Very often, both ZP Rozhestvensky and our other admirals of the Russo-Japanese War era are accused of unwillingness to learn how to shoot at long distances, which is usually understood as a distance of 60–70 cables, or even more. How fair are such reproaches?
What could have forced our admirals to engage in "ultra-long" shooting?
Let's take a look at the military clashes at sea between the Russian and the Japanese fleets from the beginning of the war to the battle of Shantung inclusive.
The first major naval battle of the Russo-Japanese War took place on January 27, 1904, when Heihachiro Togo's fleet attacked our squadron, which was recovering in the outer roadstead from a night destroyer strike. From this battle, in fact, the war began.
It was quite short and did not lead to any result. Official Japanese historiography claims that the flagship of H. Togo began the battle at a distance of 46,5 cables, and later the distance between the main forces was reduced to 24 cables. Ours reported that the battle took place on 24-35 cables, while the cruisers were coming closer.
The battle in Chemulpo began from a distance of 45 cables, after which the opponents approached.
And the battle on February 12, when the main forces of the Japanese fleet attacked 3 Russian armored cruisers located in the outer roadstead, began from an even smaller distance - 40 cables.
Thus, the first clashes at sea, although they took place at a greater range than was expected before the war, would not have suggested to anyone that one should immediately begin to learn how to shoot at 60-80 cables.
Cross-country shooting.
Here everything was much more interesting, since our officers believed that they managed to achieve a hit from 13,5-14 versts, that is, from about 78-81 kabeltov (artillery).
But how did this happen?
It began with the fact that on February 26, Japanese battleships fired from a distance of about 88 cables from behind Liaoteshan, while their cruisers, standing at a distance of 8-10 miles from the entrance to the inner roadstead, tried to adjust their fire. In total, 154 shells were used up, 3 hits were achieved ("Askold", "Retvizan", "Sevastopol"), despite the fact that both hits on the battleships fell on the armor, and in no case was it pierced.
It was extremely difficult to draw any conclusions based on such statistics.
On the one hand, the accuracy achieved by the Japanese (1,95%) was frankly disappointing, especially since the Russian ships were stationary. But, on the other hand, it was not clear whether the Japanese were able to adjust the fire, or were they just shooting in the area? It was only clear that such attacks carried a certain threat, and they needed to be countered, why measures were taken in our squadron to organize return fire.
By the way, on February 26, our coastal batteries tried to shoot at the Japanese, and there was even an opinion that, perhaps, it was possible to achieve hits on "apparently," Takasago "and a cruiser of the" Tokiwa "type, which approached the coast.
I'll make a reservation right away - it's not at all about the fact that our artillerymen managed to get into the Japanese cruisers. But our admirals did not have an afterthought, and when making this or that decision, they could operate only with information they knew, which was often speculative. For example, if, when shooting 80 cables at an enemy ship, our officers thought that they regularly hit the target, then this could prompt them to try to shoot at such distances and further, even if there were no hits in fact.
So, although it is not known from what distance the Russian sailors "observed" hits on the enemy cruisers (which in fact did not exist), but it could not have been great.
The fact is that the bulk of the coastal artillery could not fire beyond 8 versts (8 m or 480 cables), and only the newest 46-mm guns - about 254 cables. The thing is that the latter had at their disposal only armor-piercing and cast-iron shells. It was pointless to shoot armor-piercing at long distances, especially since they were not even equipped with explosives. Cast iron ones were allowed to shoot only with a practical charge, with which such projectiles flew a little further than 60 versts, that is, 10 cables.
Accordingly, even the assumption that coastal artillery was successful could hardly push our sailors to urgently learn to shoot at a distance of over 60 cables.
The next time the Japanese tried to bombard the fortress on March 9, 1904.
On this day, Fuji and Yashima separated from the approaching Japanese squadron, which, approaching the Liaoteshan lighthouse, opened fire. In response, Retvizan and Pobeda fired 29 shells, achieving, as our observers believed, one hit (3,45% accuracy), while the official documents included a distance of 13,5 or 14 versts, that is, 78-81 kabeltov ...
It would seem that this is it, evidence of an increase in the distance of artillery combat!
But the fact is that this time the Japanese battleships preferred to fire not on the move, but from the spot, so when the Russian shells began to land close to the "Fuji", in the opinion of our observers, at some point even gave reverse. It is quite obvious that shooting from a stationary ship at another, read motionless, very little resembles a real sea battle. And, even if only 3,5% accuracy was achieved in such generally favorable conditions, how much can one expect in a real battle, when both ships are not only moving, but also maneuvering?
Domestic historiography notes that the main effect of the retaliatory firing of Russian battleships was to force the Japanese to move during the shelling and thereby reduce the accuracy of their fire.
So, in my opinion, it was hardly possible to draw far-reaching conclusions about the possibility of successfully waging an artillery battle at long distances on the basis of hitting the "Fuji". Especially since the Japanese official story generally denies this hit, although he reports that the Russian shells lay not far from the battleship.
But when the enemy ships were moving, it was even more difficult to hit them.
The third shelling of the Russian squadron took place on April 2, it was carried out by Nissin and Kasuga. At the same time, the Japanese cruisers, although they reduced their speed, did not try to shoot from the spot. The Russian squadron responded by using up 34 shells, of which 28 were fired by Peresvet, but did not reach hits.
Thus, the flip fire of our ships could not "advise" the Naval Ministry to urgently learn to shoot 60-80 cables.
With the battle at Shantung, everything turned out much more interesting.
The first phase of the battle in the Yellow Sea, which took place on July 28, 1904, mainly took place at extremely large distances for the Russo-Japanese War. The Japanese, according to our observers, opened fire at about 80-90 or even 100 cables. Later, according to many reports, the distance between the main forces did not fall less than 57-60 cables, and only briefly, at about 13:00, was reduced to less than 50 cables. But soon it increased again, and later amounted to 60 cables and more until the very end of the first phase.
All eyewitnesses noted that there was a long period of time when the ships were forced to fight only with the main caliber, since the distances were too great for 152-mm guns.
Could this experience indicate the need to urgently learn to fight at a great distance?
Yes, but only if ours or the Japanese, shooting at 60-100 cables, would have achieved some kind of success. But, in the opinion of our sailors, luck was not accompanied by any of the parties. The officers of the 1st Pacific Squadron did not consider that they were able to inflict significant damage on the enemy in the first phase of the battle. And when VK Vitgeft ordered the commanders of the ships to report the damage, none of them reported anything significant.
But the Japanese noted something.
In a lecture given by K. Abo to British officers after the war, it was mentioned about the serious damage and losses caused by the Russian 152-mm shell of the Poltava, which hit the Yakumo from a distance of 13 yards, that is, about 000 cables.
There is no doubt that a Russian shell hit the Yakumo - Russian sources believe it was a 305mm shell. K. Abo noted the death of 22 people, as the Japanese official history says. Other sources note the death of 9 people and the injury of 12 more, but in any case the losses were significant.
However, the distance of 65 cables looks more than doubtful, because the maximum firing range of the six-inch Poltava was only 53 cables. However, within the framework of this article, both the caliber of the projectile and the distance from which it actually hit the Japanese cruiser are completely uninteresting. For one simple reason: our sailors did not believe that the hit to the Yakumo was achieved from a long distance.
"Yakumo" received this hit in the period between two phases, when it caught up with the main forces of H. Togo and approached the Russian ships. According to the report of von Essen, the Poltava and Sevastopol trams opened fire on him, while the distance between Poltava and Yakumo (again, according to von Essen) was no more than 40 cables. Thus, regardless of the distance from which the projectile that hit the Yakumo was actually fired, the Russian sailors had no reason to believe that this was an effective hit from 65 cables.
If you look at the experience of the battle at Shantung as a whole, it is quite obvious that while the Japanese fleet was fighting at a long distance, it did not achieve its goal - it could not stop the Russian ships breaking through to Vladivostok. Success came only during the next phase, when the main forces of H. Togo caught up with the 1st Pacific Squadron, entered the battle at a distance of 40-45 cables and then reduced it to 24 cables and even less.
Thus, the battle at Shantung rather disproved the usefulness of combat at a distance of 60–80 cables, rather than confirmed it. And therefore there is nothing surprising in the fact that Cherkasov (senior artillery officer of Peresvet), who participated in this battle, considered 60 cables to be the maximum distance of an artillery battle based on the results of the battle, and Grevenitz adhered to the same point of view even after the Russo-Japanese War.
About the material part
Let's start with a simple one - the 254-mm and 305-mm turrets of the Russian fleet were technically not very suitable for firing at such distances. During the cross-fire on April 2, the battleship "Poltava", firing two shots at an elevation angle close to the maximum, encountered the fact that piller rivets began to fly out. The machine broke down at Sevastopol. On "Peresvet", when shooting at 90 cables, too strong shocks and periodic failure of the electrical supply in the towers were noted.
Removal of the gun damaged by the shooting from the battleship "Sevastopol"
In principle, our towers did not have any catastrophic flaws, it was about the need for some improvement, but who and when would have done it during the war?
Further. Shooting at such distances was not at all provided with the fire control capabilities available in those years. Even the most modern rangefinders, which entered the Russian fleet after the start of the Russo-Japanese War with a base of 4,5 feet, could not determine such distances with acceptable accuracy. Of course, it was possible, having determined the distance to the enemy at least in the largest approximation, to clarify it by zeroing in, but there were some difficulties.
As you know, in the Russian fleet, 152-mm cannons were shot everywhere. Taking into account the fact that the maximum range of such guns on the battleships of the Borodino type reached 62 cables, this was the maximum distance at which it was possible to start zeroing. Since the maximum range of guns in battle is usually slightly lower than the passport values, perhaps it should be said that technically six-inch guns could shoot and fight somewhere in the 57-60 cables maximum.
But - only on condition that the ammunition contains suitable shells, the fall of which will be clearly distinguishable. In the opinion of our naval officers, the fall of the Japanese high-explosive shells was quite clearly visible to 60 cables, but we did not have such shells. As for the available steel high-explosive, not exploding on the water, or cast iron, which, although they had an instant detonator, but carried only a small charge of black powder, the fall of such shells could be observed by about 40 cables. It was not that zeroing in with our 60-cable Tsushima shells was completely impossible, but it obviously required ideal weather conditions, which do not always happen at sea.
Thus, in order to fight at distances of 60-80 cables, it was required to shoot from 305-mm guns. Which, alas, at that time were not very suitable for this task.
The problem was that our 305-mm / 40 cannons, which in the bulk were armed with Russian squadron battleships during the Russo-Japanese War, even according to a passport could fire no more than once every 90 seconds, but in reality, even a two-minute readiness to the shot was considered a good achievement. It was extremely difficult to shoot from such artillery systems.
The more often the guns were fired, the easier it was for the senior artilleryman to "discard" the inevitable errors that did not depend on the sight taken, such as dispersion and error in the "sampling" of the roll angle. Therefore, ideally, by the time the fire manager sees the fall of the volley, calculates and determines the necessary amendments, the guns should be ready to fire the next volley. Six-inches, quite capable of firing several shots per minute, met this task, but twelve-inches, with their more than two-minute pause, did not.
The low rate of fire of domestic 305-mm guns made it difficult to zero in, requiring an increased consumption of shells for it. At the same time, twelve-inch shells were too valuable to be scattered about.
Even retrospectively, taking into account the afterthought, one could hardly expect that in the absence of high-quality rangefinders, calculating devices, etc. squadron battleships fighting on 60-80 cables would be able to achieve an accuracy of 3-4%. But if so, the Russian battleships, having a standard ammunition load of 60 rounds per gun, could count on 7-10 hits if the ammunition was completely used up. And since the shells at such distances did not penetrate any thick armor, it was impossible to count on inflicting decisive damage. So what is the point in fighting and wasting precious ammunition without the hope of achieving a decisive result?
Between the Russo-Japanese War and the First World War, much more advanced rangefinders appeared, a number of upgrades made it possible to increase the rate of fire of 305-mm / 40 guns to approximately one shot in 45-50 seconds, calculating devices appeared as part of artillery fire control devices. All this created the prerequisites for effective shooting at a distance of 70-100 cables.
But in the Russo-Japanese War, these prerequisites did not yet exist.
About the theory of artillery combat
Alas, the level of Russian artillery science did not allow effective long-range shooting. I would like to note that the Black Sea Fleet, which in the period before the First World War showed excellent accuracy when firing at long distances in exercises, did not achieve this immediately and not suddenly, but through a lot of practice, a comparative test of different methods and a huge one, by Dotsushima standards. consumption of heavy shells.
In order to successfully fire at long distances with the shells at the disposal of the Russian Imperial Navy, it was necessary to zero in with volleys, use a fork, and evaluate flights and covers by missing bursts. In the Russo-Japanese War, methods that would take into account all this simply did not exist. Grevenitz included shooting in volleys in his instructions, but it is unclear whether this happened during the Russo-Japanese War, or after it? ZP Rozhestvensky, by a separate order, approved the need for a fork - but nothing more.
Thus, in order to develop a method of shooting at long distances with the main caliber, it was required to conduct a lot of experimental shooting, their analysis, etc. etc. - the Russian Empire, which entered the war, had neither the time nor the resources for this. And even if such techniques were created, there would be little sense from them, because there would be no time left for training the gunners anyway.
Suppose that the experience of the battle at Shantung would nevertheless initiate the creation of a method of shooting for 60–80 cables. But when was it done? While the commanders would write their reports, while they would be transferred to Petersburg, while they were analyzed there and appropriate decisions would be made, in any case, weeks would have passed, that is, the decision would have been made, at best, in mid-August 1904. And the 2nd Pacific Squadron left its native shores on October 2, 1904, in other words, there was at most a month and a half before its departure. It would be strange to expect that during this time it would be possible to create a method of shooting at "ultra-long" (for those times) distances: after the war, the Black Sea artillerymen took much longer to do this.
But even if they did, when was it to teach this technique to the gunners of the 2nd Pacific? On a hike? So he in itself was an extremely difficult and difficult event, which, generally speaking, had no analogues in the past.
Both Russian and foreign warships went to the Far East, of course. But these campaigns were carried out by individual ships or small detachments, in peacetime, when any harbors and ports were ready to receive them. Here it was necessary to drag a large squadron across half the world, made up of very different ships, a significant part of which was simply not intended for such transitions (destroyers), the other was just built and did not have the practice and time to identify and eliminate technical faults.
Do not forget that initially, when ZP Rozhestvensky's ships left, long-term anchorages in Madagascar and off the coast of Annam were not planned at all, that is, there was no time for long-term exercises. In addition, the same resource issue arose - such training required a large consumption of large-caliber shells, which the squadron could not afford.
The analogies are, of course, rather arbitrary.
But in my opinion, the proposal of the 2nd Pacific Squadron to study new methods of artillery combat on a campaign is somewhat akin to recommending a Soviet tank corps of 1941 model not only to engage in battle with the Nazis immediately after an 800-kilometer march, but also to Also, on the way, he mastered and worked out the tactics used by the German "Panzerwaffe". Despite the fact that the means of communication and additional cars that are needed for this were not delivered to our corps, and only a little more than usual was given out fuel and ammunition.
And what about the Japanese?
In view of the above, it is not surprising that H. Togo, after the battle at Shantung, did not at all strive for long-range combat. Preparing for Tsushima, he assumed it was necessary to start the battle at 33 cables (6 m) and did not recommend shooting at more than 000 cables (38 m).
Conclusions
The Russian Imperial Navy was absolutely not ready to shoot 60-80 cables in the Russo-Japanese War.
He had no prerequisites for this. The experience gained did not indicate the need for shooting at such distances. There were no such shooting techniques: in fact, the best available techniques were not optimal even for a fight of 40-60 cables. The material part had 3 critical and irreparable shortcomings in wartime: low accuracy of rangefinders, low rate of fire and technical unreliability of heavy artillery mounts when firing at distances close to maximum.
At the same time, the experience of previous battles testified that even if the battle began at a great distance, the enemy would strive to reduce it to at least 30–40 cables or even closer.
Z.P. Rozhestvensky wrote in his order:
“Our seven battleships with Nakhimov, seven cruisers with Almaz, seven destroyers and armed transports are a very great force.
The enemy will not dare to oppose his fleet to her otherwise than from long distances and with the expectation of an advantage in the course: he has docks; he can repair underwater parts. This means that we must reckon with this: let him walk as soon as possible, if only we knew how to reach it with fire at the distances from which it will hit us. "
The enemy will not dare to oppose his fleet to her otherwise than from long distances and with the expectation of an advantage in the course: he has docks; he can repair underwater parts. This means that we must reckon with this: let him walk as soon as possible, if only we knew how to reach it with fire at the distances from which it will hit us. "
The logic is quite obvious here.
Since the Russian squadron is superior to the Japanese fleet in heavy guns, it will have an advantage at short distances, where 254-305-mm shells can penetrate enemy armor. The Japanese, possessing superiority in speed, will strive to maintain a distance that excludes the defeat of the most protected parts of their ships with armor-piercing shells.
ZP Rozhestvensky ordered to switch to armor-piercing shells with a caliber of 254-305 mm from 20 cables, and it could be assumed that the Japanese would not approach such a distance. Without superiority in speed, it was impossible to impose rapprochement on them. At the same time, H. Togo achieved success at Shantung in the 2nd phase of the battle, where the battle distance was reduced from 40–45 to 24 cables.
It was to be expected that in Tsushima a decisive battle would be fought at 25-45 cables, that is, at a distance from where the Japanese could shoot accurately enough, but without entering the zone of destruction of armor-piercing shells of Russian heavy guns. This assumption was quite logical, it took into account the combat experience acquired by our sailors, and fully corresponded to the real Japanese plans. Except perhaps that H. Togo in the Tsushima battle, having seriously damaged the head Russian battleships, was not afraid to converge with the Russian ships and closer than 20 cables.
Thus, the artillerymen of the 2nd and 3rd Pacific squadrons should have been trained for combat at a distance of 25-45 cables, and if further, it would still be within the firing range of six-inch artillery, that is, no more than 60 cables. This could be done according to the methods that existed at that time, allowed for zeroing from 152-mm guns and did not "overextend" the turret mounts of heavy guns.
Judging by the testimony of senior artillery officers, this is exactly how the 2nd Pacific Squadron trained.
From the story of the senior artillery officer of the battleship "Eagle" Lieutenant Shamshev:
The firing was carried out by the entire squadron, at the pyramidal shields; walked in wake formation; the distance between ships is 2 cables; weather conditions are favorable. The longest distance is 55, the shortest is 15 cables.
Testimony of the senior artillery officer of the battleship Sisoy the Great, Lieutenant Malechkin:
Shooting was carried out at long distances, starting from about 70 cab. and up to 40 cab., but "Sisoy the Great" usually started firing from 60 cab. from 12 "guns, and from 50 cab. from 6" guns, because the elevation angles of the guns did not allow using a larger tabular range.
From the memoirs of an artillery officer of the cruiser "Admiral Nakhimov" Lieutenant Smirnov:
During the firing, the squadron maneuvered around the set three pyramidal shields; the shooting took place at a distance of 15–20 cab. for small artillery and 25-40 cab. for large.
Noteworthy is the large scatter in the readings.
In my opinion, this is due to the ambiguity of the wording of the question about the firing of the Investigative Commission, which sounded like this: "What practical firing were carried out by the ships of the 2nd squadron and how many shots were fired with real shells (and not training barrels) from each 6", 8 " , 10 "and 12" guns? "
Accordingly, there was no direct question about the distance at all, and one officer could talk about the distance at the moment the rangefinder began measuring it, another at the start of zeroing, and the third about the distance from which fire was opened to kill. At the same time, as you know, the lead ship of the detachment carried out the sighting, thus, for example, the same Malechkin could indicate the distance from the "Sisoy the Great" to the shield at the moment when the "Oslyabya" began sighting.
In general, in my opinion, the distances at which the 2nd Pacific squadron's artillery exercises were conducted were quite adequate.
But does this mean that the artillery exercises of the 2nd Pacific Squadron in Madagascar were carried out perfectly?
I do not think so.
The fact is that the ships of the 2nd Pacific fired in succession: the lead ship fired, and then transmitted the distance to the rest. In my opinion, this method of centralization did not provide sufficient practice for the fire control of other ships. In my opinion, ZP Rozhestvensky should pay more attention to individual ship firing, in which the senior artillery officer of each ship would determine the distance and carry out zeroing independently.
But you need to understand that the principle of concentrating fire on one target was almost fundamental in our fleet not only in those years, but also much later (remember the post-war methods of the Black Sea battleships). Such centralization, when the best artillerymen of "Suvorov" and "Oslyabi" would control the fire of the detachment, in theory could allow a very effective battle at medium range.
On the one hand, there were no examples of successful squadron firing of the 1st Pacific Squadron in the Russo-Japanese War, and there were no attempts to organize such firing.
On the other hand, it is quite possible that ZP Rozhdestvensky considered the detachment concentration of the detachment's fire on one target as a kind of surprise for Admiral Togo. A means to even out the odds a little in the coming battle.
However, the latter is nothing more than my guesses.
Продолжение следует ...