The Rise of the Third Reich

I don’t know if the Americans became impatient because they were under the threat of bacterial bombs every day. The United States’ offensive operations on the Hawaiian Islands started earlier than expected.

On January 30, 1944, the U.S. 3rd Fleet, which had just passed through the Panama Canal, was reinforced by some ships from the U.S. 5th Fleet and 9th Fleet waiting there, and then merged with the landing fleet arriving from San Diego to form a new fleet. 3rd Fleet.

According to the order of Admiral Halsey, commander of the 3rd Fleet and commander of the Central Pacific Command, the 3rd Fleet was immediately divided into the 30th Task Force and the 31st Task Force. Among them, Task Force 30 is a fast fleet with aircraft carriers as the core. Admiral Halsey personally serves as the commander. The main force of the fleet includes the flagship aircraft carrier "Enterprise" and the "Langley", "San Juan", " There are five "Independence"-class light fleet aircraft carriers including the USS Guantanamo, the USS Panama Canal, and the USS Oahu, and one Baltimore-class heavy cruiser, four Cleveland-class light cruisers, and four Oakland-class light cruisers. The cruiser and the escort of 25 Fletcher-class destroyers headed straight for Christmas Island, 4,700 nautical miles away, at a speed of up to 21 knots.

The main force of the 3rd Fleet and the large landing fleet formed the 31st Task Force, commanded by Lieutenant General Kincaid (the commander of the landing force was Lieutenant General George Patton who had participated in the Battle of England). In January 1944, It left the port of Panama on March 31 and sailed slowly towards Christmas Island at a speed of 12 knots.

At the same time, the 5th Fleet merged some of the main ships of the 7th Fleet and also formed two task forces - the 50th Task Force and the 51st Task Force.

Like the 3rd Fleet, Task Force 50 is also an air fleet with fast aircraft carriers as the main force, led by Admiral Spruance. The fleet has 4 Essex-class ships including the Essex, Valiant, Hornet, and Yorktown (not the one that sank in the Western Pacific, but a newly commissioned Essex-class ship). Large fleet aircraft carriers, as well as six Independence-class aircraft carriers including the USS Independence, USS Princeton, USS Brayen Forest, USS Coburns, USS Monterey, and USS Pearl Harbor, as well as dozens of Baltimore-class, Cleveland-class, Oakland-class and Frye-class aircraft carriers Under the full escort, he headed towards the Pacific waters north of the Hawaiian Islands at lightning speed.

The main force of the 5th Fleet merged with another large-scale fast landing fleet to form the 51st Task Force, with Vice Admiral Fletcher as the commander, also heading north of the Hawaiian Islands at a relatively fast speed. The Pacific Ocean sails away.

However, unlike the last time the German intelligence network reported the dispatch of the US fleet as soon as possible, this time the German intelligence network in San Diego was paralyzed due to the Japanese bacterial attack - now the entire Southern California is on the highest alert. Moreover, non-military personnel were evacuated as much as possible. The agents of the German Central Security Service were all "non-military personnel". They were either infected with the bacteria dropped by the Japanese, or they were evacuated to the central United States...

In addition, in order to prepare for Japanese bomb balloons and a new round of possible aircraft bombings (dropping bacterial bombs), the Pacific Fleet dispatched a large number of destroyers, escort destroyers and large long-range patrol aircraft to patrol near the west coast of the United States, but no Japanese bombers were found. , but actually sank 5 Japanese submarines in a row.

Two of them were sunk in the last few days of January. As a result, no Japanese submarine was in a position to monitor the port of San Diego when the U.S. 50th Task Force and the 51st Task Force attacked. .

This means that the Japanese know nothing about the situation of the 50th Task Force and the 51st Task Force!

…

"The Americans' target is obviously Christmas Island!"

At the operational meeting at the Japanese base camp, the leaders of the navy and army reached a rare agreement.

Gen. Sugiyama, chief of the Army Staff Headquarters, said: "The Americans obviously want to repeat the same tactics of the first Christmas Island battle, using powerful fleet anti-aircraft firepower and an aircraft carrier equipped with all fighter jets to consume the lives of our pilots!"

"It must be like this!" Yamamoto Isoroku nodded, "But what awaits the Americans this time will be our powerful torpedo fleet and submarine fleet. The American devils will have to learn how powerful the 93 Spear torpedo is."

The so-called mines of "Thunder Squadron" do not refer to the round mines placed in the water, but torpedoes.

Like aviation weapons, torpedoes are also weapons that receive great attention from the Japanese Navy. There are a large number of "mine warfare experts" among the senior generals of the Japanese Navy. The current commander of the Combined Fleet, Chuichi Nagumo, was originally a "mine expert" and once served as the principal of the mine warfare school.

Lieutenant General Mikawa Junichi, the commander of the 8th Fleet of the Japanese Navy stationed in the Hawaiian Islands, is also a mine expert. He once commanded the formation to defeat the British (Australian) and American fleets with torpedoes in the Nanyang Operation and the South Pacific Operation.

Yamamoto Isoroku transferred Mikawa Junichi and his fleet to the Hawaiian Islands in order to use his mine warfare capabilities to severely damage the US fleet on Christmas Island.

In addition, Lieutenant General Takagi Takeo, commander of Japan's 6th Fleet, has also personally come to Pearl Harbor these days to command submarine operations - Japan's 6th Fleet is actually the submarine command of the Japanese Navy, not a fleet in the true sense, so the fleet commander The official works on the shore.

However, unlike the two generations of leaders of the German Navy's submarine force, Dönitz and Frederborg, who were both submarine experts from U-boats, the commander of Japan's 6th Fleet is not necessarily a submarine expert.

For example, Takagi Takeo’s two predecessors, Komatsu Teruhisa and Shimizu Mitsumi, had never served on submarines. Under the command of these two submarine force commanders who had never served on submarines, Japan’s submarine force had a good The equipment is not small in quantity, but it is not surprising that it cannot achieve the same brilliant results as the German submarines.

Takeo Takagi is a little better than the previous two. He is a serious member of the submarine force and has also served as a diving school instructor and submarine captain. However, he was transferred to the surface fleet in November 1929, and never returned to the submarine force until June 21, 1943, when he became the commander of the 6th Fleet... The reason for this is probably because of his relationship with Japan. The promotion rules of the Navy are related to the status of Japan's submarine force.

In Germany, the submarine force is a relatively independent branch of the military, affiliated with the Navy, but not the High Seas Fleet. In Japan, the independence of the submarine force is not high. The officers of the submarine force do not have their own independent promotion system. Therefore, after reaching a certain level, they must participate in the rotation and promotion of naval officers. Sometimes they are team staff officers, and sometimes they are senior officers in the military command department. , and later became the captain again...

Takeo Takagi even served as the commander of the naval bases (Magong Garrison and Kaohsiung Garrison) for a long time before becoming the commander of the 6th Fleet. Submarines and the like... were all over ten years ago, and the things Takeo Takagi mastered were actually outdated.

Therefore, Japan's submarine force does not have its own combat ideas. It has always been part of the surface fleet, responsible for reconnaissance and sneak attacks on the enemy's surface fleet.

In the "Operation Czech One" plan, the submarines of the 8th Fleet and the 6th Fleet, which are mainly "heavy mine-armed" cruisers (including heavy cruisers and light cruisers) and destroyers, will be used in "Christmas Island" Mine Warfare”.

According to the plan, the "heavy mine ships" of the 8th Fleet and the submarines of the 6th Fleet will ambush in the waters near Palmyra Atoll and Christmas Island respectively before the U.S. fleet approaches Christmas Island, and the submarines will wait for opportunities to attack. The "heavy mine ship" will conduct a night attack after the landing operation begins, striving to inflict maximum damage on the invading enemy...

However, the day after Mikawa Junichi left Pearl Harbor with sixteen heavy cruisers, light cruisers and destroyers, a piece of disturbing news reached the Japanese Combined Fleet flagship "Yamato".

On the night of February 5th, Hawaii time, two "Type One Land Attack" aircraft equipped with airborne radars responsible for searching the North Pacific Ocean lost contact after reporting that they were attacked by unknown enemy aircraft!

Moreover, before losing contact, the second "Type 1 Land Attack" reported that its airborne radar had detected more than 10 surface ships, located about 1,000 nautical miles northwest of the Hawaiian Islands.

"Northwest of the Hawaiian Islands..." Nagumo Chuichi immediately walked to the chart table.

Fleet Chief of Staff Ryunosuke Kusaka immediately marked the specific location on the chart, and then he said to Nagumo: "Commander, the enemy's target is Midway Island!"

"Midway Island..." Nagumo Chuichi frowned slightly, "Americans are really good at choosing places!"

It turns out that Nagumo Chuichi has always been worried about the territory of Midway Island, because Midway Island is a small archipelago composed of three coral reef islands (Sand Island, East Island and Spit Island) with a total land area of ​​only 6.2 square kilometers. Because Midway has enough land to build an airport for large aircraft to take off and land, its strategic position is very important. It has been a U.S. naval base since 1903.

However, the area of ​​Midway Island is too small and too flat, and there is no danger to rely on. If it is bombarded by large-caliber naval artillery for a few days, there may not be anyone alive on it. Moreover, the channels on all sides of Midway Island are wide, there are no reefs that can block the landing troops, and the Americans are very familiar with it, so there is almost no possibility that the Japanese army will rely on the garrison on the island to hold on for a long time.

However, these small coral reef islands are only less than 1,500 kilometers away from Oahu, and they are even closer to Kauai and Niihau, only more than 1,200 kilometers away.

This means that once the Americans take control of Midway, the troublesome P-51B/C combat radius will be able to cover Kauai and Nihau. If there are any improvements to increase the range, Oahu will be able to Covered by P51B/C...