"After this demonstration, no matter what the British say about the results, they will put some of their attention on our airship, which is expected to play a certain role in disrupting their vision." Tirpitz said.

The British are not fools, they also have their own airships, and the initial technology was provided by Germany, so they can also use guò several tests to conclude that airships are not very effective in attacking surface ships, and it is not realistic to fool them for a long time.

"All we need is to disrupt their vision, whether they think the airship is very useful and develop the airship vigorously or they think the airship is very useless, and we are all fools who vigorously develop the airship, and it is beneficial to us." Jochen laughed, "And as long as we advertise it well, the insecure Englishmen will help us to distract their government." ”

At least before the outbreak of war, Jochen was indeed planning to develop more military airships, and since he was ready to do so, it was better to be more high-profile and attract more attention.

As long as the British people believed that the airship was very attacking, then the British government had to seriously consider and assess the threat of the German airship, then Jochen's goal was achieved.

If the British follow the trend and build airships, it will naturally be the best, if the British do not build airships, it doesn't matter, the British were not expected to be able to conduct airship races like the shipbuilding competition with Germany, the most important thing for the British is still sea power, and it is difficult for people to realize the importance of air power now

If the British strengthened their air defense, it would not have any effect, because due to the limitations of technology and the absence of real combat tests, the early means of air defense did not pose much threat to the airship.

At the beginning of World War I, Britain's main anti-aircraft weapon was a 3-pounder rapid-fire gun, with an actual caliber of 47 mm, a rate of fire of 15 rounds per minute, and a maximum firing height of 5,500 meters.

However, this is not the case.

On September 7, 1915, the German Navy's L-13 airship attacked London at an altitude of 2,500 meters, and in the face of London's dense anti-aircraft fire, the L-13 was not only unscathed, but also caused the most powerful attack of the airship in World War I: 22 directors were killed and 87 were wounded, and property damage was more than 530,000 pounds.

The records of the British anti-aircraft observation posts later showed that all the fire from the anti-aircraft artillery was too low, and all the shells exploded under the target. In fact, according to statistics, an average of 8,000 shells were fired in World War I to hit an airship.

The initial fighter was not a big threat to the airship, the British BE.2c fighter had a maximum flight speed of only 120 km / h, and the climb efficiency was extremely low, the Zeppelin could climb 300 meters in 1 minute, while the BE.2c took 10 minutes to do this, and the fighter without a pressurized device dropped the engine power at high altitude, and when pursuing the German airship, the compass often frosted and failed, and the pilot froze to death.

If an airship attack is launched at night, then the efficiency of searching by the naked eye is extremely low, and the British pilots of the 90's have never seen an airship at night.

Moreover, even if the fighter found the airship, it was difficult to pose any threat to it in the early stage, because the weapon used by the fighter was a machine gun, and the use of the same standard machine gun bullets as the army would cause very low damage to the airship with a large number of independent airbags, and before 1916, the British War Office had come to the conclusion that "bullets are useless against airships", until the appearance of Pomerroi, Brogue and Buckingham.

So in the early days of the war, airships can be used as a surprise force, and they can do more than just bomb. Throughout the war, the airship units of the German Navy made 930 reconnaissance sorties in the North Sea, spotted 70 enemy ships, attacked the enemy 150 times, and conducted 220 reconnaissance flights in the Baltic Sea, spotting 25 enemy ships. It's just that due to the German Navy's ship-keeping strategy, this hard-earned intelligence was wasted.

Of course, Jochen would never let the German Army treat airships as omnipotent artifacts as they did in history, and by the end of World War I, a total of 113 military zeppelins had been built.

Therefore, Jochen's plan was to have a stronger German airship force by the time the war broke out than at the same time in history, but after the outbreak of war, the construction of airships would be halted and resources would be concentrated on other projects.

But if the British can pay attention to the airship, then with the big guise of the airship in front of it, some other things in Germany can be hidden in the shadow of the airship, anyway, it is just acting, and there is no harm.

"As much as I hate the old English's propaganda that our navy threatens them, this time I would love to see them advertised in the London newspapers that our airships threaten them." Tirpitz said with a smile.

"Although airships are not ideal for dealing with sea navigation targets, there is still a great threat to dealing with fixed targets, and even if some people in the British realize that our demonstration is only bombing ships at anchor, they will think of us using airships to attack military ports." Jochen said confidently: "Don't underestimate the imagination of the British newspapers, aren't they best at making up stories? ”

"What His Majesty said is that this is indeed what they do best." Tirpitz couldn't help but laugh, and Goltz on the side was also smiling.

"But you all have to note that the purpose of our demonstration is to mislead the British, and our propaganda at home will also mislead a large number of our people, but I don't want the high-ranking in the army to be affected and the airship as a universal weapon, you must know that the disadvantages and advantages of this weapon are equally prominent, as a funder of this kind of aircraft research, I did not have the idea of using it as the main battle equipment of the future from the beginning." Jochen warned: "Especially the Army, which is the main airship unit. ”

Both the Army and the Navy have historically had a large number of fanatical supporters of airships, and Jochen didn't want that to happen again.

"Rest assured, we are well aware of the limitations of the use of airships, and we are very cautious about their use." Gortz immediately assured: "And having seen the effects of the special tracer bullet, I believe that at least everyone present at the time will be very careful about the conditions under which the airship will be used." ”

The so-called special tracer bullet is actually a new ammunition developed by Jochen in accordance with the requirements of the British Buckingham bullet, which is actually an incendiary bomb filled with white phosphorus, and it is also a 12.7 mm machine gun bullet, mixed with ordinary bullets, when the ordinary bullet penetrates the shell and air bag of the airship, hydrogen leakage is mixed with air, and then ignited with an incendiary bomb to cause an explosion.

After using this bullet to detonate several balloons made according to airship airbags in front of the army generals, the army realized that airships were not impregnable air fortresses.

Jochen nodded, and that's what he wanted.

"But at this pace, I'm afraid I won't be able to complete all the tests in one day today." After thinking for a moment, Jochen said: "The schedule is too tight, not only is the airship very tight to replenish ammunition back and forth, but also there is not enough time left for naval technicians to board the ship for inspection, which not only makes all the personnel very tired, but also the effect is not necessarily ideal.

So I think the next 250 kg bomb technology should be stopped and the test of the more powerful bomb should be postponed until tomorrow, so as to allow enough time for the technicians to have more time to check. ”

"The weight of the 250-kilogram bomb is already more than that of the 240-millimeter naval gun, and it is true that more time should be allowed for inspection, but if the test is delayed, we cannot be sure that tomorrow's weather will be suitable." Tirpitz was a little worried.

"If the weather is bad, we will continue to wait for the right weather, we have been waiting for several months, and we are not afraid to continue waiting. It would be a waste to blow up all three ships at once just to put on a show for the British, and we didn't collect any jù ourselves. Jochen asked, "Colma, you won't have any problems there, will you?" ”

"No problem, Your Majesty." Goltz immediately responded: "This is also an excellent training opportunity for the airship unit, and they rarely carry out bomb dropping training under such complex conditions." ”

"Then arrange it like this." Joechen commanded.

"Yes, Your Majesty." Tirpitz and Goltz responded together.

1 hour later, the tests continued, and the 8 V-type airships had returned to replenish their ammunition, and they were replaced by 8 Type IV airships, the second official model of the army's equipment and the largest number of the army's models at the moment, with a total of 16 ships with a carrying capacity of 5 tons, so they carried only 4 250 thousand bombs.

Due to the modification of the original bombing plan, the eight airships did not separate to attack the two ships, and the priority was to attack the Olga, while Frederick the Great waited until the V-type airship had replenished its ammunition.

Eight airships took turns bombarding Olga, and the 250 kg bombs were obviously a bit difficult for Olga to handle, and after the 8 airships dropped 32 bombs on her, they made 3 hits (and later learned that there were 2 close misses) and then began to tilt, and after floating at sea for more than 40 minutes, they capsized and sank.

At this time, eight V-boats returned to the test area with a total of 56 250-kilogram bombs, and the bombing of Frederick the Great began again. R1152