The captain leaned against the microphone and blew the wake-up whistle. The sharp whistle spread throughout the ship through the microphone. The sailors in the sailor cabin heard the familiar whistle in their sleep and all woke up. But it was just to wake up.
The sentry was not a battle alarm, so the sailors were still sleepy. The dim red light in the cabin meant that it was still night. They looked at the electronic clock on the bulkhead, and it was only less than four o'clock. The sailors looked at each other depressedly.
Looking at it, no one understood what was going on.
Then the captain's voice came from the PA system overhead:
"I am the captain. Listen up, brothers. We were originally scheduled to rendezvous with the cruise ship Wing On Princess at five o'clock, but the cruise ship Wing On Princess lost its signal an hour ago. This is the eastern end of the Strait of Malacca, where pirates are most frequent.
The sea area, and it is late at night, is also the time when pirates hijack ships. Therefore, we suspect that the Yongan Princess may have been hijacked by pirates. The entire ship is now on level 2 alert, and the observation posts are on guard to closely observe the surrounding sea surface.
"
Without saying a word, the sailors immediately got dressed, rushed out of bed, and took up their positions at their respective posts. The observation posts on the bridge and deck were also filled with sailors, and there were at least two observers in each direction.
Using a high-powered telescope, he looked hard at the surrounding black sea.
All the lights that could be seen from the outside of the ship were extinguished. The destroyer, which was not very tall, suddenly disappeared into the black sea.
The Kuimulang destroyer has a standard displacement of 1,210 tons, four 102 mm main guns, two 40 mm ping pong guns, six 20 mm machine guns, four 12.7 mm machine guns, a maximum speed of 36.5 knots, an endurance of 2,400 nautical miles/14 knots, and personnel
204 people.
Now, in addition to the four main guns and two 40mm ping-pong cannons, the remaining six 20mm machine guns and four 12.7mm machine guns, gun crews and gun crews are all in place.
The entire destroyer opened its fangs and claws and turned into a vigilant hunter again.
The captain's voice continued:
"Brothers on the ship, listen up. If any of you knows more about the pirate situation in Malacca, report it to me immediately... I repeat, if anyone knows the situation about the pirates in Malacca better, please report it to me immediately... The situation is urgent. I hope everyone understands it.
The seriousness…”
In the bridge command room, three old advisers have also arrived. They have heard about the situation. Now Xiang Xiaoqiang's delegation is all in the command room.
The captain broadcasted for a long time, and a few sailors actually claimed to know the situation, but when they were called up and asked, it was nothing more than what the captain knew.
Xiang Xiaoqiang was extremely upset, so he took out his cigarettes and gave them to everyone to smoke. For a while, there were only a few dark red cigarette butts flickering in the command room.
The bell rang again. It was probably a sailor who said he understood the situation. The captain grabbed the receiver:
"I'm the captain."
"Captain, the sonar heard the sound of a small diesel engine at 210 degrees, about 5 nautical miles away."
The captain suddenly became energetic, grabbed the microphone and asked:
"Moving speed? Course?"
The sonar soldier paused for a while and said:
"The course is about 240, and the speed... is estimated to be about 15 knots. ... It may be a small ship... or it may be a submarine."
Bearing 210 means that there is a small ship traveling in the south-southwest direction of the ship, 5 nautical miles away, heading in the 240 direction. In other words, its course is heading in the west-southwest direction.
Since this is near the entrance of the Strait of Malacca, the channel is very busy even in the middle of the night. However, they are all large ships, mainly cargo ships and oil tankers with tens of thousands of tons. What is heard in the sonar is heavy
There was a loud boiler sound. It was not normal for a small boat with a diesel engine to be wandering around here in the middle of the night.
Submarines? There are no submarines in the British fleet at the Singapore naval port. There are several submarines at the Daming Naval Base in Songkhla, Siam.
"Qiu Qiu," Xiang Xiaoqiang took a puff from his cigarette and asked in the darkness, "do you think it could be our submarine?"
In the darkness, Qiu Qiu was quiet for a while and said:
"It's unlikely. If it was a submarine, they would have heard us first, and they would have definitely been able to tell that it was a destroyer. They would have stayed far away, or dived quietly. They wouldn't be so arrogant."
Xiang Xiaoqiang questioned:
"Why do they have to hide when they find a destroyer? They should know that we have ceased war with the Netherlands. The nearby destroyers are either ours or the British. Why is there any need to hide?"
"This is not a question of whether it is necessary," Qiu Qiu said, "This is the principle of survival for submarines. If you find a destroyer, you must avoid it. Unless it is broad daylight and you have good sight, and you can clearly tell that the destroyer belongs to your country, you must avoid it.
Make sure that the destroyer can see you clearly and not accidentally damage you, otherwise you must avoid it as soon as possible."
Qiu Qiu paused and said:
"Besides, the course is wrong. Its course is southwest, heading straight for the coast of Sumatra. Our submarine cannot dock at Pachia Island. There is no port in this area except Singapore. The coast of Pachia Island
This section is very wild, full of mangroves, not even a small city... No, it is impossible for our submarine to go in that direction."
The captain immediately confirmed Qiu Qiu's opinion.
Xiang Xiaoqiang asked again: "Could it be a British patrol boat or something?"
Qiu Qiu added: "British naval ships will not come here. This place has already penetrated dozens of nautical miles into the Dutch East Indies."
The only possibility left is that it is some kind of "fishing boat". The fishermen along the coast of Sumatra are extremely poor, and their fishing boats have no motors.
In the 1930s, on this poor coast, a fishing boat equipped with a diesel motor...
The captain asked: "Sir, what should we do?"
Xiang Xiaoqiang smacked his lips and said directly:
"Let's go over and have a look! No matter what kind of ship it is, stop it and check it! ... If it's a pirate ship, we'll be very lucky."
…
The tweeter screamed "wow" twice, and then the captain's voice:
"I am the captain. Attention brothers, we are now entering combat mode. We are now entering combat mode... A suspicious ship was found 5 nautical miles to the southwest. It may be a pirate ship... Now let's go over and intercept it... All weapons units
Be ready to fire..."
All the sailors on the ship were excited, energetic, and full of expectations, hoping that it was a pirate ship. These young people followed the aircraft carrier south from the East China Sea Fleet and had not experienced a naval battle. Now that they heard that they might capture a pirate ship, they were extremely excited.
This kind of exciting and non-dangerous mission drove many sailors away from their sleepiness.
The destroyer suddenly accelerated its speed, made a sharp turn, and almost turned half sideways. The speed soared to 25 knots, and it headed southwest against the white waves.
These warships came to fight in the East Indies, and each ship was equipped with Dutch and Malay translators to shout to the enemy or accept the enemy's surrender. Now the captain called these two translators to the ship.
On the bridge.
After the destroyer accelerated, the command room obviously felt a lot of turbulence. The captain and Qiu Qiu stood firm, the three old advisers were sitting, which was better, but Xiang Xiaoqiang couldn't sit still and smoked a cigarette in the dark.
I walked back and forth and almost fell down several times.
Every once in a while, the sonar soldier reported the distance between the two sides. The "fishing boat" in front never changed its course or accelerated. It probably hadn't discovered that it was being targeted by the destroyer.
After waiting anxiously for about twenty minutes, the distance between the two sides was already less than a thousand meters. The boat in front still maintained its original speed without any notice.
Xiang Xiaoqiang stretched his head and looked forward through the porthole, but it was still pitch black and could not see anything. In such a dark sea, both parties did not turn on the lights and did not get very close, so it was difficult to see each other directly.
And a distance of 1,000 meters is not enough to hear the other party's voice.
Sailing on the sea at night without even turning on the navigation light, this further indicates that the identity of the boat ahead is suspicious.
Suddenly, the bell rang, and the sonar soldier reported:
"Captain, the target has accelerated and changed course!"
The other party discovered him. The captain immediately asked:
"Where to go? How far is it?"
"There are still about 700 meters! The target is turning... Okay, it's fixed. The target's new course is 310! Speed... 20 knots!"
The other party was originally heading towards the southwest coast, but now turned north-northwest and fled towards the entrance of the Strait of Malacca.
The captain immediately told Xiang Xiaoqiang the situation and then ordered:
"Speed 30 knots! New heading 310! Turn on searchlights!"
The power noise increased, and the ship immediately reversed sharply to the right, and the speed increased significantly. Xiang Xiaoqiang was holding on to the chart table to stand firm. The pencil on the chart table rolled to the right and was blocked by the edge of the table.
Xiang Xiaoqiang suddenly felt that it was extremely enjoyable, chasing prey in the vast darkness, and he was absolutely powerful...
"Bang! Bang!"
The two large searchlights were turned on, and the sea in front suddenly became bright. The light beam swept twice and covered a wooden fishing boat of 20 to 30 tons a few hundred meters ahead.
Everyone in the command room immediately ran out and stood on the open-air bridge, looking at it with large binoculars.
The wooden boat was very old, had one cabin, and was obviously in the style of a local fishing boat. But what was quite incompatible with the identity of the wooden fishing boat was that the "fishing boat" actually sailed to more than 20 knots, with dozens of meters of whitecaps emerging behind it, and the bow followed
It jumped and jumped along with the waves, which looked a bit like a military speedboat.
The captain ordered to shout. The translator took the microphone and shouted in Malay:
"Attention ships ahead, we are the Ming Navy... ordering you to stop the ship immediately for inspection... I repeat, we are the Ming Navy, ordering you to stop the ship immediately for inspection..."
After shouting several times, the "fishing boat" in front ignored them and actually turned around again and ran away to the left. However, the speed did not change. It is estimated that 20 knots was their maximum speed.
The destroyer immediately followed and turned around, still clinging to the rear. The distance was still shortening meter by meter. Now it was only more than a hundred meters.
Suddenly, a figure appeared at the hatch of the boat and threw something towards the destroyer. The object hit the bow of the destroyer and fell into the water.
"boom!!!"
A large column of water rose up from the water and clung to the side of the destroyer.
"Damn it, grenade!" the captain cursed and ordered fiercely, "Brothers, open fire!"
The two 20mm machine guns and the two 12.7mm machine guns on the destroyer's port side spurted out tongues of flame at the same time. The flames flashed wildly on the sea for a moment, making it deafening.
The poor wooden boat was instantly shattered and burned. Then the destroyer's bow turned to the left, quickly rushed towards the small wooden boat, and rolled over it like a locomotive.
"All cease fire! Shut down both engines."
The captain gave an order, and all guns and guns ceased firing at the same time. The destroyer also turned off its engines and used its inertia to make a half circle on the water. The white waves on the stern of the ship slowly faded and dissipated.
Deathly silence returned to the sea.
Two searchlights were searching the sea. What was floating nearby were wood debris, large amounts of oil, and several corpses, floating face down with blood pouring from their bodies, slowly staining the surrounding seawater.
red.
Further away, there were two places in the water where the water was splashing desperately. The bright searchlight shone over, and it was two people holding a wooden board and calling for help.
…
The captain was about to order the boat to be put down and pull them up. Xiang Xiaoqiang stopped him and said:
"Wait a minute, let's not send anyone over. These people are more ferocious than we thought. God knows what they will do. Hang the rope net on the hull of the boat and let the interpreter shout. If they want to survive, they can swim over by themselves.
"
The captain thought it was true and ordered the translator to speak.
The translator shouted into the microphone several times, but on the water dozens of meters away, the two pirates were still holding the wooden board and shouting something, as if they didn't hear them.
Xiang Xiaoqiang looked at the telescope for a while, became impatient, and said to the translator:
"I tell them, you translate."
He continued to observe the expressions of the two pirates with his telescope, and said in a dark voice:
"You are now given one minute to throw away the board, swim over, and climb onto the boat. After one minute, we will turn around and leave you here... Hey, there are several bleeding corpses soaking here around you.
The shark will come in a while... If you want to play with the shark, just stay there and don't move... We can just watch the excitement here... Huh? Did you really throw away the board and come here? Well, you can't swim too much
Too fast..."
As Xiang Xiaoqiang said something and the translator translated it, before Xiang Xiaoqiang finished speaking, the expressions of the two pirates changed drastically, they threw away the board and swam over as fast as they could.
Several sailors were guarding the deck with guns, and two pirates climbed up soaking wet on the rope net. They were immediately pushed down and handcuffed behind their backs.
Xiang Xiaoqiang went down to the deck and looked at the two prisoners excitedly. The first mate and translator quickly followed behind.
The sailor behind them grabbed their hair and forced them to raise their faces. Xiang Xiaoqiang shone a flashlight directly on their faces.
——Yes, dark-skinned, shirtless, and ferocious-looking. A typical Malacca pirate, the most ferocious among the natives of the East Indies.
"Welcome to the Kuimulang as a guest," Xiang Xiaoqiang stared at them sadly and smiled slightly, "Now, I have a few questions to ask you, and I hope you can give me face."