(A small bug was changed in the previous chapter, and the time of the Japanese army's attack on Kauai was advanced by me to half past ten in the evening)

A downed B25 bomber, head-down and tail-up, stuck diagonally on the soft beach of Kauai.

This was one of several US bombers shot down in last night's air battle. The air battle over Kauai began as the weather improved just after two o'clock in the morning.

The Americans stationed on Oahu dispatched twelve B25s to support Kauai. It was intended to prevent the Japanese Navy from landing by bombing the Japanese beachhead on Kauai by guò.

It's just that shortly after the B25 took off, it was intercepted by the Dragon Slayer night fighter that took off from the Japanese aircraft carrier.

The Dragon Slayer is the new name of the BF110 night model after it entered service with the Japanese Air Force, and it is also the first night fighter obtained by the Japanese Air Force.

The night version of the Dragon Slayer is precisely prepared for the possible night bombing operations of the US military, and it is equipped with the latest radar developed by Germany, and with the guidance of the ship-borne radar at sea, it can effectively intercept the bombers attacking the enemy at night.

Of the 12 B25s that night, five were shot down by the Dragonslayer and three were damaged, and the rest fled in panic after dropping bombs indiscriminately over Kauai.

On the beach on the side of Kauai's landing point, two armed merchant ships are now stranded. These two merchant ships took advantage of the high tide to deliberately rush and run aground on the beach during the attack last night. A large number of anti-aircraft weapons were laid out on the merchant ships. Last night, by the blow of the beach, the two ships washed a large number of Japanese soldiers onto Kauai Island, and after daybreak, they were stored as fixed anti-aircraft batteries here.

By 3 o'clock in the morning, the Japanese marines had opened a landing ground on the island with a depth of more than 10 kilometers. More than 2,000 troops and nine tanks were sent to the island, and the capture of the island was a foregone conclusion.

So the Japanese fleet, anchored in the open sea, began to withdraw westward at half past three o'clock before dawn.

The Japanese Navy is not the US Navy.

The US Navy believes that people are more important than warships, and when it is fighting to seize the island, it can rely on the large number of aircraft carriers and planes to block the huge fleet at the opponent's doorstep and forcibly launch a landing operation, even if it has a large number of "kamikaze planes" on its head.

And the Japanese Navy is much more stingy in this regard.

During the battle on Kauai. Although the Combined Fleet dispatched all six combat aircraft carriers and six escort aircraft carriers, and nearly 900 planes to participate in the attack, the Japanese forces still cautiously placed the aircraft carrier northwest of Kauai, more than 200 kilometers away from the Oahu airfield, and more than 150 kilometers away from Kauai. Use distance to make yourself more secure. And more than two hours before dawn, the mobile fleet began to move in the northwest direction.

At half past five in the morning, before the sun rose, the U.S. Air Force at Pearl Harbor wanted to take advantage of the curve of the Earth. Hitting the Japanese Navy with a time gap, a large number of planes were dispatched again.

"Work harder, move a little faster, the American plane is coming soon,"

On the beaches of Kauai, Japanese soldiers in khaki uniforms are busy like soldiers. The tanks that landed last night were deliberately driven into the crater blown up by the shelling, and then the surrounding soldiers picked up branches and palm fronds everywhere on the island to camouflage them.

Some were digging anti-aircraft trenches with sappers on the ground. Some soldiers were operating captured American anti-aircraft machine guns and anti-aircraft guns, and time was in a hurry last night. All the military can send ashore is a batch of light weapons and a small number of anti-aircraft machine guns, which are far from enough for the air defense operation that is about to begin. Fortunately, last night's attack was very successful, and when the Japanese broke through the American positions, they captured a batch of anti-aircraft weapons. In this manipulation of these anti-aircraft weapons. The soldiers of the Marine Corps were a little depressed that last night's naval shelling was too accurate, and a considerable part of the anti-aircraft weapons were damaged.

While the Japanese on the ground were still hurriedly preparing for dawn, an air battle was taking place over Kauai Island.

The heavens are brighter than the earth.

As 40 P40 fighters and 30 F4F Wildcats took off from Pearl Harbor, 24 B25 and 32 SBD "Dreadnought" dive bombers were covered. 16 torpedo attack planes went to Kauai to bomb the Japanese army, and 20 B17s were also dispatched.

The attack on the landed Japanese troops was only incidental, and their real first goal was to attack the Japanese fleet at sea.

Although the Japanese side withdrew its fleet at 3:30 p.m. last night, it was too late and not far away, and it did not escape the attack range of the shore-based aircraft.

Unlike the Battle of Midway in history, the Combined Fleet, which was overwhelmed by large troops, concentrated all the mobile fleets that could assemble aviation.

In addition to the six combat aircraft carriers led by the Musashi, there are also six "Condor-class" escort aircraft carriers to cooperate in the operation. Twelve aircraft carriers, close to nine hundred aircraft, even gave the attacking Combined Fleet more warplanes than the American military with land-based airfields.

The attack on Kauai was just a decoy, and the goal of the first day of the operation was to take the opportunity to exhaust the land-based aircraft of the Americans on Oahu.

Lieutenant General Short on Oahu, when he ordered the aviation to attack, he played a small trick.

Twenty B17 four-engine heavy bombers were ordered to bomb Kauai, escorted by sixteen Buffalo fighters. The rest of the planes, on the other hand, circled in the air, avoiding the Wahu-Khao Ai route, and struck from the flanks to pounce on the withdrawing Japanese fleet.

According to Vice Admiral Short's assumption, the rough-skinned B17 bomber was just a decoy, and he would act like a magnet to attract the Japanese fighters, thus giving other shore-based aircraft the opportunity to surprise the Japanese fleet.

Then, shortly after his plane took off, it was located in the forward fleet, which was used to carry out the task of seeking the enemy and receiving the enemy, and the battleship Yamato, about 120 kilometers away from Kauai, discovered the whereabouts of the American aircraft group in advance.

Even if there is no ship spirit, the Japanese side has guessed that the Americans are very likely to take advantage of the time difference in the earth's curvature to launch an attack at dawn, so the 12 aircraft carriers located a little farther away also released a large number of fighters in advance of dawn to provide air blocking cover.

At this time, there were constant air patrols and escorts over Oahu. When the B17 fleet is dispatched,

The Japanese fighter planes, which had been cruising around, immediately swarmed like sharks smelling blood.

The Type 160 II fighters cruising over Kauai immediately arrived at the first time, and they stopped the escorting Buffalo fighters, and the two sides quickly fought in the air.

Compared with the historical Zero fighter of the same name, the Japanese Navy's current Zero II type, in terms of performance, the engine has been replaced with 1200 horsepower, the speed is 20 kilometers faster, the maneuverability is slightly inferior, and the range has also been reduced, but the main advantage is that the bulletproof seats and bulletproof fuel tanks are installed, and the weapons are replaced with four 12.7 mm machine guns, and the 12.7 mm machine guns on the American-made fighter are the same type of products - they were originally American goods, originally installed on the P39 Flying Snake fighter "aid to Britain." "The arms, which were seized by the Germans and sold to Japan at a very cheap price.

Historically, the Buffalo fighters were beaten out by the Japanese Zero in the Midway Sea, and the results were almost zero, and the side was completely annihilated. This Buffalo fighter faced the Zero Type II, which was slightly stronger than the Zero Type, and the end was even more embarrassing, and after the air battle began, the world saw one Buffalo after another, and the Zero Type II was beaten down one by one like a fly.

The pilots of the Zero II were instructed to:

"Don't pay attention to those tough B17s, deal with the buffalo first!"

The interception of the B17 was the "professional" Dragon Slayer interceptor naval type, with a total of twelve aircraft. Equipped with a two-stage pressurized fighter with heavy firepower and high defense, this twin-engine fighter has proven its strength in actual combat during the Philippine campaign.

After being converted into a sea-based type and forcibly embarking on a ship, the biggest problem faced by the Dragon Slayer was the large wing load brought about by the thick armor of the Dragon Slayer, and it was difficult to guide it to take off from an aircraft carrier.

The ancestor of booster rocket technology is Goddard, a famous American rocket expert. As early as the first year after the crossing, Lin Han and Hannah paid for Goddard's rocket tests. Before the outbreak of the European War, Dr. Goddard felt that the German government was repeatedly enthusiastic about recruitment, and his students constantly lobbied, so he moved his family from the United States to Germany, and then a bunch of German rocket experts began to study rockets together.

The rocket booster used in the dragon slayer is Goddard's "gizmo". The twelve Dragon-slaying combat interceptors that took off from the aircraft carrier Musashi formed a box formation similar to that of the B17 and intercepted in front of the B17 bombing formation in a head-on manner.

The tactics used by the Japanese Navy were the most effective tactics summed up by the Luftwaffe against the B17 formation in World War II: the wild boar tactic.

When the B17 formation advanced in a box-shaped formation, it was filled with self-defense machine guns and crossed cover each other to form a hedgehog formation, which made any fighter fighter afraid when approaching.

Before the advent of missiles, the best way to deal with this kind of hedgehog array was to dispatch heavy interceptors with high protection and high firepower, form the same formation and hedge head-on with them.

In view of the many B17 bombers on Oahu, the foreign aid aircraft that the defenders of Pearl Harbor are most likely to get is the B17 factor, so in this Hawaii strategy operation, the Japanese Combined Fleet also forcibly put the Dragon Slayer fighter on board. (To be continued......)

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