Facing the sea breeze, the fleet broke the waves and moved forward, standing on the bridge, Shen Honglie carefully studied the theodolite,

"Report to the Commander! Call from Muscat! The army bomber group has already taken off and is expected to arrive in the predetermined sea area in 15 minutes, and the HNA will need to send enough fighters to escort it. ”

A lieutenant colonel officer walked up behind Shen Honglie with a copy of a telegram in his hand.

"Got it.

Call back to Muscat, in any case, the army aviation fighter units guarding the Hajar base cannot stay away from Muscat, although the landing field has been established, but it is not yet stable, and the main force of the British army has not been fatally attacked, we must be vigilant against the counterattack of the British army, and the army aviation fighter unit must be ready to defend the landing ground at any time, as for the sea, it will be handed over to us. ”

Shen Honglie glanced at the telegram, nodded, and quickly drafted his reply, and then called the lieutenant colonel adjutant.

Walking to the chart hanging on the bulkhead, Shen Honglie carefully searched for the chart, and finally stared at the cape, which is called "Cape Haad", located in the northeast corner of the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, overlooking the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea, and it is also the easternmost point of the Omani territory in Muscat, the easternmost point of the Hajar Mountains, in terms of geographical location, Cape Haad is not very eye-catching, but now, Shen Honglie faintly feels that Cape Haad may become the battlefield of a fierce naval battle.

The news of the British government's formation of the "Asian Fleet" has long been vigorously publicized by the British newspapers, and China's military intelligence and general staff are aware of this news, and more detailed information from Germany and Italy shows that the Asian Fleet of the British Royal Navy is quite strong, and it includes five battleships, one battle cruiser, two aircraft carriers, nine heavy cruisers, sixteen light cruisers, and many auxiliary ships. Any sea area is enough to cause a significant change in the balance of local maritime forces, and this change in power has aroused a high degree of vigilance on the part of China.

Therefore, after learning that the British "Asian Fleet" had sailed to the waters of the Gulf of Aden, the General Staff had no choice but to postpone the start of the Muscat landing operation and ordered Shen Honglie to lead the escort fleet and the landing fleet to go around the area of Socotra Island in the southern waters of the Arabian Sea, in order to confuse the British side.

The theater commander who commanded the Mascat landing operation was Zhou Daogang, who made a splash in the Malaya landing operation, while Shen Honglie's task was to cover the landing fleet to carry out the landing operation and at the same time ensure that the army units established a solid landing ground.

However, the General Staff soon found that the British fleet was not deceived by the tricks of Socotra, and after the current Chinese fleet sailed to the coast of Muscat, the British fleet quickly changed course and pounced from the Gulf of Aden to the Gulf of Oman.

The situation is rather critical, the British army has deployed a considerable number of army and air force units in Muscat, plus the British Indian Ocean detachment cruising in the waters of the Persian Gulf, if the landing ground of the Chinese army is flanked, the landing operation is likely to be a failure, after all, the first attack group of the Chinese army unit is not many troops in this landing operation.

In order to ensure the smooth implementation of the landing operation codenamed "Hot Wind," after learning of the whereabouts of the British fleet, the Chinese General Staff immediately gave Shen Honglie a task that must be completed, that is, to lead the escort fleet to turn around and advance eastward, intercept the British fleet, and prevent it from approaching the landing site.

Compared with the Chinese army units that carry out the "hot wind" operation, the naval escort fleet under Shen Honglie's command now has quite strong strength, and its core striking force is all four large attack aircraft carriers currently owned by the Chinese navy, so it can be said that all the elite forces of the Chinese navy are in this sea area, and Shen Honglie is confident that he will stop any attempt by the British fleet, and he is also confident that he will inflict heavy damage on the British fleet, and the other leg of the British navy deployed in the Asian region will also be lame.

However, Shen Honglie was still a little worried about the situation at the landing site, because before he led the escort fleet to leave the landing site, he had already received a report from a naval reconnaissance plane that the British Indian Ocean detachment that was originally cruising in the waters of the Persian Gulf was sailing towards the Gulf of Oman, and the target was obviously the landing ground of the Chinese Army. And considering that the follow-up convoys are still arriving one after another, then the air alert at the Muscat landing site must be taken seriously, and it is precisely for this reason that Shen Honglie will once again emphasize the role of the army aviation force in his callback.

As a matter of fact, Shen Honglie had already received the news that the Hajar field airfield had been attacked by British bombers, which showed that the British Air Force still had a certain counterattack force, while the Chinese side had a deviation on the issue of the connection between the naval aviation unit and the army aviation unit, resulting in the field airfield losing air protection for more than 10 minutes, and the British bombers also took advantage of this gap to slip to the landing field, bombed the field airfield, and also threatened the land forces at the landing field.

Fortunately, the army aviation fighters arrived in time to prevent a disaster, otherwise, Shen Honglie would not be able to get rid of the responsibility in the future, after all, the naval aviation troops in Muscat were under his direct command.

The naval strength of the four aircraft carriers together is a very considerable number, and there was originally a staff officer's suggestion to leave at least one aircraft carrier cruising in the waters of the Gulf of Oman to provide close air support for the landing site, but this suggestion was not accepted by Shen Honglie, first considering that escorting aircraft carriers also requires a certain amount of maritime strength, and the current situation, it is impossible for the escort fleet to divide troops, and he believes that the biggest threat to the landing field at present is not the British army aviation, nor the small fleet in the Persian Gulf, It was the British "Asian Fleet" that was about to rush to the waters of the Gulf of Oman, and only by defeating this British fleet could the current critical situation be fundamentally changed, and it was with the support of this belief that Shen Honglie decided to escort all four aircraft carriers of the fleet to follow the main force of the fleet, and to be sure to inflict heavy damage on the British Asian Fleet, which did not know what to do, and if possible, he even planned to wipe out most of the fleet of the British Royal Navy.

In the early hours of the morning, the Chinese submarine cruising in the Arabian Sea had already seen the traces of the British fleet, and just now, a naval reconnaissance plane had also tracked the whereabouts of the British Asian fleet.

It is worth mentioning that just five minutes ago, the fighters of the escort fleet on air alert mission shot down a British Air Force "Hurricane" fighter over the southwest sea, and according to the radar, the British Air Force had only one plane in that airspace, which is unusual, and the "Hurricane" fighter was most likely on a reconnaissance mission, and no one can guarantee that before it was shot down, the pilot of the British fighter did not report the location of his downed to the rear command. If the British pilot had been nimble enough, then perhaps the commander of the British "Asian Fleet" would have known the approximate location of the Chinese convoy by now, and if analyzed in this way, both sides might have known the location of the other side by now.

"Give an order to prepare for the loading of aerial bombs and torpedoes."

Shen Honglie stood in front of the nautical chart and gave an order to the staff officer, and the ground crew on the deck of the aircraft carrier immediately got busy, hanging torpedoes and aerial bombs for the torpedo attack planes and dive bombers that had long been parked on the deck.

Everything went according to plan, with the ground crews busy loading the planes with weapons and refueling, while the pilots gathered in conference rooms, studying mission briefings, and getting the current orientation parameters of the enemy fleet from the staff officers at any time, and as soon as the order to attack was given, the pilots would quickly fly the planes to the target.

Although the bombers of the Army Aviation are medium-sized bombers and can only carry out horizontal bombing and cannot carry out accurate bombing, the arrival of the Army Aviation Group will effectively enhance the overall combat capability of the assault aircraft group and deter the British fleet.

At 8:50 a.m., the radar on the warship showed the army bomber unit approaching the fleet, and five minutes later, the navy fighters on alert mission visually confirmed that the target was the "Heron" medium bomber of the Chinese Air Force.

"All the pilots who participated in the assault mission! I am Fleet Commander Shen Honglie.

This attack is a matter of great importance, the success or failure of the central strategy, you are all in one, I hope you will go all out, bravely assault, and strive to defeat the British fleet in a war! Before the pilots boarded the plane, Shen Honglie personally rushed to the conference room to cheer up the officers and soldiers participating in the battle, and personally substituted tea instead of wine to feast on the flight warriors, and then led the team to leave the combat conference room, climb the gangway, and watch the pilots board the plane.

“…… Sweep through the raging waves, run to the battlefield, and the goal is ahead! Heroic and fierce, swift assault, victory is ahead! ......" The generous and majestic "HNA Assault" once again resounded on the deck of the aircraft carrier, and in the sonorous sound of this military music, the first assault group took off from the deck of the aircraft carrier at 9 o'clock in the morning, and in order to achieve the maximum effect of the assault, the first attack wave used all the torpedo attack planes and most of the dive bombers, and together with the HNA there was also a squad of army bombers from Muscat, according to accurate calculations, the army bombers would bomb the British fleet horizontally before the naval forces launched a surprise attack, Disrupted its anti-aircraft formation, covering torpedo attack aircraft approaching the target to carry out torpedo attacks.