"fire!"
"Fire!" As the gunners gave the order, the Hongwu cannons and Yongle cannons installed on the six warships fired in unison!
Amid the earth-shaking roar of rapid artillery fire, rows of orange flames spewed out from the gun ports, and white smoke instantly enveloped the Ming warships.
When shooting again later, the gunners' vision was blocked by the thick smoke and they could hardly see anything. They relied entirely on the shooting parameters that had just been calibrated to keep firing!
Although it was impossible to judge the outcome of the battle for the time being, the gunners were confident and not worried at all about failing to gain any results.
First of all, although there was a level 4 east wind today, because we were fighting in the bay, the sea was still calm and waveless, which greatly reduced the difficulty of shelling.
Furthermore, and most importantly, the gunners of each gun crew are at least third-class police officers, which means they have served for at least four years and have been trained twice at the Coast Guard School.
Every gunner has fired at least 500 shells, and some have even fired thousands of shells. Practice makes perfect!
This was simply unthinkable in Europe. In the West, due to the severe shortage of gunpowder, the king was reluctant to let the navy conduct live ammunition training. The captains consoled themselves with the argument that "it's useless to practice since you can't hit it anyway." Usually, they just practiced firing blanks and became proficient in the movements. As for where they could hit when they really fired, it all depended on God's will.
Only a few captains who are both rich and ambitious will bite the bullet and pay out of their own pockets to buy gunpowder and train their soldiers. But most captains still actively resist involution and resolutely refuse to follow the trend.
The reason for this dilemma is that Europe lacks the raw materials for making gunpowder. In addition to charcoal, they also lack sulfur and saltpeter.
Sulfur was better, at least there were volcanoes in Iceland and Sicily in Northern Europe, so you could always buy it if you spent more money. The most troublesome thing was saltpeter, which was not produced in the whole of Europe. Before the Spanish discovered Chilean saltpeter and the British discovered Indian saltpeter, until the 18th century, it was all made by using human and animal urine to make saltpeter.
The Ming Dynasty was not much better. Although saltpeter was used to purify saltpeter, the output was very touching. But since our Mr. Zhao promoted public toilets in Jiangnan, there is no need to worry anymore. That is the urine of tens of millions of people. Isn't it enough for him to drink a pot of wine?
Moreover, Jiangnan was openly purchasing saltpeter in the name of making fertilizers. Seeing the profit, the southeast, Shandong, Jiangxi and other places also began to spontaneously build public toilets and pile saltpeter for composting. It can be said that the feces and urine of a hundred million people were used to supply one person, so Zhao Hao no longer had to go to Turpan or Bangladesh to look for saltpeter mines.
The saltpeter produced and purchased by the coast guard, security team and Jiangnan Chemical Industry cannot be used up. It can even be used to make fertilizers, ice and cold drinks.
This is the advantage of the only super-populous country in the world. The number of people who pee at Mr. Zhao alone is more than the entire population of Europe combined. This terrifying advantage is something that even the red-haired devils cannot envy...
~~
Well, while they were talking, the sea breeze finally blew away the smoke, and the observers who had locked onto the enemy ships with telescopes rushed to report their battle results!
"Left one blast tail several times!"
"Two left blasts several times!"
"Right one tail blast multiple times!"
"Right two blast tail a little bit!"
The so-called tail explosion means that the shell is fired from the stern of the enemy ship and penetrates the entire hull.
Because the stern is the weakest part of all ships. Once the shell explodes at the stern of the enemy ship, it can not only kill a large number of flesh and blood in the cabin who have nowhere to hide, but also destroy a large number of equipment, such as the stop rope and pulley system, making it impossible for the enemy ship's artillery to reset, and may even break the mast, which will greatly weaken the enemy ship's combat effectiveness.
Therefore, the large sailing ships are very careful to protect their own ships, and usually there are small and medium-sized sailing ships following behind, ready to block bullets for the big brothers at any time.
But Major General Nabamende was only concerned about the situation and ordered all the warships to line up in a single column and attack the Ming fleet that they had driven into a dead end, just like the formation they had deployed in the Battle of Lepanto.
As a result, all Spanish warships, regardless of size, turned their sterns towards the coast guard's battle line.
What's worse is that they are still downwind...
Regarding this situation, Principal Zhao made a clear statement in his book "Tactics of Sailing Naval Warfare" compiled for the Coast Guard School:
'The most important thing in a naval battle is to seize the upper hand, even before seizing the lead. When the strength of the two sides is not much different, if the "Ting Li" side is at a disadvantage, although it can gain a temporary advantage, it is far less than the wind direction advantage of the "Ting Buli" side. Because the fleet at a disadvantage will lose most of its maneuvering space and initiative. Once the formation is broken, it will suffer greater losses and even lose the entire naval battle.'
When Wang Rulong used the enemy's line of sight to be disturbed by the reflection of the sea surface and sent destroyers and frigates to lure the enemy out of the upwind position, and he calmly led the battleships to the upwind firing position in a battle line, the outcome was already determined.
'In the age of sailing warships, the real challenge of naval tactics was whether the attacker could get into firing position under fire.'
This statement also comes from "Tactics of Sailing Naval Battles".
~~
To make matters worse for the Spanish fleet, their galleons, although improved over the caravels...mainly by greatly reducing the height of the bow, but because they were obsessed with boarding battles, their sterns were still as high as buildings.
This made the Spanish galleon much better than the carrack when moving in a straight line, but once it turned, its clumsy and slow posture was exposed again.
The six Seaview battleships in the battle line kept pouring shells at their snail-moving butts as if they were shooting at targets.
Even the destroyers and frigates that served as bait could not hold back and used their range advantage to bombard the Spanish galleons from a distance, causing several headshots.
But because the armor on the bow of a galleon is the thickest and it is also streamlined, the damage from a headshot is far less than that from a tailshot.
Seeing this, Jin Ke, who was commanding the bait fleet, immediately raised flags and ordered the fleet to sail south!
The bait fleet continued to sail along the Bataan Peninsula towards the mouth of the bay. Thanks to the Chinese sails that could catch winds from all directions, these destroyers and frigates, which were already known for their speed, did not sail slowly at all!
This scene left Colonel Okende on the USS San Diego dumbfounded.
He rubbed his eyes hard, unable to believe that the Ming Dynasty warships could perfectly take advantage of the side wind to achieve a considerable speed.
"It turns out that they were not bait to be sacrificed, but they had already planned the retreat route and were confident that they could retreat..." A flash of enlightenment arose in Okende's mind, and then cold sweat broke out on his forehead.
Because he realized that although the battle was small in scale, the damage to the empire was minimal. The Philippine fleet was not even among the top 20 fleets in the huge Spanish navy.
But this defeat was enough to reflect that the empire's once invincible navy was lagging behind in all aspects, including ship design, artillery power, tactical thinking, and even navigation technology!
Just as this thought flashed through his mind, a chain bullet suddenly broke the sail cable at the stern of the Santiago. A taut cable rebounded immediately, and Colonel Oakende was caught off guard and was hit in the back. He flew sideways, hit the guardrail, and bounced back to the side of the frightened Major General Bamond.
The attendants tried to help him up, but his upper body was like cooked noodles and he couldn't stand up straight, and he was spitting out blood in large mouthfuls.
"My spine is broken..." Perhaps it was because of the divine light that enveloped him, he didn't feel any pain at all, and he could still say calmly: "General, the flagship is finished, let's quickly switch to the caravel."
"Why should I go back?" Bamende came to his senses and said in tears, "The family's honor cannot be tarnished by me. I'd better die on the ship."
"You can put all the blame on me. The Governor will definitely be willing to help you." Okende gave him advice.
Bamende thought it made sense, and angrily asked, "You! Are you mocking me?"
"I'm dying, I don't have time to talk nonsense." Oakende glanced at the Saint Domingo, which was probably hit by the gunpowder magazine and exploded, and said with his last strength: "You don't have to feel guilty. I only ask you to do one thing, that is, go back and tell your father, the Duke of Alva, everything you saw. Convince him to persuade His Majesty and His Excellency the Prince not to go to war with the Ming people again before thoroughly reforming the navy..."
"I'm just an illegitimate child..." Bamende lowered his head in shame, seemingly moved by Okende's noble qualities.
"The sinking of four large sailing ships is enough to attract the attention of the bigwigs. We must learn from the Ming Dynasty and reform the sea..." Before he could finish his words, Okende tilted his head and died in the arms of his followers.
"Cut off his head and abandon ship!" Without even looking at him, Bamende hurried down the dangerous stern deck surrounded by his followers and guards.
A guard in full armor chopped off Okende's head with a machete, put it in a cloth bag, and quickly followed him down the stern deck.
He had been gone for only a few minutes when the mizzenmast collapsed with a loud bang, crushing the poop and causing it to collapse completely...
~~
Finally, with the help of his men, Bamond boarded a two-masted caravel named "White Sparrow". With the help of its excellent crosswind performance and high maneuverability, he escaped from the siege under the cover of night.
The White Sparrow was also the only Spanish warship to escape from the Battle of Manila Bay...
The remaining small and medium-sized sailing ships were fully committed to covering the four large sailing ships, and even launched a headwind charge against the Ming fleet. However, they were easily blocked midway by the destroyers that had returned to their positions, and then destroyed or sunk.
As for the Spanish galleons, except for the unfortunate Santo Domingo which exploded, caught fire and sank, the other three, although suffering heavy casualties and with their sails and masts all destroyed, still stubbornly floated on the sea and refused to sink.
To some extent, this also demonstrates the excellence of Spanish shipbuilding technology. In the end, under Jin Ke's persuasion, Lao Wang gave up the plan to burn the three incapacitated warships with rockets, accepted the surrender of Spanish crews and soldiers, and obtained three Spanish galleons with intact hulls except for the broken shells.