Sitting back was clearly not Cunningham's style, and just as the three aircraft carriers had released their carrier-based aircraft about the same, he proposed to forcibly prepare a second attack wave, which Nimitz immediately agreed after thinking about it. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

The second attack wave of the US military consisted of two parts, the first part was the 16 SBDs sent out for reconnaissance in the early morning, except for the SBD facing the Ozawa sector reconnaissance that was shot down and the farthest SBD had no time to rush back, the remaining 14 planes were rushing back at the fastest speed; The second part is the reserve aircraft owned by the three aircraft carriers, each aircraft carrier carries 10 reserve aircraft (including 3 F6F, 4 SBD and 3 TBF), due to the early combat has not been lost, this part of the reserve aircraft and crew can still be used, and then considering that the escort fighters are relatively small, Cunningham decided to draw 6 from the existing escort fighters, and finally formed a second attack wave of 50 aircraft (14 + 30 + 6) grouping.

As soon as the order was issued, all the exhausted ground crews immediately moved again with desperate speed, they first took down the main body and spare parts of the aircraft hanging on the top of the hangar, and then assembled them at a speed of 100,000 urgently, and most of the staff officers in the bridge also rushed into the hangar to assist in the work, and now everyone knows that the situation has reached a very critical juncture, and every additional aircraft gives the fleet an extra chance of winning.

At 13:17, the second batch of 48 fighters reinforced by the Azores arrived in the fleet, all Fw-190s carrying auxiliary fuel tanks and rockets. Ito was stunned, he knew that the Fw-190 could not be ship-born, what did this batch of land-based aircraft mean? Ozawa saw his doubts and explained: "This is not a naval aircraft, this is an air force unit. ”

"Air Force? How do they land? ”

"Learn from what Commander Horikichi did in the naval battle in the South Pacific, covering the fleet until he ran out of fuel and made a forced landing or parachuted."

"How many planes are there in the whole Azores?"

"To be honest, I don't know, it is said that there are 3 air force wings, 1 navy air wing, I guess there are always 800 aircraft."

"That's a lot."

"It's not much, the total number of front-line combat aircraft in the German army is as high as 25,000, and the Azores account for only a little more than 3%. The Eastern Front is the bulk of Germany's air power, where there are nearly 15,000 German aircraft, in addition to Germany, there are also some allied air forces, including Italy, Romania, Hungary, Finland, Ukraine, the Russian Liberation Army, Iran, Iraq have good air power, adding up to at least 18,000 aircraft......" Ozawa sighed, "Although Germany's ability to mass-produce 40,000 aircraft of various types a year makes me very envious, but what I envy the most is the strong reserves of German pilots and a steady stream of elites, The pilots who supplied the HNA were all transferred from the experienced Air Force, and even the newly recruited HNA pilots had to go to serve on the Eastern Front to accept the challenge of the Russians, in their words -- if you can't even win the Russians, how can you compete with Britain and the United States? ”

All the members of the observation group nodded their heads busily, and Ito smiled bitterly: "No wonder General Tsukahara said that your tactics are very good, but Japan actually has no way to learn, or rather, there is no chance to promote it." ”

"Yes, I used to sit in the well and watch the sky, always thinking that the Imperial Navy was invincible in the world with 800 ships and 3,000 sea eagles, and laughed at the Germans for having only aircraft carriers but no naval navigation. As for the gap in mechanism, it is even more not. Ozawa pointed to the knight's cross with gold oak leaves on his neckline, "Did you see the medal that the Führer gave me?" There are no more than 30 servicemen in Germany who can receive this medal, but 11 of them are pilots, and there are even 2 pilots who have a medal higher than me. ”

Ito knew that Ozawa had won more medals than the vast majority of the German armed forces, but he was shocked to hear that there were pilots with higher medals than him.

The Knight's Cross was originally a separate level and did not have so many subdivisions, but due to the protracted war, Germany added four more levels in order to better recognize the military exploits, namely the Knight's Cross with Silver Oak Leaf, the Knight's Cross with Silver Oak Leaf with Double Swords, the Knight's Cross with Diamond Double Swords and Silver Oak Leaf, and the Knight's Cross with Diamond Double Sword Gold Oak Leaf, and even clearly stipulated that the highest level of Knight's Cross with Diamond Double Sword Gold Oak Leaf was only awarded to the 12 people with the most outstanding achievements after the victory of the war. For the sake of overall aesthetics, the color of the double sword and the oak leaf are usually the same, and there will be no nondescript things such as gold and silver oak leaves or silver double swords and gold oak leaves, so listing and explaining what material the oak leaves are will determine what material the two swords are.

When Hoffman came to power, he decided that this subdivision was not enough, and added two more levels: the first level was the Golden Oak Cross (Peerless Sword), which was between the Silver Oak Cross and the Silver Oak Cross of the Double Swords: the additional level was the Knight's Cross of the Golden Oak Leaf (without diamonds), which was between the Knight's Cross of the Silver Oak Leaf and the Knight's Cross of the Diamond Twin Swords, and Ozawa received the latter, two levels short of the highest rank of the Knight's Cross of the Diamond Twin Swords.

"You must have heard the names of these two pilots, one is called Marseilleu and the other is Hans Rudel, they were awarded the Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit with Diamond and Silver Oak (the highest rank actually awarded at the moment), one of them took out nearly 300 planes, the other took out more than 300 tanks, and Dr. Goebbels made a movie for them."

Everyone in the observation group nodded, everyone had heard of these two names - there were these two movies that were arranged to be seen in Germany within a few days, and there was also a Ranke commando, seeing this, everyone finally understood where the impact of the domestic "Commander of the Combined Fleet" movie originated, but they did not find a movie that praised the Führer's governance of the country "grand and majestic, and devoted himself to Germany", Ito Junichi occasionally asked, and the German high-level who received it laughed: "Everything that the Führer has done for the rise of the empire is obvious to the people, He himself has repeatedly instructed that there should be no need to deliberately publicize it, but to focus on publicizing the front-line officers and soldiers and outstanding figures who have made special contributions to Germany, so as to build a consensus of the whole nation, and perhaps when the next Führer is running for election again, he can make a film and put it on the show to boost morale. ”

Ozawa's next sentence is even more thought-provoking: "What medal did the Führer, who made such a great contribution to the rise of Germany, give himself?" No! Not a single one! He had only the Iron Cross, which he had received as a corporal during the last world war. Thinking about some people in our country, they don't have any credit, so they are in a hurry to wear the Great Order Chrysanthemum Medal and the Great Rising Sun Medal on their chests, even higher than the rank of Chief Yamamoto, Chief Hori and General Tsukahara, isn't it a shame? There is no necessary connection between medals and official ranks, and it is not that the bigger the official, the higher the medal, and if this idea is not broken, how can the grassroots have enthusiasm? ”

Ito Junichi remembered King Hirokoshi Fushimi Miya, who had a medal on his chest at the beginning, and he used to take it for granted, but when Ozawa said this, he suddenly felt uncomfortable. Originally, he wanted to explain the fact that Horikichi was now receiving a lot of medals, but when he thought that most of the high-ranking medals were awarded after "rebellion", he didn't know what to say - not so much that these medals were "rewarded for the work of rebellion and reconstruction", but that the palace was forced to reluctantly recognize Horiyoshi's status, and the specific truth was not clear to the people, and wasn't he Ito Junichi still unclear?

"Sir, the second attack wave is ready and taking off......"

"Sir, the radar reports that the German aircraft group is approaching, at an altitude of 7,500 meters, with more than 160 aircraft, at a distance of 175 kilometers, and it is expected to receive the enemy ...... in 15 minutes"

At 13:21, the bridge of the Hornet issued two enemy bulletins

"It's another set of high and high fights!" Nimitz was in a heavy mood, but he gave the order without delay, "Attention air defense fighters, don't be fooled, don't fall for the trick to climb!" ”

"The second attack wave strikes quickly, quickly! Be sure to be fast! Cunningham hurriedly gave the order, although he knew that the Germans would be able to arrive soon, but such a speed was still a bit unexpected, and if his side was slow, the second attack wave would be at home and unable to get out.

This time, the fleet not only had the anti-aircraft firepower of four battleships, but also the anti-aircraft guns of each ship were equipped with VT fuses, and the confidence of the US military seemed to be a little more sufficient.

"The aircraft must be changed when returning to China, first, the F6F must be equipped with turbocharging to cope with high-altitude tactics; Second, the SBD and TBF must be replaced as soon as possible with new attack aircraft that integrate dive bombing and torpedo attacks. Third, it is necessary to equip excellent carrier-based reconnaissance aircraft with high speed and long range. Nimitz told the confidential staff officer, "Send the telegram out at once, and let them know whether we make it back alive or not." ”

"Sir, take care of ......"

Nimitz waved his hand: "Anything can happen on the battlefield, who dares to say that they are invulnerable?" Tell the Armaments Bureau idiots that if they can't build them, give me a fucking copy of the Germans' planes - and follow the others and draw gourds, right? ”

After seeing the Do-412 and Ta-152, the British and American pilots all reported that the German new aircraft gun (MG213) was extremely powerful, and the British still had Sispano......

Cunningham smiled bitterly: Now the Americans are also being forced to be anxious, jets, high-performance liquid-cooled engines, aviation cannons are imitations of British goods, tanks have taken IS-1 and are ready to imitate Soviet goods, rockets and assault rifles are ready to imitate German goods, should they not imitate German ships in the next step?

"By the way, let the Joint Staff promote that weird beveled deck aircraft carrier research, I think we need to build a research and research, I have a gut feeling that this thing will be able to put a fleet of planes faster than we used to estimate! If you don't study it, you will suffer a big loss in the future! ”

Ten minutes passed in a flash, and less than two minutes after the departure of the second attack wave of the US army, a group of German planes under black pressure appeared not far away......