Chapter 439 Melee

Amid a roar, Colonel Bennett set off with his flying squadron.

The British Air Force lost more than 100 fighter planes in the last naval battle, which can be said to be their heaviest loss since the start of the North African campaign.

Originally, because of this heavy casualties, the British Air Force had to keep a low profile over North Africa for a while... Germany transferred the battlefield and the main force of the air force to the Soviet battlefield, which was definitely a good thing for Britain.

Therefore, Colonel Bennett believed that Churchill's strategy was correct, that is, to let Hitler and Stalin fight more, so that Britain would have a chance to breathe.

It is precisely because of this that the British Air Force was able to urgently transfer two air wings from the UK to North Africa for reinforcement, so that the British Air Force continued to have five air wings and more than 400 fighter planes of various types in North Africa.

Among them, there are two air wings on the island of Malta, which is mainly aimed at the 24th Air Wing originally deployed by the German army in Sicily... Two air wings against one German air wing, which is enough for the British army to maintain air superiority.

The other three air wings were deployed in North Africa, targeting the German 27th Air Wing in Tunisia and the bombing and operations against the German Gabes Line.

In fact, Bennett thought this was completely unnecessary. The British only needed three air wings plus the US air wing, and the cooperation of two aircraft carriers was enough to suppress the German air force in North Africa and gain air superiority.

In other words, Britain did not need to transfer air wings from the UK, as long as it maintained such combat effectiveness.

But Britain still did it... After traveling thousands of miles and working hard, it still transferred two air wings when the Germans had already blocked the Strait of Gibraltar, but in fact, it did not perform much in the Battle of Sicily.

The reason is that the British army does not want to be outdone by the huge air force of the United States.

But does Britain still have the power to compete with the United States?

Bennett didn't know. Bennett only knew that he hoped to end the war as soon as possible and go home to reunite with his family.

"091, 091... Received, please reply!" The call from the command center came from the communication equipment.

"I'm 091, please reply!"

"Report your position!"

"Uh..." Bennett adjusted the shape of the fighter and looked out of the cabin. Not far ahead, a group of warships and transport ships appeared vaguely.

"We are flying over the fleet!" Bennett replied, "We will arrive in Syracuse soon!"

"Very good!" The headquarters replied, "It will be light soon, get ready for battle!"

Bennett responded, and then gave orders to his subordinates: "Get ready for battle!"

A bright light suddenly lit up from the east. The sun rose from the sea level in the east, and the ground seemed to be bright in an instant. Warships and transport ships on the sea were bathed in the sun and rose and fell with the waves. Bennett saw several British soldiers on the deck waving to them, and on the other side of Syracuse, there were bursts of gunfire and explosions.

Then, Bennett heard his subordinates shouting excitedly: "It's time to perform, let's show the Germans!"

"Yeah!" The British pilots responded with cheers.

However, at this moment, a plane suddenly dived down from the clouds, followed by a burst of "da da da" strafing, and two fighters fell to the sea with black smoke.

"Yellow 14" Bennett couldn't help but screamed loudly when he saw the number of the fighter: "Damn, how could he appear here?"

Bennett was so surprised for a reason. "Yellow 14" was the plane of the German ace pilot Marseille. He belonged to the 27th Air Wing of Germany and should be in Tunisia at this time. Tunisia is at least 350 kilometers away from here. The BF109 with a maximum range of only 700 kilometers is impossible to appear here.

Then Bennett felt that things were not going well. If "Yellow 14" appeared here, then the German 27th Air Wing...

Just thinking about it, a series of fighter planes with black cross marks on their wings appeared in the clouds. They dived down at high speed with a piercing whistle, and at the same time fired rows of bullets with blue smoke from the wings. Wherever the bullets passed, wounded British fighter planes withdrew from the formation.

"Damn, Germans!" Bennett pulled up the nose of the plane to fight and shouted: "We are ambushed, fight freely!"

When Bennett's fighter plane passed through the clouds, he found that the enemy's fighter planes were much more than he thought... because he saw the Italian "Machine" fighter planes and BR.20 bombers.

Montgomery, who was commanding the operation at the Malta Island Command, jumped up from his chair as if he was pricked by a needle when he received the news that his fleet was ambushed by the German fleet and it was very likely the German 27th Air Wing.

Montgomery soon realized that the Germans secretly transferred the fighter planes in Tunisia to Sicily.

Montgomery guessed correctly. When the Germans launched a counterattack, the 27th Air Wing in Tunisia set off... The counterattack launched by the Germans focused all the attention of the British army on Sicily.

Moreover, in order not to attract the attention of the British army, the 27th Air Wing also made a big circle on the sea: from Tunisia to Sardinia, and then from Sardinia to southern Italy.

The reason for flying to southern Italy instead of Sicily was that most of the airports in Sicily were bombed to pieces by the Allies, and the large-scale landing of fighter planes was likely to be discovered by the enemy and bombed again.

As a result, the German army deployed two air wings in Italy, and together with the two Italian air wings, its strength even exceeded the two British air wings deployed in Malta.

After thinking about it, Montgomery asked: "Why did they choose to intercept the fleet?"

De Gangan replied: "This may be just a coincidence! Maybe they hope to get there before we attack the German Armored Division..."

"No!" Montgomery shook his head: "They can wait until we launch an attack on the German armored divisions. They do this because... the navy is also their target!"

Montgomery was right, because at this time, a melee was taking place over the Syracuse fleet: various types of fighters and bombers from Germany, Britain, and Italy were mixed together, making it dazzling.

Of course, the fleet was also prepared for air defense, but they found that their anti-aircraft machine guns and anti-aircraft guns didn't know where to shoot... because they couldn't tell which of the fighters in the air were theirs and which were the enemy's, Stuka, Spitfire , Hurricane, BR, March...

"God!" Lieutenant General Tovey, the commander of the British Navy, couldn't help but screamed: "We are simply helpless and can only watch the bombers dive towards us!"