Vasco De Gama vs Zheng He

The Portuguese. The Chinese barges were too big and cumbersome. The Portuguese, after years fending off traiterous English and Froggish pirates, had perfected the art of gunning people down. Their smaller, but more efficient ships, would have sailed circles around the Chinese, and send them to Davy Jones' locker!

Then, as the Chinese were sinking, Vasco da Gama would give the coup de Greece, and have his men, all valiant swashbucklers, to give the Chinese a lesson in sailing!

IN 1510 the Portuguese could only visit the Indian Ocean with about 25 ships, half of them warships and all of them about 100 feet long. The Chinese fleet 70 years earlier had 60-100 ships, sized between 130-400 feet. Such big ships would require a lot of cannonfire to sink, and not leave a lot left over to bombard cities etc. I think the Portuguese would have the fighting edge but be so short on numbers that any advance by the Chinese, such as relying on big guns to win naval battles, would see the Portuguese beaten. It would be very unlike the battle of Diu.

Portugeuse ships in the early 16th century doesn't even depend on gunnery to win, its also boarding based, and cannons at this time were not as developed as it would be in the late 16th century on. There are no fighting edge for the Portuguese ships at all, the tactics are essentially the same.

"Their smaller, but more efficient ships, would have sailed circles around the Chinese, and send them to Davy Jones' locker!"

What "smaller defficient ships"? do you actually think the treasure ship is the battle ship? Hardly, the treasureship isn't even used for war, its main purpose is for transporting grainary, it has virtually no purpose in war. The major fighting ships are the Fu Chuan which were about 170 feet in length and only 700 tons, they use incendiary weapons and BOARDING just like the Portuguese. And they are hardly cumbersome whatsoever. In Asian battle ships including the Korean Kobukson are some of the most manuevrable ships around, the Ming fleet had paddlers, Europe did not have it until the late 18th century.

Vasco da Gama's fleet couldn't even be qualified as a navy. Its more of a exploring mission with no more than a few thousand men. Zheng He's fleet has the purpose of war and it reached over 30,000 in one occasion. Not to mention, Zheng He's little fleet, is but a small part of the entire Ming imperial fleet which have 3,500 ships.

The Portuguese were naturally familiar with (and sometimes employed) the ram-and-board tactics favored by their Spanish neighbors, but they also (along with the Venetians) pioneered the art of standoff gunnery, long before it was used by the English (who are often uncritically credited with originating it).

And, as I'm sure you know, the Portuguese made a liberal use of such long-range tactics in the East.

Portuguese all the way.

Degredado is really funny, if u read this, talk more about those dashing, courageous swashbucklers.

Ironic tho that i would have to side with the treasure fleet even tho Degredado puts up such a good point.

Banana peels were lying all over the floor....

This is a site you may (or may not) find interesting:

http://www.angelfire.com/ga4/guilmartin.com/Revolution.html