This is a mistake.

A wrong time, a wrong division of forces, a wrong military operation.

"I'm sorry." Dowding, commander of the British Air Force, could not meet Churchill's expectant eyes

He didn't want to say what he was saying, but reality didn't allow him to say something nice but meaningless.

Glancing at Churchill behind the desk with some embarrassment, his fingers crossed and waiting for the result, Dowding said with great difficulty: "Our bombing formation was calculated by the Germans and was surrounded and annihilated by German fighters several times its size. The fighter formations were outnumbered and eventually retreated with difficulty, but only half of the fighters were withdrawn......"

Dowding paused, took another deep breath, and then plucked up his strength and said, "Prime Minister, in the short term, the Royal Air Force is no longer capable of launching a single air attack against Germany. ”

In fact, this is already the most euphemistic way to put it. Not to mention launching an air attack on Germany, the current Royal Air Force even wants to defend the airspace of the British Isles, which is already a luxury.

The air raid on Calais was immediately ordered by the entire British top brass after weighing it again and again in a very short period of time. The gap is very short, and it is really difficult to leak secrets. And they relied on the successful decipherment of the German cipher machine to launch this operation.

In order to hide his decipherment of his German code, Churchill even reluctantly accepted a large-scale bombing by the German army, breaking his teeth and swallowing a lot of losses.

Everything is for today.

Churchill, or now the top brass of the British Empire, actually saw very clearly that the German army seemed to be rich and invincible. However, no matter how strong their land forces were, it was impossible to land on their feet and on tracks across the English Channel. As long as you fight for losses and sink the German transport ships concentrated in the port, so that they have no ships to transport troops, you Britain will be relatively safe for a certain period of time.

By that time, even the Royal Navy had been severely damaged, and the Royal Air Force had already suffered heavy losses in the final bombing campaign. However, it was impossible for the Germans to land on the British Isles without sufficient troop carriers.

The port of Calais, the largest port closest to the British mainland, and the port where the German telegram clearly pointed out that the concentration of troop transports was an opportunity for the British.

Churchill knew very well that the most lacking thing in Britain now was time, as long as they could rely on this time to squeeze the concentrated strength of the Royal Air Force, in exchange for the time difference between the German army crossing the river without boats, they would be able to get more supplies from the United States, and at that time, even those militias armed by Churchill could exchange guns and guns, and their strength would be greatly increased.

Yes, after the two crushing defeats of Narvik in Norway and Dunkirk in France, the British mainland had few troops and not many trained soldiers. However, under Churchill's crazy move to make all the soldiers a soldier, the British Empire's war department itself expected to receive more than 1.5 million cannon fodder.

These civilians, who use old stockpiles of weapons and lack military training, will be severely lacking in heavy weapons support and will be crushed by the German regular army. However, they can still play a limited role. As long as the German transport ships were insufficient, the British army could desperately lose a large amount of cannon fodder, plus its own coastal artillery units, shrink the home fleet defending the coastal waters, shrink the native Royal Air Force, and a small number of regular army troops, with the assistance of beach minefields, coastal barbed wire, and machine gun positions, to drive the small number of German landing troops into the sea.

Although, many of the batteries on British soil are too old to be suitable for modern warfare. Their beach minefields were also lost more than a third of their losses due to the continuous destruction of the Luftwaffe and Navy. The army even lost its heavy weapons to Dunkirk, and became a small arms infantry during the First World War.

However, it is still possible to fill the number if it is good to fill the number.

The production line of Hurricane fighter jets established in Canada has become more and more mature, and it will soon be able to feed back to the mainland. Roosevelt, on the American side, finally agreed to Churchill's request and agreed to exchange 40 old and backward destroyers that were both dilapidated and extremely inefficient in exchange for some of the British overseas bases that Churchill had taken out.

Although the British side of the deal seemed to be at a loss, with these almost junk destroyers, Churchill was able to strengthen his escort fleet against the "wolf pack" submarine force commanded by the middle-aged German man named Dönitz.

With the strengthened transport fleet, the British mainland will be able to get more supplies, weapons, and equipment from the United States and Canada......

Time. Just give Churchill another two or three years, no, even if it's just a year of peace. He will be able to rebuild an army force that is barely capable of defending the shores of his homeland.

However, this bombing operation, which was all about the battle, Dowding told him, failed?!

"How could it fail!" Churchill simply felt like he was dreaming, this air raid on which he gambled everything, and it failed like this?

"It doesn't matter how much the Air Force loses, we can make up for it. With the new Hurricanes produced in Canada, and the fighters bought by the United States, we can train pilots in the north. As long as we blow up the German transports and gain time, we are not a defeat. ”

Churchill was very eager, and Dowding would add to him at this time that the so-called defeat just now only meant the defeat at the combat level, the defeat in the air force confrontation. In terms of the results of the bombing mission alone, it was a success.

It's a pity, Dowding continued with a bitter face very regretfully: "Prime Minister, the heavy losses of the Air Force are one thing. On the other hand, according to the reports of the surviving pilots who had been withdrawn, the Germans were not troop carriers parked in the port of Calais, but a pile of wooden model ships camouflaged with paint. To be sure, the Germans set a trap for us. And we, right fell into it. ”

What do you mean that the Germans set a trap and we fell right into it? After hearing Dowding's reply, Churchill almost opened his mouth to curse.

Unless, the Germans have long been sure that their code has been deciphered, and they have seen through the hidden acting of Churchill's flesh pain. Then, they deliberately used telegrams that they knew were deciphered by the British to lure the British into bombing the port of Calais, which was covered with painted wooden model ships.

Doesn't this mean that the German army has once again succeeded in weakening the already weak British Royal Air Force, so that the air defense forces of the British mainland will once again suffer huge losses!

Churchill suddenly felt a wave of dizziness, as was the case when the British invaded Norway, when the British surrendered to the French fleet, and now when the British decipher the German telegraph.

He did not understand why the Germans could accurately guess the actions of the British side every time. The point is that these operations are also very wide-ranging, either the plans of the British Army's top brass, or the Navy top brass, the Air Force's top brass, and even MI6 operations......

Could it be that the leaders of every important department of the British Empire were spies planted by Germany?!

So how can this battle be fought, does it depend on him Churchill alone?