For the Soviet Union, long-range bombers were not needed to bomb Ploiesti at all, and medium bombers such as the Tu-2 and Il-4 could travel from the Soviet Union to bomb Ploiesti. For example, from Odessa, the distance from the branch line of Ploiesti is only 400 kilometers, and from Sevastopol, the sea route is only more than 500 kilometers from Ploiesti. With the range of the Il-4, loading more than a ton of explosives can easily complete the task.

There were two reasons that plagued Arksnes' decision to bomb Ploiesti, the first being that the Soviets were not very clear about the exact location of the oil fields and refineries near Ploiesti.

Yes, no kidding at all. Some comrades may think that destroying oil fields and oil refining facilities is very simple, as if it is enough to send bombers over and drop bombs. For example, when the Allies first prepared to bomb Ploiesti in history, the Americans announced with some pride at first: "Two hundred bombers will be sent to blow up the oil refinery facilities and oil wells in Ploiesti." ”

And how did the British tell the Americans who thought they were smart? A British intelligence officer named Foster told the Americans unceremoniously: "Two hundred bombers can't cover the oil-producing area of Ploiesti, which is much bigger than you think!" ”

The British are not alarmists, because this Mr. Foster had worked in Ploiesti for a long time before the war, and even worked as an Astra. Supervisor of the Romana refinery. He knew more about Ploiesti.

As we all know, relations between the Soviet Union and Romania before the outbreak of World War II were strained, and the Soviets did not have the same good conditions as the British. He was directly involved in the oil industry in Romania. So the Soviet understanding of Ploiesti was very little and very one-sided.

Actually after the outbreak of the war. The Red Air Force also attacked Ploiesti in the past, but the effect was very unsatisfactory, and during the four consecutive days of bombing, the first three days were basically useless, and almost did not deal any damage to the Romanian oil industry. The last bombing of Ploiesti was on the night of July 14, 1941, when six Il-4s attacked the Phoenix at an altitude of 750 meters. The Orion refinery was bombed, miraculously destroying 18 oil storage tanks and halting the plant for weeks.

After that, though. The Red Air Force basically gave up bombing Ploiesti and switched to long-term aerial reconnaissance in an attempt to find out the specific distribution of oil refineries and oil fields in Ploiesti before launching an attack.

It's just that the Romanians and Germans are not stupid, they have resolutely strengthened their air power in this direction, not only to strictly guard against intercepting and attacking Soviet reconnaissance planes and bombers, but also to deploy considerable air defense forces at several important oil refining enterprises in Ploiesti.

After several unsuccessful attempts, Arksnis had to abandon his plan to attack Ploiesti immediately, or at least not head-on.

This is the first reason, and the second reason that makes Arxnis have to be cautious comes from the long-range aviation itself. Whether it's Tu-3 or Pe-8. All are only suitable for high-altitude bombing, and everyone knows it. The accuracy of high-altitude bombing is really enough. Judging from the previous exercises and tests, high-altitude bombing basically does not have the ability to accurately hit point targets.

And the bombing of Ploiesti does require the ability to strike with precision, and if you want to solve the problem with carpet bombing, then, as Forster said, 200 bombers are far from enough. It may take thousands or tens of thousands of bombing sorties to solve the problem.

Obviously, the long-range aviation of the Red Air Force does not have this capability, and even if it does, it does not dare to invest blindly. After all, as soon as the Germans found out that the idea of the Red Army to destroy Ploiesti had revived, then it was inevitable that the air defense in this direction would be sharply strengthened. At that time, even if there were so many bombers, throwing them would have suffered heavy losses.

Arksnes' idea was simple: the problem of Ploiesti had to be solved once and for all, preferably with a single bombardment. So he really didn't dare to try it without being completely sure.

And now, why does Arxnis have this idea again? The reason is simple, after more than a year of reconnaissance of Ploiesti, especially after the KGB took over the work, the Red Army's understanding of Ploiesti has greatly increased.

With the intelligence support of the KGB, the senior staff of Arxnis came up with a set of battle plans. Given the limited capabilities of the long-range aviation of the Red Army, it was impossible to completely cover the entire Ploiesti region. Therefore, the final targets of the attack are concentrated on the five most critical targets, which are the most important, all with the code name "red".

In addition to these five red targets, three auxiliary "green" targets were listed, and after the completion of the strike on the red targets, long-range aviation would continue to attack the remaining green targets if they still had the strength to spare.

The Red No. 1 target was the Rome Standard Oil plant, and the Red No. 2 target was Concordia, which was jointly owned by France and Belgium before the war. Vega Refinery, Red No. 3 includes the Standard Oil Extraction Company site and Unilia. Speranca refineries, which before the war belonged to the United States and Great Britain, respectively. As for the Red No. 4 target, the most important target in the bombing, the largest oil refinery in Europe, Astra. Romana, as well as Felix, who is closely connected to the plant. Orion refinery. The Red Five was Colombia, which belonged to France before the war. Aquila Refinery.

These targets are located on the outskirts of the city of Ploiesti and are scattered in a circular around the oil city, to the east, north, southeast and southwest of the city according to the given designation. These refineries are the backbone and core of the Ploiesti oil field. For example, Astra in it. Romana, Concordia. Both Vega and Romey Standard Oil produce more than 1.5 million tons per year, with the largest Astra. Romana produces up to 2 million tonnes per year.

And the so-called green target refers to Steva, located in the village of Campina, about thirty kilometers northwest of Ploiesti. Romana refinery, about seven kilometers south of the city of Ploiesti, in the village of Brač in Kreditu. Minier Refinery. One of the Stewa. Romana claims to be the third largest refinery in Europe, with an annual production capacity of 1.75 million tonnes.

For the above seven targets, a total of eight refineries. The KGB conducted reconnaissance and photographing separately. All 49 landmark buildings that are considered to be the most critical are marked one by one. Even a full-scale mock-up building was built near Orenburg. Used in aviation to simulate attacks.

Of course, detailed intelligence is not enough, and another key problem that plagues the Red Air Force is how to solve the accuracy of high-altitude bombing. On this issue, the Air Force has put forward a proposal -- since the accuracy of high-altitude bombing is insufficient, then low-altitude bombing should be carried out!

However, this proposal made Arxnis very entangled, because this was not the first time that long-range aviation had carried out low-altitude bombing, and the last time long-range bombers also carried out low-altitude bombing in order to destroy Norway's molybdenum mines. But that time the losses were relatively heavy. And now that the number of long-range bombers is already limited, and if there is another large-scale battle damage, the long-range aviation will simply close its doors.

Moreover, the last bombing of Norway later proved that the low-altitude performance of large four-engine bombers was really not ideal, and a considerable number of bombers were not shot down by German anti-aircraft fire, but crashed by operational error.

So Arxnis was worried about this, but a certain immortal didn't think so: "Since you want to prove the value of long-range aviation, how can you not take risks and make sacrifices?" ”

In the end, Alksnis let go of his worries and chose to strike boldly. In order to destroy the oil refinery in Ploiesti in one fell swoop, the air marshal was also out of the way. He prepared 150 Tu-3s, 100 Pe-8s and 200 Il-4s for the bombing. Of these, the Tu-3 will take off from Sevastopol with five tons of bombs on board. Take the sea route and go straight to Ploiesti, north of Bucharest.

The Pe-8 will take off from Simferopol with two tons of bombs and fly together to Ploiesti after meeting the Tu-3 at sea. As for the Il-4, it was equipped with a ton and a half of bombs. Take off from Kherson and, after refueling in Odessa, besieged by German troops, fly through Moldova to Ploiesti.

Specifically, it was to attack Ploiesti from the north and south, and this bombing operation of more than 400 bombers was named "Wave".

Of course, Operation Wave did not begin at the beginning, and there was great hope for the bombing of Arksnis, and it was natural to hope that it would be completed in one battle. So a month-long high-intensity training session was arranged. And this month's training "impressed" many Red Army pilots: "It took extreme endurance to keep the Tu-3 (Pe-8) in a uniform formation for hours, and holding the joystick for a long time made our arms sore, and when we returned to the ground, most of us barely had the strength to drink soup with a spoon......"

Not only did the pilots have to undergo intensive training, but the bombers also had to undergo a round of modifications, because the Tu-3 and Pe-8 bombing sights are designed for high-altitude horizontal bombing, and these sights are not very useful in low-altitude bombing. So it has to be replaced.

All of the four-engine bombers were replaced with low-altitude sights for the Il-2 and Su-2, which were marked with red crosshairs carved into the eyepieces to help pilots aim at their targets during ground attacks. All four-shot bomber pilots and bombardiers were asked to master the new sight as quickly as possible, dropping bombs as quickly as possible when the target crossed the red crosshair.

A considerable part of the Tu-3 was also equipped with nose machine guns, not to enhance self-defense firepower, these large-caliber machine guns were used to strafe ground targets, so their installation was not horizontal, but inclined down fifteen degrees, and most of the machine guns prepared for these machine guns were incendiary bombs.

At the training ground, the pilots of the Tu-3 and Pe-8 took to the skies in modified bombers, which they took to the air with simulated bombs and flew to the simulated targets. Pilots were given an "unprecedented" experience at "unprecedented" flight altitudes. All pilots were asked to fly as low as possible.

To be honest, this made the crazy Maozi pilots have a lot of fun, and some of the crazy pilots flew at a height of less than ten meters when they dropped the bomb! On more than one occasion, pilots have rubbed the ground on the belly of the plane during bomb dropping.

While the Red Army pilots were practicing low-altitude bombing techniques, thousands of miles away in London, MI6 also discovered the Russians' attempts.

"Ploiesti?" Learwin looked at the map and muttered, "Are you sure?" Is it true that the Russians are aiming at Ploiesti? ”

"It's almost certain that in the previous year. KGB's activities in Ploiesti have been significantly enhanced. Loot local maps and photos at all costs. And in the last month. The Germans observed that the number of Russian reconnaissance planes visiting Romania also skyrocketed. All this can indicate that the Russians have a military operation against Romania. ”

"Not only that, according to our internal intelligence in the Soviet Union, since more than a month ago, the Soviet Union suddenly transferred a huge number of Il-4 aircraft from the front line of the battlefield, and these bombers magically disappeared from the front line, and their whereabouts are unknown. We suspect that the Russians are preparing for the bombing. ”

"Il-4," Learvin glanced at the relevant intelligence about the Il-4 and found that this medium-range bomber did not have a large bomb load. "The performance of the IL-4 is not ideal!"

"Yes, but given the sheer number of Il-4s, we still think that the Russians are going to deliver a massive air strike on Ploiesti!"

Learvin thought about it for a moment and immediately called the Prime Minister's Office and asked for passage to Churchill about the emergency. As mentioned earlier, the old smoker was actually very interested in Ploiesti, but Britain did not have enough bombers and sufficient range to give up. And now, when he hears that the Russians think the same thing, he is immediately happy.

The old smoker had a bold idea, could he unite with the Russians to strike Ploiesti in the air? The idea popped up. The old smoker was excited. He saw this as a good opportunity to break the impasse in relations between the Soviet Union and Great Britain if the two countries could jointly strangle the Romanian oil refining industry. In the future, they can also unite against the Axis powers, so as to preserve the strength of the British Empire to the greatest extent.

Soon, the old smoker threw an olive branch from diplomatic channels, and he proposed to Trotsky a plan for a joint attack on Ploiesti. Among them, the British provided the most detailed intelligence support for Ploiesti and sent dozens of Lancasters to the Soviet Union to attack Ploiesti with Soviet long-range air forces.

Churchill's proposal aroused a great deal of interest from Trotsky, who had always wanted to ease relations between the two sides, especially during the last assassination of Lenin, and he was quite worried about the outbreak of a direct armed conflict between Britain and the Soviet Union. In his opinion, it would be foolish and even suicidal to do so before defeating the Germans.

Now, the old smoker's plan for a joint air strike on Ploiesti could be an attempt to break the ice, at least to ease the antagonism between the two countries. What's more, Britain's intelligence on Ploiesti should be more detailed, which can ensure the better development of Operation "Tide".

Therefore, Lao Tuo immediately put forward a proposal to the Central Military Commission, hoping that the Military Commission could discuss the possibility of cooperation with Britain. Of course, he also added in particular: "I hope that Comrade Andrei will carefully review this proposal, and it will be advantageous for the time being to jointly attack Ploiesti with the British!" ”

Trotsky was really worried that Li Xiaofeng would stir up the situation, and several opportunities were disturbed by a certain immortal, so he decided to take the vaccine in advance. It's just that Trotsky didn't expect that this time a certain immortal really had no intention of stirring up. The British did have a better understanding of the situation in Ploiesti, and with the intelligence they provided, the air strikes would be more targeted and more effective. However, he was very suspicious of the British Lancaster bombers entering the Soviet Union, which in his opinion was completely unnecessary, the Red Air Force had enough strength to complete the bombing, and a mere 48 Lancasters was at most the icing on the cake.

Moreover, once a joint bombing is agreed, liaison and communication between the crews of the two sides will be a major problem, which involves a series of complex communication problems and identification of friend or foe. With the urine nature of the British, it is entirely possible to take the opportunity to test the secrets of the Red Air Force.

In fact, Li Erwen also thought so, and she immediately suggested that Churchill use this to reconnoiter the secrets of the Red Army, and if he could obtain information on the Red Air Force's communications and identification of friend and foe, it would be very beneficial to the future confrontation.

However, Churchill was very cautious on this issue, or he was still a politician after all, and knew what it means to cast a long line to catch a big fish.

"It's better not to involve intelligence work in this operation. The Russians are not stupid, even if they agree to the joint bombing campaign, they will be very wary of us, and if any of our horses are caught by them, it will not only ruin the operation, but also arouse their high vigilance and hatred. And this is not good for the Empire! ”

However, this does not mean that Churchill is disciplined, in fact, he is preparing to cast a long line to catch a big fish, and if he can ease relations with the Soviet Union through this operation and avoid further direct conflict, it is possible to expand the scope of cooperation with the Soviet Union in the future. At that time, it is not too late to engage in intelligence and bury nails. As the old saying goes, pigs still have to be fattened and killed!

It is a pity that Li Xiaofeng is not a pig, on the contrary, he is a clever hunter, and he clearly opposed the joint bombing plan proposed by the British from the beginning. After both Trotsky and Sverdlov put pressure on him, a certain immortal said: "If joint bombing is necessary, then I don't think British bombers can stay on Soviet territory for a long time." British bombers could have entered the Transcaucasia via Iraq and Iran to refuel, and then joined up with our main fleet in the Black Sea ......" (to be continued. )