On the afternoon of 17 June, in the open sea, 260 kilometers away from Shanghai, the Japanese intervention forces, which had been adrift at sea for several days, finally waited for the rendezvous of the aircraft carrier Chicheng, which had departed from Tokyo.

After the rendezvous, the number of Japanese warships parked off Shanghai increased, including one battle cruiser Kongo and four heavy cruisers, namely Aoba, Kinugasa, Furutaka, and Kako. After meeting with the Third Fleet, which had been crippled by the Red Army, the combined number of light cruisers and destroyers reached fifteen, in addition to the aircraft carriers Chicheng and Fengxiang.

In terms of total tonnage, this is already an extremely formidable fleet. Therefore, the battleships were not sent because of the high cost of battleship sorties, and in the eyes of the Japanese, the firepower of the battleships in the weak Chinese Navy was completely surplus and wasteful, and the firepower of the opposing shore was enough for the eight-inch guns on the heavy cruise. (Note: In addition to fuel, the wear and tear consumption of parts is also very large, and when used for shore artillery support, the wear and tear of the body tube is also extremely amazing, and the life of the body tube of the battleship in World War II is generally only between 200 and 350 rounds).

Eijiro Kondo, who had experienced air raids and knew the threat of the air force, strongly asked the commander of the First Fleet, Takasu Shiro, to send the home fleet to send the aircraft carrier Kaga to rendezvous, but this proposal was rejected by the other side. At this time, the aircraft carrier Kaga was also undergoing a new round of refit at the Sasebo shipyard to correct some flaws in the design, and even if it wanted to, it was impossible to help.

At this time, the Chicheng Aviation had not yet been refitted, and a large compass bridge spanning the two sides was installed at the front of the middle deck. Two twin 200-mm guns were also installed on the sides, and due to an irrational design, the ship now has only sixty aircraft. As the world's first aircraft carrier, the tonnage of the Fengxiang is only more than 7,400 tons, and there are only a pitiful 21 fighters in total.

The advice left to Takasu Shiro before his death was that it was best for the navy to wait until the British fleet arrived and rendezvous with the aircraft carrier Fury before attacking and considering an attack on Shanghai.

But. Takasu Shiro couldn't wait any longer. In fact, he simply had no room to wait.

First of all, as a member of the "big ships and artillery" party, he did not believe at all how much of a threat the 200-kilogram bomb in the hands of the Red Army could pose to his fleet, and secondly, he believed that he also had naval aviation in his hands. There is no need to worry about air threats. Last but not least. Neither he nor the Japanese military department. At this time, they are like wolves that have been hungry for a few days, staring at the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, the most beautiful area in China, how can they wait for the British to come over and "stir up"?

Settle the Shanghai problem before the British arrive. However, replacing Britain and turning this place into the sphere of influence of the Japanese Empire and reproducing a "Manchurian miracle" is the dream of almost everyone in the navy. Even the relatively "calm" Japanese Navy, faced with such a good "international environment" for invading China, would have long ago made a big move and drooled wildly.

In Japan, the chaos caused by the death of the emperor has not subsided, and both the ruling faction and the imperial faction, the navy and the army, are now playing the "China card". All of them regard getting the most out of China as the most powerful weapon to overwhelm their political opponents. In such a situation, any failure or conservative approach will be attacked by political opponents.

It was not easy for Takasu Shiro to wait one more day and endure the arrival of the aircraft carrier Chicheng before deciding to launch a landing operation against Shanghai. Just yesterday, because he put his fleet at sea and did not immediately launch a landing operation, he was already under great pressure from the domestic military department. "How many days do you wait for the British?" How can such a building be executed?

In the afternoon of the same day, Takasu Shiro ordered the fleet to approach Shanghai, planning to force a landing in Shanghai on the 18th.

At this time, the preparation of the Japanese landing force for the landing battle was quite bad, and it can even be described as almost nothing. Just like what the Third Fleet had encountered before, Yiqiē's battle plan was entirely centered on using Shanghai's existing wharves and concession areas to carry out landing operations. The Japanese Navy, which set off in a hurry, did not even have enough dinghy for landing.

The problem is that now that the whole of Shanghai is completely controlled by the Red Army, if you want to attack Shanghai, it will become the most difficult beach landing battle. After knowing that Shanghai had fallen, the Japanese mainland urgently dispatched a batch of landing equipment to support the front line, but the problem was that it would take time, and when Takasu Shiro and the Japanese army, which "couldn't wait" on board, sailed murderously to the coastline around Shanghai, the landing equipment from the mainland had just left for departure, and it would be 72 hours later to reach Shanghai at the earliest.

When the Japanese fleet gradually approached Shanghai, from Shanghai to Hangzhou, the Red Army's air force deployed here was in full swing to make final preparations.

Yesterday, the hundreds of planes that were originally parked at Hangzhou Airport are now half gone. Although Hangzhou has a certain depth of air defense, in the era of no radar warning, it is very dangerous to squeeze too many planes into one airport. The long-range DO17 bomber and the HE111 for testing were secretly transferred to Fuzhou Airport, ready to surprise the Japanese military in Taiwan in the coming days.

After several days of continuous work, from Shanghai to Hangzhou, the Red Army had built several new temporary field airfields, and it was somewhat difficult to take off and land heavier aircraft such as the HE111 or DO17, but it was not a problem to cope with lighter fighters and biplanes with short take-off and landing distances.

On the 17th, the rain clouds that had been accumulating over Hangzhou and Shanghai finally dispersed, and the weather was sunny in both places. On the last day before the war, both the 1st Air Division stationed in Shanghai and the 2nd Air Force Division stationed in Hangzhou seized the last bit of time to enter air combat training, and at the same time familiarized themselves with the surrounding terrain, and conducted simulated air battles on the other hand.

In the skies over Shanghai and Hangzhou, several Hawker fighters with their landing gear and machine guns removed and their weight greatly reduced were simulating the performance of the Nakajima-90 carrier-based fighters currently in service with the Japanese Navy, and the Hawker fighters, the main force of the Red Army's air combat force, the FW90, and the Hawker fighters equipped with fighter jets.

The Nakajima Type 90 carrier-based fighter is an old aircraft equipped by the Japanese Navy in 1932, as a biplane for the Navy, his wing load is small, and the whole setting idea is still stuck in the First World War period, that is, it attaches great importance to dog fighting and despises speed. The engine output of the machine is 580 horsepower, the biggest advantage is that the hovering is extremely good, the biggest disadvantage is that the speed is too slow, the maximum horsepower will not exceed 300 kilometers.

Compared to the Nakajima 90, there were two fighters in the hands of the Red Army. Monoplane FW90 fighter with a speed of 400 km / h and an engine horsepower of 750 hp. And the Hawker fighter, although it is a backward biplane, also has an engine of 700 horsepower and a speed of 325 kilometers. Both aircraft greatly surpassed the Japanese machine in power and speed. As long as the pilots of the two planes do not get dizzy and compete with the Japanese planes and circle, and rely on their superior climbing force and speed, they can abuse the Japanese Navy's fighters to death in the air.

The thirties were a time of great technological development for the Air Force, and the Nakajima 90, which was equipped with the Japanese Navy in 1932, was obsolete by 1935. In 1935, the Japanese Navy was developing the Nakajima Type 95 biplane fighter to replace the old Nakajima 90, but unfortunately this aircraft could not be equipped with the army until next year at the earliest.

Even though it had formed a generational advantage over the fighters that Japan was about to enter the war, the Red Army did not dare to take it lightly. Compared with the nascent Red Army Air Force, the greatest advantage of the Japanese Navy Airlines' aircraft operation was that the flight training time was extremely long and extremely hard, even to the point that it could be called "morbidly strict." (In the early days, the pilots of the Japanese Navy were extremely rigorously trained, and the elimination rate was amazing, and many of the pilots who were eliminated were qualified in other countries.) ）

Lin Han is a person who likes to prepare more for things. The birth of the Red Air Force can almost be said to be his painstaking work, and from the very beginning, targeted training was carried out with the characteristics of the Japanese Air Force. At present, in the skies over Hangzhou and Shanghai, the people who fly the "lightly armed Hawker" to play the role of the imaginary enemy of the Nakajima 90 fighter are all elite instructors from the Luftwaffe School, and almost all of them are masters who have flown thousands or even more than 2,000 flight hours. And most of the people who sparred with them were the artillery pilots who had rebelled and surrendered in the past half month.

Compared with the Red Army pilots, these later insurrectionists did not receive similar simulation training as the Red Army. Although in the ensuing air battles, these rebel pilots mainly carried out bombing missions rather than dogfights, any accident can happen in air battles, and it is always good to be more prepared.

While the air force was making careful preparations, the cruiser Pinghai, which had been damaged in the artillery battle the night before, had also completed the repair work and re-installed all the 40-mm anti-aircraft guns in the Jiangnan shipyard. The Ruijin gunboat, where Li Huamei was located, also dismantled the 105-mm cannon howitzer that did not play any role in the naval battle at this time, and replaced it with a twin-mounted 40-mm Bofors anti-aircraft gun there, and on Lin Han's side, the Nanchang torpedo boat also added a twin 40-mm anti-aircraft gun to the stern to enhance air defense capabilities, and the ship's installation part also shoehorned a 0.5-inch anti-aircraft machine gun salvaged from the sunken British gunboat.

Correspondingly, in the vicinity of Shanghai near the coastline, nearby villagers have been relocated, and several small factories that are likely to be bombarded by naval artillery have been relocated, and the relevant equipment has been transferred long ago in the past few days.

The Red Army was now ready and waiting for a full-scale Japanese offensive. (To be continued......)