The prince had to wait for the arrival of his "honor guard", so he decided to let the German fleet accompany him for a while longer, and this stop was about two weeks, and at this time, not only the undercurrents under the calm waters of the Mediterranean, but also the situation in the North Sea was a little strange. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

The British have already said that they will not meddle in this matter anymore, and this is considered to give both sides a step down, but in fact, the British have never relaxed their attention to the development of the German Navy! While the Prince Albert, the fourth ship of the Mainz-class armored cruiser, was conducting sea trials at full speed, a shadow hovered over the sea trial area.

In order to better test the high-speed performance of a warship, it is necessary to call deep waters for long-distance sailing, and generally speaking, the test time is divided into three specifications: 6 hours, 3 hours and 1 hour sprint. And the sailing speed naturally has to reach the maximum speed. It was obviously difficult to carry out such tests in German territorial waters, so the test work of the battleship could only be carried out in the depths of the North Sea, and here the Germans inevitably ran into the British, who had always regarded the North Sea as their backyard!

"This is the new armored cruiser of the Germans, I heard that its brother single-handedly destroyed a fleet of the French in Africa, and there is a battleship in it!" A Royal Navy officer put down his binoculars and said to Jericho next to him.

Jericho was also lucky, after watching the Japanese fleet beat the American fleet in the Philippines, Jericho sorted out what he had seen, heard and thought, and made a report and submitted it to the Royal Navy, and this report was approved by the Admiralty bosses.

Well, as a mid-level officer with actual combat experience and a certain theoretical foundation, the Royal Navy believes that Jericho is very worthy of training, so Jericho has successfully crossed a hurdle that many soldiers may not be able to cross in their lifetime! From colonel to rear admiral, General Jericho now commands a detachment of cruisers of the first class of the British Home Fleet!

Although it is a new unit that has just been established, but here is concentrated the most elite cruiser force of the British, after the British became strong, started the construction of a new first-class royal power first-class protection cruiser, and now a total of 4 have been served, two of which are incorporated into Jericho's command, and the other two are allocated to the Mediterranean Fleet, and because of the late service, so when the British Royal Navy organized an onlooker of the German fleet, Jericho and his warships were in the North Sea sea trials, missed this opportunity.

But now, Jericho happened to find an opportunity, and while Jericho was on a routine cruise with the Kingpower, the Kingpower ran into the Prince Albert, who had returned from the Atlantic Ocean and was re-undergoing sea trials after a short period of maintenance.

"Powerful and beautiful!" This was Jericho's first impression when he saw Prince Albert, who was sailing at maximum speed, ploughing the surface of the sea with its knife-like bow, and the waves that rose were smashed into a cloud of mist by the solid hull, which spread so that the whole bow of the ship was foggy in the telescope.

The slender hull passing through the waves gives people a feeling full of strength and beauty, the sea conditions at this time are not particularly good, there are some small wind and waves, but judging from the situation of this battleship, it sails very steadily, and because of the use of the long bow design, the front of the battleship is relatively high, the main gun and the bridge behind it are not affected by the wind and waves, although the sea water may rush to the hull, but there is no phenomenon such as burying the head.

"He's at least 21 knots now, which is more than our Kingship." The officer said with some frustration. At the beginning, the British tried to track the battleship, and the new Kingpower was really able to bite the opponent at the beginning, and with the efforts of all the officers and men of the ship, the battleship sailed faster than designed! Section 21.7! This speed is almost 0.5 knots faster than the booking speed! And it was held for about an hour and a half.

But then, the opposing battleship accelerated even further! The distance between the two sides began to widen. If nothing else, Jericho and the others' tracking journey is probably coming to an end.

"All the cruisers of the Empire were no match for it, and such a terrible warship was a much greater threat to the Royal Navy than the battleships and the ideas of the French New School. This is a perfect battleship, enough to suppress the armored cruisers of all countries in the world, and the only one that has a chance to match it is probably the Asama-class armored cruiser that has a similar blood relationship. Chief Jerry said with a sigh.

"That's right, a new competition is about to begin, and the naval powers represented by Japan, Germany, and Russia are beginning to build a completely new kind of warship, which can sail faster than battleships and at the same time defeat most of the cruisers will become the new favorite of naval powers!" Thomas said.

"But there are two other things that I am most concerned about, the first thing is that the new German battleships have increased the number of main guns, and their output has begun to rely on large-caliber heavy guns instead of small- and medium-caliber rapid-fire guns. This is transformed from the shallow level. And the Mainz-class armored cruiser took this to the pinnacle, and his maximum sidechord firepower reached 8 10-inch heavy guns! ”

"The second thing is the expansion of the tonnage of warships. The 15,000-ton hull can no longer accommodate more and more weapons and a more powerful power system. And this is a big challenge for the Imperial Navy, because perhaps, when a certain class of warships appears, all the warships that appeared before will become obsolete! A large number of old warships in our hands will be devalued. And this is an opportunity for emerging sea power countries such as Germany, the United States, and Japan! Jericho's words revealed a sense of anxiety.

At this time, the British Royal Navy was like a rich man with a lot of money in his hands, and what he was most afraid of was not that others would build old warships with him, because the British had enough stocks! Even if you stop, the other party will not be able to catch up in a short time, and this kind of quantitative competition is the most stress-free for the British!

What is the Royal Navy most afraid of? The biggest thing is that overnight, a large number of banknotes in your hands directly become worthless! By that time, all the naval powers were forging their fleets almost from scratch, and in this case, it was clear that the more industrially powerful United States and Germany would pose a great challenge to Britain.

It cannot be said that the idea of an all-heavy artillery battleship has never appeared, but no one has lifted the lid, and one of the very important reasons is that the tonnage and cost of such battleships are too high, and the requirements for the shipbuilding industry are relatively high. It's so high that it's unbearable for a first-class empire.

The British, in order to preserve the value of their fleet, would not easily build an epoch-making warship, but the current situation is that a certain country has already lifted the corner of the curtain. It's hard for Jericho to imagine when this new curtain will officially open!

The next two chapters are passed on in advance.,The second is more present~~~.,The author asks for subscription and support~~~! (To be continued.) )