1825 My New Daming

Chapter 442 Deja vu scene (seeking subscription, monthly ticket)
"Yes, the airship reports at least a dozen old battleships, a large cruiser, a Warrior-class cruiser, and three Escort-class destroyers in Kwajalein, as well as some torpedo boats and gunboats."

"Twelve old-fashioned battleships? These are big fish!" George Elliot raised his eyebrows. Old-fashioned battleships are also battleships!Since the Battle of the Jiyi Waterway a few years ago, the British Empire has suffered losses again and again in the previous conflicts with the Ming Empire, and has never really fought cheaply.As a result, Ming's confidence is getting stronger and stronger, and the people of Ming who didn't support world wars are now supporting their country to fight.On the other hand, the morale of the people on the British side is getting lower and lower. Now it seems that a decisive sea battle is about to be fought, but the morale of the troops is still very low.

The night battle on Guadalcanal Island a few days ago had a further blow to morale. Although General William Baga had ordered the news to be blocked, the news of the defeated battle was still spread on various warships.

If the fleet can fight a turnaround in Kwajalein Atoll and sink ten or eight battleships under such circumstances, the morale of the army will immediately rise!

In addition, the old battleship also has the advantages of being old.Older battleships have relatively weak air defenses and slow speeds, and pigeon planes are good enough to deal with them.

Thinking of this, George Elliot asked again: "Did you find Ming's aircraft-carrying battleship? How many planes are there on the airport in Kwajalein Atoll?"

"There is no aircraft carrier of Ming Dynasty, and there are only a few planes on the airport in Kwajalein Atoll, and they are still seaplanes."

George Elliot took a breath and finally made up his mind, so he turned to the aviation staff: "Is the carrier aircraft ready?"

"Okay, in the first wave of 72 pigeon planes, 36 of them are equipped with a 100-pound high-explosive bomb, and 36 are equipped with a 100-pound armor-piercing bomb." The aviation staff officer of the fleet paused and thought for a while, " Do you want to change all of them to armor-piercing bullets?"

The D Fleet of the British Australian Fleet commanded by George Elliot is now the vanguard of the entire Royal Navy Australian Fleet, concentrating [-] of the [-] aircraft-carrying armored cruisers under the Australian Grand Fleet.And the task William Baga gave him was to "blow up, blow up, blow up". He would blow up whatever was caught in the Kwajalein Atoll!Various facilities on Kwajalein Atoll, the Ming Navy Fleet moored in the lagoon, and the Ming Navy Fleet who came to aid.Whatever comes, blow it up!Fry until it can't be fried, can't be fried, and can't be fried.

Wait until Fleet D is blown up. Or let someone blow it up!William Baga will command two fleets A and C that have merged the four cruiser squadrons of BEGH (of which only a few destroyers are left in squadron B) and all or part of the warships of squadron D (including [-] aircraft-mounted cruisers) Rush forward to fight the decisive battle.

"No need," George Elliot looked at his watch, and then scanned the excited eyes from inside the bridge, "There's no need to waste time, just blow it up once more and you'll remember everything. Airplanes carrying high-explosive bombs should destroy airports first! Aircraft carrying armor-piercing bombs should attack large enemy surface ships first! Tell the pilots below that the British Empire needs every one of them to do their jobs!"

"Yes!"

Amidst the shouting, the bows of the six aircraft-carrying armored cruisers shuttled in the wind, and the howling wind on the deck blew the skin on the wide wings of the pigeon aircraft, which looked somewhat similar to the wings of a flying bird, and slapped it. ring.

As the flight commander waved the flag, a pigeon plane at the end of the flight deck had already turned its in-line engine to the maximum, and the sear holding the plane was released suddenly, and the pigeon plane roared towards After reaching the end of the deck, he "thumped" a few times and jumped up, breaking away from the gravity discovered by King Zhuge Wuzhong.
As the "war pigeons" soared into the sky, in less than [-] minutes, [-] pigeon planes had left the deck, and the flight deck, which was as crowded as the busiest subway in London just now, suddenly became a little empty ——Half of the planes were missing, and the remaining half belonged to the second assault wave. Originally, they folded their wings and huddled on the aircraft decks at the stern of those aircraft carriers.

Now that the first attack wave has taken off, they can finally be pushed out to load the bombs and then fly out to bomb Kwajalein as well.

Due to the short range of the pigeon aircraft, the combat radius is less than [-] kilometers when the fuel is full and the ammunition is full. They are basically deck defenders, so one of their attack waves can only go back and forth, so it is reserved for the second assault wave. The time is not long.The ground crew on the deck must seize the time to push out the second wave of planes, hang up the bombs and fill up the fuel, and then must rush to send out the second assault wave before the first wave of planes comes back.Otherwise, the first wave of pigeon machines would not be able to land.

There is no time to lose!

Because there is no delay for a moment, the ground crews on the deck come as soon as possible. In the design of the armored cruiser with aircraft these days, the speed of deck operations has also been fully considered.Therefore, the ammunition depot and the fuel depot of the aircraft are directly installed in the deck superstructure on the side.And sometimes, for the convenience of operation, the deck staff will pull the bomb out of the warehouse and place it under the deck building
And the scene of George Elliot's D fleet "releasing pigeons", of course, could not be hidden from the seaplanes and airships of the Ming Naval Air Force hovering over Kwajalein Atoll. Because the range of the "pigeon plane" is too short, D fleet can only fly Only when you go to the edge of Kwajalein Atoll can you "release pigeons".If there is a hilltop of tens of hundreds of meters on Kwajalein Atoll, you can see the aircraft-carrying armored cruiser on the sea directly from the mountain with a telescope.

Therefore, the news of the British fleet's "dove release" was sent by telegram to the flagship "Nanjing" of the Pacific Fleet that had just left Pearl Harbor.

The standard displacement is [-] tons, and the full-load displacement is [-] tons. It is equipped with a [-]-horsepower fuel-steam turbine power system, and its maximum speed can reach [-] knots. It also has the world's most advanced and powerful long-wave and short-wave radio stations. The "Nanjing" is actually a headquarters that can move on the sea plus a hotel at sea. It will definitely allow the personnel of the headquarters, including Zhuge Weidao, to have a pleasant "journey".

While Zhuge Weidao was leaning on the railing to watch the sea view, Zhuge Yangyang, Chief of Staff of the Pacific Fleet, who was of the same clan as him and about the same age, but a generation younger, came forward with the telegram he had just received.

"Junmen, the British aircraft carrier has arrived near Kwajalein Atoll. There are [-] ships in total, all of which are aircraft-carrying armored cruisers. They are currently launching carrier-based aircraft and preparing to bomb Kwajalein Atoll!"

"Where is our aircraft carrier?" Zhuge Weidao immediately turned around, and while walking towards the combat command center of the "Nanjing", he asked Zhuge Yangyang, "How far is it to Kwajalein Atoll?"

"There are still nearly 300 kilometers!" Zhuge Yangyang said, "It's a bit out of reach! And there are only two Shu Zhongwang airborne aircraft in the second battleship team. The battlecruisers can only carry less than [-] ships in total, which is a little less."

(End of this chapter)