"This position ......," Yodel felt like a toothache after reading it, "It's not easy to deal with, you can't fight it." Pen ~ Fun ~ Pavilion www.biquge.info"

The others nodded approvingly.

Ozawa's main fleet is currently about 1,150 kilometers south-west of Ireland, which is not a random location, but a carefully planned central point - from this location, whether it is to the Azores, to Portugal, to France, to the United Kingdom, to Greenland, and even to Iceland, the distance is about 1,400-1,600 kilometers. A 1,600-kilometer circle is drawn in the center of the circle, and the main support points and hostile points are all included, which can respond to various enemy situations, especially transport fleets, in a timely manner. The Germans are confident that they can monitor the perimeter, and the reconnaissance radius of the Ar-352 on the aircraft carrier is exactly 1,600 kilometers, in other words, the fleet is almost invisible.

After all, Nimitz is not an ordinary person, probably he also sensed the danger, and actually let the fleet pass at a high speed of 24 knots when circumnavigating the southern tip of Greenland at night, breaking the German reconnaissance field and submarine blockade advantage, and now the US fleet has slipped to the position of the Danish Strait (between Iceland and Greenland), and the next step is a little tricky, at least the original seal plan cannot be implemented.

According to the original strategic approach, this wave of political offensive against Great Britain will not end with air raids alone, and the next highest stage will be the landing, and even the landing commander and troops have been chosen, which is Rommel. Joseph Kennedy knew that the Germans were going to land was true, but it was not comprehensive, and the first step of the SEAL plan was not to consider landing at the British headquarters, but on one of the three islands around Great Britain - Ireland, Iceland and the Faroe Islands.

This reflects Hoffman's prudence, although the British Empire has performed very ordinarily on the battlefield in recent years, but after all, the mainland has accumulated more than 3 million land forces, nearly 10,000 aircraft, and good coastal fortifications, and its strength is still not to be underestimated. The English Channel is indeed very narrow, but it is easy to cross the channel, and it is not so easy to establish a foothold on it, even if the first wave of the German army can go up to 100,000, it will be uncomfortable enough for the British to push it with five times the force, and if it is pushed over with 10 times the force, I am afraid that the German army will eventually be driven into the sea. And the British troops fighting at home cannot be measured by the combat effectiveness they showed in the colonies and in continental Europe, and they will burst out with a different passion to defend their homeland - any idea of underestimating the enemy is very dangerous.

After careful consideration, he believed that the current balance of power between Britain and Germany was not as great as the gap between the Normandy landings in history, and that it was very likely that the rash landing in Great Britain would break the bloodstream. Historically, because the main forces of the German army were concentrated on the Eastern Front, the response to the Normandy landings was too slow, and the US air superiority was too obvious, and it did not gather enough forces to push back so that the US troops could succeed.

But if the German army does not show its landing strength and the United States does not give up aiding Britain, it is estimated that the stone in his pit will always be smelly and hard. Landing on Britain's periphery is the most cost-effective way to suppress Great Britain, which does not require too many deaths and can also deter Britain itself -- the best political choice is to promote talks and peace through pressure. Taking 10,000 steps back, even if the landing really fails, for Germany it will be a matter of hundreds of planes, tens of thousands of people, and a few ships, and it will not hurt its vitality, but if the landing on British soil fails, then the Second Battle of Britain can be completely ended.

In the end, after repeated considerations, the Supreme Command, the Army General Staff, and the Navy General Staff unanimously decided to choose Iceland as the ideal landing site: the Faroe Islands were too small to deter Britain even if they were taken, and they would be attacked from both sides by the other side from the direction of Iceland and Britain; Ireland is large enough and has a good mass base (the Irish are generally pro-German), but it is too close to the United Kingdom, and Northern Ireland shares a direct border with Ireland, which would have caused many inconveniences in a landing battle; Iceland is about 1,000 kilometers north of England and about 1,200 kilometers from Norway, and the support available to both sides is almost close.

So the Icelandic landing became a topic: could the German landing force land successfully and defeat the Icelandic garrison?

The number of enemy troops in Iceland has long been figured out: less than 60,000 American troops, British troops in their early 20,000s, and about 400-500 aircraft, tanks but no armoured divisions, a little coastal fortifications but far less strong than Norway. In 1940, the British occupied Iceland with only one battalion, and then successively increased the number of troops to more than 20,000, and the American army landed in Iceland after 1942 and gradually increased its troops, but at most it was more than 3 divisions and a garrison headquarters, with a total strength of less than 60,000.

The total population of Iceland is only 120,000, and the number of adult men is less than 40,000, which is not even as large as the British and American garrisons. The capital, Reykjavík, is home to more than one-third of Iceland's population.

Through spying in Iceland, Hoffman also knew that Icelandic society had undergone major changes after the British and American settlements, and a large number of Icelandic women were attracted by the freedom and openness of the United States, and began to be infatuated with American soldiers, and staged all kinds of passions and *** paragraphs (after the war constituted the unique war culture of Icelandic literature), since the British occupied Iceland for nearly 4 years, except for the Bismarck sinking the Hood, there has been no major war near Iceland. In other words, Iceland's defenses are loose and fragile, and the army above him is not considered to be much stronger - it has never been a war! As for the current atmosphere of busy talking about love, I am afraid that it will lower the combat effectiveness by a higher level.

Rommel believed that if Iceland's strength was really more than 80,000 troops and 4-500 planes as the intelligence showed, he hoped that the first wave of landing troops would have a fleet, an armored division and an panzergrenadier division, and that he would occupy the complete landing ground in three days, and if the second stage could give reinforcements to another paratrooper division, it would be very ideal, and the situation could be controlled in a week; If you don't give it, it's not a big deal, 10 days to tie is.

But Hoffmann prepared him with more troops than he had asked for: 2 Panzer Divisions (Panzer Instructor of the 1944 and Flying Fortress Panzer Division), 1 Panzergrenadier Division (Brandenburg Special Panzergrenadier Division of the 1943 Model), 1 Airborne Division (22nd Airborne Division), and 3 Marine Brigades (troops withdrawn from the Indian theater) were in place one after another, and they were given priority rearmament, even a little earlier than several SS Panzer divisions.

It is clear to everyone that any unit with a name in both the Wehrmacht and the Waffen-SS is a force that cannot be provoked, such as the Flying Fortress Panzer Division, which fought from North Africa to South Africa with great success, considering the title of its predecessor "Hermann-Goering" paratrooper armored brigade, with an airborne effect; In addition to the normal Panzergrenadier skills, the Brandenburg Special Division also has additional infiltration and sabotage functions; As for the armored instructors, they are composed of leaders drawn from the 30 armored divisions and 24 independent heavy armored battalion units of the National Defense Force.

Seeing these forces and dispositions at that time, Rommel was satisfied that the Führer had not coaxed himself and that the Führer was indeed preparing to deal with the British, so he happily assumed the post of commander of the Navy SEAL Army with the rank of marshal. Field Marshal Rommel has always been treated as the commander of an army group, but the forces under his command have never exceeded the size of an army group, but fortunately, all of them are trump cards, and they can't find a place to complain, and finally even he himself is used to it - the soldiers are not more than fine!

Everyone unanimously agreed that if Rommel had led the landing force and the navy and air force had cooperated effectively, it would not have been a problem to take Iceland, and the trouble now was that the American fleet had slipped into the vicinity of Iceland. If the fleet is not defeated, the landing will certainly be a luxury, and if it is to be defeated, the main fleet will have to risk rushing over and fighting, which is likely to be flanked by the British and Icelandic air forces, and if the fleet loses too much, the landing will be in vain.

So this position is quite difficult to ride a tiger, which is too uncomfortable.

"We have to find a way to lure this fleet out, drive it away, kill it, and in short, not let it destroy the overall situation near Iceland." Yodel analyzed viciously, "It's better to kill it, even if it's worth losing 1-2 aircraft carriers." ”

"How can this fleet be mobilized?" Keitel asked, "Or what other goal would be able to make this American fleet leave the British desperate to come to the rescue?" ”

Newfoundland?

Bermuda?

These two targets are sharp enough, but it is a pity that they also have to use their own forces to carry out the mission, which is not enough to suppress the US fleet, and these two important places have been fought twice, and the Americans are really dead and unprepared.

Zeitzler frowned and said, "Or, postpone the landing?" Wait for the war in the Caucasus to end before deciding the overall situation on the Western Front? Or simply coordinate with Japan before launching the Second Western Expedition. ”

Of course, it is also a way of thinking to solve the Soviet Union first and then Iceland, but the problem is that the solution to the Soviet Union mainly depends on the army, and the solution to Iceland mainly depends on the navy, and now an American detachment has just been killed by Crankke with 3 aircraft carriers, and the British aircraft carriers and capital ships have not been put into service, and the strength is in the weakest state, if you wait until June and July to completely solve the Eastern Front (this thing is not yet completely packaged), then the British and American naval forces may recover to overwhelm the axis.

As for coordinating with Japan, there is no trace of the eight characters yet, and even if Horiyoshi agrees to send troops, it will take more than a month to go to Europe, and it will not be urgent, not to mention that the Japanese are still fighting their own little Jiujiu at all, and they are not ready to send troops to fight together. Hoffman can promise to support and aid Japan, but it does not mean that the Japanese lion will open his mouth to take what he wants.

There was silence.

After thinking about it for a long time, he slowly said the plan he had considered...... Everyone was a little stunned.

ps: The back of the monthly pass is very tight, for the sake of my hard update, you guys appreciate it......