My Italian - Chapter 627

The Tunisian Strait is the main choke point, and it is also the sea area that Italy focuses on investigation. Especially after the French formation went to sea, there were more ships and airships patrolling here, and even yesterday an Italian small warship boldly came to the sea off Tunisia. For this reason, the French side taught the other side a hard lesson, and the other side was willing to give up when they fled in embarrassment. Lessons are learned, but since the other party dares to come, it is obvious that they are not afraid of France’s maritime power in Tunisia. This gave the reinforcement formations preparing to cross the Tunis Strait less time to choose, unless they were willing to stand in the sight of the Italians. At this time, the night has become an excellent cover, which can cover these figures quietly passing through the place. The sound of a fluttering motor sounded off the coast of Tunisia, and a small patrol boat carefully observed the surrounding movement in the dark. Its searchlight kept shining all around. At this time, in this patrol boat, more than a dozen French naval officers and soldiers opened their eyes wide, observing the movement around them. “Nothing was found, everything is normal.” “No suspicious situation was found, it’s safe.” After the officers and soldiers of the patrol boat continued to observe the surrounding waters to ensure safety, the transmitter sent a secure secret telegram under the captain’s instruction. . This is not the only patrol boat to patrol tonight. In fact, from Bizerte at the end of the western section of the strait in Tunisia to Sfax, which has long been beyond the scope of the Tunis Strait in the eastern section, the French side has arranged a lot of ships. Conduct inspections in our own waters. Let the French fight so much, because there is a formation to take advantage of the night to cross here. And if you want to cross here, the best way is to use the cover of the night, rely on the sea off Tunisia, and cross the strait in one fell swoop before sunrise tomorrow. And Lieutenant General Stedy also thought so, at this time he was leading the British and French reinforcement fleet through this sea area. “Report, the French side sent a telegram. No abnormality was found on the Tunisian side of the strait. In addition, Lieutenant General Dufournell sent a telegram to ask whether to speed up now.” At the moment on the flagship, Lieutenant General Stedy is listening to the communication. The officer reported the situation. “Tell Lieutenant General Dufournell not to worry now. Increasing the speed late at night may cause unnecessary harm. The speed of 14 knots is enough for us to leave before dawn.” Lieutenant General Stedy asked the communications officer to convey his meaning. . At this time, Lieutenant General Stedy had waited for the French formation. After a brief exchange, the reinforcement formation became a reinforcement fleet. Stedy was promoted to fleet commander and British formation commander, while the French commander was Lieutenant Admiral Dufournell, who also served as the fleet chief of staff. In addition, after some friendly exchanges and discussions, the two agreed that it is too dangerous to go to the Northern Sea Route near the island of Malta, and only the Southern Sea Route near the Libyan Sea is the best choice. To this end, Lieutenant Admiral Stedy specially reported to the Mediterranean Fleet led by Admiral Carden and informed him of his own line of action. Of course, it is not enough for the reinforcement fleet to pass through the Tunis Strait alone. The French maritime forces in Tunisia also need to explore the route in advance to ensure that the fleet can safely slip through the strait without being discovered by the Italians. It’s looking good so far, they’re lucky. Yes, luck is one of the guarantees for the success of the action. As long as you are lucky enough, sometimes the unreliable plan will succeed under the circumstances. So far, Lieutenant General Sturdy considers himself lucky. With the help of the French colonial navy, a joint reinforcement fleet formed by Britain and France sneaked through the Tunis Strait under the cover of night. The Italian side, at this time, was still ignorant of the reinforcement fleet slipping through the Tunis Strait, since most of its attention was drawn to the Mediterranean fleet. At this time, there were few ships off the coast of Libya. Before, because of the harassment of British warships in Malta, Italy first created an **** formation. Therefore, there are very few ships in the Libyan waters at this time. Except for the offshore fishing boats, there are only some smuggling ships here. Yes, it is a smuggling ship. Although Italy and France have fallen into a state of war, the two countries have already fought each other in Europe. But how to say, there is demand, there is sales, especially after the two countries cut off the obvious economic and trade exchanges, many people have noticed the huge profits. In Europe, due to strict supervision, smuggling is not too serious, but in Africa, which is sparsely populated and poorly regulated, this kind of smuggling is increasingly rampant. Those adventurers who wandered in the gray area smuggled oil, automobiles and their parts from Libya to Tunisia, and then loaded tobacco, olives, wool, wine and other materials from Tunisia, smuggled back to Libya, and then smuggled back to Libya. The transport fleet returned to the homeland. This back-and-forth, in which the doubled profit is enough to make all daring people tempted. A sage surnamed Ma once said that as long as there is a 100% profit, people will disregard all laws. The smuggling between the two countries around Tunisia and Libya shows the truth in his words. At this time, a smuggling boat disguised as a fishing boat appeared on the sea. Boxes of marine fish are laid out on the deck of the boat, like a full-fledged fishing boat, but if you open the cabin, there are packs of car parts stuffed inside. Under the leadership of the captain, several crew members were operating the fast and outrageous fishing boat, which was heading towards Tunisia. Running smuggling, speed is the most important. First of all, it needs to be faster than the anti-smuggling ship, so that when encountering official forces, it can be calmly dealt with so as not to get all the stolen goods. Second, speed is profit. Smuggling also needs to be efficient. When the price of a certain kind of goods fluctuates, the ship that can bring the goods back at the first time will always get the most generous returns. And the gray merchants who roam this sea area understand this truth, so these smuggling ships are willing to have sufficient horsepower for their ships without affecting the cargo. Of course, these alone are not enough, and the crew members need to be vigilant. Pay attention to any movement around you at any time, and you may not know where the anti-smuggling boats are coming from. At this time, at the highest point of the smuggling boat, Captain Saba kept looking around. “What’s wrong with you, Captain?” “I feel something is wrong.” “What’s the matter?” “My intuition tells me that something is wrong now.” Captain Saba’s words made the crew begin to get nervous. Their captain’s intuition is very trusted by everyone. Once he said something wrong, it turned out that three anti-smuggling ships were surrounding them. If it wasn’t for everyone’s high vigilance and early discovery, they would definitely be sent to the desert to mine. It was just like that, when everyone was nervously watching the surroundings under the leadership of Captain Saba, a crew member suddenly shouted. “Note that there is a plume of smoke ahead of us, and a ship is approaching us.” With the crew’s reminder, Captain Saba also noticed it later. As a captain who has drifted at sea for half his life, his rich experience made him immediately feel wrong. “This smoke column is wrong, it’s a battleship.” The experienced Captain Saba immediately saw the situation, because the battleships are all burning the best anthracite coal, and the smoke column is completely different from the economical merchant ships. So experienced people can see it at a glance. “Captain, what should we do now?” The crew immediately became nervous when they heard that it was a warship. No matter which warship it was, they would be vigilant in the face of their suspicious fishing boat, and smugglers would be caught no matter where they were. “Turn the bow of the boat now, and we will rush towards the shallow sea area.” Captain Saba immediately ordered at this moment, and he personally took the helm to steer the ship. They just want to stay away from these warships now, and don’t want them to find themselves. But this wish was not discovered by God today. At this moment, the distant ships have appeared on the sea level, and the tall warships were seen by Captain Saba through the telescope. “Fine, this is a battleship of the Allied Powers. It’s still a battleship.” At this moment, Captain Saba’s face was pale, and cold sweat broke out on his forehead. Because as long as you are not stupid, you will know that this suddenly appeared battleship, or several battleships, must be carrying out some secret missions. It is strange to have good fruit to eat. Maybe in order to keep it secret, they even throw people and boats to the bottom of the sea to feed the fish. “Full speed, leave quickly.” At this moment, Captain Saba hoped that the other party didn’t find them. As long as he could escape from here, he would go back immediately and surrender to the customs. But unfortunately, the Saba captain’s wish came to nothing, they have been noticed. I saw a destroyer chasing them from a distance, and its extremely high speed made Saba and the others, who were trying to escape, seem to be doing nothing. Facing the aggressive destroyer, Saba and the others lost their desire to escape. The other party can see that the speed is as high as 30 knots, so how do you let their smuggling boat run at a maximum of 19 knots. “Everyone pretend to be innocent, we are fishermen who go out to fish.” At this moment, everyone on the smuggling boat tried to make themselves like fishermen, and now they can only count on the other side to just check. “Break”, but the sudden explosion of artillery shells from the side made everyone on the smuggling boat into despair. It was obvious that the other party had no intention of boarding their ship at all, and just wanted to sink them and destroy them. “Keep running.” It was not the thoughts of these smugglers who dared to sit still. At this moment, the desire to survive was flooding the brain. And the smuggling ship swayed left and right, trying to influence the other party’s shelling. “Beng~beng~beng…” Then several consecutive shell explosions sounded around the ship, indicating that the position was still effective. But as long as the mind is clear, unless the other party has a sudden power failure, otherwise this is just slowing down the death of himself and others. “Ram, come and take the helm.” Saba also knew this, and after handing the helm to his deputy, he plunged into the captain’s room. After he opened a dark compartment in the captain’s cabin, he took out a Marconi’s latest radio station. The smuggling boat also needs to keep in touch at all times, and it is normal to bring a radio. Then Saba showed a fierce look and launched a telegram. A few minutes later, a clear telegram was sent around. “We are in the waters of latitude 34.652 and longitude 14. off the coast of Libya, and we encountered a British and French fleet composed of seven battleships from the northwest. The other party is chasing us. Please pass by ships. Avoidance, I wish everyone good luck , I’m Captain Saba.” At this moment, not only the passing ships received this telegram, but Tripoli, Palermo and other places also received this telegram. Of course, the first to receive the telegram was the British and French reinforcements that were just a short distance away. “Lieutenant General, this is a clear telegram we just received.” The communications staff member handed the telegram to Lieutenant Admiral Stedy, the fleet commander, with a strange expression. “Cough cough cough…” Lieutenant General Stedy, who was drinking black tea, choked on the tea. “This is the enemy’s reconnaissance fishing boat, it’s just a usual cover-up method, it’s too inferior.” His Excellency the recovered lieutenant general put down the telegram with a tone that he had already seen through the other party’s conspiracy. “Then what do we do next?” “Telegram to General Cardon, we are now exposed, and we will move at full speed immediately. Send our position to the general as well.” “As ordered, Commander.”