"Baby, keep it steady, keep it steady, fly up..."

Bach, who was driving the ju-198 test flight mission, rushed towards the end of the deck at lightning while praying in his heart.

But things went against my wishes. When he forced his way up, the ju-198 did not fly as he wished. Instead, he raised his head up first, then fell down. With a "thump", the plane fell into the sea with torpedo. The people below immediately rushed Bach out quickly, otherwise he would be rolled to the bottom of the ship.

This "thump" sounded like a heavy drum hitting Crank and others' hearts. He shrugged and smiled bitterly: "It seems that it's not possible... I can only give up."

"Or, let's take the bomb to attack again. If we can't sink our opponent, we can at least paralyze the opponent!"

Crank shook his head: "Forget it, prepare to retreat."

"Sir!"

"Forget it, the personnel have suffered too much loss today." Crank said, "Forcing the exhausted dive bomber pilot to attack again is equivalent to letting them die. Remember, pilots are always more valuable than warships! It is not like sinking one more US warship. They can quickly produce another batch. Instead of sinking one more enemy ship, I would rather kill 50 more of them! You also know the situation of today's battle. The US military is larger than ours and suffers more than us, because the pilot level is not enough."

"The route is 290 degrees and the speed is 15 knots. Let several hedgehogs come to meet with us as soon as possible, go north first, and see the situation tomorrow, and there is no chance to find an opponent to fight another battle!" At 15:21, Crank issued an order to retreat and gave up the idea of ​​competing with the US military.

Almost at the same time, Spruins made the same decision: give up the offense and prepare to return to Cape Town.

"Sir, why don't we attack?" Roddick asked, "The SBD sent to search in the morning has been replenished after returning. The enemy now has only one aircraft carrier. With these and spare aircraft, we can form a second attack wave..."

Spruins waved his hand and said, "It's too far... I can't go back."

Roddick thought that there was indeed a problem. The distance between the two sides was nearly 700 kilometers. Even if the SBD was installed in the secondary fuel tank, the range was only a little over 1,600 kilometers. Moreover, it took more than 2 hours to fly over the German army with a tragic speed of only more than 300 kilometers. The German army would run at least 50 kilometers. The range was not enough. It was already dark when he returned. These pilots basically had no night training, which was equivalent to letting them launch a desperate attack. Although Cunningham used it once during the Battle of Cape Verde, that time was a last resort. Now the adverse consequences are clearly exposed to the obvious lack of warships, and excellent pilots are short of! The more warships are served, the less pilots are short of!

The US planes returned one after another, believing that the first attack had sunk a German fleet aircraft carrier and two destroyers, and paralyzed a heavy cruiser. Spruins and others were slightly relieved, indicating that the battle situation Kent reported to him just now was accurate. In Spruins's view, the San Jacinto and Unicorn he lost were not large in carrying aircraft carriers, which was equivalent to a fleet aircraft carrier. He did not know that Savoy looked very big, but was actually a fancy airplane, barely considered equal. In addition, the losses of destroyers on both sides were basically close, and he suffered heavy damage from the Hornets. An enemy Hippel-class heavy cruiser was paralyzed, which was a small loss.

But he didn't see Kent, and asked, "Where is Lieutenant Colonel Kent?"

Many people answered that they didn't know, and only one person replied that Kent took some planes to attack another aircraft carrier. They returned early because the attack was completed, so they did not know the specific result.

The clock slowly passed 5 o'clock, and Spruins and Roddick's faces became increasingly ugly: they thought that they might not have enough storage space after losing three aircraft carriers in one breath, but in addition to the sbd in the morning, the loss of the first attack wave was very large, and only more than 40 aircraft were collected one after another. Some pilots reported that the fuel was exhausted during the return journey and forced landing on the sea. He could only send frigates to rescue the plane, but he could not save it. Just keep people.

But even so, the loss is a bit scary.

The total number of aircraft carrying out missions when the entire TF44 formation set off was slightly over, with a total of 264 aircraft. In the morning, 24 SBDs were sent to perform reconnaissance missions and retained 72 fighter jets to air defense, and a total of 168 aircraft were handed over to Kent. In the previous air defense operation, 37 F6f was shot down for various reasons, and 3 were seriously damaged and thrown into the sea, with a total of 40 losses. As usual, he should have 224 aircraft.

But now, except for the 32 F6fs patrolling in the air (having replenished one oil bomb), the 22 SBDs (2 not returning) that had landed and the 37 aircraft that returned in the first attack wave, he actually had no planes. Even if he included the 19 planes that were forced to land on the sea, he only got 110 planes back (actually got 89), which was still 114 away from the standard number.

More than half an hour later, planes returned one after another. When asked, they were going to carry out formation aircraft attacking another aircraft carrier, the total number was pitifully small, with only 3 TBFs and 2 SBDs. Then they reported that 2 F6Fs and 3 SBDs had run out of fuel and landed for emergency landing. As for whether there were other companions, they couldn't say it.

These survivors brought back two news to Spruins: the first was a report on the battle situation, informing the German aircraft carrier and the German battleship that each had ate two torpedoes and suffered severe damage (false alarm); the second was a news from Lieutenant Colonel Kent, and someone witnessed his plane being shot down and had not jumped, and he was probably killed.

Although everyone was very happy about the news that Kent had severely damaged the two main battleships, Spruins was almost broken when he heard that Kent was killed. This was one of the few experienced commanders. Since the Pearl Harbor Incident, more than ten intermediate aviation commanders like Kent had been abandoned with lieutenant colonels and colonels, most of whom were killed and half were captured. He didn't know what to do next.

Night gradually fell, and although Spruins insisted on letting Bunker Mountain turn on the lights to welcome the pilots, everyone knew that it was basically impossible for anyone to come back. By time, their fuel must have been used up. After recalling, the pilots gradually described the situation of the first attack wave. According to their estimates, more than 80 aircraft were lost in the first attack.

Although the battlefield is very complicated and everyone introduces it to each other, everyone is afraid of the fierce anti-aircraft artillery fire of the German Hedgehog-class, believing that "it has never seen such a fierce firepower." Some people are impressed by the firepower and attack power of the do-412 fighter. Spruins is very aware of this. He lost 40 aircraft in the air defense operation and 18 pilots. The German army's losses are only in their early 20s. Of course, the pilots are either killed or captured.

In order to figure out why there was such a huge gap, he specially found two captured German pilots to understand the situation and asked them to report their own achievements.

"Korel, a German Navy captain, shot down points before this battle are 57, and the recipient of the Silver Oak Leaf Knight Cross."

"Wolf, German Navy Lieutenant, shot down points before this battle were 48, and the winner of the Knight Cross."

"Mr. Wolff's Knight Cross does not have silver oak leaves?"

"I don't have it. I'll be eligible to apply only if I get over 50 points. If the results of the battle today are included, it's just enough to apply. It's a pity..."

"Which can you rank in HNA with your record? Can you enter the top ten?"

"I can't get in... I'm about 80."

"I must be outside 100..."

Spruins waved his hand powerlessly and asked them to retreat. There was no need to ask what they said later. The results of these two people combined exceeded the performance of the pilots who died in air defense today. What is the reason?

That night, Spruins sent a long telegram to Washington: "... Today we fought with the German Falkland Island fleet and sank. One aircraft carrier of the Zhongchuang enemy fleet, one aircraft cruiser of the Zhongchuang battlecruiser (Gneisenau), one suspected to destroy a Hippel-class heavy cruiser (Sedlitz), and another 2-3 destroyers; our army's San Jacinto and the Unicorn sank, the Hornets were severely damaged, and the deck and hangar were destroyed, and another 3 destroyers and 1 frigate were lost; our army shot down more than 50 enemy planes, and our side lost more than 170 aircraft for various reasons, the pilot was killed, and 134 missing people (groups)... Our ship will continue to search tomorrow to see if there is a chance to wipe out the enemy fleet."

His telegram was written with caution and did not dare to say that it was "hardly damaged" the Ise, because he believed that even if the pilots hit two torpedoes (actually one), with the basis of the transformation of the Ise battleship, it was probably not fatal. Moreover, the results of the two were obviously doubtful. There were only single-digit torpedo aircraft, and Gneisenau made 2? The Ise scored another 2? The Germans did not have such a good hit rate. He believed that there must be some errors. Before it could be verified, it was just written conservatively, and in fact, this writing was just in line with the actual situation, and it was nothing more than the US side didn't know.

When Washington received a telegram from Spruins, he frowned. From the results of the battle, our side seemed to have a little advantage. Considering that the number and strength ratio was normal, the problem was that after this remittance, the United Nations Association believed that given the current tension in Great Britain, the more important goal of the South Atlantic Squadron was to help Britain stabilize India and to the Pacific to reinforce as soon as possible. I believe that this German squadron could not jump up after suffering a heavy blow, so he clearly asked the TF44 fleet to go to Cape Town to replenish supplies and carry out missions as soon as possible.

Spruenz, who received the telegram, sighed, said nothing, and asked Roddick to execute the order...

a
Chapter completed!