At this moment, the left side of the bow of the Haitian, which had already engaged the four new Japanese protective cruisers, suddenly burst into flames, and a cloud of yellow smoke followed.

Although even if Japan loses, the British government can turn to support China, but no matter how you look at the former, it is not as appropriate as the former, so Phelimant always hopes that the Japanese army will win in his heart, and when he sees the Haitian being shot, his face immediately shows joy.

According to the mainstream design ideas of armored ships in this period, the bow part of the ship was generally unprotected, so even if the caliber of the shell was not large, the commander of the British Far East Fleet still looked forward to its damage effect, after all, the shell contained a powerful picric acid explosive!

However, as the smoke was quickly blown away by the deck wind, Philmante's face was suddenly filled with surprise, "No damage? How is this possible? Could it be that it is designed with full protection? But with such a stubby appearance, its speed is about to catch up with that of a protective cruiser, and its power system must be extremely powerful, where is there so much load allocated to armor? ”

"Unless the thickness of the armor is limited, well, there is a real possibility, and only a 4.7-inch blasting shell hit it just now, and the two-inch thick armor will definitely be able to defend against it. However, the four Japanese protective cruisers did not only have 4.7-inch naval guns, but also 6-inch or even 8-inch rapid-fire guns that were not so easy to resist", Philimante felt that he had seen through the reality of the Haitian, and his expression suddenly calmed down a lot.

He even made up for Haitian's previous choice to let go of the Pratt Captain and not fight, "No wonder the Haitian will dodge the Pratt Tromen, there is a 240mm rapid-fire gun on it (in fact, the maximum rate of fire is only 50 seconds 1 round)!" ”

When the Haitian approached, the four new Japanese anti-patrol ships had completely turned around and put on a T-shaped crosshead, and the powerful side firepower was fully brought into play, but at this time, Deng Shichang gave an order that seemed a little stupid at first glance

"The Chinese are crazy! actually rushed directly to the T-shaped horizontal head, was he afraid that he would not die fast enough? Almost all the officers and men of the Western Navy who watched the battle shook their heads one after another, and a few of them even prayed to God in advance for the officers and men who were about to be martyred on the Haitian, regardless of whether they were religious or not.

But in the midst of this hustle and bustle, German Rear Admiral Paul Hoffmann suddenly thought of another possibility, "The Haitian is just a single warship, and it adopts a diamond-shaped layout, even if the enemy seizes the T-shaped crosshead, there is no loss in firepower output." As long as her armor can withstand the fire of the four Japanese ships, it may be a good idea to push the T-shaped cross, as it will save as much time as possible to sink as many Japanese ships as possible or force them out of battle before the Platte Trowel arrives."

However, Paul Hoffman quickly shook his head and dismissed his own idea, because all of this was premised on the Sea-Sky having strong armor protection, but how could an armored cruiser with strong firepower, fast sailing, and a comprehensive protection design also have enough armor thickness?

Although the "venture capital firm" is described in the information currently available as very mysterious, based on the pride of the first-class powers, Paul Hoffman would never believe that such an organization of unknown origin and whose members only saw the yellow race for the time being could have a shipbuilding capability beyond the world's advanced level, and in this respect, he was no different from Vice Admiral Philmantle, who was a British.

Seeing that the Haitian was actually "looking for death" and desperately urging the flagship to speed up, Inoue Yoshino, who had seen that the Haitian was actually "looking for death", showed a smile on his face that was rare after the battle began, and he fantasized with longing for the moment when defeat would turn into victory

However, relying on the quality of the officers and men who won more than one step ahead, the first to make peace was the "dead" Haitian, a 210mm blasting bomb hit the main gun shield of the rear main gun of the Japanese ship Tsushima (formerly the Argentine Navy's "July 9" protective cruiser), and the terrifying high temperature of more than 4,000 °C when the silver explosive exploded instantly made this 40 times the diameter of the 6-inch Armstrong rapid-fire gun completely scrapped!

Not only that, but the silver flames from the burning of the aluminum powder and the red-hot iron flowing onto the deck also ignited the wooden deck of the Tsushima, and if it weren't for the lessons learned from the Battle of Daitogou and the fact that the Combined Fleet no longer dared to raise ammunition in advance in order to increase the rate of fire, this small fire would have caused even more serious consequences

After the first hit, the Haitian's character seemed to have declined somewhat, and three consecutive rounds of shelling failed to hit.

However, there is a big difference from the previous pursuit, the current Haitian sailing direction is close to the direction of the Japanese ship, and the relative speed is several times faster, and after just over half a minute, the closest distance between the Haitian and the Japanese ship has been shortened by a full few hundred meters!

If it is 20 years later, a distance of a few hundred meters will not have much impact on naval warfare at all, but the main combat distance of naval warfare today is only about 2,000 meters, and if it is shortened by a few hundred meters on this basis, the hit rate of shelling will inevitably be greatly improved, even if the luck is not good, it is impossible to continue to fail like this!

I don't know if it was because the transfer finally began, or because the accumulated probability had reached a limit, the Haitian finally hit the target again, and a 210mm blasting projectile pierced the side hull of the Tsushima and drilled into the coal bunker and exploded violently, and the blazing flames instantly ignited the mountains of coal inside.

Unlike ammunition detonation, which can be avoided as long as the operating procedures are strictly followed, as long as the design of the coal bunker on both sides of the dome armor remains unchanged, the safety hazard of the lack of protection of the coal bunker cannot be solved.

Although the captain of the Tsushima ordered water to be filled and extinguished in time due to the experience of the Battle of Daidonggou due to the bad news of the coal bunker fire, the weight increase on one side caused the hull of the Tsushima to tilt significantly, and its originally proud speed began to decline, which was enough to cause the speed of the entire column formation to be dragged down.

Fortunately, at this time, the first ship of the column, the Yashima, had already completed its turn, turned around and intercepted in front of the Haitian, and the Tsushima only needed to turn in advance, and the problem of the speed drop was not immediately exposed.

However, in Deng Shichang's eyes at this time, there was only a more valuable prey that took the initiative to send to his mouth