The Rise of the Third Reich

"Your Excellency, the Norwegian Sea amphibious assault ship has been sunk, and the whereabouts of Lieutenant General Paulus are unknown!"

At noon on May 2, when Hersman was having dinner with Natalie Lesinskaya in the Ministry of Defense cafeteria and discussing Soviet political issues, Stauffenberg brought him bad news.

"An amphibious assault ship," Hersman scratched his head, "even Paulus is missing..."

It was expected that the ship would be lost, but the loss of the Norwegian Sea, which was the headquarters of the 1st Marine Division, was a bit unlucky. And even Paulus, the unlucky guy, can't be found. Could it be that if a person is unlucky, even the time traveler can't change it? It seems that we must pay attention to this issue in the future and use less unlucky people in battles...

"Who is commanding the 1st Marine Division now?" Hersman asked.

"It's Colonel Walter Wink, commander of the 1st Marine Brigade," Stauffenberg answered. "Marshal Schleicher asked him to temporarily act as commander of the 1st Marine Division."

Hersmann nodded. Volker Wenke was a lucky guy. Historically, he fought for the Third Reich to the end, and even led his troops to break out of the Soviet encirclement and become a West German. It seems that Schleicher has chosen a good division commander for the 1st Marine Division, and the Battle of Ireland is not a big problem.

"Are there any other losses besides the Norwegian Sea?" Hersman took a sip of coffee and asked again.

"The aircraft carrier Rhine was damaged, the guided missile cruiser Maria Theresa was damaged, the destroyer Z44 was sunk by a mine, and a food transport ship and a T-type ship were sunk. By the way, they disappeared last night. Rear Admiral Langsdorf was found, his torpedo boat capsized by the waves caused by the explosion of a 16-inch shell, and had to swim to the beach at Calais."

"I know." Hessman nodded, "What about the situation in the air?"

Stauffenberg replied: "We had the absolute advantage in the air, shooting down more than 330 enemy planes and losing less than 50."

"Not bad," Hessman smiled bitterly, "But after all, they sank an amphibious assault ship... This is a good result, and it should inspire the British to launch a second wave of air strikes, but this will have a negative impact on our airborne landing in Ireland." Action is beneficial.”

He turned his head and asked Natalie Lesinskaya with a smile, "If we win quickly in Ireland, Stalin will probably not dare to attack us on the Eastern Front, right?"

Natalie nodded, "Yes, Stalin is a relatively cautious opportunist. If we can quickly conquer Britain and only pay a slight price, then he would rather spend his time as the leader of the Soviet Union in the shadow of Germany." For the rest of my life, I will not take the risk of becoming a martyr of communism and devote myself to my ideals. And... I believe that the vast majority of Bolshevik cadres in the Soviet Union think so if we fall into a protracted and large-scale bitter war in Ireland. Then Stalin would make the mistake of opportunism."

…

"Two aircraft carriers and one battlecruiser... great! This is a major victory!"

Churchill was enjoying a delicious and sumptuous lunch, served with the finest Scotch whisky, when he received the report. This is not to celebrate anything, but a part of Churchill's daily life. In his words, he "does not ask for much, but only seeks the best." Even though the whole of Britain was in extreme shortage, Churchill, as prime minister and a nobleman, could still enjoy a superior material life.

"Prime Minister, our losses are not small," Viscount Brooke, the Imperial Chief of General Staff, frowned while reading the report. "336 aircraft have not returned, and the damage rate exceeds 33%. Among the returned aircraft, there are More than 120 aircraft were severely damaged and unusable...the total number of crew members killed, seriously injured, and missing exceeded 2,000."

"So what?" Churchill asked nonchalantly as he took a sip of whiskey. He had long been accustomed to the huge losses of the Royal Air Force and the Royal Naval Air Force to the point of numbness.

In fact, the current British air power has long been trapped in a vicious cycle. At the beginning, Britain and Germany had very good pilots, but the British aircraft were not powerful, and they also encountered Bf-109 and Fokker. The combination of high and low Type Zeros resulted in air combat turning into a loss of lives.

In the early days of the war, the veteran pilots were quickly exhausted. In order to make up for the lack of pilots, the training time could only be shortened. This in turn caused the pilots' skills to become worse and worse, and they died faster and faster. Although the situation improved slightly after the Royal Air Force equipped the Royal Air Force with a large number of Mustangs and Spitfires, pilot training time has been compressed again recently due to fuel shortages.

Viscount Brooke shook his head and said: "In the fierce air battles during the day and night yesterday and the air attacks by German aircraft, we also lost more than 1,200 aircraft and more than 2,100 crew members. The losses are unprecedented. If the fight continues like this, The RAF will soon be exhausted."

"The Royal Air Force must continue to fight!" Churchill ordered in a somewhat stern voice. "Now is the most critical moment. The battles that may break out in southern England and Ireland will determine the survival of the British Empire. Everyone must fight with their best efforts. "

Fatty Qiu paused, and then ordered to his secretary: "I will conduct a nationwide broadcast this afternoon to tell the people the news of the victory in Normandy, and at the same time ask them to be prepared to fight to the end!"

…

France, Brest, German Western Front Headquarters.

Chief of Staff Hermann Balck excitedly walked into Marshal Schleicher's office. Because the amphibious landing ship sank and a Marine Corps lieutenant general was missing, Schleicher was in a bad mood. He didn't even eat much lunch and just paced back and forth in his office.

"Marshal, the 5th Fleet and the landing fleet suffered a second wave of air attacks from the British!"

Is there a second wave? Schleicher couldn't help but gasp.

"Can you withstand it?"

"No problem. The Western Front Air Force Joint Command is preparing to dispatch 600 fighter jets this time."

Although the Western Front Air Force Joint Command has jurisdiction over 6,000 commonly used aircraft, these aircraft are not all day fighters, but also include a large number of heavy bombers, medium bombers, torpedo bombers, and reconnaissance aircraft. There are only about 1,800 fighter jets that can actually be used for daytime air combat, and many of them are short-legged aircraft, which are difficult to use intensively. Moreover, all fighter jets cannot be sent out at once, they must be used in waves. Therefore, dispatching 600 aircraft to support the 5th Fleet and the landing fleet is already the limit. In addition, there are 67 carrier-based aircraft on the 3 aircraft carriers of the 5th Fleet (originally 72 aircraft), all of which are Fokker Zeros. Therefore, there are 667 aircraft that can be used for air combat, which can definitely severely damage the Royal Air Force.

"According to radar detection, the British Air Force's second assault wave has about 1,000 aircraft," Lieutenant General Herman Balk said. "Counting the previous first assault wave, the British have dispatched 2,000 aircraft. Moreover, they still need to leave a certain number of fighter jets to defend important cities in the mainland, cover the fleet in the Firth of Clyde, and deploy fighter jets in northern Scotland, the Faroe Islands, and the Shetland Islands. Therefore, the number of fighter jets that can be used for maneuvers is now available. Very limited, so General Jeshunek suggested that the airborne troops attack!"

"Now?" Schleicher looked at the clock on the wall, "It's only 1:20 pm... If the airborne troops are to be dispatched, the time to arrive in Dublin should be around 5 pm. Isn't it too early? ?”

It was still dark at 5 o'clock, and the airborne troops were vulnerable to ground firepower from the Irish army. But this is not the main problem. The main problem is that Britain may send fighter planes to intercept the airborne group.

"Not early, just 5 o'clock." Lieutenant General Hermann Balck smiled. "The British second assault wave has just returned from 4 to 5 o'clock, and the airport in southern England will be very busy. The Air Force will also take the opportunity to dispatch Ju.88 will drop aluminum chaff strips, and Ju.288, P.108 and He-219 will be dispatched to conduct high-altitude penetrations to attract the British Spitfires and Mosquitoes to take off. In this way, they will not be able to send many aircraft to hinder us. Airborne."

Schleicher finally felt relieved and nodded: "Okay, order the airborne troops to attack Dublin and control the Irish government no matter what!"

The plan to control the Irish government was formulated by Lieutenant Otto Skorzeny. It was a wildly imaginative and highly feasible plan. The codename of the plan is "Phoenix Project", and "Phoenix" refers to the Phoenix Park in Dublin, the capital of Ireland. This is a huge park covering an area of ​​707 hectares and was founded in the 17th century. It was originally planned to be built as the Royal Deer Park, so it had a large area of ​​grassland. Later, the Deer Park was turned into a park, but the large area of ​​grassland was retained. After the Irish War of Independence, Ireland's Presidential Palace (the leader of the Free State) was located in Phoenix Park. 800 meters away from the main entrance of the Presidential Palace is a grassy area for large transport aircraft to take off and land.

Lieutenant Otto Skorzeny, who once traveled to Dublin, saw this grassland and the Presidential Palace not far away, and immediately thought of the idea of ​​​​allowing transport planes and gliders to land here. Lieutenant General William von Sussmann of the 7th Airborne Division was even more imaginative. After learning about Lieutenant Skorzeny's idea, he immediately told him that Messerschmitt was developing a tank that could carry tanks. It is a super large transport aircraft Me323 aircraft, and this transport aircraft can land on grass that is not very flat.

As a result, Lieutenant Otto Skorzeny and the staff of the 7th Airborne Division worked out what seemed like a whimsical plan - to use 12 just-delivered Me323 transport aircraft to transport 10 10-ton 38t tanks. Airborne troops and 240 heavily armed infantrymen parachuted to the gate of the Irish Presidential Palace.