1855 United States Tycoon

Chapter 617

To be honest, the efficiency of airship air strikes is not high, at least on the premise of using conventional bombs, its efficiency is very problematic. The speed of the airship is limited. It takes more than ten hours to fly for a single operation. Even with the use of Dali pills, the pilot cannot insist on flying for more than ten hours. Therefore, many positions must be accompanied by deputy positions. Take turns to rest. Moreover, the flight preparation of the airship and the maintenance after the mission are quite time-consuming and costly. More importantly, the airship itself is very expensive.

The Zeppelin airship, which is more than 100 meters long, needs a lot of aluminum, and the hydrogen to hold it is not cheap. However, the number of bombs it can carry is quite limited, and the British have begun to deploy some urgent anti-aircraft guns and anti-aircraft machine guns in various cities (in fact, they are modified from ordinary cannons and machine guns). The threat of these anti-aircraft firepower airships is actually very limited. The rate of fire of the anti-aircraft guns is too low, and the shooting height is also very limited. As for the anti-aircraft machine gun, the effective shooting height is not even one kilometer. As long as the airships fly a little higher, they can ignore them. However, their existence also makes the airships have to fly higher, and this means a decrease in the amount of bombs and a decrease in bombing accuracy. It also reduces the loss that one action can bring to the British.

However, the Germans still insist on sending a few airships to British cities every day as long as the weather is good, throwing bombs indiscriminately. Although according to calculations, the same number of Reichsmarks used on airships to kill people is far less efficient than cannons. That is to say, if the Germans abandon these airships, the money for producing them and sustaining their bombing operations will be replaced by cannons. There will be more enemies killed, but the Germans feel that the account cannot be calculated like that. Because of the German airship attack, the British were also forced to invest more resources in domestic air defense, and this investment is more than the Germans in the airship. If the Germans gave up the airship attack, the British could completely change the anti-aircraft guns deployed in various cities back into cannons, and then send them to the front lines of France to kill more Germans.

This is like in another time and space of World War II. The strategic bombing of Germany by the United States and Britain reached its peak in 43-44, but during the same two years, German military production also reached its peak, so that many people, because of this, Doubts about the effects of strategic bombing. But if you consider that, in order to counter the strategic bombing by the United States and Britain, the Germans had to use the main aviation force for domestic defense, and not for key battlefields. Considering that a large part of the large-caliber artillery produced by the Germans must be The price is high, and the production of anti-aircraft guns that consume more resources and time than ordinary artillery, and these things also have to be left behind instead of being put on the front line. The significance of strategic bombing is definitely not to be underestimated. For example, the number of large-caliber artillery produced by Germany in 43-44 was one-third more than that of the Soviet Union, and the number of large-caliber artillery shells produced far exceeded that of the Soviet Union. However, on the battlefield on the Eastern Front, the Soviets had It has an almost overwhelming advantage in artillery firepower, because a very large part of the large-caliber artillery produced by the Germans are anti-aircraft guns, and they have to stay behind to protect the city.

The same is true in Britain today. Just to defend London, the British had to deploy hundreds of anti-aircraft guns in London. Therefore, although the airship bombing alone is indeed very inefficient, it allows the British to do less efficient things, which is worth doing.

…

Even in a world war, mercenaries can find a place. For example, the United Kingdom has ordered a large number of Sea Breeze fighters from North American Airlines, but the British immediately discovered that they lacked sufficient pilots. Before the war, the British didn’t spend much time on airplanes. In fact, after MacDonald, everyone paid very little attention to airplanes. Therefore, there are not many well-trained pilots in the UK.

At first, the British planned to select some volunteers to try out temporarily. The final result showed that letting those guys fly the plane directly was a murder. Although the dual-wing Sea Breeze fighter has very good maneuverability, its low-speed performance is also excellent, and the take-off and landing are also quite simple. A football field is enough, while in the UK, there are more football fields. However, this thing is an airplane after all, and it is not something newbies can use casually. So the British had to buy a batch of two-seater trainers over North American Airlines, and hired a group of pilots from Blackwater to perform air defense and training new pilots.

Bellman is such a mercenary pilot. According to their contract with the British, in addition to a fixed salary, if he can shoot down a German airship, the British will pay him a full one hundred pounds, and it will be paid directly in gold. This is not a small amount of money, so now Bellman is looking forward to the Germans to come and send money almost every day.

However, the sky is not what people want, and the weather in these few days is not so good, so the Germans have not come. After the weather improved the day before yesterday, the observation post arranged by the British on the shore of the English Channel also found the incoming German airship. However, these damn Germans did not come to London, but went to Birmingham. The British had not had time to deploy fighter jets in Birmingham, where there were not even many anti-aircraft machine guns. Therefore, the hundred pounds still failed to fall into Bellman’s hands.

But Bellman was not discouraged. He knew that even from political considerations, the Germans came back to bomb London. All he needs is to wait quietly.

At this time, the electric bell in the lounge rang suddenly and violently. Bellman hurriedly jumped up from the sofa, put the half-drinking black tea man on the coffee table, grabbed the flight suit, and ran towards the plane while putting it on.

At this time, the mechanic had already transferred the plane and climbed into the cockpit. Bellman put on the helmet and pulled down the goggles to protect his eyes. At that time, the planes were all open-tops. Without this, the wind would blow. I can’t open my eyes.

The propeller turned faster and faster, Bellman glanced at the tachometer, released the brakes, and the plane began to taxi on the runway for a while and then flew into the sky. And behind him, several more planes took off one after another.

There are no radio stations on airplanes of this era, so naturally there will be no navigation services from radio. And the less there is radio guidance such as “the target is in your direction at 11 o’clock, the height is about 20,000 feet…”, the search for the target is entirely up to the pilots to find the target.

Fortunately, the Zeppelin is a very, very easy target to find, because it is not only large enough, but also colorful. The Germans painted it a shiny silver white, as if they were afraid that others would not see it. To it. The Germans are indeed thinking this way. In their view, a major function of the Zeppelin is to attack the morale of the British, so the more conspicuous the better, anyway, the British have no weapons that can really threaten it.

So it didn’t take long for Bellman to see a group of things shining in the sun ahead. There is no doubt that it must be the German Zeppelin. So he shook the wing, motioned other planes to follow him, and then flew over there.

Soon, those shining dots became bigger and bigger, and Bellman could see clearly now that those cigar-like things floating in the air, what else can they be without a Zeppelin? Bellman counted, there were eight airships. He knew that there were two “airborne torpedoes” hanging under the wings of own, and only one hit would be enough to destroy this huge creature. Generally speaking, in order to increase the hit rate, a salvo should be used to launch an attack. But Bellman dreams of getting more Zeppelin airships, because every airship is a bonus. So he planned to launch one by one, striving to get another airship down.

At this time, the pilots on the Zeppelin had already seen these small flies, but they did not panic. First of all, they saw a lot of flying things. In this era, aircraft have indeed begun to be used for military missions, but this military mission is only limited to the detection and transportation of certain special items, and no one has used this thing for combat. At this time, on the front line, sometimes, when the planes of the two sides meet, the pilots will wave and say hello to each other. Anyway, everyone’s planes are not armed, and they can’t do anything to each other. So after seeing this group of small flies, the Germans did not rush to drop the bombs like later generations of bombers when they were intercepted by fighter jets, and then frantically performed various evasive actions. Of course, a fat airship can’t actually do any dodge actions.

Bellman launched an attack from the head-on direction. Although the airship had the largest side area, it was in motion when the airship was in motion. If the airship was attacked from the side, the advance amount was not easy to calculate. Therefore, Bellman chose the head-on attack method.

The distance between the two sides was getting closer and closer. At this time, the Germans began to panic. In their opinion, the British plane seemed to be about to collide head-on. If the British were really willing to initiate such a suicide collision, Zeppelin Although it is big, it can’t stand it. But it’s useless for the Germans to worry, because the airship is so awkward that you can’t hide it even if you want to.

At a distance of about 400 meters, Bellman fired the first “airborne torpedo”. Zeppelin was so big, and it was almost impossible to miss a hit at such a distance. As the “airborne torpedo” under the right wing was launched, the wing immediately sank to the left, and Bellman also pulled the lever to make a sharp turn to avoid the oncoming airship.

That “airborne torpedo” hit the first airship exactly as Bellman expected. It first exploded a large fireball on the hard shell of the airship, and then about a second later, the entire airship Explosions began to occur continuously-that was the consequence of the hydrogen gas bag being torn apart by the explosion and the hydrogen being ignited. In the blink of an eye, perhaps less than two seconds, that beautiful airship has become a torch, perhaps more like a meteor, if you consider that it is falling straight toward the ground. But Bellman doesn’t have time to look at this now. The friends following him have also started firing at other targets. He must move faster, or else, just leave one more “airborne torpedo.” It’s going to become meaningless.