Seeing that Tirpitz did not answer, and made a deferential look, Jochen did not directly tell him his own thoughts, and the second asked a question: "Alfred, our naval warships pay attention to protection design, so the displacement spent on armor of various types of warships in our country is extremely high, and our heavy cruisers have thickened the thickness of the upper armor belt to the same level as the main armor belt, so that it has a large protection area, so as to obtain first-class protection capabilities."

This kind of protection design is therefore excellent in the engagement of the Russo-Japanese War, the huge armor belt area of the cruiser we built can block the attack of most large-caliber naval guns, so as to minimize the damage to the battleship, but in fact, our armor thickness is not very high, you should know the reason, right? ”

"Because of the shells, both warring sides use high-explosive incendiary bombs, and the fuses used are extremely sensitive, and exploding on the surface without being able to penetrate our armor does not cause very serious damage." Tirpitz immediately replied, this is a very simple truth, why did His Majesty the Emperor ask this?

"Then you should also know that this type of protection is useless for our own naval guns, right?" Jochen continued.

"Yes, Your Majesty, because of the appearance of armor-piercing shells by caps, our shells have the ability to penetrate armor, and the time-delay fuse and passivated explosives can make the shells explode after penetrating the armor to increase the lethal effect." Tirpitz continued.

"So if our enemies also start using this kind of shells in the future, does it mean that the medium thickness of the armor will be useless, and we will have to face the situation of constantly increasing the thickness of the armor?" Yochen asked again.

"Your Majesty, even if the enemy has this kind of shell, it doesn't mean that high-explosive shells will not be used from now on, so medium-thickness armor is still necessary." Tirpitz immediately retorted.

"So is our Navy still using high-explosive incendiary bombs as the main ammunition type?" Jochen said with a smile as he looked at Tirpitz.

Tirpitz suddenly blushed. The German Navy had long used the hat hood armor-piercing shell as the main ammunition, so Tirpitz couldn't say anything when Jochen snatched it out like this.

Yoheng spread his hands: "You see, we don't need it, can't others know each other?" And we can't increase the armor thickness of all the protective areas of the entire battleship indefinitely, so we need to make trade-offs. ”

"陛xià. Do you mean to abandon the medium-thick armor in the upper part of the main armor belt? Tirpitz asked tentatively, saying that the entire upper part of the main armoured belt was left to the enemy's artillery rage, which was a bit too shocking.

"No, I'm not ready to abandon the medium-thickness armor of the upper armor belt." Jochen spoke, and before Tirpitz could breathe a sigh of relief, Jochen continued, "I'm ready to give up all medium-thick armor. ”

Tirpitz was dizzy with this sentence, knowing that the two sections of the main armor belt of all warships now have an extended installation belt that, although thinner than the main armor belt, still protects the waterline area. Jochen means that even these armors have been eliminated, doesn't this mean that these areas have become a defensive hole for someone else's small and medium-caliber rapid-fire guns?

"Your Majesty, in this way, the waterline part of the battleship will be extremely vulnerable to the enemy's small and medium-caliber rapid-fire guns, which is contrary to the theory you put forward at the beginning!"

Isn't it inconsistent to put forward such a concept now, who first demanded that the German Navy abandon protective cruisers and build armored cruisers?

"Alfred, when I came up with this idea, our navy was still concerned about 3,000 meters as the standard engagement distance, but now, we have extended the standard engagement distance to 10,000 meters. And there may be more in the future, in this case. The enemy's small and medium-caliber naval guns were basically no threat to our waterline section.

So we eliminated all the medium armor, and the weight saved was used to increase the power system and strengthen the armor in key areas, and the medium armor could not block armor-piercing shells anyway. This allows us to achieve a balance of speed and protection with a smaller tonnage, which is different from the previous all-encompassing arrangement, which I call focused defense. Jochen finally spoke his mind.

AllorNothing, both focused on defense, first appeared on the Nevada-class, a super-dreadnought built in the United States. But in fact, as early as when Capus was designing the South Carolina class, he had already taken into account that with the increase in the power of naval guns, the original defense layout was difficult to meet the design requirements, and the design idea of key defense was immediately proposed, and the General Committee finally applied this concept to the design of the Nevada class after several years of argumentation, thus creating a new era of warship protection system design.

And, in fact, the German high-speed battleships did not have high requirements in terms of speed. Although David? Betty's battle cruiser fleet had the 27-knots Lion class and the 28-knots Tiger, but in reality the formation could not have reached a speed higher than 25 knots, because the slower Indefatigable class was holding back.

The Elizabeth-class high-speed battleship, which has the reputation of being the best battleship of World War I, claimed to have a speed of 25 knots, but in fact the speed was only 24 knots, and in the Battle of Jutland, Betty's battlecruiser and Thomas's high-speed battleship were disconnected.

At this time, the German Navy's power system and hull line type were not as bad as in history, and as long as the German Navy's high-speed battleships could ensure a speed of 25 knots, they would basically be able to meet the task of entanglement with David Betty's first battle cruiser fleet.

In order to ensure the stability of the firing platform, because in the artillery battle stage, each ship will reduce its speed to ensure the accuracy of shooting, this speed is generally 10-15 knots, and no drastic changes can be made during the period. Therefore, what is the so-called way of using the speed of the kite to fly is YY out of people who have played too much in the game.

In this case, the two sides of the opposing fire are playing with the line infantry who are lining up to shoot, but the high-speed battleship that Jochen focuses on protecting is wearing a bulletproof vest to protect the vital points.

Of course, this idea is not so easy to accept now, after all, when the Americans came up with this design, they were also regarded by their peers as giving up the treatment, and now Tirpitz is resolutely resisting: "Your Majesty, this design is too risky. Unarmored areas simply cannot block high-powered armor-piercing shells. ”

"The unarmored area is originally a non-core area, that is, the area that was abandoned during the artillery battle, without armor, the high-power armor-piercing projectile will pass directly through it, forming a harmless guò effect, leaving only a hole. It will not affect the combat effectiveness of the battleship. As long as the structure in this core area is not destroyed, and the waterproof compartment arrangement is reasonable, even if the battleship loses the bow or stern, it will not lose its buoyancy and sink, as long as the battleship can be saved, we can restore her combat effectiveness. ”

There are countless examples of unsinkable warships in the hands of the United States. In World War II, the entire bow of a U.S. warship was torpedoed, hit by a huge wave, and hit by itself, but it was still able to continue sailing like no one else, and there are countless examples of returning to the port for repairs under its own power.

It may be difficult to accept this kind of protection on a battleship, but Jochen is much less likely to be opposed in the name of building cruisers capable of joining the battle line.

So Jochen continued to tempt: "Alfred, think about it, when the British armored cruisers are at the normal engagement distance of our new ships. The main guns can't penetrate our main armor belt, and the secondary guns can't reach our unprotected areas. And how perfect it would be for us to use battleship-class guns to fire armor-piercing shells to tear through the weak armor of their warships, and then, after dealing with these cruisers, use the high speed to return to the main fleet and join the battle line. ”

Maybe Jochen's picture of the future is very rosy, or maybe it sounds plausible and there is not enough evidence to refute it for a while. Tirpitz thought about it for a long time and didn't think about what to say.

Seeing that Tirpitz did not object, Jochen continued to cramm his thoughts to him: "The main armor belt can be arranged with a certain camber, so that we can use thinner armor to achieve a higher protective effect, so that we can achieve a protective effect close to 300 mm thickness with an armor thickness of about 250 mm, which can save a considerable amount of weight." And this design can also be used on our battleships. ”

Jochen did not intend to propose a slanted inboard arrangement of the main armor belts as in the case of the Nelson or Iowa classes after World War I, but rather to maintain the outboard main armor belts as in the Veneto class.

And Jochen didn't plan to change the protective armor deck to a horizontal armor deck, although the sloping part of the protective armor deck was much heavier than the horizontal armor deck, but the iron pants of the First World War were still effective in defending against straight ballistic shelling.

The key protection is combined with the iron pants of the dome, and this is the protection system that Jochen prepared for his high-speed battleship.

"In addition, due to the longer engagement distance, our original 150 mm secondary gun is practically useless, and the use of the new secondary gun with a smaller caliber and faster rate of fire can also save a certain amount of weight.

The 105mm rapid-fire guns that our destroyers are using today may not be very effective against light cruisers, and I think Skoda's 120mm rapid-fire guns can be selected as standard equipment for future capital ships. ”

The Germans misjudged the distance of engagement in World War I, so they believed that the 150 mm secondary gun could still play a role in close combat.

The British, on the other hand, went to the other extreme, believing that the dreadnought's main guns were enough to deal with a threat at a distance, so the British chose 102mm naval guns as the defensive weapon of their capital ships, but after building a full class 2 super dreadnoughts, 4 dreadnoughts, and 3 battle cruisers, they realized that they were too powerful, and were unable to cope with the gradually larger destroyers and light cruisers, and had to return to the road of 6-inch secondary guns.

In contrast, the Americans, who have been using 5-inch secondary guns, have basically not encountered this kind of trouble, and this caliber has also been used as an evergreen tree of American naval guns until the 21st century, so the choice of 120 mm is enough to deal with the threat of various small and medium-sized ships.

"I will ask the designers to demonstrate your ideas, but if the new ship is designed and built according to your requirements, it will be a new type of ship that is different from all the warships we have built in the past, then I am afraid it will be too late in time."

Tirpitz decided that it would not be a bad thing to discuss it as a reserve of solutions, regardless of whether this design idea was adopted or not, so he silently took what Jochen said to heart, but if that was the case, 1906 would still be the year when the German Navy did nothing, and Tirpitz was a little anxious.

"There's no need to rush, Alfred, good things are always worth the wait, isn't it?" Jochen waved his hand.

1906 was supposed to be a glorious year for the British, and Jochen was not prepared to steal the limelight, so that the British would be proud first, otherwise how could the Germans be under pressure? (To be continued......)