"Sir, it will be difficult for us to defeat the German fleet with 5 aircraft carriers and 2 super battleships. Pen %Fun %Pavilion www.biquge.info"

Having lost the "Ark Royal" in the last Battle of Shetland, Vice Admiral Somerville frowned and looked a little lacking in confidence. He analyzed: "It is not possible to use battleships to fight a decisive battle in the first place, even if the 'Nelson' is dispatched, it is impossible to defeat two 'Hindenburg' classes, let alone the 'King George V' class with only 14-inch cannons, they are not opponents at all." ”

In fact, when two Bismarck-class ships broke through the Danish Strait in December last year, the British Royal Navy did not dare to take out the few battleships that could fight. Not to mention that now in the face of such a behemoth as the "Hindenburg" class, its 406mm cannon can hit the 13.inch side armor of the "King George V" class with "one shot"!

"There will be no battleship battles." "All the large-scale naval conflicts from the beginning of this world war to the present have shown that air supremacy is truly decisive," Cunningham said. ”

"But air supremacy is also on the side of the Germans!" Somerville said, "The Germans are still leading in terms of performance, and they are likely to have converted the more powerful FW-190 aircraft into carrier-based aircraft, and our F4F can't beat them at all, so how can they have air supremacy?" ”

"It's not okay to fight on the side," Cunningham's fingers unconsciously tapped on his desk, "but the Royal Navy cannot back down at this time, and we must use all our wisdom and courage to defeat the enemy." ”

"Make a trap for the Germans?" Somerville shook his head, saying he was not optimistic. "The Germans also had very good admirals, and now the commander of the High Seas Fleet, Gunther. Admiral Lütjans was a difficult fleet commander to deal with, and we failed to get him to the ground at the Battle of Shetland. ”

Actually Gunther. Lütjans was deceived by the British at that time, but the German shore-based aviation was too powerful, and the Fokker Zero and the JU88 S.M.79 almost became the "anti-ship three treasures". No matter how perfect the plan of the "Centennial Navy" of the British Empire is, it will only be bombed if it encounters the "Three Treasures of Anti-Ship".

"The situation is different now," Cunningham said, "and in the Battle of Shetland, our fleet was constantly under the threat of German shore-based aviation. It was the German shore-based aviation, not their carrier-based aircraft, that really inflicted heavy casualties on us. This time, if the German fleet broke through the Danish Strait into the Atlantic, then they would move away from their own shore-based aviation. ”

"But the Germans will likewise go around the combat radius of our shore-based aviation." Somerville still shook his head.

This made Cunningham very dissatisfied, as a senior admiral of the Royal Navy, how could he not have the belief of victory?

"They can't get around it," interjected Rear Admiral Lister, chief of staff of the Home Fleet, "and if a plane coming from northern Scotland lands in American-controlled Iceland, the combat radius can be increased by at least 80 percent." And now it is the polar day of the Arctic, and the weather and sea conditions near the Danish Strait are very favorable for the aviation forces. ”

"In addition, we can also use 2 large aircraft carriers converted from cruise ships and several escort aircraft carriers converted from merchant ships as bait." Cunningham pondered, "Just like we did last time at the Battle of Shetland...... The release and recovery of a large number of carrier-based aircraft from an aircraft carrier is a very complex job that can easily cause confusion. And shore-based aircraft taking off from the north of Scotland would have caused even more confusion for the Germans. This will create a chance for the 4 Tejas Class! ”

In Cunningham's plan, the four Tejas class fleet carriers are the real workhorses of the Royal Navy. Not only because the speed and armor of these four aircraft carriers are first-class, but also because the air force on these four aircraft carriers concentrates the best skilled pilots in the whole of Britain, and they are the elite of the elite -- in the months after the Battle of Shetland, the British Royal Navy has been trying to improve the combat effectiveness of the carrier-based aircraft force, recruiting elite pilots everywhere, and training them at any cost, and now it has finally made up more than 160 elite captains, and is equipped with F4F fighters provided by the United States. SBD dive bombers and TBD torpedo bombers. Now I finally have the strength to fight.

Moreover, the British Royal Air Force now has an aircraft that can be compared with the "anti-ship three treasures" of the Germans -- the German Navy. Havilland-Mosquito fast bomber.

This aircraft is fast, has a high ceiling, and has a great range. The vast majority of German fighters in service could not catch up with it -- not that these German fighters were inferior to the "Mosquito" in speed, but that they could not fly as fast as the "Mosquito" at high altitudes.

It is precisely because of this characteristic that this "mosquito" aircraft has just entered service and has become a trump card used by the British Royal Air Force to harass and reconnoiter Germany. The Coastal Air Force and the Royal Naval Air Force also received a lot of "Mosquitoes", which belonged to the Coastal Air Force and the Navy, which were not only used to reconnoiter the German High Seas Fleet, but also often carried 4-8 500-pound bombs for horizontal bombing. Although its bombing accuracy is not comparable to that of the Ju-88, it still poses a certain threat to surface targets.

However, the biggest headache for the German high seas fleet was the "mosquito" type as a reconnaissance aircraft.

"Sir, the radar has found the target!"

Off Bergen, Norway, the shouts of radar officers sounded again in the command tower of the battleship "Hindenburg".

"2 planes! The azimuth is 320 degrees, the distance is 180, and the altitude is 7000. The radar officer then reported, "It should be a mosquito plane." ”

"Damn mosquitoes!" Chief of Staff of the High Seas Fleet and Captain of the battleship "Hindenburg" Erich Brown. When Lieutenant General Pei heard this report, he couldn't help but curse.

Although the bombs dropped by such "mosquito" aircraft pose little threat to surface ships under sail. However, their presence made it difficult for the German, Italian, French, and Spanish navies to hide at sea during the daytime when the weather conditions were good. Even at night, the "Mosquitoes", with an airborne radar, could still find the Grand Fleet of the Germans.

Erich. Lieutenant General Pei then asked, "Commander, do you call the Bergen base and ask them to send high-altitude planes?" ”

There are also several "high-altitude interceptors" in Germany today, such as the BF-109G family and the FW-190D-9 equipped with liquid-cooled engines. Both aircraft were developed in accordance with the requirements of the General Staff as "emergency models" and were intended to be used against possible strategic bombing.

However, due to the unexpectedly good situation in the Pacific War, the BF-109G series and FW-190D-9 were not mass-produced and equipped with troops - they were not ideal "emergency aircraft" after all, and both Hirschmann and the Luftwaffe wanted to wait until the real "ultimate aircraft" appeared before equipping them in large quantities. And the day of the appearance of the "ultimate aircraft" does not seem to be too far away.

The "extremely high-altitude fighters" TA-152 and TA-153, which are being developed by Focke-Wulf, are undergoing test flights. The Me.155A, the "extremely high-altitude fighter" of the Messerschmitt company, completed its test flight in January 1942. The He-219, an "extremely high-altitude multi-purpose aircraft" with similar performance to the British "Mosquito", made faster progress, and completed all the test flight work on March 10, 1942, and was officially finalized and produced.

The three aircraft are equipped with Mercedes-Benz's DB-603 series engines and Yumo's Jumo-21E series engines equipped with Fokker turbochargers. As well as BMW's BMW801R (dual-row 14-cylinder air-cooled) and BMW802 series (dual-row 18-cylinder air-cooled), which also have good high-altitude performance, have now entered the stage of finalization and small-scale mass production - to improve the performance of aircraft engines, it is nothing more than to work on the three points of high temperature resistance, high pressure resistance and high-octane gasoline. To put it bluntly, it is to fight for resources, high temperature and high pressure resistance to rare metals, and high-octane gasoline to fight for oil resources.

Now Germany is no longer seriously troubled by the supply of rare metals and oil, and is naturally able to come up with aircraft engines with excellent performance.

However, TA-152, TA-153, ME-155, and HE-219 are all far water. As for the ME-262 and HE-280, the two jet aircraft that are being tested, because they are epoch-making products and use many advanced but immature technologies, the development process will only be longer than that of the TA-152, TA-153, ME-155, HE-219 and other piston aircraft.

So now the BF-109G and FW-190D-9 can be used to defend the high altitude of Europe, but the high-altitude performance of these two aircraft is not superior enough to pose a great threat to the "Mosquito" aircraft, and they can usually only be driven out, and there is rarely a chance to shoot them down.

"You don't have to drive it away," Gunther said. General Lütjans shook his head lightly and said, "According to the plan, we don't need to hide our tracks now, just let the British reconnaissance planes have a good look." ”

As he spoke, Admiral Lütjans looked at the clock hanging on the bulkhead of the conning tower, and then instructed the communications staff officer of the High Seas Fleet: "Contact the Naval Aviation Command and ask them if they have already installed a plan to bomb the Faroe Islands?" ”

The "plan" mentioned by Lütjans was called "Operation Sea King", although the purpose was only to ensure that the main force of the High Seas Fleet broke through to the Atlantic. But the whole operation was very complex, including a series of feints and preparations for the battle of the fleet. And the feint attack on the Faroe Islands is an important part of "Operation Sea King"! (To be continued.) )