Today's South African waters are filled with patrol ships of the Tang Dynasty Navy. Regardless of whether they are pirate ships or ordinary merchant ships, or multi-purpose ships that do business and rob, even the Spanish and Portuguese warships that pass by are all old.
Close the gun window honestly and sail within the route prescribed by the Tang Navy.
If you don't obey, you will be bombarded.
This is not to say that the navy of the Tang Dynasty was unreasonable. In fact, the Tang Dynasty governed the country with benevolence and filial piety, and emphasized benevolence and righteousness, even overseas. It would not act randomly, and would only beat the opponent when it disobeyed.
Moreover, South African waters can now be said to have become one of the few most important waters in the world.
The Tang Empire regarded this place as an outpost for trade with Europe. Merchant ships from the Tang Dynasty and European merchant ships gathered here and then conducted trade. However, with the urinary behavior of contemporary maritime merchants, if strong measures were not taken to maintain the maritime
In terms of public security, it is estimated that the waters of South Africa can become a paradise for pirates.
If he was robbed as soon as he left the port, that merchant would still dare to come here to trade in the future!
As for leaving the waters of South Africa and going deep into the waters along the western coast of Africa to encounter pirates, etc., the Tang Dynasty could not control them even if it wanted to. That sea area is still the territory of the Portuguese. According to the truce signed between the Tang Dynasty and the Portuguese,
In the agreement, although Datang did not formally acknowledge the Portuguese's special interests on the west coast of Africa, it was regarded as acquiescence.
If the Portuguese's territory is robbed, you have to go find the Portuguese!
As for the Portuguese not caring about it, or simply taking it by themselves, the Tang Navy can only say one thing:
Trade is risky, please be careful when going overseas!
The Atlantic Ocean is so big. You can enter the vast Atlantic Ocean after leaving the waters of South Africa. It is not good for you to go there. If you have to go to the coastline of western Africa, you are asking for death!
The Spaniards are so smart that most of their ships go directly into the Atlantic Ocean, preferring to go to South America for supplies rather than take risks on the west coast of Africa.
Although the journey is a bit long and tiring, it is safe!
However, not all merchants are willing to go deep into the Atlantic Ocean. For some merchants, the depths of the Atlantic Ocean are more terrifying than pirates. They would rather face pirates than face the storm in the depths of the ocean.
If you encounter pirates, you can still fight, and maybe you can counterattack and rob them.
But if you encounter a storm deep in the ocean, you are definitely looking for death.
I didn’t hear that the Tang Dynasty encountered a big storm in the depths of the Indian Ocean before and lost dozens of ships.
If these dozens of ships were all merchant ships loaded with goods, if they were lost like this, it would directly bankrupt the royal families of most European countries.
For the European and North African merchants coming to South Africa, this voyage is still relatively dangerous, but for the imperial merchant ships coming to South Africa from China, the danger is not great.
Although pirates are found everywhere, including the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea, the overall risk is still controllable. In addition, it is now popular to go to sea in groups, and ordinary pirates cannot attack them at all.
The famous Fourth Fleet used to be rampant in the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean. When faced with this group of pirates, the Imperial Navy and the Portuguese jointly launched an unprecedented joint campaign to eliminate them. However, over the years, they have been attacked again and again, but they cannot completely eliminate them.
But now, these pirate gangs from the Fourth Fleet are having a hard time.
Several pirate ships encountered a dozen or more armed merchant ships and were unable to defeat them.
Assembling a few more pirate ships, the target was huge, and the main fleet of the Tang Navy was attracted to clear them out in minutes.
Therefore, many pirates are now changing their positions or simply changing careers.
Changing career means not being a pirate, but becoming a maritime trader. Since you have a ship, you don't have to rob to make a living. Doing business can also make money, but it's not exciting enough and life is a bit dull.
As for the transfer of positions, they naturally went to other sea areas, such as the Red Sea, the Persian Gulf and other sea areas. The Tang Imperial Navy generally did not go to these places very much. They were all within the sphere of influence of indigenous kingdoms such as the Ottoman Empire and the Safi Dynasty. Pirates were in
There are basically no opponents there.
Of course, the visionary and ambitious pirates all went directly to the west coast of Africa.
South Africa City has now become the intersection of east and west, and its status is very similar to Malacca in the past. The waters of South Africa and the east of South Africa are the territory of the Tang Dynasty navy, and these pirates dare not go there.
But the waters west of South Africa are as high as the sky allows birds to fly!
Even if the Portuguese were to clear them out, they would still be able to survive.
It is said that the pirate gang of the Fourth Fleet, which moved from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic this year, has already had three large-scale fights with the pirates originally entrenched on the coastline of western Africa, especially in the waters of northwest Africa.
The pirates from the Fourth Fleet in the Atlantic, flying the flag of the Fourth Fleet, shouted and killed the local pirate gangs for freedom.
Just like the Tang Empire's rapid rise in the past twenty years, the pirate gang of the Fourth Fleet has also rapidly become an important pirate force on a global scale in the past twenty years.
However, the current Fourth Fleet is different from the Fourth Fleet in the early years. The Fourth Fleet in the early years was a complete pirate organization with unified command. It also had multiple nest bases in places such as Myanmar and India, and was quite powerful.
, the objects of robbery back then were all armed merchant ships of the Tang Dynasty Western Trading Company and the Portuguese East India Company. Sometimes they even dared to rob warships!
Otherwise, the Tang Dynasty and the Portuguese would not have been allowed to join forces in this regard to suppress bandits.
In the end, under the joint encirclement and suppression of the two navies, the Fourth Fleet was destroyed, and the remnants split into multiple large and small pirate forces. Then they also annexed, split, transferred, etc., and then their footprints began to spread all over the world.
In the Caribbean, in the Atlantic, in the Indian Ocean, even in Nanyang, the back garden of the Tang Empire, and even in the Fuso Sea, pirate ships flying the flag of the Fourth Fleet can be seen.
However, the current Fourth Fleet is no longer a complete organization, and even many chaotic pirates are flying the flag of the Fourth Fleet.
Today's Fourth Fleet has become synonymous with pirates to some extent.
There are tens of thousands of pirates under the banner of the Fourth Fleet, spread all over the world, with members from all over the world. Even when many merchant ships temporarily rob, they will temporarily hang a flag of the Fourth Fleet...
Therefore, the Fourth Fleet can no longer be regarded as a complete pirate organization, but should be regarded as a synonym for pirates.
But what is interesting is that although there are many pirates wearing the sign of the Fourth Fleet these days, and they come from all over the world, the few famous pirate leaders are all from the Tang Dynasty!
Most of them are former Ming generals who followed He Ding from China to Burma. These generals from the traditional Chinese army naturally behave differently from ordinary pirates. Even when they are pirates and rob, they also pay attention to various strategies and use
All kinds of strategies, but the most important thing is that these people still have traditional Chinese thinking.
And what is the thinking of traditional Chinese people? Cutting off the roots!
When two sides compete for hegemony, the winning side will often kill all the losing ones. Every time a dynasty dies or falls, the royal family will basically be eradicated. The most recent example is the royal family of the Zhu family in the former Ming Dynasty, and there are basically no direct descendants of the royal family left.
, before Du Li Xuan had time to say anything, all the generals under him consciously began to eradicate the weeds.
These pirate leaders of the Fourth Fleet who were former Ming generals, even if they became pirates, they still followed the same old routine. In order to conceal their tracks and avoid being tracked by naval warships, they would often kill all the crew members after the robbery.
Or they were captured and brought to their lair to work as coolies or something, but they were never released.
Such pirates are naturally a special and ruthless group in the eyes of the outside world. Not only are businessmen extremely afraid of them, but even pirates from other countries are also very afraid of them.
And these pirates of the Tang Dynasty are not the pride of the empire. On the contrary, the navy and merchant ships of the empire want to kill them all directly, because these pirates of the Tang Dynasty rob them, but no matter what country you are a merchant ship, even if you are an empire
They also robbed merchant ships.
In recent years, a lot of imperial merchant ships have been robbed by the Tang pirates of the Fourth Fleet.
Nowadays, these Datang pirates can no longer survive in waters such as the South China Sea and the Bay of Bengal. Many of them have gone to the Atlantic Ocean, especially the west coast of Africa, and some have even gone to the Caribbean Sea.
In this era, pirates are a group that cannot be ignored, and it is even difficult to completely eradicate them.
But in South African waters, no pirates dare to mess around.
This is not to say that there are no pirates. In fact, there are still many pirate ships that have changed their appearance and gone to the South African port to trade and inquire about information and find fat sheep. There are also many pirates passing through this sea area.
But no pirate dares to mess around here.
The Tang Navy's strong control of this sea area also ensured the prosperity of South Africa City's trade.
This kind of prosperity could already be felt by Lu Zhenjiang before he entered the port of South Africa with the fleet. When he arrived at the port, all he saw were ships.
There are all kinds of ships from all over the world, and he even found a few ships with obvious characteristics of pirate ships. The ships used by pirates pursue maneuverability, so the hulls are generally relatively slender and the tonnage is not too large.
The sails are mainly longitudinal sails, and the caliber of the artillery they carry is not too large, but the crew is often large. When robbing, they use excellent maneuverability to catch up with the merchant ship, and then closely initiate gang-hopping operations, and then control the merchant ship.
It is very different from the warships in the new era that deploy a large number of heavy artillery and sink enemy ships as the main method.
These ships, which you can tell are pirates at a glance, are parked in the port so grandly. This kind of thing can only happen in South African ports. If it is in the coastal ports of the empire or ports in Southeast Asia,
, as soon as this kind of pirate ship appeared, it was immediately targeted by the navy.
But in South Africa, all this is unreasonable but seems normal.
The Tang Dynasty treated pirates and merchants from all over the world equally. As long as you were honest and obedient and paid the relevant fees and taxes, you were welcome regardless of your true purpose of coming to the South African port!