"Hurry up, fire flares! Get ready for hedgehog deep bombs and depth charges! Those guys who drive submarines are very timid, and they will dive when they see flares, I know this best! "The captain of the destroyer Z38, Otto. Feng. Kryzimmer knight loudly ordered the flares to be fired. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

Captain U, one of the many aces of the German submarine forces, won a lot of medals and was awarded the knightly title of Otto. Feng. Krezimer, who had successfully "cleared" a few months earlier, was promoted to captain of the 1936 Type A destroyer Z38.

According to Imperial Field Marshal Hersman, this is the highest honor that can be awarded to an ace U-boat captain! Because the ace captain and his comrades were so capable that they wiped out all the enemy's ships, they had to change their careers to become destroyer captains.

It's a joke, of course, but it makes sense. Because now there are not many British merchant ships on the surface of the North Atlantic to trouble the German U-boats to sink them. On the contrary, the number of British and American submarines operating underwater is growing!

The offensive and defensive posture of the Battle of the Atlantic has changed! Now it's the turn of the former ace U-boat captains to learn the power of British submarines.

"Boom, boom!"

A few flares were fired, and Krezimmer looked at the white scene of the sea illuminated by the flares, and suddenly thought of a very strange question. The British submarine captains who commanded the submarine to set up an ambush in the Strait of Dover may have been the captain of a destroyer 12 months ago, and they may have attacked the U-boats under their command with depth charges......

"Flares, to be discovered! Urgent dive! "Lieutenant Colonel MacIntyre, who wore the Victoria Cross on his chest, was really frightened by the flares fired indiscriminately by the German destroyers. This British lieutenant commander in charge of an S-class submarine was really a destroyer captain at the beginning of the war. At that time, he, like many destroyer captains who had only recently switched to submarines, was fighting to the death in the Atlantic, fighting the evil German submarines.

But just when the British destroyers and German submarines were inseparable, the damned JU88 and Italian hunchbacks joined the battle, and there was also a "long-legged Fokker" (referring to the Fokker Zero) escort. As a result, a 500-kilogram bomb sank Lieutenant Commander McIntyre's destroyer and left him seriously injured and hospitalized.

And by the time he was finally discharged from the hospital, the Royal Navy had no extra destroyers to give him command. Moreover, the German, French and Italian battleships were already rampage in the Atlantic, and the days when destroyers could protect the Atlantic routes are gone.

So at the suggestion of his superiors, he entered the submarine school, and after several months of accelerated training, he got a brand new S-class submarine.

However, as the captain of the S-boat, he was not sent to the Baltic, Mediterranean, or Pacific to break diplomatic relations, but was incorporated into the home fleet to participate in the defense of the English Channel.

On the afternoon of 1 May, Lieutenant Colonel McIntyre was ordered to direct his submarine to leave the port of Portsmouth and go to the Strait of Dover. As a result, on the way to the Strait of Dover, he was attacked by the German JU87 dive bombers with bombs several times, and finally escaped with good luck, but he was delayed for a lot of time, and arrived at the designated place at more than seven o'clock in the evening, but encountered dozens of torpedo boats dragging balloons, and saw Dover's artillery bombarding those torpedo boats.

However, instead of using submarines to attack the torpedo boats, McIntyre continued to wait patiently, and did not wait long for a huge fleet of ships that did not know how many. This time, MacIntyre did not hesitate any longer, and decisively seized the opportunity to sink a ship of four or five thousand tons of ammunition, and as a result, the destroyer was immediately recruited.

Seeing that the other party fired a flare, McIntyre hurriedly put down the periscope and ordered an urgent dive - because his submarine happened to raise the periscope when the flare came just now, and it may have been discovered by the German "cat's eye warriors"!

"Sir, the sonar spotted the submarine, with a degree of 98 direction, a depth of 5-10, and a distance of 500, and it seems to be making an emergency dive."

The tactics commonly used when a submarine encounters a destroyer are certainly not to launch torpedoes, but to dive deep plus silence. However, during the emergency dive, it was sometimes detected by the destroyer's sonar because of excessive noise. Krezimer, who was originally the captain of the ace U-boat, of course knew this "trick", so just now he had people fire flares and hedgehog rounds to scare people.

Krezimer's bluff soon paid off, as Z38's sonar detected a diving British submarine.

"Prepare for the Hedgehog Deep Bullet Attack, 3 rounds!" Krezimmer chose the Hedgehog Bullet, because of the close distance, Krezimmer did not choose a strong depth charge, but chose a Hedgehog Deep Bomb that can attack in a wide area.

The launcher for firing hedgehog shells is mounted on the bow of the Z38 and is equipped with 24 rounds, each weighing 30 kg. It can be launched in full in a very short time, and an oval barrage of 40 meters can be formed at a distance of more than 200 meters in front of the destroyer. As long as one hedgehog bomb hits the submarine and causes an explosion, the other 23 will also explode, forming a fire net. Normally, two rounds of hits would be enough to destroy a submarine, but Krezimmer decided to blow up three rounds to be on the safe side.

But it was unlucky, the three-wheeled hedgehog deep bullet was thrown out and fell into the water without even making a sound (the hedgehog deep bomb is a trigger fuse, and it can only explode if it touches the shell of the submarine), apparently not hit. Just as Krezimmer was considering whether to try his luck with depth charges, the shells from Fort Dover had already rained down on the water near the Z38 destroyer.

It turned out that the attack of the British submarine set several German transport ships on fire, thus revealing the position of the entire fleet, allowing the British artillery in Dover to find the approximate target of the attack again.

However, relying only on the guidance of the firelight, and without school firing, it was simply indiscriminate fire. Except for two 4,000-ton freighters that were hit by near-misses and sank, the rest of the shells were all empty.

On the contrary, the British submarine that was ambushed west of the Strait of Dover made three more successes, sinking two cargo ships and one T-type landing craft loaded with soldiers and equipment.

However, these British submarines also paid the price, and 2 S-class boats were sunk by German Z-type destroyers with hedgehog shells and depth charges.

……

"Seven boats and two torpedo boats were sunk, more than 12,800 people were lost......"

Hear from the Chief of Staff of the Western Front, Herman. Lieutenant General Bakker's report, Field Marshal Schleicher, who had not slept all night, smiled slightly.

"Not bad, the loss is not big." Schleicher touched his bald head, "What's the weather like on the English Channel now?" ”

"There was some fog, but it will soon disperse, and there will be fierce fighting."

"The British will send a fleet?"

"It's unlikely, but both the Air Force and Naval Aviation are ready." Lieutenant General Bakker said. "Admiral Jeshunek has 6,000 planes ready to attack."

Lieutenant General Jeshunek is now the commander of the Luftwaffe's 3rd Air Force and also the commander of the Air Forces Joint Command on the Western Front. Not only the air force units and naval aviation units of Germany and Italy deployed in France, Belgium, and western Germany were under his command, but even the French air force, which had begun to gradually recover, was under the command of the Combined Air Force Command under his leadership.

With the concentration of large air forces from Germany, France, and Italy, Jeshunek now has an unprecedented level of air power at his disposal. The fierce air battle that broke out over the strait on May 1 was only the beginning, and the real big war has only just begun.

"Mr. Chancellor, the Germans did not land at Dover, but they destroyed 8 armored turrets in Dover. In addition, last night our submarine attacked the German fleet trying to cross the Strait of Dover, sinking at least 10 ships. ”

"10 ships? How many are there? "The fat man has just returned from the train station to the fortress under King Charles Street.

He went to the train station to bid farewell to King George VI, who was to go on a "holiday" at Fort William in the Scottish Highlands, which would be long-term if the Germans did land in Dover or elsewhere in England.

"I'm afraid there are 150 of them, or even more!" First Sea Lord, Dudley. Pound replied, "According to the report of the submarine, the fleet that passed through the Strait of Dover yesterday included at least 3 aircraft carriers and 2 battleships and dozens of ships, most likely, landing ships." In addition, our intelligence officers reported that hundreds of transport ships are currently moored in the port of Brest, and at least one armored division has been aboard. Intelligence officers lurking in the vicinity of Gibraltar reported that the port of Gibraltar was currently empty. We estimate that in the Atlantic Ocean west of Brest should be hidden the main forces of the so-called combined European fleet. ”

"Hehe, the big war is coming." Churchill sat down in his seat and said, "Can you determine the direction of the Germans' attack?" ”

"It should be somewhere west of the Strait of Dover," said Viscount Brooke, chief of the General Staff, "and there is a 50 per cent chance that Cornwall and Ireland will each be ...... Prime Minister, I recommend that you approve the entry of the Army into the Irish Free State. ”

"Into Ireland?" Churchill lit a cigar, took two puffs and said, "How much help can I get in now?" The landing was perhaps just 24 hours away, and if the Germans were to airlift troops to Cork in just a few hours? Can we occupy all of Ireland in such a short period of time? ”

"It can't be."

Churchill spat out a puff of smoke, "In that case, then let the Germans go first...... Then we'll fight them in Ireland! He looked at Viscount Brooke, who was frowning, and said with a smile, "There will always be a large-scale land battle, either in Ireland or England, and if it were not for the landing of hundreds of thousands of Germans, the one in Moscow would continue to wait cautiously." If I had to choose a battlefield, it would be better to fight on the territory of the Irish than on the land of the English! (To be continued.) )