Thirty-six Zero fighters, divided into three groups, quickly rose into the air to intercept. However, before they could climb to their optimal position, dozens of strangely shaped fighters were already approaching them. Each of these planes had two propellers, one on the left and one on the right, and they pounced on them with great ferocity.

This is the P38 "Lightning" fighter, known as the "Twin Demon". The aircraft's speed, thick armor, ferocious firepower, and unique styling impress every opponent. Historically, the title of "Twin Demon" was given to Japanese pilots.

However, the current Japanese Navy carrier-based aircraft pilots are still in contact with this aircraft for the first time and do not realize its horror.

Sudden ...... The 20-mm cannon and 12.7-mm large-caliber machine gun quickly sprayed several fire dragons, and the Japanese fighters who were caught off guard were quickly hit. In order to reduce weight, the Zero fighter used a large number of wooden structures and skins, and the result was that it caught fire on the first hit and exploded as soon as it caught fire.

As soon as the battle began, three Zeros were blown up in the air, which surprised the remaining Japanese pilots.

"Damn, Mi Beast has a new plane!"

The Japanese pilots soon sensed that something was wrong, and quickly circled and maneuvered, trying to use their high maneuverability to win the game. What the Japanese never expected was that these planes were no less maneuverable than those of the Zero War. Thanks to the installation of two engines, one left and one right, the P38 can easily hover left and right.

"Attention, the captain is already in the air defense command position!"

"Order all ships and Zero fighters to take off immediately!"

Compared to the U.S. military, the Japanese army's ground crews and crew members are indeed much more proficient. Didn't wait for those 36 to lose in zero battles. Another 36 Zero fighters took to the skies. However, the U.S. military was very well prepared this time, and the newly arrived P38 fleet continued to join in.

Soon, the Zero fighter group was completely suppressed by the P38 fighter group, and a huge hole appeared in the defense of the Japanese fleet. The B24 bombers, commanding at high altitude, quickly gave orders to the group of bombers on standby through the CIC Combat Information Center.

"Six Japanese aircraft carriers, together with 28 other ships, headed north at a speed of 20 knots."

"Roger, target found!"

"The whole army launched an attack and taught the Japanese monkeys a hard lesson, good luck to you!"

The U.S. military's B24 fleet has specially assigned a squadron to be responsible for intelligence, liaison, and command and dispatch. The twelve aircraft were not directly involved in the attack. Rather, they are in a relatively safe position to give orders.

Whew...... The bomber squadrons quickly followed up and swooped down on their respective targets under unified dispatch.

"Report sir, the target has been locked!"

"Bomb, attack!"

……

The Japanese troops of the ships below were also prepared for anti-air combat.

"The elevation angle is 45 degrees. Spot enemy aircraft! ”

"Air-to-air combat. You're ready! ”

"Burn shotguns in the air. Start shooting! ”

……

The ships quickly launched anti-aircraft fire, and because of the formation of a circular defense map, each ship only needed to attack on one side. Greatly reduced the difficulty of defense.

What the Japanese did not expect was that these B24 bombers did not adopt the tactics of flying low to break the defense, but still maintained an extremely high altitude (more than 3,000 meters) and dropped bombs two kilometers away.

Whew...... The bombs detached from the body and began to fall rapidly. However, due to the extreme horizontal muzzle velocity, the bombs were still rapidly rushing towards the Japanese fleet.

"30 degrees to the right, shoot!"

Sudden ...... Anti-aircraft artillery fire began to fire fiercely, and a dense network of fire was formed on the periphery of the fleet.

"Ammo, get on ammo!"

……

It was said that it was so far away and so high that the bombs dropped were not accurate at all, but the Japanese still sensed the danger and began to shoot at these huge bombs.

However, compared to the low accuracy of aerial bombs, the effectiveness of anti-aircraft guns is even lower. Although a few bombs were destroyed by a rain of bullets, most of them stubbornly followed the established route!

Probably because of the contempt for defense, the Japanese army was very weak in anti-aircraft guns. For example, at this time, the best anti-aircraft weapon on the Japanese ships -- the Type 96 triple 25-mm anti-aircraft gun, according to Japanese military estimates, the gun required 1,500 rounds of 25-mm shells at a height of 1,000 meters and a distance of 2,000 meters to shoot down an American plane.

In other words, now the B24 bombers are at an altitude of 3,000 meters, and even if they hang in the air and do not move to let the Japanese target them, they will not be able to do anything. As for other anti-aircraft machine guns and large-caliber anti-aircraft guns, they were not as good as the 25 mm.

For example, the famous battleship "Yamato" was finally beaten by the US carrier-based aircraft group and was quickly sunk, and there was almost no power to fight back during the whole battle. The Japanese army shamefully claimed that they had shot down six American fighters in the battle, but the Yankees still refused to admit this poor data, believing that there was no such big loss at all. In view of the anti-aircraft capabilities of the Japanese army, the B24 crews were throwing bombs almost with impunity.

Whew...... Finally, several bombs have managed to reach the top of the warship. However, judging from the trajectory, these bombs will all fall into the sea without exception. This made the Japanese officers and soldiers below breathe a sigh of relief, and began to mock the timidity and uselessness of the American pilots. It is believed that the US bombers were afraid of being shot down, so they dropped bombs from such a distance.

In the early days of the Pacific War, the U.S. military behaved very badly indeed. The Japanese army believed that the United States was cowardly and afraid of death, that it was terrible, that it had no military spirit, that it was not even as good as the Chinese army, and that it could not play its role because of the poor personnel of the United States.

"Mi Beast is such a coward!"

"Even the soldiers of China are inferior to the rubbish!"

"Mijun Red Deer, let you taste the power of the Yamato samurai!"

……

The Japanese were screaming and cursing vigorously when several bombs suddenly exploded as they skimmed over the ship. Rumble! With a loud bang, the huge body exploded. The Japanese troops below didn't know that there was such a thing as VT information management in the world, and they were all stunned.

However, there is something more brutal and bloody than the VT tube, and that is cluster bombs. 21st century. The Celestial Empire was ready to use cluster bombs against the supercarriers of the US imperialists, but unfortunately none of them came in handy.

Well, now Zheng Huzi has a place to use this weapon. After the three-ton cluster mother bomb exploded in the air, thousands of submunitions in the mother body quickly fell from the sky. The dense rain of bullets was like the scattered flowers of the Celestial Maiden, and although most of the sub-bombs fell into the sea, many of them still fell on the deck of the Japanese ship.

The "Kaga" was the first large aircraft carrier of the Japanese army, and it was at the forefront of all major wars, especially in the "Pearl Harbor Incident" six months ago. Therefore, this time it has also become a key target of the US military.

Boom, hundreds of sub-bombs fell on the deck. There are obviously several types of such submunitions, some of which are shrapnel shells with VT tubes. It exploded before it even hit the deck. A large number of steel balls were scattered and scattered, which were used to kill the living forces on the deck and destroy the exposed aircraft; Some directly blew a large hole in the deck, or even poked into the hangar below. The deck, which had been level, quickly became uneven. Not only could the plane not take off. The previous plane also could not land.

The Japanese commander did not care about the corpses and wounded that littered the deck. Shouted a command: "Quick, start deck repair work now!" ”

"Hello!"

A Japanese unit quickly began to get busy. This is also a unique skill of the Japanese Navy -- the rapid repair of the deck of an aircraft carrier. This technology is also a very popular technology in the 21st century, but to put it bluntly, it is nothing. It is to fill the pit with cement.

"Quick, cement!"

"Water!"

The Japanese screamed and tried to fill the pits, but some of the decks were already on fire. This is the third seed bomb - the incendiary bomb! These bombs attached to the wooden deck and quickly began to burn, and because of the mixture of thermite and white phosphorus, they could not be extinguished with water!

The fire was finally extinguished with a fire extinguisher, and a large part of the deck had been burned out. Well, it seems that more cement slurry is needed, and the dejected Japanese soldiers have to go back to prepare. Just then, a soldier inadvertently touched a "dud". I heard a bang, and more than 30 soldiers around me fell in a pool of blood, screaming again and again.

It turns out that this seemingly "dumb" thing is actually the legendary "devil's egg". This kind of bomb will not explode directly when it falls on the deck, just like a dud, but whoever dares to touch it will have the consequence of thousands of steel balls shooting out in all directions. With its terrifying lethality, it is enough to reimburse a platoon.

Although these types of submunitions are difficult to cause much damage to the fleet itself, they have a huge destructive ability to the flight deck, personnel and equipment exposed to the deck. This includes not only aircraft carriers, but also anti-aircraft guns and personnel of battleships, cruisers, and destroyers.

Because the anti-aircraft artillery at that time, especially the 25-mm triple anti-aircraft guns used by the Japanese army in large quantities, did not have any protective measures, not even a bulletproof shield, once it hit a VT bomb or a "devil's egg", the whole class had to gameover.

"One out of ten, well done, boys!"

The CIC Combat Information Center quickly got technical statistics. Of course, this hit data actually counts a lot of near-misses, and it is not a real parent bomb hit. Moreover, this is still using radio guidance technology, and if it had been left behind, it would have been rare for a single 50-round bomb to hit the target.

As he spoke, the second wave of bombers quickly swooped down on the target, and like the previous one, it was still a cluster bomb. It was almost helpless against this kind of bombing of Japanese ships, and their ring of defense required dense defense by all ships, which greatly increased the probability of being hit by cluster bombs.

Let's put it this way, many bombs targeting ship A may have been missed, but they just landed on the head of ship B. Vice Admiral Nagumo Tadaichi quickly discovered the problem and quickly ordered the ships to break through separately so as not to get together and be beaten. However, by this time, the B24 bomber group had also finished dropping bombs and began to return home.

……

At the same time that US planes attacked the Japanese No. 1 aircraft carrier fleet, the Japanese carrier-based aircraft group also arrived near the "Enterprise" and other aircraft carrier battle groups.

However, with the warning of radar, the carrier-based aircraft on each aircraft carrier were ready for air combat as early as possible. Due to the incompetence of the F4F "Wildcat" fighters (it is said that the US commanders had already crossed off the pilots' names when they ordered the F4F and F2A fighters to take off to meet the "Zero Battle"), the US military replaced all the planes of the three major aircraft carrier battle groups with the latest F6F "Hellcat" carrier-based fighters.

Although the performance has been greatly improved. But in terms of appearance, the F6F "Hellcat" fighter has hardly changed except that it is slightly larger than the F4F "Wildcat".

So the Japanese army didn't care about it at first, thinking that they could abuse those "little wild cats" as usual.

"I don't know if it's an illusion, but I always think that the wild cat is bigger than I used to see!"

"Haha, isn't it easier to hit a big target?"

The Zero fighter quickly met it, but the Japanese army was taken aback as soon as they met, and the overall power of the "Wildcat", which was one size larger, was increased by 25 percent, and its firepower, flight speed, altitude, and climb rate were all much higher than that of the Zero Battle.

In fact, in addition to these superficial data. The special design of the F6F fighter engine ensures that any cylinder is hit. It can still be operated by other cylinders to maintain flight. The fuselage is also equipped with bulletproof glass, and the sealed fuel tank and cooler are equipped with armor. Hydraulic landing gear is also used to increase flexibility and strength. It can also make the landing gear at a 90-degree right angle. Fold inside the wing. The arrangement of the wing is on the bottom side. This makes landing on the flight deck more stable......

In short, the performance aspect is an all-round improvement.

Soon, the Japanese pilots discovered the strength of their opponents. As a result, they were flustered and played even worse, one after another "Zero" fighters were hit, and then they were planted from the sky in black smoke.

In the midst of the fierce battle, an American pilot shouted happily: "Ahha, this looks like an ancient turkey hunting!" This statement quickly spread and marked the end of the "Zero War myth" of the Japanese army.

Soon, the Japanese fighter unit was completely routed. The US carrier-based planes turned around and pounced on the Japanese torpedo bombers and dive bombers.

Having lost the cover of the "zero battle", these bombers could only drop their bombs in a hurry, and then hurriedly fled to the "Aleutian strike formation" commanded by Vice Admiral Hososuki Oshiro.

But before these planes could land, a huge group of B24 bombers rushed in. Now that the main force of the Japanese First Air Fleet under the command of Nagumo Tadaichi has temporarily lost its air combat capability, Admiral Arnold has decided to solve this "problem in the heart" first, and then gather the forces of the aircraft carrier formation and the army aviation to attack with all their strength to inflict heavy damage or even annihilate the Japanese "combined fleet"!

Thundered...... The B24 bomber group soon began to drop cluster bombs, and the dense rain of bullets immediately flooded the aircraft carriers Longxiang and Hayabusa, and the entire deck was suddenly blown to pieces, and the other warships in the fleet were also cleared by cluster bombs over and over again, and their air defense capabilities were greatly weakened.

It was at this moment that the carrier-based aircraft forces of the US Eighth Fleet finally began to counterattack. The first sortie was a torpedo brigade, 36 TBD ravaging torpedo bombers; This was followed by a group of dive bombers, 60 SBD dreadnought dive bombers, and it is worth mentioning that both aircraft have been improved on the basis of the previous ones, and their performance has been greatly improved.

The last to set off was the F6F "Hellcat" fighter group, because in terms of speed, torpedo bombers were the slowest, dive bombers were second, and fighters were the fastest. Therefore, the fighter can return to the deck to refuel before setting off, and ensure that all three aircraft arrive on the battlefield at the same time to achieve the maximum attack effect.

"Spread out, spread out!" At this time, the Japanese "Aleutian Strike Formation" had already fallen into a panic, only knowing that it was desperately fleeing under the bombing of the US army, and desperately asking for help from the "Combined Fleet".

Vice Admiral Hososumi sent a telegram for help from Yamamoto Isoroku on his desk, and the commander, supplementary staff, chief of staff, deputy chief of staff, senior staff officer, gunnery staff officer, mine staff officer, aviation staff officer, communications staff officer, navigation staff officer, organ staff officer, war affairs staff officer, government affairs staff officer, chief comptroller, chief military medical officer, chief of agency, chief of code, chief of meteorology, and adjutant all attended the scene, and their faces were solemn and terrifying.

"Lieutenant General Nagumo and Vice Admiral Xi Xuan both reported that the Mi army used a new type of bomb with high accuracy, which would explode over the ship and then shoot a large number of small bomblets. At present, the decks of various aircraft carriers have suffered heavy losses, and it is impossible to take off and land aircraft in a short time! ”

"Gentlemen, the situation is urgent, do you say that you will continue to attack, or should you retreat quickly?"

The Black Island Turtle Man hurriedly said: "Your Excellency Commander, you must not retreat!" ”

Yamamoto raised his eyelids and asked, "Why, tell me your reasons!" ”

"Hello! If we retreat now, the Xixuan fleet will be completely annihilated by the Mi army, and the US army may continue to pursue the First Air Fleet and cause serious losses! ”

"Sodosne, what do you say?"

The Black Island Turtle Man hesitated for a moment, then suddenly gritted his teeth and said: "Your Excellency, if we follow the normal way of fighting, we will definitely lose, and now we can only use the method of one person, one plane for one ship-order our plane to crash directly into the aircraft carrier of Miyu!" ”

"Nani?" This remark, not to mention Yamamoto, can make a large number of other staff officers shocked. In the past, Japanese pilots had not crashed into warships, but that was the spontaneous behavior of the plane after it was damaged. According to Kuroshima's staff officer, it is necessary to carry out it in a planned and organized manner. This kind of suicide attack can be said to be the first time in the world!

"Gentlemen!" The Black Island Turtle Man said in a deep voice: "The situation is extremely dangerous now, our carrier-based aircraft cannot take off or land, or it won't be long before the plane in the sky will fall due to running out of fuel." Then you will fall into a full-blown passive position, and instead of sitting still, you should fight hard! ”

The meaning of the Kuroshima turtle people is very clear, they must sink or at least severely damage their three major aircraft carriers before the US carrier-based aircraft attack the First Air Fleet (i.e., the Nagumo Fleet). As long as this is the case, the Japanese fleet will have a way to survive and even turn defeat into victory. Otherwise, the Japanese fleet, which has lost its air cover, will become a living target for the naval and air forces of the US military!

"Yo Xi!" It may be that Kuroshima's last words touched Yamamoto, and he finally made up his mind and ordered: "Just do what Kuroshima says, and immediately notify the Nagumo fleet and the Hosoxuan fleet!" ”

"Hello!"

Tadaichi Nagumo and Hososumi Kokoro, who received the order, soon began to carry out Yamamoto Isoroku's order. They rushed to repair the deck quickly, because they only needed for the planes to take off, not wait for landing, so they didn't need to repair it so completely, which greatly accelerated the progress.

Soon, the planes in the hangar were sent into the sky one after another. The pilots knew that this would be the last flight, but they all silently accepted the order.

These planes, along with those that had already risen into the air, quickly formed three waves of attack groups, and then went straight to the "Enterprise" and other three major aircraft carrier attack groups.

"Report to the sir, the Japanese planes are suddenly approaching our fleet with all their might!"

"Strange, what are these Japanese monkeys trying to do? Order the fighter unit to immediately take to the air to meet the battle! ”

"Yes, sir!"

……

At this time, the US military did not realize the seriousness of the problem, and its main energy was still attacking the "Aleutian strike formation" commanded by Lieutenant General Hosoxuan Xuzilang.

Since the Xixuan fleet had been dispersed by B24 bombers, the US dive bomber group and torpedo bomber group had rapidly approached the Dragon Wing, Hayabusa Eagle and other capital ships.

At the same time, the Japanese "death squad" aircraft group also approached the three major US aircraft carrier battle groups.

The real decisive battle is coming! (To be continued......)

PS: Khan! There was too much foreplay, and I wrote three chapters in one battle before I finished it. However, the scale of this battle is indeed relatively large, and there are many aspects involved, and one or two chapters are really unclear.