The decisive battle against the Third Reich

Then Angus gave an order that he regretted: "Group B, do it!"

Group B consists of medium and heavy bombers. Angus will put them into the battlefield because he thinks that the light bombers will attract the attention of the enemy's naval guns, so that the medium and heavy bombers can take advantage of the opportunity.

On the other hand, the second batch of aircraft was about to arrive, and Angus believed that bombing at this time would also provide cover for the second batch.

Then, Angus ordered: "Group C cover!"

Group C is a fighter formation. Although the British army did not encounter the enemy's air force at this time, the fighter jets can still suppress the enemy's small-caliber anti-aircraft guns and anti-aircraft machine guns, thus providing more opportunities for medium and heavy bombers.

But what Angus didn't expect was...the German naval guns were more than enough to deal with the British light bombers, and many warships didn't even fire.

The German army has three battleships. These battleships have 12 quadruple-mounted guns and 4 twin-mounted secondary guns. Together with cruisers and destroyers, the total number may be hundreds of artillery pieces.

If the hit rate of the US military's "proximity fuse shells" is used, an average of 500 shells can shoot down an aircraft. It can almost be said that a salvo of five shells can destroy an aircraft... The five troops led by Angus More than ten planes will be destroyed in a few minutes.

Of course Angus didn't know this. As soon as he pressed the nose of his plane, he rushed towards the "Richelieu" below.

Angus had participated in the "Ballista Project" before, and it happened that it was the troops he led that damaged the "Richelieu" last time, so he could recognize it at a glance and knew the capabilities of its anti-aircraft machine guns. Location.

It didn't take long for Angus to find his target. Several German soldiers were operating a 13.2MM anti-aircraft machine gun and shooting wildly into the air. Since this anti-aircraft machine gun is mounted in four units and has a high rate of fire, Angus knows that it is more threatening than the 37MM anti-aircraft gun... This is why Angus prefers anti-aircraft machine guns as targets.

"Click, click, click" Two strings of bullets were fired from the fighter plane driven by Angus.

Angus was worthy of being a pilot who had shot down more than thirty enemy planes. The bullets accurately covered the anti-aircraft machine gun and smashed several nearby German machine gunners into sieves.

But just when Angus pulled up the nose of the plane to escape, his vision suddenly went dark, and then he lost control of the flight and slammed into the "Richelieu"... At the moment the plane hit the deck, Angus realized that this battle was completely different from the "Ballista Project" he had participated in before, but he knew it too late.

Because Angus did not have time to send out the warning immediately, and because the fierce battle set off a stream of water vapor and smoke above the fleet, blocking the sight of the second wave of fleets, the second wave of fleets did not do much after they arrived at the battlefield. Consider jumping in and joining the war group.

They originally thought that this battle would be easy, but when one after another they were blown down on the sea by shells fired from unknown directions, they discovered that things were not as they imagined.

The battle lasted for more than twenty minutes, and the British pilots could not believe the result... Most of the British bombers were destroyed by the enemy before they had time to drop their bombs.

There are two reasons for this result:

First, the pilots received such information before taking off... There is a large blind spot in the airspace above the French warships. Therefore, in order to effectively attack the enemy warships, low-altitude bombing is necessary.

The other is that the British pilots did not expect that the German large-caliber anti-aircraft guns could fire so accurately and so fast... Of course, they did not know that this was because the Germans were equipped with "proximity fuse shells" .

In the end, of the 112 British aircraft in two batches, only 31 bombers and seven fighter planes were able to return. Sadly, five of the fighter planes were injured and failed to return to Malta. That is, only thirty-three aircraft survived.

"God!" Colonel John, the commander of the second group of aircraft, said, looking at the few aircraft around him: "We are simply committing suicide. What have they (referring to senior British military officers) done?"

"They should have thought of it!" said a major: "French warships will have completely different combat effectiveness in the hands of the Germans. They made a mistake!"

"Yes!" Colonel John said: "The price is that our army is almost wiped out, damn... they should be thrown into prison, this is simply murder!"

Montgomery and Eisenhower looked at each other in shock after hearing the news.

"How did they do it?" Montgomery said: "Are you sure that was the German fleet?"

"General!" the staff reminded Montgomery: "Except for the German fleet... there is only the Italian fleet!"

Needless to say what this means, it is even less likely that the Italian fleet has such combat effectiveness.

After a pause, Montgomery asked again: "How big a blow did we inflict on them?"

"The situation is not very clear!" the staff officer replied: "Because the visibility was low and there were not many survivors, according to Colonel John's report, we damaged the enemy's Richelieu and the battleship "Strasbourg", and also fired back Several destroyers were damaged!" (Note: The battleship "Strasbourg" is the second ship of the "Dunkirk" class battleship)

"No sinking?" Montgomery was disappointed with this report.

"There is no sinking report!" The staff officer shook his head.

"We should withdraw the fleet!" Eisenhower said: "Our attack has failed!"

"No!" Montgomery replied: "We have already damaged two of their battleships. We should take this moment to break through their blockade of the Tunisia Strait in one go. Otherwise, when they repair the two battleships and regain their combat effectiveness... our The sacrifice is in vain!”

Montgomery's consideration makes some sense, but it can also be seen that he was a little panicked... At this time, he was actually thinking that if the German fleet has such amazing combat effectiveness now, then in time, Germany will become more familiar with French warships. Now, does the British army still have a chance to break through the Tunisian Strait?

Therefore, the British Navy seems to have only this opportunity, taking advantage of the German Navy's two battleships to beat them when they are damaged. After all, the British Mediterranean Fleet also has three battleships and an aircraft carrier, although this aircraft carrier can only carry 21 aircraft. .

Eisenhower did not have much command authority at this time, so he could only nodded in agreement.

"It's up to you, General!" Eisenhower said: "But I think we have to re-estimate the combat effectiveness of the German Navy before that!"