Chapter 553 Imperial Counterattack

"Captain, 25,000 meters!"

The captain turned his head and looked at Xiao Tianzhi, who was still lying on the chart table, but the latter seemed to forget the three British battlecruisers rushing in the distance. He waved his hand and continued to focus on the chart.

As the captain of the navy who started with Li Mo from the beginning, from the earliest Chilean second-hand protective cruiser to the later light patrol, to the heavy patrol to today's fast battleship, Xiao Tianzhi is the kind of officer who climbs up step by step. In addition, he is naturally thick-skinned and familiar with everyone. Even Ji Rushan and other best commanders were tricked, and they gave him all the skills of naval warfare.

No one knows how much he can learn, but those who are familiar with him know very well that after being robbed of his credit by Long Xiao in the first battle against Japan during the First Sino-Japanese War, he actually used expensive torpedoes to hit the captain of the slowly sunken Xijingwan. He was definitely not as simple and honest as his appearance.

Anyway, the officers in the First Fleet have sent the Ya, not that he can attract wealth, but that his captain will never leave you a mouthful of soup when he smells the fishy smell.

So from the beginning, Xiao Tianzhi wanted to annihid Steady's New Zealand squadron.

Like Ning Xiaochuan, he is very clear that Dalian-class heavy patrols can't be used as capital ships to deal with war patrols, so only two fast battleships, Yanjing and Yucheng, are available. Whether it is equipment or strength, as long as there is enough patience and abundant time to eat the three war patrols, it is not a big problem, so what he needs to consider most is How to shorten the time, because it is already four o'clock in the afternoon, and the sky will be dark two hours later. In addition, the sea must be filled with smoke after the war. At that time, the visibility will be greatly reduced, and the nearby environment should also be paid attention to. To the north is the Lark Islands, to the east is the Gilbert Islands, and to the south are the Solomon Islands and Vanu. Atu, the first two are densely populated areas of islands and reefs, which is not conducive to the battleships' engagement. It is only about 40 nautical miles away from the center of the battlefield. At the speed of the other side's three war patrols, you can get there quickly if you want to run.

As for going south, it is more harmful, because there is an American mobile fleet there. Once the two fleets are merged, the difficulty of encirclement will be greatly increased. Maybe it will be the same as Ning Xiaochuan.

Therefore, we must give full play to the speed advantage of the fast battleship, so that the British can see how powerful the T-shaped tactic is at the absolute advantage of the speed!

Xiao Tianzhi gently put down his pen, raised his head and walked to the observation porthole.

Unlike the old battleships, because the capital ship bridge built from the Yanjing class is getting taller and larger, the bomb area is also much larger. In this case, in order to ensure the safety of the warship commander, the command tower is moved down, and the field of vision is much worse than before.

Fortunately, the designer has not blocked the porthole, and considering the size of the oriental people, he specially set up small accessories such as foot pads, but this smart design is not very popular in the army, because the reason is very simple. The captain will admit that he is a dwarf?!

But in order to win, it's better to use it!

Xiao Tianzhi, who is thin, muttered in his heart while pulling the steel plate switch on his feet. After stepping on it, his vision suddenly broadened a lot.

The number and type of enemy ships no longer need to be repeated. Due to the need to protect the soldiers who landed in Nauru, Steddy only brought three war patrols and four armored patrols. He didn't see this force at all. He was not Ning Xiaochuan who lacked a battleship. If two heavy patrols Even the armored cruisers are not smooth, so they really need to be removed.

Among the three battle patrols, two are invincible, invincible and unyielding, and one indefatigible battle patrol New Zealand. The latter belongs to the upgraded version of the former, with a displacement of 2,000 tons. Although the speed has not improved, its survivability is much stronger, so Xiao Tianzhi immediately set the first shelling target.

"Order the re-inspection team, take the opportunity to separate the three war patrols, immediately disperse the cruisers, order the mother ship to send two squadrons to monitor Nauru and here, and drive the patrol team to cooperate with the heavy patrol."

After Xiao Tianzhi finished giving the order, the captain had reported the distance again: "Captain, 22,000 meters!"

"Left, 15 degrees."

"Communication, tell the gun, open fire immediately after approaching 20,000 meters. Don't worry about the hit. Give me the fastest speed to target the New Zealand for three rounds!"

"Yes, captain."

When Xiao Tianzhi's order was sent to the shelling command tower at the top of the bridge, Lei Shaoming, the gun commander, was also a little stunned. The Yanjing-class fast battleship did have the ability to shell the opponent 20,000 meters away. The front two and the back-to-back layout can also fire in the face of the enemy rushing at this moment, but this distance is almost a wave. Fei Cannonball, not to mention that it still maintains a high speed of 25 knots. Unless it really becomes a beast, it is impossible to hit it.

It is impossible for the captain not to know the surname of the L50/305mm gun on the Yanjing class. If it is replaced with a 356mm or a newly equipped 380mm gun, it can slow down and try ultra-long-range shelling, because the shells are heavy and the trajectory is stable.

Does the captain have another purpose?

As a gun captain, Lei Shaoming is the core member of the battleship and has the right to make suggestions, but at this moment he still chose to shut up, because he understands that even if he has doubts at this moment, he should not challenge the captain's authority. Even if there is something wrong with the plan and he loses the war, he can only talk to the captain in private. Otherwise, the unity of more than 900 officers and soldiers on the ship will be destroyed.

So he immediately put down all his doubts and puzzles and began to distribute the fire channel.

Fire control is the core mechanism on any warship, and the line connecting the fire unit and fire control command is called the fire channel. The Yanjing-class fast battleship has four fire channels, that is to say, it has four reading rangefinders and command system, including the distance measurement and command of the two main guns of the front and rear bridge. The other two towers are the secondary gun and the air-to-air ranging and command tower, which are located on the left side of the front bridge and the right side of the rear bridge respectively.

It is impossible for any good battleship to put eggs into a basket, so it is necessary to continue to fight if any firepower channel is destroyed, so the four ranging and command towers need to be arranged separately.

In addition to the four fire channels, rangefinders are also installed in the three main turrets, which is the system used by the gun squad itself, but it can also provide parameters for the fire command of the whole ship in an emergency.

These reading or series systems are all connected to the fire control room at the bottom of the bridge by the telephone line. Even the data observed by more than a dozen lookouts on the front and rear bridges and masts will be fed back there. Finally, through more than a dozen mechanical computers inside, and finally converge. Form a group of shelling coordinates and elements.

This seemingly complex and huge system, in fact, the reaction speed is not slow. It only takes two minutes to locate successfully. If it is fired, it is simpler. You only need to quickly calculate the coordinates of a round of shelling according to the distribution of bullet points.

Within a few minutes, the calculated data had been sent from the telephone, and then the data was quickly sent to each gun position. Standing in the front gun main gun command tower, I looked down. I only saw that at the moment when the bow was deflected, the three turrets began to move. Just because of the shooting angle, the No. 3 turret had no The method completes the rotation and alignment of the target, but it is also prepared in advance according to the trajectory of the ship.

"21,000 meters!"

The reminder of the watchman behind him made Lei Shaoming's hand holding the phone quickly close to his cheek.

At this time, the three British war patrols also quickly deflected their bows, forming a human-character geese line on their side and pointing to the west at the same time. In a trance, it was like a dragon ball somewhere in front of them, attracting everyone to compete.

And this dragon ball is the key to the battle of battleships.

T bit!

This position is extremely important to any fleet. As countries begin to use the layout of multiple ships and middle line distribution, the T-position tactic has become more and more important, because only when you grab the horizontal on the T can you pour all the firepower to one side, while the enemy can only play one in a vertical position. Semi-strength, in the era when only one or several shells were needed to complete the final kill, this tactic is ranked in the most prominent position in the battleship tactical manual.

The British fleet suddenly turned and accelerated, which did not make Lei Shaoming feel strange, because this is the easiest way to compete for the T position. It is to use its own speed advantage to suddenly turn to accelerate when it quickly approaching the enemy but did not reach the artillery distance, cross the opponent's bow and then turn around, so as to grab the final kill first. The opportunity.

But obviously, the commander of the other party miscalculated the speed of the Yanjing-class fast battleship. In addition, his captain had been pretending to be a pig and eating a tiger, and the speed of the two fast battleships was maintained between 24 and 25 knots, so the brave British general wanted to use this method to overwhelm himself in one fell swoop. Wrong decision.

"He miscalculated!"

"Emergency 3, fire!"

At 4:10 Eastern Australian time, when the lookout only shouted a distance of 20,000 meters, the four triple front main guns of the bow of the Yanjing and Yucheng burst into a roar at the same time. The thick black smoke suddenly spewed out of the muzzle. Several black spots in the fire tore their eyes and rushed to the enemy in the blink of an eye.

The huge recoil and roar made Lei Shaoming, who were standing high, only feel that a few clouds of fire suddenly exploded in front of them. They almost roared and their hair stood upright all over their bodies, and a stream of heat rushed to the back of their heads.

This is the flower of the battleship hailed by the literati!

But this is only a momentary feeling. For these sailors and officers who swam between the shells and the explosion and put their heads on their belts, it is essential to launch the second shell as soon as possible.

In the case of a standby shell filled in advance, the 305mm main gun can reach a rapid speed of three per minute, so when the first wave of shells was still roaring in the sky, the second wave of shells rushed out of the gun again.

And Lei Shaoming also faithfully carried out the captain's plan. He didn't look at the water column that began to explode in the distance, and ordered a third round of volley.

62 seconds!

As the third round of shells roared out, the two heavy patrols behind him quickly slanted and rushed along the gap behind the other side's three battle patrols.

Although he knew that he was not willing to hit, Lei Shaoming still raised the telescope at the fastest speed. He even thought that even if there was a nearly lost bomb, but with the fall of the shell more than 20 seconds later, this hope was still frustrated.

Three rounds, 54 shells, and the nearest one is also hundreds of meters away from the other party, such as disappearing under the sea through the boots.

Just when Lei Shaoming and everyone were disappointed, the bullet point, the other party's speed, wind direction and wind speed and other data had been fed back to the fire control module by each observation point connected by the telephone line. After the calculator entered the mechanical computer according to these data, the new shelling coordinates were finally obtained.

At this time, the two fleets were gradually parallel, and the distance was getting closer and closer. When the main guns of the stern of Yanjing and Yucheng finally saw the target, Xiao Tianzhi ordered to fire again.

Only three minutes have passed. When the 18 main guns roared at the fifth time and hit several shells on the sea only 70 meters away from the enemy ship, Lieutenant General Steddy on the flagship invincible couldn't help shiverging.

Nearly lost!

To be honest, he didn't expect that his opponent would fire at a distance of 20,000 meters. Just now, he was overjoyed because the other party opened fire first, because whether it was a battleship or a war patrol, it would slow down the speed of the ship due to the cross-shift caused by the hexic force during the shelling. Therefore, during the naval battle of Xibilu Island, the Xinhua Fleet ignored the Russians's. That's the reason for blowing up and burying your head.

Previously, he dreamed of replaying the scene of the Battle of Sibilu Island, so that the Xinhua Navy could also taste their pain in dealing with the Russians, but he didn't expect the enemy's shells to be so accurate!

This is only the fifth round, and there is a near loss of ammunition, and the distance between the two fleets is still approaching rapidly. If they continue to let such unscrupulous shells go down, once there is a cross-fire, I'm afraid I will fall!

If there is a loss without firing, I'm afraid I will become the most cowardly captain in British history.

But the problem is that although the range of the three warship guns is more than 20,000 meters, the hit accuracy is too poor, because Britain has just begun to study the fire control system before the start of the war, and so far, even the domestic main battleships have not been equipped, so not to mention the New Zealand Squadron.

In this case, the best way to stop the other party from being beaten foolishly is to take the initiative to close the distance and use high-speed maneuver to slow down the opponent's aiming accuracy.

It should be said that Lieutenant General Clarkston, who is hundreds of nautical miles away, did expect that Lieutenant General Steddy was indeed infected with the common problem after a hundred years of pride. He was brave and tenacious but forgot the gap in equipment.

In addition, he also committed the problem that any war patrol commander in this era would commit, that is, he only saw the main gun comparable to that of battleships on the war patrol, and ignored its thin armor protection ability to adopt line tactics that only battleships can use!

At 4:20, a moment after the sixth shell of Xinhua fell, Lieutenant General Steddy ordered the three ships to approach, forming what he thought was a very perfect battle line, and actively deflected to the right to close the distance.

There is no doubt about the quality and professional quality of British sailors. In just a few minutes, three war patrols completed a team similar to battleships, and the uniformly deflected bow was inserted diagonally to the right in an attempt to accelerate and close the distance, and then exerted the power of 24 heavy guns of the same caliber.

When the next round of shells of the two battleships of Xinhua, which failed to be corrected in time, crossed the front array and flew far to the left side of the warship, Lieutenant General Stedy was even complacent. He believed that as long as the bow of the other party's speed was comparable to his own, as long as the bow was constantly deflected to accelerate the maneuver, then the accuracy advantage of the Xinhua naval gun would be It is eliminated.

He made a mistake. The three battle patrols of the 25-day maneuver constantly deflected the bow did bring trouble to the fire control calculation, but he did not expect another thing. What he was facing was not the war patrol mentioned in the intelligence, but two first-generation fast battleships!

When the Yanjing and Yucheng were getting faster and faster in sight, the waves of their bows began to increase. When the three-meter rangefinder installed before departure reported that the enemy's speed had exceeded 28 knots, Lieutenant General Steddy's face suddenly turned pale!

Because his bow is deflecting to the right, while the opponent is deflecting to the left, and the speed is faster than himself, so this is almost a chance for me to give the opponent to kill!

At 4:37, when Xiao Tianzhi shouted to slow down and the right rudder was full, a perfect T word appeared on the sea in the northwest of Nauru. At this time, Lei Shaoming understood the captain's painstaking efforts. He wanted to use better fire control than his opponent to force his opponent to take the pride of the British navy and take the initiative to deflect in order to counterattack. The bow, and then take the opportunity to accelerate the overtaking to complete the transverse.

Of course, the success of this tactic is not only because of the illusion of the other party that it has been pressing the speed at the beginning, but also because of the unique supercharged boiler technology on the two fast battleships.

Of course, the process at this time could not achieve the abnormal level of accelerating from 0 to 32 knots for 2 minutes like the modern-class destroyers of later generations, but the test results of the sea test still stunned a batch of naval officers at that time, because he only spent five and a half cents on Yanjing with a normal displacement of 25,500 tons at that time. The number is pushed to a high speed of 20 knots, while it takes 15 minutes for the normal boiler and steam turbine to accelerate, and at least half an hour for the reciprocating steam engine.

Not to mention that the warship had been sailing at a speed of 25 knots just now, so it took only two minutes for four steam turbines to enter full load operation and quickly grabbed the position sent by the opponent.

T word.

is the life letter of the battleship. Every excellent gun commander will not miss the fleeting opportunity that the opponent can complete the rudder to make up in four or five minutes, so Lei Shaoming did not stop for almost a second and gave the order to sip again.

One round, two rounds, three rounds.

When the leading ship New Zealand kept deflected in an attempt to quickly pull into a parallel counterattack, the fourth round of shelling finally achieved a perfect breakthrough. According to the later observer's report, the two 305 armor-piercing shells launched by the Yucheng almost fell down from the sky and hit Xinxi at a distance of 17,000 meters. The tragedy of the Lan, only 50mm, can only be on the horizontal armor of anti-fragments.

One rushed straight down the first chimney behind the conning tower, and the other drilled in along the rear deck of the third turret.

It was not until the sailors rescued by the New Zealand explained how much damage had been caused by the two almost straight shells. The first one first drilled into the boiler chamber, swept through the first cabin No. 1 to tear up three boilers, and then continued to break through along the only 30mm compartment steel plate, and in the side-by-side No. 3 boiler chamber. There was an explosion.

As for the second one, it directly penetrated the well protective wall of the turret, and then slightly changed its direction into the gunpowder warehouse where the propellant was stored. The fast-burning propellant exploded immediately.

This almost soaring penetration shows how weak the protection of the battlecruisers is. Under the heavy bullet used in Xinhua, there is no power to fight back.

If the destruction of two boiler chambers can maintain at least half of the power of New Zealand's withdrawal from the battlefield, then the big explosion under the rear turret completely deprives the 22,000-ton warship of the possibility of leaving. When one of the turrets weighing more than 400 tons in the stern of the target ship is blown to tens of meters high, another After one was also turned up, even Lei Shaoming and other gun officers who made this scene with their own hands couldn't help but be dumbfounded.

In their imagination, two shells could penetrate one to two layers of armor, and it was good to destroy the power module, but they did not expect to go deep into the well-protected turret, which made them wonder whether it was a British proud battlecruiser or a fragile armored cruiser.

However, it was not surprising when Li Mo later learned about this. The reason why the battlecruisers were quickly eliminated was that the protection and armor were too poor, but later generations needed to rely on the battle of the Battle of Delan to prove the situation, and the first generation of fast battleships he tried his best to get the true face.

At 4:43, this battle, which took place in the northwest of Nauru and was later known as the Battle of the West Point, the T-shaped battle once again showed an important surname, occupying the T-shaped position for only five minutes. The hull has completed a 65° deflection, and the British second-generation battlecruiser New West, which is about to launch the first round of syring counterattack. The Lan was destroyed.

Looking at the smoky New Zealand, which was destined to leave, Lieutenant General Steddy's hands and feet were cold, and his whole brain was blank. It was not until the adjutant shouted in his ear that he immediately ordered to use the opportunity of the body of the New Zealand explosion and the smoke to continue to turn the rudder and retreat along the inner corner.

When two invincible war patrols quickly passed by the New Zealand that exploded, every British sailor who saw this scene was stunned. They never thought that the century-old maritime empire, known as the lord of the world's seven seas, was towed off its disguise in just a few minutes, revealing its weak side. .

At this moment, on the remaining two battlecruisers, the fighting spirit that the British navy is proud of has disappeared. All that is left is a dull, white face with trembling lips.

So much so that the two relatively complete armored cruisers farther away almost fled like the Gilberto Islands in the east, making the two heavy patrolling imperial sailors sigh that the battleships were fighting too fast.

But it's not over yet!

When the remaining two combat patrol partners completed the rotation and retreated to the east, Xiao Tianzhi decisively ordered the re-warfare to give up the pursuit of the two armored cruisers and snipe head-on the fleeing New Zealand fleet. At the same time, it accelerated to 28 knots again to bypass the New Zealand and chase the enemy.

Seeing the intercepted Xinhua heavy patrol, Steddy, who was already jealous, vented all his anger on his opponent, but he forgot the damage to morale caused by the destruction of the New Zealand in a few minutes. In addition, the opponent adopted a guerrilla method, and the two war patrols who fought while walking were wasted countless shells and did not hurt the other party much.

At this time, the two fast battleships that completed the roundabout had caught up. When their majestic bows rushed out of the gunpowder smoke and quickly inserted between the heavy patrol and the battle patrol. After grabbing the T position again, Lieutenant General Steddy directly stamped his feet and cursed!

Lei Shaoming, the gun commander, once again showed his extraordinary command ability. In just a few minutes, he successfully seized the opportunity that the main gun could not shell when the Invincible turned the rudder sharply, gave up the original predetermined target, and used only three rounds to pierce the Invincible's waterline armor belt, making the battle patrol rapid. The water intake speed has dropped to 15 knots.

It should be said that this is almost a copy of the Battle of Coronel. At that time, Craddock was weakly equipped and stubbornly tried to damage Speer's fleet. He made no mistakes and was besieged by Stedy, who was inadvertently involved in a larger war.

The serious injury of the Invincible finally calmed Stedy and realized that the gap in equipment was too big. He knew that if he didn't leave, he would be left here, so he gave up the shelling and used the old method of Invincible as the central axis to cover the steering.

At this time, Xiao Tianzhi issued an order that can be said to be extremely bold. He ordered two battleships to be inserted across the right wing of the Invincible and pass through the war patrol with a certain combat effectiveness!

This sudden and bold action gave Stedy an opportunity to order the Invincible to shell at full speed, hoping to hit the opponent's cover the retreat.

The invincible, who knew that he could not escape, finally burst out the pride of the British navy. The gunners almost crazily hit the shells at the Yanjing and Yucheng that passed by them. At this time, Lei Shaoming ordered the muzzle to turn, all aimed at the invincible, but it was forbidden to fight back!

It can be said that the victory of the Battle of the West Cape Sea is completely the crazy director's of Xiao Tianzhi and Lei Shaoming. Xiao Tianzhi took advantage of the advantages of the equipment to open the way with shells in the ultra-long distance, tempting Steddy to grab the T position, while Lei Shaoming gave full play to the quality of an excellent gun captain, especially the near At the distance, he ordered all the turrets to point to the Invincible, using the thickest front to resist the shells, but did not launch a shelling to avoid affecting the speed of pursuit, which was almost the same as suicide.

It should be said that this is also a helpless choice, because at that time, the indomitable has accelerated to the highest speed of 25 knots. If it is not inserted horizontally but in a big circle, it will take at least 20 minutes. In addition, the original distance between the two ships is 15,000 meters, which means that the indomitable can be pulled to more than 25,000 meters. The distance is enough to ensure that Steddy escaped to the Gilbert Islands.

But this kind of madness is not without price, especially in the few minutes of 6,000 meters on the side of the Invincible, Lei Shaoming, standing on the shelling command tower clearly saw that a shell slammed into the front of the Yanjing No. 2 turret, causing a violent explosion, but Fortunately, the British shell still lacks a delayed fuse, insufficient armor-piercing ability, and does not penetrate the front armor of the turret, which is as thick as 305 mm and tilted by 20°.

However, the violent explosion made the turret not hit a shell again.

The Yucheng that followed was not much better. A shell penetrated the chimney, so that the Yucheng had to continue to pursue with a broken chimney, and the speed was lost a lot.

Fortunately, a few minutes of almost baptismal covering shelling finally survived. When the two fast battleships hit the flames and reappeared less than 13,000 meters behind the Unyielding, Stedy was desperate.

At 6:15, just before the unyielding was about to arrive at the day of escape from the Gilberto Islands, the undamaged Yanjing once again frantly turned 6,000 meters in front of the unyielding, stuck in the T position for the third time, and at the same time, the slightly slower Yucheng also went against the trend, in the direction of the swerving. The transverse rotation has completed the alternative T-word steering.

At the same time, Lei Shaoming, who was full of fire, ordered a volley, and the shells fell violently!

Later generations will always smile when they talk about this battle in the West Cape, which is known as the counterattack of the empire.

"They got their ass three times!"

(to be continued)