Southwest of Portsmouth Harbour, the English Channel.

For thousands of years, this strait, which was neither too wide nor too narrow, built a unique barrier for the Anglo-Saxons. In addition to failing to prevent the invasion of the Romans and the harassment of Viking pirates, it almost helped this island country with limited manpower to resolve all threats from foreign enemies, and thus determined the survival and development model of Britain.

On the rough sea, a brand new lead-gray battleship, a 70% or 80% new light gray battleship, and two medium-sized cruisers sailed on straight routes in turn. Except for the second Black Hawk Iron Cross Naval Flag flying in Germany, the other three masts were all filled with the St. George Cross Flag. A group of white ship-shaped floating objects can be seen from a distance on the sea in front of the right. The outline of their contours in the telescope is like a fleet sailing in a geese-shaped combat formation, but they are actually some used ships and wooden floating objects.

Dong...dong...dong...dong...

A thunderous roar suddenly sounded, and the lead-gray warship was leaping on the lead-gray warship, and a gushing gray-black smoke filled its entire starboard side. This scene made people suddenly return to the era of sail warships fighting on the side. Although the number of artillery on the lead-gray warships is far less than that of sail warships using boreforward guns, its destructive power is ten times more than that of the predecessors and more than a hundred times more.

Within just a few seconds, eight 12-inch naval guns placed in the huge main turret in a double-mounted manner opened fire one after another, and the huge power of the sound had never appeared in previous single-ship shootings. After a while, the whistling sound of heavy shells falling through the air brought a sharp and stimulating auditory sense. The rising water columns on the sea instantly formed a fence without a crossbar. This is an intuitive manifestation of the power of the warship. No wonder British naval officials who had witnessed the shooting of the Fearless before praised it as the revolutionary progress of the main battleship.

Following the German battleship "Alsace", about 1,000 meters behind the British "Default", the officers, naval officials and engineers were all obsessed with observing the shocking artillery scene of the British full-heavy artillery warship. Putting aside the difference in the caliber of the British 12-inch gun and the 11-inch gun of this ship, the "Alsace" has only 4 main guns, and the firepower output of the main gun volley was only half that of the former. The fire density was directly related to the combat hit rate. The combat effectiveness of fleet artillery battles was obviously also a multiple-level gap. The only comforting thing is that the maximum range of the 40-diameter main gun of the Brunswick class reached 18,830 meters, which was farther than the British battleships built at the same time, and was not inferior to the new naval guns equipped by the Default.

The earliest artillery exchanges between the British and German navy began during the Bismarck period, but this had nothing to do with the excellent political skills of the "Iron-Blooded Prime Minister". It was originally purely the result of the efforts of the naval personnel of the two countries to develop and consolidate friendship, just like the British navy must send ships to participate in the Kiel Military Harbor Festival and German ships to visit the UK every year. After the three-year artillery exchange was resumed, the British side only made some minor adjustments to the original communication mode, and Germany did not feel inappropriate. After the formation of the Fearless, the Alsace and the British cruiser used to carry German Prince Heinrich, British Navy General Mountbatten and other British cruisers left the port, the fourth unplanned British cruiser entered the bystander, which made Natsuki begin to worry about the real intention of the British to arrange all this. He felt that the British cruiser was likely to carry some special figures.

Xia Shu lowered his head and pinched his head in seconds. 55 seconds after the first round of artillery fire, the second deafening roar came from the Fearless. Next, it was the turn of "Arsace" to fire live-fire from roughly the same position.

"wrong!"

Xia Shu suddenly made the officers busy preparing for shooting in the commander's tower "freeze" their actions instantly, and the naval officials and engineers present also turned to each other.

"We were plotted by the British!"

Xia Shu told Captain Reinhart Schell, and at the same time, he did not avoid the crowd present.

"The purpose of this artillery exchange is to prove the great advantage of the Fearless over the Alsace. Although this advantage exists objectively, it will be demonstrated in the same game to prove the strength of the new British warship, and it will definitely greatly detract from the image and reputation of the German Navy."

After hearing what Xia Shu said, Schell frowned, his expression already showed his deep concern about this speculation. At present, it is impossible to temporarily withdraw from the artillery communication. There are still two minutes before the Alsace arrives at the shooting position, and they have almost no time to properly consider countermeasures.

Just when many people were not clear about it, Natsuki suggested to Sher: "We cannot lose to our opponents, let the second-level artillery also add the shooting, and have a single-side 30-second rapid fire!"

A few seconds later, Sher's frown suddenly stretched out, and his deep eyes instantly burst out. He looked at Xia Shu and ordered loudly: "The second-level artillery is loaded live ammunition, the shooting command is ready, the first-level and second-level artillery fires 30 seconds in front of the starboard side! The first mate, the warship, continuously turned to the full rudder and turned right 10 degrees, then immediately turned left 25 degrees, and execute!"

Amid the rumbling sound, the second volley of the Fearless shells sparked a mass of water on the distant sea. In Xia Shu's view, the two volleys of British warships destroyed many target ships. Such dense and fierce artillery fire would definitely leave an extremely deep impression on the first sightseeing, and the psychological shock caused by this is better than actual power.

Once the captain's command was issued, hundreds of officers and soldiers on the Alsace were running quickly like a sophisticated machine. Driven by the huge oar rudder, the 10,000-ton warship began to turn rapidly. Its razor-like sharp bow cut through the waves, and the sound of the torrents that could be heard on the fore deck was comparable to the detonating sound of a waterfall.

At the same time, what you hear near the battleship's double main turret and silhouette sub-cannon is another sound effect. The barrels of the 283mm main gun and 170mm secondary gun are constantly raised to the maximum elevation angle. This extreme state makes the battleship look like an angry hedgehog. In the shooting command room above the command tower, experienced officers are calculating the shooting parameters at the fastest speed.

"The full rudder turns right to 10 degrees, and now the full rudder turns left!" The first mate gave a report with his unyielding shout, and his devoted state brought people into a realistic fighting atmosphere.

Immediately afterwards, a report from the shooting commander came from the tube sound transmission tube. The combat staff officer who was in the same level as Natsuki shouted and said: "The target's real-time orientation... 029 ahead of the starboard side, distance 10,800!"

Reinhart Schell calmly ordered: "All first-class artillery and starboard second-class artillery fired 30 seconds!"

In the shooting command room, the major officer with a short beard narrowed his eyes. He quickly opened the covers of all the sound transmission cylinders, used his confidence to quickly report the shooting parameters: "The vertical firing angle of the front and rear main guns is 015, the horizontal firing angle of the front main gun is 030, and the horizontal firing angle of the rear main gun is 210; the vertical firing angle of the starboard second-level gun is 018, the horizontal firing angle of the horizontal firing angle of 030, the rapid firing of 30 seconds...preparation..."

The atmosphere solidified, and the sound of waterfalls like a waterfall came from the empty front deck. The bow of the ship quickly moved from the starboard sea facing the Fearless starboard. When the proudly erected bow flagpole crossed the port side of the Fearless, the commanders in each turret and the constellation heard a powerful command from the sound transmission cylinder: "Shoot!"

"shooting!"

Two main turret messengers and seven deputy artillery messengers made this unquestionable communication to their companions in charge of artillery almost at the same time.

Boom...boom...boom...boom...

The guns were thundering on the starboard side of the Alsace. After a flash of lightning, thick gray smoke gushed out from the muzzle. They spread with the wind and eventually formed a band-shaped cloud of smoke behind the ship.

The so-called 30-second rapid fire is the designated gun position that fires at the fastest speed according to the same shooting parameters within half a minute. On the Alsace, the maximum shooting speed of the main gun is 15-20 seconds per shot, and two shots can be ensured within half a minute. The maximum shooting speed of the second-level gun is 8-10 seconds per shot, and at least four shots in half a minute.

After the first round of artillery fire, the starboard secondary gun located in the artillery quickly roared the second round. After a while, the four main guns of the two main turrets made a second roar. Almost at the same time, the starboard secondary gun roared for the third time, followed by the fourth time. In this way, the Alsace fired a total of 36 shells and 8 main guns and 28 main guns at the targets away from ten thousand meters in half a minute, which was far more than the two rounds of volleys carried out by the Fearless in one minute. The roar of artillery and howling shells sounded not inferior. As for the destructive power of live-fire shooting, the shooting commander's accurate judgment obviously played a key effect. All shells of all sizes fell around the target, and one of them hit the target directly.

Seeing this result, the officers in the commander tower of the Alsace breathed a sigh of relief. Captain Schell turned to look at the prominent staff officer, and Xia Shu also turned to look at the unfamous Schell. The two of them were not only pleased with the outstanding performance of the officers and soldiers of the ship, but also appreciated and recognized each other: at the critical moment, under heavy pressure, one of them came up with brilliant suggestions and the other made a wise decision to resolve the sudden crisis together. Although the Alsace's shooting did not meet the British side
Chapter completed!