"As early as the design of the PISA-class armored cruisers, the talented General Xu had already tried to arm the warship with a unified heavy artillery, and at the same time the main gun was arranged in the central axis to improve the side-chord firepower. But in the Spanish-American War, the PISA class did not perform as well as the King-class armored cruisers that were slightly later than it. The four 11-inch 40L main guns and numerous secondary guns of the King class were obviously more practical than the six 10-inch guns and four 6-inch guns of the PISA class. Many believe that the amount of projection played a decisive factor, but no one noticed the destructive effect of large-caliber guns on fully protected ships. There is nothing wrong with the central layout, the all-heavy artillery layout itself, but there is a premise, that is, the number of main guns must be large! - Commissioned Leo.

When the resounding name of the dreadnought quickly spread around the world, people were shocked by the huge tonnage of the new warship and the number of more than 10 12-inch guns. Senior naval experts did not recognize this powerful warship. The root cause of this is also the idea of the supremacy of projection.

Even the best protected battleship, its superstructure and the defense of the upper hull are not immune to the blow of high-explosive shells. The bridge, in particular, was almost defenseless. Under the action of picric acid explosives, after a shell explodes, the shrapnel often pierces several adjacent compartments, and no matter how good the division is, it cannot avoid the tragedy of being swept by shrapnel. And the projection of large-caliber artillery at medium distances is not as good as that of 10-inch naval guns. That is, expensive large-caliber naval guns are inferior to medium-caliber naval guns in the blow to the hull.

Although in the Sino-Russian naval battle, the new armor-piercing projectiles equipped with Beiyang have repeatedly penetrated the armor of Russian cruisers. However, all penetrations were achieved at close range, and they never penetrated armor larger than 9 inches. That is to say, for a battleship, a 12-inch heavy gun is still not enough! In the opinion of opponents. Since it is impossible to penetrate the opponent's armor at long distances, it is inevitable to engage at medium and close ranges, and at this time, the expensive 12-inch heavy guns are undoubtedly very weak. It is better to continue to increase the number of level 2 guns.

But at this time, Rear Admiral Schell of the German Navy and Rear Admiral John Jerichault of the British Navy, who had observed the Battle of the North Seas, put forward such an opinion. "If all the warships of a fleet are equipped with 12-inch heavy guns, supplemented by sophisticated measurement and control and ballistic calculations, then engagements at a distance of 10 km will be possible. And judging by the ballistics of various artillery pieces. AT A DISTANCE OF 10KM, THE WALK OF MEDIUM-CALIBER ARTILLERY IS SIGNIFICANTLY GREATER THAN THAT OF HEAVY ARTILLERY. ”

And Jericho, who had experienced the war, then pointed out that even if the heavy artillery could not penetrate the heavy armor, the huge impact force could still be said to be the misalignment of the thick armor plates. Or it can cause the armor backplate to crack, injuring people or machinery in the cabins behind. Slows down and destroys ships. With the advancement of technology, the new armor-piercing projectile will definitely have a chance to penetrate more than 9 inches of armor at medium distance, and at this time, heavy artillery will truly become the master of the battlefield. At a time when medium-caliber artillery was not yet capable of effective fire. Heavy artillery has already beaten the opponent to the ground!

So. Scheer and Jericho agreed that in future naval battles, battleships with full heavy guns and long-range fire control were the kings of naval warfare, and for this reason, they expressed their praise for the new Chinese warships on various occasions. And strongly demanded that the national navy start designing dreadnoughts. Needless to say, the German Navy has decided to use the 12-gun battleships of the Huaxia Navy as a blueprint for the next phase of the shipbuilding plan. And the British, after a brief hesitation, also decided to start building a new type of all-heavy artillery battleship.

But there was another hiccup at this time. Fisher, then the British Secretary of the Admiralty, learned through a special channel that in addition to ordering these four new battleships, Huaxia also designed another model that emphasized speed and firepower. At the same time, the new warship weakened its protection, and the protection was strong enough to withstand the Russian armored cruiser collar ships. This is quite tempting for the British Navy!

The British Empire was never afraid of other countries attacking the front, whether it was the Spanish Armada or the Dutch fleet, or the Sun King's fleet and Napoleon's combined fleet of the United States and Spain, all of which were quickly and neatly dealt with by the Royal Navy. And now, although the battleships of the British Empire were not the most advanced of the period, they were definitely the largest in number, and the British home fleet was not afraid of any challenge.

But what really bothered the British imperialism was the increasing number of more and more sophisticated cruisers in various countries, and a huge part of these long-endurance and fast running guys were French and Russian. Considering the Franco-Russian alliance, as well as France's colonies in the world, such a break at sea was too lethal, and in the face of these cruisers, the battlefleet could not catch up with the range and was not enough. Britain's existing cruisers were unable to form an overwhelming advantage, which made Britain's reliance on sea lines of communication to sustain the life of the empire quite uncomfortable. So the most urgent need of Britain was not an invincible battleship, but a battleship capable of effectively hunting cruisers!

After Fisher learned that Huaxia also had a new type of fast warship, he directly threw aside the information about the newly built battleships built by Italy and Germany that his subordinates had just sent, and asked him to immediately notify Jericho, who had a good relationship with the Huaxia Navy, and asked him to quickly contact Yan Boxun, the chief designer of the Huaxia Ship Design Institute, who was staying in Europe, to discuss the issue of the new fast warship!

The idea of the British imperialists is very simple, since everyone is an ally, and as the largest financier, it is not too much to ask for the design of new warships, right? Although it is said that it would damage the face of the British Empire to directly take the things of the allies and change them, in the face of the increasingly tense maritime environment, Fisher still decided to talk to Huaxia.

After the British Empire began to act, France, as the second strongest navy in the world at that time, was not to be outdone. But unlike the British Empire, when the British Empire was planning to strengthen its cruiser fleet, the French suddenly felt that the original Green Water Navy was very unpromising! There were a certain number of cruisers, but the speed of their capital ship renewal was significantly slowed down, especially when Britain launched a large number of battleships of the Majestic series, and Germany increased a large number of battleships at their own speed, the French finally realized that their first solution was not to block the British in the open ocean, but how to guard the doorstep of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic!

Especially after the Germans announced a new naval plan in a high-profile manner, the British were nervous, and the French were just scared! The army is definitely inferior to Germany, and if the navy is inferior, how can France mix? For this reason, the French decided to immediately hurry up with the new capital ship plan, and the first-class battleship named Danton finally appeared in the French naval plan ahead of schedule!

The French were skeptical of the all-heavy artillery battleships touted by China, Germany, and Italy, and on the one hand, the romantic-natured French were eager to try this new design concept. But on the other hand, the French have limited resources to devote to the navy, and they are typical of trying but not daring to gamble. So in the construction of the new Dandong-class battleships, an extremely special situation actually appeared!

There are actually two different subtypes of first-class battleships! THE FIRST MODEL IS THE SAME AS THE HISTORICAL DANDONG-CLASS BATTLESHIPS, WITH TWO TWIN 12-INCH GUNS AT THE BOW AND TAIL, AND THEN THREE TWIN 240MM SECONDARY GUNS ON EACH SIDE OF THE SIDE CHORD. However, the other subtype has the same two twin 12-inch guns at the beginning and end, and six single-mounted 12-inch guns on the left and right strings. THE IDEA OF THE FRENCH IS VERY SIMPLE, IF THE SECOND MAIN GUN IS GOOD, THEN REPLACE THE 12-INCH SINGLE-MOUNTED TURRET OF THE SECOND SUBTYPE WITH A TWIN 240MM SECOND-STAGE MAIN GUN, AND IF THE LATTER IS GOOD, THEN REPLACE THE FRONT SECOND-STAGE MAIN GUN WITH A SINGLE-MOUNTED 12-INCH!

Although it still can't exert the most firepower on one side, such a design obviously minimizes the risk. And so. At the same time, the French rushed to start 4 Dandong-class battleships, although there were 2 fewer than in history, but these Dandong with an all-main gun layout can also be regarded as the earliest dreadnought-class battleships of the French!

By the way, there is another company on the other side of the ocean that is very concerned about new warships, and this is the American who was beaten by his opponent at home in the Spanish-American War in 1898. After a series of crushing defeats, the U.S. Navy finally began to regain its strength after nearly two years of adjustment, and the powerful industry of the United States provided sufficient support for the expansion of the U.S. Navy. The U.S. government, bent on revenge against Spain, also gave the navy a lot of financial support. Just when the US Navy was planning to build a series of new warships, the appearance of dreadnoughts made the Americans' eyes shine.

There is also a debate in the United States about the 2nd class main gun and the full heavy artillery. But at this time, Magifin, who had already controlled the development of the US Navy's armaments, ended the controversy in other countries in a few words at the meeting. "What we lack is not money or industry, but time, and it has to be said that there is a clear gap between the navy of the United States of America and the world's first-class navy, not only in terms of combat quality and warship skills, but also in terms of the concept of naval warfare. Since we can't raise our level in the relevant field to the same level as our elder brother's naval power in a short period of time, why don't we follow in the footsteps of the other party? It's slower, but at least it doesn't go too far, and it's better than wasting time in endless bickering! ”

So, under the impetus of Majifen, the United States also started construction of 2 dreadnought warships at the same time, and it completely adhered to Xu Jie's teachings of full heavy artillery and full central axis layout! As a result, the South Carolina-class battleships, which were supposed to start construction in 1906, were planned to start construction in 1901, and these two battleships equipped with eight 12-inch 45L guns officially opened the era of American dreadnought. In this way, the entire world navy entered the era of fearlessness, and a more magnificent history of naval warfare began to slowly kick off!

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