That night, the final German fleet moved north, and in the middle of the night, believing that the distance was sufficient, Kranker turned his sail to the southwest, and the whole fleet had little fuel in stock, and he had to return to Argentina as soon as possible, otherwise all the warships would be paralyzed on the surface of the sea due to the running out of fuel. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

Thanks to the unremitting efforts of the sailors and the desperate work of the drainage pumps, the Ise was basically balanced on both sides, and a total of more than 500 tons of seawater were discharged, and the boiler was restored after emergency repairs, and now the speed of the entire warship has barely increased to 18 knots.

Cranke knew that he had to get rid of the opposing American fleet as soon as possible, because the opponent still had the ability to kill him, and his own side had to be lucky enough to inflict heavy damage on his opponent. However, in a hurry, he kept the fleet zigzag to avoid being attacked by American submarines. At the same time, the radar room was required to concentrate on avoiding any ships, each of which could inform the Americans of its position and expose the fleet to its targets. Fortunately, everything was very normal and there was no trace - he did not know that because of the presence of the German fleet, the Allies had notified all transport ships to stop sailing.

After a night of fear, the whole fleet was in good working order, and Krake was determined to cheer up all the officers and men, so he went to the loudspeaker with great interest and lectured all the crew.

"Attention ship, I'm Fleet Commander Crank." He cleared his throat and said enthusiastically, "I would like to congratulate the Marine Engine and Damage Management Department, your performance is a testament to the Navy's traditions. In addition, I would like to congratulate our air forces, they are amazing, they have achieved an impressive record of destroying 3 enemy aircraft carriers with only 40% of the enemy's aircraft, and our losses are much less than the enemy's! ”

Saying this, in fact, the top management is still very heartbroken, and yesterday's battle itself suffered a lot of losses. The Savoy sank, the Z29\30 destroyer sank, the Hedgehog class also reimbursed one, and the dying and paralyzed Sedelitz was finally torpedoed and sunk by our own destroyers, and the officers and men of the ships also lost a lot of men, and the Ise and Gneisenau also lost some of their officers and men because of bombs and torpedoes -- just the surviving officers and men on the Savoy and Sedlitz were transferred to fill in.

The loss of aviation power was also very serious, with nearly half of the number of aircraft, 32 pilots (groups), a loss rate of more than a quarter, and the loss of 6 winners of the Knight's Cross and above, especially two of them with silver oak leaves of the Knight's Cross, made Kranke sigh - less than 1,000 soldiers in Germany have received this rank (the number of Knights' Cross recipients is currently about 6,000)

In the early morning, the visibility was greatly improved after the sky brightened, and the situation of the Ise was further improved, and tons of seawater were pumped away by the emergency drainage pumps in the cabin, and the flooded boilers and pipes were repaired immediately after they came out, and the remaining 1 degree of inclination was also unconsciously corrected, Cranke estimated that there are now more than 2,000 tons of seawater on both sides of the ship, and the opportunity to completely clean up is only to the Argentine shipyard, but the situation is an indisputable fact.

"What is the maximum speed?" Cranke asked.

"I think I can walk 21 knots." Captain Aoki muttered for a moment and said, "If you're optimistic, you can get back to 22 knots after 9 o'clock." ”

"Great, hold on! Things will get better! Cranker immediately ordered the release of the Ar-372 scout and the remaining four Ar-352 ship scouts.

After 9 o'clock, the Ise's maximum speed was restored to 22.4 knots, and the wind on the sea seemed to be stronger than yesterday evening, and Walter asked for another test torpedo load take-off - failure would mean losing another Ju-198, and Cranke gritted his teeth and agreed.

It was Bach who carried out the second round of test flights, and yesterday's test flight failure made him sad all night, and he was analyzing with his comrades all night whether he could fly and how to make the plane have better lift-off performance.

It was almost the same scene as yesterday, but the difference was that today at the end of the deck, the big guy full of fuel and torpedoes, weighing 6 tons, flew steadily under Bach's gentle maneuvering, and the officers and men of the whole ship applauded warmly, and several sergeants on the scene observed that there was at least 4-6 meters of room left......

"Yay, it worked! It worked! Walter, who is in his 40s, jumped and jumped excitedly like a child, waving his fists and saying, "We still have more than 20 attack planes, and this time we can send all the damned Americans to the bottom of the sea!" ”

"I'm thinking that when I return home, I'll have to carry heavier armor-piercing or semi-armor-piercing shells for dive bombing." Simon added, "A 400-kilogram aerial bomb seems to be impossible to sink against the Essex-class, and it seems to have been somewhat difficult to use a 500-kilogram bomb before, and a little more must be dosed." ”

"Let me think about it......" Walter pondered, thinking differently than Simon, "I think I can carry that kind of dexterous anti-ship bomb." ”

"You mean, Hs-393? It's perfectly fine in terms of weight, but doesn't the use of this thing require absolute air supremacy? ”

"There is always a difference between theory and practice, and when I took over the battle yesterday, I found that the US F6F was as stupid as a piece of wood at high altitude." Walter originally described the situation of yesterday's engagement, "The F6F, especially the new F6F-5, is a good aircraft at medium and low altitudes, stronger than the Bf-219, and may be slightly stronger than the Do-412, but at medium and high altitudes, especially at high altitudes, it is completely a waste, and above 9000 meters is so stupid that even bombers can't compare, if we approach at high altitude and high speed, and then drop Hs-393, it will be very ideal, and besides, this tactic has not begun to be tried on land in China, Ready for a forcible attack on the ship? ”

The so-called land-based use does not refer to the Ju-188 of the Air Force, but to the BMW 901 engine version of the Ju-298 used by the Navy, after removing the shipboard device and increasing the wing area and pressurized cockpit, the practical ceiling exceeds 12,500 meters, codenamed Ju-298S, and it is a perfect match for the Ta-152, which is also dedicated to high altitude. The Ju-188\288 can also be used in this airspace after improvement, but the bomb load has dropped to less than 1 ton (the series originally had a normal bomb load of 3 tons), which is at the same level as the Ju-298, and the range is not as good as that of the opponent, so it can only give up the idea of a longer and shorter in this field.

In fact, by the beginning of 1944, the Navy's and Air Force medium bombers and attack planes were almost monopolized by the Junkers, and a total of four main models were introduced: Ju-188\288 and Ju-198\298 -- the first marked one used the BMW 801 aircraft, and the second standard used the 901 engine. Although the 801 and 901 series engines both have a maximum power of 2,400 hp, the performance of the 801 in the same power is obviously better in the aircraft - the latter has only 14 cylinders, and the weight and volume are superior to the 901 series imitation of the American R-2800 engine.

But on the other hand, the 14-cylinder air-cooled engine to 2400 horsepower is the limit, and now the performance of the 2400 horsepower 801F (actual maximum power of 2350 horsepower) is very unstable, with an average of 2 out of every 3 units, and the Ministry of Armaments does not dare to use it normally on the aircraft at all, and it is so-so only for testing. The performance of the 901 series is slightly better than that of the 801F, and the yield rate is about two-thirds, which is still full of hidden dangers for operations, and the Ministry of Armaments still refuses to let it go, but the tone is not so tough. However, the 901 series is much more reliable than the 18-cylinder engine 802 series that was also the original project of BMW, the latter is heavier and has a lower degree of completion.

The current situation is obvious, the 2400 horsepower 901 series and 801F are not yet ready to use, the most used on the main aircraft is still the 2000 horsepower level of BMW801S - the actual maximum power of 2045 horsepower, and the use of R-2800 British and American main fighters P47 \ F4U and F6F are basically at the same level, but because the 801 engine has a small windward area and light weight, so the German army has a certain advantage.

Of course, the German army also knew very well that the 2400 horsepower or even 2800 horsepower R-2800 in the hands of the Americans was fully qualified for service, because they had found the 2400 horsepower R-2800 engine in Newfoundland (for the latest P-47 fighter), so Hoffmann couldn't wait to push out the new jet bomber - after the German test flight, the German army thought that the P-47 interception of ordinary medium bombers was very powerful, and the threat exceeded that of the Spitfire or P-51, The Germans themselves did not have a heavy 4-engine bomber formation, and if they used the Ju-188 to carry out air strikes, they might repeat the mistakes of the first air battle in Britain.

Hoffman's strategy was successful, and fearing the fact that jet warfare could not be defended, the Americans postponed the production and training of pilots such as the P-47 and F4U, and devoted all their energy to the Meteor jets, which succeeded in breaking (albeit only for a short time) the enemy's rhythm.

Until 12 noon, all reconnaissance aircraft reported that nothing was found within 1,000 kilometers.

"It seems that the enemy has returned to South Africa?"

"It's okay......" Cranke thought for a moment, "we'll go back to Argentina, and we'll go back to the Mediterranean after urgent repairs and replenishment, and this time we'll take the Atlantic Ocean instead." ”

"Atlantic?" Simon was stunned and asked with some concern, "Could it be?" ”

"It's okay, the Führer is fighting Britain, and the Americans are so anxious that they can't take care of our ...... for the time being"