In order to control the three oceans of the Pacific, Indian Ocean and even the Atlantic Ocean at the same time, the Imperial Navy of the Tang Dynasty needed a large-scale fleet. If the fleet was large in number, the price would be very sensitive.
Only then did the Qinzhou-class frigate appear, a type of ship that only focused on quantity and price, but not much on performance.
For this low-cost ship type with only about 100,000 yuan, the Navy continued to purchase and equip its initial model and subsequent improved models starting from the 23rd year of Xuanping, and continued until the arrival of the era of rifled naval guns.
In 2001, the Navy stopped building this class of ships and instead built Haeju-class frigates equipped with forward-mounted rifled guns.
In six years, the Navy purchased a total of forty-eight Lianzhou-class frigates.
The subsequent construction of Haizhou-class frigates was not slow either. From the 29th year of Xuanping to the 33rd year of Xuanping last year, a total of sixteen ships were ordered and put into service in four years.
Compared with the huge number of fifty-six frigate fleets in the Datang Navy, the Datang Navy has relatively few cruisers and battleships.
From the beginning to the end, the Datang Navy built a total of twenty-four ships, including the Jiangnan class that was previously used as a battleship. Among them, the Jiangnan class was no longer useful. Four ships have been retired, and the other four will also be used.
They will retire one after another this year.
Therefore, there are only sixteen ships left.
These cruisers are actually less numerous than armored cruisers!
There are sixteen armored cruisers in the Tang Dynasty Navy currently in service. There were originally eighteen ships, but unfortunately two were sunk in accidents. These armored cruisers are the previous battleships Shanxi class and Guangxi class, but most of these armored cruisers are
Deployed locally and rarely overseas.
As for battleships, the two currently in service are the Guangdong and the Luzon, and there is also the Banten under construction.
There were too few battleships, armored cruisers guarded the homeland, and only a small number were dispatched overseas. This also led to the fact that the Tang Navy relied more on frigates and cruisers to maintain its overseas sea power.
Now too, Colonel Ge Chengbin's cruiser Colombo, frigate Xinnan and frigate Sanhe are preparing to go overseas to safeguard the interests of the empire.
After the three warships merged, they waited for most of the day, and finally waited for a large fleet.
The transport ships are all from the Joint Logistics Command's transport fleet, with a total of twenty-two ships of various sizes, several of which are passenger ships of five to six thousand tons. These are large ocean liners temporarily requisitioned by the military as troop transport ships.
These ships are all used to transport the troops of the second large-scale expedition to India that the Tang Empire is about to launch!
In order to reinforce the Indian direction and completely defeat the local indigenous people, the Army even deployed a combat-ready infantry division that had been equipped with front-loaded rifles and rear-loaded rifled guns: the 18th Division went to India to participate in the war.
In addition, there is a large amount of ordnance, equipment, ammunition and other supplies for the Indian armies, including breech-loading guns, front-loading rifled guns, etc.
With so many people and weapons and equipment, a lot of ships are naturally needed.
If it were a wooden sailboat with several hundred tons in the past, it would probably take several hundred ships to do it.
Fortunately, the tonnage of today's steam and steel cargo ships is generally relatively large, ranging from one to two thousand tons, to even three to four thousand tons.
A large-tonnage cargo ship can surpass the transportation volume of several or even a dozen ships in the past.
Otherwise, the ships needed for this operation would not be more than twenty, but hundreds.
Although Captain Ge Chengbin is the captain of the cruiser Colombo, naturally he cannot be the commander of this small escort fleet and the huge joint transport fleet.
The commander of the joint transport fleet is Vice Admiral Feng Xinqian. In Ge Chengbin's opinion, this man is probably the commander just to get gold.
Therefore, this person has no experience in commanding a fleet at all. He is an officer with a background in logistics and has stayed in various headquarters for a long time.
Generally speaking, the captains and fleet commanders in the Tang Dynasty's navy all had a sailing background. What they learned in military schools was how to sail ships and command battles. Although they would hold various positions after serving, promising people generally have the rank of major.
Sometimes, they often become captains of transport ships and other auxiliary ships in the navy, or offshore patrol ships, shallow water gunboats and other ships. If they are promoted further, they will be lieutenant colonels of frigates, and then they will be captains of cruisers, and then they will be transferred to battleships.
Or the captain of an armored cruiser. Although he will be transferred to other positions in the process, this circle must be completed.
Only in this way can he become a squadron commander or even one of the seven fleet commanders in the future.
Command the fleet to conduct operations.
Vice Admiral Feng Xunqian obviously does not belong to this path. He has been serving as a logistics officer. This time he is just here for gold plating. He will return to Jinling City after the gold plating is completed. If nothing happens, he will probably be in the navy.
I have become a senior executive in the logistics department.
Vice Admiral Feng Xianfeng obviously knew that he was only here to plating gold. He did not interfere with the command of the fleet along the way. Instead, he let the Chief of Staff of the Combined Transport Fleet do it for him.
However, this was originally just an ordinary escort and transportation mission. The entire route was in the waters controlled by the Tang Navy. Apart from storms, it was naturally impossible to encounter any enemies.
This does not mean that there were no storms along the way, but the ships that appeared in the Tang Dynasty were all large ships of more than 1,000 tons, and they were all steel structures and powered by steam engines. Compared with traditional wooden ships with sails, their ability to withstand storms was much stronger.
too much.
It was a smooth journey into Malacca, stopped for supplies and then started again, and then arrived at Gohe State.
Today's Gehe Prefecture is still the largest overseas territorial city of the Tang Empire in India. It is developing very rapidly. The fleet will be renovated here for a period of time and necessary maintenance will be carried out. At the same time, it will also allow the sailors to go ashore and have a wave, allowing the army to
The landlubbers came ashore to catch their breath.
The prosperous Go River State fully restored the morale of the fleet, and then the fleet continued southward to the island of Ceylon.
Compared with Go River State, Ceylon Island is even more prosperous, because this is the place where ships passing through the Indian Ocean must pass. When most ships pass here, they will enter the port of Ceylon Island for rest and supplies.
At the same time, this place is also the headquarters of the Indian Ocean Fleet of the Tang Dynasty Navy, the headquarters and home port of the Fourth Fleet.
After arriving at the Ceylon Naval Base, Ge Chengbin's escort mission was concluded. At the same time, he officially joined the Fourth Fleet and was assigned to the subordinate 43rd Fleet.
As soon as it docked, his new immediate boss, Rear Admiral Lu Yuze, commander of the 43rd Fleet, was about to board the ship.
Rear Admiral Lu Yuze had a bald head, a Chinese character face, and a long beard, which made Ge Chengbin feel a little weird.
"You are finally here. I received an official document last month and knew that you were coming. I have been waiting and waiting, and finally I have got you!" Rear Admiral Lu Yuze seemed quite enthusiastic when he saw Ge Chengbin, and then he went directly to
While walking out, I didn’t forget to say to Ge Chengbin: “Let’s go, let’s take a look at my new boat!”
When Captain Ge Chengbin heard this, he said silently in his heart: That is my ship, not yours!
Because of the maintenance needs of steam steel battleships, and the sea area that the Tang Dynasty Navy needs to control is too large, and only the mainland can be overhauled, and there are only a few large naval bases that can carry out routine maintenance, under many conditions, the Great Tang Navy was born.
The Tang Navy had a rather special rotation dispatch system.
This system has both advantages and disadvantages. The disadvantage is that there is generally no tacit understanding among the ships, and the fleet commander and the captains are often not familiar with each other. Even the fleet commander often needs to do extraordinary things because the ships under his command often change.
Multiple plans to deal with different situations.
The advantage is that it can make better use of the existing warships of the Tang Dynasty. Otherwise, the Navy of the Tang Dynasty would not be able to control most of the world's strategic maritime arteries with only about a hundred steam and steel warships.
The Strait of Malacca, the Strait of Ceylon, the Strait of West Asia, the Red Sea Strait, the South African Sea, the Strait of Gibraltar, etc. were all under the control of the Tang Navy.
There are no aircraft carriers or radars these days. To control so many sea areas, a lot of warships are needed, but the Tang Dynasty Navy did it with a scale of hundreds of warships.
Of course, there is a lack of actual enemies. The Tang Navy has no challengers. All actions are basically proactive, which is also related to the current rotation dispatch system.
As for issues such as lack of familiarity, tacit understanding, and inability to exert combat effectiveness, they are not so important.
Under the rotational dispatch system, Ge Chengbin may take the cruiser Colombo to perform tasks in different squadrons.
Therefore, Colonel Ge Chengbin said that the cruiser Colombo belongs to him and not to Rear Admiral Lu Yuze, which can be regarded as having a certain theoretical basis.
Of course, this kind of thing can only be said psychologically, anyone who dares to say it openly is seeking death.
Because according to the order, the cruiser Colombo has now been dispatched to the 43rd Fleet. Before the ship was transferred away by the superiors, the ship had been a warship belonging to the 43rd Fleet and was under the command of Major General Lu Yuze.
Major General Lu Yuze apparently didn't notice Ge Chengbin's inner murmur. He was now very excited about the three newly arrived warships.
He had long known that China was already equipped with breech-loading rifled guns, and the Guangdong and Luzon were both famous.
As for cruisers and frigates, due to time constraints and the fact that a large number of previous rear-mounted naval guns were actually used on the two battleships, the initial output was not high enough, so not many were replaced, and the new ones were built.
Less.
In his 43rd fleet, there is no warship equipped with rear-mounted naval guns.
Soon, Major General Lu Yuze boarded the Colombo. Without looking elsewhere, he ran directly to look at the 150mm 35x breech-loading rifled gun on the bow deck.
"This tube is long enough. Thirty-five times the gun barrel is much longer than the 30 times the 150mm muzzleloader we used before!"
"This cannonball is different. The charge is obviously much larger!"
"Also, this gun bolt is interesting. Why has no one thought of using a plug-in gun bolt before? Those idiots at the Shanghai Gun Factory!"