Night 25 March 1942, Faroe Islands. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

At a distance of 25,000 meters, on the narrow Vigel Airport, the 406mm high-explosive bomb had the effect of shaking the ground and shaking the mountains, and a shell smashed down immediately became a pit of more than ten meters, and the dust stirred up could be as high as tens of meters! Clusters of orange-red fireballs continued to rise, making the small island seem to be drowned in a sea of fire.

Several shore defense batteries armed with 10-inch (254mm) and 8-inch (203mm) cannons opened bravery fire. Soon, 406mm and 380mm naval guns were drawn back, and because there were AR-196 seaplanes in the sky firing at school, only a few rounds were fired, and the shells fell on these improvised shore defense batteries.

Hundreds of kilograms and thousands of kilograms of high-explosive shells fell from the sky, and then the earth shook like a mountain, and the British soldiers on the battery were blown into minced meat before they could even make a cry for help!

Piercing sirens sounded over the British barracks all over the island, and heavily armed soldiers rushed out of the barracks like a tidal wave, rushing to one preset position after another. The British commander on the island also burrowed into the fortified bunker and, while calmly ordering his troops to hold on, sent urgent telegrams to London and the battleship King George V in the North Atlantic.

……

King Charles Street, the British wartime cabinet headquarters, the pace is hurried and the pace is endless, and the soldiers and officials of the empire on which the sun never sets, known for their elegance and steady, have become a little restless.

"Mr. Prime Minister, the Faroe Islands are under heavy shelling! At least 4 German battleships are shelling there......"

Updating Churchill on the situation of the war was First Sea Secretary Dudley. Sir Pound. The British military's top brass, including the First Sea Lord, the Imperial Chief of the General Staff, the Chief of the Air Staff, the Secretary of the Admiralty, and the Secretary of the Air Force, had now gathered at the wartime Cabinet Command. Because the ongoing decisive battle at sea is directly related to the survival of the British Empire.

Churchill took a big drag on his cigar, "Sir Cunningham still thinks the Germans are feintging?" ”

Sir Pound nodded helplessly, "Yes, Mr. Prime Minister." ”

It was not that he felt helpless about the confusing situation of the war, but that he was helpless that Prime Minister Winston Churchill always interfered with the command of the army. Although Churchill came from a military background (he graduated from the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst), he did not fight in any serious battles, and spent a few years in the army writing novels and guest appearances as military reporters.

Since 1899, Churchill has had his ups and downs in politics, and his involvement in the military has been limited to his role as Secretary of the Navy, Secretary of the Air Force and Prime Minister. Moreover, the outcome of Churchill's involvement in military activities as a politician was often a bad mess.

Looking at the prime minister who sat in the wartime cabinet headquarters every day, Dudley. Pound was a little envious of his German opponent. It is said that German Chancellor Adolf. Hitler rarely intervened militarily. In the German General Staff, which commanded operations, although the officers in charge of the General Staff were army officers, they were also the best soldiers in the world, and the German Naval Commander-in-Chief could at least discuss naval strategy with them.

"The Americans also thought on December 8 last year that the Japanese would not take Hawaii," Churchill said, "but now, the Hawaiian Islands are full of Japanese flags!" ”

At the time of the high-altitude bombing of the Faroe Islands this morning by P.108 bombers and Amio 357 bombers, Churchill was convinced that the German attack on the Faroe Islands was a feint. But now, when the four German battleships began shelling the Faroe Islands, Churchill began to suspect that Germany was really going to capture the Faroe Islands.

"But the Prime Minister," Dudley. Pound shook his head, "The Faroe Islands are within the combat radius of the German shore-based aviation, and even their FW-190s can fight over the Faroe Islands after attaching auxiliary fuel tanks. The FW-190 and the Fokker Zero are combined, and even the P51 is difficult to fight. If our P51 fleet suffers heavy losses over the Faroe Islands, then it will be very difficult for us to deal with the German fleet as soon as it advances towards the Danish Strait......"

According to Cunningham's plan, the British Coast Air Force's deployment of hundreds of P51s in northern Scotland is the key to victory. If these planes are consumed by the FW-190 and the Fokker Zero over the Faroe Islands, then the ensuing battle will be very difficult. Although the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy together have tens of thousands of commonly used aircraft, they are not inferior to Germany in absolute numbers. But the level of training of the pilots and the number of ace pilots were significantly inferior to those of the opponents.

The airfields in the north of Scotland are now concentrated in the elite of the British Air Force fighter pilots (and for the British). If it is shot out, even if the P51 piloted by a rookie pilot can be drawn from elsewhere to participate in the war, most of them will not be able to defeat the Fokker Zero on the German aircraft carrier...... There is no need to even fight, just flying the P51 from the airport in the north of Scotland for two or three hours to participate in the sea near Iceland can make most rookie pilots so tired that they vomit blood, and only God knows if they can fight when they get there.

Churchill stared at Dudley. Pound, "Sir, but we must not lose the Faroe Islands, can we?" ”

"Yes, we can't afford to lose the Faroe Islands." Dudley. Pound glanced at Viscount Brooke, the chief of the Imperial General Staff. Viscount Brooke hurriedly interjected: "Mr. Prime Minister, the army has a complete defense in the Faroe Islands. ”

"The U.S. Army has 2 divisions and 200 tanks on the Hawaiian Islands, but the Japanese still occupy Hawaii!"

Churchill shook his head and said: "If we lose the Faroe Islands, Britain will face the doom of being completely locked down, which is a very bad thing!" He took another puff on his cigar, "I am not worried about the Germans landing on the beaches of Dover now, because those GCists in Moscow will not watch National Socialism wipe out Britain." But if it's just a blockade...... This meant that the Germans' powerful land forces would not have to fight at all, the blockade of Britain would not require the use of armored divisions and motorized rifle divisions, and the millions of Germans armed to the teeth would be on the Barbarossa Line on the Eastern Front. In this case, it is quite possible that Stalin would not dare to throw himself into his Red Army, which was not very combat-ready. ”

Churchill's layman's analysis could not be said to be wrong - the members of Britain's wartime cabinet now knew that Stalin was preparing to stab Germany in the back when Germany invaded Britain.

But they also saw the performance of the Soviet Red Army in Poland, Finland and Afghanistan (the guerrilla war in Afghanistan continued), weak is not weak, but certainly far inferior to the German army. A sneak attack with a knife in the back has a chance of victory, and if it is put in a dignified formation, the Red Army will definitely be beaten to heavy losses.

This kind of battle is lost, it is estimated that even the Russian Tsar Nicholas II will not fight, let alone Stalin.

Therefore, Britain is now not afraid of a large-scale German landing, but is afraid of being blockaded by the Germans with aircraft and warships for a year and a half. Once the time comes when the reserves of resources are exhausted and the food supply is seriously insufficient, how many people will be left in Britain to support the war?

……

"Leader, I think tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, there will be a fierce air battle over the Faroe Islands."

In the Berlin Chancellery, Reichsmann Hersmann, Defense Minister Schleicher, and Naval Commander-in-Chief Raeder were also briefing the two laymen on the latest war situation. One of the two laymen is naturally Adolf, who "does not interfere with military command". Hitler, and the other layman was Prince Friedrich, who was preparing to go to the Netherlands to go on a blind date with his cousin, Princess Elizabeth.

The prince was a Luftwaffe colonel, but he was not a combatant, but an air force lieutenant to his father, Kaiser Wilhelm III, and was actually a vase. Today he came to the Chancellery as a representative of Emperor Wilhelm III to learn about the progress of the war.

In addition, he tactfully expressed the intention of His Majesty the Emperor that he did not want his cousin and daughter-in-law, Elizabeth, to take over a country in ruins in a few months or a year......

"What if the British are not fooled?" Adolph. Hitler asked, somewhat worriedly, "They know that the Faroe Islands are within the combat radius of the FW-190, and their Spitfire and P-51 are simply no match for the FW-190 and the Fokker Zero." ”

"They're going to be fooled." Field Marshal Schleicher took over the problem, he had already discussed with Hersmann and Hitler, and was ready to temporarily hand over the post of Minister of Defense to Hersmann (the chief of the general staff would be to be held by Field Marshal Kesselring), and to be the commander-in-chief of the attack on Britain himself, who could be regarded as a truly great soldier as long as he defeated Britain.

Field Marshal Schleicher said: "What we have now is time, and if the British are not fooled, then we will bomb and shell the Faroe Islands every day until we raze them to the ground...... And the British absolutely cannot afford to lose there, and if they lose the Faroe Islands, then the Iceland-Scotland route will be completely cut off by us. ”

Hersman went on to say: "In fact we have plans to capture the Faroe Islands or Shetland Islands, and now the shelling and bombardment of the Faroe Islands is actually part of the landing operation. ”

The landing on the Faroe Islands was part of the Irish campaign, and according to the plan drawn up by the General Staff, the landing on the Faroe Islands would be carried out first to attract the attention of the British Home Fleet and the Royal Air Force. For this reason, Germany's three "missile cruisers" and several "amphibious landing ships" that are being refitted will no longer break through into the Atlantic, and they will become the main force in attacking the Faroe Islands. (To be continued.) )