Chapter 1037: Paper Tiger Shows Its Power

Since the empty weight of the Me264 bomber is much lighter than that of the B-29, the engines used by the two belong to the same level, both are 18-cylinder air-cooled engines with turbochargers. Therefore, the Me264, which has an empty weight of nearly 10 tons, can fly higher and faster than the B-29 after dropping the "Silver Death" jet. Therefore, Commander Genda can witness the battle between the "Silver Death" and the B-29 at an extremely high altitude of 11,500 meters.

Through a 6x military telescope, Genda Minoru clearly saw two "Silver Reapers" forming a two-plane formation. First, they chased behind the US military's B-29 fleet at an altitude of about 10,000 meters and continued to accelerate (the current jets The engine has a problem of slow acceleration). After flying for about 3 minutes, the two "Silver Reapers" had already flown at a speed of about 800 kilometers per hour. It was like two silver falcons flying across the sky and pounced on one of them. The Me264 is also a huge American heavy bomber.

"It's going to be doomed!" Minoru Genda said to himself. According to his experience, the four 20mm cannons of two "Silver Reapers" firing together are enough to kill a Me2264. It is not a sturdy aircraft, and its firepower is not strong. In these two aspects, it is simply not as good as the Japanese's own " "Swallowing Dragon", "Flying Dragon" and "Galaxy", its strengths are flying high and fast, it can avoid anti-aircraft firepower on the ground and water, and it can also be out of reach of enemy fighter jets.

Therefore, after Genda Minoru and most of the Japanese aviation commanders heard that the United States had a B-29 similar to the Me264, they all took it for granted that the B-29, like the Me264, was a thin-skinned and large aircraft.

According to Genda Minoru's estimate (refer to the Me264 for estimation), using 40 "Silver Reapers" to intercept them, it only takes one attack to ensure the downing of 20 American B-29s. If you include the Army's "Jiebi" fighter jets and As for the results of ground anti-aircraft artillery, there is no problem in achieving 40-50 kills in the first battle against B-29s. Even if the Americans dispatch 150 B-29s at a time, they will suffer a damage rate of more than 30%.

This is definitely an unbearable loss for the bombing aviation!

But when the two "Silver Reapers" that passed over the B-29 at high speed opened fire violently, Minoru Genda was shocked.

Two of the four tongues of fire clearly hit the fuselage of the big and stupid-looking B-29, opening several large holes in an instant. But the B-29 seemed to be fine, and continued to fly forward swaggeringly.

"Baga, it didn't come down. It's too strong..." Genda Minoru was so shocked that his jaw almost dropped.

He quickly moved the telescope left and right, trying to see if any other B-29s had been shot down. It turned out that the B-29 fleet in the sky was still stacked in layers and mighty. Although there were two planes dragging black smoke forward, they did not seem to be about to fall.

The attack of 40 "Silver Reapers" just now may have shot down one or two B-29s, and damaged several others. But compared to the huge fleet, that loss is simply insignificant.

Genda Minoru's face turned pale because the "Silver Death"'s interception was over!

Although the "Silver Death"'s high-altitude performance and speed are enough to deal with the B-29. But it is not a real fighter. It has no air combat flaps. The two 20mm cannons have too little ammunition and can only support one round of violent shooting. Moreover, the endurance of the "Silver Death" is very short, only 300 kilometers, which is not enough to support the aircraft in long-term operations. After completing an interception operation, they must fly back to the Singapore base.

After the Japanese Army's Type III "Feiyan" and the Japanese Navy's "Silver Reaper" failed to intercept one after another, the only weapons that can protect the Palembang Oilfield are the Taisho 11-type 75mm anti-aircraft gun and the Type 88 75mm anti-aircraft gun. , Taisho 14-year-old 105mm anti-aircraft guns and Type III 120mm anti-aircraft guns.

Although the army deployed a powerful anti-aircraft division (the 5th anti-aircraft division) around the Palembang oil field, it also deployed more than two hundred 75mm, 105mm and 120mm (including only 36 three-type 120mm anti-aircraft guns).

But as a Japanese naval aviation warfare expert, Genda Minoru certainly knew how poorly medium and large-caliber anti-aircraft guns performed in actual combat. Unless equipped with sufficiently sophisticated fire control radars and radio proximity fuses, these anti-aircraft guns will not pose any threat to targets around 10,000 meters away.

The Palembang Oilfield is going to be hit by a lot of bombs now!

…

On June 5, 1944, at 10:20 am, 133 B-29 Super Fortress bombers had already flown over Palembang. Contrary to the original imagination of the Japanese, these American aircraft with excellent high-altitude performance did not drop bombs from an extremely high altitude of 10,000 meters. Instead, they circled and descended to a medium-high altitude of less than 5,000 meters before starting to drop a series of bombs.

The Japanese anti-aircraft artillery positions had already begun to counterattack. All the anti-aircraft guns were spitting out tongues of fire and shooting countless black smoke balls in the sky. However, the American bombers directly ignored the shrapnel fired by the Japanese anti-aircraft guns and passed through these black smoke balls, dropping strings of bombs and solidified bombs while circling.

Looking out from the cockpit of the "Walberg Mountain" on the Musi River, along the east bank of the Musi River, where oil derricks are lined up, a burst of fiery red light suddenly rolled over. It immediately enveloped large tracts of land, and then there was a thunderous sound, followed by a scorching wave that came through the open windows of the cockpit, and finally a raging fire that burned everywhere.

The fire was so fierce that it spread all at once and set everything on fire. At first it was still burning piece by piece, but in a blink of an eye the fire on the east bank of the Musi River burned into a large area, and there was a "boom boom boom" sound, as if the earth was also screaming because of this sudden sky fire.

Major Knopman, who participated in the First World War, had seen many scenes of artillery bombardment, but he had never seen such a scene that seemed to be a sky fire burning the world. Major Knopman did not think that ordinary explosives could produce such an effect. This was not even a fire caused by an incendiary bomb (actually solidified ***). Could it be that the incendiary bombs dropped by American planes happened to ignite the light oil stored in the Palembang oil field?

Major Knopman thought: The Japanese are too careless...

At this time, a series of bombs fell from the sky with a harsh whistling sound. This time the target of the bombing was the Palembang urban area and refinery west of the Musi River. The so-called Palembang oil field is actually a general term for a series of oil production areas in the upstream and downstream areas along the Musi River near Palembang. The solidified *** just burned by the American bomber was only an oil production area. All the oil produced will be sent to the Palembang refinery and oil storage facilities by pipeline for processing and storage, and finally transported through the Palembang dock.

Therefore, it is more difficult to destroy scattered oil fields, which requires repeated air strikes, while it is very easy to blow up concentrated oil refining and oil storage facilities. Therefore, in the American bombing plan, the refinery, oil storage facilities and an oil production area near Palembang City were the first targets to be destroyed.

The "Mount Walsburg" cargo ship was relatively close to the refinery in Palembang, so the violent explosion of solidified oil immediately gave the crew a feeling of the collapse of the sky and the earth. Moreover, the air waves rushing towards the ship were even hotter, and every crew member exposed to the outside world seemed to be in a furnace, and the hot smoke filled their respiratory tract and lungs, making them breathless.

"Major," the first mate of the Walsberg Mountain shouted at Major Knopman, "We have to leave here... otherwise we will be burned by the damn fire."

Major Knopman suddenly reacted and shouted, "Camera, take the camera... take pictures of the scene outside, they will need these photos."

"Yes, Major!" The second mate of the ship was also an old German navy, but his legs were still quite agile. He responded and ran to get his Leica camera from somewhere.

"Weigh anchor! Let's leave here first." Major Knopman then gave the first mate the order to weigh anchor and leave. His luck was pretty good. The air defense alarm sounded when the boiler was not extinguished just now. So Major Knopman did not give the order to shut down the boiler. Now the freighter can start at any time and drive to the lower reaches of the Musi River to avoid the terrible fire and air raid.

Genda Minoru, commander of the 343rd Air Force of the Japanese Navy, was also witnessing the fire in Palembang at this time. The Me264 he was riding was at an altitude of 7,000 to 8,000 meters near Palembang. Through the canopy on the head of the aircraft, he could clearly see the fire below and the scene of American aircraft fearlessly passing through the smoke from the anti-aircraft guns.

Obviously, everyone underestimated the power of B-29... No, it should be underestimated the strength of the United States!

This opponent is only at the same level as the European Community, and compared with the strength of Japan, it is completely different.

Before, Japan was exhausted by using submarines, mines and commerce raiders (including aircraft carriers). Now there is the tough guy B-29. Can Japan still fight like this?

It seems that it is better to stop while it is ahead, make peace with the United States, and then sit back and watch the fight between the United States and Europe...