"Oh God! We've lost the Royal Oak! ”

In the officers' lounge of the battleship "Nelson", Admiral Winston Murphy, whose face was covered in blood. Churchill was so anxious that he was on the verge of tears.

He had only been Lord Chancellor for 4 days, and he suffered the most painful defeat in the history of the British Navy, although it was caused by the enemy's treacherous sneak attack, but the fiasco was a fiasco after all!

First two valuable aircraft carriers were burned into floating torches, then the training ship "Iron Duke" battleship (which has been abandoned and is sinking), and now the battleship "Royal Oak" has sunk! The battlecruiser "Counterattack" also seemed to have suffered heavy damage, the hull sank, the bow was still smoking, I wonder what was ignited by a torpedo explosion? And "Nelson" and "Rodney" also received several torpedoes each, and sinking was impossible. But if you are caught in a thunderstorm, you will definitely have to repair it, and you will have to lie in the dock for a few months.

That is, in the coming months, the three battleships "Nelson", "Rodney", "Counterattack" will not be available (not to mention "Royal Oak"). The power of the Royal Navy in the North Sea and the Atlantic will be greatly reduced!

Thundered......

There was another loud bang, and Churchill felt the floor shake a few times beneath his feet. He hurriedly asked Sir Pound, "What's the matter?" ”

"It's the Glory......," replied Sir in a mournful tone, "we're going to lose it, no, we've lost it!" ”

After the "Fury" and "Brave" were burned into floating torches, the aircraft carrier "Glorious" did not escape doom either. It was also dive-bombed by a whole squadron of Ju.88 bombers! And the Luftwaffe captain Friedrich, who commanded the bombing. Foss made an adventurous high-angle dive (more than 60 degrees), and 15 Ju.88s sequentially rushed down from an altitude of 4000 meters, sending 7 of the 30 SC-500 bombs into the body of the USS Glorious.

7 bombs of 500 kg! And all of them pierced the deck, exploded in the "belly" of the aircraft carrier, and one of them impartially hit the ammunition depot......

"Chancellor, we now only have 'Hood', 'Prestige', and 'Ark Royal' available." Sir Pound sat down on the floor, and his whole body was sluggish.

He was an expert in the navy, and he knew what the German "Scharenhurst" and "Seidlitz" classes were up to—with the current strength of the German navy, even if the fleet in Scapa Bay was completely wiped out, it would not be possible to land in England.

The three battle cruisers and battleships "Hood", "Revenge", and "Determination" alone are not something that the two "Shane" class can deal with. Moreover, the battleship "Warrior", which is being refurbished at the shipyard, is almost completed and will be delivered to the Navy in October. Therefore, the decisive battle to seize the sea supremacy of the English Channel is not something that the German fleet can do, and they can only use the speed of the sea to suddenly attack the British sea lines of communication in the Atlantic!

Therefore, Pound decided to concentrate the home fleet in Scapa Bay, in order to intercept the German sabotage fleet that was trying to break into the Atlantic Ocean at the first time.

And now, Britain has lost 3 fast "fleet carriers". Of the remaining 4 aircraft carriers, the "Eagle", "Hundred-Eyed Giant" and "Athletic God" can be ignored, because they are too slow to keep up with the German broken fleet, and only one "Royal Ark" is left to cover the sorties of "Hood" and "Prestige".

On the German side, however, there were two "Scharinhurst" classes and two "Seedlitz" classes. Although it may not be able to compete with the British Royal Navy, it is difficult to catch it by going around the Atlantic Ocean at high speed.

Churchill shook his head and said, "No, we still have 2 'Dunkirk' class ships to use, and maybe the 'Count Cavour' to use." ”

The battlecruisers of the "Dunkirk" class were the treasures of the French Navy, there were two of them, and the "Count Cavour" was an Italian battleship. The former is a new ship, which was completed in 37 or 38 years. And the latter is an old ship that has been modernized and reborn. All three ships were not slow, and could barely be used to intercept and pursue the German flotilla.

"But Italy is still a neutral country!" Sir Pound reminded.

"No, they won't be neutral forever!" Churchill said, "This world war will be a great reshuffle of power around the world, and no ambitious power can really stay out of it." Mussolini was ambitious, this is known to everyone. So will definitely join, the question is just who will he be on! ”

……

"Enemy planes! Spot enemy aircraft! "Lieutenant General Graeme on the 5000 in the sky was counting the results of the battle, and suddenly there was an exclamation from the earphones." It seems to be a 'Hurricane' fighter! Lieutenant General, we'll have to lower the altitude and let the Fokker Zero come to the rescue......"

Lieutenant General Graham was taken aback, the Fw-200C he was flying in was a reconnaissance plane converted from a passenger plane, and it was not very effective. Just as he gasped for air, the plane had already begun to accelerate and dive, and at the same time, the captain also sent a distress signal to Zero, who was hovering at medium and low altitudes.

"Big guy!" Captain Carter of the 67th Fighter Squadron of the RAF shouted excitedly that he had spotted a "four-engine heavy bomber".

Yes, he flew from high! Because the request for reinforcements from the home fleet did not make it clear what kind of aircraft were attacking. Therefore, Captain Carter took it for granted that it was the German four-engine heavy bombers that attacked Scarpa Bay - after all, Scapa Bay was thousands of kilometers from the German mainland, and only four-engine heavy bombers and twin-engine heavy fighters could be found in the British Royal Air Force.

So Captain Carter's squadron went straight to an altitude of 6,000 meters as soon as it reached the sky in order to seize the high-altitude position, and only then flew over Scapa Bay.

"Haha, without fighter escort, it can't escape!"

"Woohoo, it's mine, I'm going to knock it down so I can get a result!"

Captain Carter's headphones were filled with the cheers of his subordinates, and he was in a good mood as well, and it was a good sign that he would be able to achieve victory on the first day of battle. However, he still reminded his subordinates, saying: "Pay attention to maintaining formation, pay attention to covering each other, the first detachment and the second detachment will rush with me, and the third and fourth detachments will continue to search." ”

Because it did not participate in the Spanish War, the Royal Air Force was relatively backward in air combat tactics, using the traditional three-plane wedge formation. This formation method is mainly for aesthetic considerations, but there will be many problems in actual combat, such as easy to collide with one's own people when the fighter makes an emergency turn and dodges.

However, for Captain Carter, the biggest mistake he made in today's battle was not the formation, but the fact that he did not think that the Germans had a single-engine escort fighter with a long range!

So after seeing the Fw-200C dive down and reduce the altitude, Captain Carter didn't think much about it and dived down with 2 detachments (6 Spitfires). Seeing that the huge Fw-200C is getting closer and closer, it will soon be within range of 8 machine guns. Suddenly, someone in his headset shouted: "Enemy planes!" Enemy aircraft were spotted, and 1000 meters below the left front, German fighters were spotted! ”

Captain Carter thought it was a twin-engine fighter like the BF-110 (very clumsy and couldn't hit the Spitfire at all), so he didn't look at it, but just gave a loud order: "Two detachments go to deal with the German fighters, and one detachment concentrates fire on their bombers!" ”

As he spoke, the Naga Fw-200C had already entered the effective range of the fighter piloted by Captain Carter, he immediately aimed at the tail of the opponent, and then pressed the launch button, first a point shot, 8 flames flew away, and the bullet seemed to sweep the Fw-200C. Captain Carter felt confident that he would hit the enemy plane, and was about to open fire with all his might, when a terrified shout suddenly came from inside the headset.

"I've been hit! I've been hit! ”

"Oh God! What kind of plane is that, it's going around my back! ”

"There are too many, there are too many enemy planes, we are surrounded......"

What's going on? Unable to concentrate any longer, Captain Carter lowered his head and looked down to his left front, seeing something that made him unbelievable.

Four small, single-engine fighters in light blue livery were chasing one Spitfire in circles, while the other two Spitfires were gone. Those four small German planes were extremely flexible, and no matter how the Spitfire turned, they were bitten by the other side! Suddenly, two of the small German planes opened fire, a salvo of two machine guns and two 20 cannons. Effortlessly, the Spitfire was set on fire, and the plane was planted in smoke without a pilot parachuting.

What kind of plane is this? Where did they come from? Captain Carter broke out in a cold sweat, and before he could figure out these two questions, the four German planes that had won the victory raised their noses and began to climb, rushing towards Carter's location at great speed.

"They're going to grab the high-altitude position!" Carter suddenly yelled at the intercom, "Climb, climb!" ”

He and the other two wingmen didn't care about hitting the Fw-200C, and they all pulled up the plane and rushed to the high altitude - in air combat, condescending is a great advantage, and can use the dive to accelerate the plane. Just look at the speed of climb and the flexibility of the fighting of those small German planes, it is an excellent fighter with performance no less than that of the Spitfire! If you let them fight high in the air, you will be in big trouble.

To the surprise of Captain Carter and the other two wingman pilots, however, the Germans seemed to be trying to drive them away from behind the Fw-200C. By the time the three Spitfires reached an altitude of 6,000 meters, the four German planes and the Fw-200C were gone.

"Captain, the Germans are gone!" The voice of a wingman pilot rings through Carter's headphones.

"I see, I think they must have protected that Fw-200 and flew away!" Captain Carter said.

"Captain," the pilot of another wingman suddenly shouted, "Look at Scapa Bay below!" It seems that the home fleet has suffered a heavy blow! (To be continued.) )