Chapter 810 The End of the Twin Dragons

"Oh my God, they are coming in..."

On the platform outside the bridge of the Akagi aircraft carrier, little Hersman, who served as a liaison officer and observer of the German naval aviation, held a telescope and opened his mouth wide. Because he had discovered that there were only forty or fifty Zero 52 fighters in the air that could still fight. The rest of the Zeros were either shot down in the battle or landed on the aircraft carrier after running out of ammunition.

The P51, F6F and F4U fighting with these dozens of Zero 52s were still more than a hundred (the American planes also lost a lot, and some flew to El Salvador because the fuel was running out). At this time, the northeast sky was once again filled with black spots, just like the dragon knight in the myth, making a buzzing and piercing sound, hanging deadly bombs, and suddenly appeared from the intersection of sea and sky.

The Zero planes in the air battle discovered these new crises, and they abandoned their opponents and rushed towards the groups of American planes regardless of everything. What they wanted was not to shoot down the enemy planes, but to force some of the dive bombers and torpedo bombers to drop their bombs and torpedoes.

However, their desperate attack was not completely successful. Not many SBDs and TBFs were targeted by these Zero aircraft. Instead, many Zero fighters were shot down by the oncoming F6F and F4U.

Little Hessman, who was very familiar with the performance of the Japanese version of the Zero, knew that the Zero aircraft was a good dogfighting aircraft, but not an excellent interceptor. It was most afraid of facing the heavy firepower opponent head-on.

While little Hessman was praying for the Japanese pilots on the shot down Zero fighters, the four (one side) twin-mounted 128mm anti-aircraft guns on the Emperor Friedrich III missile cruiser opened fire first - because of Hessman's request, the German Navy's ships generally focused on anti-aircraft firepower, and the ship-borne heavy anti-aircraft gun system was the 40-type 128mm anti-aircraft gun developed by Rheinmetall in 1937.

However, the development progress of Germany's radio proximity fuze did not meet Hessmann's requirements. Therefore, until the surrender of the British mainland, Germany's 128mm heavy anti-aircraft guns did not use radio proximity fuzes (currently, the radio proximity fuze has been developed and is being organized for production, but it has not yet been equipped to the troops). Therefore, the shells fired by the 128mm anti-aircraft guns of the Emperor Friedrich III today did not pose much threat to the US aircraft group. The only function was to disperse them.

After a fierce but inaccurate explosion of shells, the dense US attack aircraft in the sky had dispersed. The scattered US aircraft began to circle around the Japanese fleet on the water. Among them, the SBD dive bombers descended to an altitude of 3,000-4,000 meters, which was the altitude for launching dive bombing, while the TBF torpedo bombers continued to descend to ultra-low altitude.

At this time, the Japanese ships on the water also erected their 127mm and 100mm caliber heavy anti-aircraft guns and began to fire shells into the air. In the opinion of little Hessman, the 100mm anti-aircraft gun, which was equipped in small numbers, was probably the best anti-aircraft gun in Japan. It had automatic loading, rotation and elevation systems, and a large caliber of 65 times, so it had a very good firing height and range. However, this kind of anti-aircraft gun with excellent performance was not the main force among Japanese shipborne anti-aircraft guns.

There are two types of shipborne anti-aircraft gun systems that are now regarded as the main force. One is the Type 89 40-caliber 127mm gun; the other is the Type 96 25mm machine gun. The Japanese Navy does not have the most common 40mm, 37mm and 20mm anti-aircraft gun systems in the navies of European and American countries.

Among them, the performance of the Type 89 heavy anti-aircraft gun was quite satisfactory, that is, the firing rate was relatively low, and the range and firing height were not very large, but it could still be dealt with. As for the Type 96 25mm machine gun, the performance was not too bad, but it was loaded with a magazine and had a relatively slow firing rate. However, it was enough to drive away torpedo planes.

But little Hessman knew that Japan's shipborne air defense system could not withstand the assault of US aircraft. Because the anti-aircraft gun system of Japanese surface ships includes long-range high-altitude anti-aircraft guns and close-range low-altitude machine guns, but prefers medium-range medium-caliber 40mm or 37mm anti-aircraft gun systems.

Without 40mm or 37mm anti-aircraft guns, Japanese surface ships cannot fight against dive bombers that break through the Zero defense and heavy anti-aircraft gun defense.

Regarding this weakness, the German Navy's observers and consultants stationed in the Japanese Navy have already raised it. The Japanese navy and army actually knew that there was this problem. After the outbreak of the Pacific War, they also seized the Bofors anti-aircraft guns from the British and American troops, and then started the copycat project. However, until the beginning of 1943, the Japanese did not copy the 40mm anti-aircraft gun, let alone install it on the warship.

The problem of not having 40mm anti-aircraft guns did not seem to be very important to the Japanese navy and army leaders, so they did not ask Germany for technical assistance-after all, the so-called assistance comes at a high price.

And this negligence finally led to a big mistake in the Battle of Panama in March 1943.

At 6:10 pm on March 17, 38 SBD dive bombers launched the first assault in the dusk. They roared into the airspace filled with smoke from the explosion of anti-aircraft shells from an altitude of about 3,300 meters. Most of them passed through unscathed, and only two planes were hit by shell fragments and fell.

The 40mm guns (only German ships have), 25mm guns, 20mm guns (only German ships have) and anti-aircraft machine guns of various calibers on all ships on the water immediately began to rain bullets, and a rain of metal bullets suddenly blew over the sea.

However, such a dense rain of bullets only looks scary, and its actual effect is almost zero. At 6:12, 12 SBD dive bombers were divided into two teams and began to launch a high-angle dive attack on the aircraft carrier Hiryu, the flagship of the 2nd Air Force!

"Oops!" Everyone in the bridge of the Akagi trembled. Little Hersman, who was standing on the platform outside the bridge, closed his eyes because he knew that it was impossible for 12 SBDs to drop bombs continuously. All failed. The level of American pilots is not that high.

"Boom boom boom boom..."

Four loud noises were heard in succession. When little Hersman opened his eyes again, thick smoke and fire were already coming from the flagship of the 2nd Air Warfare Commander Rear Admiral Yamaguchi Tawen, the Hiryu!

Four 1,000-pound high-explosive bombs hit this aircraft carrier with a standard displacement of 17,900 tons! One bomb was hit in the forward elevator and the bow flight deck each, and two bombs were hit in the midship flight deck. One of the bombs that hit the midship flight deck successfully penetrated into the hangar and detonated, shattering the pieces stored in the hangar. The backup aircraft also ignited the fuel in the aircraft's fuel tanks (these aircraft were scheduled to fly soon as planned), causing a fire.

"Oh my god, they blew up the Flying Dragon!" Little Hersman was petrified by the scene where the aircraft carrier seemed to be hit by a bomb and burst into flames, and he couldn't help shouting.

Before he could finish his shout, misfortune once again befell the Ssangyong's sister ship, the Soryu. The same 12 SBDs launched a charge despite the rain of bullets fired from 25mm machine guns and various anti-aircraft machine guns. As a result, three 1,000-pound bombs hit the flight deck of the aircraft carrier. One of them landed right near the 11 Zero fighter jets that had just landed and were refueling and refueling, causing a series of explosions and fires.

Less than 2 minutes later, SBDs from two squadrons once again flew over the aircraft carriers Canglong and Feilong, which were almost submerged in fire, and launched the second wave of assault!

This time, the Soryu was hit by five 1,000-pound bombs. One of them penetrated directly near the boiler room and exploded, while the other penetrated into the hangar and exploded. The violent shock and fire caused the aircraft carrier to instantly lose all power. It became a floating fire coffin.

The Feilong also had bad luck. Four bombs landed on the front, middle and rear of the aircraft carrier's flight deck, blasting four large holes. The violent explosion also affected the aircraft carrier's power system, causing the Feilong to lose its Most of the power was lost, and the fire spread throughout the ship.

Witnessing the entire process of two aircraft carriers being destroyed by American dive bombers on the Akagi aircraft carrier, Commander Ozawa and his staff of Japan's First Mobile Fleet were all stunned.

Although they all know that using Japan's national strength to fight against the United States, it is impossible to always seize the initiative in the Pacific. But victory after victory made them think that the day when Japan lost the initiative was still very far away. As a result, this day suddenly appeared in front of everyone!

"Torpedo machine!"

Someone yelled loudly, which immediately woke up Ozawa and others as if they were in a dream. It turns out that 12 TBF torpedo bombers have targeted the aircraft carrier Akagi!

It turned out that the American torpedo planes in the air were originally going to hit Feilong and Soryu, but the Americans found that the two Soryu-class ships had been burned into balls of fire, and they would probably be abandoned by the Japanese. Therefore, the target of the attack became the nearby Akagi, Kaga, and the battleship Kongo that escorted them!

"The Akagi and the Kaga must be saved!" Ozawa Jisaburo almost yelled and gave the order.

Compared with Hiryu and Soryu, the value of Akagi and Kaga, two aircraft carriers modified from battlecruiser and battleship hulls, is much higher. The huge hull with a full load of more than 40,000 tons gives them a lot of room for modification and upgrade, and the flight deck is more than 30 meters longer than the Soryu class. As long as they are willing to invest money in modifications, Akagi and Kaga can become "unsinkable aircraft carriers" like the Taiho class, which will play a huge role in future naval battles.

If the Akagi and Kaga are allowed to follow the footsteps of the "Double Dragon", then Jisaburo Ozawa will undoubtedly be the number one sinner of the Japanese Navy!