Southwest of the strait, on the battleship "Yanhai".

"Report!"

"What's wrong again!?"

When the telecommunications officer ran over and shouted a report, Jin Hongteng stood up suddenly, more like jumping from his seat to be precise.

"The voice radio is tuned and can be used normally."

"So what are you waiting for, let's go!"

As soon as Jin Hong said this, the officers and soldiers in the bridge took action one after another.

After giving the order, Jin Hong sat down again, and took a deep breath to calm his emotions.

It all started a few hours ago.

If nothing else, the "Xuhai" and "Yanhai" would have arrived before one o'clock in the morning, but what did they think, there was really an accident.

It's not Jin Hong's "Yanhai", it's Li Jie's "Xuhai".

First, a boiler had a problem and could not reach its maximum pressure, resulting in a reduction of about 10 percent in the output of the connected steam turbines.

Fortunately, this only reduced the maximum speed of the "Asahimi" by 0.5 knots, and the impact was not too great.

It's just that when the battlefield was about to be killed, to be precise, at half past eleven last night, during a routine inspection of the system, the officers of the electronics department found that the gun-sighting radar installed on the top of the bridge could not be activated, and it was difficult to repair it on the battleship.

Now, it's troublesome.

Gunsight radar is the secret weapon of the two "Asahimi"-class fast battleships!

As early as a few months ago, the two "Xuhai" class ships completed all power tests except for the ultimate speed, but the Navy has been dragging its feet and not allowing the two battleships to join the combat sequence, because there are problems with the gun-sighting radar equipped with them, and the reliability has never reached the standard.

If a big war had not broken out, the Navy would have waited until the radar was perfected before the two battleships were put in the ranks.

The reliability of the radar is not high, and the shipyard and the company that produces the radar cannot be blamed, after all, this is the world's first gun-sighting radar.

In terms of the difficulty of technological development, artillery sighting radars far exceed those of anti-aircraft search radars.

What's even worse is that the Imperial Navy chose a very high starting point.

Paired with the battleship's main gun.

What do you mean?

The interference caused by clutter reflected from the sea surface made the development of the radar very difficult, and the development progress was repeatedly delayed.

After a long period of effort, all the technical difficulties have been solved, and all that remains is the question of reliability.

The radar cannot be used, and the combat effectiveness of the "Xuhai" class may not be above that of the "Longxing" class.

The "Asahimi" class was the first and only fast battleship built by treaty standards in the Imperial Navy, and it had to compromise on armor protection by cramming nine 400-mm guns into a 35,000-ton hull and having a maximum speed of 29 knots.

Although the inclined main armor belt is used, it is still designed according to the theory of "key protection", but the armor protection of the "Xuhai" class is still very bad. Within the Navy, the traditionalist generals believed that the "Asahimi" class was a battlecruiser and did not meet the standards of a battleship at all.

Theoretically, the "Asahihi" class, in the full range of its own main guns, could not withstand the blow of heavy armor-piercing shells.

In fact, it was because the protection was so bad that only two ships of the "Asahimi" class were built.

To put it bluntly, if you want to fight the enemy with bayonets, the "Longxing" class is the ideal choice, while the "Xuhai" class is more suitable for hiding behind and putting cold guns.

This is precisely the reason why the Imperial Navy first equipped the "Asahimi" class with gun-aiming radars.

In addition, the "Asahimi" class is equipped with an improved 45 times diameter 400 mm naval gun, which can exert the power of heavy armor-piercing shells in the full range of fire.

It should be said that the artillery sighting radar itself was developed for the "Xuhai" class.

It was precisely in this way that, under Li Jie's order, the two ships reduced their speed to 20 knots, and at the same time mobilized all the officers and men to find an alternative solution.

Fortunately, there is power in numbers.

The method is also very simple: the "Yanhai" will take the lead and use the voice radio to provide the "Xuhai" with artillery aiming parameters.

Interestingly, neither battleship was equipped with a voice radio!

Nothing surprising, the voice radio came out only this year, and the construction of the two "Asahimi" class ships had already been completed before that.

Luckily, the seaplane was equipped with a voice radio.

Although the working distance is a little closer, only a few tens of kilometers at most, but for two battleships fighting side by side, this is enough.

However, the antenna had to be re-set up, and an appropriate low-voltage power cord had to be pulled.

When the officers of the electronics department tossed the voice radio, Jin Hong almost went crazy.

Dozens of kilometers away, the local fleet commanded by Gui Boyong was fighting fiercely with the second main team, and the two cutting-edge "Xuhai" class ships could only do it in a hurry.

With Jin Hong's temperament, it's okay if he doesn't jump like thunder.

According to the memories of the officers and men on the "Yanhai", during the more than an hour, Jin Hong did not scold his mother less, and also focused on greeting his good brother Li Jie.

It's just that the two "Xuhai" class ships did not stand still in this more than an hour.

Although the speed was reduced to twenty knots, the two battleships kept sailing towards the Watchman Strait.

At the beginning, Li Jie sent out the four destroyers accompanying him to sneak attack the four light cruisers blocking the front, and succeeded in one fell swoop.

The destroyer fired a torpedo several kilometers away, after which it turned to disengage.

The four light cruisers of the Narrow Navy had been engaged in a constant exchange of fire with the light cruisers of the home fleet, and all of them were heavily damaged, failing to detect the destroyers that appeared in front in time.

As a result, after being hit by a torpedo, it was also believed that it was attacked by a light patrol detachment of the home fleet.

Even the destroyer that launched the attack could not be detected in time, let alone the two battleships behind the destroyer.

By now, it's 2:50 a.m.

To the east of the "Yanhai", about twenty kilometers away, is the flagship of the first main team, the "Damen".

Although the "Yanhai" was responsible for providing the shelling parameters, the "Xuhai" was the leader of the team, and the "Xuhai" had to fire first.

Twenty kilometers, very far indeed.

At such a distance, the decisive thing is whether you can measure and aim at a distance.

As for other factors, that is, those in the traditional decisive battle of the fleet, such as the relative angle of the course, the impact on the artillery battle can be said to be minimal.

If you can't measure and aim, it's useless to say anything!

Obviously, at night, directing artillery battles at such a great distance, a conventional optical rangefinder will definitely not be able to do it.

To be precise, it exceeds the limits of the human eye.

Not to mention that human beings have lost their night vision in the process of evolution, even if they are replaced by cats, they cannot see targets tens of kilometers away at night.

At 2:52 p.m., the "Xuhai" sent a message that the fire control had been set and that the firing time was set for one minute after the contact.

At fifty-three points, nine main guns on the "Asahiko" opened fire.

Almost at the same time, the "Yanhai" also fired the first full salvo of the ship.

At that time, neither the lookouts nor gunners of the two ships saw the enemy ships, and all of them set the shelling parameters according to the data provided by the fire control officers.

As for the data, it is provided by the gun-sighting radar.

To put it mildly, the target is just a point of light on the radar screen. The so-called fire control data are nothing more than several sets of values calculated by the electronic officers.

This was also the first naval artillery battle conducted at night without the participation of optical ranging equipment in the history of world naval warfare.

As for the result, it can be said that there is no suspense!