Just as Major Hafs's submarine attacked, the other nine submarines were also in position and attacked, and the explosions began to sound continuously, and in just ten minutes, as many as six transport ships were hit. The main reason for such a high hit rate is that the cover of the night allows these submarines to go very close to the ship and launch fish. Thunder, this naturally makes the hit rate increase greatly.

Major Hauffs was very satisfied with the results of the ambush formation, but he was not very satisfied with the results of the U-92 under his direct command. It's a shame that Ray was all gone. At this time, the North Wind had already sailed out of the U-92's fish shooting range, of course, if U-92 was willing to turn around, it could still launch another round of attacks on the North Wind, but at this time, other ships entered the U-92's shooting range, and U-92 did not need much adjustment, just wait a little before launching an attack on that ship.

Under such circumstances, Hafs naturally did not continue to chase the North Wind, he quietly stared at the cargo ship that was only a few hundred meters away, and estimated the fish in his heart. The rendezvous of Ray and that boat, and then the command to shoot was given.

This time Hafs's shot was quite successful, and he shot it; Two fish. One of the mines accurately hit the transport ship, and the fish . The thunder hit right near the keel, and the huge explosion directly broke the keel of this transport ship.

This blow was the most deadly blow to a ship, and as soon as the keel broke, the ship was immediately torn apart by itself and the weight of the cargo it carried, and it probably sank to the bottom of the sea in a few minutes.

However, Hafs didn't care about this now, because he noticed that a destroyer was rushing towards the U-92 at top speed.

"Discovered?" Hafus was taken aback. It stands to reason that it should be difficult for the British destroyer to find out, and Hafs immediately wanted to get into the cabin and ordered the submarine to dive urgently. However, at this time, he found that the destroyer had turned on the searchlight to search the sea, and the direction of the searchlight was not on the U-92, but in the opposite direction. Apparently, the destroyer did not find the U-92, it just happened to get here.

"Turn to 20, five and six. Thunder. Tube preparation. "Hafs decided to attack the destroyer first and see if he could take it out. If you can't, you can only dive quickly and try to hide behind the cargo ship that has been tilted by the mine but has not sunk yet.

Targets such as destroyers are generally difficult to hit. First, the destroyer is too small, so the length of the waterline is also small, and the difficulty of hitting it is naturally greater, and second, the destroyer is too fast and agile. If it's too fast, shoot a fish at it. When the mine is born, the amount of advance to be left is very large, and the destroyer is very nimble and turns very quickly, once it finds a fish. Thunder, just a slight change of direction, fish. Ray is definitely going to fail.

Tonight, though, Hafs' luck seemed to be particularly good, as the U-92 shot a fish. The lightning struck the bow of the destroyer, blowing up the entire bow, even half of the hull, and the destroyer was sailing at a high speed of more than twenty knots, and the sea water immediately rushed into the huge breach, and in just a minute or so, the destroyer disappeared on the surface of the sea.

During this time, several other submarines also opened fire, and almost every once in a while, a cargo ship was fished. The sound of an explosion hit by thunder was heard. By the time it was almost dawn, almost all the fish had been used. Ray's ambush formation withdrew from the battle, and at this time there were only three transport ships left on the surface of the sea, and a full twenty were lost! Even the destroyers that escorted the escort lost half of them, only three remained, and the German submarines that launched the attack retreated with no losses.

The Boreas was one of the three remaining transports, which rescued a hundred or so sailors from the sea after dawn and continued on to England. However, on the way after that, they were never attacked by German submarines again, and reached Britain safely and smoothly.

……

This successful ambush confirmed the effectiveness of the wolf pack tactics. Major Hauffs received a telegram on the third day after the end of the attack, telling him to rush back to Germany in a cow submarine. Upon his return, he was immediately promoted, promoted to colonel by one rank, and served in the Operational Staff Group of the Submarine Operations Center of the Imperial German Navy, where he also served as a tactical instructor for the "Submarine Commander's Refresher School".

His name and achievements were also printed in various German newspapers. It has become an idol worshipped by countless Germans. His tactics were also quickly promoted, although the British later adopted such means as once attacked, immediately scattered flares in the sky to counter, but the effect of these means was actually quite limited, first, the area illuminated by the flares was actually quite limited, more often, they not only failed to illuminate the area where the submarine was located, but also exposed themselves, so that the Germans could better aim.

Moreover, the Germans painted the submarine a deep blue-black, so that even with flares, the low submarine would not be very conspicuous. Of course, flares still have a certain effect, and on one occasion, during an attack, a submarine was illuminated by flares, when the submarine was aiming at the transport ship Boreas, and not far from it there was a British destroyer, which resulted in the destroyer colliding directly into it, breaking the hapless submarine in two, thus saving the life of the Boreas. However, in this attack, the Germans sank fourteen British cargo ships.

The British had also discovered the frequent telegraph exchanges between German submarines, so they had largely guessed the secrets of the organization of German submarine warfare, so they stipulated that as soon as they discovered a dense telegraph exchange at sea, they would immediately turn the convoy to avoid the German ambush. This trick really worked at first, but later, the Germans also discovered this, and as a result, they sent some meaningless telegrams every once in a while, so that the British could not judge that those telegrams were really leading the interception, and as a result, of course, German submarines continued to successfully intercept the British fleet on the ocean.

In the two months after the Germans began to use the "wolf pack tactic", the loss rate of British freighters on each transoceanic voyage reached a staggering fifteen percent, that is, a cargo ship that could run less than four round trips if it was used to run a route across the Atlantic would generally be sunk in less than four round-trips. Such a sinking speed far exceeds the speed of Britain's own shipbuilding, and even with the speed of shipbuilding on the American side, it is far too late.

Only those fast merchant ships ordered from the United States maintained a smaller ratio of losses, since they ran faster than submarines, and the submarines of the Germans, even if they were able to ambush them, in general, had only one chance to attack.

"To save Britain, we need more, more, more fast merchant ships!" This became the consensus of the British government and army. So Sir Woodgad approached Macdonald again, because now only MacDonald could produce fast merchant ships at super-high speeds.

"We need more, but cheaper, fast merchant ships. We want these boats to have a cruising speed of 18 knots and a top speed of more than 20 knots even when fully loaded. Sir Woodgad said to Scrooge.

"But Sir, you know, this is no ordinary metric, and we can't afford to be too low at that rate." Compared to Sir Woodgend, Scrooge was in no hurry.

"You can reduce costs elsewhere." Sir Woodgaard said, "Durability, for example, as long as they last two or three years." Therefore, in some non-important places, if you can use low-grade goods, you can use low-grade goods to mix up. For example, steel plates or something, I don't think you need to use high-grade shipbuilding steel plates, it's really not good, wrought iron can be. There are also many parts that can be treated with rust prevention that can be simpler, anyway, it can be used for two years. The Germans will definitely not hold out for two years. Two years of service for these ships is enough. If so, Mr. MacDonald, do you think the price of these ships can go down a little more? ”

"But, sir, if this is done, the inevitable result is that the use of these ships will be very inefficient, and after two years, there will be little chance of further use except for reheating. And the average ship, if it has only been used for two years, should be called a new ship. Scrooge replied, "If we build such ships, we will smash our brand." Later, when people talked about MacDonald's boats, they would say, 'Ah, I know, those rags that last only two years and are recycled as scrap.' It's too much of an impact on MacDonald's reputation. How can we find such a ship? Scrooge shook his head vigorously, and his attitude seemed to be very resolute, "And sir, you also understand that even if you pay so much price, cut corners to reduce the service life of this kind of ship by more than 80 percent, the production cost will not drop to the original 20 percent, in fact, at most it will only drop by a little more than 10 percent, is it worth it?" ”

Normally, it's certainly not worth it. But for the time being, the British can't afford not to do this, because if they don't, they will be doomed immediately. Although it is very unworthwhile to buy such a junk in the long run, if it does not do so, Britain will collapse in the war, and once Britain is defeated, there will be no long-term to speak of.

"Yes, we just need two years of life for these ships. Mr. MacDonald. In addition, can the pace of construction of these ships be increased a little? Sir Woodgad continued.