For a battleship like the "Musashi", the explosion of the anti-ship missile warhead itself is not fatal, because it is rough and thick-skinned and designed to withstand damage, but the remaining fuel of the anti-ship missile is fatal when burned...
This does not mean that the deck of the "Musashi" can be burned through. There is a layer of insulation material on the top deck and the deck is still several hundred millimeters thick. It is indeed not easy to burn through.
The problem is that this fire will burn the gunners and crew members on the battleship to death one after another... That's it for the gunners. Burning them to death will not affect the escape of the battleship, but the crew will become smaller and smaller as they burn, and even the commanders will be affected. This will affect the operation of the battleship.
There were only 7 anti-ship missiles that hit the "Musashi" last time, and the damage caused was not great. However, this time it was hit by more than 20 missiles... Even the Eighth Route Army itself did not know how many missiles hit it. TV Guidance sometimes feels a bit like being in the depths of the clouds: the missile soldier controls the missile to approach the enemy ship from the picture transmitted back, getting closer and closer, and then suddenly the picture disappears.
At this time, no one could be sure whether the missile hit the enemy ship and exploded so that the picture could not be seen, or whether it was hit by enemy anti-aircraft artillery and exploded in the air.
If you really want to see it clearly, you have to be a pilot performing a cover mission in the air, but they can only roughly report that there are more than twenty.
The twenty dozen or so were three times the previous seven. When the fire burned, thick smoke billowed into the sky and flames shot into the sky. The warships were filled with screaming Japanese soldiers who were set ablaze by the fire... These people were lucky, they were still alive. , many devils were directly surrounded by flames and lost their voices in an instant.
Many Japanese who were set on fire jumped into the sea to escape.
In fact, this cannot be said to be an escape, because even if they jump into the sea with burns, they will basically not survive, and the Eighth Route Army will not take the time to rescue them.
But being drowned in the sea is better than being burned to death on a warship, at least that's what these Japs thought.
Then the speed of the Japanese battleship slowed down significantly.
Xu Huandong, who was watching the battle, thought the fire had spread inside, but later he learned that was not the case.
The reason why the battleship slowed down was that the fire sealed the fire vents and other gaps in the inner cabin. As a result, not only was the air unable to enter, but the air in the inner cabin was sucked out.
This made the crew in the inner cabin panic. They didn't know whether to open the hatch cover and go out or continue to stay in the cabin.
Most of them chose the latter, because opening the hatch cover would set themselves on fire.
But waiting like this is not an option. They can only hope that the fire will become smaller soon.
However, the missiles that followed quickly dashed their hopes...
At this time, the Japanese were basically unprepared for the Eighth Route Army's missiles: the "Musashi" was hit by more than 20 missiles and basically lost its anti-aircraft firepower, and a destroyer accompanying it was hit by two missiles and basically lost its combat effectiveness.
At this time, the Japanese destroyer's anti-aircraft firepower should be said to be very strong.
The Japanese destroyer is the Bailu class, and its anti-aircraft firepower originally only had a Type 91 40mm anti-aircraft gun.
This also shows how little the Japanese paid attention to air defense in the early days.
But this is normal, because in the early days of World War II, many people believed that naval warfare was still about "big guns and big ships". What effect could something like an airplane dropping bombs have?
Therefore, air defense is just a show-off. One or two anti-aircraft guns or anti-aircraft machine guns are enough.
However, as the war became more intense, it was discovered that in real naval battles, naval guns were useless and anti-aircraft guns were in short supply, so the anti-aircraft guns were modified more and more. First, they were changed to two twin-mounted Type 96 25mm anti-aircraft guns, and then directly to 9
There are two double-mounted guns and three single-mounted guns, a total of 21 guns, and there are also 2 anti-aircraft machine guns.
This anti-aircraft firepower is much better than Mao Xiong's "Wrath-class" destroyer.
But then again, Mao Xiong's destroyers really don't have much need for air defense... Hans's fighter planes will go to the sea to blow up its destroyers when they are full and have nothing to do.
Therefore, if the Japanese destroyers and a cruiser were all in place, that is, surrounding the "Musashi", the Eighth Route Army's missiles would not be able to cause such great damage to the "Musashi".
But now, a heavy cruiser and a destroyer chose to escape, and the remaining "Musashi" and destroyers became targets and were blown up into flames.
Once they were bombed and lost their combat effectiveness, it would be easy for the Eighth Route Army to hit these two ships again.
If the Japanese warships really set up a defense formation as ordered by Inoguchi Toshipei, it is really not certain who will win. There may be a few missiles that will overflow and hit the "Musashi", but the "Musashi" will resist the attack and will be captured in a short time.
It has no choice. The final result is likely to be that the Eighth Route Army's anti-ship missiles have run out and only damaged the "Musashi". Then the Eighth Route Army watched the "Musashi" leave with regret.
Now in this situation, the enemy's defeat is certain, and the Eighth Route Army still has 300 missiles that can be slowly fired.
The next batch only had fifty pieces.
Because the battleship at this time has no power to fight back, no matter how hard it hits, there is a high probability of hitting it.
Sure enough, the injured and smoking battleships and destroyers had only sporadic anti-aircraft firepower. Only one of the fifty missiles was intercepted by it, except for a dozen that missed or hit the outer armor... The missiles hit the outer armor of the battleship.
The armor is not much different from a miss. Its main armor belt is 410mm thick and is designed to withstand artillery shells. Anti-ship missiles and other charges cannot damage it, and the remains and fuel will fall into the sea and burn.
What worked was the thirty or so bombs that were hit on the deck to continue to maintain and increase the intensity of the fire.
When the Eighth Route Army fired the third batch of missiles, an explosion had already occurred inside the destroyer and the hull began to tilt. Although the battleship was still moving, its speed had slowed down significantly.
The Eighth Route Army fleet chasing behind had already entered the range of the naval gun. The staff officer asked Xu Huandong: "Commander, will you fire?"
Xu Huandong replied: "Why are you shooting? How many people are alive up there? What are you shooting at?"
The staff officer asked again: "Then let's torpedo and sink this guy!"
Xu Huandong rolled his eyes at the staff officer and replied: "You just want to sink it. Such a big piece of metal can be worth a lot of money even if it is sold as scrap metal!"
Then he gave the order: "Get ready to board the ship!"
"yes!"
Although the staff officer responded in this way, he was muttering in his heart.
The main reason is that most of the crew members of the coastal defense regiment are crew members of civilian ships, and they cannot fight. The only ones who can fight are the gunners.
But there are not many artillerymen who have ever fired guns. Only a small part of them are artillerymen of the Eighth Route Army, and the rest are militiamen who have been trained for a period of time.
Under such circumstances, it is really not an easy task to organize a commando team to board the ship and fight hand-to-hand with the Japanese!