Reborn South Africa as a police officer

Chapter 2133 Unprofessional Royal Navy

Finding two warships in the vast Atlantic Ocean is as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack.

The Royal Navy spent nearly a month, but did not find any traces of the "Deutschland" and "Admiral Graf Spee". What they waited for was the news that two German warships kept sinking British merchant ships.

Especially the "Earl Spee", within a month of leaving Wilhelmshaven, under the command of Captain Hans Lansdorf, the "Earl Spee" continued to attack British merchant ships. Within 20 days, the "Earl Spee" sank the 5000-ton passenger ship "Clement", the 4300-ton cargo ship "Ashlia", the 8300-ton "Hunter" cargo ship, and the 5400-ton cargo ship "Hunter". The freighter "Trevanion", the 10300-ton passenger ship "Dorian Star", the 8100-ton passenger ship "Tyraola", and the 4000-ton freighter "Skyrishawal".

In addition, at least three other passenger ships or cargo ships were also sunk by the "Earl Spee", because these three ships failed to send out the signal in time, and the British government did not confirm that these ships were also sunk until a few months later. .

Hans Ransdorf has participated in the last world war, has rich experience, and has a deep understanding of breaking the war.

The continuous and frequent attacks left the Royal Navy's search fleet with increasingly clear directions. After the "Earl Spee" sank the "Skiri Shaw", the commander of the search fleet, Commodore Harwood, accurately It was judged that the destination of the "Earl Spee" was the mouth of the Rio de la Plata.

On December 12, the Royal Navy G Fleet spotted the "Graft Spee" at the mouth of the La Plata River.

G Fleet is one of the nine search fleets of the Royal Navy. Its members include a "York" class cruiser and two "Leander" class cruisers.

The "Earl Spee" has a standard displacement of 12000 tons and a full-load displacement of 16200 tons. It is equipped with two triple-mounted 280mm main guns and two quadruple-mounted 533mm torpedo tubes.

The three cruisers of the G fleet, the "Exeter" is equipped with six 6mm main guns with a range of 203 meters.

The "Ajax" and "Achilles" are each equipped with eight 8mm main guns, with a maximum range of 152 meters.

Compared with the "Earl Spee", the biggest advantage of the three British cruisers is speed. The fastest speed of the "Earl Spee" is only 26 knots, and the fastest speed of the three British cruisers is more than 30 knots.

The battle started at [-]:[-] in the morning. The "Earl Spee" had the superiority in firepower and fired at the "Exeter" first.

Before the encounter began, Commodore Harwood split the three cruisers into two and flanked the Graf Spee.

This strategy is effective, so that the "Graf Spee" can't take care of both ends.

Hans Lansdorf has rich experience and concentrated his firepower to attack the "Exeter". As soon as the battle started, the B turret of the "Exeter" was destroyed, and the bridge was also hit. The personnel inside either died or the "Exeter" temporarily lost its combat capability.

When the "Count Spee" was attacking the "Exeter", "Ajax" and "Achilles" were also desperately attacking the "Count Spee".

Compared with the 152mm artillery, the 280mm artillery is indeed not powerful enough. The "Graf Spee" has strong protection. The thickness of the turret armor reaches 160mm. The 152mm artillery is just like scratching an itch.

For the three British cruisers, the thickness of the turret armor is only 25 mm.

The thickness of the armor belt is about the same.

The biggest hidden danger of the "Graf Spee" is that the Germans are not sure when the British reinforcements will arrive.

Lansdorf had no intention of fighting, and after damaging the "Exeter", he shelled the "Ajax".

It has to be said that although the strength of the German navy is not as good as that of the Royal Navy, the quality of German naval officers and soldiers is indeed top-notch.

After "Ajax" was used as the main target of attack, in just 5 minutes, the two turrets at the tail of "Ajax" were destroyed, and the combat effectiveness was seriously damaged.

At this time, the "Exeter" fired a torpedo at the "Earl Spee".

After the "Earl Spee" evaded, it shelled the "Exeter" again.

The already severely damaged "Exeter" was hit hard again, and the last turret was completely destroyed. "Exeter" completely lost its combat effectiveness and withdrew from the battle.

At this time, the "Earl Spee" released smoke bombs and left the battlefield. The entire battle lasted for 1 hour and 20 minutes. The three British cruisers were damaged to varying degrees. The boiler rooms were damaged, and there was not enough fuel and power to return to Germany.

At this time, the "Earl Spee" and the two British cruisers were in the predicament of insufficient ammunition.

The "Count Spee" voluntarily withdrew, followed by two British cruisers, fighting and stopping all the way. Shortly after midnight, the "Count Spee" was forced to enter the port of Montevideo for maintenance.

The port of Montevideo is a port of Uruguay. At this time, Uruguay did not participate in the war. According to international conventions, the "Earl Spee" can only stay in the port of Montevideo, which is a neutral country, for 24 hours.

At this time, "Ajax" and "Achilles" were just outside the port, and more British warships were coming quickly. A political game was going on around the "Earl Spee".

After learning about the situation of the "Earl Spee", the German Minister in Montevideo negotiated with Uruguay, hoping to extend the stay of the "Earl Spee" in the port of Montevideo, on the grounds that "Earl Spee" The "Count" is no longer able to leave the port of Montevideo by its own ability, and it will take longer for repairs.

The Royal Navy strongly disagreed, arguing that the Graf Spee was fully capable of sailing and must leave within 24 hours.

Lansdorf knew about the Graf Spee.

As long as the "Earl Spee" leaves the port of Montevideo, it will be sunk by the British cruisers guarding outside the port.

The "Earl Spee" has a powerful turret armor, but the horizontal armor is average. The torpedoes of "Ajax" and "Achilles" can completely cause a fatal blow to the "Earl Spee".

What's more, more British warships are coming, including the "Ark Royal" aircraft carrier and the fast battleship "Prestige" equipped with three twin 381mm main guns and a maximum speed of 31 knots. The Earl Pey had lost all possibility of escape.

Uruguay did not want to offend Britain and France.

I don't want to offend Germany either.

So the Uruguayans sent an investigation team to determine the situation of the "Earl Spee", and finally extended the stay of the "Earl Spee" in the port of Montevideo to 72 hours.

"Earl Spee" was severely damaged and could not be completely repaired in 72 hours.

When the time came to January 1940, 1, Lansdorf sent a telegram to the German Admiralty to report the situation of the "Graf Spee" and ask for instructions on what to do next.

Knowing that the "Earl Spee" was blocked at the port of Uruguay, Mustache personally presided over the meeting, and finally decided: If possible, break through the siege and sail to Buenos Aires, and will never be captured in Uruguay. Scuttle the ship and completely destroy it.

Lansdorf accepted the result calmly.

He transferred more than 700 sailors on the "Earl Spee" and the remaining supplies on the "Earl Spee" to a German merchant ship in the port of Montevideo, and then aboard the "Earl Spee" key Place explosives in place.

At six o'clock in the afternoon on January 1, the "Grand Spee" slowly left the port of Montevideo.

The British cruisers waiting outside the port were ecstatic, and they finally waited for the "Earl Spee".

However, before the British cruiser fired, the "Earl Spee" blew up on its own, without giving the British any chance.

Lansdorf did not go out to sea with the ship, but stayed in the port, and shot himself at nine o'clock in the evening on the 3rd.

The forced self-sinking of the "Earl Spee" proved the failure of Germany's tactics of breaking diplomatic relations. Since then, Germany has devoted almost all its energy to submarines.

This decision took effect very quickly. On January 1, a German submarine took advantage of the defense loopholes of the Royal Navy and sneaked into the Royal Navy's naval base in Scapa Flow. The battleship was sunk.

This is difficult to explain.

The fact that a German submarine can slip in a heavily guarded military base makes one wonder how professional the Royal Navy is.

The daring one was the German submarine U47. The captain, Captain Prien, launched the first attack at 1:30 midnight, and a torpedo hit the bow of the "Royal Oak".

An even more incredible thing happened. At this time, no one realized that the "Royal Oak" was attacked by a German submarine. Everyone thought that the "Royal Oak" itself had exploded.

Three minutes later, the U3 submarine launched a second attack. Two torpedoes hit the middle of the "Royal Oak". The violent explosion caused fire and thick smoke. The situation quickly got out of control. It sank within minutes, and 47 officers and 29000 sailors, including the commander of the Second Fleet of the Royal Navy, Bragruf, were killed, and only 10 survived.

The sinking of the "Royal Oak" quickly detonated British public opinion.

In fact, the Royal Navy cannot be blamed for being lax. During the last World War, a German submarine tried to sneak into the naval base, but it hit a mine and sank, killing all the crew. It is reasonable to think that any attempt to break through Scapa Flow It would end in a disastrous defeat, the defenses of Scapa Flow impenetrable.

After the outbreak of the European War, the Royal Navy strengthened the defense of Scapa Flow. In addition to mines, it added a number of water fences and obstacle ships, which still failed to prevent the invasion of the U47 boat.

In addition to submarines, in January, Germany began to dispatch bombers to attack the Royal Navy.

The warships of the Royal Navy have been modernized many times, and a large number of anti-aircraft weapons have been added. This time it is a tie.

On the evening of the 22nd, 12 German bombers were divided into four formations to attack the British warships docked in the Forth Bay Naval Base, the Royal Navy's "Southampton" cruiser, and the "Edinburgh" cruiser, and The destroyer "Moholland" was injured and 25 officers and soldiers were killed.

Germany lost 6 bombers.

Also at the end of January, the first batch of southern African pilots volunteered to arrive in Britain to fight against Germany.

(End of this chapter)