Like the first joint landing fleet during last year's Battle of Malacca, this second joint landing fleet was also temporarily organized. Except for a small number of escort warships dispatched by the military and some transport ships from the army and navy, most of the remaining ones were
It is a private merchant ship temporarily recruited.
Nowadays, the Tang Empire has a complete set of requisitioning systems. Whether it is ships, carriages, horses, mules and other livestock, or even supplies needed for ordinary battles, the military of the Datang Empire has formulated a unified requisitioning system.
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Whenever the military has mission requirements, it can directly requisition it. However, if the requisition is in the country and the property of the empire's subjects is requisitioned, it will be requisitioned with compensation. The military will provide compensation, and this compensation is usually based on the market price.
Give compensation.
Not only the requisition of materials is paid, but even the temporary recruitment of civilians is also paid. The recruitment system formulated by the unified department clearly stipulates that the recruitment of empire subjects to engage in auxiliary military services requires not only the provision of food, clothing, housing and transportation, but also the need to comply with the requirements.
Salaries are paid at market prices.
This is also why when the Tang Empire attacked the Koryo Peninsula, it did not like to recruit civilian husbands from the country to enter the peninsula. Instead, after entering the peninsula, it directly recruited local Koreans to serve as civilian husbands. It is very simple. The domestic civilian husbands have to be paid.
, as for the indigenous people, not to mention money, they even have to bring their own food rations.
The Tang Empire, which unified China, still cared about its official image in all aspects, which was completely different from the various behaviors in the early stages of the Unification War. Of course, the dark history of the early years was basically covered up, but if it can be uncovered
The written records have also been destroyed long ago.
If it really couldn't be erased, it would be tampered with. For example, when the Tang Dynasty King was short of food and clothing, he followed the policy of feeding on the enemy and robbed countless landowners' granaries. But later, it was changed to local
The gentry welcomed Master Wang and took the initiative to donate food and so on.
However, not many people know about the dark history of the early days. Those who knew some inside stories in the early years kept silent about it.
In short, according to the official documents of the Tang Dynasty, it is said that the Tang Dynasty has been very good since the day it was established. There has never been a good dynasty in China and even in human history.
This is not only true of the Tang Dynasty, but also of many previous feudal dynasties. They would always try their best to erase some dark history, and then praise themselves and portray themselves as the most awesome and greatest dynasty.
Regardless of whether it is the Ming Dynasty or the Yuan Dynasty, or the Song Dynasty, Li Tang, etc., basically there is a lot of dark history, but there are not many that can be truly recorded and well known to future generations.
Where are the pieces.
After all, history is just a bitch. If you ask her to turn over, she will turn over. If you ask her to kneel and raise her buttocks, she will raise her buttocks. When it is over, it will be recorded that this woman was a loyal and loyal woman...
Although there was a lot of dark history in the past, the official actions of the Tang Dynasty can still be said to be legal and compliant. After all, with Li Xuan watching from above, the various reforms of the Tang Dynasty are very in-depth, and
There are great differences between traditional feudal dynasties.
The expropriation system is just one of them.
According to the requisition system, the military has the right to directly requisition any ship when necessary. Well, this requisition is forcible and does not require the permission of the ship owner.
During the requisition process, compensation will be given based on the prevailing shipping conditions.
At the same time, this requisition is not limited to the ship itself, but also includes the captain, sailors and other personnel on the ship.
To put it bluntly, this method of requisition is the military hiring private ships, which is nothing more than forced hiring and unilateral pricing.
When this happens, the owners of those ships can only admit that they are unlucky and put down their business first to deal with the requisition. However, this will only delay the business for a while. After all, the military will pay the freight and will not
It will cause losses to shipowners in transportation costs, and of course it will also affect their own business.
In the past, this kind of requisition was handled by the army and navy, but later it became the responsibility of the Joint Maritime Transport Department, and then it was now the responsibility of the Joint Operations Department.
In order to prepare for the decisive battle in the Indian Ocean, the Joint Operations Department mobilized a total of more than 70 ships, all of which were sea-going ships capable of ocean voyages. Moreover, for the sake of tactical needs, priority was given to recruiting Tang ships and ships equipped with steam engines.
Then coupled with an escort fleet of eight warships dispatched by the Navy from the mainland, the Navy's own twelve armed transport ships, and the eight armed transport ships of the Army's Maritime Transport Division, there are more than ninety ships in total.
The number of troops expected to be dispatched is obviously only about 12,000, but it is more than the number of ships used in the last Battle of Malacca. In the last Battle of Malacca, a full 30,000 ground combat troops were transported.
Why do we need more ships when there are fewer people?
This is naturally because the distance is too far, and the combat time is expected to be very long. Even if the time required for the battle itself is not included, the sailing time at sea will take at least half a year.
Coupled with the necessary rest and combat time, the entire combat plan may last for more than a year!
This is a combat operation with a very long time span.
In order to avoid accidents, especially the lack of ammunition after the troops arrived in the Indian Ocean, the Joint Operations Department was ruthless this time and prepared a large amount of combat supplies to be transported with the troops.
Therefore, of the nearly a hundred ships, not many are actually used to transport troops, but more are used to transport various equipment and supplies.
At the same time, the Second Joint Landing Fleet does not directly belong to the Indian Ocean Fleet or other fleets of the Navy, but belongs to an independent temporary organization. Yes, this is not a military organization, but a temporary organization.
It is under the jurisdiction of the Joint Operations Department. Of course, this is only theoretical. In fact, the commander of this fleet is still a naval general. There is no way. Maritime operations cannot bypass the navy.
The Navy will provide full escort for the Second Joint Landing Fleet. In addition to deploying some warships from the mainland and Southeast Asia and directly integrating them into the Second Joint Landing Fleet, they will also assemble the main ships of the Indian Ocean Fleet and then station troops in the waters around Ceylon Island.
, so as to cover the army’s forced landing on Ceylon Island.
At the same time, it is also responsible for the subsequent blockade of the waters around Ceylon Island.
The subsequent second phase of the South African campaign generally had a similar arrangement.
This plan for a decisive battle in the Indian Ocean is similar to the previous Battle of Malacca to a certain extent. The navy is covering the army's landing operations and seizing the enemy's port strongholds. In essence, it is not much different.
The only difference is that the distance is too far!
Organize tens of thousands of ground combat troops, plus at least a hundred ships, and tens of thousands of sailors to go to the southernmost tip of Africa for an expedition!
This is China, no, it should be said to be the farthest and most massive expedition in human history, and it is also a cross-sea expedition!
Absolutely unprecedented!
Even the Tang Empire found this kind of thing extremely difficult!
According to the plan of the Joint Operations Department, the preliminary preparations will take at least one month. It will take one month to set off from Guangzhou, then go all the way south along the coastline, arrive at Malacca, then go to the Myanmar waters, carry out supplies along the way, and finally arrive at the large city of Gohe Prefecture.
The largest colony of the Tang Empire in India.
They also carried out renovations for at least half a month to allow the soldiers who had traveled long distances to rest and to rest. At the same time, they also seized the time to maintain the ships before setting off to continue southward and only land on Ceylon Island.
Of course, this landing time was not a beach landing under enemy artillery fire, because the Tang Empire also had its own stronghold in the Ceylon Island area. Although the scale was small, it could still be used as a landing site.
After the troops landed, they marched from the ground to the Portuguese stronghold in the south of Ceylon Island, and then attacked and captured it.
After seizing the island of Ceylon, the navy will forcefully cover the combat troops to move to the battlefield, land directly in southern India, attack several Portuguese strongholds, and completely eliminate the Portuguese strongholds in this area.
During this series of operations, the possibility of being attacked by the Portuguese fleet is very high. For this reason, the Navy plans to concentrate all the main warships of the Indian Ocean Fleet to cover the army operations. Of course, in fact, the Navy is more
The hope is that in order to save the island of Ceylon, the Portuguese will send their main fleet to fight them to the death.
In the end, the two sides engaged in a massive naval decisive battle and completely defeated the Portuguese fleet in the Indian Ocean!
If this can be achieved, then there will be no need to carry out the second phase of the landing on Motor Island or even South Africa. Just push it all the way through. Without the fleet, the Portuguese will have no threat!
Will the Portuguese just give them this chance?
Judging from the current performance of the Portuguese people, it is probably unlikely.
It's not that they have never dealt with the Tang Dynasty. On the contrary, they may be the foreign country that has dealt with the Tang Empire the most. Even the Tatars don't understand the Tang Empire like the Portuguese.
The two sides have been conducting large-scale maritime trade for more than ten years. The Portuguese merchant ships frequently visited the major trading ports in the empire, and even established consulates with permanent diplomatic personnel in Guangzhou, Shanghai and other commercial areas.
Even if these businessmen and diplomats did not deliberately collect various intelligence, even some of the information they came into contact with on a daily basis was enough to give them a deep understanding of the power, or in other words, the terror of the Tang Empire.
Especially steamships. They knew that the Tang Empire had these things, and they also knew that the huge tactical role of steamships, whether they could allow warships to achieve higher speeds, was secondary. The most important thing was that these steam warships of the Tang Dynasty could
The tactical advantage of maneuvering independently of the wind direction is almost fatal on the battlefield.