Ding's group of planes arrived at the Cuban coastline at about 6:20 a.m., and the scheduled arrival time was about the same, and he immediately received a report from a reconnaissance plane in front of him that there were more than 100 combat planes parked on the US military airfield, and the vigilance of the US military was not high, and no signs of fighter planes taking off were found.

This is the best news, which proves that the US military did not know that the bomber group was about to arrive, otherwise it would have let a group of fighters take off before dawn to intercept it. At this time, Zhang Ding's fleet had been reduced to ultra-low altitude, and the flight speed was also accelerating. The other three groups also arrived near the Cuban coastline at this time, and after receiving the report from the reconnaissance plane, they all quickly lowered their altitude and accelerated their flights.

Although Cuba was the largest island in the Caribbean, the island itself had no defensive depth, and the radar performance at the time was quite limited, and the warning time that could be provided to the defense forces was quite limited. The bomber group entering at ultra-low altitude is not undetectable, but it is very close to detect, which is the main reason why bomber groups generally take ultra-low altitude entry before destroying the enemy's airfield. In addition, the four regular US military airfields are all near the coastline, about 5 miles away from the nearest airport, and no more than 30 miles from the farthest. The radar deployed by the US military near the coastline can detect up to 10 nautical miles away, and flying at ultra-low altitude means that the bomber group's assault distance is only 40 nautical miles at most, and it only takes about 7 minutes to fly.

In the past few minutes, it was difficult for all the US fighter planes on the airfield to take off into the air. And it will take several minutes for the fighter to climb to a favorable altitude. Therefore, these fighters will not necessarily pose a threat to the bomber group after takeoff, but will become the target of escort fighters. This is the passive side of the defensive side, which is often alerted when the strike arrives. And by this time it was too late to organize defense.

In fact, this is exactly the case, the airfield that Zhang Ding's group attacked was the farthest from the coastline, and when he saw the airstrip, there were only a few US "Mustang" fighters climbing in the sky, and a few were about to take off. Jiang Wenhan's escort fighters were also climbing at this time, and they accelerated towards the US fighters. Another group of escort fighters rushed to the front of the bomber group and fired with machine guns at the American fighters who were about to take off.

The battle began, the resistance of the American troops was extremely weak, and even the anti-aircraft guns protecting the airfield were not able to react in time. Zhang Ding dropped the bomb first. He was dealing with the anti-aircraft artillery positions of the US army, which were also relatively dangerous targets. By this time, the bomber group had dispersed, divided into several formations, and went to deal with their respective targets.

The most important thing is to blow up the runway of the airport so that the airport can no longer be used. The bombing method this time was quite different from the previous ones.

The first to enter the airspace over the runway were five two-plane formations, each of which carried two 500-pound heavy bombs. Their mission was to first blow up the runway into six sections, each longer than the fighter needed to take off. So that the fighters on the airfield could not fly. Immediately, the other two squadrons of 24 "Falcons" will pass longitudinally over the runway in two times, and these 24 bombers will all carry two 500-kilogram bombs, each of which will be filled with more than 30 small bombs weighing less than 10 kilograms: =: enough to blow up a crater with a diameter of 23 meters on the runway.

This new tactic was summed up after several bomber airfields. If the airport is blown up in a few pieces, it is not enough to completely destroy the airport, and the engineers can use prefabricated parts or steel plates to quickly repair the airport, so that the airport can temporarily restore its use capacity. The same. If only small bombs are used, it is difficult to guarantee that the airport will be immediately incapacitated, and second, the damage caused will not be large enough. The combination of the two munitions is enough to ensure the destruction of the runway, and the small munitions blow up more craters, although each crater is not too large, but it is much more difficult to repair. Coupled with some irregular time bombs, it was also able to prevent the enemy's engineers from carrying out repair operations.

After the two squadrons of "Falcons" dropped bombs respectively, the bombing operations on all other fronts were basically completed. Three anti-aircraft gun positions around the airfield have been completely destroyed, and each of the fortified hangars has been hit by two bombers. to ensure that the hangar is completely blown up. The enemy planes parked in the open were mainly manned by fighters who had completed their escort duties, while some bombers that dropped bombs also took part in strafing operations. Naturally, the camps of the US military will not be left out. Killing pilots and ground crews is even more important than blowing up planes.

The entire bombing operation lasted only about 15 minutes, and the bombing was completely completed, and the two reconnaissance planes that accompanied it confirmed the results of the battle, and did not call the second batch of bombers from the Seventh Task Force to come and carry out supplementary bombing. Zhang Ding was the first to enter and the last to withdraw, which was one of the tasks of leading the plane. At about 6:50 a.m., Zhang Ding caught up with the returning group, and soon, he determined the loss of the group. Only two bombers were shot down in combat, and one of them, as if it had broken down and crashed, and not by anti-aircraft guns. Four other bombers were damaged to varying degrees, two of which may have had to land at an airfield on the island of Jamaica. None of the escort fighters were lost, and in addition to shooting down seven US fighters that took off, these escort fighters also destroyed at least dozens of US fighters parked on the ground.

Before 7 o'clock, several other bomber groups also sent back combat reports to the fleet one after another, and the aircraft groups responsible for bombing the large field airfields of the US military also sent back reports before 7:10 a.m. At this point, the first round of bombing was completed, and only the American airfield in Thanamo was bombed, probably because the bombers of Task Force 7 could not return to the fleet with their bombs, so they simply dropped their bombs.

Tan Renhao got the final bombing report at about half past seven, and in the entire bombing operation, the fleet lost only 23 bombers, and another 48 bombers were damaged, 21 of which had to land at the airfield on the island of Jamaica. Seven U.S. airfields were destroyed and could not be repaired for at least two days. In addition, 37 U.S. fighter jets were shot down, and at least 550 U.S. fighters were blown up at the airfield (because it is impossible to determine whether there were fighters parked in the destroyed hangars, it is impossible to determine whether the destroyed hangars were destroyed).

less US military aircraft).

"Contact the Jamaican side and ask them to try to repair the damaged fighter and send us a damage report." Tan Renhao was quite satisfied with the results of the bombing. "In addition, contact General Lei Shaoqing and ask him to send the supplementary combat aircraft as soon as possible. Also, the actions of the other units can begin. ”

The telegram was soon sent, and the Combined Fleet had already torn through the American air defense network in Cuba, and that was only the beginning of the day's massive bombardment. Using superior carrier-based bombers to tear apart the enemy's air defense network and open the bombing channel for shore-based bombers and heavy bombers of the Navy became the standard bombing mode later.

After the telegram was sent from the "Hefei," the first sortie was the 12 squadrons of shore-based tactical bombers and fighters deployed on the island of Jamaica. All 12 squadrons of fighters took off before 8 a.m. and arrived over Cuba between 8:40 and 9 a.m. to concentrate on bombing important US military targets.

At that time, the main targets of the US military were dealt with by shore-based tactical aviation, such as command posts, front-line headquarters, barracks, anti-aircraft artillery positions, troop assembly points, bridges and tunnels and other transportation hubs, and other targets that needed to be bombed with precision. These are basically tactical targets, and the difficulty of bombing is enormous, and the danger is relatively great. In the case of bridges, in order to blow up a bridge, it is best to blow up the piers, not just blow up the deck. It was difficult for heavy bombers to deal with such small targets, and only tactical bombers were able to drop bombs on bridge piers. This. It has been proven in the strategic bombing of Britain that the use of heavy bombers against tactical targets is definitely one of the worst methods.

As shore-based tactical bombers entered the battle, groups of heavy bombers deployed in Honduras and Nicaragua also carried out their first large-scale bombardment of southeastern Cuba at about 10:30 a.m. that day. This was also the only striking force that Luo Yunchong could handle at that time, and the heavy bombers were divided into several groups. Carpet bombing was carried out on large US military targets and some important infrastructure.

At the time of the heavy bombers' entry into the battle, the bombers of the Combined Fleet completed the second round of bombing by eleven o'clock. This time, only Task Force 1 and Task Force 4 sent bombers, and other task force bomber groups did not participate in combat operations. Tan Renhao also mainly considered that the pilots' energy is limited, and there is no need to dispatch more carrier-based bombers when they can complete the task by coastal and strategic bombers, so as to bear greater losses.

Bombing campaigns have been going on. At noon, HNA's shore-based bombers were dispatched again. A second round of focused bombing was carried out on the US military. In the afternoon, the bomber group of the Combined Fleet completed two more rounds of bombing, and the same shore-based forces of the Navy also carried out a third bombardment in the afternoon. Luo Yunchong also mustered up his strength and let the heavy bombers complete the second bombing operation in the evening. It was also the official beginning of the offensive against Cuba and the entire duration of the campaign, except for the day the Marines landed. The intensity of the bombing was at its highest for a day.

During the day on the 27th, carrier-based bombers and fighters flew 2,746 sorties. 42 warplanes were lost by bombing (excluding those that were scrapped after returning to airfields or fleets). Shore-based tactical aviation flew 1,327 sorties, dropped 1,100 tons of bombs, and lost 11 fighters (ibid.). Strategic bombers made 588 sorties, dropped more than 2,400 tons of bombs, and lost 3 (op. cit.).

In terms of sorties, carrier-based aviation is undoubtedly the most important aviation force, and in terms of the amount of bombs dropped, it is second only to strategic bombers. What's more. Of the more than 1170 targets, carrier-based aviation destroyed 718, which is more than sixty percent of the total. There is no doubt that carrier-based aviation is still the main striking force, which, in addition to the large number of aircraft carriers of the combined fleet at that time, has a lot to do with the quality of carrier-based aviation. It can be said that even if there were enough front-line airfields at that time and enough shore-based tactical bombers could be deployed, the position of carrier-based aviation was still unshakable. This also determines that carrier-based aviation is still the main long-range strike force of the Navy.

On the same day, the US military also dispatched bombers. Two bombings of the airport on the island of Jamaica were carried out on a modest scale. At that time, the U.S. military did not know the exact location of the Combined Fleet. Moreover, its front-line airfields were largely destroyed, and it was only capable of dispatching medium and heavy bombers from the rear airfields, which made it difficult to pose a threat to the fleet and could only counterattack the airfields of the Imperial Navy. The intensity of these two counterattacks was not too great, most of the US bombers were not able to drop bombs on the targets, and their own losses were also very huge, and the losses of the two field airfields that were bombed were quite slight, and did not even affect the third round of bombing operations of the HNA at about 4 o'clock in the afternoon.

In the evening, after recovering the reconnaissance planes at the return site, Tan Renhao asked the fleet to withdraw south from the battlefield, and the carrier-based aviation would not be responsible for night bombing, which would be mainly handled by shore-based tactical aviation and strategic bombers. Moreover, according to Luo Yunchong's plan, the task of the Combined Fleet is to tear apart the US air defense network and open a channel for other strike forces. The Combined Fleet had already completed this task, and Tan Renhao didn't want to suffer too many losses, so withdrawing from the battle became the best choice.

The bombing on the 27th was only a prelude. On the 28th, HNA transferred more than a dozen squadrons originally deployed in Sigoku to Jamaica to join the bombing of Cuba and undertake the main bombing mission. Because the strategic bombers Luo Yunchong needed had not yet reached Central America at that time, Luo Yunchong could only use the only "wolf doves" in his hand to complete the bombing operation.

On the 29th, two support fleets reached the waters south of Jamaica and joined >. By this time, most of the stationary targets had already been destroyed or had lost their bombing value. And fighter-bombers on escort aircraft carriers are much more effective against moving targets on the ground. The HNA has also adjusted the deployment of its bomber fleet, increasing the number of fighters and reducing the number of tactical bombers to improve its ability to strike moving targets on the ground.

On this day, Tan Renhao also received an important piece of news, the US Atlantic Fleet finally moved.