Newfoundland is a special island, although it is large (about 111,000 square kilometers, equivalent to nine Falklands or half of Great Britain, and there are more famous Inuit people on the island), but the population is quite sparse, with a total permanent population of less than 200,000 - and this is still a painstaking recovery. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

Newfoundland, like Canada, was an independent Dominion during World War I, and sent troops to fight in Europe, only to lose a quarter of its young men in World War I, and finally became a British colony, St. John's, the island's capital and main port, as well as a major population center. Originally, Newfoundland was not so important, but because the traditional Atlantic route was staged, Newfoundland's important role as the closest large island base to Great Britain and close to Greenland and the North Atlantic route began to be reflected.

With the help of the United States, Newfoundland eventually became the starting point of the Anglo-Canadian route and the distribution center of major North American material shipments. According to the joint memorandum between the three parties, Newfoundland's defense and transportation capabilities need to be strengthened, and the air force is obviously provided by the United States, and the United States originally proposed that the army should also be provided by the United States, and Churchill basically agreed, but Congress, which is based on the traditional forces of the Conservative Party, believes that this is very "dangerous" to Newfoundland's future -- it depends on the United States for its economy and defense, and after the victory of the war, will Newfoundland still belong to the British Empire?

Canada also has territorial aspirations for Newfoundland, hoping to incorporate the island into its own country, and once the United States takes control of Newfoundland, it will be tantamount to forming a clamp on the eastern coast of Canada -- what will happen in the future when everyone is hello and I am so happy during the alliance period that we almost want to wear a pair of pants? So it was proposed that the Dominion of Canada provide an escort fleet and that Britain send an army, but in this way the United States did not do it, and finally discussed and discussed, and agreed that the escort warships would be jointly dispatched by the United States and Canada, and the army would be sent by Canada to undertake the defense task, and at the same time, Canada's Prince Edward Island would also send part of the US army to the army.

After this adjustment, although the British were still nominally the controllers of the Newfoundland government and also served as the chairman of the Maritime Commission, the British Empire relied on the United States and Canada for all its uses, and this title basically did not care about anything but to ask for people generously.

From a military point of view, if Newfoundland is really to be built into a huge military base, its airports should be scattered to avoid being destroyed in a single enemy assault, but due to the urgency of opening up strategic air routes and the fact that the rest of Newfoundland Island is still relatively primitive, more than 70% of the airports are concentrated around St. John's, and another 30% of the airports are concentrated in the west of the island, facing Canada, in the area of Conabrook and York Harbour, and the two Canadian students are also deployed on one side. The western base is mainly responsible for supplies from Canada and the Great Lakes region of the United States, and the eastern base is mainly for supplies from the east coast of the United States and South American countries, so it should be managed separately to avoid confusion.

German intelligence was aware of this distribution, and when the battle plan was drawn up, although it was theoretically necessary to carry out assaults in both places, Ozawa considered that the fleet could only dispatch more than 200 attack planes in total, and that it had been divided into two attack waves, and if the first attack wave was broken up, the strength would be too severely weakened, so he persuaded the other top brass of the fleet that the first attack wave would only attack St. John's, and the second attack wave would attack Cunabrook in the west.

In order to achieve the maximum possible goal of paralyzing the airfield, most of the German bombers dropped 100 kilograms of small bombs and incendiary bombs, so as to ensure more coverage under the premise of the same load, but to the surprise of the German pilots, they only dropped dozens of bombs into a parking area, and there was a chain explosion below, and the rumbling sound was transmitted one after another, and the wing fragments, engine parts, onboard weapons and material components were lifted into the sky by piles of air waves.

Several of the attack planes that flew low were even staggered by the shock of the flames and air waves that rushed into the sky.

"Wow...... That's great...... It's so exciting...... These planes are refueled and all time bombs! A bombardier shouted excitedly over the radio, echoed by a large crowd.

They had no idea that in addition to the plane's refueling, the cabin was also stuffed with precious aviation fuel -- all supplied to the British, the Anglo-Canadian route was blocked, food and general fuel could be improvised, the most important aviation fuel had to be provided by the United States, and the loading of supplies was just over Sunday afternoon, and now it was all a bomb that exploded.

The explosion of the chain reaction also swept the hangar and the runway, coupled with the incendiary bombs dropped by the Germans, they were lit one after another, and from the sky, there was a flowing sea of fire below, and then this fire dragon continued to explode and burn with other fuel, supplies, and ammunition, detonating all the other fighters and attack planes, and even the anti-aircraft artillery positions near the airfield could not be maintained.

In order to achieve the maximum offensive effect, at least half of the fighters carried small bombs, and after they hurriedly dropped the bombs, they began to violently suppress the US patrol planes and the fighters that hurriedly took off after hearing the news.

Unlike the Battle of Pearl Harbor, Newfoundland had a total of 24 fighters on patrol duty at that time, and more than 10 planes flew up in the state of emergency, basically P51 or P47, but unfortunately, their number was too small, and it was a battle in a panic, less than 10 minutes of fierce fighting, all of which were shot down by German escort fighters, and the Germans paid the price of 4 BF-219 fighters, 3 HE-218 and 1 JU-98, and the overall exchange ratio was 1:4.

Since the St. John's air raid went more smoothly than expected, Frank, who was in command from the air, temporarily changed his operational deployment and led more than 50 planes in the first attack wave to attack Conabrook, preparing to change the follow-up attack of St. John's to the second attack wave.

The German bombers were in a hot fight, the war room of the Joint Staff Committee was in chaos, and the battle orders had been sent to the Army Air Force in Maine and the troops stationed on Prince Edward Island, and the orders were carried out in unison, but it didn't take long for them to send a telegram to complain: What should I do if the plane cannot return after dark?

Everyone looked at each other, Marshall turned his head and glanced at the wall clock, the time had slowly passed 4 o'clock, Washington was still 2 hours away from dark, but not in high latitudes, he sighed: "Let the fighters on Prince Edward Island go to support Newfoundland, even if it shoots down some German planes, if the pilots can't find the airport at night, they will parachute on the island...... Newfoundland is so big, and there are 2 Canadian divisions on it, there is always a place for pilots!

The words were very hard, but they didn't sound much confidence, and everyone was helpless. Only Admiral Kim slammed his fist on the table and said angrily: "It's good that they come to attack, save yourself from hiding and hiding in the way, let Cunningham's fleet turn around and intercept them, and then transfer the army planes to Prince Edward Island and Maine at night, and we can catch them attacking early tomorrow morning!" ”

Ingram added: "The escort fleet should be sent to cover the cargo ships from the port, and the more scattered the hiding is, the better, because the supplies in the port will be blown up, and the ships will not suffer any more heavy losses......

As soon as everyone said a word, they immediately gathered a large number of countermeasures, and although they were researched under an emergency, the responses were quite swift and immediately and orderly implemented. Admiral Arnold, in particular, learned that the Newfoundland Island Army Aviation Base had been bombed, and his heart was like a knife, and he couldn't stop complaining that Spartz did not send a reconnaissance plane and discover the German fleet in time (Spartz on Newfoundland Island rolled his eyes: Blame me?). ）。

The time difference between Newfoundland and Berlin was four and a half hours, and soon after the successful start of the critical battle, Machar sent a telegram to the high command in Berlin, and when he heard that at least more than 500 American planes and airfields had been destroyed, everyone including Hoffman could not help but smile with satisfaction, and Hoffman laughed: "Very good, the Japanese hit Pearl Harbor, we hit Newfoundland, and it was above board, and the Americans still don't remember it for a long time." ”

"As soon as the strategic airlift is cut off, Qiu Fatzi can only jump into the sea hungry." Yodel said wittily, and everyone laughed.

"There's a hard fight to ...... night," Hoffman asked Dönitz, "are the wolves ready?" ”

"No problem, 12 of the latest XXI submarines have been prepared, as long as the fleet can take out those escort warships that are in the way, the submarine boys can send all those freighters to the bottom of the sea."

Hoffman nodded with satisfaction, and then studied the problem of Cape Verde with everyone, although the total number of defenders had dropped to less than 3,000, Link optimistically said that he could continue to hold on, just hoping to support a little more troops and medicine, and by the way, take some of the wounded away, this Dönitz also arranged for the S-boat force and submarine force to respond. Now that the US military is on tight defense, it would be suicide to use S-boats to surprise at night, but the "Tokyo Express" used by the Japanese troops on Kuah Island inspired everyone, and Germany was determined to use the "Berlin Express" -- to use S-boats and submarines to replenish supplies for the officers and men defending the island.

After nearly an hour of discussion, news came from the fleet again, and Ozawa offered to replenish the aircraft as soon as possible.

"Air raid losses are huge?" Hoffman asked, frowning.

"About 20 or so, the rest of the air attack aircraft group has successfully returned home, but considering the surrounding US airfields and aviation bases, the fleet's air power is limited, in order to maintain the operation for the next few days, it is necessary to replenish the aircraft." (To be continued.) )