PS: Thanks to harrison for tipping the monthly pass

The aircraft carrier Indian Ocean was like a furious sea, attacking two islands more than 700 kilometers away in one day. When the news was conveyed to the Japanese Truk base, Vice Admiral Ugaki, the chief of staff of the Combined Fleet, frowned slightly, and General Yamamoto 56 simply did not even have a little expression.

Three airfields were attacked, and the loss of less than twenty fighters was nothing in the eyes of Admiral Yamamoto. As for the hundreds of devils killed and wounded, in the mind of Admiral Yamamoto, it is not as important as airplanes. Besides, most of those planes are old-fashioned planes, which can barely play the role of vigilance and reconnaissance, and almost all of them cannot go to the battlefield.

How could there be such a bland reaction?

For more than half a year, the ambitious gambler Yamamoto Fifty-six has disappeared. Ever since the Battle of Midway, he seems to have been drained of his spirits.

Over the past few months, he has also lifted his spirits many times, and the Japanese Navy has also won several battles. But the victories and defeats in the New Guinea and Kuah battles were torture for Yamamoto.

After a few months of fighting, Yamamoto realized that victory or defeat would be unbearable attrition for the Japanese Navy, the Japanese Army, and the whole of Japan.

Yamamoto has a table on his desk that lists the various losses on a daily basis. Judging by the format of the table, either Yamamoto or the staff officers of the Japanese Combined Fleet were already aware of the importance of aircraft.

Because, the losses of fighters are in the first column. As for the loss of the ships, Admiral Yamamoto didn't need charts at all, and he clearly recorded them all in his heart.

In less than half a year, the Japanese Navy alone lost more than 600 fighters of various types. For the loss of Japanese Army fighters, it is easy for an officer of the rank of General Yamamoto 56 to figure it out. But Yamamoto, out of a certain ostrich mentality, is a bit of a cover-up and stealing the bell. He didn't really put it into practice. He only needed to know a little, the Japanese army and the American MacArthur in the southeast of New Guinea were dead, and the number of fighters lost was not much less than that of the navy.

In other words, the Japanese army lost more than 1,000 fighters in less than half a year in the Central Pacific Theater. Together with other battlefields, such as Ceylon, the losses of Japanese fighters averaged two hundred and fifty per month.

At the beginning of the Pacific War, Japan's production capacity was about 90 fighters per month. By the end of '42, production had tripled to about 230 aircraft. However, this capacity is still far from sufficient.

Aircraft losses outpaced production, and the Japanese Navy now has fewer fighters than it did after the Midway disastrous. As a last resort, the Japanese Navy has deployed the old 96 carrier-based aircraft for training on various islands. So. Training aircraft began to be lacking, and the replenishment capabilities of the pilots of the Japanese Air Forces became even weaker.

The quality of the pilots of the Japanese aircraft carriers also declined sharply during the half-year battle, and the half of the elite after the Battle of Midway Island was reduced to almost two squads (a squad of four aircraft. In order to stand up to an elite flying officer.

On the other hand, in the United States, the production capacity of fighters in the early days of the Pacific War was about two to three hundred per month. By June, the Battle of Midway, it had reached five hundred per month. And by the end of the forty-second year. The United States has already reached the production capacity of thirteen hundred aircraft. And. This rate of rapid expansion continues. What made the Japanese army even more frustrating was that the US fighters were constantly innovating, and in the past, the US bombers were so solid that the Zero fighters were difficult to shoot down even if they ran out of bullets. But now, the Zero fighter, which the Japanese army was proud of, has gradually fallen behind in the fight-to-fighter fight.

P38 in the face of the US Army. With a twin-engine fighter or a high-horsepower fighter like the P47, the Japanese pilots were full of powerlessness, hitting the opponent dozens of bullets in a row, and the opponent's fighter could even fly back to its old nest. As for the Zero fighters of the Japanese army. I simply can't stand such a ravage.

The appearance of the U.S. Navy's new carrier-based aircraft F6F Hellcat and F4U Corsair on the battlefield made the Japanese Zero fighters feel even more pressure.

After half a year of fierce fighting, there were many casualties among American pilots, but the unique advantage of the Americans made them train pilots faster than the Japanese. The United States is known as a country on automobile wheels, and the penetration rate of automobiles is extremely high, and young people's familiarity and understanding of machinery far exceeds that of Japan. It makes it very easy for those young people who are used to driving cars to become familiar with the operation of fighter planes. Pilots are like soap bubbles on the battlefield. Although these American pilots are not elite, the adventurous Americans in the war are also growing rapidly, from rookies to veterans.

The wealth of the United States is also enough to support the extravagant training of pilots, and the equipping of American pilots is one on the front line, one as a reserve, and one in training. Such a configuration has enabled the US military to replenish its pilots at any time, and the combat effectiveness of the Air Force has risen instead of falling in the brutal war of attrition for half a year.

In the Central Pacific Theater, Japanese officers and men, both Navy and Army, felt the same way: the number of American planes was growing every day. The US planes fought more and more, while the Japanese planes fought fewer and less.

What the devil does not know is that even so, the US military invested only 15 percent of its total strength in the Pacific theater in 42 years. It was only after the outbreak of the Kuah Island and New Guinea campaigns that the scale of the war expanded, and the United States increased its support for the Pacific theater. By the end of '42, the United States had only invested 30 percent of its troops and material resources in the Pacific theater.

Historically, the United States has invested 15 percent in the Pacific theater for 42 years, and now this proportion has been forced to change.

It's time to retreat. Yamamoto Fifty-six sighed in his heart.

Retreat from Kuah, retreat from New Guinea. Shrinking the defensive line and the U.S. military took time to buy time for Japan's weapons production and soldier training.

To retreat, Yamamoto Isoroku had already requested the base camp several times in a few months. However, the current Japanese Prime Minister Hideki Tojo, nicknamed "Private Tojo" and "Razor Tojo", simply ignored him. Still holding on to the fanaticism of the invincibility of the Imperial Japanese Army, he continued to increase troops to New Guinea and Kuah.

A small melon island, the Japanese army filled in 50,000 troops.

In New Guinea, the total strength of the Japanese army has exceeded 200,000, including 100,000 troops in southeastern New Guinea. To say that the Japanese army in New Guinea really spent blood, 200,000 troops. And there are quite a few elite troops. Among them were the troops drawn from the Kwantung Army, which were originally intended to be sent to Ceylon, but as soon as this side was tight, they didn't care about recovering face from Ceylon, so they allocated a few divisions and regiments and filled in the New Guinea battlefield.

It's easy to say if so many troops can win, but in the current situation, let alone winning, even retreat is a problem. You know, there is a large mountain in central New Guinea that runs from east to west......

In order to connect the north and the south, the Japanese army desperately searched for a mountain road. This mountain road. People can barely get through, but the supply of weapons and ammunition is all in the imagination. The Japanese Army's usual dirt buns are no longer dirty this time, and they even began to transport them by air.

100,000 troops, the daily consumption is an astronomical amount. Just the Japanese Army's planes. It's a drop in the bucket. And the American ghost animal is so easy to talk to? An air supply that will make it easy for the little devils? Every once in a while, the Japanese transport planes would be beaten by a group of US fighters.

Fight in other areas. The consistent style of the Japanese army is robbery. But in a wilderness like New Guinea, there is no one to grab. At present, the ammunition of the Japanese army in New Guinea is still secondary, and the key is that there is no food to eat, and they have fallen into the same situation as the Japanese army on Kuah Island - starvation.

In the New Guinea battlefield, the US military played very poorly, but it could not stop the US military from having enough troops. The weapons are good enough, and the supplies and ammunition are abundant.

In addition to being a good actor, MacArthur, the American general, is not entirely an idiot in his tactical level. To be the principal of West Point, it is impossible to play the role of a military academy without knowing tactics. But. MacArthur was a military expert with a continental mindset, and he was really not an expert in mountain and jungle warfare.

But after MacArthur paid a heavy price and withstood the first wave of Japanese attacks, the tide of the war entered the rhythm of the American army.

Static fronts, which were the norm on the battlefields of the First World War in Europe. The U.S. military was well acquainted with this research, and after a slight demonstration of the U.S. military's powerful engineering prowess, a defensive line was quickly constructed, and the Japanese offensive came to a standstill.

The devil really doesn't know the tactics of great depth, and he can't think of the defense-breaking tactics of a salvo of thousands of artillery, and of course he can't transport so many shells and cannons at all.

You must know that in New Guinea alone, the U.S. military has mobilized more than 300,000 troops, three times the strength of the Japanese army. And the firepower was more than ten times that of the Japanese army.

In the tropical mountains and forests, if there is a sports war, the Japanese army may still have a way to survive. But once MacArthur was forced to the point of a static front defense, the little devil knew what an impregnable wall was.

The more American officers and men fought, the more familiar they became with the battlefield, and the more they fought, the more supplies for the Japanese army lacked.

Even under such circumstances, the Japanese base camp reluctantly issued an order on January 4 to prepare to evacuate the Japanese troops on Kuah Island. Remember, it was the army that only evacuated Kuah Island.

Yamamoto Isoroku is simply indignant that a head like Hideki Tojo became prime minister. Only the Kuah Island Army was evacuated. If we continue to fight, I don't know if the navy will be able to organize a retreat.

The Japanese Navy lost more than just aircraft in this battle, which lasted half a year. The Japanese Navy sank 1 aircraft carrier, 2 battleships, 5 cruisers (including 2 heavy cruisers), 11 destroyers and 6 submarines.

Two of these battleships were the only two high-speed battleships of the Japanese Navy. In the Japanese Navy, there were only four battleships that could run at speeds of more than 30 knots, namely the Kongo, Hiei, Haruna, and Kirishima. Among them, the Kirishima was sunk by a submarine of the Maritime Resistance Army after the Battle of the Arabian Sea. The Hiei was converted into an aircraft carrier due to heavy damage, but was sunk again at the Battle of Midway. Now the Japanese Navy has lost the battleships Kongo and Haruna.

By this time, although the Japanese Navy still had eight battleships, there was not a single high-speed battleship that could follow the aircraft carriers.

As for the heavy cruisers of the Japanese army, there were only eighteen at the beginning of the war. In two naval battles in the Indian Ocean, the Navy's resistance forces sank a total of three ships, with the Japanese losing one at Midway and two at Kuah Island. Now there were only twelve heavy cruisers.

That is, the proportion of losses of the Japanese Navy, both battleships and heavy cruisers, was a third.

And aircraft carriers, it is too meaningless to calculate the proportion of total losses. After the Battle of Midway, the Japanese had a total of six aircraft carriers, whether regular, light, or modified. Although in the battle, which lasted half a year, only one was sunk. However, three ships were injured. Now there are only two converted aircraft carriers that can appear on the battlefield. This is no longer the extent of breaking the muscles and bones, but has been disabled.

Therefore, when Yamamoto heard that the Gilbert Islands and the Marshall Islands had been attacked, his first judgment was that the US military had a new aircraft carrier to enter the war. He did not know that the two air raids were carried out by the Naval Resistance Army.

That's an aircraft carrier, it's not a small thing. It has only been a year since the start of the war, and the new aircraft carriers of the US military have already begun to appear on the battlefield, and Japan's industrial capacity is simply incomparable.

In the whole of Japan, there is only one regular aircraft carrier under construction - the Taiho (there was originally a Shinano, but it has not yet been included in the plan. ）。 However, during the war, Japan's shortage of materials had begun to leak, and the pace of construction was so slow that even Admiral Yamamoto 56 could hardly judge when the aircraft carrier would be launched.

If you want to be fast, General Yamamoto Fifty-six has an idea, which is to use battleships to refit them. That is, after the attack on the Marshall Islands by the Naval Resistance Army, Admiral Yamamoto made a decision to select two battleships to be converted into aircraft carriers.

Of Japan's eight existing battleships, the Yamato and the Musashi undoubtedly cannot be retrofitted, and these two giant battleships are the pride of Japan and a symbol of invincibility in the world. And the Nagato and Mutsu two ships, which are also new ships, have been used as flagships by the Japanese Combined Fleet for many years, with huge symbolic significance and strong combat effectiveness, and they cannot be refitted.

As for the battleships Fuso and Yamashiro, they were too old, and no general of the Combined Fleet liked to take these two old fellows with them. Generally speaking, these two battleships can only stay around the Japanese mainland to take care of the home and nursing homes, and a little long distance may give you a mechanical breakdown or something.

Picking and choosing, Admiral Yamamoto 56 made a decision to convert the battleships Ise and Hyuga into aircraft carriers. In fact, the two battleships Ise and Hyuga are all of the same grade as Fuso. It's just a little shorter. The speed is also terrible slow, only about twenty-five knots.

However, it is difficult for a good woman to cook without rice, and Yamamoto Fifty-six has no other choice even if he has Tongtian himself. Although Yamamoto Isoroku did not have a temper at all consumed by the US military, he still showed his courage in this regard. The determination to refit two battleships at once is unique in the Japanese Navy, which has infinite admiration for giant ships and cannons, and even in the whole of Japan.

After making up his mind, Yamamoto Isoroku's desire to retreat became even stronger. At the very least, the Japanese troops on Kuah Island must be withdrawn first, which is too far from the Rabaul base on the island of New Britain and has exceeded the combat radius of Japanese land-based fighters.

It was so strange that the Navy's attack on the Gilbert Islands and the Marshall Islands had other purposes, but it prompted Yamamoto Isoroku to make up his mind to evacuate Kuah Island immediately. As early as 4 January, the Japanese base camp had already issued an order to evacuate Kuah Island, but the Japanese Army was still hesitating, and the evacuation operation was not immediately launched.

Yamamoto even believed that the US army's surprise attack on Gilbert and the Marshall Islands was a defeat and gave the Japanese army an excellent opportunity to withdraw from Kuah Island. How did he know that the US military did not know about this matter at all, and the air raids were all done by the naval resistance forces.

Yamamoto made up his mind, and naturally a group of staff officers began to plan an evacuation plan. Yamamoto's most trusted former staff officer, Kuroshima Kameo, Osa, has had some subtle changes in his position since the Battle of Midway. Admiral Yamamoto seems to have discovered that this so-called genius doesn't seem to be a real genius.

The Black Island Turtle Man is a little hazy and hazy, and the "U.S. Army" -- he also thinks that the air raid was carried out by the U.S. Army, will they sneak attack Wake Island, or even storm Wake Island.

However, due to the decline in status and the reduction of the right to speak, the Black Island Turtle Man smashed his mouth and did not speak. It was just a routine notice that the Japanese troops on Wake Island should strengthen their vigilance. Then he began to work hard to formulate an evacuation plan for Kuah Island.

It was such a mistake that caused Yamamoto to misjudge the situation of the war, and he did not know that the Naval Resistance Force had appeared in the Pacific Ocean, nor did he know what the purpose of the Naval Resistance Army was, nor did he know that the Pacific Fleet of the US Navy was still going all out to blockade Kuah Island. (To be continued......)