Black smoke is billowing, white waves are flying, and a large fleet is sailing fast against the rising sun. The red and white St. George's Cross flag www.biquge.info the Pavilion, as if it was still as proud and conceited as it was half a century ago. In the cluster of dozens of ships, a slender giant ship stands out: although her bridge is not as modern as Rodney and Warrior, and her mast is a popular triangular mast during World War I, her handsome and smooth body stands out from the crowd and makes everyone in the world who knows the navy blurt out her name!

On the battlecruiser USS Hood, Vice Admiral Tovey listened to a report on the situation at the front with a pale face. The German battlefleet had already been covered by the air, and the first round of carrier-based aircraft attack groups released by itself with all its might was like a torrent in front of the rocks, which was smashed to pieces in an instant, and scattered in the east and west. The Swordfish crew suffered heavy losses, and a full third of their wings fell. Even so, the sea fighters who escorted it also suffered a quarter of the battle losses, and except for a few German fighters, the British fleet of 67 aircraft in total did not have anything to gain!

Tovey slowly turned around and stared at the aircraft carrier formation not far away. The Ark Royal, the Glory, and the Eagle, three large ships are lined up, and the ground crews on their decks can be seen busy with various preparations. It was from them that the previous wave of fighters took off, and the attack that was supposed to be won became the last goodbye of the British pilots. The reason for this is that the hardware disadvantage of the side is decisive: not only the aircraft performance is inferior, but the design flaws of the aircraft carrier also greatly limit the strength of the attack wave lineup.

At present, except for the Ark Royal, which was just completed in November 1938, with a full length of 244 meters of flight deck and a high speed of 31 knots, which can easily release more than 30 aircraft at a time, the other two aircraft carriers are all broken hands and feet. The Glory can reach speeds of up to 30 knots, but its flight deck is less than 195 meters long; The Eagle's flight deck was nearly 210 meters, but its speed was only 22.5 knots, which was not enough to generate enough deck wind. Now these two half-way aircraft carriers have shown their flaws, even if they are given the latest and greatest aircraft, their combat effectiveness will be increased by the sharp decline in the aircraft sortie ratio.

The gap between the carrier-based aviation and the Germans was so great that the idea of relying on them to inflict heavy damage on the German fleet could almost be declared bankrupt. But how can its own surface fleet play a role? Tovey thought with a heavy heart. Today, the sunny weather in the Norwegian Sea in the south was the perfect stage for the aircraft to show their talents, and Tovey had no illusion that the British Rapid Fleet, led by the Hood, would be able to get close to the German battlefleet outside the port of Bergen without being noticed. Once they were discovered by German reconnaissance planes, the German fleet could either run away in advance or summon a large group of bombers to watch them; No matter how you fight at that time, you will be an out-and-out loser!

Tovey pulled a cigar out of his pocket, lit it, and took a few sharp puffs in his mouth, the crisp and pure sensation running from his throat to his lungs, constantly stimulating his cranial nerves in the repeated aftertaste. This is a habit he has developed in his more than 30 years of military career, and whenever he is in trouble, he always uses nicotine to suppress the anxiety and negative heart. Especially after becoming an admiral, Tovey took calming his emotions as his first priority: because he understood that every decision he made would affect the lives of thousands of officers and men of the fleet, and even the fortunes of the country!

"The advantage of the Germans was in carrier-based aircraft. In any case, the fleet could not be exposed to needless bombing in front of German carrier-based aircraft......" Tovey frowned, and his heart became more worried. At present, the German aircraft carrier is an impassable moat in front of him, and as long as the British fleet wants to regain Norway, it must sail east to collide with the other side. It was easy to avoid it, but it also announced the abandonment of Norway by the British: in the long run, it would be tantamount to quenching the thirst of the Germans and watching the Germans tighten the ropes around Britain's neck.

"Wait, maybe things are turning around?" Suddenly, Tovey's mind raced, and he couldn't help but blurt out. He stood there for a moment, his face gradually revealing a mixed expression: doubt, pain, loss, remorse...... It's a mixture of words that is hard to describe. Tovey bit the cigar from his mouth to clear the negative emotions away, and now he had no more suitable choice but to give it a try.

"The order was given, and the fleet turned its rudder and headed due south. The aircraft carrier formation left 1 squadron of fighters, and the rest of the fighters all went to support the slow battlefleet. Tovey took the light curling cigar in his mouth and said to the lieutenant beside him in a calm voice.

In view of the current battlefield situation, Tovey still has a very clear understanding: the German aircraft carriers provide an air umbrella for their battlefleet, and the next step is to send attack aircraft to harvest their own capital ship groups. Although the old battleships had little chance of surviving the operation, Tovey obviously couldn't afford to die, taking advantage of the fact that his fleet had not yet been discovered, so that the three carriers could use all their residual heat before they were damaged.

The transmission of information in naval warfare has always been lagging and ambiguous. Tense situations, fierce fights, damage to equipment, and negligence of front-line personnel under pressure...... As a result, battlefield intelligence cannot be effectively transmitted to a considerable extent, thus affecting the commander's decision.

In this naval battle, the Bismarck failed to relay the details of the British attack aircraft group detected by the radar of the former Elpitz to the aircraft carrier group in the rear. It was not until the end of the air battle that the commander of the German carrier-based fighter took back a simple battle report. This made Fang Yan ignorant of the direction and speed of the British aircraft group, and could only rely on his professional ability to forcibly analyze the area where the British aircraft carrier was located.

And now a similar problem has arisen with the British. Forbes, who commanded the battlefleet, did not pass on his own battle damage to the Hood, and Tovey did not know the details of the previous confrontation between the two armies, and thought that the Rodney was alive and the vitality of the main fleet was not greatly damaged. Because of this, Tovey also left himself a dozen fighter jets to guarantee. If Tovey had known that Forbes' fleet had sunk 1 battleship and 4 destroyers, and that 1 battleship, 2 light cruisers, and 3 destroyers had been destroyed, then all the sea fighters would have been sent by him to support the friendly fleet 200 kilometers away, and there would be no suspense.

At 10:47 a.m., a leading German fighter spotted the main British fleet slowly moving westward on the sea. The pilot immediately sent out a short-frequency communication signal to call for more than 90 other warhawks to come and hunt here. For the British fleet, which had old battleships at its core, their doors to hell had been opened......