Satsumville did not know that Task Force 3 was guarding the Strait of Dover, and that the warships sent by Task Force 3 had spotted them and were taking advantage of their position. In order to ensure safety, in addition to sending a light cruiser equipped with radar to explore the way, Summerville did not let the fleet immediately turn to the port of Puffmouth, but let the fleet keep its original course and continue to sail southwest, preparing to turn again after reaching a relatively open sea area, so that it was unlikely to hit a mine.

This was a fatal mistake, and if Satmoville had turned immediately after leaving the minefield set by the British Navy, it was very likely that the "Jiyang" would not have been able to detect them, and even the "Guanghan" to the northwest would not have been able to spot the British Home Fleet. What's more, as long as Sarmoville let the fleet sail directly to the port of Pottsmouth, it would be difficult for Chang Zhixin to get in front of him in time, and the British Home Fleet might rush into the port of Portsmouth, avoiding the unfavorable conditions of the night with the Third Task Force, and instead fighting it according to Sarmoville's previous arrangement.

Luck and coincidence in naval warfare cannot be avoided, after all, naval warfare has its own inherent characteristics, in which the discovery of the first enemy and the preparation of the first enemy for battle are extremely crucial factors in determining the victory or defeat of the sea. Satsumville originally drew up a more reasonable battle plan. And he also knew that in the night battle, he could not defeat the Third Task Force, after all, the British Home Fleet had already exposed the defects of poor radar performance in the battle with the German "Far East Fleet", and in the night battle. The performance of the radar determines almost everything. But the problem was that the battle could not have developed as Satsumville himself had expected, and he could not control the actions of Task Force 3, or even know the actions of Task Force 3, so it was not that he could fight whenever he wanted, but that he had to fight a decisive battle with Task Force 3 at a time he did not want.

It can be seen that Chang Jianxin overestimated the opponent of Samoville. Relatively speaking, Satsumville was not the brilliant fleet commander of Cunningham. Nor is it a commander who can seize fleeting opportunities on the battlefield. Judging from the two recent naval battles commanded by Summerville, while the British Home Fleet was victorious, at least strategically, it was on other fronts. Summerville's performance was mediocre, especially in the battle with Sherdi, where he was tactically defeated, after all, he lost a battleship with equal forces, and eventually allowed the German "Far East Fleet" to escape.

At the same time, Sateroville also seriously underestimated Chang Jianxin's opponent, and the fundamental reason why he underestimated his opponent was that he had never fought against the Tang Imperial Navy, so it was difficult to have a direct understanding of Chang Jianxin's new group of generals. Although Satsumville obtained a lot of information about the young admirals of the Tang Empire through various channels. Many of them are often recommended new information, but he does not know much about the new recommendation, and the intelligence departments of the United Kingdom, the United States and other countries regard Tan Renhao as the number one fleet commander of the Tang Imperial Navy, and the new ranking of the regular recommendation is even after Huang Xiaotian, Hao Dongjue and others, so the information provided by the intelligence department is quite limited, and even biased.

This also reflects the difference between the Tang Imperial Navy and the British Navy, the old and new generations of admirals.

The bloody lessons on the Pacific battlefield made the new generation of generals of the Tang Empire more precocious. Especially in the early days of the war, in several battles with the Japanese navy, the Tang Imperial Navy suffered a lot of losses, most of which were directly related to not understanding the opponent and underestimating the opponent. Therefore, an unwritten rule has been formed in this group of young generals who talk about Renhao and often recommend new generals, that is. On the battlefield, if you don't know enough about the enemy. Then it is better to overestimate the enemy than to be underestimated. It is precisely because of this habit that in the next difficult battle with the United States, the young generals of the Tang Imperial Navy had the last laugh, and after several years of bloody battles, they finally defeated the US Navy and those old generals in the US Navy.

Opposite. The British Navy did not experience so many ups and downs and tribulations. Since the outbreak of the war, the British Navy has suffered only one heavy defeat, that is, the expeditionary fleet commanded by Cunningham was defeated by the expeditionary fleet of the Tang Imperial Navy in the South Atlantic. Relatively speaking, the strategic impact of this defeat on Britain was not very large. First of all, the British Navy also had enough warships to ensure its blockade of Germany, and was even able to send warships to the Mediterranean Sea against the fleet of the Persian Empire. Second, the South Atlantic was not a British sphere of influence in the first place, and Britain had no major strategic interests here. Finally, and most importantly, the Tang Imperial Navy was not able to quickly move north with the help of its victory in the South Atlantic, because of the lack of naval bases in the Atlantic, it was difficult for the Tang Imperial Navy to quickly penetrate the North Atlantic and threaten the British mainland. It was these three points that the British Navy did not be able to learn from the failures of the expeditionary fleet and did not even realize that they were making a serious mistake. Of course, there is another point that cannot be ignored, that is, Cunningham and many other excellent commanders of the expeditionary fleet were annihilated in the battle, and few were able to return to Britain to learn the lessons. All these factors led to the lack of sufficient understanding of the Tang Imperial Navy among the old-fashioned admirals of the British Navy, and even less of the new generation of admirals of the Tang Imperial Navy.

It is precisely because of this difference in understanding that there is a major deviation in the prejudgment of the generals of the two sides. If Satsumville had been able to pay attention to the new adversary at that time, he should have taken into account that it was very likely that Task Force 3 was still active in the strait, and that he should return to the port of Puffmouth as quickly as possible, rather than wandering around the sea, giving the adversary valuable time. In fact, Samoville cannot be blamed for this, the British intelligence department also made a serious mistake at this time, a serious mistake that led to the initiative of its home fleet to send to death, that is, the wrong judgment of the telegram sent by the Sixth Task Force as the telegram sent by the Third Task Force, which is also one of the important reasons for the wrong judgment of Samoville.

The Sixth Task Force was in contact with the First Task Force at about half past eleven, and Chang Zhixin was not able to receive the telegram from the Sixth Task Force in time, so he did not know the whereabouts of the Sixth Task Force. Gu Zhenyun's telegram relieved Tan Renhao, who was commanding in the rear, but the radio waves were also picked up by a radio monitoring station located in the southern part of the British mainland. British intelligence quickly came up with the results of the analysis and immediately sent them to the Home Fleet. One can imagine how Sulmurville would react when he knew that the battleship fleet of the Tang Empire was still outside the strait, and at this time, the home fleet commanded by Sarmoville had just passed through the Strait of Dover!

Of course, there were many other factors that affected naval warfare, among which the mistakes of the British fleet itself were also an important factor. At 12:20 a.m., when the Hirohan's radar detected the battleships in the British Home Fleet, it was about 13 nautical miles from the alert cruisers sent by Satsummerville. This distance was actually within the detection range of the British radar, but because the destroyer was relatively thin and small, and the wind and waves on the sea surface were relatively large at that time, it interfered with the radar. The radar on the cruiser "Birmingham" had actually detected the destroyer "Guanghan", but the target signal came and went, as a result of which the radar operator believed that it was interference from waves on the sea surface, and the officer in charge made the same judgment, thus missing the opportunity to detect the 3rd task force in time.

Numerous mistakes, coincidences, and differences in basic command ideas led to very different campaign deployments by commanders on both sides, and although Chang Zhixin overestimated his opponent, he quickly revised his judgment. And he prepared to predict the enemy's intentions and whereabouts, which laid the foundation for him to finally seize the opportunity. On the contrary, for various reasons, Satsumi was unable to prepare, and promptly judged the whereabouts and intentions of Task Force 3. As a result, several times the opportunity was missed, and the British fleet "walked" to the dangerous sea area because of this.

It was not until 12:50, when Chang had already led the fleet to the northwest for almost half an hour, that Sarmoville ordered the fleet to turn to 310 degrees and sail towards the port of Pontesmouth. The half-hour was quite deadly, and within half an hour, Task Force 3 had sailed 12 nautical miles at 24 knots, compared to about 22 nautical miles from the British Home Fleet. In other words, at the time of the Satsumville turn, Task Force 3 was actually in the western part of the British Home Fleet, at a distance of about 28 nautical miles.

Samoville did not let the fleet accelerate. Still maintaining a speed of 16 knots, the main reason is that the coal-fired boiler on the "Iron Duke" has been unstable, and it is good to be able to maintain a speed of 16 knots. At this rate, Chang Zhixin had enough time to stop between Satsumville and Portsmouth, and the distance between the two sides began to approach, the difference was that the five battleships of the Third Task Force were all ready for battle, lined up for battle, and the shells were loaded. But Thermoville still did not prepare the fleet for battle. Because he didn't know that Task Force 3 was right in front of him, and the two sides would be engaged in battle in an hour!

When the "New Provincial Capital" class battleships carry out ground shelling missions, their main guns can hit shells nearly 20 nautical miles away, and the firing range of the newly developed special ground strike ammunition has also been increased to about 24 nautical miles. However, in the case of naval warfare, the distance of the artillery battle was limited to 14 nautical miles because of the need to ensure that the armor-piercing projectiles had sufficient power and the artillery bombardment was sufficiently accurate. And it's better to be within 10 nautical miles, that is, about 20,000 yards, and the distance for a really effective artillery battle is actually between 15,000 yards! In other words, by the time the battleships of the 3rd Task Force fired the first salvo, the radar of the British Home Fleet had already detected the 3rd Task Force, which may have been a blessing in misfortune for Sarmoville. (Fastest update: n).

Less than half past one in the morning, the steering was completed ahead of schedule. And the radar on board the "Birmingham", which continued to serve as a forward alert mission, detected five huge targets, and this time the radar operator did not make a wrong judgment again. The situation was immediately reported, and at the same time the distance to the target was measured. Those were the five battleships of the 3rd Task Force, which at this time were about 14 nautical miles from the "Birmingham". When the radar on the "Birmingham" discovered these five battleships, the radar on the "Nanning" and other battleships also discovered the light cruiser with a displacement of less than 10,000 tons almost simultaneously.

The officers on board the "Birmingham" immediately sent the information, but before the cruiser could turn and accelerate, the first shells fell. This batch of shells are all from five battleships, under normal circumstances, the first round of shelling is used to measure the accuracy of shelling, so that the gunner can adjust the shelling parameters according to the actual deviation, as a result, this round of shelling ground readiness rate is a bit unexpected, a huge shell from the "Nanchang" fell on the sea less than five meters in front of the left front of the "Birmingham", the shell hit the cruiser's hull after passing through a few meters of seawater, and the cruiser was directly blown off the bow, even if this shell did not explode, It was enough to smash this light cruiser to the bottom of the sea!

After receiving the news from the light cruiser, Summerville was also very surprised, and he first wondered if the radar on the cruiser was malfunctioning, so he immediately asked the staff officer to send a telegram to the cruiser, asking the "Birmingham" to reconfirm the target. But the hapless cruiser sank within two minutes, and no new reports were received from Samoville. This caused him to delay for more than ten minutes, and when it was almost 1:50, Summerville realized that there was something wrong with the "Birmingham", and he immediately asked another cruiser on a vigilance mission, the "Aberdeen", to look for the "Birmingham", and at the same time ordered the fleet to carry out combat mobilization, but did not let the fleet enter a combat state. At this time, Sarmoville was only about 17 nautical miles away from Chang Zhixin, and the radar on the "Nanning" had already detected the battleships in the British home fleet, but Summerville still did not know that there was a huge danger ahead!

It is conceivable what kind of result will be led by the many mistakes, Summerville is not only careless and underestimated, but also seriously backward in intelligence, even if the British home fleet has the advantage of troops, this naval battle will be an asymmetrical battle, for Summerville, and tens of thousands of British naval officers and men, they have embarked on a road of no return.