For any naval power, a fleet with a complete range of arms and a balanced lineup is the foundation for its ambitions. In fact, even for a country like Germany, which did not have many overseas colonies to protect, its "risk fleet" for alliance with Britain needed to be filled with a considerable number of cruisers. Because a naval battle that determines the fate of a country is not only a form of battleships lined up in battle lines to bombard, but also the activities of light ships such as reconnaissance, tracking, harassment, escort, and dog fighting are indispensable; If the light cruisers can successfully detect the enemy, or effectively complete the escort of their own capital ships, then it is entirely possible to change the outcome of the entire naval battle.

Prior to that, the development of light cruisers of the German Navy was not satisfactory. On the one hand, the expansion of the Kiel Canal in 1895 reduced the funds available to the navy. In Tirpitz's planning, the purpose of the German Navy was to conduct a frontal decisive battle, and the funds for the construction of capital ships must be guaranteed first. As a result, Tirpitz had no choice but to extend his butcher's knife to the light ship force, slashing at this type of ship, which costs much more than the capital ships. In addition, another reason for this phenomenon is due to the two concepts proposed by Qing Ying before this. According to the theory of the uselessness of protective cruisers and the theory of appropriate large-scale battleships, it is better to build a protective cruiser than an armored cruiser, and it is better to build an armored cruiser than to build a large-scale decisive battle mounted cruiser; The tonnage of the battleship was stacked up, and finally it was out of control.

As a result of these two factors, Germany built only four small 2,200-ton cruisers in the seven years from 1895 to 1901, with a top speed of 20.5 knots and 10 105 mm guns with weak firepower. It was also established that they would be suitable only for the implementation of escort of the main fleet. Compared to the large-tonnage protective cruisers started by the great powers in the same period. The 2,200-ton German "gazelle" is really like a harmless antelope.

Until the end of 1901. The greatly expanded Kiel Canal was officially opened, and the navy not only threw away this burden of continuous gold swallowing every year, but also received a huge congressional grant thanks to Tirpitz's efforts, and the design of the new cruiser was cracked and melted in the thick ice. At this time, Qingying had also waited for the opportunity to develop small fast warships - Parsons steam turbines were equipped on ships. Although this new type of machinery does not have an advantage in the power-to-weight ratio compared with the latest reciprocating steam engine in Germany, it has quite superior low vibration and low wear at high speed, which can make the cruiser's speed easily break through the bottleneck of 23 knots, and will not reduce the speed in a short period of service due to severe wear and tear at high speed like the use of reciprocating steam engine. This is a huge benefit for both combat effectiveness maintenance and routine maintenance.

In fact, the reason why Qingying acquiesced to Tirpitz's near-one-size-fits-all budget for small cruisers before 1901. That's the purpose. A small cruiser with a reciprocating steam engine could run at most 22 knots, and even if the speed was forcibly increased to more than 23 knots by adding boilers, it would be beaten back to its original shape after a year or two due to mechanical wear. It was clear that small cruisers of this speed would be almost completely useless after entering the dreadnought era: even battleships of nearly 10 times greater tonnage could sail at almost the same speed, so what if these small cruisers were still a little shary?

However, this problem has been solved with the successful use of Parsons steam turbines on small ships. In 1902, after years of domestic momentum and agitation by Tirpitz, the German Reichstag passed the Second Naval Enlargement Act, which set the number of small cruisers needed for the High Seas Fleet. And Qingying is also happy to see this situation. and again participated in the design of small cruisers; He decided to eradicate all the ills of German light ships in history and build a new detachment of German light cruisers.

Historically. The light cruisers of the German Navy were a tragedy before 1913. Britain was armed with 152 mm L50 naval guns on the Bresto class, which began construction in 1909, while the Regensburg class, which Germany built until 1912, was still armed with 105 mm guns. Although the caliber of the guns of the two sides did not seem to differ much, the single shot of the former was more than three times more powerful than the latter, and the small German cruiser was completely destroyed by the British in terms of firepower.

After all, the German 105-mm guns had a rate of fire nearly three times that of the British 152-mm guns, and in close battles between cruisers, the projection of both sides could be considered roughly equal. But what is speechless is that the Germans actually lined up their guns along the sides of the ship, in the form of deck guns and gun profiles, which means that their broadside firepower is only half that of all guns! However, the British battleships were superior in gun utilization due to the fact that the single-mounted guns at the bow and stern of the battleships could be pointed to the two sides, thus forming a firepower advantage over the German cruisers. Even small cruisers often need to use guns on the other side in a very different combat environment from capital ships, and they often need to use guns on the other side in a harsh and complex dogfight environment, but they don't have to be played like this by the Germans! From 1898 to 1912, all the small cruisers they built were equipped with a single 105-mm deck gun side by side on both sides of the nose and stern; As long as the enemy appears on the broadside, the single-mounted guns on the other side can only stare dryly. Compared with Kaiser Wilhelm's superior concept of a twin armored plate gun at the end of the "lead duck", the German designer's bizarre idea is simply impossible to look at!

The only advantage of the Germans was that they were ahead of the world in small water-tube boilers. Thanks to this, while the British cruisers were still at 25 knots, the German cruisers were already at 26-27.5 knots, and it was not until the British used all-oil boilers that they caught up. Again, this was achieved in the case of inefficient propulsion due to the propulsion of the German propeller due to its proximity to the hull. Germany in this plane has improved the propeller arrangement, and the advantages in power will be more vividly displayed. On the freeboard, the German cruisers were magically much higher than the British, which was exactly the opposite of the freeboard height difference between the capital ships of the two sides, so the freeboard of the German small cruisers could be completely compressed again.

After combining these historical factors, Qing Ying confided his ideas to Tirpitz in detail. In recognition of these ideas and trust in the young man, Tirpitz did not change the terms of his demands. At the end of 1904, a slender battleship was officially completed at the Volken shipyard; After more than a year of equipment commissioning and personnel running-in, the warship named "Bremen" finally entered Qingying's expectations in his eyeballs.

Compared to the Gazelle class, which was born purely for escort, Bremen has achieved a significant improvement in performance in all aspects. In terms of tonnage, Bremen's standard displacement has suddenly increased from 2,200 tons to 3,900 tons and 4,800 tons at full load. The entire warship adopts a low freeboard type with one level of raised bow, in order to reduce the weight of the structure while ensuring the seaworthiness as much as possible, and provide ideal performance for other areas.

In terms of firepower, the Bremen class is equipped with five single-mount 150mm L42 guns, which are commonly installed on German capital ships; The gun has an average rate of fire of 6 rounds per minute, fires 45.3kg of armor-piercing or high-explosive shells, and has a discharge speed of 835m/s, which is comparable to the same type of British artillery. One of the five main guns was in the front, two were arranged in the stern in a knapsack position, and the two were arranged on both sides, which could ensure the needs of both flank and broadside operations. In order to make up for the lack of barrage caused by the four main guns on one side, and to consider the poor strike effect of torpedo boats moving at high speed, the ship was also equipped with two single-mounted 88 mm rapid-fire guns on each side. Three 450 mm torpedo tubes were located underwater, and they were an indispensable offensive and defensive weapon for small cruisers.

In terms of protection, because the protective cruisers without vertical armor had become lambs to the slaughter in the era of rapid-fire guns, the German Navy, which had long abandoned this type of ship under the influence of Qing Ying, would naturally not regain its old troubles. The Bremen class had a thick 80 mm armor on the side of the waterline, 70% of the waterline's length and 2.5 meters high, plus a layer of 30 mm horizontal armor to form a pseudo-armor box, which was enough to withstand the 6-inch shells that the Great Powers were currently equipped with on cruisers. Even against the British Challenger-class protective cruiser, which was completed in 1905 and had a tonnage 1,700 tons larger than hers, the German Bremen definitely had the potential to win the war.

And in terms of speed, the Bremen class is even more proud of the small cruisers. 12 coal-fired boilers and two Parsons steam turbines provide a stable output of 21,000 horsepower, with a maximum stable speed of 25.2 knots, and can be overloaded at 27 knots during sea trials. The steam turbine running at high speed does not have the roar of the reciprocating steam engine, which is absolutely of great significance for warships pursuing high speed. Although the ship cost a staggering 7.5 million marks due to this high-power power unit, it was well worth the money in terms of its performance!

Between 1902 and 1904, six Bremen-class cruisers were built, all of which have now been completed, and the German Navy's fast fleet has changed its face. Beginning in 1905, Tirpitz built new cruisers of better tonnage and performance at a rate of 1.5 per year, eventually reaching the limit of 25 ships he had planned. (To be continued......) (To be continued......)

PS: Yesterday, the author's unit regiment year, using a regular release to send a chapter, I didn't expect it to go wrong, I'm sorry

The author of the wrong chapter will reissue it in the public chapter as compensation~~~ I'm sorry~~~