New World War II Eagle Strikes the Sky

Facing General Collins' question, Ron replied: "General, in this attack of ours, the cooperation of ground and air forces is the most important. Especially close-range direct fire support like this. A little carelessness , there may be the phenomenon of accidental injury. And the different weapons used by our attack aircraft have different safe distances. The ground troops must understand the safe distances of these weapons. And because of the smoke on the ground and the camouflage of the enemy It is difficult for us to see the target clearly in the air. Therefore, we need ground troops to use obvious methods, such as bright lights or smoke to indicate the target for us. Our wing will send ground liaison instructions to your front-line assault troops personnel. They will be in charge of direct communication with the attacking aircraft and designate the target for the attacking aircraft. In order to avoid fratricide, the attacking aircraft will only attack after receiving instructions from the ground contact and instruction personnel. We hope to adopt this method It can more effectively improve the efficiency of the attack."

"That's a good idea," General Collins said. "We'll protect the liaisons. But they'll have to obey the command of the ground forces too. You know, you're asking them to go to the front line, and the Germans there Not vegetarian. Also, how many trained ground liaisons do you have now?"

"We now have 24 trained liaison officers. Two of them form a team, one is responsible for indicating the target, and the other is responsible for the air contact." Ron replied.

"When will they come to us, Ron, you should bring them here directly. This way we will have a little more time to run in with them."

"General, I've brought them here, including their equipment. It's in a truck just now."

"Very good, Pasha, you go and make arrangements. Assign them in groups to the company that will take on the attack mission tomorrow."

……

All night, naval artillery fired on the fortifications on the outskirts of Cherbourg.However, their firepower is not intensive, and it seems that they are only interfering with their opponents.It was not until more than 4 o'clock in the morning that the navy stopped such low-intensity, long-duration shelling.With the pause of shelling, the world immediately quieted down.It was as if everything had fallen asleep at this moment.Neither the birds nor the grass and insects made a sound, only the gentle rushing sound of the waves gently stroking the black basalt cliffs could be heard from the distant beach.

However, everyone knows that this is only a temporary tranquility before the war.As the sun rises, the artillery fire from both sides of the United States and Germany will once again tear this tranquility to pieces.

The sun rises early in June, just after 6:4, the sun rises from the east, and sprinkles the reddish light all over the earth.At this time, there was still a thick layer of bluish-white sea fog on the ground.If you stand on a small hill nearby, you will see the bluish-white mist under your feet as the sun rises higher and higher, and the color begins to change constantly, from bluish-white to crimson, and then into a cloud of mist again. It was red, like a rainbow falling on the ground.

At 08:30, the fog began to dissipate gradually, revealing the blue sky.At this moment, the heavy engine sound of a heavy bomber came from the blue sky.

That was a full 8 B-500 Sky Fortress bombers of the 17th Air Force.They lined up in a neat formation and flew towards Cherbourg.In previous battles, many of Cherbourg's large-caliber anti-aircraft guns were destroyed by air strikes.So now, Cherbourg's anti-air firepower has become very sparse, and the threat to the bomber fleet is even smaller, so these bombers now dare to drop bombs in dense formation at an altitude of about 2500 meters.

Numerous bombs were dropped from the bombers in clusters.Immediately, the earth shook.Even in the trenches about three to four thousand meters away from the bombing area, Ron could feel the shaking of the ground.And General Collins, who was keeping his eyes on the high-powered binoculars mounted on a tripod, also took his eyes away from the binoculars.He smiled and said, "The shock was so great that I couldn't see anything through the telescope."

When the multiple of the telescope is high, any slight shaking will cause the scene in the field of view to jump violently, making observation difficult.Generally speaking, any telescope with a magnification of more than 10 times is difficult to use by hand, and a telescope with a magnification of more than 15 times must be equipped with a tripod.Therefore, the magnification of the telescopes carried by general officers is only 7-8 times. For example, a friend once gave Ron a Zeiss military telescope captured from the Germans, and its magnification is only 8 times.

After the bombers dropped their bombs, they began to climb slowly and go away.When the figure of the bomber gradually faded away.The navy's naval guns, which had been silent for several hours, roared again.This time, the naval shelling was completely different from the harassing shelling last night.Last night, the navy only used two destroyers, using the 127mm guns on them, to fire some shells intermittently at the fortification area outside Cherbourg Port at a low rate of fire.At this time, the entire fleet, 3 battleships, 4 cruisers, and 11 destroyers were all mobilized. They formed formation outside the port of Cherbourg and were ready for bombardment.The fleet's own calibration aircraft had already taken off, and it was now hovering over the target area, outside the killing range of the German anti-aircraft firepower.

Each warship fired one or two shells towards its target.This is test firing to determine the point of impact.Calibration planes would watch where they hit and report back to the fleet. Three minutes later, the fleet fired another round of shells based on the information given by the calibrating plane.Then they stopped again to wait for news of the calibration plane.

Perhaps this time their shooting was quite accurate, so after 2 minutes, these large and small naval guns began to enter the effective shooting.

The firing of naval guns is really a shocking thing, especially those tall battleships.Each shot from their 16-inch guns was capable of smashing a one-ton shell on the German lines.Almost every shell hit the ground, shaking the ground violently.

However, the frequency of battleship fire is not high.The barrel life of battleship guns is very short. Even if they use high-explosive shells with lower chamber pressure and less ablation of the barrel than armor-piercing shells, their lifespan is only a few hundred rounds.And the cost of this body tube is very expensive.Therefore, the issue of saving must be considered when using it.In addition, it is not a duel between battleships now, and it is necessary to use the maximum speed to fire more shells to overwhelm the opponent.Of course, they can slow down their shooting speed. Every time they fire a round of shells, they wait quietly for new data from the calibration plane before making corrected shots.And such a low rate of fire can also reduce the loss of the barrel.

不过战列舰上的那些152毫米口径的副炮和巡洋舰上的203毫米口径或是152毫米口径的主炮就没这个顾虑了。所以他们们全都在以最大的射速喷吐着火焰。尤其是那些152毫米，它们因为超高的射速，甚至获得了6英寸机关枪的美名。

Of course, the 127mm guns of destroyers cannot compare with the 16-inch, 8-inch or 6-inch guns of battleship cruisers in terms of power, but the 127mm guns have a higher rate of fire, and when fired at full firepower, the effect is also good. very good.

After 10 minutes of rapid fire, the fleet's artillery slowed down.The burst rate of naval guns is much faster than that of the army's artillery of the same caliber.However, affected by the same body conditions, their final sustained rate of fire will not be much faster than those of the Army.

However, the decline in the rate of fire of naval guns does not mean that the density of US artillery fire has decreased.Because the artillery belonging to the Seventh Army also joined the organ concert.The 203mm, 155mm, 105mm, and even 76mm guns under the Seventh Army are all spraying flames towards the enemy's positions.

"Under such bombardment, are there any living people on the other side?" Looking at the other side, Ron couldn't help saying this.

"There must be! And there are quite a few!" said General Collins. "When I was in the Pacific, I used to think like you when I saw naval guns firing heavily on enemy positions. But once you start landing, those The damn guy will come out of the ground like a bunch of unkillable rats and shoot at you."

"Well," Ron nodded, and said, "Actually, I know this too, because I was bombarded by Japanese battleships in Guadalcanal. The shelling alone cannot solve the problem. But even though I know this , but seeing such firepower, I still can't help wondering if there are any living people over there."

"We'll see it soon, look, the naval bombardment is over, now it's our turn to attack!"

At this time, the naval bombardment had gradually stopped. Except for the 406mm cannon of the battleship, which was still firing at the core positions of the Germans, the other artillery had stopped firing.When the navy is shooting from the opposite shore, due to communication problems, it is difficult to keep the landing point of the shells about 100 meters in front of the charging soldiers like the army's own artillery. Therefore, when the army is about to launch an attack, the navy's artillery fire It is necessary to stop, so as not to accidentally injure the army comrades.As for the 406 mm guns of the battleships, since they are now hitting targets far from where the land forces are now going to hit, they can continue to fire.Once the soldiers of the army approached this area, they would stop immediately.

"Look! Our attack has already begun." General Collins stretched out his right hand, pointing forward.

Led by nearly a hundred m-4 tanks, soldiers of the Seventh Army of the U.S. Army are attacking Cherbourg from several directions.Through the captured German Zeiss 8x binoculars, Ron saw, just behind an M-4 tank, a soldier with a Springfield rifle loaded with a grenade and another carrying a heavy On the radio station, the soldier with an m1 carbine in his hand was following the tank closely-that was the liaison team he sent.