"I hate to fight in the air."

"Dunkirk is not an away game, the Germans are in our encirclement, there are only a few tens of square kilometers there."

"But we are also in the encirclement of the Germans, in a larger encirclement. Speaking of which, flying across the English Channel for an air battle reminds me of when we were in China five years ago, when we were fighting across the sea in this way. ”

Before the attack, Major Wink, the captain of the 11th Flying Group of the Royal Air Family, vomited at his superiors.

As a veteran pilot, Major Wink has more skill and luck. He participated in the Chinese War of Intervention and also "intervened" in the Spanish Civil War. In the Chinese battlefield and the Spanish battlefield, she encountered Li Huamei's "Blue Thirteen" in the air three times, and she was defeated three times, and all three times she survived and even "unharmed".

Having experienced so many air battles and the lessons of being shot down many times, Major Winck, like Captain Merlin, has become an "old oilman", and he has summed up a complete set of experience in air combat to save his life like the "shrewd" Captain Mason in the Norwegian Sea.

If this experience is used in the air battle, he will definitely end up being arrested by the military police on the ground and sent to the military justice department for the crime of "fearing the enemy" after getting off the plane at the end of the air battle.

On the 18th, Major Wink's greatest dissatisfaction was:

"Why don't you let us strike with a Spitfire?"

His 11th Flying Group happened to be in the process of being reequipped with Spitfire fighters in the past few days, but considering the problem of flight familiarity and the issue of "giving priority to guaranteeing" the local air defense, he could only fly a slightly inferior Hurricane fighter to attack today, which made Captain Wink very dissatisfied. And it was the commander of the Royal Air Force, Dowding, who issued this directive. He strongly opposed Churchill's instructions to force the Royal Air Force to conduct air raids on Dunkirk.

In Dowding's view, the more than 300,000 horses are now hopeless, and after several months of air battles, the Royal Air Force is now suffering heavy losses, and the war situation in the western European theater is a certainty. For the sake of the needs of the homeland's defense, it is really not necessary to send planes to fight "away".

But it was absolutely impossible for Churchill to die in the 30-odd British and French troops in the German encirclement.

On the 18th, it was dawning. From several front-line airfields on the British mainland near the English Channel, 54 fighter planes took off one after another to cover 70 bombers and 30 Swordfish attack planes, and went straight to Dunkirk.

Before the sortie, the bomber flew and received a somewhat contradictory command.

"Bomb the German troops in Dunkirk with all their might, but not destroy the port facilities in Dunkirk."

After seeing this instruction from his superiors, the British pilots who were flying the plane at that time almost collectively had the idea of scolding their mother.

At seven o'clock, a large number of British planes lined up in a box formation and began to cross the English Channel, when they were suddenly intercepted by the first batch of 36 HE100 fighters over the strait.

A few minutes later. In the second batch, German fighters who had taken off from the newly occupied Belgian temporary field airfield also rushed to the battlefield, and at the same time, British fighters from other directions also joined the fighters of both sides, and the fighters of both sides launched the most tragic battle against the backdrop of the white waves of the English Gap.

Major Wink's "crow's beak" before taking off was unfortunately hit, and the entire course of the air battle was like a copy of the air battle that took place over Shanghai and Hangzhou.

The British side dispatched mainly Hurricane fighters, Blenheim light bombers and Wellington medium bombers.

And the relative "simplicity" of the German side draws out. All they flew were fighter jets. Most of them are HE100 fighters, and a few are land-based HE112s. In order to ensure air supremacy over Dunke. On 18 May, the Luftwaffe prepared six flying wings and more than 300 fighters for the Dunkirk battlefield alone, taking turns to ensure that there were fighters in the skies over Dunkirk to provide air cover at all times.

than the British fighters who had to be distracted to protect the bombers. The Luftwaffe, which was dedicated to interception and hunting missions, undoubtedly had a much higher degree of freedom in air combat.

From seven o'clock on the 18th, the sky near Dunkirk was filled with planes as dense as a swarm of mosquitoes. Looking up, everywhere you can see HE100s painted with iron crosses on the fuselage and British planes with the logo of "ring on ring" waltzing in the air.

On the shallow beach in the German-controlled zone below the battlefield of the air battle, the anti-aircraft guns of five ships in a "stranded" state were violently firing at the British planes flying into low altitudes.

The interval between the successful raid on Dunkirk in the early hours of this morning and the large-scale bombing by British aircraft was only a few hours. Due to time constraints, and the lack of equipment to unload heavy weapons in the port, which was originally only a small fishing village, the Germans in Dunkirk, which were now occupied, were simply unable to establish anti-aircraft artillery positions on land.

Fortunately, the German side had already considered this problem before the war, not only the two former dreadnoughts, but also the other three ships that had been stranded on the beach, all of which entered the shipyard for large-scale renovation before coming, and after dismantling an external facility that could be dismantled, all the main guns on the hull of the five ships were equipped with anti-aircraft guns, and then sailed to Dunkirk as a water air defense platform. When British aircraft massively attacked Dunkirk, these floating air defense platforms became the most threatening weapon of the German ground forces against the British Air Force.

In addition to this ship, which is stored as a fixed anti-aircraft battery, a total of ten air defense destroyers are scattered in the sea near the port of Dunkirk.

Of the 10 air defense destroyers, except for one Type III air defense destroyer by Lin Han Jiling and another one for backup use, with a tonnage of 2,500 tons, the remaining eight are all Seagull-class destroyers of 800 tonnage left over from the Weimar era.

Dunkirk is too close to the British land-based airport, and it is the focus of contention between Britain and Germany. In such a situation, large warships are extremely vulnerable to bombing by aircraft. So in order to protect the precious naval warships in their hands. Ringham and Hannah sent eight 800-ton destroyers built during the Weimar Republic to the port of Dunkirk.

These old destroyers, launched in the Weimar era, have a high center of gravity and a long range, which are not suitable for ocean-going combat, but they are extremely suitable for use as coastal defense ships. In addition, its design is old, and the hull is cheap. Before the Battle of Dunkirk, Hannah took advantage of the "sit-down war" and ordered these old ships to be sent to the shipyard for anti-aircraft renovation to be used as mobile anti-aircraft batteries.

Haiou-class destroyer, tonnage of 800 tons, armed with 3 105-mm naval guns. After carrying out anti-aircraft modifications. Some of the ship's buildings were demolished, and all the vacant spaces vacated were replaced with 40-mm Bofors and 20-mm Erlikon anti-aircraft guns.

These relics of the Weimar era, due to their short range and high center of gravity, were only suitable for coastal defense, and Dunkirk happened to be the battlefield adapted to its operations. What's more, these old ships are "worthless", for the German Navy, which has a thin background. Even if the British Air Force sinks it here, it won't hurt too much.

The reason why more destroyers were not sent into Dunkirk was mainly to achieve the suddenness of the battle. Before capturing Dunkirk, Hannah led the main German naval force into the North Sea, shelling the British mainland coast at night, attracting all the attention of the British army. The task of capturing Dunkirk was carried out by the destroyer detachment led by Lin Han. Due to the distance, Dunkirk would not be supported by the main fleet, which had already "gone far", until the early morning of the 19th.

Lin Ling's spirit was a Type III air defense destroyer. With a standard tonnage of 2,500 tons, it was one of two large destroyers cruising in the harbor of Dunkirk. Another ship of the same type is his "spare" body. On this destroyer, numbered Z28, a five-barreled thirty-mm Gatling anti-aircraft gun was installed on the central axis of the hull near the bridge.

Regarding the Battle of Dunkirk, in order to be able to block hundreds of thousands of British and French troops here, Hannah and Lin Han had made full preparations long before the outbreak.

When the campaign in Western Europe began, on May 13. Under the pretext of "sleeping", Li Huamei and Katyusha quietly left Japan, and then flew halfway around the world to return to Germany, where they directly participated in the French campaign.

Lin Han and Katyusha are now in a state of "integration" on the air defense destroyer numbered Z28. When Katyusha and Li Huamei merge, the consciousness of one of the two sides will disappear temporarily. When combined with Lin Han, both of them will maintain their sense of independence.

The Z28 destroyer, which cruised off the coast of Dunkirk, now serves as an air defense battery and another task as an air force dispatch and command post on the front line. Lin Han's consciousness was now used to monitor the movements of British fighters on the battlefield, and to mobilize Germany to choose the right time to enter and leave the battlefield. Katyusha's consciousness and perception are all used to coordinate the firing of the anti-aircraft fire of each ship, and the number provided by her humanoid distance finder adjusts the firing unit of the ship's anti-aircraft fire, and when necessary, Katyusha will also personally control the five-barreled Gatling anti-aircraft cannon on the ship to shoot.

As for Li Huamei, she directly joined the Luftwaffe and flew the HE112G "special aircraft" specially modified by Lin Han and Hannah for her to participate in air battles. For the Luftwaffe, learning that the world's number one air combat ace "Blue Thirteen" joined the Luftwaffe to help in the war was also a morale boost.

From the early morning of the 18th, the skies of Dunkirk were filled with British and German fighter planes, buzzing and screaming like flies, and hundreds of planes chased and bit each other, and almost every minute planes with black smoke fell from the sky.

"Altitude 1500 meters, angle 32, gun elevation angle 65, timing 6.5 seconds, rapid fire fire!"

On the Z28 destroyer, Katyusha reported the number of shots, and a total of four 128 mm high-level dual-purpose shells were filled in front and behind, and the barrels were raised according to the number of guns, and as the melodious female voice sounded in each turret, the gunner stepped on the wrench, and four shells filled with timed fuses + VT (radio proximity) fuses were fired out at the same time. (In order to save trouble, the radio proximity fuse will be replaced by the American abbreviation VT in the future)

This air defense destroyer, numbered Z28, is a later modification of the Type III destroyer, and the biggest difference from the earlier model is that the original twin 128 guns have been cancelled, and the design of the four-seat single-barreled 128 Gaoping dual-purpose guns has been restored. The reason is that in the test, it was found that in terms of the performance of the hunting target, the single-barreled 128 gun is more hunting, and the design of the double-barreled 128 gun, one of the biggest flaws is that the semi-automatic loader is too cumbersome and complex, which is not only prone to failure, but also causes the ship's center of gravity to be high, and the air defense efficiency is not as high as that of the single-barreled 128 gun in the test.

Another destroyer, the Z29, with the same equipment as it, followed closely behind the Z28 and shared a number of shots. The 128 Gaopinggao gun, equipped with a semi-automatic loader, fired extremely fast, and when firing urgently, it could lightly fire 20 shells in one minute. With Katyusha's order, the Gaoping dual-purpose guns on the two ships instantly fired a dense barrage eight thousand to nine thousand meters in front of the hull.

The anti-aircraft efficiency of the 128 guns with VT fuses was more than three times that of the ordinary timed fuze, and the target locked by the Katyusha happened to be a formation of twelve Wellington bombers.

A large number of 128 shells exploded in the fleet of Wellington bombers, and the two Wellington bombers were blown headlong into the sea on the spot. The rest were also wounded, and most importantly, the formation flight formation, which was originally neatly arranged and covering each other, was forced to disperse during this wave of artillery fire.

As soon as the formation was in disarray, the German fighters, who had long been lying in ambush nearby, immediately swarmed up like sharks smelling blood. Although there were also British fighters escorting nearby, the number of German fighters was larger, and after several "killers" who had slipped through the net broke into the queue of British planes, they immediately "enjoyed" them in large chunks.

One of the biggest advantages of the German fighters fighting over Dunkirk compared to the British planes fighting "away" was that they had a mobile air defense platform Z28 destroyer at sea to help provide tactical guidance. Under the dual guidance of the electronic radar on the Z28 destroyer and the humanoid thunderbolt of the Linhan, the German fighters can always find the best entry point to launch an air battle. What's more, thanks to the "radar" guidance, Luftwaffe pilots only need to focus on their own front, without fear of being attacked from behind by their opponents.

This is extremely important in air combat.

When flying an airplane in an air battle, it is simply an extremely draining thing, and people's energy is limited. The biggest difference between air warfare and naval and land warfare is that the battlefield is three-dimensional rather than flat.

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