High-speed dive, precise strafing, and rapid withdrawal, this series of actions is simple to say, to shuttle and fly through the fierce and dense anti-aircraft fire network of enemy ships, it is simply a game with death!

In order to suppress the open air guns of the enemy ships, to disperse the enemy's anti-aircraft fire, and to relieve the pressure on the attack of their own bombers, Richthofen and his fighter pilots had such an important and dangerous task after reaching the skies over the enemy fleet. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

Although the process of preparing for this counterattack was hasty, the strategic location of the Azores is very important, and the task of the garrison units throughout the year is to conduct rigorous combat training, and they simulate all kinds of possible situations; the current situation seems to be extreme, but in fact it is also within the scope of the consideration of the staff organs, and the land-based aviation units, ground antiaircraft artillery units, and garrison fleets all have contingency plans, so they will not fall into the situation of blind combat. Richthofen used half of its fighters to cover at medium and high altitudes, and half of its fighters lowered to low altitudes to strafe enemy ships, and so on until the end of this wave of bombing.

In Richthofen's conception, the leader is the embodiment of the courage and courage of a battlefield commander, and at this time, weighing the pros and cons of all parties, he personally led a dive strafing attack on the enemy ships, and the targets of the attack were the aircraft carriers with the most striking hulls!

After catching its prey, the osprey would quickly leave the water, and seeing the enemy's gunfire coming to his face, the colonel with extremely skilled flying skills immediately jumped up in an osprey style, leaving the enemy's gunfire under the wing, and then rolled in the air, flashing another series of relatively sparsely spaced machine shells, and quickly approaching a huge aircraft carrier at an altitude of about 100 meters.

The appearance of the large man in front of him is similar to that of the German aircraft carrier, the lower part of the hull is a narrow battleship line, with a typical open hangar and a low island-style bridge, the spacious and flat flight deck is painted with eye-catching lines and numbers, the aircraft propeller in the stern direction turns rapidly, and the anti-aircraft guns located in the front and rear and on both sides of the battleship do not constantly spit out blazing tongues of fire.

This was not the first time Richthofen had observed an aircraft carrier from such an angle, but at this moment, his visual senses were still quite shocked. The enemy did not intend to let the German fighter calmly "sightsee", and the artillery fire from the side of the ship almost grazed his cockpit. Richthofen quickly turned right with his wings upright, then reflexively turned sharply, swept a shuttle at the flight deck of the enemy ship at a small angle, and then quickly reversed, strafing the port gun position of the enemy ship, pulling it up, sweeping past the stern of the enemy ship, rocking the wings from side to side until it flew out of the range of small-caliber bullets, and then decisively pulled up and returned to an altitude of thousands of meters.

Leaving the dense firepower network at medium and low altitudes, the tense nerves were like springs that had been squeezed to the extreme, and they bounced up suddenly, and suddenly there was a feeling of being separated from the world. Looking back, the fierce battle continued, and the sea between the ships rose in waves, and the ripples of the waves were wider than two or three ships combined.

Under the air attack, the huge enemy fleet is changing course, and the overall formation of the fleet is also undergoing some changes, but in a small area, the ships have always maintained a position conducive to defense.

As far as Richthofen knew, the command command's counterattack order was to prioritize the enemy's capital battleships, and according to tactical conventions, the order of attack of aircraft carriers should precede battleships and battlecruisers. Therefore, most German bombers dropped bombs on enemy aircraft carriers, but tactical bombers did not dare to dive to a height of tens of meters above sea level, like fighters, but dived from high altitude to medium and low altitude, aiming and dropping bombs. Due to the interference of the enemy's artillery fire and the many differences between actual combat and exercise, the pilots who participated in the battle for the first time did not perform at their normal level, and the hit rate of the first round of bombing was very low

In addition to the Ju-30, the Luftwaffe was also heavily equipped with another tactical bomber, the Ju-17/20, which was an orthodox dive bomber, with two major series, land-based and carrier-based, with a total of more than 2,600 units before the outbreak of the war. Compared with the Ju-30, the Ju-17/20 has a slower speed and a slightly inferior bomb load, and its biggest advantage is its unique large-angle dive bombing capability, which has a dive hit rate of more than twice that of ordinary bombers at the same altitude.

Based on the fact that dive bombers are a killer weapon for air-to-ship, the German naval aviation is equipped with as many as 900 Ju-17/20s, while the Luftwaffe has more than 200 Ju-17/20s deployed in the Azores during the war, half of which are stationed on the island of Texel, and the rest are scattered on several major islands such as San Miguel, Faial, and Flores. In this counterattack, the Ju-30, which has a faster speed and a larger bomb load, is the vanguard, and the Ju-17/20 is concentrated in the second wave of bombers.

After reuniting with his wingman, Richthofen flew a short distance north with the intention of probing the strength of the escort force at the rear of the enemy carrier formation, but the mighty auxiliary ships at the rear of the enemy fleet caught his attention.

Commanding the wingman to take cover in the air, Richthofen quickly lowered his altitude. During the descent, surface ships opened fire on him, but the anti-aircraft fire was nowhere near as powerful as the battleship groups and aircraft carrier formations in front. Reduced to a flight altitude of about 100 meters, he was able to clearly distinguish the outline of the ship in front of him and even the situation on the deck.

Among the surprising number of auxiliary ships, some are temporary civilian ships, and some are auxiliary ships built for military purposes, and there are obvious differences in the appearance and appearance of the two. Richthofen flew close to a group of auxiliary ships with identical silhouettes and liveries, narrow hulls, and a number of small and medium-caliber guns, with many soldiers in khaki uniforms visible on decks and in the ship's side passages. They wore flat Tony helmets, some carried rifles, some took out machine guns, and when enemy planes attacked, they joined the air defense ranks.

Richthofen adjusted the direction and aimed the nose at one of them, then with 7. 92-mm machine gun fired. Ordinary bullets were not a threat to such a relatively sturdy auxiliary ship with a displacement of several thousand tons, and Richthofen's intention was to have an automatic camera gun capture the target......

Two hours later, at the German Azores Defense Command in the southwest of the island of Texel, a large number of aerial photographs were spread out in front of German intelligence and staff officers, who needed to use their professional ability to identify and analyze and put together a complete map of the enemy situation, which provided the generals with an important basis for judging the situation.

After reporting the information on the enemy's capital ships and escort forces that had been painstakingly screened, the officers continued to rummage through the piles of aerial photographs, and then someone pointed to the photographs taken by Colonel Richthofen and said:

"Hey, what do you think this is? Seems to be a troop carrier? ”

An officer next to him carefully inspected it with a magnifying glass: "Well, it should be an American-made fortress-class troop carrier, and it is said that two can carry an infantry regiment and all its weapons and equipment." How many did the wing commander report? Knowing the number can give a rough estimate of the enemy's landing force. ”

The officer who asked the question searched through a stack of papers: "Well, here...... Pilots of the 33rd Fighter Wing reported that some 30 ships of this type had been visually observed, and that several civilian vessels were carrying combat troops, the exact number of which was unknown. ”

Another officer answered: "15 regiments? With a conservative estimate of 30,000 troops, plus the incalculable part, the enemy's prepared land forces are likely to be more than 50,000? ”

An older lieutenant colonel said: "But such estimates are too lazy, and I am worried that these 20 Bastion-class troop carriers are only transporting the first wave of landing troops, and that there are many more troops carried by other troop carriers...... To seize the island of Texel, the enemy should prepare at least 100,000 marines. ”

At this time, an intriguing issue was raised: "It is difficult for us to determine how many troop carriers the enemy has, but one thing is certain -- if we sink just one, the enemy's land strength will be reduced by several hundred or thousand, and this is not more effective than sinking one of the enemy's capital ships." ”

Outside the headquarters, the roar of aircraft taking off and landing was heard from time to time. Trained German officers and men were struggling to recover from the devastation caused by enemy air strikes, fighter units had built new air lines north of Texel Island, and bomber units had fought back in waves, transforming the battle from a one-sided attack by the United States and Britain to a constant wrestling between the two sides.

Soon after, a somewhat lengthy report was sent to the German General Staff in the southern suburbs of Paris, where it was presented to Crown Prince Wilhelm the Younger, who was the chief of the German General Staff, and his senior staff.

"There is no doubt that the enemy has deceived our spy department in a very cunning way, and 80 percent of the main warships of the United States and Britain have already arrived in the waters north of the Azores, and their continuous air raids have severely damaged our air force on the island of Texel, and in just half a day, we have lost more than 700 combat planes, but fortunately, the fleet left Porto Heromasli the day before yesterday for military exercises in the waters off Flores, and the two aircraft carriers and more than 100 carrier-based aircraft on board were intact." Chief Staff General von Carson, as usual, summed up the essence of the front report in concise language.

After his right-hand man finished speaking, Crown Prince William nodded and said with a clear attitude: "Judging from the current situation, the counterattack of our air force is very resolute, they have laid down two or three hundred enemy carrier-based aircraft in the battle, sunk and damaged many enemy ships, and dealt a heavy blow to the enemy's arrogance, so I think we should be cautiously optimistic about the situation in the Azores, and what we need to do now is to issue a clear order to the Navy and send the main force of the High Seas Fleet to the Azores!" ”

Admiral Oscar von Hurtier, the first commander of the Marine Division and a "tactical genius" who had successfully played the two worlds of the army and navy, chimed in: "Your Highness's decision is very wise, and the present situation is similar to that of the beginning of August 1914, and if we can seize the opportunity to defeat the enemy in a decisive battle at sea, we will win more than half of the war." However, I feel that we should not ignore one detail mentioned in the report, which is that the enemy fleet has a large number of troop carriers, and I fear that the enemy's landing attack on the Azores will be faster than we expected, and even comparable to our surprise attack on the Isle of Man and the Coen peninsula. Our defenses in the Azores are very well equipped, the morale of the army is high, but the enemy is clearly prepared, and if they are lucky enough to capture one or two islands in a very short time, and establish temporary airfields and defensive positions, the battle for the Azores may turn into a large-scale war of attrition, so we will have to consider the follow-up arrangements for the main fleet to go to the Azores. ”

Everyone in the audience felt that Huthier was reasonable, but they didn't know how to deal with it. Crown Prince William raised his head slightly: "The general must have a countermeasure strategy in his heart, and I will listen to it." ”

Huthir was a talented and self-confident man, and he calmly responded: "Our garrisons in the Azores are more than defended, and the counterattack is insufficient, and if some of the islands fall into the hands of the enemy, they will have to invest heavily in recapture." Therefore, while dispatching the main fleet to the Azores, we should urgently dispatch marine forces and land-based fighters to give the Azores maximum reinforcements in the shortest possible time. In this way, the weight of winning this decisive battle will be more in our hands. ”

Crown Prince William pondered: "The troops attacking Britain from Ireland cannot be weakened, they must be transferred, and now only the troops deployed in northern France can be drawn...... How long will it take for them to immediately board ships from the ports of northern France and arrive in the Azores? ”

Without hesitation, Huttier replied: "If it goes well, the first batch of about 50,000 troops can be transported to the Azores within six days, and the combat planes will be dispersed and shipped on ships, and the first batch can carry 800 fighters and 500 bombers." ”

Crown Prince William nodded with satisfaction: "In this case, I propose to form the Azores Theater of Operations, with General von Blomberg as the commander of the theater and full responsibility for the deployment of troops, do you have any objections?" ”

There were more than a dozen generals and many senior staff officers present, many of whom had not yet considered the cause and effect clearly, but seeing that the crown prince seemed to have figured it out, and that the urgency of the situation was indeed urgent, and von Huthier was indeed a very capable commander, he did not propose a long-term plan.

Seeing that there was no objection from the crowd, Crown Prince Wilhelm made a decision on the spot with the courage of a great dictator, entrusting the command of the crucial battle to the veteran, who was born in 1857 and whose health has fluctuated in recent years. Of course, since the deployment of combat troops from northern France with land-based fighters will inevitably be affected by the cross-channel attack on southern Britain, and in the short term, a landing operation from the direction of Ireland may become the only main attack on the British mainland......

(End of chapter)