"This is the third wave, and is it over?"

Near a "Soma" S-35 tank with its tracks blown up, Murphy, the tank commander, crouched in the grass, looking depressedly and fearfully at the German fighter planes that were rushing towards his tank convoy.

Counting this time, less than three hours from dawn to now, the mixed tank division to which he was located had been bombed by German planes for three full rounds on the way to Dunkirk.

His tank division was part of the 3rd Panzer Division of the French Army, and the main tank of the division was the S35 tank, which weighed 20 tons, had a three-person crew, and the main gun was a 47 mm tank gun, which was the best tank in France, and its performance was better than that of the German Army's No. 2 tank.

In this operation back to Dunkirk, the 3rd Armored Division, which is closest to Dunkirk, became the main force. They were also supported by a battalion of British tanks based on Mathilde II tanks and R35 Renault tanks transferred from other units.

However, this attack was repeatedly frustrated from dawn.

After the Battle of the Maas River, the British and French air forces, which had suffered heavy losses in order to destroy the pontoon bridges on the Maas River, were no longer able to weave an airtight air defense net over the head of the 3rd Panzer Division. Although there were their own fighters escorting and covering in the air as soon as it was dark, under the guidance of the air traffic control command center on the Z28 air defense destroyer anchored off the port of Dunkirk, the Luftwaffe used fighter jets to divert the attention of the French Air Force fighters, and then forty JU87 and HS129 took advantage of the gap in the air defense network to infiltrate and blow up the British and French tank divisions fiercely.

In order to protect its own armored forces, the French Air Force did not work hard, but the timing and entry point of the German attack aircraft on the opposite side were always excellent. Around the Dunkirk battlefield, the French army was originally equipped with several anti-aircraft radars imported from the British, but since the successful German raid on Dunkirk last night. These radars have been inexplicably interfered with, and they have all become blind and cannot play the role of air defense early warning at all.

Due to the continuous air raids, Murphy's armored unit has only advanced less than ten kilometers since dawn, and only about 140 of the 180 tanks at the time of departure are still able to move before the third wave of air attacks, and his vanguard is still moving. Now it is thirty-eight kilometers away from Dunkirk.

Had it not been for the first two waves of bombardment, when the Luftwaffe focused on the French infantry following them, the losses of this tank division, which was dominated by the French, would have been even greater.

On the Dunkirk battlefield, too many planes from both sides were piled up in too small a space, and even if there were fighters providing 24-hour uninterrupted air cover, neither side could guarantee that their side would not be bombed by enemy planes, and could only suppress the attack of the opponent's air force to the greatest extent.

Compared with the British and French air forces, the German army, which had taken the lead and placed anti-aircraft radar ships in this area, had a relatively great advantage. Its air force was able to grasp the timing of its sorties and cut into the battlefield better, and its air defense efficiency was raised to the maximum.

Just like this third round of bombing, the timing of the German attack group's entry coincided with the time when the French fighter group was expelled and the support fighter group did not have time to arrive at the battlefield. Although this gap was only five minutes, it was enough for the German planes to do what they wanted.

"The plough is coming!"

Someone screamed, accompanied by a buzzing spiral pulp. Commander Murphy saw a black dot flying at a low altitude in the northeast, and the figures of those black dots were the HS129 anti-tank attack aircraft that he was familiar with in the past half a month.

HS129 made its debut in 1935 in China. The table is extremely outstanding and eye-catching. After the war, this fighter continued to be improved and upgraded, and by 1940, the HS129 that appeared on the battlefield in France had the biggest change compared to the prototype that first landed on the Chinese battlefield was upgraded to two 850 horsepower air-cooled engines, in addition to another change. It is according to the different combat missions that the Germans have developed a variety of matching weapon components, which can be temporarily replaced according to the different combat objectives.

Compared to the Anglo-French forces, which were hastily mobilized for war in October 1939, the Germans were extremely well prepared for war, and from the outset they used all their potential.

Lying on the side of the road in a fire crater. Looking at the HS129 flying low overhead, Murphy hated and envied it.

"If only we had such a strike machine."

After the land battles in Western Europe began, the French armored forces feared two opponents the most.

One was the German No. 3 tank, whose 75-mm, forty-two-fold gun could tear through the armor of any British and French tank within 600 meters, and even the thickest armored Mathilde II tank or the French B2 tank could not withstand their "gentle" blow at 600 meters. The Anglo-French tanks, whether British 2-pounder guns (about 40 mm) or French 47 mm tank guns, could hardly penetrate the 60 mm thick/60 degree inclination frontal armor of Tank 3 even at a distance of 100 meters, and could only attack from the side or from behind.

On the Belgian battlefield, the tank units of the Anglo-French forces and the tank groups of the German Army Group B fought several times, and they all suffered heavy losses in front of the No. 3 tank of the 25th class. (Save someone from reading the book and not seriously forget the previous plot, and then explain that due to the influence of the traverser in this plane, the Germans did not develop the 15-ton No. 3 tank and the 20-ton No. 4 tank at the same time, but directly developed the 22-ton tank, and then upgraded to the 25-ton level, because only one level was developed, so the order advanced one place, from the fourth to the three).

Tank No. 3 can be said to be a perfect combination of the three most important indicators of attack, defense and mobility tanks. As soon as the land war in Western Europe began, the British and French tanks that confronted them head-on were not at all opponents of the same level, and the anti-tank guns of Britain and France in service were either two-pounder guns of about 40 mm or 28 mm (this is a French infantry tank gun), which became a "knocker" on the surface of the No. 3 tank.

Another weapon in the German army that made the British and French armies feared was the two-engine HS129.

The 40mm anti-tank gun hanging on the belly of the HS129 was originally prepared to deal with the T34 frenzy on the Eastern Front, and the British and French tanks used to fight the Western Front were already overkill. At the end of the Norwegian campaign in March, the Germans captured a batch of British Mathilde II tanks in Norway. Lin Han and Hannah, who were traversers, knew that it was the strongest defense tank that Britain and France could come up with in the next six months. When sent back to Germany for testing. The military found that although the front armor of this tank was extremely thick, the top armor was thin, and even the MK103 cannon mounted in the nose had an excellent striking effect after using a special tungsten core armor-piercing warhead.

When the fighting broke out on the Western Front, out of conservative ideas. Originally, a 40-mm anti-tank gun was hung on the belly of this anti-tank fighter aircraft, and they were even more "overpowered" when they hit British and French tanks, and they basically "hit the soul with one shot". After a few days of actual combat, the Germans found that the old MK103's 30 mm aviation cannon, even without an expensive tungsten core warhead, had a good combat effect on British and French tanks when using ordinary metal warheads, and finally decided to temporarily dismantle the 40 mm anti-tank gun and reduce weight.

The reduced weight of the HS129 increases speed by 30 km/h, allowing it to evacuate treacherous battlefields more quickly after ground attack. Almost all of the HS129s that roared over France had their belly-mounted 40-mm anti-tank guns removed and replaced with six 60-mm aerial rockets or a 250-kilogram fire bomb.

Today against the attack of the French 3rd Tank Division. HS129 is formulated to be one such formulation. As HS129 flew overhead, he was dismissive of "infantrymen" like Murphy lying in a crater to avoid air attacks, and he was not interested in his smoky and wounded tank. They were only interested in chasing down the tanks that were still moving.

At this time, the French 3rd Tank Division had not yet recovered from the second air raid, and then suffered a third air raid.

In the sky, rockets with white smoke pierced the sky with a steady roar, shooting at the British and French tanks that were fleeing and hiding like ants on the plain. Twenty HS129s fired all the 120 rockets hanging from the belly of the belly against the British and French tanks on the ground, and they were done. The MK103 machine gun and 13mm machine gun in the nose continued to strafe the British and French tanks.

After the test of the Chinese war, the Luftwaffe abandoned the original experimental A, B, and C models in spite of the crazy accumulation of weapons. The main reason is that it was found after being sent to China for combat testing. The accumulation of excessive firepower caused the attack aircraft to fly with extremely poor maneuverability, which the pilots described as unbearable and had to be light-armed to improve maneuverability. And now no more than in 1935, it has entered the era of monoplanes, and the slowest speed of the opponent's fighter is more than 500 kilometers per hour, and the HS129 can no longer bully a low-speed biplane fighter as much as it did on the Chinese battlefield. After completing the ground attack, he relied on "high speed" to get rid of the pursuit of enemy fighters.

Now equipped with the Luftwaffe HS129E, the standard armament is one cannon and four machine guns. The machine guns were four 13 mm MK131 machine guns, and the guns were replaced as needed: either the nose-mounted MK103 muzzle shells reached 860 m/s, or the machine guns were dismantled and replaced with a 40 mm aircraft gun suspended in the belly with 16 rounds in reserve.

MK103 cannons against future T34 or KV tanks may face the problem of insufficient power. But the tanks that fought the British and French on the Western Front were more than enough. The most important thing is that it has up to 80 rounds of ammunition and has a strong fire power.

Lying on the ground, Commander Murphy watched the German attack planes circling and strafing at the heads of their tank clusters, and all he could do was bow his head and pray for God's blessing, and these flying "can-openers" focused on hitting more valuable targets such as tanks, and did not transfer the target to his own "small target of little value".

This batch of HS129s, after firing rockets, strafing cannons and bullets, took three minutes to go away satisfied. At the same time, HE111, which came with them, also completed the task of bombing the supply convoy and retreated together. Less than a minute after the German attack planes had withdrawn, about thirty-two P40 fighters rushed to the battlefield like late policemen.

At this time, if there were no German fighters nearby, these P40s could rely on their speed and altitude advantage to pursue the retreating HS129 and He111, but the HE112 group that arrived on the battlefield a few minutes before them had already occupied the height and angle and was ready for battle. As a result, the late "policemen" did not have time to pursue the "escaped criminals", and they themselves fell prey to the He112G fighters lying in ambush at high places.

Over the French 3rd Panzer Division, air battles continued. The P40 fighter has average performance and cannot compete with the HE112 at all. Not to mention that the German fighter wing over the third armor is now the most elite JG51 wing in the Luftwaffe and the best He112G such a "magic change" fighter.

Trembling on the battlefield looking up at the air battle, the tank commander Murphy was very depressed to see that the planes falling from the sky seemed to be all P40 painted with the French Air Force logo. H is the first letter of its English name)

In the sky of Dunkirk at this time, Marseilleu piloted the "Yellow 14" fighter with a beige nose, and was happily brushing the results of the battle in the P40 fleet. The HE112 he piloted had an overwhelming advantage over the old P40 in terms of firepower, climb, speed, acceleration, and even hovering, and today was stimulated by Li Huamei's results in an air battle to shoot down five fighters, and Marseilleu was also in good shape.

The "special aircraft" He112G prepared for elite pilots in the German army did not have special firepower allocation restrictions, and there were five 13 mm aviation machine gun versions, three 20 mm aircraft guns, one cannon and four machine gun versions, and so on. It all depends on the pilot's own personal preference - of course, such a loose will be purely the "prerogative" of the ace pilot.

Marseilleu, who was trained by Li Huamei, used one cannon and two machine guns with weak firepower. In view of the problem of inconsistent ballistics of machine guns and machine guns, which were criticized by Li Huamei in the past, the German military developed a third-generation long-barreled 20-mm aircraft gun, which can ensure that the projectiles fired by this kind of aircraft gun can have ballistics close to those of a 13-mm machine gun within 500 meters. Marseilleu chose only a two-gun version instead of a four-machine gun, in order to be able to carry more ammunition and to make the aircraft have a lower wing load and better maneuverability—the former could increase the number of rounds per machine gun to 450 rounds, nearly twice as many as the latter.

Marseilleu heard on the radio about the JG47 team's record off the coast of Dunkirk. Due to the unclear statistics of the battlefield, the reason why the damage caused by the downfall cannot be correctly determined. There must have been a lot of discrepancies in the propaganda on the propaganda of the actual number of shots downed, but the report on Li Huamei's results in the propaganda still seriously stimulated Marseilleu.

Stimulated by this, on the morning of the 18th, Marseilleu was able to strike in the skies over Dunkirk. He was in excellent form, first shooting down three MB152s in three minutes as soon as he appeared on the field. Five minutes later, when facing the P40 group, he rushed left and right, and within ten minutes, he shot down four P40s in succession, and shot down seven French planes in less than half an hour, finally "shortening" the gap between Li Huamei.

After returning to Ostend Airport. Marseilleu was greeted like a hero by ground ground crew. However, what made him depressed was that he did not recall the excellent performance of the morning, and before he flew out again at half past eleven o'clock that day, he heard from the radio channel the "bad news" that Li Huamei, who had made a second sortie after returning in the morning, had shot down six planes in the air battle.

Stimulated by this news, in order to brush up on more achievements and pursue the goddess in his heart, the British and French air forces on the opposite side were tragic.

On the 18th, Marseilleu attacked three times in one day, and shot a total of 17 fighters before and after, setting a record in his original history "ahead of schedule". If it weren't for the fact that Captain Garand took into account his limited body and forcibly stopped him from attacking, the crazy Marseilleu would have wanted to force his attack for the fourth air battle, which made Marseilleu extremely depressed - because on this day, Li Huamei had made four sorties, and had shot down twenty-one British fighters in one day.

Marseilleu, the first ace of World War II, has worked hard and is very strong, but it is a pity that the "woman" he is chasing is simply a non-human.

On the day of May 18, due to the excellent performance of the JG51 Wing and the JG47 Wing, especially the outbreak of Li Huamei, a non-human and Marseilla, two super aces who were almost non-human, the British and French air forces were directly blown up in the sky over Dunkirk.

When the battle in the air was over, British Air Force Commander Dowding took the battle damage report for that day, and looked at the more than three-digit aircraft losses on paper and the reports of losses of pilots and aircrews that were more than double that number, and his hands trembled.

At that time, Dowding called directly to the prime minister's office at 10 Downing Street.

When Churchill, who had lost a lot of weight from days of anxiety, picked up the phone, he heard Dowding's almost crying pleading:

"Lord Daoxiang, if such an air battle is fought for a few more days, I will not be able to send planes to defend British airspace."

On the same day, the British dispatched 700 planes of various types from the mainland to bomb Dunkirk, and as a result, under the desperate interception of the German air force, more than 120 planes were directly shot down over Dunkirk. As for the planes that were injured and needed to be repaired before they could be re-flown back, there were even more with minor injuries and holes in the fuselage that needed minor repairs.

From the beginning of the Norwegian campaign to the air battle of Dunkirk, the Royal Air Force, which had lost blood for months and weakened dramatically, was now in danger.

On the phone, Dowding said to Churchill very bluntly:

"Either remove me from my post and replace me, or tomorrow I won't send a plane to the skies over Dunkirk." (To be continued......)

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