At the insistence of the commander of the Perth Expeditionary Force, Derek Champlin, at nine o'clock in the morning, five Perth Expeditionary Force warships, including the Perth, launched a fierce attack on Port Hedland.
Objectively speaking, although the Paz is a broken ship that is about to be decommissioned, the armament on the ship is still good. The British also spent a lot of effort to replace the main gun on the ship when they sold the Paz to the Pars people.
, the current Paz has four twin-mounted 203 mm caliber main guns. If the secondary guns are added, the firepower of the Paz alone can withstand the entire defensive firepower of Port Hedland.
But war is not determined by a simple conversion of numbers, and weapons are not the only factor that determines victory or defeat. People play a key role in war.
Although the composition of the troops responsible for defending Port Hedland is complex, they are now basically Hedlanders. For them, this war is a war to defend their homeland and resist the tyranny of Western Australia, so this war is almost impossible.
In need of mobilization, the morale of the defensive forces has reached an unbelievable level.
The components of the Pas City Expeditionary Force responsible for the attack are also very complex, especially the naval members. They are basically hired by Pas City from the United Kingdom. For the sake of money, they will do what they should do, but
It would be nit-picking to ask for high morale and a strong will to fight.
Relatively speaking, the land forces of the Pas Expeditionary Force are more willing to fight. However, it has not yet reached the landing stage, and the land forces are temporarily unavailable. Therefore, the artillery battle is only carried out between warships and coastal defense batteries.
The artillery of Port Hedland is a force composed of artillerymen from the Foreign Legion period as the backbone. The backbone of this force have all participated in the world war and have rich combat experience. They are also tenacious, never admit defeat, and cooperative.
The tacit understanding and other advantages, especially the last point, were vividly displayed not long after the artillery battle began.
There are four forts in the coastal defense force, and these four forts only have 12 artillery pieces in total. It is unjustifiable to say that the firepower is powerful. At this time, tactics play a very important role.
The officer in charge of commanding the artillery is called Duan Chengye. This is an experienced artillery commander. He was promoted to major during the Foreign Legion and was responsible for commanding an artillery regiment. In order to maximize the power of the coastal defense fort, Duan Chengye was on the wave defense team.
A command center was set up to command all artillery in a unified manner and launch an attack on one target at the same time. In terms of target selection, Duan Chengye did not choose the Paz, which had the largest target, but chose a destroyer with a smaller tonnage.
When designing warships, armor protection is considered. Generally speaking, it is difficult for warships of the same level to sink each other with artillery.
The main gun of the Paz is 203 mm, which means that the Paz has a certain protection ability against the 203 mm caliber artillery. If it relies on the 150 mm caliber artillery of the coastal defense battery, it will be difficult to cause damage to the Paz.
What a serious injury.
But those destroyers are different. Whether it is the Black Swan or the George V, the guns equipped on these destroyers are also the same 150 mm, which means that the 150 mm guns of the coastal defense batteries have certain attack capabilities against these destroyers.
There is one factor that must be paid attention to, which is the age in which these objective conditions exist.
These destroyers of the Paz Expeditionary Force, even the youngest Black Swan, are more than 10 years old. Therefore, when armor protection was originally considered, these destroyers were based on the artillery power of ten years ago. Compared with the current artillery
Generally speaking, this level of protection lags far behind.
War is the biggest driving force for the development of science and technology. During the World War, new technologies and new processes appeared almost every day. The weapons equipped at the beginning of the World War were completely different from the weapons equipped one year after the beginning. As for the differences between the World War before the World War and the World War
Finally, they are two different worlds at all. The gap between weapons can even be described as a generation difference. Therefore, although these destroyers also use 150 mm caliber artillery, they are both different in terms of range and power.
There is a huge gap in the 150mm caliber artillery on the coastal defense turret.
This gap became apparent soon after the battle began.
In fact, after the first two rounds of test firings, the artillery group on the coastal defense turret formed a straddle fire on the Boddington in the third round of salvo fire. This fully demonstrated the power of unified command and also made Gao proud.
The big British naval officers and soldiers suddenly became nervous.
At the 45th minute of the artillery battle, a shell fired by the No. 2 Battery caused a near miss near the Boddington. The Boddington's propulsion device was affected, and the speed suddenly dropped from 25 knots to less than 15 knots.
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This is simply the best target, as eye-catching as a blazing torch in the dark night.
Duan Chengye immediately commanded the battery to attack the Boddington. Although the captain of the Boddington tried his best, finally at the 55th minute, a shell fired by the Hou Xing'an gun crew in the No. 3 turret hit the Boddington.
The chimney of the USS Boddington collapsed and hit the bridge heavily, causing the death of 12 people on the bridge, including the captain of the Boddington. This incident caused the Boddington to lose its command center, just like
The tender and delicious lamb walking in the dangerous wilderness suddenly attracted more malicious eyes.
After the emergence of optical rangefinders, naval warfare has been fundamentally overturned. Previous rangefinders relied on the rich experience of gunners. If you want to obtain accurate data in the shortest time, there are no more shortcuts and you can only rely on
The accumulation of experience and precipitation over time.
With the optical rangefinder, even a newcomer who has just been exposed to artillery can obtain accurate data in the shortest time. This greatly improves the efficiency of the artillery crew, especially when dealing with targets that have lost power.
Effortless.
It takes time for a cannonball to come out of the barrel and hit the target. Generally speaking, at a distance of 10,000 meters, it takes about thirty or forty seconds for a cannonball to hit the target. During these thirty or forty seconds, if the target
It is moving at a speed of 25 knots, so within these thirty to forty seconds, the target can run a distance of about 500 meters. Therefore, artillery battles often occur in naval battles. A small fashion and nothing is achieved, but if a certain warship loses power,
, then it will be sunk quickly.
This is the fate that the Boddington is facing. When the Boddington lost power and command center, within two minutes, four shells hit the Boddington, among which the first turret fired
One of the shells directly hit the Boddington's ammunition depot, causing the 1,300-ton warship to be blown into two pieces from the middle, and completely sank to the bottom of the sea within 20 seconds.
In 20 seconds, even if a sailor jumps off the ship in time, he may not be able to swim out of the whirlpool formed by the sunken ship.
137 naval officers and soldiers were buried at the bottom of the sea.
The sinking of the Boddington sounded the alarm for the Paz Expeditionary Fleet. No matter how arrogant Derek Champion was, he still had to consider James Jerome's opinion at this time. After all, compared to the command authority of the fleet,
He said that the strategic goal of capturing Port Hedland is more important. If this strategic goal cannot be achieved, Derek Champion will be responsible.
So starting from the 70th minute, the Paz Expeditionary Fleet finally reached a consensus, concentrated all artillery, and began to attack the coastal defense batteries in Port Hedland from south to north.
This change immediately made Duan Chengye feel the pressure.
Even though the forts had reinforced concrete roofs and were reinforced before the war, these protective measures could not last long under the continuous attack of large-caliber naval guns.
It has to be said that the British navy is indeed very experienced in combat. Once unified command was established, the Paz Expeditionary Fleet immediately got on the right track. For a time, the southernmost No. 1 fort was attacked continuously, and shells kept falling.
When we arrived at the No. 1 Fort, the dust in the sandbags of gunpowder smoke was flying all over the sky. Even if we looked at the nearest No. 2 Fort, we could not see the outline of the No. 1 Fort.
The destructive power of artillery shells is not just based on shrapnel. The impact of the shell will also cause serious damage to the target. Especially if a person is in a relatively closed space and is continuously attacked by the shock wave, various types of damage will definitely occur.
Such physical discomfort will lead to combat attrition.
Duan Chengye still feels sorry for these artillerymen under his command. The purpose of the artillerymen holding on to the fort is not to shut out the Perth Expeditionary Force, but to show that Port Hedland is not helpless in the face of the Perth Expeditionary Force.
After achieving the goal, Duan Chengye immediately ordered the artillerymen to withdraw from the position through the underground passage under the fort.
In fact, at this time, the attack target of the Paz Expeditionary Force had already been the No. 3 Fort.
James Jerome still has rich experience. Under his command, the Paz Expeditionary Force no longer seeks to destroy the forts, but only needs to achieve the purpose of making the forts inoperable. The warships of the Paz Expeditionary Force are indeed relatively old.
The artillery shells used produced a large amount of smoke when they exploded, which had an unexpected effect. The smoke, together with the dust stirred up by the shells, blocked the gunners' sight, eventually making these forts lose their combat effectiveness.
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Today's weather is indeed good, with not a trace of wind. This has also become a boost for the Paz Expeditionary Force. As long as the fort is attacked, the smoke around the fort will be everywhere for a long time and cannot be dissipated. As the counterattack firepower becomes more and more
Weak, the attack of the Parth Expeditionary Force is more calm and efficient.
At the 110th minute of the artillery battle, Duan Chengye ordered all artillery troops to withdraw from their positions and abandon these coastal defense batteries, and the artillery battle ended.
Duan Chengye did not order the forts to be blown up because these forts would eventually remain the property of Port Hedland.
It is estimated that the Parth Expeditionary Force will not blow up these forts, because in the view of the Parth Expeditionary Force, these forts are now their property.
Although the battle in the outer harbor has ended, compared to this war, it has just begun.