The Rise of the Third Reich

"Sir, a Mosquito aircraft has been spotted!"

On the battleship Hindenburg, the flagship of the German High Seas Fleet, Admiral Gunther Lütjens listened to the staff report with an expressionless face.

"Commander, the British fleet will be here soon!" Lieutenant General Erich Bey said loudly.

Needless to say, this Mosquito must be the eye of the British air raid group, coming to search for the German fleet. Since it appeared in the sky near the Hindenburg, it meant that it had found its target.

Taking the helmet from an adjutant and placing it on his head, General Gunther Lütjens asked: "Have you not discovered the British aircraft carrier formation yet?"

Erich Bay replied: "Not yet... Currently, the Bergen base and our five aircraft carriers have sent aircraft to search, and there are 11 submarines in the North Atlantic between Iceland and Scotland to search."

"The British aircraft carrier will definitely appear!" Admiral Gunther Lütjens pondered for a while, "Send power to Admiral Richthofen at the Bergen base and ask him to recall all P.108S immediately. I require all The P.108S installed the Hs293V3 bomb within one and a half hours and was ready to attack at any time!”

Before Erich Bey could answer, Admiral Gunther Lütjens had already turned to the communications staff: "Inform the naval headquarters and request a diversionary air strike."

The current confrontation between Britain and Germany is not only in the North Atlantic and Norwegian Sea, but also in the English Channel, North Sea and other places. If the German navy and naval aviation can launch air strikes in other directions, they can hold back a considerable part of the British air power and prevent them from rushing north for reinforcements.

"Sir...the enemy plane is coming!"

The shouts alerted the officers in the command tower. Everyone turned around and saw that the British planes that were blocking the sky had appeared under the white clouds in the distance, and the 96 Fokker Zero fighter jets on their side had also joined forces with them. The other parties strangled each other.

"Let all Fokker Zeros take off..."

"Sir... Condor No. 057 (Fw-200C) reported that a large number of enemy aircraft were spotted over the F5 waters west of the Faroe Islands and are flying towards us."

"F5 sea area? It should be a British carrier-based aircraft!"

"Their aircraft carrier must be to the west of the F5 sea area!"

Hearing the appearance of a British aircraft group over the F5 waters west of the Faroe Islands, the fleet staff in the command tower of the "Hindenburg" immediately thought of British aircraft carriers. Everyone is gearing up. Now the British battleships are no longer worth mentioning in front of Germany's cutting-edge "Hindenburg" class and "Bismarck" class. The only ones that are still a bit of a threat are a few Glory-class fleet aircraft carriers.

If they can be sunk, then the British Royal Navy will no longer be a military force that can threaten Germany's hegemony in the Atlantic!

"Sir, we have received another report from Condor 057. The radar has detected an unidentified fleet located in the S6 waters."

"S6 Sea Area? It's almost 350 nautical miles away from the Faroe Islands." Lieutenant General Erich Bey quickly found the location of S6 Sea Area on the chart.

400 nautical miles is almost 650 kilometers. Generally speaking, the combat radius of an aircraft is 35%-40% of its maximum range. If it wants to bomb an enemy ship 650 kilometers away, the aircraft has a maximum range of at least 1,800 kilometers, and even more than 2,000 kilometers to be safe.

"Does the Fokker 100 have enough range?" General Gunther Lütjens asked with a frown.

"No, the maximum range of the Fokker 100 is only 1,600 kilometers." Erich Bess said thoughtfully, "If we want to attack, the fleet must sail westward at 25 knots for three hours."

"This won't work, we are under air attack." General Gunther Lütjens immediately vetoed Erich Bey's proposal. "If we run too far west, the Fw-190 taking off from Bergen will not be able to reach us... Let's let the Bergen base send P.108S bombers."

…

"Sir, it's a German Fw-200."

Aboard the battleship King George V, Sir Cunningham received a report of a German reconnaissance plane.

"Where is the German aircraft carrier?"

"It's still east of the Faroe Islands, at least 370 nautical miles (less than 700 kilometers) from our current position, and it should be out of reach of us."

"We continue eastward and maintain a distance of 500 nautical miles from the German aircraft carrier."

Cunningham is very aware of the value of the four Glory-class ships in his hands. As long as they still exist, the British Royal Navy will be a very deterrent maritime force in the Atlantic. If the United States can fight side by side with Britain in the Atlantic in the near future, these four Glory-class ships can be loaded with carrier-based aircraft using the deck tethering method, and their combat effectiveness can be at least doubled!

However, Cunningham cannot let these four Glory-class ships hide far away, because they still need to recover the F4F and SBD that flew back from the Shetland Islands in 6-7 hours.

So now Cunningham can only place his aircraft carrier 500 nautical miles away from the German aircraft carrier, and this position is about 1,500 kilometers away from Bergen. Completely within the strike range of P.108S.

…

"Captain, I've been bitten by a Mustang and it's firing at me!"

"Pull up, pull up quickly, lure it to chase!"

Nowotny shouted orders to his wingmen. The squadron he led was currently fighting with an equal number of P51 fighters.

Nowotny is already very familiar with the performance of the P51. This American-produced fighter has better performance than the Fokker Zero at low altitudes of 3,000 meters. Although the Fokker Zero is more flexible than the P51, the latter has a solid body, powerful firepower, and excellent dive performance. Once bitten by a Fokker Zero, it is usually possible to escape using its diving capabilities.

However, the Fokker Zero also has a unique skill to save life, which is to raise the altitude. This move would definitely be a recipe for death against the Spitfire, but it is very effective against the P51, which has poor high-altitude performance (it will have no weaknesses once it is equipped with the Merlin 60 engine). The current P51 takes 11 minutes to climb 6,000 meters, while the Fokker Zero only takes 6 minutes and 30 seconds. So when the Fokker Zero is grabbed by the P51, the most effective way to escape is to pull up.

Fortunately, the sea area where today's battle is taking place is nearly 500 kilometers away from northern Scotland, and the British short-legged Spitfire aircraft cannot reach it. Otherwise, if the Spitfire + P51 were to cooperate, the German Fokker Zero would be in trouble.

However, these P51s without Spitfire are still very difficult opponents. Even if the German pilots flying the Fokker Zero are far better than the British pilots flying the P51, it will be difficult to solve them quickly. Because the P51 is so strong, its unladen weight exceeds 3 tons, while the unladen weight of the Fokker Zero is less than 2 tons (the Japanese Zero is even lighter, less than 1.8 tons). This 1 ton weight makes the P51 The body is far stronger than the Foley Zero. The Fokker Zero's firepower combination of two 20mm machine guns and two 7.62mm machine guns was slightly weak, and it suffered a lot in the confrontation with the P51.

Due to the entanglement of the P51, most of the Fokker Zeros covering the fleet were unable to deal with the British's 65 Beaufort torpedo bombers, 65 Boston attack aircraft (A-20), and about 20 Mosquito bombers.

While the P51 and Fokker Zero were fighting fiercely, British bombers and attack aircraft began to rush from high altitude, medium altitude and low altitude towards the dense anti-aircraft firepower network surrounding the German aircraft carrier. Hundreds of anti-aircraft machine guns spit out tongues of flame continuously, while four battleships and one armored ship closely protected the five aircraft carriers, acting as a "human shield" to attract torpedoes and bombs.

"boom……"

A ball of flame once again rose from the port side of the battleship "Hindenburg". The large water column then dispersed into countless water droplets, falling on the deck of the "Hindenburg", almost covering a four-door The Bofors 40mm anti-aircraft gun was installed and covered, and the gun crew members felt as if they had been fished out of the sea. They were soaked and shivered when the cold wind on the Norwegian sea in March blew.

"Commander, it was a near-missed bomb..."

"Don't worry, the Hindenburg is strong enough!"

Near misses pose a considerable threat to merchant ships and destroyers without heavy armor protection. In the German naval aviation's breaking operations, near-missile tactics were used. But for a giant ship like a battleship with solid waterline armor, near miss is of little use.

However, General Gunther Lütjens could not help but frown when he spoke. Because there is an aircraft carrier "Potsdam" with little armor in his fleet.

Since the "Potsdam" was rebuilt from an older cruise ship, it does not have a powerful power system comparable to a battleship (with 100,000 horsepower) like the "Europa" and "Bremen", so it can be used in the rebuilt At this time, four to five thousand tons of waterline armor and mine protection armor will be added.

In addition, the British Boston attack aircraft (A-20) and Mosquito bombers used mid-to-high-altitude penetration and horizontal bombing attack methods, which also reminded Gunther Lütjens of the P.108Sg bomber and Hs293V3 bomb. German surface ships, like British and American surface ships, all focus their air defense on medium and low altitudes. Therefore, many of the British Beaufort torpedo bombers have been destroyed now, and the torpedoes that were barely dropped were too far away to pose a threat. However, few of the Boston attack aircraft and Mosquito bombers that broke through from above 4,000 meters were shot down.

It seems that we need to consider equipping the German aircraft carrier with a few real high-altitude aircraft... Weapons such as wire-controlled glide bombs are easy to imitate!

At this moment, Fleet Chief of Staff Erich Bey suddenly shouted: "Commander, the Potsdam reported that the starboard side was hit by two near-missiles, five cabins were flooded, and the deck was tilted 3 degrees. Filling with water!"