Chapter 831 Roosevelt at a Historical Turning Point (Part 2)

Shi Tingsheng frowned and asked: "How much strength does the navy still have now?"

"The British side has two aircraft carriers, the Unicorn and the Hornet, and two George V-class battleships; we have four aircraft carriers here, the Bunker Hill, the Wasp, and the San Jacinto and Franklin (except for San Jacinto, which is Independence class, the rest are Essex class). Among them, Franklin just completed sea trials and joined the fleet in January, but we only have two battleships, and then one heavy cruiser. No, just a few anti-aircraft light cruisers."

"Hiss..." Shi Tingsheng took a breath of air and cried out, "Why do we only have so few troops?"

"This is why Turner had to let the fleet retreat first despite the infamy. Sometimes it is more difficult to live quietly than to die generously." Nimitz said, "The situation will get better in March, and then there will be Tikande The USS Roga (Essex-class) and the USS Wisconsin (Iowa-class) were commissioned; further improvement occurred in May, with the aircraft carriers USS Hancock and USS Bennington (Essex-class), and the USS Missouri (Iowa) -class) will be able to serve. However, a new problem arises - when calculating the strength comparison between the enemy and ourselves, all 2 battleships and 2 armored aircraft carriers of Great Britain were included. Now that this has happened, I guess the British may not necessarily do so. I’m willing to do that.”

Although Smith-Tingson does not understand the navy, he can still do simple arithmetic. The current strength of the Atlantic Fleet is not very full, and the situation will not completely change until June. But if the Royal Navy is neutral or even joins the axis, the U.S. Navy will be able to do so even in June. After getting new warships in March, they still have to be suppressed and beaten by the Axis Fleet, not to mention that there is still an aggressive Japan in the Pacific.

"Assuming this doesn't happen, General Cunningham's response is appropriate. We only need to dispatch part of the fleet to South Africa to complete the mission." Mitchell said with a wry smile, "According to my idea, against having two fleet aircraft carriers , the German fleet with 1 battlecruiser as the core, we deploy 2 Essex class, 1 Independence class, 1 Unicorn and 1 battleship are enough to cope with it, even if the final battle loss is 1:1 In exchange, we should still have two aircraft carriers left, and then we can send the remaining fleet to the Far East to reinforce Halsey."

According to Nimitz's idea: it is not difficult to take care of the British mood. The worst is to give the Ticonderoga, which will be commissioned in March, to the other side. In this way, there will be three aircraft carriers in the North Atlantic direction. The offense is insufficient, but the defense is still very solid. ; and it would be safer to send the fleet south to eat the enemy and then rush to the Far East for reinforcements. But now that Cunningham's incident happened, the entire fleet did not dare to move at all. After excluding the Royal Navy, it is impossible to raise the troops to go south. If we draw too much, the North Atlantic direction will be stretched; if we draw too little, the South Atlantic will not be available.

It is not only the direction of South Africa that is affected, the African campaign being planned by the Joint Chiefs of Staff is also implicated. Considering that there is a British colony in West Africa (Nigeria), and the troops to be used in the landing campaign are the British Army, it is no longer possible to cooperate. In the past, Britain and the United States were close buddies fighting for life and death, and one of them worked hard to deliver supplies and equipment to Britain. , a man worked hard to send warships, troops, technology and workers to the United States. Now everyone says they have lost money, what will they do in the future?

No one said such silly things as "Didn't the President communicate well with Prime Minister Churchill?" If it were just Wallace and not Dewey's subsequent inquiry, maybe this matter would have been dealt with like this. Now it's good that the Independent Commission of Inquiry has Once it was established, and the British and British ships implemented it, it would be difficult for the two countries to return to their original state.

After deliberation for a long time, everyone finally decided that it was not advisable to take risks and to send a few submarines and shore-based aviation forces to intercept.

Originally, the discussion on this topic had come to an end, but Mitchell muttered and added: "Sign a minute, saying that it was jointly discussed and decided by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and it should be written clearly on what reasons, what considerations, what judgments were based on which the decision was made. Decided, if there is another mad dog in Congress in the future that bites us and accuses us of indulging the enemy, even if we are suspended, there will be an explanation, and we will keep a few more copies of the minutes..."

Everyone laughed bitterly, and several school-level officers who attended the meeting were so sad that they almost shed tears - the officers were forced to do this, and they would only be able to win.

On February 7, Congress approved the establishment of an independent investigative committee chaired by Truman. Within the first hour after the resolution was passed, not only were all the recent files and materials of the Joint Chiefs of Staff seized, but all mid-level and low-level military officers who had participated in the previous meetings of the Joint Chiefs of Staff were seized. , even the guards on duty outside were summoned, and the Pentagon, which was originally full, felt empty.

Chairman Truman, who took office, was very energetic at work. Regardless of fatigue, he interrogated the suspects overnight and issued strict instructions: asking them to write down what they were doing during this period, their views on protection fees, and their contacts with the three generals. They recalled whether there was any abnormal decision-making process within the Joint Chiefs of Staff...

The grandeur, intensity, seriousness of his tone, and ferocious attitude stunned everyone. At first, the Republicans happily thought that Roosevelt had made a mistake again. How could he nominate such a fool? Isn't it necessary to push left and right, cover up and get through? The current scene, according to people familiar with the Soviet faction in the Communist Party of China, is comparable to the scene in the Ministry of Internal Affairs when Stalin's father was conducting a great purge - except that there is no torture to extract confessions.

But slowly they realized that something was wrong. Truman was definitely doing it on purpose. He had evil intentions - deliberately arousing the soldiers' resentment and dissatisfaction with the investigative committee. Everyone knows that Truman has been in charge of military auditing, and his work style has long been known to others. It is definitely abnormal to suddenly change like this. Truman's own position was made very clear at the meeting that day - attacking Wallace to shake the morale of the military was treason, and he must be impeached. There is only one explanation for the sudden change in style: someone behind him forced him, who was it? Republicans and Dewey!

As a result, scenes of astonishment emerged one after another: all the officers asked, regardless of their rank, said they did not know, were not clear, and had never heard of the protection fee section. "The officers will still discuss this? Is it you?" Are you crazy?", "Sir, it's so troublesome to betray the country? Why don't we just tell the Japanese the location of the fleet and the deployment of troops?" and other comments are endless.

The funniest thing is that the adjutant who interrogated General Jin asked him what he usually did. He told him clearly when General Jin got up, when he went out, when he saw a doctor, and when he had meals. He only had to answer how many times did General Jin do in a day? It's shit, but when asked about the key points, everyone said "I don't know."

"How could you not know?"

"How could I possibly know?" the adjutant asked, "He is my superior. How can he tell me what meetings he held, what decisions he made, and what was discussed? I am not the president of the United States, so why should he report to me?"

"Where's the document you asked him to sign?"

"No, haven't you all checked the files? I can't remember clearly. It's all in the files."

"You usually say a few words when chatting, right?"

"Don't say it! Don't say a word!" the adjutant said, "How can a person with such a strong sense of confidentiality like the commander say this? Instead, let me exercise more, learn more other skills, and don't become an officer in the future. Let’s avoid being angry with the MPs in the future!”

"You!" This was clearly pointing at the monk and scolding the bald donkey. The congressmen were furious and had no choice.

As time went by, the personnel checked everything. As a result, they all said in unison about the protection fee: "I don't know!", "I don't believe it!", "No way!" Finally, they found some clues about the connection. , a logistics officer reported: "The commander requested to prepare 30 ships, and the goods should be loaded as evenly as possible. Every ship should have every kind of material."

Feeling like they had found a treasure, the investigative committee decided to dig deeper, but after a while they couldn't dig it out.

"The reason for this is easy to guess. The Soviets must have broken it into parts and used a single transport ship to attack the blockade. No one knows which ship will be in trouble. This arrangement is very appropriate. Occasionally, a few ships will be sunk. It will not cause Certain types of supplies are completely lost.”

On February 10, the exhausted committee members approached the Soviet ambassador and military attache in the United States and asked them to talk about protection money.

The ambassador said he was not sure. Usually the military attachés were responsible for contacting people. The military attaché said, "I probably know the 40% figure more clearly."

"Can you please talk about it in detail? We will keep it completely confidential."

"Of course. After the supplies were intercepted in December, we proposed an alternative plan. We suggested that you change the delivery location to the Aleutian Islands, and then we would send crews to transport the supplies back to the country. The ships would not be organized into fleets when they returned home. A single ship will use the cover of night and weather to break in..." the attaché said unhurriedly, "The ratio we said at that time was 40%. It was based on our comprehensive assessment based on the losses on the British-Canada route, and we thought there would probably be this many. No one has tried whether the loss is high or low."

"Then why is it settled in Aleutian? Can't we just transport it directly here and disband the formation?"

"Have you not always been worried about doing this?"

"What are you worried about?"

"If you do this, you are very likely to be sunk by Japanese warships or submarines, and your country is likely to lose a lot of people. And your country values ​​the lives of its citizens the most. I'm afraid that this will make some people find excuses to cut off transportation lines. . In order to dispel your country's concerns, Comrade Stalin ordered Soviet soldiers who were not afraid of death to carry out the last and most dangerous voyage. "Of course the military attache was telling lies with his eyes open, but he had received the highest instructions, and the truth of the incident would not be known even if he died. If you can't reveal even a word, how can you possibly tell the investigation committee?

Now the investigation committee is completely blind: we can't find any evidence here, and the Soviet side completely denies it. We can't ask the Japanese side for proof, right?

Roosevelt was very happy after hearing the news: "Harry really has a way!"

Hopkins whispered a few words in his ear, and he nodded: "The person in Turner's case has also been found. Let Harry go to interrogate him tomorrow. It's time to settle it..."