On April 23, 1942, the day of dawn in the Gulf of Gdynia was dawning, and the rising morning sun was shining on the main German fleet stationed in the bay. Due to the growing threat from the air, the German Navy had moved its main anchorage from Wilhelmshaven to the Gulf of Gdynia in the Baltic Sea.

The Gdynia naval base was less than thirty nautical miles from the port of Danzig, an anchorage large enough to accommodate the entire German navy and far from the British and Russian threats. Together with Königsberg and Memel, it has always been the main naval base of the German Baltic Fleet, and since the beginning of the war, the Home Fleet Command has made it its main anchorage to ensure the safety of the fleet, and only occasionally uses the naval base at Wilhelmshaven.

On the orange-tied water drum near the pier at the anchorage, the commander of the German Home Fleet, Gunther? The flagship of Admiral Lukins, the battleship "Deutschland" with a full load displacement of more than 57000 tons. The submarine cable to the shore would enable the Deutsche to use the ship's telephone to communicate directly with the naval command in Berlin and to maintain close contact with the Gdynia naval base to arrange for the ship's berthing, repairs, replenishment of troops and other matters. Around the "Deutschland", sixty-eight warships were assembled, accounting for about half of the surface capital ships of the German fleet.

With the completion of the modernization of five "King-class" battleships, Gunther? Admiral Lukins' capital ships included two "Deutsche class" and four "King-class" battleships, a total of six battleships, two heavy aircraft carriers "York" and "Lune" of the 1st Air Fleet, and two "Zeppelin-class" aircraft carriers of the 5th Air Fleet, "Wilhelm the Great" and "Frederick III".

Around each capital ship, mine protection barriers are laid. Although there was little chance that British and Russian bombers and submarines would enter the Gulf of Gdynia, experience after the war showed that even warships in the harbor could be attacked by torpedoes and aerial bombs from the air and underwater. Prevent a surprise attack from the enemy even in a safe sea area. Other light cruisers, destroyers, and transports were stationed around the capital ship to further protect the capital ship from aircraft and submarines.

Now the huge fleet, outwardly painted in the dark grey paint peculiar to the German and Austrian navies, was quietly anchored, and each warship had filled the port of Gdynia with fuel, ammunition, and supplies in order to complete the preparations for the sortie, so that the waterline was kept low. Throughout the harbor. Only small patrol ships and transport boats were shuttling back and forth, and the crews of the warships could already be seen moving.

At 8 o'clock in the morning, after the daily flag-raising ceremony of the battleship "Deutschland", a signal flag was raised on the signal mast, and the order that people were nervously waiting for was issued: "The fleet will set sail on time!"

Three huge anchor chains on the foredeck of the battleship began to rattle, and the iron anchors weighing several tons left the sea with the sludge, and the seawater brought up rattled along the side of the warship, leaving two obvious water stains on the bow of the warship. The anchor chain splashed with white water. When these heavy anchor chains passed through the holes of the anchor chains, the mud on them was washed away by the splash.

The 2 light cruisers and 12 destroyers of the 3rd Destroyer Fleet, which escorted the fleet, set sail first, followed by the 3rd and 5th Cruisers, the 4 "King-class" battleships of the 5th Battleship, the 1st and 5th Air Fleets, and finally the battleships "Deutschland" and "Marshal Ludendorff" of the 1st Detachment of the 1st Battlefleet and 2 light cruisers and 8 destroyers of the 5th Destroyer.

When the "Deutschland" sailed out of the anchorage, the officers and men of the naval base stood on the pier and waved their hats to bid farewell to their fleet, and the sailors on the warship also lined up next to the railing of the ship to cheer. Wave your hat. Everyone was beaming, and everyone believed that they were about to plunge into a brilliant victory at sea for the Imperial Navy.

Since the beginning of the war. The German fleet was never as dazzling as the Austro-Hungarian navy of the allies, and the German surface ship force was decent in the war, but it lagged far behind the Austro-Hungarian navy in the number of ships sunk by the British and Japanese navies. On the one hand, the German fleet's range of activities was mainly confined to the waters of the North Atlantic, and the British Royal Navy, after suffering a heavy defeat in the North Atlantic naval battle, was confined to the range of nautical miles off the coast of Great Britain. The Atlantic Fleet of the US Navy has been staying in the waters of North America, and the German Navy, except for submarine forces, has mostly only carried out the task of blocking British sea transport with the Austro-Hungarian and Italian navies, and has not experienced large-scale naval battles for more than a year. On the other hand, the German Navy was armed with only 6 aircraft carriers. Its long-range combat effectiveness is indeed slightly inferior to that of the Austro-Hungarian Navy.

This made the entire German Navy feel a bit psychologically unbalanced.

In terms of strength, the German Navy has 4 "King-class", 5 "Bavaria-class", 5 "Mackensen-class" and 5 latest "German-class" battleships, and its strength is on par with the United States and Britain, and it should far surpass the Austro-Hungarian fleet with only 4 "Austria-class", 2 "Mackensen" class and 2 "New Combined Forces class" battleships, but the harsh reality is that the Navy has entered the age of aviation, and the Austro-Hungarian Navy had 11 aircraft carriers at the beginning of the war, It is indeed ahead of the German Navy in terms of the number of aircraft carriers built and construction technology, which also makes the German Navy, which is very unconvinced, have no choice but to catch up.

With the 6 "Graff? The German Navy finally leveled the gap with the Austro-Hungarian Navy in this regard, but after the Austro-Hungarian Navy successively commissioned two more "Romanian-class" aircraft carriers and two "Zeppelin-class" aircraft carriers, the number of aircraft carriers between the two countries was once again opened.

Now, almost all naval nations are aware of the importance of aircraft carriers, and the US Navy began construction of six "Essex-class" aircraft carriers in the second half of 1939, and in 1940 and 1941 successively increased the construction budget of 18 aircraft carriers of the same class. It is clear that the Americans, realizing the obvious inadequacy of the number of aircraft carriers they are equipping, are stepping up to close the gap with Germany and Austria. The British also immediately began to build four "Dreadnought-class" aircraft carriers with a displacement of 38,000 tons and capable of equipping 106 combat aircraft after losing the naval battle, but due to the decline of British industrial capacity and the impact of the war, the British Royal Navy has lagged far behind Germany and Austria in the shipbuilding competition.

At the Axis Military Coordination Conference in the winter of 1941, according to the Austro-Hungarian Emperor's proposal, Germany, Austria, Italy, China, Ukraine, Don, Finland and the Caucasus reached an agreement to launch a full-scale offensive against Soviet Russia in the spring of 1942 and forced Soviet Russia to withdraw from the war ahead of schedule. The Axis powers then concentrated their main forces at sea and forced Japan, India, and Australia to surrender on the lines of Japan, India, and Australia, thus forcing the United States to withdraw from the war.

The campaign against the Soviet Union had been fully launched in early April, and the 350 German troops were divided into two major groups, of which the total strength of the northern front group was about 1.5 million, plus about 500,000 servant troops of the three Baltic countries and Finland, and a full-scale attack on Leningrad would be launched from the north and south; The Southern Front group, with a total strength of 2 million people, plus 500,000 Ukrainian Republican Army and 200,000 Belarusian Defense Forces, marched from Kiev to Minsk on the front line, towards Moscow.

The total number of troops dispatched by the Austro-Hungarian side is 2.1 million, of which 900,000 are on the Western Front, and together with 300,000 Ukrainian Republican Army and 150,000 Don River Army, they will advance from Poltava to Luhansk to Kharkiv and Voronezh; The Austrian army of 1.2 million men on the Eastern Front, together with 300,000 Don Army, 300,000 Italian Army and 150,000 Caucasian Army, attacked the Tsaritsyn fortress along the Don River valley with all their might. In addition, 150,000 German-Austrian troops and 200,000 Caucasian troops marched to the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea, intending to drive the Soviets away from Turkestan.

On the Russian Eastern Front, the 3 million Chinese Army marched to Siberia in three directions, of which about 450,000 troops from three armies marched to the southern line of Lake Balkhash and then into Central Asia.

In order to contain the possible assistance of the United States to Soviet Russia, the German-Austrian navy decided to take the initiative and launch an attack on Iceland, which was already under the control of the American army.

That is why Admiral Lukins left the Baltic with the main fleet.

After more than half a year of idle adjustment, the main German fleet once again embarked on a new journey. (To be continued......)