Chapter 40: Iberian-Japanese War Part V - The Luzon Invasion and the Battle of Hoang Sa
The spring began with the departure invasion fleet headed towards Luzon, carrying both general Kanbe Tomoyoshi and naval magistrate Kuki Moritaka. The 100-ship fleet of transports, warships, and tekkousen carried a land army of 15,000 men aside from sailors, including 10,000 Oda troops, 4,000 Ryuzouji troops, and 1,000 Bireitou samurai. Some of these ships would land in the various Batanes and Babuyan Islands between Bireitou and Luzon and gather resources and provisions, coming across some of the local tribes. Notably, a fort would start to be constructed on Calayan. The rest of the fleet aimed towards Aparri, site of the 1582 Battle of Cagayan between wokou pirates and the Spanish.
On March 16th, the Battle of Aparri began with a brief naval battle, if it could even be called that. The small Spanish fleet off of Aparri was dwarfed by the Azuchi fleet, and after a couple exchanges which saw the latter completely overwhelming the former, the Spanish captain chose to retreat rather than suffer inevitable losses and fight together with the reinforcements from Mexico City, which had arrived too recently to adequately prepare and set sail against the Japanese. However, Aparri was guarded by a well-provisioned army of 10,000, of which 1,000 were fully armored conquistadors, 1,000 were Latin American soldiers, and the rest were Catholic native levies. The bulk of this army fiercely resisted the landing Japanese forces at a beachhead to the east of Aparri, firing volleys of arquebus fire and showers of arrows from makeshift trenches and palisades. Surprisingly, cannonfire from Japanese carracks failed to shake the Spaniards’ well-entrenched position, and assaulting samurai and ashigaru only captured one of the trenches before retreating under heavy fire. At the same time, Japanese galleons and zentousen bombarded Aparri but received returning fire as well. The Japanese decided to briefly withdraw for the night while the Spanish-native force finally found time to rest.
The next day saw the continuation of this situation, with mounting losses on both sides. On the 2nd night, an exhausted Tomoyoshi decided to shift strategies and would take up the advice of Yamada Nagamasa (山田長政) [1], a prominent cavalry commander from Bireitou. Shortly before the dawn of the 3rd day, a few ships evaded the notice of the Spanish amidst the deep fog and landed a cavalry contingent of 300 a few kilometers east of their position, led by Nagamasa. The morning began much like the other 2 days on the main front. However, an hour into the battle, a firework signal was launched from a Japanese ship, followed by a cavalry charge from the east. The entirely dismounted Spanish army’s right flank began to become overrun by the elite samurai on horseback wielding melee weapons and bajouzutsu. Seeing the tides beginning to turn, Ryuzouji Noriie led his clan’s forces from the front and took trench after trench, palisade by palisade through heavy fighting. By mid-morning, the already beleaguered Spanish army routed and the main organized core retreated back to Aparri, entering the landscape of an bombarded city continually assaulted by the Japanese fleet. By the evening, the city was surrounded by the Japanese land forces. Aparri was sieged for a week before on the night of the 24th, the surviving conquistadors, accompanied by willing native allies, escaped the siege and headed deeper into the Cagayan Valley where they hoped to rebuild strength. The rest of the army surrendered the following morning on March 25th. The Japanese, despite this victory, had lost 1,000 men and now had to look after an additional 1,000 wounded men. 4,000 men in the Spanish army, meanwhile, had been killed, with another 4,000 captured.
Salmon=Japan, light orange=Spain
The victorious Japanese consolidated their position and rebuilt the devastated city, notably restoring the old Nihonmachi quarter that had been destroyed the previous year and setting up their headquarters there. Over the next month, the Mouri navy and army would slowly arrive in the area, establishing their own camp a few kilometers and bringing much-needed food provisions. A Japanese army of 20,000-25,000 now stood in northern Luzon relatively unchallenged for the moment.
Not all was well, however. The small naval fleet at Aparri had quickly retreated back to Manila, where the naval commander was relieved of duty and imprisoned for cowardice and incompetence. Replacing him was Juan de Amezqueta, a veteran captain of the Puerto Rican militia who had come to Manila as the commander of the naval reinforcements from New Spain. However, rather than confront the Japanese in the Luzon Strait, he strived to break the blockade on Macau first and wait until the reinforcements from Madrid to arrive before striking at the main Japanese navy. De Amezqueta left Manila in late March just before the fall of Aparri with a fleet of 13 galleons, 5 carracks, and 20 smaller vessels.
Portrait of Juan de Amezqueta
On April 7th, the Spanish fleet tracked down Itou Sukenori’s fleet of 20 ships in the middle of the Hoang Sa islands [2]. Caught by surprise and lacking full strength as he regularly sent out scouting vessels across the South China Sea, Sukenori hastily assembled his fleet into formation. However, the Spanish fleet outnumbered the Japanese fleet 2 to 1 and held an even greater advantage in firepower., bombarding the latter. Nevertheless, Sukenori employed his hobayasen and zentousen well, squeezing the partially ironclad ships in between Spanish warships and carrying out boarding action while firing cannonballs forward from a safe distance. In the end, de Amezqueta was still able to clobber the Japanese, sinking or seizing many ships including all the hobayasen while mostly suffering casualties from a carrack successfully boarded by the Japanese and gone rogue. As Sukenori’s defeated fleet sailed back to Bireitou, the connection between Macau and Manila became secure again, allowing Portuguese ships to join the Spanish.
The prowess of Spanish naval power demonstrated in the naval Battle of Hoang Sa foreshadowed the truly titanic naval clashes that lay ahead in the war as de Oquendo’s grand fleet sailed ever closer to Manila, ready to rumble in the seas. On the other hand, the Japanese victories in northern Luzon endangered Manila as the former now had a viable land route towards the Philippine capital.
[1]: The same Yamada Nagamasa who served the Siamese king IOTL is a talented vassal of Iriebashi ITTL.
[2]: Vietnamese name for the Paracel Islands