Iron Cross

Of course Hoffman was unhappy, but since the Hipper was not there, it was acceptable for the enemy to sink a destroyer in a 4V2 situation. He couldn't afford to lose anything - the opponent was the world-renowned Royal Navy.

The battlefield situation changed dramatically, and the German army regained the upper hand in terms of strength. Hipper appeared with Z16 and began to sprint to pursue the British army. The Hipper had a top speed of 33.5 knots, and the distance between it and the British destroyers did not widen. On the contrary, the British troops adjusted their course and turned, and the distance between them became closer. The 203mm main gun continued to fire, but due to the long stay in the Alta Fjord, the gunnery skills of the German sailors had greatly declined, and the dispersion was too large - this problem already existed in the gun battle between Z6 and Z16 just now. It is not difficult to solve it. You will find the feeling after playing a few more rounds. What is wrong with Z6 is that it was beaten before it could find the feeling.

If it were any other time, Sherbrooke and his five destroyers would have dared to have a head-on fight with the Hipper, but he had just received the news that the cruiser formation commanded by Major General Burnett was more than 30 nautical miles northwest and was on the way. Arriving at a relatively high speed of 26 knots, the Major General asked him to bring the Hipper over to try to solve this scourge in the Barents Sea. So he immediately had an idea. While commanding the formation to retreat to the sea area where his cruiser was located, he carefully estimated the speed of the Hipper formation and set the retreat speed at 33 knots so that the opponent could feel that the distance was closing, but at the same time Can't catch up again.

The distance between the two is now 19,000 meters. He plans to risk it and move it to about 16,000 meters. At this distance, he believes that the Germans cannot hit him. The only purpose is to draw the Hipper towards the guns of the three cruisers on his side. , just like how you just solved Z6, use superior troops to eat him.

The Germans took the bait without hesitation.

But just then, he heard a scalp-numbing buzzing sound and looked up to see a large number of planes flying in from the southern sky.

"Damn it, German planes!" he cursed, and then immediately asked the ships to release smoke screens to disrupt the enemy planes' sight.

He has carried out escort missions on the Arctic route many times and has some experience in aerial bombing. He knows that the German Stukas cannot reach the waters around Bear Island due to their range, and the Ju-88 bombers can only bomb horizontally, and their accuracy is very poor. Although it is a bit of a threat, But as long as he was flexible, he believed that the Germans would not be able to hit him.

Hipper and Z16 in the distance saw their own aircraft coming to support and immediately cheered. Hartmann smashed his fist on the wall of the command tower and said viciously: "Escape! Let's see where you escape to!"

"Isn't that right? Why is this bomber flying so fast?" Sherbrooke temporarily gave up the command of the formation to the chief of staff. He only used his binoculars to observe the enemy planes, and found that these planes were not the Ju planes he was familiar with. The -88 is not a more traditional Stuka, but a new aircraft that has never been seen before, and there is another new aircraft escort next to it - also unseen.

He quickly turned to the German aircraft identification manual to check. Thanks to the help provided by the Russians, he finally found the corresponding aircraft model.

"Hell, this is the Bf-21218 - this is a dive fighter. How can they fly so far? This is unscientific!"

In fact, the He-218 has almost never appeared in the UK except for throwing out a leaflet once. The British know very little about the Bf-219. The relevant content of the manual is only published based on the information provided by the Russians. Now The Red Army may have learned more about the characteristics of both aircraft, but the British apparently had no time to update their identification manuals.

Sherbrooke's complaint is very representative: the straight-line flight distance of the German aircraft taking off from the Cape North Point base to the sea here has exceeded 500 kilometers. Considering that the aircraft cannot fly in a completely straight line in the air, the actual flight distance may exceed 218. The maximum range is only 1,500 kilometers. To ensure safety, two auxiliary fuel tanks containing 50 liters of aviation gasoline are mounted under the wings before departure. Usually, 30 kilograms of small bombs are installed in this position, relying on the extra 100 liters of gasoline. , the plane can still fly 200 kilometers more - with these 200 kilometers as a base, the attack becomes safer. When Sherbrooke saw the attack group, those small fuel tanks had long been thrown into the sea, so he would have "no science" illusion.

The Black Smoke-belching Tenacious became the first target of the German attack. Three He-218s broke away from the formation, cut in quickly from high altitude, and dropped the bombs at a speed that stunned Sherbrooke. At this time, he really wanted to be angry. Questioning the question – this is so damn unscientific! The enemy's "fighter" not only flies almost as fast as the Spitfire, but it can also conduct dive attacks. In fact, his estimate was wrong. After throwing away the bomb, the land-based He-218 could fly faster than the Spitfire, and its endurance was far beyond that.

The first two bombs were nimbly avoided by the Tenacious. The falling bombs exploded into the sky, and the shrapnel caused by the near-missed bombs hit the superstructure of the destroyer crazily. The third bomb finally couldn't be avoided and stuck firmly to the destroyer's superstructure. After a violent explosion on the front deck, Sherbrooke closed his eyes involuntarily and did not dare to watch the end of the Tenacious. In front of the 500-kilogram aerial bomb, the 2,000-ton destroyer quickly broke into two pieces like paper. Sinking down - not even a single sailor could escape.

In less than 2 minutes, the score became 1:1. The officers in the command tower of the Hipper cheered - the efficiency of the air force, no, the naval aviation is high. There are still 21 planes left. According to this effect, there will still be some left even if all the British destroyers are sent to the bottom of the sea.

The remaining British destroyers witnessed the tragic end of the Indomitable, and they were terrified and fought back desperately. At the same time, the smoke screen was released to the maximum effect, and the sea surface was suddenly filled with thick smoke. Unfortunately, the wind over the Barents Sea was strong, and the smoke screen was much less effective under the northwest wind.

The German aircraft group in the air seemed to be unaffected. One minute later, the second batch of He-218 continued to attack, aiming at the Obedience this time. All the anti-aircraft firepower of the British destroyers fought back desperately, but it seemed to be useless. The second batch of He-218 played a trick - they pretended to dive bomb, but they quickly leveled after diving less than 500 meters. The British anti-aircraft gun positions that had no time to react were destroyed by the Bf-219s that were covering the air. The deck was full of injured sailors groaning in pain. After the anti-aircraft firepower was weakened, the three He-218s circled around and attacked again.

The Obedience did not escape the disaster - 500 kg bombs were not something a destroyer could withstand, and it was sunk like the Indomitable. Fortunately, the sinking speed was not so fast, which gave the British sailors a chance to jump into the sea to escape. The survivors of the Z6 destroyer who had just been rescued were forced to jump into the water again.

The Germans changed the score to 2:1. Taking advantage of the British destroyers' maneuvers, the Hipper fleet narrowed the distance to within 15,000 meters. However, he ordered the main guns to temporarily cease fire for fear of interfering with the bombing of the aircraft.

Just as the third batch of aircraft entered the airspace and prepared to kill the remaining destroyers, Shelbrooke was completely desperate. He trembled and sent a farewell telegram to Rear Admiral Burnett: Our army encountered an air attack by superior enemy aircraft, and the whole army may be destroyed!

Then a very shocking scene happened: the He-218s that were about to enter the attack position flapped their wings and flew away, and the escorting Bf-219s also flew away.

Just when everyone was confused, the Hipper received a telegram from the aircraft-several warships were found in the northwest, which were large in size and suspected to be enemy battleships. The shorter the message, the bigger the incident. Hartmann was so happy that he almost jumped up - the Navy was very considerate, giving him the credit for sinking the destroyer and letting him take on the hard task.

Major Schroeder, who led the air force, was not sure that he had discovered the British battleship. He just felt that the distance was not far, so it would be okay to fly over to check. If he was wrong, he would go back and deal with the destroyers. Besides, there was Hipper next to them. How could a heavy cruiser plus a destroyer let three British destroyers escape?

Hartmann immediately sent a telegram to Berlin: "The Navy sank two enemy destroyers and is currently dealing with another enemy fleet. Our ships are chasing three British destroyers."

Hearing that the plane killed two destroyers in one breath, the depressing atmosphere in the Navy Command was finally relieved a lot. Many people were happy, but Hoffmann's face was not very happy - just two destroyers, the Japanese Navy sank two battleships, and you are the only one who is happy.

Although they couldn't believe what they saw, the British sailors were glad that they had escaped. However, in order to avoid the air raid, the fleet had been maneuvering around and the order was in chaos. Taking advantage of this opportunity, the Hipper fleet closed in more than 1,000 meters. When the 203mm shells fell, everyone finally realized that although the planes had left, the German cruisers were still there, so they fled to the northwest again.

Soon, this direction was changed to the southwest by Shelbrooke: he didn't know why the German planes left, but one thing was certain, the German planes were not showing mercy, they must have found more valuable targets, whether it was the transport fleet or the cruiser formation, he didn't dare to imagine the consequences, so now he could no longer join up with Rear Admiral Burnett, but had to retreat to the southwest to try to lure the Germans away.

Taking advantage of the time when the British destroyer turned again, the Hipper had chased to a distance of only 12,700 meters, and the naval gun firepower was getting closer and closer to the target - the German sailors finally found the feeling.