Located about 20 kilometres northwest of the island of Flores, Corvo is one of the three smallest islands in the Azores, 6 kilometres long from north to south and 4 kilometres wide from east to west. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 infoAfter the German troops were stationed in the Azores, the military value of all nine islands was discovered, and barracks, military ports, airfields, fortresses, and radar stations appeared on the island of Corvo one by one. At its peak, there were more than 2,000 German officers and soldiers stationed on the island, deployed two squadrons of combat aircraft and a vigilance squadron, but in the early days of the Azores campaign, due to the German General Staff's underestimation of the determination of the United States and Britain to seize the islands and the number of troops invested, the result was a series of defeats. The more than 1,000 German soldiers who remained on the island of Corvo became a group of poor people abandoned by their companions, who held out for a day and a night under the heavy fire of the American and British fleets, and finally surrendered to the landing force several times their size, leaving a helpless exclamation point for the German officers and soldiers and the people at home.

At a time when the situation in the Azores continued to decline and the German top brass was building a "European barrier", the battlefield situation suddenly took an unexpected turn, first the Allied reinforcement fleet annihilated the American and British fleets that came to attack their escort fleet in the waters east of the Azores, and then launched a fierce battle with the aircraft carriers of both sides as the protagonists, and finally ended with the complete victory of the Allied countries. To the delight of all supporters. In fact, it is not only those who have no military common sense or overestimate the combat power of their own army that think that the great counteroffensive of the Allies in the Azores is about to begin, that those islands occupied by the United States and Britain will soon be planted one after another with the battle flags of the German army and the Irish army. Mighty Germany will return to a series of victories.

Only those who keep a cool head and an objective mind at all times can see that there is still a long, arduous road to go to win this battle.

Returning to the German battlecruiser "Mackensen", the military conference attended by some senior naval officers of the Allied powers only put forward a feasible combat plan, and in order to put it into practice, it was necessary to carry out a lot of deductions and calculations, and to make corresponding preparations in terms of personnel equipment and tactical strategies. Over the next four days, Natsuki and Lars conducted a number of discussions, responsibly identifying any loopholes in each part of the plan, and then submitting the step-by-step improvement plan to everyone for discussion.

During this period, the lightning strike squadron with the "Mackensen" as its flagship continued to lie dormant day and night -- during the day, it retreated to the warning circle of Allied fighters, and the aircraft carriers and carrier-based planes of the 1st Task Force carried out combat reconnaissance of the sea area between Texel and Flores, and at night they took over the carrier-based aircraft to enter this area for patrol. At the same time, the Allied air forces on Sao Miguel Island, ignoring the high battle loss rate, continued to carry out oppressive bombing on Texel, which on the one hand greatly depleted the U.S. and British air forces on Texel Island, making the opponent tired and unable to carry out large-scale combat patrols in the surrounding waters, and on the other hand, it also seriously disrupted the deployment of the main US and British fleets, making it difficult for them to gain a foothold in the waters around Texel Island.

As for the 2nd Task Force and the two attack ship formations assigned by Natsuki, the sea supply lines of the US and British troops were still blocked as planned for the past four days. In retaliation for the night attack on São Miguel by the US and British fleets, two Deflinger-class battlecruisers under the command of William Marchar launched a long-range night bombardment of Flores Island, although it caused only minimal damage to the military installations on the island, but it had the effect of disturbing the enemy's military morale, while the two Moltke-class battlecruisers sailed to the sea area of 44 degrees north latitude and 47 degrees west longitude under the command of Gunther Lütjans, and the seaplanes taking off from the "Moltke" "visited" within the range limit On the island of St. Pierre on the southeastern tip of Canada, two 10-kilogram small bombs were given to Canadian soldiers at the St. John Point radar station.

The frequent activities of the Allied Navy and Air Force and the multi-faceted attacks could make the American and British generals under pressure inside and out, and it was difficult for them to sleep and eat, and the commander of the US-British Joint Operations Fleet, Charterfield, who had already received the formal appointment order, seemed to be particularly calm, he vetoed all kinds of suggestions of the commander of the detachment and the staff and staff of the detachment, insisted that the main fleet stay in Texel, and let the ships carrying troops and supplies to the Azores assemble in Boston, and ordered the fleet carrying wounded soldiers or empty ships to return to North America to wait for orders on Flores Island for four full days. In the vast sea between Texel and Flores, and between Flores and North America, there were no lone or formed ships to be seen, except for a few vigilant patrol ships and ships ordered to return to the assembly point.

Chatfield was able to calm down, and the British military top brass, who pushed him to be the commander of the Combined Battle Fleet, did not have such determination, and the remnants of the British mainland troops were forced to retreat to the northern highlands of Scotland, although the army and civilians had the determination to fight to the end, after losing Wales, England and the south of Scotland one after another, they basically lost the ability to produce their own war materials, and if the Atlantic route could not be opened for a long time, they would soon stop fighting because they ran out of ammunition.

What worries the British top brass even more is that once the Battle of the Azores is lost, the US Government may be forced to withdraw from the war due to the dual pressure of unfavorable foreign war and popular opposition, and Soviet Russia and Japan will also make choices that are unfavorable to British interests, and the sunset empire will completely lose the opportunity to reverse its destiny.

Given pressure from all sides, Chatfield was unable to hold out until Day 5 with a quiet braking strategy, which was inexplicably sad for a talented and ambitious commander. After nightfall, he ordered British Vice Admiral Buckhouse to sail to Flores Island with a squadron of HMS Howe and Queen Elizabeth, accompanied by two American light cruisers, three American destroyers, and three British destroyers. After leaving the island of Texel, the formation rushed north at a speed of 24 knots, and did not turn east until midnight, trying to avoid the night reconnaissance of the Allied ships, but they were not fast enough, and the distance to the north was not far enough, and there was still more than an hour before midnight, and the whereabouts of the formation were detected by the shipboard radar of the German destroyer "Heinz-Butch", which immediately informed its own fleet of the location of the enemy formation -- this radio signal was detected by the "Howe" and "Queen Elizabeth." Radio direction finding had always been the Royal Navy's forte, and Buckhouse soon learned that the enemy ships were following behind, so he immediately changed his plan and led the fleet westward, and sent a secret message to Chatfield, suggesting that he immediately lead the main fleet to sail in order to flank the enemy fleet with his backhand.

At 2 a.m., Buckhouse's formation reached more than 60 nautical miles northeast of Texel Island, and during the day, he was always within the cover radius of his land-based aviation units, but in the dark night before dawn, he and his formation were hovering on the edge of danger. Under the direct command of the commander of the campaign, as many as 26 ships, including the ships temporarily transferred from the waters off São Miguel Island, as many as 26 ships rushed towards the Buckhouse formation from several directions, and the 1st Task Force, which had two aircraft carriers, followed from afar, and the ground aviation units stationed on São Miguel Island made preparations for the attack in advance......

At this very critical moment, the "Heinz Buch," which had been following the Buckhaus formation, led the wingman "Otto Styra" and another group of destroyer detachments that arrived first, resolutely assumed the heavy task of containing the enemy. The four Allied destroyers were far inferior to their opponents in frontal combat, but they made full use of their agility and maneuverability, sometimes firing a volley of torpedoes and sometimes a false shot, forcing Buckhouse's battleships to turn and evade one after another, buying precious time for the swarm of their own light ships.

At 2:26 a.m., the German submarine in charge of keeping an eye east of Texel Island saw several large warships on the sea, and 15 minutes later, the Irish light cruiser "Piwell" followed the guidance of its own submarine and used radar to detect a large number of enemy ships heading towards the direction of the Buckhouse formation.

For days, Natsuki had been waiting for the enemy fleet to sail away from Texel, and he was sure to cook a delicious feast against the 10 ships of the Buckhouse formation, but the enemy was more cautious and clever than he thought. Faced with the situation in which the enemy's main fleet poured out, he resolutely made a rational choice and ordered all the participating ships to abandon their current actions and withdraw from the target sea area as soon as possible, while the dive bombers and tactical bombers on standby at the airfields on San Miguel Island were replaced with aviation armor-piercing and armor-fragmenting shells, and as soon as dawn they used fighters as outposts to carry out reconnaissance and search for the US and British ships that had left the anchorage of Texel Island, and immediately spared no effort to attack them after finding them, and the heavy bombers were dispatched an hour later than before. The targets of the bombing continued to be various aviation facilities on the island of Texel.

After adjusting the operational deployment with lightning speed, Xia Shu let out a long breath, although this move can strive for relatively large gains at a relatively small cost, but unless the army aviation pilots are full of character, it is unlikely to pose too much threat to the US and British capital ships, and after many days of high-intensity bombing, the Allied air force stationed on San Miguel Island has also been exhausted, and it is inevitable that a period of rest and replenishment will be carried out later, and if you want to really break the deadlock, I am afraid you have to rely on the strategy offered by Lars.

(End of chapter)