The focus soon returned to Midway, and in the early morning of the 27th, just one hour after Huang Xiaotian went to sleep with his mother and son, and just returned to the command post of the fleet, he received new information. On the night of the 26th, Han Shaofeng arranged for ships to send the last batch of supplies to the garrisons on Lysan Island and Gardner Island, so that the tens of thousands of Imperial Navy officers on these two islands could support themselves for more than two months. The ships carrying the supplies also withdrew a group of non-combatants from the two islands to Midway as they retreated. That same night, the last of the planes were also transferred back to Midway.

Han Shaofeng has "given up" air supremacy on Lysan Island and Gardner Island, which is something he can do nothing about. After several days of fierce fighting with the US military, the airfields on Gardner and Lysan islands were "scarred" and no longer suitable for the deployment of combat aircraft. In these few days of fighting, the naval aviation of the Tang Empire suffered heavy losses, but it did not give the American army any sweetness.

From the 23rd to the 26th, the US military flew more than 3,000 sorties of bombers during the four days, dropping tens of thousands of tons of bombs on the islands of Lysan and Gardner. Most of the bombs fell on the airfield, and the U.S. military also bombed the Marine Corps barracks, warehouses and other important infrastructure. At least more than 200 combat aircraft of the Imperial Naval Aviation were blown up on the ground, and more than 3,000 officers and men of the Imperial Navy were killed or wounded.

In the air battle on the 23rd, at least more than 60 US fighters were shot down, including more than 30 US bombers shot down by air defense fighters, and more than 10 US escort fighters were shot down. On the 24th, the US military lost more than 50 fighters. 25th. Han Shaofeng concentrated all his forces to fight a counterattack operation, killing more than 40 US fighters in the air battle, and more than 20 US fighters were shot down by antiaircraft guns on the ground, making a total of 75 US fighters shot down in this battle. On the 26th, more than 40 US warplanes were shot down. During the four daytime. In the two nights of fighting, more than 250 US fighters were shot down, including 185 heavy bombers confirmed to have been shot down. In fact, 206 U.S. heavy bombers were shot down, more than 10 of which crashed after flying over Gardner Island.

In addition, on the 23rd and 24th, Han Shaofeng also organized two counterattacks. Heavy bombers were dispatched to bomb the U.S. airfield on Kauai. Both bombing campaigns were quite sudden, the one on the 23rd in the evening and the one on the 24th in the early hours of the morning, that is, the two bombings were basically continuous. Although the number of bombers dispatched was not large, and the two sorties combined were only 320 sorties, the results achieved were not small. During the bombing on the evening of the 23rd, at least 70 US bombers that had just returned were blown up on the ground. Then. During the bombing in the early morning of the 24th, more than 50 US fighters did not have time to take off, and as a result, they all turned into scrap metal.

In other words, from the morning of the 23rd to the evening of the 26th, the US military paid a heavy price of nearly 400 combat planes in order to destroy the airfields on Gardner Island and Lysan Island. Among them, there are about 280 heavy bombers. The loss of American pilots in combat operations exceeded 2000. This loss is quite huge, according to the Tang Empire's bombing of the Japanese mainland, the British and American bombing of Germany, and now the German and Tang Empire's bombing of the British mainland, the loss rate of more than 12% is quite amazing, and often when the loss rate exceeds 4%, it is basically unbearable!

This reflects the intensity of the fighting in the waters west of the Hawaiian Islands. Both sides are doing their best. Judging from the "crazy" bombing campaign of the US military, Nimitz must have made up his mind to take down Midway, and if it were not for the fact that US bombers could not fly to Midway Island to drop bombs, I am afraid that Midway Island would have become the focus of US bombing!

No one doubted the importance of Midway, and everyone, including the staff officers of the Theater Command, believed that the purpose of the U.S. counterattack was to take Midway and consolidate the defenses of the Hawaiian Islands. Then use Midway and Wake Island as a base to attack the Mariana Islands. Eventually, the Imperial Navy was forced to shift its focus to the Central Pacific, thereby reducing its commitment to the Australian mainland. But the problem was that not everyone at that time thought that the U.S. military would attack Midway directly, but would attack Lysan Island first, and then use Lysan Island as a springboard to attack Midway.

There are not many people who adhere to this view, including several important staff officers under Liao Hanxiang, and even Han Shaofeng is more inclined to this result. The core view of these people is that Midway is too far away from the U.S.-controlled island of Neck, which will make it more difficult for the U.S. military to project and logistically support it. In addition, the Fifth Fleet had to deal with the Fourth Task Force and could not fully support the Marines in attacking Midway, so the U.S. forces had to consider acquiring an advance base, and Lysan Island was the best starting point for a counterattack on Midway.

This judgment is not unreasonable, Huang Xiaotian once thought so. Necke Island is 1,350 kilometers away from Midway Island, which is almost on the extreme combat radius of US heavy bombers, and the runway of the airfield on Necke Island is limited, so it cannot be stationed with heavy bombers, and at most it can only be used as an emergency landing point for bombers. If the U.S. military wants to jump to attack Midway, then it must be prepared to escort the 1,350-kilometer sea route. From the point of view of troop projection, a round trip between the transport fleet and the landing fleet will take at least four days, even if the time for loading and unloading cargo and troops is not counted. This will greatly limit the speed at which the US military can project troops and deliver war materials.

On the other hand, if the U.S. military does not have a forward base, then the Marine Corps landing on Midway will have to be supported by the fleet. As long as the Fourth Task Force is still active on the battlefield, the Fifth Fleet will have some scruples and will not be able to fully support the attack on Midway. The key to attacking Midway is not the amount of Marine Corps, but the amount of support that the Marine Corps can receive, artillery support, and aviation support, all of which are key factors in determining whether the US military can take Midway Island. If the Fifth Fleet is not fully capable of supporting the Marines, then the U.S. military will have to consider laying a forward base first. Then land on Midway.

But soon Huang Xiaotian vetoed this possibility, for only one reason, the US military did not have time to prepare for the attack on Midway, and the difficulty of taking Lysan Island was not lower than that of attacking Midway!

At that time, at least 30,000 officers and men of the Imperial Marine Corps were stationed on the island of Lyssan. Over the course of several months, the Marines built well-fortified positions on the island, modeled after the American army, and turned Lysan into a fortified sea fortress. In addition, the Marine Corps also has sufficient reserves of combat materials. According to the combat effectiveness of the Imperial Marine Corps at that time, even without the cover of the fleet, the US army would take Lysan Island. It will take half a month at the earliest, and you even have to be ready to take Lysan Island within a month. More importantly, the combat planes deployed on Midway Island will certainly support the fighting on the other side of Lysan Island, so it will certainly be very difficult for the US military to attack Lysan Island.

In addition, there are problems with the strength of the US military. To take Lysan Island, Nimitz had to prepare at least four divisions of marines, just to transport these marines and the necessary war materiel. This requires a large number of landing ships as well as transport vessels. Perhaps Nimitz was not short of troops, nor was he short of ships, but after committing so many troops to Lysan Island, it would certainly have a huge impact on the combat operation of attacking Midway.

The most critical thing is time, maybe Huang Xiaotian really expects the US military to attack Lysan Island first, and then Midway. As long as the marines on Lysan Island hold off the US military for half a month. Then the U.S. military would have to attack Midway in mid-July. It would be great if it could drag on for a month. It will also take at least half a month to a month for the US military to attack Midway. Well, it is impossible for the US military to completely occupy Midway before the beginning of August. According to the current progress on the ground battlefield in Australia, the Marine Corps and Army will take Sydney by early August at the latest. Task Force 1 and Task Force 2 could be transferred to the Central Pacific Theater as soon as mid-August. Judging from this time, the more the US military delays on Lysan Island for one more day, then they are one step closer to defeat.

Because of the above reasons, Huang Xiaotian believes that Nimitz will not be stupid enough to waste precious time on Lysan Island, and the only choice for the US military is to storm Midway, strive to take Midway Island as quickly as possible, and cut off the connection between Lysan Island, Gardner Island and the Mariana Islands, as long as the US military holds Midway. At the same time, he controlled the sea control in the western waters of the Hawaiian Islands, and Nimitz did not need to send troops to attack the islands of Lysan and Gardner, which had no fresh water resources. Within three months, the officers and men of the two Imperial Marines who had arrived in Shangdi would be starving to death or dying of thirst.

Liao Hanxiang also made the same judgment, so in the early morning of 27 July, Liao Hanxiang stressed in a telegram that the US forces would directly attack Midway Island, and that the Fourth Task Force should maneuver to the operational sea area as soon as possible and make good preparations to deal with the Fifth Fleet. The first task of the Fourth Task Force is not to fight a decisive battle with the Fifth Fleet, nor to cover Han Shaofeng on Midway, but to pose an invisible threat to the US military as much as possible, so that the US military cannot attack Midway Island with confidence and boldness. As long as the Fifth Fleet could not bomb Midway with all its might, then Han Shaofeng would be able to hold out on Midway for a longer time.

After sending a telegram to Huang Xiaotian, Liao Hanxiang also sent a telegram to Han Shaofeng, asking Han Shaofeng to strengthen surveillance of the surrounding waters and assist the Fourth Task Force in dealing with the Fifth Fleet. If the Fifth Fleet is found, it is necessary to immediately organize the shore-based bombers of the Island Communist Party to deal with the Fifth Fleet, and strive to reduce the pressure on the Fourth Task Force. Liao Hanxiang did not forget another important point, that is, if the Fifth Fleet suddenly attacked and lost air supremacy over Midway, the Marines should be prepared to hold on to the defense and not expect to receive support and assistance until a decisive victory in the southwest Pacific is achieved.

No matter what Han Shaofeng thought, Huang Xiaotian couldn't be happy after receiving the telegram. To put it bluntly, he is likely to have a real fight with the Fifth Fleet this time. Spruance was not a fool, and the Fifth Fleet still maintained full combat effectiveness. At its most basic point, Spruance would bomb the airfield on Midway first, making it impossible for the Imperial Navy to support Task Force 4 on Midway. Spruance would then do everything in his power to force Task Force 4 to come out and fight him in a decisive battle to eliminate Task Force 4 in one fell swoop, and then the U.S. Marines landed on Midway Island to fight Han Shaofeng for this strategically important small island.

The Fourth Task Force had quite few options, and if the Fifth Fleet was driven out of the waters of Midway, then Huang Xiaotian would only be able to watch Han Shaofeng become a turtle in the urn, and it was unlikely that the officers and men of the Imperial Marines on Midway would hold out until August. Maybe Liao Hanxiang will not blame Huang Xiaotian, but the Fourth Task Force will avoid a fight, and the consequences will be extremely bad. However, if the Fourth Task Force wants to take the initiative to fight, then it will have to face the powerful Fifth Fleet, and the result will be to kill several aircraft carriers of the Fifth Fleet at most, and the Fourth Task Force will be completely annihilated, and the US military will still be able to quickly capture Midway, and this result is still unacceptable.

What to do? It wasn't until noon on the 27th that Huang Xiaotian made a decision, he only had one chance, that is, when the Fifth Fleet bombed Midway, seize the opportunity to kill the Fifth Fleet, at least a task force of the Fifth Fleet. In the case of equal forces, a decisive battle with the Fifth Fleet will be held. There was little hope of victory, as Spruance would have anticipated Task Force 4's actions, but it was the only option.

After lunch, Huang Xiaotian climbed on the chart table and thought about the combat operations of the fleet. At this time, the 4th Task Force was still sailing north, and was expected to reach the waters west of Midway in the early morning of the 28th. To successfully ambush the Fifth Fleet, this must be a rather difficult thing to do, and quite a risky thing to do. What made Huang Xiaotian even more uncertain was that he didn't know where Spruance would appear at all. And, will the Fifth Fleet bomb Midway first? If the answer is no, then Spruance will find a way to take out Task Force 4 first, which is the worst possible outcome.

Time passed quickly, and when Yan Yulong came to replace him, Huang Xiaotian found that the sky had darkened. All afternoon, he had been thinking about where to place his fleet, but he still didn't have much of a clue.