After letting go of his worries, Bai Zhizhan finally slept peacefully.

In fact, it was only a few hours, and I woke up before dawn.

After breakfast, Bai Zhizhan returned to the commander's bridge.

"These were all received last night, no surprises. No, I've got to get some sleep and don't call me until lunch. ”

"Okay, you go and rest."

Waiting for Li Mingbo to go out, Bai Zhizhan sat down and picked up the telegram left by Li Mingbo.

There are only two important news.

Just after three o'clock in the morning, the "Wuzhou" sent a telegram saying that it had encountered the first main force in the Shuangche Strait and had withdrawn after the battle. By the end of the artillery battle, the 1st Main Squadron had turned to the northeast, but its destination could not be deduced.

In the final battle, the cruiser detachment destroyed and damaged several pursuing Narrow-minded warships.

By the time the telegram was sent, the cruiser detachment had gotten rid of all enemy ships and was sailing in the direction of the Watchman's Strait, in an attempt to catch up with the 1st main squadron.

The guards clearly mentioned that after catching up with the first main team, they would immediately send a report to the powerhouse.

After that, another telegram came from the "Wuzhou". If you don't catch up with the first main team and don't receive a telegram from Bai Zhizhan, you will return to Asahimi from the Watcher Strait, and the estimated arrival time is the evening of the 28th. The implication is that if there are other arrangements, you have to send a report to contact you before that.

Another piece of news came from the home fleet, which Gui Boyong personally signed.

He had received a telegram from the White Stop War, and would send all his seaplanes to monitor the Watchman's Strait before dawn and search the waters east of the strait.

To this end, the home fleet has already sent four heavy cruisers out at full speed.

The main reason is that the range of carrier-based seaplanes is limited, and the heavy cruiser needs to go 200 kilometers forward before it can fly to the waters east of the Watchman Strait to carry out reconnaissance missions.

There are sixteen seaplanes in total, all of which will depart before five in the morning.

Because the time of the report was before five o'clock, and the four heavy cruisers would not immediately report to the flagship, it is not clear how many seaplanes were successfully lifted into the air.

Gui Boyong mentioned in the telegram that after receiving the news, he would immediately contact Bai Zhizhan.

In addition, the message contained a communication channel used by the seaplane, so that the third air task force could intercept the seaplane's telegram as long as it was within the working distance of the station.

Sixteen seaplanes looked like a lot, but Bai Zhizhan was not at all at ease.

If anything, because it has never been taken seriously, there have always been various problems with the carrier-based seaplanes of the Imperial Navy. In fact, in the past ten years, the Imperial Navy has been using carrier-based seaplanes as search and rescue platforms, that is, searching for officers and soldiers who have fallen into the water during battles, such as pilots who parachute and make forced landings, and have never thought of using carrier-based seaplanes to carry out reconnaissance missions.

For the same reason, seaplanes are slow and have a short range.

While the problem of short range has been improved, the problem of slow speed has not been solved. Dragging a huge pontoon, even with the best engine, is certainly much slower than the carrier-based aircraft of the same era, and the efficiency of carrying out reconnaissance missions is far inferior to that of carrier-based aircraft.

Besides, before the Great War, the Imperial Navy really did not encounter a situation where carrier-based aircraft were insufficient.

Looking at the whole world, the fleet aircraft carriers of the Imperial Navy are among the best in their ability to carry combat aircraft, and special emphasis is placed on and attention to aviation combat capabilities.

Not to mention anything else, in the combat state, the "Imperial Capital" class can carry up to three additional squadrons and more than 20 carrier-based aircraft.

Bai Zhizhan made a second-hand arrangement.

When he came to command the bridge, Li Yunxiang was at the aviation operations center below, arranging tasks for the pilots who were the first to be dispatched today.

It's a reconnaissance mission!

The two aircraft carriers each dispatched eight Exocet, and all of them were commanders' landlines, and both were equipped with long-wave radio stations. In order to get enough range, they all took off overloaded, and they carried a large auxiliary fuel tank on the central hardpoint in the belly. The key point is that on the way to the northwest, that is, to the north and south of the Sadou Islands, the reconnaissance plane had to return to the direction of Ashishima and land at the Ashishima airfield after discovering the target, that is, the Third Air Force. If no orders were received from the fleet after that, they would be temporarily assigned to the 1st Carrier Air Wing, which had already arrived at Ashshima.

To put it simply, you don't have to fly back.

It is not that the range is insufficient, but that the return of the reconnaissance plane may not expose the Third Air Task Force.

It's just that the problem of such an arrangement is also prominent.

After yesterday's battle, the 3rd Carrier-Air Wing had only 47 torpedo planes left, including two spare planes that had been cobbled together overnight, and after 16 sorties were dispatched to carry out reconnaissance missions, the remaining 31 were only enough to launch an attack.

If two attacks are needed, then in the second round there will be no torpedo machines available!

Bombers, that's still enough!

Originally, there were sixty-four, but yesterday they lost seven, and counting the spare planes, now there are fifty-nine, which is enough for two rounds of attacks.

Fortunately, the targets were the two small fleet carriers of the Third Air Force, and the dive bombers were the main force.

As a result, sixteen seaplanes and sixteen torpedo planes carried out reconnaissance missions.

In Li Yunxiang's words, as long as the Third Air Force follows behind the Second Main Force or follows the Second Main Force to the Watchman Strait and dispatches fighters in the rear to provide air defense cover for the Second Main Force Force, it will definitely be found by reconnaissance planes.

The north-south Sadou Islands run northeast to southwest, like a chain between the Asahi Sea and the Guia Ocean, and the Watchman Strait is in the middle of the archipelago. Geographically, the Watchman Strait is the boundary between the North and South Sadou Islands, but the exact location is actually slightly southwest and not in the middle. It is also because of this that the Watchman Strait is closer to Foot Island.

This decided that the 3rd Air Force could only operate in the southeastern direction of the Watchman Strait.

To the south of the Channel?

It was too close to Ashishima and could easily be spotted not only by Ashishima patrol planes, but also by shore-based aviation units deployed on Ashishima.

Yesterday, the shore-based aviation forces of Ashishima had already attacked the second main force.

At that time, there were zeros of the 5th Air Force to provide cover, and did the 3rd Air Force have so many zeros?

East of the Strait?

Yes, but you won't be able to join up with the main team returning at full speed in time.

At least judging from the telegram sent by the "Wuzhou", it is likely that the first main team will go directly to the Watcher Strait after turning.

Don't forget that two of the Imperial Navy's cutting-edge fast battleships have returned to Asahi.

In the Narrow Navy, in addition to the four "Golden Steel" class ships that have not yet escaped, only the two "Gate" class of the first main force team can block two fast battleships in the Watcher Strait. Although the "Gate" class was not fast enough, its sixteen-inch naval guns were sharp enough. Theoretically, only the sixteen-inch guns of the "Gate" class could pose a threat to the Imperial Navy's cutting-edge fast battleships.

It can be seen that the Third Air Force is likely to move south to meet the returning First Main Force.

Now, the net has been spread, just waiting for the enemy to throw it from you!