financing was diverted to the completion of the and the new cruisers, so the repairs of Sissoi Veliky proceeded at a slow pace. She had her artillery, boilers and ventilation system completely replaced, but once again it turned out that the repairs were not up to scratch and needed a thorough rework. The Russo-Japanese War broke out in the Pacific on 1904. In March the navy assigned Sissoi Veliky to the Second Pacific Squadron bound for the Pacific with Admiral Zinovy Rozhestvensky in command. Despite the urgency, calls to speed up repairs of Sissoi Veliky and completion of the new ships were stonewalled by the Ministry of the Navy until the shocking loss of Petropavlovsk on . Admiral Aleksei Birilev, the new Governor of Kronstadt, hastened the repairs by striking out "unnecessary" jobs. Sissoi Veliky went into action with new rangefinders, searchlights and small-calibre guns, but her damaged internal decks were never mended. Manuil Ozerov, the captain of Sissoi Veliky, expressed concern about her stability, but on at least three occasions Birilev suppressed his reports, arguing that past experience is sufficient proof of the ship's seaworthiness. On the Second Pacific Squadron sailed from Saint Peterburg to Reval, where it wasted nearly a whole month in preparation for a fleet review. Tsar Nicholas II personally visited each battleship and harangued the crews in anticipation of a victory over Japan. On the squadron departed Libau, and sailed to Tangier. Here, Rozhestvensky split his forces. The newer battleships continued their way past the Cape of Good Hope and Rear Admiral Dmitry von Fölkersam's squadron of cruisers and transports were ordered to rendezvous with Black Sea Fleet ships in Souda Bay and then take the short route via the Suez Canal. Rozhestvensky initially planned to keep Sissoi Veliky and Navarin with his main force, but assigned them to Fölkersam instead. The ship rejoined Rozhestvesky's fleet at Nosy Be, Madagascar on where they stayed for two months, training while Rozhestvensky finalized coaling arrangements for the next leg of the journey. Despite regular exercise, the gunners of the new Borodino-class ships could not match the level of Sissoi Veliky and other old ships. The squadron sailed for Camranh Bay, French Indochina, on and reached it almost a month later to await the obsolete ships of the 3rd Pacific Squadron, commanded by Rear Admiral Nikolai Nebogatov. The latter ships reached Camranh Bay on and the combined force