Chapter Eighteen Alas, he did not belong to Britain (Seven)
On the 4th day, at dawn, the long-awaited and thrilling thing that had been building up for days finally exploded - the two most powerful dreadnought fleets in the galaxy encountered each other.
No pretence, this is a high 'tide' surging duel, representing the peak showdown of this turbulent era.
At the beginning of the battle, the High Seas Fleet was at an unforeseen disadvantage. Under the interference of sea fog, the High Seas Fleet collided with the Grand Fleet in four columns. At this time, Hipper led the 7th squadron's four K?nig-class battleships to launch a desperate charge against the British line, covering the deployment of the High Seas Fleet.
It is difficult to evaluate the gains and losses of Admiral Hipper and the Seventh Squadron, although the High Seas Fleet deployed its battle line smoothly. However, Scheer's most powerful Seventh Squadron was also in a state of disarray. It wasn't until this massive sea battle was about to end that the Grosser Kurfürst achieved any results.
The most typical battle line of the Dreadnought era, which had been lukewarm for over ten minutes, was clearly not satisfactory to General Scheer, after all, Germany's quality advantage steadily suppressed Britain's weak numerical advantage.
The commander-in-chief's furrowed brow was almost frozen, but no one expected the wonderful news to come like a "tidal wave" around 7:56.
At 07:57, the Rashen sank due to a magazine explosion.
At 08:01, Ajax was scuttled by her own destroyers due to excessive flooding.
At 8:09, Admiral Scheer's excellent mood was finally ruined by the damned smoke screen. The First Scouting Group had once used a smoke screen to boldly cross the battle line of the Grand Fleet and cover the safe withdrawal of the Seventh Squadron from the pursuing fast fleet, half an hour later, the situation reversed, this time it was the turn of the British to gain a breathing space through the smoke screen.
Poor visibility made it impossible to continue the battle, and both fleets ceased firing and withdrew from combat. The irascible Admiral Scheer was somewhat disheartened but not yet ready to curse his fate, for everything was still under control, at least he had one Friedrichshafen FF 33b seaplane left in hand.
The British would never retreat on the occasion, after all, the decisive battle between the First Reconnaissance Fleet and the Fast Fleet had not yet ended. The main fleet that covered the Fast Fleet could not choose to withdraw in advance at this time, otherwise Scheer would not hesitate to use all his strength to destroy the British Fast Fleet. Of course, the commander of the Grand Fleet also drew confidence from an aircraft with relatively objective endurance, any movement of the British would not escape its sight.
As an old-fashioned naval officer, Reinhard Scheer was skeptical of the role of aircraft in actual combat. The North Sea was windy and rough with frequent fogs, wooden planes could not be used for a long time, and the lifespan of the plane's engine was limited, with short range and endurance, and the weapons and payload that could be carried were also limited, so the impression left by the plane on Scheer was not as good as that of the Zeppelin airship which had repeatedly raided the British coastline.
However, when two seaplanes arrived over the High Seas Fleet at 7:33 and reported the first scouting group's "pinpoint" location to Scheer via wireless telegraphy, he finally realized the value of aircraft in combat with their wide field of view and greater mobility.
If it hadn't been for the damned fog, if there had been even one seaplane scouting before encountering the Grand Fleet, the High Seas Fleet wouldn't have run head-on into the British line. But this world doesn't have ifs; Scheer promptly dispatched one seaplane to provide cover for the first scouting group and another to accompany the main fleet.
At 8:16, the overwhelming smoke had dissipated, and the two fleets, having completed plugging leaks, extinguishing fires and mechanical repairs as much as possible, redeployed to continue the battle of the summit!
At the beginning of the battle line, the British had twenty battleships, while the High Seas Fleet had only seventeen. To avoid the four Nassau-class battleships of the Second Squadron of the First Battle Squadron encountering concentrated British fire, Scheer was forced to issue a dangerous order that would allow Admiral Mauve, commander of the Second Squadron, to demand compensation for four Bayern-class battleships after the battle - pulling two old Prussian-class battleships into the line to make up numbers.
After the sinking of Lützow and Derfflinger, the numerical inferiority of the High Seas Fleet was greatly alleviated. However, Admiral Scheer did not distribute his firepower evenly in order to expand the results as soon as possible, but instead concentrated his forces to ensure a local firepower advantage over the British. Friedrich der Grosse and Kaiser formed a brotherly alliance, concentrating their fire on HMS Bellerophon, while Nassau recklessly jumped into the fray with HMS Hannover and SMS Posen, sounding the horn of counterattack.
But the British seemed to have been blessed by God, no matter how hard the Imperial gunners tried, they could not achieve a decisive victory, and the Silesia sank after being hit continuously in this exchange.
At 8:20, the German iron will finally shook the gods. The First Battle Squadron, which had initially performed below par, again came into its own and Helgoland scored several hits on the hapless Dreadnought, causing her No. 2 turret to be completely destroyed, forcing the captain of Dreadnought to order an emergency flooding of the turret and withdraw from action.
At 8:25, Ostfriesland's counterattack grew sharper, and after five hits on Collingwood, the old battleship had one turret and two boiler rooms completely destroyed, and could only grit her teeth.
At 8:33, just as Ostfriesland was about to overwhelm Collingwood with a hail of shells, the unexpected happened. Iron Duke led off by hoisting the signal for retirement, abandoning the intact line of battle and turning away in divisions to quit the action in an unseemly fashion.
The tactical maneuver of the British fleet left Scheer somewhat at a loss. The High Seas Fleet had not yet received the final tally of the results of the battle, but since the British were retreating, there could be only two reasons: either the fast division and the First Scouting Group had already decided the issue, and the Grand Fleet was beginning to execute its tactical retreat after having covered the fast division, or else the Grand Fleet itself had suffered losses that it could not bear, which exceeded Admiral Jellicoe's limit.
"Grand Fleet, engage!"
"The navy is really disappointing!"
Early spring in the North Sea, the temperature was slightly cool. The cold wind cut like a knife, carving out Lieutenant Hanna-Shaw's nearly frozen face.
The Friedrich-33 seaplane was flying southeast at high speed, the young lieutenant tightened his leather jacket and the "fur" blanket on his legs, while looking out for the ocean fleet with the Imperial Navy flag in the vast and majestic North Sea, and muttering to himself with a crooked mouth.
Hanna-Shaw, son of a Junker nobleman from Redstone, whose family had always been loyal to the Redstone Infantry Regiment, but he was an exception.
In 1912, the seventeen-year-old Hanna came to Berlin alone for school and witnessed a flight performance organized by the German Aviation Enthusiasts Club on the outskirts of Berlin. The son of the army fell in love with this career that could get close to the sky and was full of infinite stimulation.
Hanna ignored her father's dissuasion, even dropping the "Feng" from her name to learn flying and later becoming a member of the flight club and a crazy fan of Heide-Sillem who wrote "On Asymmetric Warfare in the Age of Battleships".
In June 1914, with war clouds gathering in Europe, nineteen-year-old Hanna was no longer content to be a flying instructor at a flying club and turned his attention to the military. With an army background he eagerly ran off to the Army recruiting station only to be told that the first round of expansion for the Army Air Corps had already been completed.
Hanna Reitsch had thought she could make a big splash in the Navy, but trouble kept popping up. At the outbreak of World War I, Hanna Reitsch was eager to show off her skills, but the Naval Staff did not have an active attack plan, and Hanna Reitsch could only fly day after day over the Heligoland Bight.
The Battle of Heligoland Bight broke out, but unfortunately it was a fight in the 'fog'; The Dogger Bank battle broke out, but unfortunately it was a night battle; Reality has already made people desperate, let alone Count Luckner, like the North Sea fog, frequently visiting the Imperial Navy Headquarters and the North Sea base, frantically shouting "Give me a sailing ship to go out to sea for a battle, let me beat the British guys to death".
To be honest, Lieutenant Hanna-Sho had no prejudice against Count Lukner, and he even admired the count's adventurous spirit. However, if the count came to the navy every time with his sister, Hanna-Sho's fiancée, Lina von Lukner, Hanna-Sho seemed to have only anger and collapse left.
In 1915, the days of trouble seemed to have come to an end. The Count of Luckner, who had been bothering General Heidkampf-Silem with his antics, was finally given an old sailing ship and thus calmed down, and the bothersome Countess no longer had any excuses for frequent visits to the naval air force. Hanna's classic "On Asymmetric Warfare in the Age of Battleships" finally got its practical application - Zeppelin and Lillenthal were converted into seaplane carriers. On the night of March 2nd, the commotion at Wilhelmshaven and the subsequent scramble had young people's blood boiling.
At 8:35 on March 4th, Lieutenant Hanna-Shaw flew back over the Grand Fleet in his beloved Friedrich FF-33 seaplane. The sight before him was even more shocking - the supposedly invincible Royal Navy, with a main force that could make other nations retreat, had actually been defeated.
A long line of warships, steel giants firing in unison, endless smoke and flames filling the air, high-speed destroyers racing by, releasing protective smoke screens - all this before Hanna's eyes formed a more tense and explosive 'precise' oil painting than Henri Matisse's Fauvist paintings!
A 350mm armor-piercing shell penetrated into the six-column formation of the British main fleet, and with a loud noise, one of the steel giants suddenly burst out a thick black smoke column, orange flames and iron blocks were constantly thrown into the sky.
Hannah-Shaw hastily pulled out a somewhat damaged ship identification manual from under the "fur" blanket, and just flipped through less than a few pages when an even more violent sound came from below. Hannah-Shaw's heart panicked, and the ship manual slipped into the cockpit.
"Another capital ship, the Conqueror-class dreadnought!"
Hannah's face showed no excitement as expected, but rather a kind of unfulfilled 'desire' from not being able to participate.
I still remember the excitement and sleeplessness in the pilots' rest room of Li Lin Tower, but the fact is cruel. Except for a brief takeoff inspection on the afternoon of the 3rd, the epic Battle of Beihai Peak was fought all night, and Hanna Xiao sat idle in the rest room all night due to the darkness. After barely holding out until dawn, they encountered continuous heavy fog, and Hanna Xiao could only continue to wait.
At 7:24, the weather finally permitted takeoff, and Hanna-Platz went to the battlefield, where he was immediately dispatched to provide cover for the First Scouting Group. Hanna-Platz followed hopefully in the direction of his idol's First Scouting Group, but when he found his idol's fleet, the First Scouting Group had already passed more than half of its final battle with the British Fast Division, and Hanna-Platz could only watch as the First Scouting Group sank the British Indomitable and Tiger at the cost of heavy damage to Derfflinger and Moltke.
"Must we be boring onlookers again?!"
To increase the endurance, Captain Li ordered to dismantle the aft machine gun of Friedrich-33, which made him feel that he was not in a human world. The British did not send out Short 184 from head to tail, and he didn't even have the chance to pull out his pistol to play Russian roulette with the British. Now, as the curtain is about to fall, the lieutenant, who had no military achievements, only had desperate anger left!
"I will never give up!"
The seaplane circled above the Grand Fleet several times, and Hanna's pistol was emptied in an instant. The lieutenant desperately suppressed the idea of throwing down his pistol, and urgently searched for anything that could be used as a weapon at hand.
A flash of metallic sheen caught Hanna-Sho's eye from the rubber seat behind. It was as if he had glimpsed a beautiful woman's naked body, and Hanna-Sho slightly raised the corner of his mouth, pushing the control stick forward to lower the altitude of the plane, his gaze fixed on the innocent Saint Vincent battleship.
A hammerhead shark poked its head out of the seaplane's fuselage, thrashed about for a bit with a slight diving angle and fell down.
On the surface, the Fourth Destroyer Flotilla of the British Grand Fleet was forming up in line ahead to deliver a death-ride attack on the chattering German main body, covering the retreat of the Grand Fleet.
"Hause, I hear our naval forces in the Mediterranean have suffered heavy losses due to a treacherous Turkish attack..." Pips stood near the shield of a 1-pounder (37mm) gun, his thin body turned away from Gunner Hause, his blue eyes scanning the sea area in front of him.
"I'm thinking that if even the Turks can create miracles, maybe our destroyer squadron will also achieve glory!"
This is the port side of the Saint Vincent's second deck, with the thick hull behind and a layer of shipbuilding steel above. Unless the Germans' large-caliber main guns can hit here, this is currently the safest place on the Saint Vincent. Pips and Haus's posts are here, responsible for manipulating this one-pound machine gun to prevent possible sneak attacks by German submarines.
"Provided there isn't that damned mosquito!" The sound of House's gritted teeth had barely faded when a dull thud, as if something blunt had struck the vertical armor plate of the 1-pounder (37mm) gun.
The steel plate as thin as a sheet of paper suddenly deformed, and the two sailors screamed with their heads in their hands, not even daring to breathe.
No explosion as imagined, no flames, no toxic gas. The bold Haus stood up tremblingly, swallowed hard, and stepped step by step towards the black, iron-hammer-like blunt instrument with a long handle on the deck.
Before House could bend down to take a closer look, another object similar to pliers fell from the sky. A strange loud noise came from the right side of House, and Commander Kent, who had just crawled out of the heavily damaged watertight compartment, stumbled and fell softly onto the deck.
"Oh God, the Germans have used a new type of weapon on us that can strike with 'precision'!"
……