The reason why Nishimura Shoji ordered the ships not to act rashly was not that he was as vague and hesitant as the Honorable, but that the Japanese gamblers had a very good mentality in this regard, and once they decided to play with their lives, they were generally able to get out of the way.

Nishimura Shoji was afraid of startling the snake, if nothing else, he should have run into the main force of the "American" navy, at this time he had to calm down, not act rashly, should find out the enemy's situation, and then rush forward to solve the problem in the way that the Japanese navy is best at.

The so-called Japanese navy's best way is naturally night lightning strikes, and since the Dingyuan attack on Weihaiwei in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Japanese have been addicted to lightning strike tactics. Lightning tactics play an important role in the war plan against the United States, and the devil's true practice is to play with his life day and night.

It can be said that in that era, the Japanese army's ability to fight at night, especially at night mine warfare, was quite terrifying, anyway, the Americans had learned the power of the Japanese in Guadalcanal, but that was not mentioned for the time being.

Returning to the battle itself, Nishimura Shoji's 4th Destroyer Fleet consisted of three parts, starting with the light cruiser Yura, of course. The ship can be said to be the destroyer lead ship tailor-made by Japan for the mine warfare team.

Generally speaking, the Yura belongs to the Nagara-class cruisers, but in fact, whether it is the Nagara-class, the previous Kuma-class, or the later Kawauchi-class light cruisers, they all belong to Japan's 5,500-ton light cruisers. It's just that the Nagara class is an improved version of the ball mill class, and Kawauchi is another improvement of the Nagara class, in fact, the big guys are all ancestors.

In order to strengthen the mine combat capability of the 5,500-ton light cruiser, the number of torpedo tubes was quite large (in the 1920s). For example, the ball mill class is equipped with four twin six-year 533 torpedo tubes, and the Nagara class is further strengthened. It was replaced with four twin eight-year 610 torpedo tubes. Of course, that's not the craziest of all. It is known that the Kitakami and Oi in the 5,500-ton light patrol were finally converted into super mine strike ships. A total of 10 Type 92 quadruple torpedo tubes are equipped.

However, this has nothing to do with the current battle, at this time the Nagara in addition to the torpedo, the artillery is not weak, a total of 7 140 mm guns are installed (five are arranged on the center line, and the other two are arranged on both sides of the bridge), there may be comrades to say, this firepower is not strong. Yes, compared to the standard American treaty-type light cruisers. Japan's 5500-ton light patrol is really not too strong. However, please note that the standard treaty light cruises of the United States imperialism are of the 10,000-ton class, while the displacement of Japan's 5,500-ton light cruises at sea trials is only more than 6,000 tons.

Moreover, functionally speaking, Japan's 5,500-ton light cruiser is more like a large destroyer lead ship, whose mission is to release torpedoes with a mine team, rather than playing artillery battles like the treaty light cruisers of the United States imperialism.

In addition to the flagship Yura, the Fourth Destroyer Squadron also had seven destroyers, divided into two detachments, and the Second Destroyer Detachment was led by Masao Tachibana, which had four destroyers under its command: Murayu, Mayyu, Haruyu, and Yutachi. The 9th Destroyer Detachment was commanded by Admiral Yasuo Sato. It has three destroyers under its command: Chaoyun, Fengyun, and Xiayun.

As mentioned earlier, the Murayu of the 2nd Destroyer Detachment was not only the first to be discovered by the Red Navy. At the same time, it was also the first to discover the Red Navy. After receiving the notice from the Murayu, Nishimura Shoji actively adjusted the formation of the fleet on the one hand, and on the other hand, he also hurriedly informed Nobutake Kondo on the flagship Atago, telling the commander to hurry up and prepare for battle.

In fact, the Japanese combat preparation is very simple, it is nothing more than to launch a large number of torpedoes from a distance, sneak attack and disrupt the enemy's formation, and then the main force follows up with artillery bombardment, for which the Japanese have specially strengthened the performance of torpedoes, and the big guys know what is going on with acid torpedoes, so there will be no nonsense here.

This time the Japanese also planned to follow this routine, Kondo Shintake was overjoyed after receiving the report from Nishimura Shoji, in his opinion, this is the Heavenly Blessed Imperial Kingdom, and it was Amaterasu who sent the enemy to his mouth.

Judging by the situation at that time, the Japanese had every reason to rejoice, because the situation could no longer be in their favor. The black light was blind and the enemy did not react, and the enemy was still at the tail end, which was like a boiled duck brought to the mouth, and the Japanese navy that had been trained in the way of moon and moon, water, fire, wood and gold to win this naval battle was simply handy.

The Japanese were overjoyed, like a pack of jackals who had found carrion, which was preparing a good meal. It's just that what the Japanese didn't expect was that the delicacies on the plate were made of steel, and if you wanted to eat them, you had to have a good tooth first.

The sea-search radar on the Murmansk was finally turned on, and after only one turn, several shiny signals appeared on the phosphor screen, and Lieutenant Colonel Kokorin knew very well that there should be no other signal response from his tail except for the Noble and Kokang. And now that there is, it means that it must be the enemy!

"Raise the alarm, immediately telegraph to the flagship, the tail of our fleet has found an enemy ship!" Kokorin gave the order quickly, and almost just as the cacophony of sirens sounded, Kokorin saw through the porthole on the bridge that the Kokang had fired its first shot.

This surprised him a little, why did the Kokang open fire without waiting for his order?

The reason is simple, Yurisic's sea search radar was barely functional, and he was shocked when it was turned on, with at least seven signal responses in his tail, and over time, eighth, ninth, and even tenth signal responses appeared. And judging from the position, course and speed of the signal, these Japanese are definitely coming towards the fleet. And judging by the formation of the enemy, it is clear that this is preparing for a lightning strike.

At this time, Colonel Kokorin's side did not react, which made Yurisic jump to his feet in a hurry, if the enemy was allowed to calmly fire the torpedo, the result would be unimaginable! So he constantly called Lieutenant Colonel Kokorin by radio, hoping that Comrade Lieutenant Colonel would make a decision quickly. But what made Yurisic depressed was that no matter how much he shouted at Lieutenant Colonel Kokorin, there was no response (the Murmansk was busy liaising with the flagship Kiev at that time, and did not bother to respond to Yurisic), and Yurisic, who was in a hurry, had no choice but to decide to go it alone.

"Give me the honorable number...... Comrade Burkic. Behind are the enemy...... It's obvious. I'm ready to strike first. They must not be allowed to occupy advantageous positions...... What, you still have to wait for the order, damn it! ”

It is clear that Burkić is not so decisive compared to the decisive Yurisic, he belongs to the typical Red Army officer, accustomed to waiting for orders from his superiors, and lacks the ability to make independent judgments and deal with unexpected situations.

For the Kokang. Things were a little bit bad, Kokorin didn't react, and Burkic didn't have eggs. Son, it's not a good idea to fight a horde of enemies on a single ship. However, once Jurisic has made up his mind, he will do it to the end.

"Launch a torpedo, I know that I may not hit at such a distance, but I just want the enemy to know that we fired a torpedo!" Jurisic later recalled.

Apparently, Yurisic's idea was to fire torpedoes at the position that the Japanese ships might occupy, forcing the enemy not to occupy that position, and to disrupt the enemy's rhythm a bit. This can buy more time for friendly ships.

As an anti-aircraft destroyer, the Kokang has only one quintudo tube. It can launch the Red Navy's 53-39 torpedoes (53 represents the caliber 533 mm, 39 is the year of development), and the performance of this steam gas torpedo is okay, with a maximum range of 51 at 4000 knots, a maximum range of 8000 meters at 39 knots, and a maximum range of 10000 meters at 34 knots.

At that time, the distance between the Japanese ship and the Kokang was about 7,500 meters, and it stands to reason that he should have chosen the speed of 39 knots. However, what is surprising is that Jurisic chose the 34th quarter. Why did he do that?

According to the conventional concept, the faster the speed in the effective range, the better, so that the enemy will have less time to react, and it will be easy to hit the target. And now Yurisic has chosen to do the opposite, isn't this nonsense?

Note that this is not a fool, but for a reason, the reason for which the latest 53-39 torpedoes are installed with a relatively advanced set of "automatic control systems". Note that I'm talking about an automatic control system, not an auto-guided system. Although the sound-guided torpedo was soon to be put into the battlefield, the Soviet Union at that time really did not have it!

What does this so-called automatic control mean? Let's briefly introduce it, the general way of attacking the target of a direct-sailing torpedo is very simple, set the speed and depth and the discrete angle, and rush directly to the target after launching.

However, the attack mode of a torpedo with an automatic control system is different from that of an ordinary direct-sailing torpedo, and an ordinary direct-sailing mine is a one-shot deal. However, a torpedo with an automatic control system can set a turnaround point - the so-called turnaround point is when the torpedo starts to turn when it has sailed a specified distance (the angle is controllable, it can be the original way to turn back, or it can be other angles, depending on how it is set before launch). This torpedo with an automatic control system turns around and launches a second attack on the target after the first attack misses the target, at the turnback angle set before launch. Even if the control system is advanced enough, the range of the torpedo is large enough, and multiple turnaround points can be set to give the torpedo a few more chances to attack.

Such torpedoes are undoubtedly much taller than the direct navigation mines that were sold with a hammer, and they also belonged to black technology in World War II, such as the Germans who applied this technology in the G7 series of torpedoes (also known as the FAT and LUT system). With pre-launch settings, this torpedo can be used to attack targets in a zigzag pattern (mainly to attack fleets). And compared with the back of the acoustic torpedo, the technical requirements of the self-controlled torpedo are much lower, after World War II, Germany's black technology was divided by the victorious countries, and the Soviet Union also used to improve its main torpedo 53-39 at that time, and later exported the relevant technology to the soil. Total, soil. A total of Fish 1 (a remake of 53-39) also has such an ability.

Of course, there is a certain immortal in this time and space, and this kind of black technology that is not a black technology can naturally be used as soon as possible, so the 53-39 torpedo has an automatic control device at the beginning of the finalization, and it can be crossed on the sea as quickly as possible.

So Yurisic's choice is quite reasonable, now he is the only destroyer to attack, and a wave is five torpedoes. Five torpedoes to attack one target are really okay, and in order to make the enemy more trouble, these five torpedoes need to walk around the sea a few more times. So it is necessary to choose a lower speed, but to get the maximum range.

But to tell the truth, the Soviet steam gas torpedo track is still relatively obvious. The attack is relatively poorly concealed. And the Japanese specially ordered the night combat skills. So it was found that the problem with this batch of torpedoes was not particularly big.

Let's briefly introduce the steam gas torpedo, because many comrades always think that this is a torpedo fueled by steam gas. Tsk, I can only say that this is really wrong.

Let's start from the beginning, the power of the earliest torpedo is compressed air, this kind of torpedo is also called cold torpedo, that is to say, the power of this torpedo is to drive the propeller by compressed air, when the compressed air in the cylinder is consumed. The torpedo stopped. So the range of early torpedoes was quite pitiful (several hundred meters). This torpedo actually only utilizes the potential energy of the working fluid.

Later, engineers filled the combustion chamber with compressed air and fuel (usually alcohol or kerosene) and burned it, and then used the hot gas to drive the engine to do the work, which is called a thermodynamic torpedo.

Although the speed and range of thermodynamic torpedoes have been greatly improved, the temperature of the gas is quite high, which is easy to damage the engine or combustion chamber. So the engineers used to soak the whole machine in water to cool down, but in this way, the thermal efficiency was reduced.

To solve this problem, engineers have adopted a new method, which is to spray water into the combustion chamber. And this water that is sprayed into the combustion chamber is vaporized under the action of high temperatures, when the speed of the torpedo is getting faster and the range is getting longer and farther. It also requires more water to be injected into the combustion chamber to cool down, even if more water is injected than fuel. And the torpedo that uses this cooling mode is the so-called "steam gas" torpedo.

The difference between the so-called acid torpedo and the ordinary steam gas torpedo is that the accelerant injected into the combustion chamber by the ordinary torpedo is compressed air, while the acid torpedo is injected with pure oxygen. Pure oxygen is consumed after combustion, while ordinary steam gas torpedoes also need to be exhausted because they are injected with air and other gas components, and these exhausted gases form an obvious track. Of course, oxygen is flammable and explosive, and storage is highly dangerous, and it is normal that the safety is not good (the Germans are even crazier, using hydrogen peroxide as an accelerant, what is the nature of hydrogen peroxide, needless to say?). ）

Of course, the same thermodynamic torpedo, the engine is also different, for example, the Soviet Union used to use a horizontal two-cylinder reciprocating main engine, Britain and Japan used a multi-cylinder (four-cylinder or star arrangement) semi-diesel engine, while the Americans were accustomed to using steam turbines.

Well, that's the end of the nonsense, moving on to the battle. After firing the torpedo, the Kokang did not sit idle, let alone turn the bow and retreat at high speed, which is not the style of a fighting nation. Yurisic soon ordered all the main guns to start firing, and the target was none other than Nishimura Shoji's flagship, Yura.

It's not that Yurisic has a sharp eye, and he can recognize Yurashi in the dark of night. In fact, the Russians don't have a very good eye, at least far from the Japanese who have specialized in this area. Of course, on this dark night, the Japanese were not able to accurately identify the rank of the Kokang, and the Japanese later admitted: "An American light cruiser fired first." ”

In terms of tonnage, the Kokang was barely able to get on the side of the light cruisers, at least close to the Japanese Yubari. The Kokang had a total of four turrets, each equipped with two 130 mm high-level guns. Compared with the previous Type 33 destroyers, this 130 mm main gun barrel is much shorter (40 times the caliber, the former 50 times the caliber), and the natural muzzle velocity and maximum firing range are also much inferior. However, because the barrel is shortened, the weight of the whole gun is greatly reduced, and the pitch and rotation rate are greatly improved, and the maximum rate of fire can be stabilized at about 12 to 15 rounds with a semi-automatic loader.

Of course, the main function of the gun is air defense, and sea and land attacks are not the focus. If it were the daytime, the Soviet short-barreled 130 met the Yura's 140, it would not be a class contest. But fortunately, this is night, and the distance between the two sides has been shortened to less than 10 kilometers, so the next 130 is not so disadvantaged, if you count the firepower advantage of the Soviet side (8 guns against 6 guns, 12 to 15 rounds per minute against 6 to 10 rounds per minute, then the Red Navy still has the upper hand).

However, it's all air-to-air, and no matter how big the caliber of your guns is and how fast the rate of fire is, it's all for nothing if you miss the target. And in this regard, the Japanese were quite confident, and at the same time that the Kokang fired first, Nishimura Shoji smiled, and he was very confident and proud to lecture the officers and men of the Yura: "Gentlemen, it is time to show the results of your training. Surprise the beautiful animals with their best performance! ”

The state of the Yura is interesting, and generally speaking, if there is to be an artillery battle, then it is necessary to exert all the side firepower, that is, to turn the hull of the ship and sail parallel to the enemy. But at this time, the Yura did not do this, it still aimed its bow at the Kokang, and still maintained a high speed, which was more like an assault posture.

In fact, Nishimura Shoji was also preparing to continue the assault, because for the time being, he only saw the Kokang, and the main force of the "American" fleet was still nowhere to be found, and now the enemy was the first to open fire, which meant that he had to seize the time to find the enemy's main force and quickly launch the first round of lightning strikes, so as to strive for a certain advantage for the main force of his own fleet.

Naturally, in the face of the harassment of the Kokang, Nishimura Shoji did not care, in his opinion, three or four main guns in the bow of the ship were enough to teach a beautiful animal who did not know the height of the sky...... (To be continued.) )

PS: Bow and thank you to the Rider, Heba Zixin, Ghoul Kiss Mo and Comrade Juventus!