The Rise of the Empire

Chapter 2441: Cruiser planning six



Is an air defense cruiser necessary? Naturally there is a need. After all, the true naval powers in history, whether it is the United Kingdom or the United States, have built a number of full-time air defense cruisers, such as the American Atlanta-class air defense cruisers. As well as the British Dido-class air defense cruiser and the following warrior goddess-class air defense cruiser are the response plans produced after the navy faced huge air defense pressure under the conditions of World War II. Generally speaking, the defense of the air defense cruiser is still useful, and it is still trustworthy as the core air defense pillar of the fleet.

As for the use of destroyers instead of air defense cruisers? How to say it, if calculated by tonnage, the most common destroyer for the Americans in World War II was the Fletcher-class destroyer, with a standard displacement of up to 2300 tons, and his main anti-aircraft firepower was five 5-inch guns. How about the American Atlanta-class air defense cruiser? The standard displacement of this class of air defense cruiser is 6,700 tons. The main long-range air defense firepower is 16 5-inch guns, of which 14 5-inch air defense guns can be concentrated on one side.

This is similar in terms of tonnage, but in fact, in terms of cost and actual combat performance, the air defense light cruiser will be better. Among other things, at least the turret on the anti-aircraft cruiser will not be penetrated by the 20MM cannon, and the 5-inch antiaircraft gun on the destroyer is really defensive at all! Face the suppression of fighters will be easily penetrated. From the perspective of hull defense, light cruisers are very defensive in the face of small bombs of less than 100KG, but it is difficult to say that destroyers.

For crit attacks that exceed the general specifications, the light cruiser may also survive. For example, in history, the British light cruiser Dido was hit on the base of the B turret by a 500KG armor-piercing shell on May 29, 1941. Incidentally, even the nearby Q turret was also severely damaged. Then this buddy ran back. For another example, on August 27 of the same year, the ship of the same class, the Goddess of Light, was hit by an air-launched torpedo, exploding a large hole of 8.5 meters * 5.5 meters, and then the cargo successfully ran back. There are still several similar encounters in the history of the Dedo class. In history, British air defense cruisers have been attacked by German and Italian navy and air forces in previous operations in the Mediterranean. Although the war has sunk a little, its survivability has been tested by many wars.

From the perspective of future naval battles, as the world’s top navy, building an air defense cruiser is a must. If you wait until it is bombed by a plane before replenishing the air defense cruiser, it will be too late. In fact, the British air defense Cruisers appeared very early, as early as the history of the 1930s when the British Royal Navy reorganized its armaments. The Dido-class air defense cruiser is the product of this situation.

Of course, this class of anti-aircraft cruiser is not successful from a design point of view. First of all, the Dido class anti-aircraft cruiser uses twin 133MM artillery. Although the muzzle velocity of this artillery is higher. But as an anti-aircraft gun, he lacks some of the most basic elements.

Take the American dual-mounted 5-inch gun as an example. The theoretical value of the British 133MM artillery rate of fire is 10 rounds per minute, which is actually 7.5 rounds. The American twin-mounted 5-inch gun has a single shot rate of 20 rounds per minute! And if it is a single 5-inch gun on the destroyer, the rate of fire can reach 2.7 seconds!

Because the anti-aircraft gun needs to track and tell the moving target, the rotation speed of the turret is a very important performance. The horizontal rotation speed of the American twin 5-inch gun is 25 degrees per second, while the British is 15 degrees per second. There is also a gap in speed in the UK. Therefore, the 133MM gun is not very good as an anti-aircraft gun. As a result, the third batch of Dido-class air defense cruisers switched to 4-inch guns....

And more sadly, the number of artillery on the Dido-class anti-aircraft cruiser is scarce. Dido-class air defense cruisers have up to 10 main guns, while American Atlanta-class air defense cruisers have up to 16 5-inch guns. This, even if the fire control of the two sides is close, the air defense firepower of the Dido-class air defense cruiser is far inferior to that of the American ones! At this moment, Dido once again inherited the British tradition of integrating cheating....

"The anti-aircraft cruiser is to be built, even if it is just an experimental ship, I have to try two." The crown prince thought for a while and said. "I think that the standard displacement of the new air defense cruiser should be controlled at 6,000 tons, and the unilateral firing power should not be less than 12 medium-caliber anti-aircraft guns. The speed can accompany the aircraft carrier."

"Then how many ships do you plan to build?" Marshal Scheer said at the first glance at the crown prince. Naturally, it is impossible to refuse to speak. General Rodhak's request is reasonable, and with various factors, Marshal Scheer is naturally not good at vetoing it directly.

"At least two. After all, there are two main types of antiaircraft guns for the Navy in the future, one is 105MM antiaircraft guns, and the other is 128MM antiaircraft guns. We need at least two platforms to compare the performance of these two antiaircraft guns. "The crown prince thought for a while and said.

"Two ships are not enough," Admiral Rod Huck said.

"Your Excellency, it is not difficult to build a 6000-ton warship. Even if it is possible to start construction temporarily before the war, we only need to build a small number of warships for training tactics~www.novelhall.com~ There is no need for peace. During the period, we built these warships with specialized functions and narrow applicability.” Marshal Hipper said.

"His Royal Highness, we can actually consider the problem from another angle." At this moment, Earl Spey suddenly said: "Since we are signing a treaty, then in order to avoid our advantage in the tonnage of cruisers from being reduced, we can specifically address this. Class ships design a tonnage limit to remove them from the cruiser tonnage. What do you think?"

"What do you mean?" Marshal Scheer asked.

"That's it. We have communicated with the French Navy before. The French are very satisfied with our 2000-ton destroyer, especially the 6-inch artillery above. They think it is unlikely that the French Navy will build too many in the future. Cruisers, after all, the French have limited money bags and limited demand. Most of their colonies are in northern Africa and do not need a long range. Therefore, the French plan to use a cruiser that is weaker than ordinary light cruisers, but far superior to ordinary destroyers. Intermediate warships replace the tasks and functions of some light cruisers. The French call them super destroyers, also called anti-destroyer large lightning strike ships. "Scheer said.

Are you shocked? Was it unexpected? A few months ago, Germany and France had a bloodshed. Count Spey has repeatedly damaged the French fleet. Now the two navies have begun technical exchanges. This is the terrible part of politics! As a comfort to the French, the Germans even leased two 2,000-ton destroyers to the French. And the French feel that this boat is really good after studying it!

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