"Hawkeye 2, Hawkeye 2, this is Longbow 1, and the Longbow Squad has successfully arrived on the battlefield. The www.biquge.info looks very lively below, US fighter planes are attacking Japanese ships, it seems that one Japanese aircraft carrier was injured and caught fire, and another is maneuvering to evade under the protection of the wingman, and the other has not been discovered for the time being. We're going to attack as planned! Repeat, we will attack as planned! ”

The pilot who communicated with his AWACS aircraft by radio was Captain Joseph Bob of the Irish Navy, who was now in the cockpit of an IR-39T carrier-based fighter with a wide field of vision, leading a combat formation composed of two IK-43T carrier-based bombers and six IR-39T carrier-based fighters to fly at an altitude of 10,000 meters in thin air -- this is the flight ceiling of most carrier-based fighters at present, and Irish carrier-based aircraft are no exception.

As the main carrier-based bomber of the Irish Navy, the performance indicators of the IK-43T are similar to those of the U.S. military's "Hell Dive", but their armament is more sophisticated than that of the U.S. Naval Aviation. At this time, in the round belly of the two IK-44Ts, the radio-guided armor-piercing bomb nicknamed "One-eyed", a unique attack weapon of the Irish Navy, was mounted. This guided bomb weighs 670 kilograms, drops from a height of 10,000 meters, and the vertical speed when it falls to the surface is about 400 meters per second, and its kinetic energy is roughly equivalent to the state of a 12-inch armor-piercing projectile flying 15,000 meters, which is enough to penetrate a 300-350 mm thick armor plate, and its charge is 65 kilograms, and the explosive force after penetrating the target armor is three times that of a 406-mm naval gun armor-piercing projectile, and it is not an exaggeration to call it a battleship killer.

Unlike the early radio-guided bombs, which simply relied on the rudder blades to change direction, the "One Eye" is equipped with a unique rocket engine, which can allow the aerial bomb to make a dynamic orbit change during the falling process, so as to ensure the attack accuracy of the high-altitude bomb. When the weather conditions were good, the Irish Navy pilots used the "one-eyed" to attack sea targets, and the diameter error of the bomb dropped from a height of 10,000 meters could be controlled within 30 meters, which was more than double that of the radio-guided bomb of the early model.

After the leader sends the signal to attack, the two IK-43Ts do not have to dive like dive bombers, nor do they have to carefully and courageously look for attack opportunities like torpedo bombers, they only need to maintain this flight altitude that is difficult for most ship-based anti-aircraft guns to reach, and the bombardier searches for and locks on to the target through mechanical sights, and then chooses the right time to drop the bomb - the real highlight starts from the moment the bomb leaves the bomb bay, and the bombardier uses the bombing sight to constantly adjust the bomb's flight trajectory. To keep it "coincidental" with the target image on the sea surface, and taking into account the air resistance, it takes nearly a minute for the bomb to fall from an altitude of 10,000 meters to the sea level, during which the bombardier needs a very stable observation and control platform, otherwise the high hit rate of the guided bomb will not be guaranteed......

"Attention! Note! Two enemy planes came up! Longbow No. 2 follows me, No. 3 and No. 4 are ready for reinforcements, and No. 5 and No. 6 hold their ground! ”

Faced with the sudden appearance of a new enemy situation, Bob hurriedly gave the battle order, and then gently pushed the control stick, causing the IR-39T to press down on the nose of the plane and dive towards the two Japanese fighters who had climbed up from a lower altitude. At a distance of about 2,000 meters from the enemy aircraft, Bob was the first to launch two air-to-air rockets - they were not the usual "unguided rockets" that could not be fired, but radio-guided rockets manually controlled by pilots, which were the top works of the Irish military industry and were one of the first "missiles" to appear in this time and space. Although their mode of action is still very primitive, and their attack radius and effective hit rate are still very limited, they are undoubtedly the first of their kind and give users a generational advantage.

In the cockpit of a fighter with good visibility, Bob uses the flight control stick to control the plane while controlling two rockets fired at the same time through the four-way knob at the top of the flight control stick. In the optical sight at the front of the cockpit, the Japanese fighter he was targeting immediately danced in a zigzag shape, trying to avoid the rocket in this way, but the simple method that had been tried and tested repeatedly failed this time. The two rockets actually turned in the air, and when they flew to a position more than 10 meters away from the Japanese fighters, they exploded, and the scattered shrapnel immediately damaged the Japanese plane, and it was replaced by a Zero fighter, which was about to fall down eight or nine times out of ten, but this Japanese fighter plane, which was larger than the Zero fighter, was not shot down on the spot, but dragged a puff of black smoke, swaying left and right and turning around and flying back.

When the rocket fired by the long plane exploded, the IR-39T, which was acting as a wingman, wasted no time in firing a rocket at another Japanese fighter. Seeing what happened to his companion, the pilot of the Japanese fighter did not dare to be careless, he first made a roll circle in the air, from a straight line to a straight line to a small angle dive, and then made a sharp turn to the left and to the right.

How can a rocket flying at high speed have such a strong maneuvering ability, and in the blink of an eye, it misses the target and flies far away.

Seeing that the cunning Japanese fighter plane had dodged the guided rockets fired by the wingman, Bob manipulated the joystick and throttle with a blank face, driving his landline to pounce on it with a fierce tiger. After chasing to a distance of more than 1,000 meters, the pilot of the Irish long plane fired a rocket for the second time. After the rocket was fired, he focused on the scope with both eyes, his thumb resting on the four-way button used to control the rocket. After fully accelerating, this guided air-to-air rocket flew 1.5 times the speed of sound, nearly twice as fast as the champion aircraft of the 1945 International Air Racing Competition, so it was impossible for the Japanese fighter in front of it to get rid of the attack by diving and accelerating.

Realizing that the enemy plane had launched rockets from behind, the Japanese pilot behaved calmly and agilely, he made a rolling circle again, continuously changed the flight trajectory, and then made a 90-degree sharp turn to the right with the help of air combat flaps, and easily shook off the two rockets behind him!

Realizing that his rockets could not bite the cunning loach, Bob did not continue to chase after him, but returned to the altitude of 10,000 meters with the two rockets that had not yet been fired, along with his wingman. In the process, on the IK-43T, the first to drop the bomb, the 23-year-old bombardier, Sergeant Sidles Doe, kept his eyes on the Eagle bombing sight in front of his seat. Before carrying out this attack mission, he underwent eight months of systematic training and 34 live-fire training exercises, and the training hit rate was close to 80 percent, and 11 times he hit the bull's eye. Despite his excellent training results, Doe was too nervous to miss a bomb during the night raid on Manila a week ago, which has kept him blaming himself, and this fight is undoubtedly a great opportunity for him to prove himself. With Europe's best mechanical bombing sights, world-leading radio guidance technology, and abundant sunlight that provides a good line of sight, Doe seems to only need to follow the training instructions, but his target is an aircraft carrier that is operating irregularly at a speed of more than 20 knots, and the occasional explosion of anti-aircraft shells or flashes of fighter planes over the battleship is much more complicated than any training. Doe's fingers twitched slightly, and the right hand holding the pole omnidirectional controller was already covered with sweat, and he muttered quietly, "Man, to the right, to the right, to the right...... Okay, right here, right here...... A little further up, man, a little higher......"

Suddenly, the green light on the tail of the guided bomb to indicate the location disappeared, and Doe shuddered violently, and after a blink of an eye, a red flame flashed in the field of vision magnified by the sight, and then it was swallowed up by a large cloud of black smoke. Doe was stunned for a moment, then shouted, "Aha, guys, the bomb hit the target!" The bomb hit the target! This shot hangs straight to the bottom right of the goal, and if we're lucky, we'll take out the Japanese aircraft carrier in one go! ”

Hearing the excitement coming from the communication channel, Bob looked down. At this time, the flight altitude was close to 10,000 meters, and those large and small ships on the sea were only the size of soybeans in the line of sight, and the medium and low airspace was covered with explosion smoke and fighters from both sides.

A moment later, the pilot of another bomber reported in the communication channel: "It's a pity that my ball slid through the door, and the landing point was only a few meters away from the Japanese aircraft carrier!" Fortunately, Doe's blow was beautiful enough, and the back of its deck is now obscured by thick smoke, and it looks like there should be no way to take off and land planes! ”

Bob glanced at it again, at least six Japanese fighters were flying towards him, it seemed that the Japanese had discovered that a new deadly threat existed above the altitude of 10,000 meters, so he hurriedly ordered: "The attack has been completed, now all return!" All return! Enemy planes are coming, fighters pay attention to cover! Watch for cover! ”

At this time, on the almost boiling sea, two Japanese aircraft carriers were already shrouded in billowing black smoke. The commander and his crew were trying their best to deal with the low-altitude attack of the US torpedo planes, and there were people at the lookout posts who were specially on guard at medium and high altitudes, but no one noticed that the bomb that fell straight down from a height of 10,000 meters, it penetrated the armored flight deck of the Izumo-class aircraft carrier, which was said to be able to withstand the attack of 1,000 pounds of bombs, and then successively penetrated through the two layers of hangars, and exploded above the tanks used to store aviation fuel. The fire spread rapidly, and it almost turned all the more than 2,000 crew members of the "Aso" into roast ducks - due to the proper rescue method and the reasonable damage management design of the Izumo-class, the Japanese army controlled the fire in time, so that the main aircraft carrier was finally able to evacuate with injuries.

(End of chapter)