My Italy

The sun was shining brightly on the blue sea, and a fleet was sailing at noon. It can be seen from the flag flying on the ship that this is an Australian transport fleet.

The fleet has eleven ships, mainly carrying blankets, leather and some food and other supplies. They just left Sydney early this morning and were preparing to head north to the Indonesian Islands before heading to Calcutta.

Today's Australia is basically based on a farm economy and is not yet a country sitting on mines, so it mainly relies on animal husbandry.

And with a land of more than 8 million people, every Australian with less than 5 million people is a big farmer, and their life should not be too prosperous.

Of course, the advent of war allowed Australians to show their loyalty to Britain, and thousands of Australians were conscripted into the army and went to the battlefield.

Of course, the Australian Navy is also being recruited, but the ones being recruited are mainly more advanced ones. For small warships like the Agility that were in service in the 1990s, they can only be retained for escort missions.

For Captain Philip of the USS Agility, the escort mission was too mundane, but for the sailors of the USS Agile who had only joined the army for a few months, it was great to be able to participate in the escort mission. It's not very dangerous, you can get some exercise, and it's not tiring. It's a perfect mission.

But soon, neither Captain Philip, who was eager for meritorious service, nor the rookie sailor who had only been in the army for a few months cared about this.

"A plume of smoke was found in the east, and a ship was coming."

The lookout loudly reported his new discovery.

To the east of where the crew of the Agile reported, the lookout of the Pierre, the forward of the Spey fleet, was also reporting his findings.

"Report, a fleet was discovered in the west. Through the observation of the telescope, it is a transport fleet. There should be one or two escort warships."

As a reconnaissance cruiser, the Pierre is not very powerful in terms of firepower, but it is quite excellent in speed and reconnaissance. Its top speed of 29 knots is much higher than that of ordinary cruisers. In addition, the ship is equipped with an optical detection instrument more than 3 meters long in Shanghai. These are optical instruments equipped on warships of more than 10,000 tons. They can allow the Pierre to detect opponents earlier and understand the situation earlier.

Therefore, in front of such professional maritime reconnaissance ships, the traces of ships such as the Agility cannot be hidden.

"Send a telegram to the fleet and inform us of the situation here."

Soon Spey, who was more than ten nautical miles behind him, called back and ordered him to monitor the fleet and they would arrive soon. Obviously, Pace no longer intends to remain hidden, and wants to capture this Australian transport fleet.

After receiving the order, the Pierre began to follow the still unaware fleet from a distance.

On the side of the transport fleet, the crew on the Agile felt strange as they watched the smoke column in the east but could not see the ship for a long time.

"What's wrong with this ship?"

"Is there a power failure?"

"How about we go over there and take a look at the situation."

Don't blame the crew of the Agility for not thinking that this might be an enemy, because this was so unexpected. Who would have thought that enemies would appear near the east coast of Australia, let alone these crew members, not even Captain Phillip, who hated not being able to go to the battlefield, had thought of it.

"Turn around, let's go over and see what's going on."

Following Captain Philip's order, the Agility turned away from the escorting fleet and rushed to the east.

"In some cases, the smoke column became more intense. It seemed like a fleet was converging."

Before the Agility could get closer to see clearly, the lookout quickly reported the new situation.

"What fleet?"

After hearing this, Captain Philip raised his telescope and observed. At this time, including him, the entire staff of the Agile had not yet realized the danger.

At this time, Lieutenant General Spey, who had just arrived, rushed towards the fleet with his warships.

"It's a warship. These ships are warships."

At this moment, the lookout who finally saw the ship clearly shouted in surprise.

"How come we encountered a warship here and we couldn't send a telegram to notify it? Could it be..."

At this moment, Captain Phillip still felt that the situation was strange, but soon his professional knowledge made him think of a chilling possibility, and at this moment his whole face became unhappy.

At this moment, the lookout hand who clearly saw the flag on the opponent's battleship also let out a trembling scream. "This is the enemy. They are German and Italian warships. They are rushing towards us!"

At this moment, the lookout's screams caused chaos among the people on the ship. They were just recruits who had only been in the army for a few months. It was normal for them to not know what to do in the face of emergencies.

Fortunately, the first mate, boatswain and other officers of the Agility have served for many years and know how to appease these newcomers.

As for Captain Philip, after discovering the enemy ship, he issued several orders in succession. "Immediately send a telegram to the fleet. An enemy fleet was found southeast of us. We suspect that the opponent is the German and Italian fleet that was hiding before. Let them disband the formation and flee immediately. Also send a telegram to Sydney to tell them the Fourth Transport Fleet. At the position of longitude 152.75162 north latitude -33.14726, we were attacked by the German and Italian fleets. At the same time, we ordered the warships to turn and we sailed north."

That's right, Captain Philip planned to turn the ship around and escape after reporting the situation and disbanding the fleet to escape.

Although it is a good tradition of the British Navy to attack the enemy when it sees it, it does not mean that it should be allowed to act recklessly. At least now, it would mean suicide to adopt this tradition. As for the Royal Australian Navy, which was just established, of course it knows how to adapt.

After all, there is no reason to block the opponent's entire fleet with hundreds of tons of Agility, other than to risk death. It only takes a few minutes for the opponent to send the Agility back to the west.

It is unclear whether Sydney received Agile's telegram, but the Pace fleet was definitely the first to receive it.

"Report, radio waves have just been discovered near us, the content is unknown."

"Okay, I get it."

Regarding this radio wave, Pace knew without thinking that the other party must be reporting his location and specific situation, and he didn't care about it.

He knew that even if Sydney received the news, it would not pose much threat to him.

Because he has been to Sydney, he also has a good understanding of Sydney's coastal defense situation. The largest caliber of its current coastal defense facilities are two 240mm coastal defense guns. However, these two cannons are from retired battleships of the last century and pose little threat to themselves. As for other such as 152 mm and 127 mm coastal defense guns, let alone them.

Of course, if the main force of the Australian Navy is in Sydney, then Lieutenant-Admiral Spey will be suicidal. Before the war, the Australian Navy had a strong strength of one battle cruiser, one battleship, five cruisers and more than ten other ships.

But now its main force has been deployed long ago, and the remaining ones are warships such as the Agility that can only be used for second-line tasks such as escort. These warships can block the attack of his Pacific Fleet, even if Nelson is resurrected.

"Order all ships to attack and sink all merchant ships."

Looking at the merchant ships fleeing in all directions, Lieutenant General Spey did not waste much time. He did not intend to capture these merchant ships, but planned to sink them all directly.

As for the result, there is no need to think about it. How could a merchant ship running for more than ten knots escape the pursuit of a warship of more than twenty knots? Therefore, within the next two hours, each transport ship of the Fourth Transport Fleet was sunk one after another.

As for the Agility, which turned around and ran away as soon as the situation turned bad, it actually escaped. The reason is very simple. He can't outrun the tiger but he can outrun his teammates. By the time the tiger takes care of his teammates, he will have disappeared long ago.

Although they will be in big trouble later, at least their lives are saved now.

After solving the transport fleet, the Pace fleet rushed to Sydney.