On the Nelson, Commander Cunningham's face was as ugly as the sky above him.

Although his fleet lasted until dawn, taking advantage of the improved visibility, he repelled the arrogant German navy in an artillery duel, but the price paid was extremely heavy.

When he left Scapa Bay, Officer Cunningham took nine battleships, fourteen cruisers, and twenty destroyers, but now, he had only four battleships, seven cruisers, and ten destroyers left, and his strength had shrunk by more than half, which can be described as an unprecedented fiasco.

The battleship Nelson, which had eaten a total of fifty-six inch shells from the opponent before and after, was in no good shape at the moment.

Inside and outside the ship was a hectic scene.

The shell that hit the front main turret was 20,000 hits. It landed at an angle of nearly seventy degrees to the top of the turret and struck the top of the turret. It was a "heavy shell" with a strong charge, and the seven-inch thick (about 18o mm) armor on the top of the main turret was simply unable to resist it, and it was lightly shot down, and then the shell fell into the shaft and exploded, killing all the gunners and sailors in the turret. The entire turret was rendered useless, and it was impossible to restore its combat strength without returning to the port and returning to the factory for overhaul.

The shell burst into flames inside the turret at first, and after the rescue of the damage management team, the fire has been extinguished, and the fire isolation and blast door is well designed, but it does not spread to the ammunition depot. However, the breach in the top of the smashed turret was still smoky.

The No. 2 turret was also hit, but it hit the thickest (41o mm) frontal shell, and due to the large inclination of inclination, the shell was lucky enough to bounce and fell into the sea hundreds of meters away.

The third hit hit the foredeck of the bow of the ship, and after penetrating it, it exploded inside, blowing up the entire foredeck of the bow in large quantities and twisting it into the sky.

The fourth shell hit the open deck of the rear bridge of the ship, piercing as usual, destroying several compartments, including the radio room: Nelson's ship's equipment was completely destroyed by the blow, and he was completely deprived of communication and could only communicate with friendly forces by means of signal flags and lights.

and devastated into the boiler compartment and burst into flames, which rendered a quarter of the Nelson's boilers inoperable, which, together with the damage caused by previous mines, reduced the ship's maximum to sixteen knots.

The same sixteen-inch class artillery, the power of the main guns of the two "Demon Battleships" is much greater than the power of his legacy of the "Treaty Era". Due to the use of a "light bullet" design and the fact that it was manufactured more than a decade ago, the Nelson's main gun was not very powerful compared with the fifteen-inch gun. In contrast, the sixteen-inch guns of the same caliber used by the German battleships on the opposite side were terrifyingly powerful, hitting the Nelson with almost every shell causing an effective breakdown.

As for the 11-inch (283 mm) shells from three German pocket battleships on board, these minor injuries are not mentioned.

In the artillery battle, the remaining three British battleships were not targeted by the large-caliber guns of the German ships at all, except for some six-inch shells. In the previous artillery battle, the Germans' combat idea was very clear, that is, they wanted to sink him, the strongest remaining battleship of the Royal Navy, so all the large-caliber naval guns were aimed at him.

Had it not been for the overnight battle, when the German ship's main guns were close to running out of shells and forced to retreat, Cunningham knew that his fleet would be unlucky.

Fortunately, the wind and waves in the Norwegian Sea are high today, and neither aircraft carriers nor 6-base aircraft can take off. Otherwise, at this time, a German plane will appear to "replenish the gun", and I am afraid that none of his capital ships will be able to leave the sea off Bergen.

Cunningham can imagine what will happen to him when he returns home, the trial and accountability of the Judge Advocate General's Office will definitely not run, and he himself will be "immortalized in history" with "the commander who lost a record tonnage of the fleet overnight". Because of the Norwegian naval battle in January last year, the overall strength of the Royal Navy has fallen from joint first place in the world to second place in the world. And after today, they can't even keep the second position, both in terms of the number of naval tonnage and the number of battleships owned, they have been ranked third by the Japanese Navy.

The only thing that made the British feel a little "comforted" was that the Japanese Navy, which had become "second in the world" without doing anything, was still an "ally" of the British.

Standing on the bridge of the ship, looking at the huge breach on the top of the main gun of the battleship Nelson, which had been punched by the German ship's sixteen-inch guns, Cunningham felt as if a man was grinning at him, mocking him mercilessly as a defeated general.

The mood of Lieutenant General Phillips, who had recently returned from defeat and had committed suicide in his room, Cunningham now fully understood. The accountability of the Judge Advocate General's Office, the anger of the people, the tears of the families of the sailors, these things add up, they are too heavy.

Suicide to apologize? Thinking of this, Cunningham touched the gun on his waist, but the thought that had just arisen was quickly suppressed by him.

"Nope! Although I was defeated, I had to be like a man, brave enough to face my defeat, unable to escape or retreat! ”

Cunningham's orderlies walked by and reported him a piece of good news.

"The Nottingham is back, his unwired has been broken by the Germans and there is no way to contact us."

Nottingham, a destroyer, had lost contact with the German ship in a lightning strike operation the previous night when it was delayed in pursuit. Cunningham looked in the direction the orderly was pointing, and he saw a destroyer disappearing in the distant sea, its searchlights flashing in the direction of the fleet, using Moore code for light communication.

Cunningham smiled wryly and said to the orderly, "This is the best news I've heard today." ”

When Commander Cunningham on the front could still hear some "good news," at 8 o'clock in the morning on 24 January, Churchill, who was working at 10 Downing Street, received complete "bad news"

"Five battleships, seven cruisers, nine destroyers sank, and the German Navy suffered only minor losses."

When he got this briefing, Churchill almost jumped up from his desk.

He propped his hands on the table, supported his fat body, stared at the blistered eyes and asked his female secretary, "You confirm that you have not taken the wrong telegram!" ”

The female secretary said with a worried face: "I also hope that I took the wrong telegram myself." ”

In the middle of the night, Churchill sat back in his chair, and his right buttocks ached from this movement.

It was a gunshot wound he had suffered in Japan, and on this bad day, he had been injured by the violent sitting down before.

“！”

Churchill muttered in a gaffe.

He thought of the ugly face of the current president of the United States, the cactus Garner, the insatiable guy he met in the United States not long ago, and now you are happy, you must be happy, right? Damn the Yankees, and that damn Hitler, and those two damn "demon ships".

Churchill was tempted to scold: Cunningham betrayed my trust, but he held back in the end. Churchill opened the drawer, took out his cigar, and smoked a "stuffy cigarette".

He knew he was going to the United States again soon, and then he had to pinch his nose and endure the disgusting bad breath of the obese American red-necked man like him.

Last time, he unceremoniously pushed back his greedy claws towards the British Empire, but this time, he will have to learn to endure. Churchill, who was sitting in the office of the prime minister at No. 10 Downing Street smoking a cigar, had faintly heard the sound of sharpening knives from across the Atlantic.

The sorrow of the English is the joy of the Germans.

Lin Han left his ship, the Gneisenau, and temporarily lodged his spirit on the cruiser Valkyrie, staying in Bergen to help monitor the perimeter of the Rapid Detachment that was temporarily stationed there. And Hannah returned to Oss 6 with the main fleet.

The main German fleet, which had won an epic victory last night, did not return directly to the nearby port of Bergen, but retreated to Oss 6. The port of Bergen is small, and it was only available yesterday, so there is not enough supplies to provide the necessary supplies and maintenance for the whole country. The 4o6 mm shells on the sister ships of Shane suffered great losses and had to return to Oss 6 for the time being. At present, the port of Bergen is left only with the torpedo boat force that had done a great job last night, several destroyers, and the cruiser Valkyrie, which was the soul of Linhan Jiling. In addition, the light cruiser Nuremberg, which ran aground with mines in the ship, was also there, as well as a captured and heavily damaged British destroyer.

Hannah was accompanied by more than 700 British sailors who had been salvaged from the sea last night, all of whom were sailors on the Balham and Rodney.

In Norway, a cold battlefield with a temperature of more than ten degrees below zero, it was a night naval battle, and the sailors who fell into the water had almost no chance of survival. The reason why so many British sailors were captured was entirely due to Lin Han's "kindness".

In last night's night battle, the Rodney and Barham were hit by mines and paralyzed at sea. The German capital ships were busy chasing and killing the rest of the British ships, and they had no time to pay attention to these two "dead tigers" for the time being.

The Rodney was judged by Hannah to be "certain death" early on, so the German Navy did not waste torpedoes on him, but just watched him tilt little by little and sink. Before sinking, a German destroyer, which had been wounded and slowed down to take part in the battle, approached the Rodney, lowered its life-saving valve, and rescued more than 500 British sailors who were trapped on the sloping deck and desperately waiting for death, but the ship's captain refused to be rescued and sank with the ship.

The situation of the Barham was a little different, and its captain responded with the ship's guns in response to the German destroyer's kindness of "order your crew to abandon the ship, and we will do everything in our power to save your sailors". Then he was besieged by several destroyers, and after eating several torpedoes, he quickly sank. However, the Germans, under Lin Han's instructions, still "regardless of their previous suspicions", fired their cannons and snatched the British sailors who fell into the water as much as possible, and afterwards rescued more than 60 guys who were shivering from the sea.

In addition, the German ships also salvaged his sunken sailors from the sea in bits and pieces, and most of these rescued people were lucky enough to board the life-saving valve. In the sea of ice in January, ordinary people only need to soak for a few minutes before quickly losing their body temperature and freezing to death.

As for the captured British destroyer, at that time he was damaged by the ship guns of the German cruiser and became a floating object at sea after losing power. The captain gave the order to open the sea valve and abandon the ship, and all the sailors were put on the rescue valve, and later these sailors were captured by the German ship. However, the sailors who carried out the order to open the sea valve did not know what was wrong, and only partially opened the sea valve, and by dawn the ship was still floating on the sea, although it was flooded a lot, and was finally towed to the port of Ber by a nearby German ship, and was finally captured.

Lin Han and Hannah asked the German Navy to save people so "with heart", not because they were kind, but because they had more money to negotiate with the British. War is easy to start, but the hardest to end. After a great victory in a naval battle, it is also very good for one's reputation to rescue the enemy's sailors who have fallen into the water.

In last night's naval battle, the German Navy lost five high torpedo boats and ten torpedoes in addition to the heavy damage suffered by the bow mine of the light cruiser Nuremberg. In addition, the ships suffered various artillery damage of varying severity, and two 10,000-ton merchant ships that served as radar decoys were expelled and sunk by the British, and in total less than 100 sailors were killed and more than 200 wounded. Compared with the loss of more than half of the British fleet and the tragic loss of nearly 10,000 sailors killed in the battle, this loss is almost insignificant.

After the Battle of Bergen in the early hours of 24 January, Norway's confusing strategic situation was reversed overnight. Although the British Navy still maintained an "advantage" on paper over the German Navy, in fact this advantage was completely a "white elephant" in the face of the Germans' terrifying night artillery combat capabilities, and it was only an advantage on paper.

The battered British Royal Navy is now blocking the German Navy and preventing it from entering the Atlantic to break diplomatic relations. Even maintaining control of the North Sea and the Norwegian Sea, and ensuring the safety of the sea routes between northern Norway and the British mainland, were in great question.

Before solving the difficult problem of night artillery warfare of the fleet, nearly two-thirds of the time of sea supremacy in the Norwegian Sea must have been in the hands of the Germans -- Norway, near the North Pole, between January and April, the days were short and the nights were long, and the German Navy, even if it had only two main battleships, was almost insoluble for the British Navy at present by relying on its anti-sky night artillery technology.

After the end of the naval battle on 24 January, the situation in Norway became clear at a rapid pace, and the British were no longer thinking about the strategic idea of contending with Germany for Norway and closing the door to the Atlantic, but about withdrawing the troops previously sent at the port of Narvik from the matter of their lives before the Germans cut off the sea transport.

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