Starting with the smashing of Dunkirk

Chapter 220 One pit unfilled, another dug.

When Emperor Wilhelm wanted to meet with Brigadier General Lelouch, Lelouch himself was on his way to Port Wilhelm.

One day later, on the morning of January 28, Lelouch appeared in Port Wilhelmshaven.

He was personally greeted by Admiral Franz Ritter von Hippel, Deputy Commander of the High Seas Fleet, and Mr. Gustav, the owner of Krupp.

"I really envy you, for assisting His Highness the Duke in making such a tremendous contribution on the southern front. Three months ago, I thought that the Empire's victory in the Baltic Sea was already the greatest achievement of the year, and that Marshal Mackensen and I were definitely the most dazzling generals of the army and navy last year."

Unexpectedly, in just the last three months of the year, the gains in the southern Black Sea theater surpassed those in the northern Baltic Sea theater.

As soon as the group met, General Hipper began to speak freely and playfully, without any concern for being gossiped about or being treated with formality. He said whatever came to mind.

Lelouch knew the other person wasn't treating him like an outsider, but he still had to say something polite:
"Why distinguish between the southern and northern fronts? Aren't we all dealing with the same enemy? It's just that a country like Lusa is too vast, and it's destined that it can't be completely conquered in one or two years."

Since that's the case, we should try our best to force them to make peace through economic means. Given the cold climate of Lusha, attacking from the south would be more effective and more likely to disrupt their people's livelihoods.

After exchanging pleasantries, Lelouch took the opportunity to inquire about Admiral Hipper's recent situation and whether there had been any unusual developments in the naval leadership recently.

Lelouch noticed something unusual today: in Wilhelmshaven, Hipper was the one who presided over the commissioning ceremony of the new ship and was in charge of everything. Everyone in the navy consulted him on everything.

But in the distance, a large group of officers and social elites, who had nothing else to do, were gathered around an elderly man in a wheelchair, who was also wearing the uniform and epaulets of a naval admiral.

Lelouch was too far away to see the other person's face clearly, but he could roughly guess who they were.

When Hipper saw that he had asked, he explained in a low voice: "You're going to attend the ceremony later, so you should go and say hello. General Bohr's health has been very poor since winter, and he has decided to officially retire at the end of the month."

He was so excited upon hearing that the 'Baria-class' battleships were about to enter service, finally upgrading the Imperial Navy's capital ships from 12-inch guns to 15-inch guns, that he insisted on personally presiding over the commissioning ceremony.

Although Lelouch was a military enthusiast in his previous life, it was impossible for him to remember all the historical details.

Unbeknownst to him, in the Earth dimension, Admiral Hugo von Pohl officially retired on January 24, 1916, handing over command of the High Seas Fleet to Admiral Reinhard Scheer. He died shortly after his retirement due to worsening health.

In this world, Hugo von Bohr has held on for four more days than on Earth, mainly because he's tied up with the momentous event of witnessing the commissioning of a groundbreaking battleship. Once this wish is fulfilled, he can finally retire in peace.

So today, General Boll was pushed here in a wheelchair.

However, in this world, Admiral Hipper, having joined forces with Lelouch earlier and received his advice and strategies along the way, has clearly secured his position. Once Admiral Hugo von Pohl retires, he will be able to take over as Commander of the High Seas Fleet. Reinhard Scheer, with even less combat experience, will not be in the running; he will only be able to serve as Vice Commander.

"Congratulations!" Lelouch said. "I'm sure you'll be able to lead the fleet to even greater achievements after taking command of the High Seas Fleet. Once the two 'Baria-class' battleships are fully operational in the first half of this year, we might be able to launch some major operations against the Burkina Faso."

Hipper said with a helpless self-deprecating laugh, "I would like to make some big moves, but the enemy has to be willing to take the bait. Otherwise, if we are confident but the enemy is not, and they are unwilling to fight, then it's useless. By the time the enemy feels fully prepared and ready to fight, I will no longer want to go into battle. A naval battle is not so easy to start."

Lelouch: "That's hard to say. To lure the enemy into a trap, there are only two methods. One is to find another place to start a fire, so that the enemy fleet, which has to be deployed all over the world, will be diverted to deal with it, thus weakening their home fleet."

Another tactic is to deliberately feign weakness and spread false information, such as delaying the commissioning and sea trials of certain key warships of our navy. For example, the 'Baria-class' can't be kept secret anytime soon. Commander Hugo von Pohl is getting on in years and is eager to see the warship officially commissioned, so you can't very well spoil his fun.

However, the second ship, the 'Baden,' will likely enter service during your tenure as commander. If the timing is right, with a difference of less than one or two months, a sea trial could easily conceal the progress. You could find a way to hide the progress of a key warship before the decisive battle, making the enemy mistakenly believe that it has not yet achieved combat readiness.

Even further, in the future we could say that Krupp's new main gun process has some problems, the technology is immature, the design is too radical, and it has encountered some minor issues, requiring repairs and retesting. At the same time, to avoid occupying dry docks, it can be towed to smaller shipyards in East Prossen for maintenance on ordinary docks.

Lelouch's words were quite conservative; they didn't involve any specific plans, only some open-ended assumptions, so the level of secrecy didn't need to be too high, and with a third person, Gustav Krupp, listening in, it was fine.

Moreover, if such intelligence deception were to be implemented in the future, it would certainly require the cooperation of Krupp. After all, this would be tantamount to smearing Krupp's reputation while simultaneously feigning weakness to entice the Royal Navy. If Krupp were unaware of this and reacted with rebuttal upon receiving such a report from within the Navy, it could lead to serious consequences.

Therefore, it is only when Lelouch, Hipper, and Gustav Krupp are present today that these words are most suitable to be spoken.

In short, Gustav needs a heads-up, so he's aware that while it's uncertain whether the Navy will smear Krupp in the future, or when it will, he just needs to remember to obediently accept the blame if the Navy does so, never argue back, and play along.

Perhaps this mudslinging will never be thrown at us until the end of the war, but it's good to remember to keep this in mind.

After figuring out the reasoning, Gustav first gasped slightly, then lowered his voice and gave a wry smile:

"Alright, since it's General Lelouch's idea, we'll cooperate. From now on, no matter what negative news the Navy releases about Krupp, I won't refute it. Even if you say Krupp's new 48-caliber electric furnace steel gun barrel design is too radical, or that the barrel walls are too thin to withstand high chamber pressure and will explode, I'll accept it..."

Gustav's words were merely a casual murmur of frustration, entirely based on his professional instincts.

But when Lelouch heard this explanation, it was like hearing celestial music and his ears were instantly clear—this excuse was so detailed, so real, and so useful that if he really needed to use it in the future, this would be it.

"Okay, then it's settled."

The three chatted for a while longer about their plans for future naval battles. The commissioning ceremony was almost time, so Admiral Hipper gestured for Lelouch and Gustav to board. The group followed Admiral Hugo von Pohl, who was in a wheelchair, as they ascended the gangway onto the warship.

It was only after getting closer that Lelouch realized that the "Barria-class" was not larger than the "Deffringer-class" battlecruiser he had previously sailed on.

It was indeed 1 meter wider and slightly deeper than the Derfflinger-class, but nearly 20 meters shorter. Ultimately, the unloaded displacement of the two was not much different. When fully loaded, the Barria-class was slightly heavier by more than a thousand tons, mainly because the 380mm main guns required much more supplies than the 305mm guns.

"Modern warships require far too much tonnage and size to achieve high speed. To increase the maximum speed under boosted conditions from 23 knots to 28 knots, while still carrying 8 main guns, the caliber must be reduced from 380 mm to 305 mm, the main armor must be reduced from 350 mm to 300 mm, and the horizontal protection must be reduced from 100 mm to 25-50 mm."

Lelouch stood on the open lookout tower of the bridge of the "Barria" and looked out over the familiar Wilhelmshaven, feeling a surge of emotion.

Towards the end of World War I, too many other performance aspects were sacrificed in pursuit of battlecruiser speed. The power technology of that era had reached its limit, and in order to increase speed, countries could only increase the number of boilers and shafts. However, the small-bladed propellers of the main warships were already spinning at extremely high speeds, and further increasing the power and speed did not significantly improve propulsion.

Therefore, relying on existing technology to increase speed has reached a critical point where the marginal returns are significantly diminishing.

With current technology, even if you pile up the numbers to the extreme, it would be difficult to produce battlecruisers or battleships with a knot count of over 30.

"Is there any good way to solve this problem?" Admiral Hipper, who wasn't very knowledgeable about the technical details, asked Lelouch casually.

Lelouch: "We must build a gearbox that can be used for the main power source of battleships, and reduce the output speed of the high-speed steam turbines, changing them from high speed and low torque to relatively low speed and high torque."

Only then can the propeller diameter and blade pitch be increased again. A large-diameter, low-speed propeller has a much higher propulsion efficiency than a high-speed, small-diameter propeller.

Otherwise, no matter how powerful the main engine is or how fast the propeller spins, if countless bubbles are churning around the blades, the contact area between the blades and the seawater decreases, and the area used for pushing water also decreases. Therefore, no matter how fast it goes, it cannot increase the actual thrust. There is a limit to the speed of a propeller in water and its contribution to thrust. Beyond this limit, going faster becomes almost ineffective.

This depends on advancements in materials science within metallurgical companies and in the manufacturing processes for high-precision gears in machining enterprises. Both are indispensable; we must gradually build up our industrial foundation.

General Hipper's gaze also fell on Gustav; the task of manufacturing new gearbox steel still fell on Krupp's shoulders.

Gustav reluctantly stated, "General Lelouch mentioned this to me last year when we were discussing the new applications of three-phase electric arc furnace steel in the naval field. We at Krupp have also initiated a parallel project on it."

However, in the field of machining, especially in the machining of large-diameter, high-strength gears with a large number of teeth, Krupp is not a specialist. We don't manufacture precision gears; we need to find someone else for this."

Hipper then looked at Lelouch: "Do you know any companies in this field? I don't think I've heard of them before; this area is completely new to me."

Lelouch was quite adept at setting things up, mainly because as a time traveler, he was quite familiar with famous industrial companies of the future. So he immediately gave Hipper a suggestion:

“I am very familiar with Minister Baden of the Ministry of Prisoners of War and Occupied Territories Affairs. I also talked to him last year, and he took it very seriously, saying that there was a newly established precision transmission company in Friedrichshafen, the Duchy of Baden, last year, called ZF.

I told him that with high-quality electric arc furnace steel available in the future, the high-precision gear business would also have great potential. He then had the Baden royal family invest in and reorganize the company, accelerating its technological development. If Mr. Gustave is interested, we can have in-depth technical cooperation.

You supply them with gear steel, and they give you specific material optimization requirements; you work together to improve the process. I'll just act as a go-between.

ZF, the famous gear and transmission giant of Demania, was also founded in 1915 in the Earth dimension. It was also created because of the war. The Empire had a need for high-power transmission gearboxes that could "increase torque and reduce speed", which led the Duchy of Baden to set up such a company.

However, ZF's true rise to prominence on Earth didn't occur until the 1930s. In its early days, Demand lacked high-quality materials like three-phase electric arc furnace steel, and the post-war sanctions imposed by the Treaty of Versailles prevented the company from upgrading its metallurgical industry, causing it to stagnate for many years. It wasn't until the Great Depression of 29-33 ended and Demand's metallurgical industry and processing technology returned to their peak that ZF truly shone.

However, with the influence of Lelouch, coupled with his vision and resource integration capabilities, Krupp was able to produce high-quality three-phase electric arc furnace steel as early as 1915. With the support of good materials, and with Krupp giving ZF special treatment and being willing to do "customized" optimization for this small customer's small orders, ZF could probably avoid at least ten years of detours.

I believe that within a year, Demania's technological level in gear transmission and gearboxes will surpass the level of Earth's recovery after the 1924 Kinmark crash.

It is possible that within two years, by the end of this war, the Earth's current level will reach the level it reached at the end of the Great Depression in 1933.

Of course, even if they reached the gearbox technology level of Earth in 1933, it would be impossible to build the power system of the "Scharnhorst" or even the "Bismarck". Scharnhorst used gearbox technology from 1936. The years from 33 to 36 in Earth's time were a period of frantic, high-speed technological improvement by the Demacians, and there was no room for ambiguity in that.

Therefore, Lelouch estimated that if they started to fully develop gearbox technology today, by 1918, they should still be able to create a gearbox transmission technology similar to the "Dunkirk-class" of the Franks in 1931.

By 1921-1922, the goal was to achieve variable-speed transmission for the Scharnhorst-class warships on Earth. If this technology could be kept secret, the Empire could ensure that its warships for future wars would be at least one generation ahead of their enemy counterparts in terms of propulsion systems.

To put it simply, this difference is basically equivalent to "for the same total tonnage of ships and the tonnage occupied by the power system, German ships can be 3 knots faster than Britannia and American ships".

(Note: Steam turbine battleships with first-generation reduction gearboxes were generally 2-3 knots faster than battleships of the same power tonnage without gearboxes. The Dunkerque-class was roughly equivalent to that generation of gearboxes. Steam turbine battleships with second-generation reduction gearboxes could be 2 knots faster under the same conditions, roughly at the level of the Tirpitz.)
Gustav Krupp had never even heard of ZF, a small company that had only been established last year. Now, there are indeed several startups in Demania that, after sensing the potential of new electric arc furnace steel, have started to develop high-power gearboxes. A giant like Krupp doesn't know which of them will emerge victorious, so naturally, it won't make any advance contact or cooperation.

But now that General Lelouch has given them guidance and connections, the situation is completely different. Krupp certainly can't fall behind; it has to take this seriously.

When Zeff hears this, he will surely be grateful to Lelouch in the future, and he will also do Grand Duke Baden a favor.

(End of this chapter)