Chapter 1: Skagerak's Gold (10) If you have water injection, be careful

"Although it is the most difficult time for the Royal Navy, the Royal Navy, which once overturned the Invincible Fleet, defeated the Dutch Fleet, and defeated the Faspise Fleet, would not surrender like this. The British Isles and the British never had a precedent for voluntarily surrendering!"

The full text of the internal publication of the Great Fleet published by Orkney Island features the speech of the new Navy Secretary Arthur Belford at Buckingham Palace.

"Reorganize?" David Betty, who had been suspended from work, shook his head contemptuously, stuffed the newspaper into the trash can, knocked on the door and walked into Lampard's apartment.

"Commander, are you back?" Lampard buried his head in writing a book on his small desk. When he heard the movement behind him, the former deputy commander of the Rapid Fleet put down the heavy information and turned his head and said overjoyed: "Has the London Naval Conference reached a unified consensus? What is the opinion of the Admiralty on us, the defeated general?"

"Major General, there is good news and bad news here." Betty took off his military uniform, hung it on the hanger, and explained with the cold humor of British gentlemen: "The good news is that Arthur Belfort will take over as the Minister of the Navy, and the bad news is that Arthur Belfort will take over as the Minister of the Navy."

"So, will we become abandoned children?" The hope that rekindled in Lampard's heart was instantly extinguished. As a senior naval officer, he understood the cruelty behind Betty's implicitness.

Belfort has a strong character, firm will and strong means. These qualities are conducive to dealing with the end of the Royal Navy's defeat in the North Sea. However, before regaining the navy, Belfort will inevitably break everything that the Royal Navy has in his mind and start over according to his ideas.

"When it comes to the battlefield at sea, people are always used to connecting me and Silame. We have more than ten years of private friendship, we are both the best of the younger generation of each other's countries, we are both the proposers and beneficiaries of new tactics and new theories, and we even faced the trial of the military court after a naval battle. Unfortunately, Silame was greeted with a heroic judgment given to the lofty meaning, and I..."

David Betty, who was once brave and rebellious and used to being full of energy, is now somewhat lonely. The former deputy commander of the Grand Fleet said pale and powerlessly, and was unwilling to think too much, so he focused on the notebook on the desk.

"Lampard, is this your private diary?"

(--Gorgeous dividing line--)

“On March 20, Scapa Bay, haze.

The decisive battle in the North Sea ended. At the London Naval Conference on March 10, the new Navy Minister, Mr. Arthur Belford, put forward many views aimed at saving the Royal Navy. From Mr. Belford's tough attitude, I vaguely saw the shadow of impetuousness and the next defeat. As a naval officer who had experienced three steam naval battles and witnessed the largest and most tragic dreadnought battles in history, I thought it was necessary for me to write something that might not make Belford happy.

Since the decisive battle in the North Sea took place in the Skagrak Strait, let's name this naval battle as the Skagrak Strait. This protracted naval battle can be roughly divided into two battle groups, General Betty's fast fleet and Silame's first reconnaissance fleet battle patrol team, General Jelico's large fleet and Scher's ocean fleet are the team.

In the Battle Patrol Team, we have the advantage of numericality. In this team, we once had the advantage of T-shaped horizontally, but the result of the naval battle was disheartening: the Royal Navy, which had only thirty-two main battleships, lost four battlecruisers, one fast battleship and three battleships at once.

What exactly happened to the error that led to the Royal Navy's defeat in the Battle of Scarglak Strait?

Looking back, perhaps we can see a glimpse from the long-standing Battle of Dogel Sands, or the sinking of the Daring battleship before the Battle of Dogel Sands.

On November 1, 1914, the same day when the Battle of Cape Sochi and the Battle of Coronel broke out, the battleship Bold sank in the desolate northern Scotland.

In response to the German naval shipbuilding plan, the parliament issued a huge shipbuilding budget of up to eight main battleships in one breath and began a large-scale battleship deployment plan. Four Orion-class super-dreadnoughts and four British King George V-class super-dreadnoughts improved on the Orion-class are always regarded as the mainstay of the large fleet. However, such a super-dreadnought with a cost of 1.92 million pounds was hit by a mine in Willis Bay on the cold north shore of Scotland and overflowed and sunk.

In the Dogers Sands Battle broke out on November 14, 1914, the Sileme fleet had only three main battleships, namely the Moltke, von der Tinn and Blücher. During the visit to Keel Port in June 1914, Betty noticed that the Germans called the battlecruisers since the Moltke the rear Seedlitz type battle patrol. The official rule of the Blücher in Germany was an inconsistent large armored ship. It was obvious that the Moltke and von der Tinn were already old-fashioned main battleships, and Blücher could only be called quasi-war patrol. In fact, it was these three old battleships that withstood the concentrated fire of General Betty's five battleships and three Orion-class battleships, supporting reinforcements from General Hippel's two Deflinger Class and one Seedlitz.

The follow-up to the Doger Sands Battle was the Deflinger-class battleship that easily sank our Thor battleship.

Marshal Fisher's battle patrol is a perfect cruiser equipped with artillery of the same caliber as a battleship, but does not have the protection of the battleship. However, the sinking of the battleship of the Thor in a sense subverts Fisher's theory.

Unfortunately, we refused to consider the deeper things, but instead put the reasons for the defeat in the Dogel Sands Battle on Major General Ravenson's poor command attainments and night battles that were not familiar to the Royal Navy. Yes, the sinking of the Bold and the defeat in the Dogel Sands Battle could have been a warning to the proud and arrogant us, but we insisted on the glory of the world's first navy in the Empire and personally destroyed the glory of the Royal Navy!

What exactly is the problem?

First, we despise the protection of the main ship too much. The side-side protective armor of our main ship can only be described as shocking. Since the launch of the Fearless, most of the waterline belts of the Mi-flag battleships remain at 10-13 inches, while the battle cruisers remain at 5-9 inches. The latter is obviously not qualified to participate in the decisive battle of the battle line. Although the former can defend against the 12-inch and 13.5-inch armor-piercing bombs commonly equipped by the Germans at a combat distance of more than 13,000 yards, we must know that the coverage area of ​​our main armor never exceeds one deck. In addition, the lower end of the upper armour belt on our side is only 229 mm and the upper end is only about 203 mm, and the thin and uncontinuous armor belt is only a sloped dome behind the thin and uncontinuous armor belt that has not even been able to resist the fragments of the armor-piercing bombs.

The second is the horizontal armor that is not valued. It must be admitted that when we designed warships, we were not expected to have enough naval combat characteristics in the era of Dreadnought, which resulted in the horizontal armor of our battleships being generally only two layers, totaling 2.5-4 inches, while the battle patrol was only 2-3 inches. During the Battle of Scargerac Strait, the combat distance was frequently penetrated by the Germans in most of the naval battles, resulting in damage to the inside of the hull. One of the reasons for the sinking of the Royal Princess was that the horizontal deck was continuously penetrated.

Finally, our turret design was quite failed. As a battleship, our turret front armor is generally only 11 inches, and the cannon seat is only 9-10 inches, which means that the Germans can easily penetrate our turret armor at a distance of 11,000 yards. Furthermore, there is a problem with our turret structural design. Our turret front armor has an inclination angle. This design relative to absolutely vertical armor helps reduce turret space and reduces

Low armor weight, but considering the parabolic flight route after the cannon is bored, this will undoubtedly make the opponent's armor-piercing projectile form a vertical corner to achieve the maximum deep penetration effect. In addition, the inclined design of the armor on the top of the turret also has the same problem. Although the 64mm "horizontal" top armor is not useless, the inclined design weakens the protection of this layer of armor in geometric multiples. The Reckless battleship exploded and sank because the armor on the top of the x turret was broken.

Second, our gunners did not strictly implement the combat regulations in naval battles. According to the combat regulations accumulated by the Royal Navy, the hatch of the ammunition depot can only be opened when the ammunition is transported out. After the ammunition is transported to the turret through the ammunition conveyor, the protective cover in the turret must be closed immediately, and then the turret can be fired.

However, in actual combat, we did not strictly follow this procedure, which led to the possibility that once our turret was hit, the ammunition depot would be destroyed by the secondary fire of armor-piercing bomb explosion. In naval battle, the flagship Lion of the fast fleet was torn apart by a 350mm armor-piercing bomb from the Luzov battle patrol. The horizontal armor near the turret was exploded in the bomb-transporter. If Harvey had not been desperate, perhaps the number of main ships lost by the British Empire would have to be increased.

Third, there was a problem with our shells. During the Battle of Scarclark Strait, four King-class battleships launched a death charge at the Great Fleet. We concentrated four teams to open fire at the Germans. Almost every German ship was shot more than five rounds, but the four King-class ships still withstood our concentrated fire and safely withdrew our team under the cover of the Sileme fleet.

Although the heavy bombs we use are not as penetrating as those of the Germans, and although the protection of German warships is extremely strong, they are not unable to bite the opponent. Perhaps this is more worthy of the British Empire artillery experts than simply shirking the responsibility of German warships.

Finally, we cut corners in the watertight design of the main battleship. Our main battleship's underwater torpedo armor and the upper armor belt usually do not constitute continuous protection. Although we lay a layer of dome armor on the inside of the main battleship that can store buoyancy, the weak upper armor belt greatly reduces the role of the dome armor. In addition, early main battleships were not equipped with watertight partitions, and the strength of the watertight capsule and the contact door was also problematic. Once the hull was shot, huge vibration would cause the surrounding watertight shell of the hit part to loosen.

The problem of poor protection, gunner's operational errors, and shells is ultimately due to errors or extreme maritime strategies.

In the 1980s, Prime Minister Hamilton proposed two strong standards, that is, the British Navy must maintain its strength to fight the joint fleet of the two enemy countries.

When the two strong standards were first proposed, our shipbuilding pressure was not high. France, the former world's second naval power, destroyed the Great Wall, and Germany, the later second naval power, and the United States, the third naval power, had not yet risen. However, in 1898, the maritime situation changed suddenly. The German parliament passed the "Navy First Naval Expansion Act", and the British-German naval arms race that lasted for more than ten years began.

The UK does not lack naval shipyards, mature technicians, and shipbuilding technology. Therefore, we continue to have two strong standards, claiming that every time the Germans build a battleship, the British will start construction of two ships in response.

Slogans are always beautiful, but our national strength can no longer support the money-burning shipbuilding competition. Although we do not need to maintain a strong army, it is a fact that the Empire's status in the world economic territory has continued to decline. The slow economic development and financial difficulties in the political and financial situation have often caused our shipbuilding plans to be unsustainable.

Just like the St. Vincent-class battleship was the product of the naval budget that was barely approved in 1907, just like Neptune was the only lucky person to cut the budget in 1908 in order to reduce the fiscal deficit and maintain fiscal balance; just like the two giant-class battleships were stimulated by the accelerated construction of the German dreadnought and urgently allocated additional funds in 1909; just like the Australian and New Zealand battleships of the tireless warship were almost cut in half due to budget issues, and were barely built with the financial support of the Australian and New Zealand politics, and thus it was named the world's cheapest warship.

Under the guidance of this strategic idea of ​​one-sided pursuit of quantity advantages, we have to be very careful about the cost and design of each battleship, and we can obtain as many battleships as possible. Therefore, the tonnage of the battleship is strictly limited, the strength and structure of the watertight chamber are repeatedly compressed, the thickness of the armor is replaced by paper data, and the limited indicators are placed on the number, caliber and speed of the main guns that we are more interested in.

The pursuit of the number of main guns and caliber leads to our emphasis on and emphasis on the rate of fire and speed. The captains of each of our main battleships know how weak the defense of the battleships they command is, so the captains have to force the sailors to increase the rate of fire as much as possible, throw the maximum amount of ammunition at the target ship as quickly as possible to sink the opponent and save themselves.

The disadvantages of this idea are not very obvious in the Battle of Dogel Sands, because after all, we still have a numerical advantage. In the Battle of Scarglak Strait in March 1915, two export-type battleships were confined to the Mediterranean, three tireless class battleships had just completed the transfer of thousands of miles, and two Queen Elizabeth-class battleships barely completed the final commissioning, so we did not have a significant numerical advantage over the Germans, and failure was inevitable."

(--Gorgeous dividing line--)

"Diary about the Battle of Jutland?" After obtaining Lampard's consent, Betty picked up the dense stack of manuscripts and read them carefully.

Betty clearly agreed with Lampard's point of view, but when he raised his head again, the admiration had dissipated and was almost moldy.

"As far as I know, Japanese ship designer Kirihisa Fujimoto began to plan and write a paper titled "Research on the Relationship between the Battle of Skagrak and the Construction of the Battle of Skagrak". Compared with the Japanese who can be outside, perhaps as the party who failed the Battle of Skagrak, we should bravely stand up and write something, and use memoirs to describe it with no prejudice. Yes, we cannot sit idly by the vanity of the history of the Royal Navy officers and soldiers who fought bravely in the battle of naval battles, and more importantly, we cannot let history repeat itself!"

"Memoir?" Lampard's eyes lit up. Obviously, Lampard, who has a poetic temperament, had been ready to write something for this painful naval battle, but he had not found the right direction.

"Yes, the memoir is called "Skagrak's Gold"!" Betty lifted up a little blinds slightly, letting the bleak light outside the house seep into a trace. "It is a sad story. It does not belong to the Nordic pirates, does not belong to the Red Bearded pirates, and does not belong to the Age of Discovery. The story is not long, and the guns are not cold there; the place of the story is not mysterious, it is in the busy Skagrak Strait; the plot of the story is not legendary, because it is the eternal cup of a nation, I call it Skagrak's Gold!"

...
Chapter completed!