Not only did the Japanese Navy suffer huge losses, but even the Japanese army attacking in North China was also effectively blocked by the Chinese Air Force!

On the same day that the Japanese aircraft carrier was bombed, a wonderful aerial hunt was also staged over Beiping, and of course, the targets of the hunt were all kinds of fighters of the Japanese Army Air Force.

In order to cooperate with the offensive of the ground forces, the Japanese Army Air Force sent more than 200 bombers of various types, plus more than 100 escort fighters, to Beiping to carry out bombing missions. This time, however, they were intercepted by the Chinese Air Force.

In northeast China, the Japanese army has rebuilt and expanded a total of 10 military airfields, and more than 600 combat planes of the Japanese Army Airlines are stationed at these 10 airfields.

At 5 o'clock in the morning on October 12, 1936, it was still a starry night, but under the faint starlight and moonlight, both the mountains and people in Jilin Province were still asleep. At this time, several airports in southern Jilin began to get busy. After an hour of busyness, more than 300 combat planes were ready to take off at several airports.

With the order of Takeshi Yoshida, the commander of the Japanese Army Aviation, one Japanese fighter plane after another began to slide towards the runway! This time, the Japanese Army Aviation is going to send a big gift to Beiping, which not only has all kinds of bombs, but also a newer weapon, that is, poison gas bombs!

The night sky was pierced by the lights of the airport and the lights of airplanes, and the roar of piston engines shattered the pre-dawn silence in the mountains. A large group of Type 96 land attack planes lined up in a neat line at one end of the runway. One by one, they rose into the air at the command of the tower, and then merged into the dark night sky, only the wingtips of the navigation lights flickered on. The Type 90 and Type 95 fighters were the last to take off, and they were faster than the Type 96 land attack aircraft. Even if you take off last, you can get to the front!

It should be said that Japan's army aviation forces have not been able to launch a sufficiently good fighter. The Type 96 land attack has always been the main aircraft of the Japanese Army Aviation.

Long-range shore-based large bombers can fly directly to important bases in the enemy's rear during war, and use torpedoes and bombs to attack the enemy's ships, ports, and factories. Airports and other important facilities strive to greatly weaken the enemy's strength before the decisive battle between the main forces of the two sides, so that their main fleet can smoothly defeat the enemy who has been seriously weakened in the decisive battle.

Therefore, in 1934, the Japanese Navy put forward a mission book for the development of a medium-sized land attack aircraft for the ninth test, requiring that the aircraft be able to bomb land and sea targets at a distance of 1,500 kilometers with bombs and torpedoes, and have the flight speed of a fighter at that time. At that time, this seemed to be very difficult to do, because the Japanese aviation industry at that time was still relatively backward, most of the Japanese aviation weapons were designed by foreign companies, and most of the engines were imported or imitated. Moreover, foreign developed countries have not developed bombers with such performance, and most of the fighters and bombers at that time were still biplanes, with a range of only 1,000 kilometers, and such high performance indicators were a test for Japan's aviation manufacturing industry and design capabilities.

However, Japan's Mitsubishi company actually successfully completed the design task of the aircraft, when Mitsubishi successfully developed a new high-power aero engine, so the design of 9 test medium land attack aircraft has a certain feasibility, in order to improve the flight speed, Mitsubishi company decisively gave up the biplane design. A monoplane design is used, and retractable landing gear is used to reduce flight drag. It was one of the first monoplanes in the world to use retractable landing gear, and the fuselage was an all-metal monohull, company number G3M. The success of the G3M test flight marked that in the mid-1930s, Japan's aviation design and manufacturing technology had reached or even surpassed the world's advanced level.

At that time, although European and American countries felt that G3N was indeed of a high level, they also believed that G3N was definitely not designed and manufactured by Japan. Newspapers in some countries also published reports that the G3N was equipped with advanced engines imported from Europe, and later simply speculated that the G3N, like the earlier Japanese aircraft, was designed by European aircraft designers hired by Japan for the Japanese, and almost killed the Japanese.

The G3N was officially ordered by the Navy in 1936. The Navy called it the Type 96 land medium attack aircraft, the chief designer of the aircraft is Honjo Jiro, in addition to Kubo Futen, Kusakabe Nobuhiko, Oda Hiroji, Fukunaga said two, Takahashi Jijiro and other famous Japanese aviation designers participated in the design, the 96 type medium attack aircraft has a very large range, it can be said that it was the longest-range bomber at that time, in order to meet the training needs of this bomber, the Japanese Navy specially built two aviation bases for the Type 96 land attack, Kaya and Kisarazu, After the training, he was deployed to Taiwan and Northeast China.

Loaded with ammunition and fuel, these Japanese fighters formed a number of small formations and began to fly quickly in the direction of Beiping. These formations are separated by several kilometers and communicate by radio, because the larger the formation, the easier it is to detect and the more difficult it is to achieve the suddenness of the attack. In addition, the maneuverability of large formations will also be relatively poor, and turning may cause fighters to collide in the air, and the use of radio has greatly improved the communication and control capabilities of fighter formations. However, the radio performance of the Japanese aircraft was poor and often broke down.

These fighters either form a four-plane formation or a three-plane formation, and the four-plane formation is actually a composite of two two-plane formations. The four-plane formation of two twin-plane formations is usually numbered as a four-fingertip formation, which was invented by the Germans and has been the main form of formation since then. This formation is very similar to the four fingertips of a finger, and the spacing of the aircraft in this formation is about 200 meters, which is basically the same as the turning radius of the aircraft, which provides ample maneuvering space and good cross-vising. This fingertip formation can also be quickly divided into two formations for coordinated attacks and operations. In particular, after World War II, the large use of jet fighters, the speed and maneuverability of aircraft increased rapidly, and the maneuvering space and range requirements of each aircraft in the fighter formation were further increased, making the four-fingertip formation the main formation. The three-plane formation is a V-shaped formation, and the advantage of this formation is that it is conducive to the better maneuverability of the long plane, and it is not easy to separate the long plane and the wingman, which is convenient for concentrating the firepower of the formation.

Most of these pilots have more than 200 hours of flight training, but more than 200 flight hours can only be regarded as novices. This bombing also served the purpose of training pilots, and it was easy to bomb a city like Peiping, and it did not require a high degree of bomb dropping accuracy, just dropping bombs one bomb after another into the city. Therefore, the flight altitude of the Japanese fighters is about 6,000 meters, so if the horizontal bombing is carried out, it is not easy to be attacked by ground anti-aircraft fire.

Soon, nearly 400 Japanese combat planes were about to arrive in Beiping, but when they flew 50 kilometers north of Beiping City, they were intercepted by a large number of Chinese Air Force fighters. This is due to the fact that the observation posts set up on the ground by the Chinese side detected the Japanese bomber group in advance! (To be continued.) )