At this stage of the war, history has long since taken another fork in the road, changing the war that Hoffmann is familiar with beyond recognition. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

In the original time and space, due to the short construction period, low cost and strong attack capability of aircraft carriers, both sides built aircraft carriers at all costs. The reason why the United States prepares 24 Essex-class dumpling ships a year was originally based on this consideration.

However, the old problems have not been solved, and new problems are constantly emerging: the United States is unable to provide a large number of aircraft carriers with skilled sailors and pilots, and pilots in particular have become a more troublesome problem than the shortage of warships, which has even led to a change in tactics as a last resort.

In other words, if God opens his eyes now, and tomorrow Norfolk Harbor is filled with Essex-class aircraft carriers, Admiral King and the Navy will have to worry about having enough qualified sailors and pilots. The same problem arose in the German Navy, such as the sinking of the Hyuga and Savoy in the Battle of Iceland is unpleasant, but if these two warships are unsinkable, the new two Resentment class ships should be worried for the sailors.

This is also the reason why Germany has to carry out the readjustment of its services, turn land into sea, disband the offshore submarine force, and use the officers and men to enrich the destroyer force. However, this kind of adjustment can only be done by Germany alone, and it is impossible for other countries to be constrained by the system and the contradictions on land and sea.

Concerned about the lack of troops, the Naval Shipbuilding Planning Committee refused to make further improvements to the Essex-class construction. Originally, according to the shipyard's suggestion, if the acceptance standards were lowered (for example, the standard of the Victory Wheel) and the simple method of construction was adopted in some areas, the construction speed of the Essex class could be compressed to less than 14 months, but the anti-sinking resistance of the warships built according to this method would not be ideal.

Nimitz was a clear opponent of the simple construction method, and his view was: "It may be possible to provide a few more aircraft carriers, but once an aircraft carrier using this construction method is attacked, it is likely to sink immediately, and then the entire ship will be shipwrecked without having the opportunity to escape back as before...... In the end, it must be a collapse of morale and a lack of organization in the army. ”

What is surprising is that the army actually supports this point of view, and the experience comes from the report sent back by the observer in the Soviet Union: On the battlefield of the Eastern Front in 1943, in order to get more tanks, the Soviet Union did not hesitate to use inferior materials and simple equipment to produce T-34 tanks, and forcibly increased production. Tanks produced by high-quality steel and low-quality steel are not the same for personnel protection, when more and more skilled crews are knocked out, even if the new novices have tanks available, they can't beat the veterans on the opposite side under the numerical advantage of several times.

It was not until later that the Soviet Union concentrated on high-quality steel to build IS-1\IS-2, and although the number decreased, the exchange ratio was no longer huge.

In view of the reality of the shortage of excellent pilots, Nimitz's second innovation is to go further on the basis of the cross-transposition of the Spruance fleet aircraft carriers and the escort aircraft carriers, and realize the separation of the old and the new: let the skilled and experienced old pilots carry out the direct cover operation of the fleet air defense, and let the inexperienced new pilots carry out accompanying operations under the leadership of a few skilled pilots to cover the attack aircraft group assault.

This was by no means a dizziness in his mind, but the product of careful thought and analysis: no matter whether the air defense operation is won or lost, the pilot has a high chance of being saved, while the cover group of the offensive operation is shot down, whether it survives or not, it is a loss to the fleet. After the adjustment, at least the losses of skilled pilots are guaranteed to be reduced to a minimum.

This was of course unfair and rather frustrating, but after an explanation and frank announcement, it was approved by the pilots of the carrier-based aircraft.

The third innovation of Nimitz was to adjust the proportion of torpedo attacks and dive attacks in the attack aircraft group, increasing the number and strength of torpedo attacks.

Before the outbreak of the war, lightning operations were the mainstream of aviation operations, and dive bombing was temporarily sidelined at first. However, in the later period, dive bombing became more and more mainstream, because torpedo planes with slow speed and poor maneuverability could easily become targets for anti-aircraft fire and achieved few results.

Moreover, with the improvement of bomber bombing accuracy, the contrast of low hit rate of torpedo planes is more obvious, the hit rate of torpedo planes piloted by Japanese and German elite pilots trained on Socotra Island can theoretically exceed 50 percent, and the hit rate of dive bombers can exceed 90 percent, and in actual combat, due to the evasion of enemy ships and the deterrence of anti-aircraft fire, the hit rate of dive bombing can still be close to 50 percent, but the hit rate of torpedo attacks is less than 20 percent.

In the case of the German army, the contrast between the US military is even greater, and the torpedo hit rate of its attack aircraft pilots is less than 10% in training, and only 3% in actual combat. Such a low hit rate is closely related to the training method, and most of the pilots of the aircraft carriers of the existing fleet of the US military are drawn from escort aircraft carriers, and the latter are not able to take off and land torpedo planes at all, so the pilots have no opportunity to practice, and only after they are transferred to the fleet aircraft carriers do they train in torpedo attack tactics, and their technical ability can be imagined.

In addition to the fact that the hit rate is inferior to that of the opponent, the US military is inferior to its German counterparts in the performance of torpedo aircraft (TBF vs Ju-98) and torpedoes, and the torpedo attack is more difficult than the dive attack, so the US military has repeatedly lowered the proportion of torpedo aircraft in the aircraft carrier aircraft.

The initial results strongly supported this adjustment: the Japanese and German aircraft carriers were relatively fragile, and the use of aerial bombs could effectively sink them (all four Japanese aircraft carriers died in the Battle of Midway), which made the US military rely more heavily on dive bombing.

In order to effectively deal with the dive bombing of the United States, Japan came up with the idea of building a heavy armored aircraft carrier, Taiho, in an attempt to protect itself from aerial bombs with a heavy deck. The United States has slightly thickened the deck of the Essex class, reducing the chance of explosion of oil depots and ammunition depots, and reducing the chance of the power compartment being penetrated

In the final analysis, the tactical needs of the United States are different from those of Japan and Germany: In the United States' vision, heavy damage to Japanese and German warships is considered victory -- because the other side is slow to repair and build, and heavy damage can ensure that the opponent's combat effectiveness can be paralyzed and thus gain time -- and now the United States is most lacking in the world; In the tactics of the Axis, sinking a US ship is the first priority, not only because the Americans are fast, but also because sinking a US ship can bring a lot of losses to the other side -- no matter how strong the production capacity of the Americans is, it will still take 20 years to produce one person!

The problem of sinking also appeared on the axis - the biggest headache for the Japanese and German sides was the anti-sinking ability of the Essex class, unless it was particularly effective, the 400-kilogram bombs carried by the Ju-198 could not sink the Essex, so the torpedo machine had to be retained.

Dive bombing is a good thing that it can't deal with battleships, especially super battleships, and it makes the US military feel a deep headache, such as the Yamato-class, Richelieu-class, Bismarck-class, Veneto-class and other main battleships have eaten aerial bombs, and there are more than one of them several times, but these cutting-edge battleships can't help it, and after repairing for a period of time, they appear on the battlefield in a hurry.

For example, Germany took the opportunity of repairing the Richelieu to take the opportunity to take down the three triple 152mm/55 times diameter secondary guns and six twin 100mm/45 times diameter anti-aircraft guns in the original design, and changed them to a combination of 12 twin 128mm anti-aircraft guns + 6 phalanxes, and then deployed a circle of 40mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns and 30mm quadruple anti-aircraft guns (ball lightning air defense vehicle shipborne version) around, Under the action of the improved fire control radar and the proximity fuze, three layers of high, medium and low dense anti-aircraft firepower were constructed.

In terms of the strength of the anti-aircraft firepower of the battleships of the Axis, there is no right side of the Richelieu, so Hoffman considered using the Savage to build a pure air defense battleship.

The Combined Fleet was also very envious of the German anti-aircraft firepower, according to Ozawa's introduction and intelligence exchange, Horikichi did not hesitate to purchase a large number of 128mm electric anti-aircraft guns from Germany, and comprehensively replaced the Type 89 high-level dual-purpose guns on the Yamato-class, as for the newly built Shinano, the anti-aircraft firepower was built with reference to the level of transformation of Richelieu, except for the Phalanx (in fact, it can be plugged completely, but Japan is reluctant to give up the 4 triple 155mm secondary guns), 12 twin 128mm anti-aircraft guns (although the Yamato-class ships were larger, the Richelieu-class guns were all concentrated on the foredeck, and the rear deck had more airspace), 40mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns, and 20mm Erlikon machine guns.

Japan's most criticized radar and fire control level is also catching up, and the Yamato-class is full of imported goods, and the large amount of gold makes the German side smile from ear to ear -- it is cheaper and better to sell it to Japan at three times the ex-factory price in Germany than Japan's domestically made equipment. Therefore, there was a separate clause in the armistice conditions between Japan and Britain, and Britain was to transfer relevant radar technology to Japan, but Britain obviously would not sell its housekeeping skills.

In view of the above-mentioned reasons, both sides have invariably adjusted their tactics, and finally embarked on the same path. Germany developed the Ju-198 based on the technology of meteor modification, which integrates lightning strikes and dive bombing, while the United States also uses BTD, which integrates lightning strikes and dive bombing, but the two are different in terms of specific emphasis:

The bomb-carrying capacity of the Ju-198 is not as good as that of the BTD, but it has fast speed, high ceiling and long range, which is suitable for excellent pilots.

The BTD has a slow speed and a short range, but it has a large bomb load and a relatively stronger fuselage, which is suitable for the characteristics of the majority of novice pilots in the United States -- since it is difficult to increase the hit rate in the short term, it is necessary to simply double the carrying capacity, so that the hit results will increase exponentially while the hit rate remains unchanged.

This time, Nimitz equipped each of the three Essex-class aircraft carriers with 48 BTDs, preparing to strengthen the lightning strike intensity.

This scene is different from the history that Hoffman is familiar with: in 1944, dive bombing was the absolute mainstream, except for attacking Musashi and Yamato, which used more torpedo planes, SBD and SB2C were the absolute protagonists of the American aircraft carrier formation, and no one knew that Nimitz's innovation was actually another form of retro.

ps: Strive to resume the third watch tomorrow, my thoughts have been a little messy in the past two days, sorry......