In the first three minutes, the "Ohio" did not resist at all, and in these three minutes, the six battleships in the south fired five or six salvos each, that is, in just three minutes, the six battleships of the "New Provincial Capital" class used up almost 3oo shells on the "Ohio". According to the results of later statistics, the hit rate of the shelling in these three minutes exceeded 50%, but the problem is that the actual explosion of shells is far from that many.

After the war, the statistics of the six battleships of the Third Task Force showed that at least 16 shells of the enemy ship were hit, and the error was about 10%, but the number of explosions observed by the lookout was only more than 3o, and the explosions fired inside the hull would not exceed 5o. If there really were about 17o shells that hit the "Russo-Russian", then less than a third of the shells exploded, the rest were all duds! There is no doubt that this dud ratio is indeed too high, a bit outrageously high! Later, after the "Ohio" was salvaged, this statistical result was confirmed, and the troops responsible for the salvage work at that time found a total of 86 shells on the battleship that did not explode, in addition, many shells were ejected after hitting the battleship and did not explode.

There are two main reasons for the dud rate and ricochet rate as high as 70%, one is the angle of shelling at that time, and the other is some defects in the design of the Type 26 armor-piercing projectile.

In the first three minutes of the artillery battle, the six "New Provincial Capital" class ships hit the front of the "Ohio". The Montana-class battleships have learned a lot of practical lessons and experience in the design, the size of the bridge is relatively small, and the frontal armor of the main gun turret, as well as most of the main armor, have a large angle of inclination. In this way, not only can the vertical thickness of the armor be increased in disguise. It is also possible to increase the proportion of ricochetic projectiles, which increases the ability to resist strikes. It was precisely because of this that about 20 percent of the shells that hit the "Ohio" at that time became "ricochets" and did not threaten the battleship. In addition, at this distance, the Type 26 armor-piercing projectile should have enough certainty to penetrate the main armor plate of the "Russo-Russian". Because of the large angle of inclination, a large number of shells did not penetrate the armor and enter the hull.

There were also certain problems with the design of the Type 26 armor-piercing projectile. The first heavy armor-piercing projectile of 4oo meter caliber. The difference from the light armor-piercing projectiles used by the Imperial Navy in the past is that the heavy armor-piercing projectiles have a low initial level, good storage capacity, and a large ballistic curvature. More suitable for long-range engagements. According to the Imperial Navy's ground tests, the optimal strike distance of the Type 26 armor-piercing projectile should be between 15ooo and 2oooo. At this distance, armor-piercing shells fell almost vertically, and there was a large stock, which was guaranteed to penetrate the horizontal armor of the enemy ship. On the contrary, above 2oooo, the degree of the shell is reduced a lot, and the armor-piercing ability is weakened, and within 15ooo yards, because the angle at which the shell falls is not large. Moreover, most of the blows were on the side main armor of the battleship, and its effect was not good. This can be said to be a common feature of all heavy armor-piercing shells at that time, and according to this characteristic, the fuse of the Type 26 armor-piercing projectile was also designed to pay more attention to vertical + reliability, without taking into account that when dealing with the enemy's inclined armor plate in close combat, the angle of impact of the shell is not vertical, and its impact and angle must be different. As a result, the Type 26 armor-piercing projectile not only found it difficult to penetrate the thickest parts of the main armor belt of the "Russo-Russian" at a distance of 7ooo, such as the frontal armor of the turret. And even if it penetrates the armor, it is because the design of the fuse is not reasonable. Most of the shells did not explode!

If the two sides were evenly matched at that time, and the four "Montana" and the six "new provincial capitals" were in a fight, these two problems would be enough to make Chang Jianxin suffer a lot. Fortunately, the six "new provincial capitals" were dealing with one, half of the "Montana" to be exact, because the "Ohio" had only two turrets on the front to return fire. And in the first three minutes, the "Ohio" did not react at all, and the overwhelming blow quickly paralyzed the battleship, and it was difficult to threaten the "new provincial capital".

The counterattack of the US troops did not pose much threat, and at that time, the three main guns of the No. 2 turret of the "Ohio" department had all been damaged, although not a single armor-piercing shell penetrated the frontal armor of the main gun turret, but after being hit continuously by the Type 426 armor-piercing shells, even if the main gun turret was thick, the huge impact force of the armor-piercing shells when it hit was enough to shock all the equipment in the turret, and to death and shock the gunner. In addition, the commander's bridge behind the turret is also a key target. As with the "Iowa", the thickness of the armor of the commander bridge of the "Montana" class was a little thinner than the frontal armor of the main gun turret, about 5o mm less, and this 5o meters thick was enough for the Americans to regret. Within three minutes, at least eight armor-piercing shells hit the commander's bridge, four of them jumped away, and only two penetrated the armor, which was enough, as long as one armor-piercing bullet penetrated, even if it did not explode, the officers and men in the commander's bridge would not be spared, let alone two, and all of them exploded.

In the first round of shelling, the bridge of the commander of the "Ohio" was knocked out, just like a person's brain has been crippled, the body cannot be controlled, and there are no strong limbs, and there is not much threat. It was only two minutes later that the officers and men in the two turrets in front learned that the commander's bridge had been blown up, and almost all the senior officers on the battleship, including the captain, had been killed. Within these two minutes, the B turret also lost its combat effectiveness, and in the end, only the relatively low and difficult to directly target A turret could still be used. So, three minutes after the start of the battle, the gunners of the A turret fired the first round using the auxiliary sight.

All three shells flew over the head of the No. 3 ship, the "Guiyang," which was located in the middle of the formation of six "Xinprovincial capital"-class battleships, and then landed on the sea several hundred meters south of the battleship. This deviation distance is also a bit scary. At the beginning, in order to improve the defense capability of the "Montana" class and reduce the area of the bomb, the A turret was designed to be relatively low, but this also affected the vision of the A turret, and as a result, the gunner could not aim accurately at all, and the shells fired were even less likely to threaten the opposing battleship.

The "Ohio" counterattack startled the captain of the "Guiyang", but soon he appeared, and the enemy ship's return fire was not at all