Hearing this, Hoffman couldn't bear it any longer, and suddenly pushed open the door of the conference room and strode in, glancing at everyone with a gloomy face. As it was an impromptu meeting, there were not many people in the room, except for the Chief of the Air Staff, Senior General Jeshunek, the Chief of Air Defense, Lieutenant General Joseph Kamhuber, and Garand, and there was also an officer he did not know, judging by his rank, a major, and Lyman whispered to him that this was Gerhard Schöpfil, the new commander of the JG26 Wing.

Everyone didn't expect the Führer to suddenly push the door in, and they actually forgot to salute for a while, and it took a long time to react, and they hurriedly arranged for the Führer and others to be seated.

"Gerhard Schöpfel?" Hoffman stopped the major, who was about to quietly retreat, and said bluntly, "I heard your argument just now, and I'm disappointed in your performance. ”

"Honorable Führer, I ......" Schupfeld knew that the situation was not good, and he wanted to explain a few words, but was interrupted by Hoffman shaking his hand, "The investigation of the responsibility for the failure of the air defense operation would not have implicated an ordinary air force wing commander, especially since there were still problems such as command and equipment, and I did not want to be angry with an ordinary grassroots officer." But what I can't tolerate is that in the face of a powerful enemy, you have lost the minimum fighting spirit and spirit of a soldier, this is not a drill, this is your life-and-death struggle -- either we walk by the corpse of the enemy, or let the enemy walk through our corpse, there is no other way to choose. You think you saved the lives of the boys of the flying team? On the contrary, if the British bombs had been allowed to fall, more German soldiers and civilians would have lost their lives as a result. ”

Schupfel's face flushed, and his head drooped involuntarily.

"Since you love life so much, from now on, in the name of the Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force, I will relieve you of your position as Wing Commander of the JG26 Wing, and you can report to Marshal Milch tomorrow, hoping that the prisoners of war can feel your love for life and improve the survival rate."

Poor Schöpfell shuffled out of the conference room like an old dog with a broken backbone.

"Who recommended such an officer?" Keitel stared at Scheepfell's stumbling back and said dissatisfiedly, "The weak style and lack of fighting spirit have brought the whole wing to ruin." The Führer is still too tolerant of people, and I will directly drive him out of the army. ”

Garland's expression looked a little strange, this matter actually had little to do with him, and the choice of wing captain was not recommended by him, otherwise Major Schöpfell would not have dared to be so rude just now. Originally, he was going to follow Marshal Kesselring to the Southern Front, but there were still some daytime air defense work that did not complete the handover with Lieutenant General Kamhuber, so he was stranded in Berlin for a few more days. This afternoon, the performance of the JG26 Wing in the face of the US Army Air Corps aircraft attack was ineffective, as the old commander of the wing, he could not hold his face, specially called Schuppfell to inquire about the situation and hoped that the other party could admit his mistake, improve the impression of Jeshunek and Kamhubel on the JG26 Wing, but did not expect to catch up with the arrival of the Führer, this is good, everything hit the muzzle, Major Schuppfell did not even have a chance to admit his mistake was removed from his post by the Führer, who is also the commander-in-chief of the Air Force.

Hoffman didn't reassure everyone's thoughts, and only asked: "Shot down the latest American bomber this afternoon?" He was very nervous, could it be that the Americans had put in the B-29 in advance, and those big guys were not easy to deal with.

"Yes, Führer." Jeshunek handed over a bunch of photos, "This is a photo of the wreckage of the downed plane. ”

After taking the photo, he only took a cursory glance, and Hoffman threw it on the table in anger: "This is clearly a Boeing B-17 bomber, and the Americans call it the 'Flying Fortress' -- but it is exactly the same as the name of our newly adapted paratrooper armored brigade, what kind of new aircraft is this?" I knew that two years ago. ”

Everyone looked at each other, and suddenly all eyes turned to Jeshunek, as if to blame him for making such a fuss, and the latter himself felt that something was wrong, and suddenly recalled: on the eve of the mutual declaration of war between the United States and Germany last year, the German military attache in Washington, Friedrich von Bertischer, had completed a detailed report on the development and production of American bombers, according to his report, advertisements for new aircraft (such as the B-17F and Mustang) were everywhere in magazines, children's books, cigarette packages, Americans don't have a sense of secrecy at all. After reading the report, Jeshunek was so shocked that he commissioned Bertischer to report to the Führer four months ago, in May, but the Führer refused to believe the data at all. In private, Jeshunek desperately told Berthichel that the war had been lost, but in public he preached the opposite view, and at an internal exchange meeting of the Air Force Technical Department, an aeronautical engineer tried to explain his views on the growing threat of heavy bombers from the U.S. Army Air Force, but Jeshunek was unrelentingly interrupted: "Every time the Allies make a large four-engine bomber, I am happy, because we will shoot down these four-engine bombers as we shot down the twin-engine guys, The destruction of a four-shot bomber was an even greater loss for the enemy. ”

The Führer's attitude at the beginning of the Air Force actually knew, but now the position has changed so quickly, Yeshunek didn't know how to round things up and straighten things out together, so he had to reluctantly say: "Indeed, as the Führer said, the wreckage shot down is the American B-17, but it is not the old C-type, but the latest F-type, compared to the models in our identification manual, he has a different nose, a larger area of vertical tail and ailerons, and more cannons and more fierce firepower, Therefore, the JG26 wing was very unsuitable for the attack - the characteristics of the latest model and the data had not yet had time to be distributed to the grassroots troops. ”

"It's a dereliction of duty." Hoffman was not in a good mood, and he was blocked by the JG26 team, so his tone was very bad.

Jeshunek nodded silently, and Kamhuber, fearing that the Führer would continue to anger the honest chief of the General Staff, hurriedly added: "The U.S. 8th Air Force has been stationed in the British mainland and is rapidly gaining strength, and last month began to launch air strikes against us on its own, but the number and frequency are not high, and they are mainly aimed at France and the Low Countries." This afternoon was their first independent attack on the Reich mainland, and it was an order of magnitude larger, with about five consecutive formations, each with 18 B-17s or B-24s, and their tactics and tactics were not quite the same as those of the British, so we had some problems dealing with them - but I don't think the American threat was insignificant, on the contrary, they might put us under more pressure in the future. ”

This sentence made everyone nod, and it seemed to be in response to the Führer's previous attitude towards contempt for the US Army Airlines, and vaguely meant to help Jeshunek speak. Hoffmann could naturally perceive this unusual atmosphere, and he once again scolded the arrogant Hitler in his heart, and quietly changed the subject: "The matter of the B-17 will be put aside for a moment, and we will discuss the events of last night first. ”

"Führer, I'm sorry for what happened last night, but we did our best." Night air defense has always been coordinated and commanded by Lieutenant General Camhuber, "Yesterday there were about 400 sorties of British planes launching night attacks on us, the main aircraft were Lancaster, Stirling, Wellington and Halifax, the British were very cunning, before the bombing they first interfered with our radar, and then made a feint, deceived our air defense system, so that most of the intercepted night fighters pounced, so ......"

"I want to ask clearly, did the British deceive our radar or did we not receive the radar warning signal at all?" Hoffman's tone was serious, and he didn't want to listen to the air defense director's sloppy eyes.

"To be exact, first the air defense radar was jammed, but we still took off night fighters to check and intercept, and then the large swarm of the British quietly shifted direction, because the radar was generally jammed, we were not able to detect this change, so the fighters pounced and only caught a few small fish." Kamhuber candidly told about the course of the anti-aircraft operation, and Hoffman fell into deep thought.