Naval warfare is actually not as bloody as land warfare.

You think both sides have single-digit hit rates and slow rate of fire, which can't be intense at all. Generally speaking, the battleship will shoot a third or even fourth salvo at a distance of more than 10,000 meters to form a straddle shot, and after the straddle shot, it will take several rounds to hit. Moreover, the theoretical rate of fire and the actual rate of fire of battleships are two different things, and most battleships generally have a rate of fire of three rounds in two minutes when fighting guns, which is far slower than the theoretical rate of fire.

In the naval battle of the Danish Strait in another time and space, the two sides fought for a long time, and the Prince of Wales only ate seven shots and fifteen inches when he left the battlefield.

Of course, after the two sides approached, the situation was different, and the scene when the secondary guns fired together must have become intense.

Therefore, if you want to enjoy the thrill of naval battles, you should not drive battleships, you should drive destroyers, most of the bloody naval battles in World War II took place on destroyers.

What Rafi protruded into the face, what Taffe III destroyer force forced Yamato away in a desperate assault, what wild points challenged the entire US fleet and was blown into parts, it was all done by the destroyer.

At this time, the German fleet in the Danish Strait did not have destroyers, and the destroyers in Holland were still 20,000 meters away from the Germans, and the two sides were still in the stage of throwing bricks at each other at a long distance.

The Bismarck was firing a half-salvo, in which all turrets fired one of the two guns at the same time, which was the general practice during the calibration phase, and once the half-salvo had achieved straddle fire (i.e., the shells fell more evenly around the enemy ship), a full salvo would begin.

The basic essence of naval warfare in this era is to slightly change the course after discovering that the enemy ship has formed a straddle launch, so as to make the enemy's straddle firing ineffective. After that, the statistical battle report draws a formation map, which generally ignores this small range of twisting, and still regards it as the battle line is unfolded.

The Royal Navy actually encouraged captains to take their own initiative and drive their ships more agilely, a tradition handed down from the days of sail warships with poor communications. When the British commented on the French navy in the Battle of Trafalgar, they would say that they were too rigid and only knew how to maneuver with their flagship, while the British themselves were relatively not so rigorous in formation.

This tradition has been passed down from generation to generation, so that every ship of the British fleet, which is now in a trapezoidal diagonal formation, swings its hull with small rudder angles to create problems for the German calibration. On the one hand, the small rudder angle of the hull changes direction is small, and it is not easy to get out of the basket, on the other hand, the speed of changing back to the rudder is fast, and the rudder of a large warship is very slow.

The German fleet, on the other hand, was rudder according to tactical drills, so the German ships ran a very neat serpentine trajectory on the sea - every single one.

Of course, now the firepower of the British warships cannot be brought into play, and the change of direction of the German army has not reflected the superiority of school shooting brought to the British army.

The calibration of the main guns of large battleships has a very complicated process.

The highest point of the bridge of each large warship is generally arranged with a rangefinder for the main gun, which will rotate with the main gun, and its appearance is very recognizable, because there is a horizontal thick rod, and the two ends of the thick rod are the two lenses of the rangefinder, which is actually a gun mirror magnified countless times. The distance between the two lenses of the Yamato's main rangefinder reached fifteen meters, probably the largest artillery mirror ever made by mankind.

Some ships also had crossbars with lenses on their turrets, which were the turret's own backup rangefinders, which were used to direct artillery fire when the main rangefinder was destroyed.

When a large battleship wants to fire the main gun, it will first obtain the enemy's distance number jù by the rangefinder, and estimate the enemy's speed through continuous observation, and then provide the ship's course and speed number jù by the navigation room on the ship, all these numbers are summarized in the main gun firing command post, and the general firing command post will have a simple calculation device, for example, the Japanese Navy in another time and space uses a gear computer, The U.S. Navy, on the other hand, used simple electronic computing devices (computers did not exist at this time, so please understand them as calculators that we use in our daily lives).

After calculating the firing yuan, the number jù will be sent to the turret, the turret must complete the loading and adjustment of the main gun before the calculated best firing time, when the time is about to expire, the whole ship will have an electric bell and other means to announce, this is to tell everyone that the main gun is about to be fired, please grasp the things next to you.

The firing of the main guns of large ships causes far more movement than ordinary people think, and even half a salvo can cause the hull to shake. Like the Yamato, not only should the electric bell be announced before launching, but also the open-air anti-aircraft gun emplacements on the deck should be organized for evacuation, and the deck of the Yamato was specially set up with a bunker for the operators of the open-air anti-aircraft gun emplacements, and the operators had to hide in the bunker when the main guns were fired, otherwise they would be blown away by the muzzle storms fired by the main guns.

This is what the British and German warships are doing at this moment in the waters of the Danish Strait.

The two sides threw bricks at each other, but the momentum was still very strong, and shells were constantly falling around the warships on both sides, and the water column that exploded was more than 20 meters high.

However, the situation on the ships did not have that kind of bloody feeling, and the sailors on both sides were doing their best to complete their duties, and they did not even say anything, except for the sound of orders, and there was hardly any bloody roar or the like.

Because there were no planes to fight at this time, and the secondary guns had not entered the firing range, only the main artillery group and the firing control unit were busy on each ship, and the secondary artillery group and the anti-aircraft artillery group were all watching the show, and even the engine room was in a state where more than half of the people had nothing to do - now everyone was burning oil, and there was no need to fill the boiler with coal.

For Navy veterans, they enjoy this state of having nothing to do, because when there is something to do, it is usually a battleship that has been shot.

Twenty minutes after the exchange of fire began, the Prestige lookout post shouted: "There is a fire on the port side of Rodney." ”

Holland chuckled in his heart, but soon his staff officer reported: "It looks like the side of the bullet is in the sub-gun position, and there is no fire in sight, so it should be fine." ”

At this time, the signal corpsman reported: "There is no problem with the Rodney announcement, the speed and firepower are normal." ”

Horan breathed a long sigh of relief.

At this time, the captain of the Prestige said: "We are already close to 16,000 meters, can we consider turning?" It would be nice to let the cruisers and destroyers continue to advance. ”

"Not enough, sir." Holland shook his head, "We have to get close enough that the secondary guns can also fire, and only if we suppress the enemy's deck can we ensure the safety of our cruisers and destroyers." ”

The reason why the battleship is terrible is not only its main guns, but also the tons of secondary guns of the battleship are also an important source of his combat effectiveness. Generally, a destroyer only has a few five-inch guns, but the Bismarck has six 15CM twin-mounted turrets alone, and the firepower is equivalent to two destroyers. What's more, the battleships here are all equipped with ship-based battle girls, which pose a great threat to destroyers with almost no armor and complete "structural resistance".

Therefore, Holland planned to approach the German ship and use the secondary guns for the so-called "deck washing" operation, the penetration of the secondary guns was destined to not be able to threaten the core of the battleship, but it could take out the secondary guns of the battleship, in this case, the British cruisers and destroyers would be effectively protected.

As a result, the British fleet continued to rush at full speed towards the German single column, with the tall bow open to the sea, and the Royal Navy's St. George's cross flag flying in the smoke and water columns.

Five minutes later, the command post of the British main gun fire saw a fire coming from the German pilot ship.

"Bismarck shot!"

After the call sign came from the microphone, Holland slowly picked up the binoculars, as if the German ship was shot was an inevitable thing, and there was no need to make a fuss.

After observing for a while, the voice of the captain of the Prestige entered Holland's ears: "It seems that it has not been able to penetrate the main suit, probably not sixteen inches of the Nelson-class." ”

"Maybe it's because it's too far away, and our flicks don't have enough penetration."

The light bullet mentioned here refers to the main gun warhead whose weight is deliberately reduced, and the initial velocity of the light bullet is greater when it is fired, and the kinetic energy becomes larger and the penetration increases. At the beginning of the twentieth century, navies in another time and space had a divergent understanding of the weight of bullets, some countries preferred low-speed heavy bullets, characterized by good shell storage speed and high penetration power when hitting at long distances, while others were superstitious about light bullets.

But here, both sides like to flick, because low-speed heavy flicks are easy to be blocked by the ship's battle queen with a shield at close range, and the flick is helpless even when fighting at close range.

But correspondingly, at such a distance, it is difficult to pose an effective threat with a flick.

Holland continued to observe the German pilot, hoping to see signs of fire, but unfortunately the German battleship was sailing safely.

"Your Excellency, Commander," the captain of the Prestige said to Holland suddenly, "the Flying Warriors have asked for an attack. ”

"What are you doing? Assault enemy warships? Holland shook his head, "Let them wait, and when they enter the melee stage, they will be useful." ”

"Will it go into a scuffle?"

"I can't say exactly. When our destroyers and cruisers fired torpedoes, the German ships had to evade, and when they were out of formation, we could rush up and fight. It would be better than the Germans running away at speed. ”

At this time, Holland and the others all heard a strange noise, as if they were hanging their fingernails on the surface of a tin sheet, followed by a muffled sound.

"Have the ship's departments check the condition of the ship's hold." Holland, who was also an experienced commander, knew that the sound was the sound of a cannonball exploding at the bottom of the ship after it had grazed the hull under water, and the sound came through the hull of the guò ship, which was connected to the main armor belt.

Soon, the report of "no anomalies" was sent to Holland.

Holland breathed a sigh of relief, and at this time, the two turrets in front of the Prestige were firing exactly the twenty-seventh salvo.

More than ten seconds later, the main gun firing command post reported in a loud voice: "Confirm one hit, confirm one hit, judging from the color of the landing dye of the surrounding falling shells as a hit for this ship." ”

Holland looked at the enemy ship with a telescope and saw a large amount of gas gushing out of the middle of the pilot German ship.

"Looks like it hit the flue." It was the captain of the Prestige who was the first to make the judgment, "Well done, you can choke the Germans to death." ”

"A little bit more or a little deeper, it might be ...... Wait, is the German ship blackout? ”

"I'll see...... Well, it's kind of like, apparently its main gun was preparing to be raised, but stopped halfway through. ”

The battleship's main gun had to be lowered to a certain angle when loaded, and then raised upwards after loading. Only the main guns of the new French battleships could be loaded at any elevation angle, so the actual rate of fire of the main guns of the French battleships was much faster than that of the battleships of other countries of the same period.

Holland and the captain of the Prestige, who was his deputy, glanced at each other, and then he ordered: "The left rudder is full, the whole fleet turns, and it becomes a single column." ”