The plumes of smoke in the sky are clearly visible in this clear day, and every warship is desperately pouring heavy oil into the boiler to maximize the power of the power system.

The huge and heavy hull plows the waves, the high bow points to the northwest, and the entire fleet has spread out in battle formation, divided into the leading fleet, the flank fleet, the core fleet, the rear fleet, and the feint fleet, which is the standard British Royal Navy combat formation, any officer who graduated from a regular British naval academy can put up such a formation, although this formation is the simplest, but it is the most reliable, no matter which direction the enemy fleet attacks, the British fleet can cope with it, of course, there is a premise for this, That is: the British fleet was not far from the enemy fleet in terms of technical equipment.

Standing next to the bridge navigation clock of the USS Brilliant, Admiral Cunningham had no expression on his face, and even his eyes rarely blinked, as if it was a statue and not a fleet commander standing there.

If I had to find an adjective to describe Admiral Cunningham's mood at the moment, perhaps "hesitation" would be the most appropriate one.

Indeed, the British Admiralty told Mr. Admiral to "make up his own mind," the British Prime Minister told Mr. Admiral to "win back the dignity of the British Navy," and Admiral Cunningham himself preferred the opinion of the Operations Staff Officer to "take a prudent initiative while preserving strength."

Admiral Cunningham hesitated for a long time in the face of these different opinions, although the fleet still accelerated through the waters of Cape Hader according to his orders, and began to adjust its course and sail westward, but Mr. Admiral still did not make up his mind, whether to conduct a naval battle between aircraft carrier task force and aircraft carrier task force here? If this naval battle breaks out, it may be destined to go down in history, for the simple reason that this is a real head-to-head battle between aircraft carrier battle formations, compared to the last Andaman naval battle, this time, the British aircraft carrier formation is not unprepared, Admiral Cunningham and his staff officers already know the general orientation of the Chinese aircraft carrier formation, and more importantly, the carrier radar of the "Brilliant" aircraft carrier has detected a large group of aircraft with obvious hostility that is rushing towards the Asian fleet.

Since the defeat in the Battle of Malaya, the British government and the Admiralty have learned from the pain and taken a series of effective measures to boost the morale of the navy, and one of the most effective measures is to quickly put some new military technologies hidden in the depths into actual combat, such as sonar technology, such as radar technology, and as a result, some very good results have been obtained, some Chinese submarines active in the Red Sea were discovered and sunk by the sonar of British destroyers, in contrast, "Brilliance" The long-range warning radar installed on the aircraft carrier can show the power of modern military technology, although this radar uses meter waves, can not accurately detect the distance of the target, but it can at least let the navy know that there are enemy planes approaching in the sky.

But radar alone is not enough, Admiral Cunningham knows very well what the fleet needs most now, what the fleet needs most now is better performance combat aircraft, including fighters and torpedo attack aircraft, dive bombers, the outcome of the Andaman naval battle has already told the British Navy a truth with bloody facts, in the face of military technological progress, even if it is only a little gap, the consequences are enough to make the defeated side unforgettable, China's naval aviation not only has enough morale, Moreover, it also has better combat aircraft, and the latter is the most critical, but the British naval aviation lacks such advanced equipment, and the gap between fighters is slightly smaller, and the technical gap between torpedo attack aircraft and dive bombers will be calculated in units of "ten years".

As a naval general who has long been concerned about the arms race in the Far East, he has carefully studied the combat aircraft deployed by the Chinese Navy on Bangka Island, and at that time, he believed that the technical gap between the Chinese naval aviation and the British naval aviation was not large, and the torpedo attack aircraft used by the Chinese naval aviation were also biplanes, but the fuselage was all-metal, and there was nothing worth noting, but later, Admiral Cunningham suddenly discovered, I don't know when the Chinese naval aviation completely eliminated the biplanes and replaced them with the latest monoplanes, and even the torpedo attack planes were replaced with monoplanes, which threw the British Navy out of the way at once.

There is no doubt that the reason why the Chinese Navy has used the old combat aircraft for a long time may be to confuse the potential enemy and make the enemy relax his vigilance, and after the enemy ignores the technical reserves of the Chinese Navy, what will follow is the huge technological gap between the two warring sides, and this gap is definitely not something that can be made up in a short time, it takes time, and it needs more innovation in military technology, and now, both of which are very lacking in the UK, especially the former, The only thing the British Navy has now is a group of pilots who are willing to serve the country on the battlefield, and they can only fly old aircraft that are a whole generation behind to engage China's most advanced combat aircraft, which can no longer be called a battle, for British pilots, it is almost the same as a moth to a fire.

In fact, Admiral Cunningham now commands only two aircraft carriers in the British Asian Fleet, one is the "Brilliant" and the other is the "Eagle", and the tonnage of these two aircraft carriers is very limited, and what is even worse is that in addition to a small number of fighters on these two aircraft carriers, the remaining combat aircraft are basically the old "Swordfish" torpedo attack aircraft, this kind of biplane nicknamed "mesh bag" has a very "primitive" structure, and it is the same as the aircraft during the European war twenty years ago, the "Swordfish" The upper and lower wings are fixed by struts and tension lines, which is also the origin of its nickname "mesh bag", which directly leads to the great resistance of the aircraft in flight, even if the aircraft does not carry any ammunition, the speed is already outrageously low, if the torpedo is mounted, it is simply a victim of the Chinese "Falcon" under the talons.

Before leaving the Mediterranean, Cunningham sent a telegram asking the Admiralty to hand over the latest "Big Mackerel" torpedo attack aircraft to his fleet, but until he led the fleet to leave the Gulf of Aden and go north, those "Big Mackerel" were nowhere to be found. At a time when the Chinese Army had begun to sweep across the Indian subcontinent, it was impossible for them to quickly replace with new equipment, and even the radar of the "Brilliant" was transported to Colombo by a destroyer, and the Chinese's full-fledged flowering tactics clearly kept the British military department busy.

Without suitable attack aircraft, aircraft carriers are nothing more than ornaments, and they are also targets for activity at sea, so is it really necessary to "use battleships to win back the confidence of the British Navy", as the British Prime Minister shouted in his telegram? Admiral Cunningham didn't think the joke was funny at all, he just felt sad that the dignified "empire on which the sun never sets" was so busy that it couldn't even get a decent combat plane, and if the British government had understood this cruel fact, would it have declared war on China?

No matter what Admiral Cunningham thinks and hesitates now, the fact is that even if he wants to retreat now, it will be too late, and according to the radar estimates, in another 15 to 20 minutes, the combat planes of the Chinese naval aviation will fly over the heads of the Asian fleet.

"Let all the fighters take off, the torpedo attack aircraft load the torpedoes, and immediately take off, first to the southeast, deep into the land, and then north, looking for opportunities to attack enemy aircraft carriers. All the submarines of the fleet immediately sailed to the north, formed a submarine hunting force, searched for and attacked on their own, and regardless of the fleet's actions, the submarine force decided its next move. Then he sent a telegram requesting strong battlefield support from the Royal Air Force units of the shore-based aviation forces in Muscat. ”

Cunningham quickly gave an order to the adjutant, and in this case, he could only count on the shore-based aviation units of the British Air Force, after all, the British Royal Air Force deployed more than a dozen combat groups in the Middle East, and their strength should not be underestimated.

A terrible battle siren sounded on the aircraft carrier "Brilliant", all the British sailors and officers were busy, the anti-aircraft guns raised their muzzles, the battleship's main guns were removed from the plugs, and the "Hurricane" and "Sea Fire" fighters left the flight deck one after another and threw themselves into the sky, but the few numbers made people feel particularly desolate, even the most ordinary British sailors on the deck were crossing their chests and praying for those naval aviation, and as for Admiral Cunningham himself, he simply closed his eyes.

"Please send a telegram to the Admiralty and tell them that our fleet has entered a combat state and is about to fight with the assault aircraft of the Chinese fleet. But I am not at all sure of victory, I can only do my duty, try to preserve the strength of the fleet, and if the first battle is lost, I ask to retreat at the first opportunity. ”

After dictating the contents of the telegram, Admiral Cunningham finally opened his eyes and looked at the sky, and just two minutes after he opened his eyes, the mournful air defense sirens sounded, apparently, the radar of the aircraft carrier "Brilliant" had miscalculated the distance before the Chinese planes, and in fact, the arrival of the Chinese planes was at least five minutes ahead of the radar crew's predictions.

"Air defense! Air defence! ”

The commander on the anti-aircraft gun position shouted hoarsely, and the sailors who shoulder-mounted the anti-aircraft rangefinder also immediately aimed their cameras at the sky in the northwest direction, began to measure the height and distance of the incoming aircraft of the Chinese Navy, and quickly calculated the coordinates and provided them to the gun commander on the gun position, and the gunners quickly adjusted the pitch angle and azimuth angle of the gun body according to the gun commander's order, so that the gun muzzle was aimed at the most dense airspace of the Chinese aircraft as much as possible.

"Free fire! Free Fire! ”

The officers quickly conveyed the order of the fleet commander, and then, the anti-aircraft fire of the entire fleet began to shoot a rain of bullets, large and small shells flew into the sky, and exploded in the sky after a few seconds, and the sky that could only hear the roar of the aircraft engine suddenly became boiling, and the blue sky appeared densely filled with smoke of various colors, black and yellow, and exploded one by one in the sky.

A minute after the anti-aircraft guns opened fire, the first incoming bomber was hit by a shell, but instead of crashing immediately, it continued to pour black smoke from the left flank towards the British fleet, which was a twin-engine medium bomber, and at this moment there were at least eighteen such bombers in the sky, and the same number of "Falcon" fighters were escorting it.

Apparently, the 1st assault group of the Chinese Air Force was going to carry out horizontal bombing of the British fleet.