My Italy

The Tunis Strait is a choke point and a sea area that Italy focuses on investigation. Especially after the French formation went to sea, there were more ships and airships patrolling here. Even yesterday, a small Italian warship boldly came to the waters off Tunisia.

For this reason, the French side gave the opponent a severe lesson and beat the opponent until they fled in confusion before giving up.

Lessons have been learned, but since the other side dares to come, it is obvious that France is not afraid of France's maritime strength in Tunisia. This gives the reinforcement formations preparing to cross the Tunis Strait less time to choose, unless they are willing to face the Italians' sight.

At this time, the darkness provides excellent cover for these figures to sneak through the place.

The whirring sound of motors sounded off the coast of Tunisia, and a small patrol boat carefully observed the surrounding movements in the night. Its searchlights were constantly shining all around.

At this time, in this patrol boat, more than a dozen French naval officers and soldiers opened their eyes wide and observed the movements around them.

"Nothing was found, everything is normal."

"No suspicious circumstances were found. It's safe."

As the officers and soldiers of the patrol boat continued to observe the surrounding waters to ensure safety, the transmitter sent a safety coded message at the captain's signal.

There will be more than one patrol boat out tonight. In fact, starting from Bizerte at the end of the western section of the Tunisian strait, to Sfax, which is already beyond the scope of the Tunisian Strait in the eastern section, the French side has arranged many ships. Conduct patrols in one's own waters. The reason why the French were so aggressive was because a formation wanted to pass through here at night.

The best way to pass through here is to use the cover of night, sail quickly off the coast of Tunisia, and cross the strait in one fell swoop before sunrise tomorrow.

Lieutenant General Sturdy thought the same way as he was leading the British and French reinforcement fleets through this sea area.

"Report, the French side sent a telegram. No abnormalities were found on the Tunisian side of the strait. In addition, Lieutenant General Dufournel sent a telegram asking if the speed should be increased now."

At this moment on the flagship, Lieutenant General Sturdy was listening to the communications officer reporting the situation.

"Tell Lieutenant General Dufresneel 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 Sturdy asked the communications officer to convey his message.

At this time, Lieutenant General Sturdy had already waited for the French formation. After a brief exchange, the reinforcement formation became a reinforcement fleet. Sturdy was promoted to fleet commander and British formation commander, while the French commander was Lieutenant General Dufnel, who also served as fleet chief of staff.

In addition, after some friendly exchanges and discussions, the two agreed that taking the northern passage near the island of Malta was too dangerous, and only the southern passage near the Libyan Sea was the best option.

For this reason, Lieutenant General Sturdy specially reported to the Mediterranean Fleet led by Admiral Cardon and informed him of his course of action.

Of course, it is not enough to just rely on the reinforcement fleet to cross the Tunis Strait. France's maritime power in Tunisia also needs 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've had good luck.

Yes, luck is one of the guarantees for success in action. As long as you are lucky enough, sometimes plans that may seem unreliable will succeed due to a combination of circumstances.

So far, Lieutenant General Sturdy feels that he has been lucky.

With the help of the French colonial navy, the joint reinforcement fleet formed by Britain and France sneaked through the Tunis Strait under the cover of night.

At this time, Italy still knew nothing about the reinforcement fleet that had slipped through the Tunis Strait, because most of its attention was attracted by the Mediterranean fleet.

There were few ships in the waters off Libya at this time. Italy was the first to create a convoy formation due to the harassment of British warships from Malta.

Therefore, there are very few ships in Libyan waters at this time. In addition to 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 been fighting in Europe. But how can I put it, if there is demand, there will be sales, especially after the two countries cut off apparent economic and trade exchanges, many people noticed the huge profits.

In Europe, due to strict regulations, smuggling is not a serious problem, but in Africa, which is vast and sparsely populated and has poor supervision, this kind of smuggling is becoming increasingly rampant.

Those adventurers who wander in the gray area smuggle fuel vehicles and their parts from Libya to Tunisia, and then load tobacco, olives, wool, wine and other materials from Tunisia, smuggle them back to Libya, and then use The transport fleet returned to the mainland.

The doubled profits from this round of transactions are enough to tempt all brave people. A sage named Ma once said that as long as there is 100% profit, people will disregard all laws.

The smuggling surrounding Tunisia and Libya demonstrates the truth in his words.

At this time, a smuggling ship disguised as a fishing boat appeared on the sea.

Boxes of sea fish are placed on the deck of the ship, which looks like a fishing boat with a harvest, but if you open the cabin, it is filled with bags of car parts. Several crew members, led by the captain, operated this incredibly fast fishing boat and headed towards Tunisia.

When running smuggling, speed is the most important thing.

First of all, it needs to be faster than the anti-smuggling ship so that it can respond calmly when encountering official forces to avoid both people and everyone taking the stolen goods. Secondly, speed is still profit. Smuggling also requires efficiency. When the price of a certain commodity fluctuates, the ship that can bring the goods back as soon as possible will always get the most generous rewards.

The gray merchants who roam this sea area all understand this truth, so these smuggling ships are willing to have sufficient horsepower in their ships without affecting the cargo.

Of course, this alone is not enough, the crew also needs to be more vigilant. Always pay attention to any movements in your surroundings, as the anti-smuggling boat may appear from somewhere.

At this time, at the highest point of the smuggling ship, Captain Saba kept looking around.

"Captain what's wrong with you?"

"I feel something is wrong."

"What's going on?"

"My gut tells me something is wrong."

Captain Saba's words made the crew members become nervous. Their captain's intuition was very much trusted by everyone. He once said something was wrong, only to find three anti-smuggling ships surrounding them. If everyone hadn't been so vigilant and discovered it early, they would have been sent to the desert to mine.

Just like this, when everyone, led by Captain Saba, was nervously paying attention to the surroundings, a crew member suddenly shouted. "Pay attention to the smoke column to our left front, and there is a ship approaching us."

After being reminded by the crew member, Captain Saba also noticed.

As a captain who has been drifting at sea for half his life, his rich experience made him immediately feel that something was wrong.

"This smoke column is wrong, it's a battleship coming."

The experienced Captain Saba immediately saw the situation, because warships all burn the best anthracite, and their smoke plumes are completely different from those of merchant ships that pay attention to economy. Therefore, experienced people can see it at a glance.

"Captain, what do we do now?"

As soon as they heard that it was a warship, the crew immediately became nervous. No matter which side of the warship it was, they would be wary of their suspicious fishing boat, and smuggling would be caught no matter where it was.

"Now turn the ship around and head towards the shallow sea."

At this moment, Captain Saba immediately gave orders, and he personally took the helm to turn the ship. They just want to stay away from these warships now and don't want them to discover them.

But this wish was not discovered by God today.

At this moment, ships in the distance have appeared on the horizon, and Captain Saba saw the tall warships through the telescope.

"Come on, this is a battleship of the Allied Powers. It's also 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 the sudden appearance of the battleship, or several battleships, must be carrying out some secret missions. It would be strange if you bump into each other by accident, and you will get something good. Maybe in order to keep it secret, they would throw the people and the boat to the bottom of the sea to feed the fish.

"Full speed, get out of here."

At this moment, Captain Saba hoped that the other party had not discovered them. As long as he could escape from here, he would go back and surrender to the customs immediately.

But alas, the Saba captain's wishes came to nothing, they were noticed.

They saw a destroyer chasing them from a distance. Its extremely high speed made Saba and the others who were trying to escape look like their efforts were in vain.

Facing the menacing destroyer, Saba and the others lost their desire to escape. The opponent's speed was as high as 30 knots at first glance. How could their smuggling ship run at a maximum speed of 19 knots?

"Everyone pretends to be innocent. We are fishermen out fishing."

At this moment, everyone on the smuggling boat tried their best to look like fishermen. Now they can only count on the other party to just conduct inspections.

"collapse"

However, the sudden explosion of artillery shells from the side plunged everyone on the smuggling ship into despair. It was obvious that the other party had no intention of boarding their ship and only wanted to sink them and eliminate them.

"Keep running."

Sitting back and waiting for death is not the idea of ​​​​these daredevil smugglers. At this moment, the desire to survive fills their brains.

And the smuggling ship was swaying from side to side, trying to affect the opponent's bombardment.

"Beng~Beng~Beng..."

Then several consecutive shell explosions sounded around the ship, indicating that the move was still effective. But as long as you are clear-headed, you will know that unless the other party suddenly has a power failure, this will only slow down the death of yourself and others.

"Ram, come and take the helm."

Saba also knew this. After handing the rudder to his deputy, he dove into the captain's cabin. After he opened a secret cabin in the captain's cabin, he took out a Marconi company's latest radio station.

Smuggling ships also need to keep in contact at all times, so it is normal to bring a radio.

Saba then showed a fierce expression and sent a telegram.

A few minutes later, a clear telegram spread around.

"We encountered the British and French fleet consisting of seven battleships coming from the northwest at the latitude 34.652 and longitude 14.15496 off the coast of Libya. The other side is chasing us. Please avoid the passing ships. I wish everyone good luck. I am Captain Saba."

At this moment, not only the passing ships received this telegram, but also Tripoli, Palermo and other places. Of course, the first to receive the telegram were the British and French reinforcement fleets that were just around the corner.

"Lieutenant General, this is a clear telegram we just received."

The communications staff officer handed the telegram to the fleet commander, Lieutenant General Sturdy, with a strange look on his face.

"Cough cough cough..."

Lieutenant General Sturdy, who was drinking black tea, choked on the tea.

"This is the enemy's reconnaissance fishing boat. It is just a common cover-up method. It is too cheap."

The lieutenant general, who had recovered, put down the telegram with a tone that showed he had already seen through the opponent's conspiracy.

"So what do we do next?"

"Send a telegram to Admiral Cardon. We have been exposed now. We will move closer at full speed immediately. Send our position to the Admiral as well."

"As you command, Commander."