Berlin, palace.

In the spacious and bright German study, William, wearing military uniform, was standing straight on his head. A pair of gray pupils like a falcon stared at the exquisitely crafted warship model on the long table in front of him, pondering without saying a word. Next to him, Tirpitz, who had two long Christmas beards, also showed great interest in the wooden model in front of him. Only Qingying, who was familiar with history, glanced at it and his attention did not hit it again.

"I really didn't expect that the British would have made such a thing. The new battleship they built with concentrated manpower and materials across the country did not arrange a large number of 234mm guns like the previous "Lord Nelson" class, but replaced them all with 305mm with the same caliber as the main gun. Although its outfitting project has just begun and the things on the deck are still missing, we can already determine that this ship will be equipped with 10 45-diameter 305mm main guns with a unified caliber." William's eyes flashed with a strange color and said slowly.

Tirpitz nodded slightly and said, "Although Fisher is arrogant and arrogant, he is very hostile to my German like His Majesty, I must admit that he is an outstanding reformer who saved the entire British navy for God's sake. He has a sharp insight into the new naval changes produced by the development of the times. What's more, the concept of this full-heavy artillery is not a new thing. The Italians proposed this idea three years ago, and he himself proposed a warship plan to build a 254mm main gun with a unified caliber. It is reasonable for the British to build such a ship this time."

Qingying heard it in her ears, and some memories of her previous life could not help but turn into her mind.

As time entered the 20th century, the maritime situation faced by Britain was particularly severe. Although Britain's shipbuilding speed had reached its highest historical peak, the average annual number of main warships had exceeded 6, but facing five or six navies including the United States, Germany, France, Russia and Italy, Britain, whose industrial output value dropped below 20% of the world, could no longer "take charge of the ocean" like in the mid-19th century. In order to save the British navy's gradually shrinking control of the ocean, Fisher, who served as the First Minister of Maritime Affairs, decided to use the current background of rapid development of science and technology and naval warfare to build a new main ship with comprehensive performance crushing existing warships. Let the British navy regain the supreme glory half a century ago through quality improvement. After some exploration and search, the concept of "full-heavy artillery" from Italy came into his eyes.

In 1904, Fisher took the lead in establishing a committee to explore the feasibility of 10 305mm caliber main guns equipped with a unified model and a battleship that can maintain a 21-kinetic speed for a long time. This plan is the USS Defence battleship. With the development of technology, the 305mm heavy artillery has been greatly improved in the rate of fire, accuracy and power of the 305mm heavy artillery. After 15 years of silence, the large-caliber artillery has become mainstream again like the era of ironclad ships with "fireworks and fires". The dark history of armored cruisers and rapid-fire guns dominate the battlefield no longer exists. One year later, the USS Defence's plan has gone from the original fantasy blueprint to a real actual drawing. In ecstasy, Fisher immediately tried his best to persuade Congress to temporarily increase the budget, and started this epoch-making battleship at the Portsmouth Shipyard in October 1905.

In addition to the 10 305mm L45 main guns that are the same as Lord Nelson's class, the biggest improvement of the Fearless is the use of the steam turbine produced by Parsons as the power unit, which allowed the British to get rid of their slag-reciprocating steam engines that were far inferior to those of German counterparts. Its speed has been greatly improved. With one-fifth more boilers than the Lord Nelson's class, which started construction in the same year and had a very different tonnage, the Fearless's output power has increased by nearly 40% compared to the latter, increasing the speed from 18 knots to 21 knots that are almost the same as the armored cruiser, and it can sail stably at a speed of more than 20 knots for a long time. As for the so-called "Fighter" on the Hundred Poisons Qingying could only laugh at the saying "the cabin is miniaturized and water-tightened, which significantly improves reserve buoyancy and sink resistance." Qingying could only laugh at the saying that the underwater protection and sink resistance of British battleships are simply fighters in garbage. The descendant of the Fearless, the super-Dreadnought Dark, with a displacement of more than 23,000 tons, was sunk by a mine filled with 180 pounds (less than 82kg) of Fire Cotton. You should know that the explosion of Fire Cotton is only half that of TNT, which means that this mine is only equivalent to the explosion of TNT capacity of about 40kg, and the design value of the general large battleships to resist underwater blasting is at least 150kg TNT or more!

Because Fisher urgently hoped to use the service of this epoch-making battleship to demonstrate the Royal Navy and supreme majesty and unshakable world hegemony, he mobilized a large number of skilled technical workers and materials to build the warship, which made the construction period of the Fearless extremely short. The ship started construction on October 2, 1905, and was launched on February 6, 1906 just four months later. Its total construction period was only a little over a year. Its appearance made all the warships in service and under construction in the world become the goods to be swept into the garbage dump in an instant. Britain spared no effort to promote that they had built such a powerful ship in such a short period of time, which also shocked the world's major powers who were interested in the ocean, and had a new understanding of the strength of the British navy. Fisher's intention was initially realized.

However, from a long-term perspective, Fisher's move was tantamount to sending the Royal Navy into the tomb.

The original intention of the reformer was to expand the gap between the Royal Navy and other powerful powers through the service of this new giant ship, so as to make Britain's maritime hegemony more stable, but the result was contrary to his vision. The basic core of the dreadnought - full-heavy artillery and steam turbines - are not difficult to meet luxury goods. The former is just an improvement in shipbuilding concept, while the latter also has Curtis-style steam turbines in the United States that are no less than Parsons in the United States. Japan used this American-made power machinery on the battleship "Anyun" which started construction in 1906. What's more, in the early 20th century when the capital economy was operating at a high speed, even the British company's steam turbines could be installed on German battleships. So which country could not buy steam turbines? Therefore, for those powerful powers with strong industrial foundation, there was no technical problem in building dreadnoughts.

Because the dreadnought has a huge advantage over the former dreadnought (which was Fisher's original intention), the Dreadnought was so arrogant that while the former dreadnoughts of the other powerful powers, it also swept the British Navy's own large group of former dreadnoughts into the garbage dump in an instant. Before this, the Royal Navy had already outspoken with its superior strength of more than 50 former dreadnoughts, but the appearance of the dreadnoughts instantly reshuffled the original naval power structure: the former dreadnought became an irrelevant product, and everyone stood on the same starting line again to create fearlessness, which was a fatal blow to Britain, whose proportion of industrial economic power to the world had already shrunk!

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"Thankfully, Germany started the construction of this kind of fully heavy artillery warship two and a half years ago. Although this is the result of our main gun's characteristics being different from the great powers and accidentally hit, its power was fully reflected in countless previous shooting tests. There is no doubt that we should continue our previous path in the subsequent construction of the Navy and vigorously develop this new battleship with unified caliber main guns." Tirpitz looked at the fine model in front of him and smiled, "Although the British ship is equipped with 10 305mm main guns, due to the arrangement method, only 8 can fire at the same side; at this point, the new battleship with the main guns arranged diagonally across the side of our side is much better than them."

Hearing Tirpitz's words, William's eyes showed doubt and asked, "Alfred, I remember Congress approved the construction budget for four new battleships in total, of which two were started at the end of 1903. How are their construction going now?"

"Report to your Majesty, these two new battleships that were first started to be built have completed half of the outfitting work and are expected to be completed by the spring of tomorrow. They are named the German and Hannover respectively. The 3 ships have completed 95% of the hull construction and will be launched within one month. The 4 ship will be launched until the end of this year." Speaking of this, Tirpitz looked at Qingying half dissatisfied and half angry, and then said, "According to the requirements of His Highness, we have made strict confidentiality measures for the construction of this class of ships, not only built around the ship platform.

The giant wooden shed that blocked the view was set up, and even the necessary launch ceremony for each warship was cancelled. This did block the foreign spies who came to spy on intelligence, but it also caused me to fight for funds for the Navy in Parliament. Your Highness, you should know that it is far from enough to promote the threat posed by the British Navy to us. The people and the MPs must see the brilliant achievements that the Navy has made that they are excited about, and they will willingly open the green light to the funds needed for the development of the Navy!"

Qingying could only laugh at him when he heard this. The purpose of his previous purpose was to avoid the butterfly effect caused by Germany's early construction of the dreadnought, so that the British dreadnought construction time would adhere to history and lay an advantage for Germany in the dreadnought competition. However, since the British dreadnought has been launched now, it would be unnecessary to keep it confidential. At this stage, it is time for Germany to make its own voice.

PS: Thanks to book friend Yin Yinshancao's monthly ticket and hugetiger's reward~~
Chapter completed!