dumbfounded people at this time were of course the shogunate troops who were still watching the battle on both sides of the Taiwan Strait. Most people never expected that this sea battle would turn out to be one-sided. After a brief battle, the shogunate fleet was driven out of the strait by the Kyushu fleet, leaving only a dozen ships still burning. Warship wreckage.
So the question is, after losing control of the Kanmon Strait, how should the shogunate's more than 20,000 troops currently stationed in the Kitakyushu camp deal with such a situation.
Chapter illustrations are generated by the AI software provided by the writing background. I tried it out and found it to be a good auxiliary function. This function requires the author to provide a special text description, and there is a limit on the number of times it can be used per day, so it is not available in every chapter and will be used depending on the content of the chapter.
It would have been nice if this feature had been released a few years earlier. I feel like many of the chapters with scenes in this book could have been useful.