Choosing a good target for an air attack is not an easy task. Because the Red Navy had so few targets to choose from. The Red Navy could strike at three targets -- the German-Italian-Japanese axis. However, among these three targets, Japan and Italy must be eliminated first, not to mention the Japanese side, the Pacific Fleet of the Red Navy is even weaker and more scum, and to provoke the Combined Fleet is to die. As for Italy, the Black Sea Fleet will not be able to get out of the Black Sea, and the Northern Fleet is too far away, so it naturally has to be excluded.

So in fact, the only target that the Red Navy could attack was the German Navy. But how many worthy targets does the current German Navy have, in addition to submarines? The British Bismarck had dried up, and Tirpitz was cowering in the Norwegian fjords. Both the Scharnhorst and the Gneisenau were damaged by the Royal Air Force and are still under repair. In addition to these three big ships, Germany only has a few Hipper-class heavy cruisers left, but the heavy cruiser is really not enough to see, no matter how you look at it, it feels a bit like killing chickens with a dragon slaying knife.

In addition to air strikes on German naval targets, it was not impossible to hit land targets, but the Air Force did a good job and did not need the help of the Red Navy at all. And even if you go to help, it is not brilliant, it can only be regarded as the icing on the cake.

After some planning, Li Xiaofeng finally set two targets, the first was the submarine base and related facilities of the German Navy, and the second was the aforementioned Tirpitz. Only these two goals are enough.

However, it is not easy to attack these two targets by air, first of all, submarine facilities, in order to let the precious U-boats survive the indiscriminate bombardment of the Allied forces, the Germans have built a large number of solid U-boat depots at no cost. For example, Elbe II and Fink II in Hamburg, North Sea III in Hurgland, Killian and Conrad in Kiel and Valentin and Hornet in Bremen. And even after the encroachment on Norway. Taking advantage of Norway's unique geographical conditions, "Bruno", "Dora I" and "Dora II" were also built. These were submarine depots within the Red Navy's reach. There are also submarine bases and caves in Brest and Norion and Saint-Nazaire in France.

And note that the Germans spared no expense in these caves, and their defenses were considerable. The relatively small Elbe II cave in Hamburg, which can only accommodate three U-boats side by side, is frenziedly sturdy.

On 8 March 1945, the Imperial Air Force dispatched more than 300 bombers to bomb the docks of the Port of Hamburg, dropping about 1,000 tons of bombs. Then, at the end of March, the Royal Air Force sent another 450 bombers to drop 2,200 tons of bombs, almost leveling the Hovaldes factory grounds, but the Elbe II cave in the same area was largely unharmed.

The unrelenting Britain made a comeback on April 8. Another 400 bombers were dispatched to concentrate all their efforts on bombing the "Elbe River II" cave, but what was the result? Only the lifting steel door at the entrance of the dock was knocked down, but the main structure of the cave was still intact. By the end of World War II, the Elbe II still had four Type 21 submarines and two Type 7C submarines in storage.

Note that this is not the only Elbe II of the small scale, but the Fink II, the largest U-boat depot in Germany, is even more formidable. On April 9, 1945, 17 RAF Lancasters headed for Fink II with 15 five-ton tall cabinets and two 10-ton Grand Slams.

In this bombing, six of the 17 bombs hit the "Fink II", although the top of the cave was blown through, but the overall structure of the cave was still intact, and the shock wave only caused minor damage to the Type 23 submarine in the cave!

You know, it's a stilt board and a slam bomb. Bombing Tirpitz is like play, but dealing with these sturdy caverns is a bit of a hindrance. It can be seen that the Germans used construction materials very much.

For the Red Navy, it could not bomb these fortified depots no worse than the Royal Air Force and the US Army Aviation. Either send hundreds of bombers to carpet the stream, or go on super-heavy bombs to kill. But what makes the Red Navy depressed is that aircraft carriers do not have the above capabilities, and now the Red Navy can dispatch a total of 5 aircraft carriers, and a single piece cannot make up hundreds of bombers, and please note that the maximum bomb load of Ro-2 and Ro-3 is limited, and they can't carry five or ten tons of bombs, which means that the Red Navy is not capable of striking such an unusually strong target.

Why don't we blow up the U-boat depot, or do we have to deal with Tirpitz? But let's be honest, Tirpitz isn't easy to deal with!

Tirpitz is not very strong in air defense, as we all know that the air defense capabilities of German warships in World War II are a joke, and what really makes Tirpitz difficult to deal with is that it hides in a unique geographical environment.

At this time, the Tirpitz was hiding in the Fatenfjord, 24 kilometers away from Trondheim, Norway. The fjord is about 1.2 kilometres wide and is sandwiched between steep cliffs. Moreover, the Tirpitz anchored directly below the cliff face to the north, and a large number of anti-aircraft guns and balloons were placed on and around the cliff wall.

In fact, Operation Refueling, conducted by the Royal Air Force in January 1942, proved to be very difficult for the Tirpitz to attack. Only two of the 16 bombers flew to the Norwegian coastline during that operation, and after searching for a long time without finding any trace of Tirpitz, they randomly found a few ships to drop bombs and returned. After that, the unrelenting Royal Air Force tried several more times, but the results were not satisfactory.

There may be comrades who want to say, since horizontal bombing and dive bombing will not work, then get on the torpedo. It's a pity that the torpedoes didn't work either, because there was a ring of anti-submarine nets and anti-mine nets around the Tirpitz. When the Royal Navy sent X-class pocket submarines to raid the raid, it almost fell short.

Li Xiaofeng knows very well that under the current situation, trying to destroy the Tirpitz through air strikes is tantamount to a fool's dream, so is there no way to solve the Tirpitz? A certain immortal didn't think so, but he still came up with two ways - one was a technical solution, and the other was a tactical solution.

Let's start with the technical solution. This is also the program that Li Xiaofeng has been strongly promoting since the thirties, that is, missiles. Specifically, anti-ship cruise missiles. After entering 1941, the pace of development of the anti-ship missile, which was later called P1, accelerated dramatically. And because of the addition of the Air Force. Investment in the research and development of key electronic equipment has been greatly strengthened. By May 1942. The small-diameter cone scanning radar has been produced, although the reliability and volume are still large, but the problem has finally been solved, and it can barely be used anyway.

It was not enough to have radar, another major problem that plagued the Soviet missile industry was the engine, and at that time the R&D department came up with three sets of schemes, one was to use the conventional layout of the existing piston engine, and the other was a rocket engine scheme. The last set is a jet-powered scheme.

The first of these three schemes to be eliminated was the jet power scheme, because the Soviet Union's metallurgical and precision machining capabilities were still too poor, and the jet power was really unavailable, and the failure rate of the barely saved engine was extremely high.

Then there are only two options left, the rocket engine scheme is much better than the jet scheme, at least through the research and development of rocket artillery, the USSR still has a certain technical reserve in this regard. Both solid and liquid rocket engines in general are ok. However, it is not an ordinary rocket engine to be used on the missile, according to the design indicators, the P1 anti-ship missile is required to carry a 500-kilogram armor-piercing warhead, and the range is not less than 30 kilometers. Okay. Together, the difficulty skyrockets. Anyway, the existing rocket engines are unlikely to meet the requirements. There is a serious lack of thrust!

According to the normal pace of research and development, it will take at least another year to solve the problems of the engine. However, it is clear that Li Xiaofeng will not be able to wait a year, and he wants to prove the power of naval aviation now.

As a result, the rocket engine power is also out, and it seems that the only way to use the existing piston engine is to make a missile similar to a "small plane". But there is a problem with this, the existing piston engine layout, basically the nose of the machine is occupied by the engine and the propeller. The seeker of the missile is best placed in the nose because of the field of view, which inevitably leads to contradictions, either the engine and propeller are moved to the butt, or the seeker must be arranged in the belly.

The choice of the Soviet designers was simple: to put the engine in the tail section, and this strange missile, which came to be known as Anti-Ship One, was born. Looks like it's time to open champagne? It seems that Tirpitz is in danger?

Hey, you're rejoicing too soon. There were no problems with the tactical performance of the Anti-Ship One, and even exceeded the technical requirements, its maximum range reached sixty kilometers (the piston engine was fuel-efficient), and the performance of live fire was not bad.

However, naval aviation simply could not use it to attack Tirpitz. The reason is simple, because of the use of piston engines and an aircraft-like layout, this missile is so large that it cannot be stuffed into the magazine and can only be plugged out. None of the existing attack aircraft of the Red Navy could hang it under the wings, and as for the belly, because the altitude above the ground was lower, the huge propellers of the missiles could directly declare this impossible.

Let's put it this way, the anti-ship No. 1 missile cannot be used, and none of the attack aircraft and bombers equipped by the Red Army can carry it safely into the air, not even big guys like the Tu-3 and Pe-8.

Obviously, the road of solving Tirpitz with technical methods is not feasible for the time being, that is, Li Xiaofeng only has a second way left, and he has to find a way from tactics. The so-called tactical solution, to put it bluntly, is to lure out the Tirpitz cowering in the Norwegian fjords, as long as the cargo reaches the ocean, it is undoubtedly much easier to sink it.

However, this is not easy, since the end of the British smarck, the main ships of the German Navy except for submarines have been very low-key, and they will not easily go to sea to fight. Especially a giant ship with symbolic meaning like Tirpitz is even more cautious. Without a sufficiently attractive decoy, Tirpitz would definitely not have made a move.

So what kind of goals would have piqued Tirpitz, or Hitler, in particular? In fact, history has the answer, at the end of June 1942, the PQ-17 formation sailed from the United States to the Soviet Union aroused Hitler's interest, this fleet of 34 merchant ships, transporting a total of more than 200,000 tons of supplies, immediately excited the mustache, and even ordered the precious Tirpitz to attack (and turn back halfway).

The "results" of the PQ-17 gave Li Xiaofeng a possibility that if a false target similar to the PQ-17 was created, the Germans were likely to be fooled. Even if it's like in history. Tirpitz turned back halfway to the Norwegian anchorage. But as long as the goods come out. It's a lot easier to fight.

Soon Li Xiaofeng formulated the idea of a "fishing" plan, and later handed it over to Kuznetsov and Sukhoi for detailed study, asking them to come up with a comprehensive plan.

When Kuznetsov and Sukhoi received this task, their faces were not very good, because the plan was somewhat whimsical, and it was very risky to implement, and most importantly, who could guarantee that the Germans would definitely send the Tirpitz? According to the current trend of naval warfare in the Atlantic. The Germans played more smoothly with submarines and airplanes, and large capital ships basically existed in the fleet.

"Comrade Andrei, how is this possible?" Sukhoi and Kuznetsov asked in unison.

Without waiting for an immortal to speak, Sukhoi said loudly, "What if the enemy does not send the Tirpitz?" ”

And Kuznetsov said: "What if the Germans see through it as a decoy and are not fooled?" ”

From the answers of these two people, we can see that they have different understandings of a certain immortal, Sukhoi is too familiar with a certain immortal, since a certain immortal has proposed a strategy to lure the snake out of the hole, then this strategy must be realized, and the Germans must not be able to see through it. So he didn't have Kuznetsov's worries, he didn't worry about the Germans not being fooled. What he was worried about was, what would happen if the Tirpitz didn't come out?

Li Xiaofeng raised his eyelids. "The KGB has hinted through some channels that the German spies hidden in us will be delivered in June with the Type 36 anti-submarine frigates we built for the UK in ......"

As soon as this sentence came out, Sukhoi and Kuznetsov immediately lit up, because this decoy was attractive enough to the Germans, and as Britain introduced a large number of old destroyers from the United States through the Lend-Lease Act, and gradually began to improve the escort system, it had an impact on German submarine tactics.

It is particularly worth mentioning that German submarines also constantly tried to strangle the Soviet Union's Arctic Ocean routes, but because of the excellent performance of the Type 36 anti-submarine frigates and the perfect escort system coupled with the uninterrupted patrols of the Red Navy Aviation, the lethality of German submarines to the Soviet Union's Arctic Ocean routes was really not worth mentioning, but they lost a lot of submarines.

If the Royal Navy also introduced Type 36 frigates, it would certainly not be a good thing for the Germans, and if they could destroy these frigates in one go, would it be worth the try?

Sukhoi and Kuznetsov believe that the Germans may really take risks, and because of the excellent anti-submarine performance of the Type 36 frigates, if the Germans really want to try their skills, I am afraid that the submarine will not be the main force, and may choose to let the large capital ship pour out of the nest, so can the Tirpitz continue to stay in Norway?

Li Xiaofeng still seemed to feel that this bait was not good enough, and he continued: "The KGB is spreading not only this news, but also spreading that two hundred tons of gold are carried on this batch of Type 36 frigates, which are specially used to pay the United States for the purchase of various war resources......"

Hiss......

Sukhoi and Kuznetsov gasped at the time, for the Germans, stranglehold Britain's maritime lifeline and defeat the Soviet Union as soon as possible, that was their core task. Once the Soviet Union purchases more war resources from the United States, it will inevitably be able to produce more and more powerful weapons and equipment with the industrial capacity of the Soviet Union. So for the Germans, a risky naval battle that would both solve the British threat and inflict a heavy blow on the USSR would be worth it!

Let's put it this way, the bait thrown by Li Xiaofeng really scratched the itch of the Germans, and the urine of the mustache is absolutely unbearable. Sure enough, after the Gestapo received this information, the mustache immediately approached Dreyer and consulted the navy for advice.

What does Dreyer recommend? He certainly would not choose to avoid the battle, because with the loss of the Bismarck and the sudden rise of the submarine force, the pressure on his shoulders was very great, and if he could not achieve outstanding results, with Hitler's stinky temper, I am afraid that he would order the dismantling of all surface ships and let the navy go to land as cattle and horses.

For an old navy, Dreyer always believes that surface ships are the king, and although submarines can be successful for a while, there are also many shortcomings. Once the enemy pays attention, and then adopts targeted tactics and the large-scale use of new anti-submarine weapons, the good days of submarines will soon come to an end. According to his traditional thinking, in order to win this war, the surface ship force must be strong.

But what made Dreyer depressed was that Hitler was an extreme person, and the Führer decided that the matter could not be pulled back by the nine-headed dragon, let alone his old arms and legs, so Dreyer has been anxiously waiting for the opportunity, waiting for an opportunity to prove the role of surface ships, especially large ships.

This time, Dreyer saw it as a good opportunity, saying, "According to your intelligence, this deal between the Soviet Union and Britain will directly endanger the survival of the Empire, so it must be destroyed anyway." ”

After a pause, Dreyer looked at Hitler's face, and the mustache seemed to agree, so he continued: "But such an important deal, whether it is Britain or the Soviet Union, there will inevitably be heavy protection, they are likely to dispatch large warships, and for such a fleet, there are not many ways to submarine, and the enemy fleet route is likely to deliberately avoid our air power, so if you want to destroy it, there is only one way, our capital ships must be dispatched ......" (to be continued......

PS: Bow and thank you Pig Chic 2, Ma Shen Bobo, Hacker on the Iceberg, Southern Rangers and Comrade Juventus!