Less than 3 minutes apart on the left and right sides of the fleet, two groups of torpedo machines appeared at once. On one side were 15 Avenger torpedo planes from the USS Hornet, and on the other side were 14 torpedo planes of the same model from the USS Enterprise. These two formations were different from the historical ones that attacked separately because they were separated, and now they were successfully organized together to form a joint force. What's more, at an altitude of about 400 meters above them, there are 20 F4F covered each. Zero can no longer attack torpedo planes as recklessly as he did just now.

But in any case, Zero War must do its best to stop the American attack on the fleet. It's just that now there are no more zeros in the air than incoming enemy aircraft, and even no more than escort F4Fs. Because some of the Zero Fighters had already landed and refueled, and others had not yet had time to take off, the US fighters had an advantage in the overall number of fighters in the air today.

Now Ron could see that above him, only 6 Zeros were pounced on the torpedo planes behind them. The first to attack was the formation on the USS Hornet, so the vast majority of the Zero Battles were attracted to them. The observation posts were distracted, so much so that they failed to signal Ron in time when they appeared, and as a result, only a few Zeros, who were still on guard higher above the fleet, had time to pounce on them and intercept them.

The commander of this Zero Fight was Yuichi Miyamoto, an old pilot. He judged that it would be difficult for the opposing fighters to climb to their altitude to intercept them, so they could have flown directly over the F4F group and then swoop down to attack from the flanks and rear hemispheres of the torpedo group. However, because the enemy plane was discovered too late, if it had done so, the enemy would have already entered the attack course and dropped torpedoes. If the enemy calmly drops torpedoes, if the mothership is hit, even if all the enemy planes can be shot down one by one, it will be a failure. Therefore, it is now necessary to dive head-on, directly break through the interception of the F4F, and shoot down as many enemy planes as possible before dropping torpedoes. Even if you use the way of ramming, you must stop enemy aircraft from dropping torpedoes!

So these Zero Battles uncharacteristically rushed directly head-on. (Under normal circumstances, Zero will avoid a head-to-head situation.) Since the Japanese wanted to come up with a passionate head-to-head shot, the Americans certainly had no reason to refuse. (It's too late to welcome.) Ron pulled the nose and caught up. The distance between the two sides quickly approached, and the American planes opened fire first, (no way, who made the family have a longer range.) The Japanese planes dodged as they continued to close, and a Zero appeared directly in front of Ron, who put it into the shooting halo and fired a long point shot. Then he saw a lot of debris falling from the plane, and then thick black smoke and orange flames came out of the plane. But the plane wasn't completely out of control, and it continued to charge at Ron, first with a 7.7mm machine gun, and then with two 20-gun guns. Obviously, the plane was going to fight with Ron. But how could Ron let him get his wish, with a light push, the nose of the F4F sank, and all the cannonballs fired from the opposite side whizzed over Ron's head, and then the Zero Battle, dragging smoke and flames, also rushed over Ron's head, and Ron turned around and saw it fall straight into the sea - this was Ron's seventh victory.

Just as Ron shot down a Zero, Yuichi Miyamoto also entered the confrontation with the F4F, and when the two sides were still 700 meters apart, the opposite F4F had already begun to fire fiercely. (The U.S. military's .50 machine gun bullet has a high muzzle velocity and a good bullet shape, so it has a large range.) Even in tail pursuit, it can effectively hit targets at a distance of 500 meters. Head-on, because the direction of movement of both sides is opposite, it is possible to shoot effectively at a greater distance. From Yuichi Miyamoto's point of view, those .50 machine gun tracer rounds were like a swarm of angry hornets coming straight at him. Yuichi Miyamoto made a sharp putt, and Zero Battle made a negative G action lightly, and quickly sank downward. This maneuver is a common dodge maneuver when being attacked head-on, and in the eyes of the opposite pilot, the Zero on the opposite side suddenly disappears. Of course, the Zero did not disappear, it only entered the blind spot of the F4F's line of sight - the F4F pilot's view was blocked by his own nose at this time.

If you are an experienced old bird, you will definitely do a barrel roll or side-slide to defend against such a situation. But Anand, who is now in the cockpit, is not a seasoned old bird, although he has excellent grades in flight school, but rookies are only rookies after all, and he was stunned at this moment. Although this period of time is short, maybe less than a second. But this second can make the difference between life and death.

After a putt, Yuichi Miyamoto immediately pulled a lever. With the nose of the aircraft raised, the oncoming F4F has been firmly encased in his shooting halo. And because the distance between the two sides is very fast in the head-on state, the other side has now entered the range of the 20mm gun of the zero battle. Miyamoto pressed the launch button fiercely, and a string of orange fireballs roared out.

The oncoming shells are also far more powerful than when they are chasing after them, and even a sturdy F4F will never be able to withstand them. This 20mm shell hit the Anand fighter head-on, and the plane trembled violently under the blow, and then, in fact, with a violent explosion, the whole plane disintegrated in the air, turning into a large pile of falling debris. Anand, the honor student of this flight school, was killed in honor of his country in the first real air battle of his life when he was hit by the first string of shells fired by the enemy. Perhaps as long as he survives the first few air battles, he will be able to grow up and become a true old bird, and even in the ranks of these old birds, he will have a chance to become the best, a formidable, evil, terrifying butcher's bird. However, there is never a possibility on the battlefield, and the life of a rookie here can always only be counted in minutes.

But the situation of Miyamoto the victor was not so good, as a piece of debris flying from the exploding enemy plane hit his plane, hitting one side of the aileron, rendering the aileron almost completely ineffective. This nimble plane, all at once, turned into a waddling duck. If it was a normal time, Miyamoto was completely sure that he would still be able to land safely on it. But now, this is clearly not possible. Although all the enemy planes have staggered past them, as soon as the enemy turns around, the zero battle of this aileron's failure has been washed and put on the chopping board. Anyone, even a rookie, can easily shoot it down. -- Sometimes it's not just technology that determines the outcome of an air battle, but also luck. (So giving up your seat to your grandmother on the bus is extremely important and should not be neglected.) ）

In this head-to-head hedge, two planes were shot down on both sides. In addition, two planes on the American side were slightly injured (they were hit by 7.7, but they had little impact on the operation), and on the Japanese side, Miyamoto's captain was seriously injured. Taking into account the range and numerical superiority of the F4F, as well as the influence of luck factors, it has to be said that in this hit, the Japanese naval pilots demonstrated an extremely high level of technology.

Now the remaining 4 Zeros (one of them was seriously damaged and almost difficult to fly) were able to directly face the torpedo formation. They had to shoot down as many torpedo planes as possible before American fighters turned their heads.

Miyamoto still piloted the almost out-of-control fighter, staggering towards a torpedo plane, he began to fire at the plane, but because his fighter plane was always writhing uncontrollably, none of these shells hit, looking back at the American fighter jets turned their heads through a half-somersault, and they were about to kill back. Moreover, the torpedo machine has already entered the attack route and is about to drop a deadly torpedo.

"There's no time." Miyamoto looked at the friend next to him, and silently said in his heart: "Gentlemen, I've seen you at the Yasukuni Shrine." Then he drove the plane and hit the "Avenger" in front of him, which had already entered the attack route and was about to drop a torpedo.

The Avenger avoided the impact of this clumsy fighter plane in a sharp turn, and in reality, not every warrior with the belief of dying together can succeed. Miyamoto's plane slammed into the sea, stirring up a huge, beautiful snow-white splash of water that fluttered in the sea breeze like the cherry blossoms in Ueno Park in late spring.

Miyamoto's sacrifice was not meaningless, and in order to avoid his impact, the torpedo plane hastily dropped the torpedo in advance, and judging by the crooked track of this torpedo, it must have hit crookedly.

Before the U.S. fighter jets turned back, the other three Zeros were also desperately spraying ammunition at the torpedo planes. There were already three torpedo planes that were smoking, but these three planes did not drop their torpedoes and get out of the queue, in fact, as long as they did, those Zeros would definitely abandon the attack on them and move on to other targets. The three planes were still trying to hold their attack course, moving forward......

By the time the U.S. fighter jets turned back, two of the three torpedo planes had already been shot down, and one had also been heavily damaged, apparently unable to fly back. But all three aircraft fulfilled the task of dropping torpedoes. Now, a large net woven from the tracks of the torpedoes dropped by these 14 torpedo planes has tightly held the Soryu and the Flying Dragon aircraft carriers in the center. No matter how these two big fish struggle, at least two or three torpedoes will be able to hit.

Just as Ron was aiming at a Zero and was about to take out his wingman to kill it, the Zero was rushing straight towards the sea. Crashed into a torpedo that was being fired at the mothership.

A beautiful cherry blossom bloomed again on the surface of the sea, but he did not hit the torpedo, which was too small and several meters underwater. The white tracks on the surface of the water were actually just the gas that drove the torpedoes. So the top of the track is not a torpedo, the torpedo is a little ahead. The success rate of hitting a torpedo with a fighter is actually very small.

But inspired by it, the remaining two Zeros actually hit the torpedo without hesitation. However, they did not succeed either. Looking at the cherry blossoms on the sea that had dissipated, although Ron hated the Japanese to the core, he still raised his hand and silently gave a military salute in the direction where the Zero War fell.

Despite the Dragon's best efforts, two torpedoes hit him. The continuous explosion of the torpedo stirred up a huge column of water, and the huge Canglong trembled in the explosion. The Wyvern, on the other hand, was particularly eye-catching, making an extremely precise turn from her massive hull, so that the two torpedoes passed by, leaving the carrier unscathed.

At the same time, on the other side of the fleet, the formations of fighters and torpedo planes that took off from the Hornet were bogged down in bitter battles. Let's go back a few minutes to a few minutes ago, due to the early detection by the Japanese, these planes were attacked by the Japanese intensively, and they were first greeted by more than 25 Zeros. This time, the Zero no longer had the option of firing head-to-head with the escorted F4Fs, as they now had enough time - the torpedo planes would have to go on an attack course for at least 4 minutes before they could enter the attack course and drop the torpedoes.

The Zero crossed the F4F, which was flying a little ahead of the torpedo planes, from a higher altitude, and then killed the torpedo group with a dive. The escorting F4F also immediately turned around with a half-somersault and pounced towards Zero. A scuffle began.

F4F pilot Lawrence was bitten to death by a Zero, and the 7.7mm machine gun behind it had already hit his fighter more than once. Fortunately, the F4F is relatively strong, and it is worthy of being a product of the Grumman Steel Works (the fighters produced by Grumman are quite strong and durable, so the Grumman Aircraft Company got the nickname Grumman Steel Works.) This injury has not affected the plane much now. However, if you get a few 20mm shells, it's hard to say. Fortunately, at this time, a wildcat rushing from the direction of 9 o'clock saved him, and although the plane's shot did not hit the Zero behind him, the flying bullets also forced it to abandon the attack on Lawrence.

Just as Lawrence was relieved to have escaped, a Zero-Fight unexpectedly appeared in front of him. The Zero, which was chasing a torpedo machine, inadvertently ran ahead of Lawrence, so much so that Lawrence had no trouble taking a vantage point in its rear hemisphere. And it is likely that the pilot of the Zero War may not have realized that just as he was about to attack the torpedo plane, someone was also preparing to attack him. If it were normal, Lawrence would have quietly touched it, and when he was most sure, he would shoot him hard and send him to the sea to feed the fish. But now the situation is different, and the Zero is about to fire at the torpedo machine. Protecting your comrades is always a priority over shooting down your enemies. This is the basic work ethic of a pilot. So Lawrence opened fire at a distance of 450 meters. It is difficult to hit accurately at this distance, and the intersection point of Lawrence's machine gun is set at 250 meters, (so that the meeting point is set closer so that it can be fatal with one hit when it is more sure) that means that the density of bullets is highest at this distance, beyond this distance, the bullets begin to scatter. However, Lawrence's purpose was not to shoot down the enemy plane, he was trying to stop the enemy from attacking the torpedo plane.

The Zero was startled by the tracer bullets flying by, and it immediately gave up its attack on the torpedo plane, and with a sharp turn, it got rid of Lawrence. At this time, Lawrence didn't care about chasing it at all, because another Zero was eyeing him.

In a skirmish, there may be an enemy plane in your rear hemisphere at any given moment, or an enemy plane may expose 6 points to you on its own. The chances of everyone opening fire are greatly increased, and sometimes the situation in the air is like a large sandwich, with an American torpedo plane in front, a Japanese Zero-fight behind it, then an F4F, and then a ......

In just a few minutes, fire was being fired everywhere, Ono was aiming at the torpedo machine, Sam was firing at Ono, Oshima was firing at Sam, and then ...... And then, well, 15 torpedo planes were shot down, 6 more, and two were also seriously injured, and it is estimated that they will not be able to fly back. The remaining 7 were not unscathed. Of the 20 F4Fs, 6 were also shot down, and 3 more were seriously injured and withdrew from the battle. Of course, the Japanese were not unscathed, although their superb technology and excellent flight performance and even numerical superiority gave them the upper hand in the melee, but the F4F also relied on a solid airframe, more effective firepower, and radio superiority to make the Japanese pay a considerable price - a total of 10 Zeros were shot down in air combat, but the rest of the aircraft were not injured. (Because the structure of the Zero War is too fragile, it is basically the end if it is hit, so the probability of being injured and not shot down is indeed not high) Although the losses are very large, the US aircraft group still firmly approached the enemy fleet, and if it advanced a little further, it entered the range of torpedoes!

Now those large-caliber high-level dual-purpose guns of Japanese warships also began to shoot at them. Although the projectile power of these large-caliber antiaircraft guns is very large, the rate of fire is limited, and at this time, the radio proximity fuse has not yet been invented, and the projectile still uses a timing fuze, so if the enemy plane dodges, their threat to the aircraft is actually very limited, and the purpose of launching them may not be to rely on them to shoot down the enemy plane, but to use them to disrupt the enemy's formation. Jamming enemy aircraft to drop torpedoes. With the flickering fires from the Japanese warships, around the aircraft group, and even in the gap between the formations, flowers of death composed of flames and smoke continued to bloom. However, the US torpedo group still firmly maintained its formation and advanced forward. At the same time as the large-caliber anti-aircraft guns opened fire, according to the code, the fighters responsible for interception should have withdrawn from the battle to avoid being accidentally injured by the fire of the anti-aircraft guns. But at this time, the Japanese pilots did not even retreat, they braved the fire of their own people, still tightly biting the torpedo plane, and the American F4F also ignored the threat of anti-aircraft fire, and still tried their best to prevent the attack of the torpedo planes by the Zero War. In a sea of flowers of death formed by the constantly exploding anti-aircraft shells, the fighters of both sides fluttered like elves.

At this distance, two more torpedo planes and one F4F were shot down, (one of which was already seriously damaged) and two Japanese Zeros were also hit by anti-aircraft fire and crashed. But the remaining torpedo machines finally rushed into torpedo range. Now there were only 7 torpedoes, and the formation of the torpedo planes was not ideal due to the interception in front of them, but in any case, the torpedoes were finally dropped, and they pulled a long snow-white track and shot like sharp swords at the Japanese aircraft carriers Kaga and Akagi.

The "Avengers", having dropped their torpedoes, urgently pulled up and prepared to withdraw from the battle, but by this time they were already within the range of the ship's small-caliber anti-aircraft guns, these guys had a fast rate of fire and were a much greater threat to aircraft than large-caliber anti-aircraft guns. In the process of turning, 3 more torpedo machines were shot down. Now after a few minutes of fierce fighting, only 4 of the 15 torpedo planes at the time of the sortie remained!

Due to the amount of interference received during the mine-dropping, the torpedoes dropped by these torpedo machines failed to hit any of the carriers. Nagumo's aircraft carrier experienced this large-scale attack, and only the Soryu lost the ability to sail at high speed due to a medium mine, and there was an inclination of about 8 degrees, temporarily losing the ability to take off and land aircraft. Both it and the mothership are intact. Nagumo believed that as long as the fighters above them flew together, they would be able to completely destroy the American fleet. Now maybe it was the turn of the Japanese to attack.

Just when Nagumo was full of ambition, the air defense siren sounded again: "Dive bombers found!" ”