Chapter 717 Atlantic Strangulation War (26)
At 17:03, everyone on the fleet breathed a sigh of relief when they saw the U.S. military plane finally disappearing from sight—the plague god was finally sent away.
"Have you intercepted the enemy's telegram?" Crank asked worriedly.
"Intercepted, but unable to decipher."
"Probably he is reporting the position of our military." Ozawa waved his hand and turned around to give the order, "Turn the entire army around, take a course of 345 degrees, and a speed of 20 knots. Let's go to Newfoundland..."
"Report!" A loud voice interrupted the silence in the Joint Chiefs War Room, "The Bermuda reconnaissance plane discovered the enemy fleet..."
"Okay!" Admiral Jin stood up excitedly, quickly took the telegram and glanced at it before passing it to others.
Other staff officers marked the position of the German fleet on the sand table: "At around 17:00 in the evening, the center of the enemy fleet is east-northeast of Bermuda. The specific position is approximately 56 degrees west longitude, 37 degrees 11 minutes north latitude, about 1,000 meters away from Bermuda. Kilometers, 1,600 kilometers away from New York, heading 275 degrees when discovered, speed about 17 knots... confirmed to be the main force of the Axis Fleet, with most of the capital ships present."
"Have you sent out an attack fleet?"
Arnold shook his head: "The sea attack fleet does not have enough range, and the only heavy bombers that can get on top are not fast enough. In addition, our army cannot launch night attacks, so we only strengthened our air defense alert and cannot attack."
Admiral Jin added: "The enemy is not an ordinary person, and the combat range is well controlled. Our army has nothing to do with it at the current distance. However, they can speed up their advance after nightfall and reduce the distance to less than 500 kilometers before dawn tomorrow. At that time, we can take the lead in launching an attack, and our army will need to conduct another reconnaissance to locate it.”
"Where is Admiral Cunningham's fleet?"
"There are still more than 1,400 kilometers away from Bermuda. If they go at full speed, they can reduce the distance to less than 800 kilometers tomorrow morning and launch an attack on the enemy at noon or afternoon tomorrow."
Marshall nodded: "The problem now is very critical - we must withstand the first wave of attacks launched by the enemy in the early morning, and then find their position as soon as possible to launch a counterattack..."
Eisenhower reminded: "We cannot ignore the possibility that the enemy will attack New York or other large cities?"
"Let me think about it." Vice Admiral Jonas Ingram took the staff's pencil and sketched it on the map. He quickly drew a route that approximated the inverse tangent of an arc. "If we do this, the enemy will It can basically remain 1,200 kilometers away from Bermuda and attack the east coast at the same time. It is expected to launch an attack on the east coast in the evening of the 28th or the early morning of the 29th.”
Due to Admiral Ingersoll's incompetence in combat command and his own fatigue, Roosevelt planned to change the general and considered transferring Nimitz back to serve as commander-in-chief of the Anglo-American Atlantic Fleet. The Pacific Fleet was directly replaced by Halsey. General management, now, unlike historical time and space, the Atlantic Ocean is the main direction of operations. The fleet in the Pacific direction has lost its large-scale combat capability after losing all its fleet aircraft carriers, and can only live with two battleships and a bunch of escort aircraft carriers.
Admiral King agreed with this, but he had difficulties in personnel arrangements. In view of the equally important importance of the Pacific direction, and the competition for who dominates the sea and land, MacArthur and Halsey, two hot-tempered people, were very difficult to put together. There might be a direct quarrel, and Marshall also expressed concern about this. For the sake of balance and harmony between sea and land, Roosevelt believed that the Pacific Fleet needed to be equipped with a steady and steady person. Nimitz himself also agreed, hoping to give Halsey more training, and personally recommended Jonas-English. Lieutenant General Gramm and Turner were promoted to lieutenant general, but their qualifications were not as good as Halsey's. Admiral Jin also agreed that Turner still needs to hone his skills. If he has outstanding military exploits - such as taking down Ford For such an attack, we can consider arranging other important positions in the future. In the end, the Joint Chiefs of Staff reached a consensus that personnel adjustments would be made after the battle of the Atlantic was over.
After listening to Ingram's analysis, everyone frowned again, feeling that this matter was too difficult: Although a large number of air defense facilities were set up on the east coast, the president also said not to pay too much attention to air strikes - the American people will have to accept such a scene sooner or later. This is a war, not a play-off between two powerful countries, but everyone still hopes that the east coast will be tested as little as possible.
After thinking for a long time, Arnold replied: "Now the initiative is in the hands of the German fleet. We can only be forced to passively defend. But at least we have the opponent's initial position, and Admiral Cunningham's fleet is also on the way. , I am confident of victory, and hope that the navy will deploy submarines and torpedo boats forward, striving to launch a wave of attacks on the enemy fleet early tomorrow morning..."
This request was indeed a bit difficult, but Admiral Jin readily agreed.
Since the sunrise in Bermuda is about an hour earlier than in Washington, everyone in the Joint Chiefs of Staff decided to stay on site overnight, preparing to fight this battle and waiting for the Germans to come and die.
Time passed by, and the Bermuda Airport had completely entered a white-hot state. After nightfall, all aircraft were ready, the air defense force was fully prepared, and the radar room had additional personnel, waiting attentively for the German attack to begin. Considering that the German army has night air raid capabilities, in order to prevent the aircraft from being destroyed on the ground by the enemy, according to the scheduled plan, the aircraft will remain ready for dispatch at any time to deal with emergencies. Assuming that the German army does not appear before 4 o'clock, the Army Aviation will go first Take off to search for the enemy.
Under such a night, the Axis fleet and the British and American aircraft carrier formations were all running desperately towards their destinations, but the directions were completely opposite and the distance was almost not reduced.
The clock slowly passed 1 o'clock. Taylor, who was sleepless, simply ran to the radar room and studied the enemy situation with professional sergeants, but found nothing except false alarms and blanks.
At 4 o'clock, the roar of propellers broke the tranquility of Bermuda. Heavy bombers took off first, followed by P51 fighters and TBF\SBD and other sea attack aircraft. According to predictions, the enemy fleet should be within 400-600 kilometers of Bermuda at this time. Taylor sent a telegram to Washington: "Our army has not encountered air strikes yet. The planes have taken off one after another and are ready to search for the enemy."
Arnold was also busy commanding large bombers to take off - what if the Germans were so stubborn that they wanted to bomb the east coast?
It was 5 minutes short of 5 o'clock, and it was still dark. Admiral King and Marshall had all gathered in the conference room waiting for news, waiting for the damn Germans to show up.
However, they were destined to be disappointed. One hour passed, two hours passed, and until 8 o'clock when the sun had risen high, there was no sign of the Germans attacking. What was even more puzzling was that the Bermuda aircraft group reported that they had not found the German fleet.
Everyone was asking: Where were the Germans?