readx; In the main fleet of China, there was only one First Cruiser Fleet and the First Thunderbolt Fleet that were originally attached to the battlefleet, and the number of destroyers was sufficient, but there was only one heavy cruiser Huawu, which was far inferior to the number of heavy cruisers in this one, so after the First Air Fleet retreated to the southwest at high speed, the Third Cruiser Fleet and the Fourth Cruiser Fleet reinforced the First Battlefleet. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

So when these three 15,000-ton heavy cruisers of China rushed out with four or five light cruisers and a large number of destroyers, they said, "The 6th Squadron and the 1st Mine Squadron over there were a little overwhelmed, not only could they not occupy the advantage in numbers, but they were also suppressed in terms of surname."

You must know that although the three heavy cruisers in the 6th Sentai are also known as heavy cruisers, they are two levels of things compared to the three 15,000-ton balanced heavy cruisers in China, and after this fight, China's heavy cruisers can resist the blows of a large number of six-inch guns or even eight-inch shells, but those thin-skinned heavy cruisers in the Chinese fleet will definitely not be able to withstand the blows of the eight-inch naval guns in the Chinese fleet, and they will not even be able to defend against the six-inch guns, and in close combat, Even the five-inch guns on those destroyers were able to inflict damage on these thin-skinned heavy cruisers. The avant-garde fleets of these two sides had only been fighting for about ten minutes, and Hasegawa in the back frowned and said, "This team is close to support!" ”

At this time, the main fleets of the two sides were still about 20 nautical miles apart, and the sky was already blurry, so the hit rate was too low in the fight, so the two sides tacitly agreed not to carry out artillery bombardment between the capital ships, but carried out fierce artillery fire on the auxiliary ships in the middle position.

And after the three battle cruisers of Ben's 3rd Sentai hit the three Chinese heavy cruisers with artillery fire, Wen Tinghe, who was behind, did not hesitate to order: "Let them withdraw first!" ”

As a result, after the auxiliary ships of the two sides engaged each other for about 20 minutes, it ended with the Chinese auxiliary ships taking the initiative to retreat, and this period of contact caused both sides to fire a large number of shells, among which the Huawu heavy patrol was full of bullet holes, fortunately all the shells that were hit were small and medium-caliber shells, otherwise they would have been planted here.

When the forwards of the two sides made a small contact, the 1st Sentai of Ben's main fleet finally approached, and the distance between the two sides had been shortened from the previous 20 nautical miles to about 15 nautical miles, and at this time, the time was already more than seven o'clock in the evening, and the night had completely fallen.

A super-large-scale naval artillery duel is about to be staged in the night.

As night fell, although the fleets of both sides implemented strict lighting control, because the distance between the two sides was a little closer, and both sides fired lighting shells over the other fleets from time to time, and the sea conditions were good tonight, there were no strong winds and waves, let alone rain and fog, and even later, a bright moon rose in the clear night sky.

The good sea conditions and excellent weather provided good external conditions for the night battle between the two sides, so from the two sides at eight o'clock, the capital ships of the two sides began to shell each other, because the capital ships behind the lights of the 1st Squadron that had been discovered had also arrived one after another, so Wen Tinghe did not take the way of hard resistance on the spot, but used his excellent mobility ability to prepare to retreat while fighting.

Because Wen Tinghe's combat mission is not to destroy as many enemy capital ships as possible in tonight's field battle, but to protect the First Air Fleet behind it in the darkness of night, as long as it lasts until dawn, the planes of the First Air Fleet will be able to take off again to fight, and then they will be able to launch a large-scale air attack on the main fleet, and according to the results of the air raid during the day today, it is not impossible to inflict heavy damage on the main fleet again.

When the time comes, your own victory is certain!

In the darkness of the night, the First Air Fleet had already broken away at high speed, and the First Battlefleet began to slow down in order to contain the enemy, but after nine o'clock in the evening, it also began to accelerate, and soared to the highest speed of twenty-eight knots.

When the Chinese battleship formation soared to 28 knots, only the three battlecruisers of the 3rd Sentai and the battleship Kii directly under the 1st Fleet could keep up with the main fleet, and the three battleships of the 1st Sentai as the main force were constrained by the slow speed, and it was difficult for them to rise after their maximum speed soared to 26 knots. I can only slowly pull away the distance.

Although the weather at night was extremely good, the hit rate of the artillery battle between the capital ships of the two sides was still extremely low, anyway, the capital ships of both sides fought for several hours, and only a few hit shells, and a 16-inch armor-piercing shell fired by the 16-inch 45 times the naval guns on the Chinese battleship Zhuan successfully hit the No. 3 turret of the Kirishima and directly caused the No. 3 turret of the Kirishima to lose its combat effectiveness. In addition to a 16-inch shell from the Kaohsiung that hit the Shundi and partially damaged the bridge, a 14-inch shell from the Haruna also hit the side armor of the Yandi, but it did not penetrate.

It can be said that the two sides fought for several hours in the first half of the night and did not achieve much success.

Compared with the silence of the capital ships, the auxiliary ships of both sides are extremely ferocious. When the capital ships of both sides began to shell from a distance of about ten nautical miles, those cruisers and destroyers were constantly wandering in the waves in the night, these cruisers and destroyers were all super fast, almost all of them were more than 30 knots, and the destroyers could even reach a speed of 34 or 35 knots, this high-speed battleship was constantly trying to find an opportunity to attack the enemy's capital ships, and at the same time launching an attack, it was also preparing the enemy's auxiliary ships to attack their own capital ships.

And because of the weak protective armor on the auxiliary ships, coupled with the extremely fast rate of fire of those six-inch and five-inch naval guns, they will be like machine guns and machine guns when they fight, so they hit a lot of bullets, and once these lightly armored warships are hit, they are basically unable to defend themselves. The protection of China's Heshen-class light cruisers and Pingtai-class destroyers is not very good, and the protection of the Heshen-class light cruisers is only 65 mm, which is good at long distances, but it is difficult to block the 140 mm naval guns at close range. In the same way, he said, "My light patrol or heavy patrol only has a broadside protection between 60 and 70 millimeters, and it also can't stop the six-inch naval guns that China is equipped with a large number of them."

The main guns of heavy cruisers in the Chinese Navy are eight inches, while light cruisers are divided into two types, one is six inches and the other is five. At the beginning, the cruisers were mainly six-inch, including the three imported from the United States and the two imitations were all six-inch calibers, and later they tried to deploy five-inch and forty-fold high-level dual-purpose guns on light cruisers, but found that the air defense capability was there, but the artillery combat capability became extremely poor. It was simply impossible to resist the 140-mm cruiser main guns that were installed in large quantities at that time, so after only building two anti-aircraft cruisers, they went back to the road of six-inch artillery cruisers, which frustrated the idea of unifying the caliber of auxiliary ships advocated by Vice Admiral Qin Yi.

The main guns on these six-inch cruisers and those destroyers with five-inch guns have a super fast rate of fire, and the distance is close after fighting each other, so the armor on these light ships on both sides can only be anti-shrapnel and the like, in fact, it can't stop the enemy's shells at all.

At this time, China's three balanced heavy cruisers were the embodiment of their due value, although their main guns were of the same eight-inch level as the heavy cruisers of Ben, the power of the main guns of the two was also half a catty. The speed is even slightly inferior to the re-patrol of Ben. After all, the speed of the Shiguang class is only 34 knots, and the speed of the Huawu is even slower, only 32 knots. However, it is said that the heavy cruising speed of this is generally more than 35 knots, and the Aoba class has reached 36 knots.

There is a difference in the speed of the two, but the protection of the two is also very different, among them, the side armor of the Aoba class is only three inches, and the side armor of the latest second advanced heavy cruiser is only four inches, although it has been slightly improved. And the Chinese three heavy cruisers have much higher side armor than them, and the Huawu is six inches thick on the side of the armor and three inches of horizontal armor. The broadside armor of the Shiguang-class heavy patrol is also six inches, and the horizontal armor is also three inches, and the ammunition depot, engine room and turret protection are also thickened.

The protection standard of China's three heavy cruisers is to be able to protect against the blows of eight-inch naval guns, and the protection standards of those treaty-type heavy cruisers are to protect against the blows of six-inch naval guns, and in actual combat, they often can't prevent the blows of six-inch guns, because warships are designed to have an immunity range, but because the speed of the cruisers is super fast, they often take the initiative to close the distance in order to achieve a higher hit rate after fighting. Therefore, the combat distance between cruisers is mostly less than 10,000 meters.

Therefore, the protection capability of these treaty heavy patrols is actually not much better than those light patrols of five or six thousand tons.

Except for the three heavy cruisers of China, the other auxiliary warships of both sides are not very good at protection, and both sides like to use high-explosive bombs when fighting at close range, so the fight was extremely tragic, shrapnel flew sideways, and everyone's casualties were quite heavy.

In the large-scale engagement of the navy, although it is the duel between the capital ships that determines the victory or defeat of the sea, when it comes to tragedy, it is definitely the most tragic battle between light ships.

A destroyer on the front line of the battle has been destroyed even after many firepower interceptions, but it has successfully rushed to a distance of less than three thousand meters from the Yandi, and then the destroyer began to fire torpedoes under the blow of a large number of five-inch secondary guns of the Yandi, and less than ten seconds after the torpedo was fired, it was hit by several five-inch secondary artillery shells of the Yandi, perhaps detonating the ammunition depot, and the next moment the destroyer was a ball of fire and quickly disintegrated and sank into the sea.

And just when the destroyer exploded and caught fire, a violent vibration suddenly came from the Yandi, and at the same time, a column of water tens of meters high rose on the starboard side.