The battlecruiser, the Battlefrigate, was Lorraine's first attempt to add its own understanding of naval warfare, or more accurately, the understanding of naval warfare to the technical system already existing in the Age of Sail.

Its design predecessor was the famous battlecruiser of World War II, that is, it has enough size and tonnage to be able to fight with battleships, and can respond quickly in the battle line, forming a rapid group in the form of independent or small groups, and attacking the head or end of the enemy's battle line.

Lorraine remembers very well that Fisher, the father of the battle cruiser, commented on the battle cruiser: this kind of high-speed armored ships can suppress anything floating on the sea, and from the data point of view, they are in fact high-speed battleships.

True, it was impossible to build a real battle cruiser in the era of wooden sailing ships, and there was not even such a class of cruisers in this era.

The grading of wooden sailing boats is simple.

Ships above the third level exist only for the battle line, and are collectively referred to as battleships; Ships below the fourth rank are not included in the battle line and are collectively referred to as cruisers.

Cruisers are warships of the fourth to sixth classes, and according to their main functions, they are respectively named "patrol", "expelling" and "escorting".

Frigates are not large warships in formation, but non-war or auxiliary warfare affairs such as waterways, merchant ships, logistics, etc.;

Destroyers, of course, what she drove were not elusive submarines, but pirate ships and smuggling ships, which ran around the sea like rabbits and couldn't catch up with battleships.

Cruiser is a general term for this type of small and medium-sized ship, and it is also a special name for a fourth-class ship, which refers not only to its flagship role in small formations, but also to its campaign function of defending the flank of the battle line.

The so-called frigate, the gate is the door, arranged at both ends of the battle line, like a door, so that the large ships in the [gate] can vent their fire without distraction.

So the cruiser is an outlier of small and medium-sized ships.

Although theoretically they are not included in the battle line, in practice they are an indispensable part of the battle line.

In addition to cost considerations, the reason why the major powers generally use the old third-class ships of the previous generation as the fourth-class is that the generals are unwilling to weaken the frontal power of the battle line too much.

It's just that judging from the results, the common twenty-four-pounder guns of the fourth-class ships did not live up to the expectations given to her by the admirals in the battle line with strong guns, but its clumsiness and slowness became the weakness of the battle line, and with the development of sailing technology, it became more and more unworthy of the title of "door".

Perhaps this is where the Americans came up with the idea of designing a new pocket battleship.

The naval base of the nascent United States is very weak, very weak, and this weakness is reflected not only in the professionalism of soldiers and generals, but also in the accumulation of strategy and tactics and the lack of technical fields.

They had never built a battleship with more than two gun bays, could not build a 32-pound naval gun, had not experienced the baptism of a large battle line, and could not imagine how they would react to the devastating rain of shells.

This meant that they could not design full-fledged and reliable ships of the fourth rank and above.

So they came up with a compromise.

Unable to build a double-deck gun bay, they focused on a single deck, lengthening and enlarging the standard-sized destroyer so that it could carry the terrifying recoil of heavy artillery roar.

If the twenty-four-pounder gun does not perform well in the battle line, then they don't want the battle line, and anyway, the US Navy does not have the luxury of forming a qualified battle line in the short term.

By removing the shackles of the battle line, the new type of ships can focus on regional defense and skirmishes, faster, braver, and stronger, and strive to get the match point in a single ship or a small battle group.

This idea is similar to that of Germany in World War II, and the data tendencies of the new ships are the same as those of Bismarck. The only difference is that while Germany could only pounce in small fishing ponds in the North Sea, the United States had a vast Atlantic Ocean to gallop on.

This dooms two similar ships to have completely different endings. Latest

But Lorraine is not a U.S. Navy after all, and he doesn't need to pay attention to the help and value of a warship to the development of the country's navy, let alone cost-effectiveness.

All he needed was to be faster, braver, and stronger.

So he needed a battle cruiser.

The Pocket Battleship is an inferior battleship with the physique of a cruiser, but the Battlecruiser is an excellent cruiser with the power of a battleship, and at the same time, it will be the most powerful cruiser in the history of sailing.

The debate in the conference room had broken through the roof, and the three top shipwrights were straining their intellect about the battlecruiser.

But they always seem to miss the point. For this new concept of the ocean, they are always around the answer, but they are reluctant to reach out and touch it.

Lorraine began to get agitated.

The man behind Boston is still in sight, and he spends his precious day here not to listen to the increasingly whimsical brains of his employees, but to finalize what his future flagship will look like.

"It's too narrow-minded...... he couldn't help but mutter, "it's too conservative!" ”

Boom!

The broad palm slammed against the table with anger, and the table creaked in pain, threatening to fall to the ground entirely.

The controversy came to an abrupt end.

Lorraine squinted and turned to the three masters on the field and cleared his throat.

"You're all some of the best boatwrights in the world, and you have a talent for design that I could never match. But I'm a boss and a seaman, please know that you are building a ship for me, building a new type of ship based on the first dock, a ship that satisfies me and is willing to entrust my life! ”

"Now, I'll tell you what I want, and you will find a way to achieve it, so that I don't hear [unreasonable] and [impossible] as much as possible."

"First, I want high speed. A ship faster than me cannot be a threat to me, and a ship that can be a threat to me cannot catch up with me. Combining the above two points, the downwind speed should not be less than 11 knots, and the upwind state should not be less than 3.5 knots. ”

"Second, I want to be fast. With similar speed and wind, I have the freedom to choose the right to pursue or disengage according to the situation on the ground. So she needs to have top kinetic energy utilization, and she needs to run faster than the wind most of the time. ”

"Third, I want to be flexible. She should not turn around in place for more than twenty minutes, the minimum turning radius should not be three hulls, and she should be navigable in any type of hydrological environment, including but not limited to straits, waves, reefs and shoals, as long as the water depth is suitable. ”

"Fourth, I want firepower. Comprehensively suppress the fourth-level ships, and the single-ship duel is not weaker than the third-level ships, and it is necessary to have the ability to sink the opponent, and there are many options, and it is necessary to be at ease. ”

"Fifth, I want to be strong. It is still at the level of a fourth-class ship and a third-class ship, a distance of 50 meters to be able to resist the direct attack of a twenty-four-pound gun, and a thirty-two-pound cannot be collapsed at the touch of a button, you have to give me the confidence to launch a death fight at a critical moment. ”

"Sixth, I want to be tenacious. In the future, there is no guarantee that I will not fall into the trap of a first- or second-class ship, and in the face of this high-freeboard sea monster, I must have the ability to withstand the first or even the first three rounds of saturated shelling. Only by surviving Hell will I be able to turn around and run away, using all the advantages mentioned earlier. ”

With all the words said in one go, Lorraine breathed deeply, letting the fresh air soak her lungs and clear her mind.

The first time he laughed, he laughed extraordinarily wildly.

"That's all I have to ask for, gentlemen. Not accepting the unreasonable and impossible, and achieving them is your only task today! ”

"So gentlemen, rack your brains and start thinking, I'll wait for you."