Munitions Empire

The Great Tang Empire now possesses many ports, with giant ones including Linshui, Beiyuan, Dongwan, Nanshan, Dragon Harbor, and Weigang.

So many ports actually have huge docks and can build large ships. Among them, Weigang, Nanshan, and Linshui focus mainly on building civilian ships, while Dragon Harbor, Beiyuan, and Dongwan focus primarily on constructing military warships.

However, as time goes by, these ports all have tasks to build various kinds of ships, making such strict definitions impractical.

For example, Weigang was initially a port mainly for building ultra-large civilian ships, but after the Great Tang Empire decided to expand its military, it began taking on the task of building the 4th and 5th aircraft carriers.

Additionally, part of the docks at Linshui Port is also used for building large military ships, including the missile cruisers and missile destroyers of the Great Tang Empire.

The appearance of these warships is actually completely different from traditional destroyers and cruisers, and thus their functions are entirely different.

The new Great Tang Empire missile ships have already discarded the basic structure of artillery warships, increased the size of the superstructure to equip more electronic devices, reduced the number of guns to install more missile slots.

In the trade-offs, missiles, due to their powerful functionality, have been placed in the most important position. To make way for the new missile systems, other functions on destroyers have to step aside.

With the presence of the visionary Tang Mo, the destroyers of the Great Tang Empire have avoided any detours, and the latest missile destroyer has directly removed the aft main gun and designed a relatively large helicopter hangar.

Though from today's perspective, the role of this helicopter hangar is not that significant, Tang Mo knows that future anti-submarine warfare and relay guidance will rely on shipborne helicopters.

The rear part of the hull is largely occupied by the helicopter and helicopter hangar, leaving the midship section for the chimney, and the anti-ship missiles are fitted wherever possible.

Due to tactical reasons, the development speed of the Great Tang Empire's anti-ship missiles hasn't been particularly fast, since the core tactics of the Great Tang Empire Navy don't rely on destroyers for anti-ship combat.

Frankly, destroyers in the Great Tang Empire Navy have always been the knife guards of aircraft carriers, and the Great Tang Empire Navy never counted on destroyers to perform anti-ship tasks.

As for the possibility of developing those terrifying trump cards of the Rabbit Navy later, that's a topic for another time; it's simply not necessary now.

There's no getting around it; shipborne aircraft anti-ship is just too appealing—cost-effective and versatile, much more attractive than anti-ship missiles.

The anti-ship missiles of this era aren't as intelligent and powerful as their successors, therefore, they're not yet capable of challenging the shipborne aircraft anti-ship systems.

When the time comes to bring out the Rabbit's "Eagle Strike" tricks, it will still be in time to discuss whether shipborne aircraft or missiles are more practical.

In front of the chimney and anti-ship missiles is, naturally, the giant bridge, where the ship's entire command system, electronic system, communication system, and radar detection system are integrated. Bringing together so many systems without mutual interference is inherently a challenge to electronic technology levels.

In fact, after installing so many systems, there's almost no room for other equipment on the bridge and mast.

Therefore, those anti-aircraft guns that looked like hedgehogs in the past can no longer be installed around the bridge.

In the end, two multipurpose high-angle machine guns were inserted in the corners just to barely get by with the assignment.

The main air defense weapons of the entire ship are actually concentrated at the front of the ship: a single-arm automatic loading anti-aircraft missile launcher, and a 127mm caliber fully automatic naval gun.

This is basically the go-to air defense weapon system on the entire destroyer; it looks very simple, but its actual effectiveness has greatly increased.

To ensure these two systems can work efficiently, two fire control radars on the bridge will guide the anti-aircraft missiles and naval gun; their destructive efficiency against slow targets is almost one hundred percent.

In comparison with air defense, anti-submarine capabilities are somewhat lagging: the new warship retains the bow sonar and installs two anti-submarine rocket depth charge launchers at the bow.

But to make way for missiles, the torpedo range used on new warships has been somewhat reduced, so the entire ship's anti-submarine capability can only be considered average.

Only when the navy version of the Great Tang Empire's Black Hawk Helicopter starts being deployed, will there be a fundamental improvement in the anti-submarine capabilities of the new warships.

Judging from this warship layout, the new destroyers of the Great Tang Empire are actually much like modern missile destroyers.

This layout is very reasonable and facilitates subsequent improvement and modification. Coupled with the Great Tang Empire Navy's emphasis on blue-water navy and prolonged ocean warfare, the tonnage of the new destroyers has surged to 7,000 tons, comparable to cruisers of other countries.

Tang Mo is well aware of the foresight of this design, thus the new cruisers of the Great Tang Empire Navy also adopt the same layout, only installing higher-powered radar and two sets of anti-aircraft missiles arranged fore and aft.

The new cruisers have a full load displacement of 9,000 tons, leaving a little room for improvement for subsequent new warships.

The massive tonnage leaves a lot of room for follow-up improvements on these new warships, including towed sonar, more advanced radar, larger missiles...

At the same time, the large body makes these warships relatively stable launch platforms at sea, and the ship's anti-sinking capability is very assured.

The huge hull provides naval personnel with a relatively spacious living environment, with ample space inside the ship, ample food and oil reserves, and the ability to better execute long-term sea missions solo.

Also, the phased-array radar system specifically designed for naval warships has begun development, and the development of a new vertical missile launch system has also been placed on the agenda.

In the ports of the Great Tang Empire, such new-style warships are being frantically built. The former beloved Beiyuan-class destroyers have become yesterday's darlings, while the Tengyun-class missile destroyers and Sishui-class missile cruisers have become the new favorites of the Tang Navy commanders.

With the successive construction of these new missile ships, the Great Tang Empire has also begun to sell off existing artillery destroyers on a large scale.

These artillery destroyers, although not equipped with missiles, are fitted with early radar, which is considered rare and valuable by various naval forces.

Thus, yet another arms race has begun.