In the High Seas Fleet of the Second German Reich, similar "German silhouettes" abounded, making it difficult for even the most discerning lookout to accurately discern them from thousands of meters away. After the invention of the www.biquge.info airplane, the most effective screening method changed from the approach reconnaissance of the ship to the low-altitude reconnaissance of the aircraft, and after the first naval battle of Flanders, the British Navy finally realized the importance of the aircraft in this war, and the Admiralty tried every means to urgently expand the aviation force, requisition civilian aircraft, and recruit civilian pilots. Before the outbreak of the war, civil aviation activities were still in their infancy, and the British were not particularly keen on it, but the British Navy quickly managed to gather more than 50 seaplanes and more than 20 land-based aircraft. However, despite the large number of these aircraft, their performance was uneven, and the logistical maintenance pressure was heavy, and after two weeks of training, nearly half of them could not be lifted off due to malfunctions, and the rest lacked effective command and liaison - most civilian aircraft at this time were either unable to accommodate bulky radio equipment, or were forced into a no-wire station and an operator, and the speed was extremely slow, the range was extremely short, and it was difficult to fly high.

In the waters of Flanders in early September, the sky was filled with smoke, blood and fire, and another thrilling steel collision was raging. After some combat reconnaissance, the light cruiser "Daring", to which the new Harwich fleet belonged, reported to the fleet command by radio about the second German fleet. Colonel Hockleys agreed with the lookout's judgment that they were two Seydlitz-class battlecruisers.

In the intelligence database of the British Navy, the "Seydlitz" and the subsequent Deflinger-class battlecruisers were called the "Seydlitz class", for the simple reason that from the "Seydlitz", the German naval battle cruisers were equipped with more powerful 12-inch guns, and the combat tonnage was close to or more than 30,000 tons, which belonged to the 30,000-ton class of heavy warships. In addition, their main body design, size specifications, and main performance are basically the same, and there is really no need to distinguish them in detail.

After the "Daring" sent out the first reconnaissance report, Colonel Hocklis originally wanted to lead the light ship formation to continue to approach the German fleet, but several near-misses caused a relatively serious leak in the bottom compartment of the "Daring", and he was worried that this cutting-edge light cruiser would be lost in vain, so he turned around when he was 8,000 yards away from the enemy fleet and quickly left the range of the German fleet. Not long after, the fleet command replied with a telegram ordering it to confirm the results of the reconnaissance, and out of prudence, the colonel sent the destroyer "Harrier Eagle" to carry out this dangerous mission alone.

Without the drag of the formation, the Tier I destroyer ran at a speed of nearly 35 knots, nimbly dodging the ferocious fire of the German fleet. In the face of the British destroyers advancing alone, Hipper's attitude was very firm, and the two battle cruisers never used the middle guns of the triple main turret, which was equivalent to reducing the firepower by one-third, and the "Harrier Eagle" advanced to a position about 4,000 meters away from the German fleet, and was able to launch an effective torpedo attack before that, but unfortunately at this point, its hull had been attacked by enemy shrapnel and small-caliber naval guns and suffered multiple damage, and it had to sound the gong to withdraw its troops.

It is worth mentioning that the captain of the "Harrier Eagle" was the young Captain John Tovey, and on the German battle cruiser "Moltke" opposite, Major Erich Raeder, who was 9 years older than him, took part in the battle as the chief of staff of the reconnaissance fleet. If it weren't for a time-traveling "butterfly" that changed the course of history, more than 20 years later, they would have faced off as rivals in the North Sea - Tovey became the commander of the British Home Fleet, leading the LinkedIn fleet through the most difficult period, and Raeder became the commander-in-chief of the German Navy, reaching the peak of his life at the beginning of World War II.

The reconnaissance report from the front was quickly transmitted to the British main fleet, which was on standby in the waters of Great Yarmouth. The battle cruisers of the Germans suddenly changed from four to six, and the situation on the battlefield was suddenly very different, but the fleet combat meeting had ended, and the commanders of the various detachments and detachments were in the hands of Jericho to decide whether to carry out the original plan according to the original plan.

When Jericho asked for his opinion, the chief of staff of the fleet, Charles Madden, did not answer directly, but applied philosophical thinking, saying: "Sometimes what we see with our eyes is not necessarily the real side of things. ”

"You mean, the Germans misled us by means of camouflage?"

"Quite possibly." Lieutenant General Madden's tone was not resolute.

Although not a man to be easily shaken, Jericho was quite hesitant at the moment, and he said: "If they do have six battlecruisers in battle, it will be enough to defeat the Channel Fleet in a relatively short time, and then only need to send the cruisers deep into the Channel to attack the troop carriers, and the battlecruisers will quickly turn back and join forces with the battlefleet to meet us...... The odds of winning this battle are slim! ”

Lieutenant General Madden reluctantly admitted: "Yes, sir, the possibility of this cannot be ruled out. ”

After thinking for a long time, Jericho sighed, "What a terrible opponent. ”

Madden agreed: "The German High Seas Fleet's style of operation was not at all like that of the traditional German army, which was so cunning that it was elusive. ”

"Then we can only take one step at a time?" The grammar of Jellico's sentence is an interrogative sentence, but the meaning is a helpless affirmation.

Madden turned his gaze to the east, and according to the plan agreed at the operational meeting, two rapid detachments, three battle cruisers under the command of Rear Admiral Christoph Parkenham, and the super-dreadnought "Ireland" under the command of Vice Admiral Betty, and the armored cruisers "Essex" and "Lancaster", would set out for the concealed positions, and wait for the battle between the main fleets of the two sides to begin, waiting for an opportunity to attack the support ships behind the German fleet.

At the other end of the battlefield, the German Navy's main combat ship group was cruising on the surface of the sea just a dozen nautical miles from the Dutch coastline, and its whereabouts and strength were also unknown to the opponent. Unlike Jericho's hesitation, Reinhardt-Scheer is much calmer, not because he has better cards than his opponent, but because he has a brilliant plan to win in the face of danger.

"King", "Caesar", "Elector", "Oldenburg", the number of dreadnoughts available to the German Navy in combat was much smaller than the British expected. In the Battle of Jutland, the world often only saw the devastation of the British Navy and ignored the heavy price paid by the German Navy. In the decade from 1904 to 1914, in order to build capital ships with increasing tonnage and size, the German government allocated huge sums of money to help shipyards expand their docks, and made every effort to build a first-class main lineup of the high seas fleet, resulting in a long construction period and high cost of capital ships, which indirectly affected the construction service of light ships - the light cruisers and large torpedo boats equivalent to destroyers built in the same period were only less than half of those of Britain.

On a midsummer night, in the waters of Jutland, the fleets of both sides raised their thick black muzzles and bombarded each other mercilessly, and the ships that sank to the bottom of the sea did not need to be remembered, and the damaged ships floating on the surface staggered home, so the major shipyards began to be busy. To restore a badly damaged battleship to its original state, not only does it require a lot of labor and materials, but the technical requirements are not inferior to the construction of a new ship - engineers must comprehensively inspect the damage to the ship, develop a reasonable maintenance plan, and constantly adjust during the repair process, all of which are competitions outside the battlefield.

Before being completely crushed by fear, the British went all out to repair the old ships and build new ones, and a protracted war was bound to be detrimental to the German Navy, which was completely inferior in size, strength and resources in the shipbuilding industry. From the head of the Navy, Tirpitz, to the head of the fleet, Scheer, from the Chief of Staff of the Navy, von Pohl, to the Chief of Staff of the Fleet, Joachim, every wise general realized the need to win the victory in one fell swoop. Because of this, the High Seas Fleet is once again fighting to end the war at sea before the terrifying Queen Elizabeth-class super-dreadnoughts are completed and put into service.

The battle strategy decided by Scheer and Natsuki was that Hipper led the battle cruisers "Moltke" and "Goeben" and light patrols "Karlsruhe" and "Rostock" into the English Channel, used their speed to avoid the interception of the British Channel Fleet, attacked the British troop carriers with a quick knife, and then went straight through the channel into the Atlantic Ocean. This move is certainly dangerous, but as long as you set up doubts, disrupt your opponent's judgment, and grasp the best time, you have a good chance of success.

Towards noon, the divisions of the German Navy began to act as planned.

In the south-west sea, four German battlecruisers joined forces and sailed at a speed of 24 knots to the Dover Strait, the dreadnought group and support fleet advanced towards the British coast, and the submarine force that had entered the channel ahead of time was ambushed outside the port of Portsmouth. In the course of this process, the carrier-based planes of the "Bismarck" continued to be dispatched in full attendance to intercept and attack British reconnaissance planes, and two Zeppelin airships of the German Navy also flew to the English Channel as planned to closely monitor the activities of Allied ships in the central and eastern waters of the strait.

After the Russian army was defeated by the German Eastern Front, the British top brass obviously realized that the Western Front had become the only point that would determine the outcome of the war, and after the transfer of troops from the Western Front to the Eastern Front, the German army still maintained a vigorous offensive, but their offensive had already shown signs of being contained by the French army, and the warring parties were very likely to launch a decisive battle on the Somme and Marne, and with each additional British division, the Allies' hopes of reversing the decline increased by one point. Therefore, even under the threat of the German Navy, the British trans-sea operations were still in full swing......

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