As rising navies, Japan and Germany have their own deep-rooted defects in naval culture and convictions: The problem of the former is that they are too radical and adventurous, and they will fight to the death at every turn, and the problem of the latter is that they cower and dare not go beyond it. As a traverser www.biquge.info Hoffmann was well aware of the problems between the two, but he could only adopt the current construction and command policy, because it was even more unreliable to change the Italian commander.

Fortunately, Ozawa's rashness and the conservatism of Martial and others have more or less neutralized, coupled with the luck of having a match and Germany's superiority in the field of carrier-based aircraft, forming a fairly good naval situation at present, in fact, the Third Reich has enough confidence in the development of the navy to overwhelm Britain and the United States, and even Hoffmann himself is not confident enough, otherwise what would he do if he is trying to strengthen the Azorean defense system? It is not for the sake of one day that it will not be able to fight at sea, but also to rely on this nail to maneuver with Britain and the United States and buy time for Germany's victory in other directions. In Hoffman's ideals, it would be better for the navy to be able to hold back Britain and the United States, and when Germany had settled the Soviet problem and initially integrated Europe, Britain and the United States would not have to be afraid of maritime superiority.

followed Ozawa a few times, especially after beating Newfoundland, the ambition and self-confidence of Marchar and others began to slowly build, at least dare to shake Britain and the United States head-on, otherwise if it was the news of the current convergence of the two fleets of Britain and the United States before, Marchar would definitely take the fleet and leave, instead of choosing to kick Ingersoll's ass first like Ozawa, and unexpectedly achieved the effect.

The night owl squadron's performance of only flying and not attacking greatly confused the US troops, who only increased their vigilance and anti-aircraft firepower, and did not think of taking off to meet the night fighters -- the effect of taking off was not good anyway, and the German planes were allowed to fly around to collect intelligence and battlefield movements. At 3:37 a.m., an hour before dawn, the fleet radar again detected a large number of planes flying, this is not 1-2 planes dangling like the Night Owl Clan, it is obviously a large formation group. Turner finally realized that something was wrong, and while ordering all ships to prepare for air defense, he ordered several warships to take off F6F-3N night combat aircraft as much as possible.

The F6F-3N is a night fighter derived from the daytime version of the F6F fighter, with the main difference being that the wingtip fairifiers are equipped with AN/APS-6 radars, and two 12.7mm machine guns are removed to reduce the wing weight. However, the performance of this airborne radar is average, and it also affects the aerodynamic shape of the aircraft, so that the performance deteriorates a lot, and the US military has taken off night combat planes to intercept it during the first few night owl attacks, but the result is not only failed to achieve results -- the few 12.7mm machine guns that fire tracer bullets are simply scratching the itch for the thick-skinned bombers, and in many cases they can't even hit this, but they also lose a few planes when landing, so that the pilots regard flying this plane to carry out night battles as a daunting way. Considering that the sky was about to brighten, there would be no obstacles to take-off and landing, and the enemy situation was suspicious, Turner resolutely gave this order.

But the decision was too late, and after the U.S. military had taken off only four night fighters, the first attack wave, led by Colonel Seydlitz, commander of the Dunkirk air, had completed the final formation before the attack, and the night battle before dawn began.

Two Me-264 bombers, which had been circling around the perimeter and had actually been monitoring the direction of the fleet, quickly increased their speed to the maximum, and then lowered the altitude to 4,500 meters and began to break through, following the route of the heavy bombers, the attack aircraft group swarmed up, and the German night owl team, which had infrared night vision capability and had been monitoring for nearly three hours, familiarly led the attack group to the assembly place of the escort aircraft carrier, and also dropped a series of flares to point out the direction for the follow-up attack. After completing this, the Night Stalkers quietly left the battlefield, and they didn't have to worry about the rest of the situation.

Seeing this scene, all the US officers and men subconsciously had a thought: "It's broken......

The U.S. ship scrambled to take off fighter jets and turned on anti-aircraft fire to try to intercept it, but this could no longer stop Colonel Sedlitz's thunderous blow. A group of three He-218 attack formations quickly swooped down, their target was clear, not those more or less wounded battleships, and all the spearheads were pointed directly at the escort carriers. In less than 5 minutes, the four aircraft carriers ate the German bombs and began to sink slowly, and the light cruisers Oakland and Reno (both of which belonged to the Oakland-class air defense cruisers) escorting the fleet desperately used 40mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns to intercept the Germans, but the end was very tragic, the former hit four 500-kilogram bombs and capsized directly, and the latter was officially sunk after two torpedoes were broken into two parts.

What makes the fleet even more crazy is that the sky has just brightened, the German attack wave has just retreated, and the ships are salvaging the survivors, the German second attack wave has arrived on the battlefield again to launch an attack, this time the sky has begun to brighten, and the F6F fighters have gathered more than a dozen, but the German escort Bf-219 quickly shot down the American plane by relying on most of them, and then continued to attack, Tripoli, Wake Island, The Solomon's three Casablanca-class escort carriers, which were completed only in October, also followed in the footsteps of their companions and were quickly sunk, the most tragic being the Solomon. Probably the name Solomon Islands is really unlucky, in the South Pacific naval battle the US military was overwhelmed by the Japanese army, a warship of the Solomon actually hit three torpedoes - almost in the blink of an eye, the ship sank, the whole ship of more than 1,000 officers and men rescued only 14 people.

At 5:35 a.m., the third German attack wave rushed to the scene to attack again, although the number of planes in this round of attack was only 46, which was the smallest batch, but the US defense force was also weakened to the extent that it was almost impossible to see, there were only 4 escort aircraft carriers left, and the officers and men were discouraged, their eyes were dull, and they were almost blinded, and the German troops who were unforgiving sank the two escort aircraft carriers of Cassan Bay and Fangxiao Bay, and by the way, they also sent the Yargu air defense cruiser (Dedo class) to the bottom of the sea.

At 6:07, Colonel Kahn, the commander of the KG-48 wing who took off from Dakar, personally led the team and led all the planes to launch a surprise attack, and saw the American fleet that was completely beaten on the sea and shouted angrily: "Wow, the navy is so excessive, there is nothing left for us!" ”

"Sir, two escort aircraft carriers were found ......"

"Assault of the whole army!" 48 Ju-188 and 24 Fw-190 swarmed up, and sank \ heavy damage to 2 escort aircraft carriers with horizontal bombing and sea sweeping shooting, especially the Fw-190 that strafed the sea, and used R4M rockets and 20mm machine guns to terrify the US military, and it was a piece of bombing, although the 250 kg bombs of Ju-188 were not particularly lethal, and the bombing accuracy could not be compared with dive bombing, but it could not withstand 12 bombs that could be carried by an aircraft. The area covered by the overwhelming air raids is quite staggering, and there is little reason to survive.

Before leaving, Karn glanced at the battleships on the sea with "reluctance", and said to himself: "There are so many big guys, I should have brought those wire-controlled bombs in the first place......"

After only three hours of tossing, Ozawa's unreasonable punch beat the US fleet to the point that its nose and eyes were swollen, and except for a few battleships that were safe and sound, the light warship group under Admiral Ingersoll's command, especially the escort aircraft carrier formation, was wiped out except for one White Plains, which was paralyzed on the water and was dying!

At about 7 o'clock in the morning, Cunningham, who was still waiting for the latest information of the reconnaissance plane, received two bad news: the first bad news was sent by Turner, telling him that he was attacked by the main German force in the early morning, and all the escort aircraft carriers were destroyed, and the strategy of planning a two-way flank attack was directly discounted; The second bad news came from the army on Sal Island, and they sent a telegram in a frightened tone, "The German battleship unit is shelling Sal Island, and the life and death of the headquarters are only ......on the front line."

"Bastard!" Spruance, who was always good-natured, was furious, and lost 11 escort aircraft carriers in one early morning, which was completely beyond his comprehension.

"Sir......" he asked, looking up at Cunningham, "we're in big trouble. ”

Cunningham took a deep breath: "One bad move, all the games are lost, the strategy of two-way flanking has failed, let the admiral lead the rest of the warships to retreat as soon as possible, and half of our carrier-based aircraft will be dispatched to attack the German fleet that is currently shelling Sal Island......"

"But......" Spruance asked, puzzled, "we haven't found out where the enemy carrier formation is, so we can't rush to attack it, right?" Otherwise, the attack force may not be enough."

"The main thing is to remind the Germans that we are coming." Cunningham looked helpless, "If I don't do this, the battleships may be sunk by the Japanese fleet that is in pursuit, and then the battlefield will be completely out of balance, leaving them with a future!" ”

Marcial, Crank, and others did not fully understand Ozawa's intention of insisting on only attacking escort aircraft carriers and small US battleships, until the combat unit reported the destruction of all 11 US escort aircraft carriers, and suddenly it dawned on them: After defeating this fleet, the remaining battleships of the Americans were completely incapacitated for their own side -- they could neither rush to Sal Island to continue the artillery bombardment, nor could they come up with effective means to threaten their own side, and if the fleet was willing to catch up, they only needed to fight the whole deck and air force planes for another round. Maybe we can send all these capital ships to the bottom of the sea.

But this idea was soon dispelled, and just as the ships were busy retrieving planes and preparing for the second round of air strikes, the latest news came: the American attack aircraft group was about to launch an attack on the German artillery detachment......