Chapter 3607
Chapter 3607
Chapter 3607
One of the important reasons why Li Dou chose to participate in the time travel was that he was very interested in history. Manokwari had also experienced the baptism of war in the time and space before the time travel, and there was a very famous story.
In the late stage of World War II, this place was one of the important defense locations of the Japanese army in the Pacific. At that time, the 20,000 Japanese troops stationed in Manokwari were blocked from the outside world by the Allied forces. In order to preserve their strength, Commander Fusotaro Toyoshima ordered his 12,000 men to move to Idre, 170 kilometers south of Manokwari, in order to obtain supplies from there.
However, the Japanese army did not survey the marching route in advance, relying only on a rough map with a scale of one millionth. The distance between the two places on the map seemed to be only 170 kilometers, but due to the complex geographical environment nearby, the actual marching distance later exceeded 500 kilometers.
The Japanese commander, Lieutenant General Fujizuka, believed that the destination could be reached after a three to seven-day march, so the rations issued to the soldiers were capped at ten days.
However, the outer areas of Manokwari are all mountainous and densely forested, with hot and humid swamps full of poisonous insects. When people march in such an environment, it is not only difficult to distinguish the direction, but they will also be constantly attacked by diseases such as malaria, enteritis, and dengue fever.
Once fever and diarrhea begin, it means that the marching ability is weakened, and the disease will deteriorate rapidly. If the treatment and nutrition are not in place, they may die on the march in just a few days.
The marching route, which was originally thought to take three to seven days to reach the destination, actually took two months to complete. More than ten thousand people died on the march, and only less than a thousand Japanese soldiers were able to complete the transfer mission alive.
Li Zhencheng had never heard his father talk about the story of Manokwari, nor did he know that the environment around this secret harbor was so dangerous. After landing, he found that most of the surviving Spaniards fled into the nearby mountains and forests, so he prepared to order an organization to go into the mountains to pursue them.
It was at this time that the staff sent by the Luzon Combat Command reminded him that he should first report the battle situation to Manila and ask for instructions on the next steps, rather than rashly commanding the troops into an unfamiliar inland environment.
This comes from the experience accumulated by the Luzon Army from long-term combat in this area. The complex environment of these tropical islands often hides dangers that foreign troops cannot imagine. Even the Luzon Army does not dare to go deep into the mountains and forests of unfamiliar areas at will.
The reason why the Luzon Army made such slow progress in clearing out the Spanish colonial forces on various islands was largely due to the complex geographical environment. They could only operate near the coast of most islands and could not penetrate deep into the inland areas of the islands.
Although Li Zhencheng was somewhat dissatisfied with the caution of the combat staff, he still followed the agreement with the combat headquarters and sent a telegram to report the progress of the operation.
Xiao Liang, who was commanding the troops in Manila, was also shocked when he saw the telegram sent by Li Zhencheng. He originally just wanted the Taiwan fleet to operate in a relatively safe area, but he did not expect that Li Zhencheng would lead the fleet all the way east and actually find the secret port built by the Spanish on Papua Island.
As for Li Zhencheng's plan to lead his troops into the inland to continue clearing out the Spaniards, Xiao Liang vetoed it without hesitation.
He knew much more about the dangerous environment of tropical islands than Li Zhencheng, and would definitely not let the reinforcements from Taiwan rashly advance deep into the country.
Soon Li Zhencheng received a call back from Manila. Xiao Liang asked him to abandon the pursuit operation deep inland, hurry up to clean up the seized documents, confirm whether there are other undiscovered Spanish strongholds and fleets in the area, and it would be best to discover the Spanish troop deployment and dispatch arrangements in the South Pacific.
For this round of war between the two countries, timely understanding of the opponent's combat deployment is obviously more important than entering the mountains and forests to hunt down the remnants of the defeated army. Although Li Zhencheng felt helpless after receiving the call back, military orders were like mountains, and he had to obey them even if he was unwilling.
The troops searched and counted the buildings in the port, but the seized items did not satisfy Li Zhencheng.
The Spaniards who fled into the forests almost emptied the arsenal and granary in a very short time, but left behind several large boxes of silver coins. After all, for them, carrying heavy silver coins to escape was meaningless, and weapons and rations were their necessities for survival in the forests.
The local administrator's official residence was also set on fire by the Spaniards before the Hai Han army landed, and probably also burned a lot of documents and materials that were inconvenient to take away.
Only a few Spaniards failed to escape in time, basically all of them were the elderly, the weak, women, children, the wounded and the sick, as well as a few missionaries who volunteered to stay and take care of these people.
After interrogating these captives, we learned that this port had been built for three years and was mainly used to serve Spanish ships traveling between the South Pacific islands and the American continent. The original local resident population was about 500. However, due to the fleet that arrived here recently, the number of people who actually fled into the mountains and forests was far greater than the resident population.
What makes this place different from other colonial settlements is that it has been completely controlled by the military since its construction and has been kept secret from the outside world. Only a few navigators know the exact location of this place. It seems that it was used as a military base.
The large sailing ships that were destroyed in the harbor by the Taiwan fleet were the fleet that had just arrived from South America to help. Unexpectedly, they died before they could achieve their goal. Before they even stepped into the battlefield, they were completely destroyed by the Taiwan fleet.
As for whether there were other colonial settlements or similar secret ports in the vicinity, the captives all responded in unison, saying that this was the only settlement within a thousand miles.
Although destroying this secret port was definitely a great achievement, Li Zhencheng still felt a little disappointed with the result.
There was not even a single officer among the prisoners, and no military documents were seized, which meant that it was impossible to obtain intelligence to infer the Spanish combat deployment. At most, the enemy would lose an important supply point.
Although this was certainly a severe blow to Spain, the loss of Manokwari would not necessarily prevent Spain from continuing to transfer troops across the ocean from the Americas.
In order to prevent the fleeing Spaniards from returning here and re-operating the port, Li Zhencheng ordered the complete burning of all the buildings here, then loaded all the captives onto the ship and set off on the return journey the next day.
In this battle, a total of 19 Spanish ships of various sizes were destroyed. The number of enemy soldiers killed could not be accurately counted because some ships sank, so it can only be roughly estimated to be around 300.
As the incident happened suddenly, most of the crew members were still on shore when the battle started, and they had no time to board the ship and organize a counterattack. Seeing the fierce attack of the Hai Han army, most of them chose to flee into the mountains to avoid the battle. However, although they avoided the attack of the Hai Han army, how many people could survive in the dangerous wild environment still depended on their luck.