April 18, 1942, 8:03 a.m

A short, stocky man in his fifties in a dark blue admiral's uniform pushed open the office door and walked in, this person was none other than Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku, commander of the Combined Fleet of the Hikamoto Navy. Pen, fun, and www.biquge.info

"Bell bell bell ......"

A rapid phone rang in the office, and Yamamoto Fifty-six, who had just entered the office and had not had time to take off his hat, looked slightly stunned, and walked quickly to the desk to pick up the phone.

"Moxi Moxi, I'm Yamamoto, who are you? Nani...... When did it happen? Okay, I got it! ”

With a "snap", Yamamoto Fifty-six put down the phone and immediately pressed the electric bell button on the table, and soon a big Zuo strode in, saluted Yamamoto and said loudly: "Your Excellency Commander, what instructions do you have?" ”

"Kawada-kun, you immediately notify all officers above the rank of major general in the headquarters to immediately come to the conference room for a meeting within five minutes!"

Five minutes later, in the conference room of the Hisakamoto Naval Headquarters, more than a dozen generals sat quietly in their chairs and waited for His Excellency the Commander's lecture, and Yamamoto Fifty-six did not talk nonsense and went straight to the point.

"Ladies and gentlemen, just twenty minutes ago, our Hai Reconnaissance No. 068 reconnaissance ship sent a warning telegram, they found the American aircraft carrier formation in the sea area 180 degrees east longitude 1,200 kilometers away from us, and this formation is currently heading towards the mainland of the empire!"

"Nani, is this true?"

As soon as Yamamoto Fifty-six's words fell, there was an uproar in the conference room, and many generals even stood up in surprise.

"Your Excellency, the Americans' Pacific Fleet has just been severely damaged by us, how can they have the audacity to approach the empire's homeland, aren't they here to send them to death? It can't be a false positive, right? Vice Takeshi Toyoda, who was the commander of the Kure Town Guard Mansion at the time and the admiral, stood up and asked incredulously.

"No, it won't!" Yamamoto Fifty-six shook his head with a calm face: "Just more than ten minutes ago, we have lost contact with the 068 and 069 reconnaissance ships, which is enough to prove that the information sent by these two reconnaissance ships is true. ”

Deputy Toyoda pondered for a moment before saying: "Since it can be concluded that the intelligence is true, then what is the real purpose of the Americans, anyway, I don't believe that the Americans will use the only two aircraft carriers to seek a decisive battle." ”

Everyone in the conference room nodded secretly, but no general with a normal IQ would make such a decision that bordered on suicide.

Yamamoto Fifty-six said with a calm face: "Of course the Americans will not make such a stupid decision, I think the most likely thing is that they will send carrier-based aircraft on the aircraft carrier to bomb the imperial mainland to avenge the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor!" ”

Everyone nodded in unison, and at the moment only this possibility was the highest. Vice Takeshi Toyoda continued: "Your Excellency Commander, then should we immediately order the fighter plane to take off to meet the enemy?" ”

"Don't be in such a hurry." Yamamoto Fifty-six sneered: "Now the main carrier-based bomber of the United States is the SBD dreadnought dive bomber, the range of this bomber is only 1,200 kilometers, and the Americans want to bomb the empire mainland at least to sail the aircraft carrier formation to within 500 kilometers of the empire, so their carrier-based aircraft will not be able to take off tomorrow at the earliest, so we still have a day to prepare, I will order below!" ”

"Whoa!"

All the generals stood up and bowed their heads respectfully.

"Order the 1st and 2nd Fleets to immediately rush to the sea area where the US fleet has been discovered and intercept it, and then order the 1st Flying Division on the mainland to dispatch all of them to intercept the US bombing formation at 8 a.m. tomorrow. Yamamoto Fifty-six's cold voice wafted through the conference room.

"Hay!"

There was a neat answer in the conference room.

It has to be said that Yamamoto Isoroku has a very deep understanding of the American army and the weapons it is equipped with, but because of this, he made a decision that was enough to make him regret for life, because he never dreamed that it was not the carrier-based aircraft of the US Navy that flew to the RB, but the B-25 twin-engine bomber with a large range, and it had already taken off early on the morning of the 18th, and was now coming towards the RB.

At noon on April 18, after more than three hours of boring flight, Doolittle blinked a little tiredly in the cockpit of the No. 1 plane, which had been flying at the forefront. He handed the plane to the co-pilot, leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and handed Doolittle a cup of coffee to Henry Porter, the navigator next to him.

"Sir, have a cup of coffee, I poured it before I got on the plane."

"Thank you!"

Doolittle took the coffee and took a sip, a slightly bitter and mellow taste reached the brain through the tongue coating, and after a cup of coffee, Doolittle's spirits lifted a little, and he asked, "Henry, how long do we have to get to the homeland of Japan." ”

Henry Potter shrugged his shoulders and said, "If our course is correct, we'll be on the RB coastline in no time." ”

"Sir, I see ...... I saw the coastline of Hikamoto! As soon as Henry Potter's words fell, the voice of Paul Leonard, a gunner above the nose, rang out.

As Paul's voice rang out, the crew members cheered excitedly. But after the excitement, they fell into tension again, because their whereabouts had already been discovered by Hikamoto's reconnaissance ship, and Hinata himself would now definitely send a large number of planes to intercept them. Prior to this, in order to reduce weight, the crew had removed all unnecessary things such as the belly and tail cannons, and even considered that the radio should be silent throughout the whole time, and even the radio station was dismantled, and all the excess places were stuffed with aviation gasoline. It can be said that in the face of Ri Ying's own plane, they don't even have the ability to fight back.

The only weapon for self-defense is a 12.7mm machine gun in the nose.

With all these worries, the flight crews of the sixteen B-25 bombers flew to the territory of Hinamu himself with trepidation. But what surprised them was that when they flew over Hikamoto, a group of RB people below were waving enthusiastically to the bombers, and it turned out that the fuselage of the American bombers at that time was still painted with old-fashioned badges. The old-fashioned badge of the United States is a white star in the blue circle and a red ball in the white star, which at first glance is very similar to the sun flag badge of the RB aircraft, and from a distance it looks like a Japanese plane.

What is even more coincidental is that when Doolittle led the bombing squadron to fly over the Mito Army Aviation School in Hikamoto, he happened to meet two groups of Japanese fighters, who were escorting RB Prime Minister Hideki Tojo to the Mito Aviation School for inspection.

At the same time, Hideki Tojo's secretary Nishiura Osaku inadvertently glanced out the window, and suddenly found more than a dozen bombers passing under the clouds. He staggered back a few steps, sat on the seat, pointed out the window, and couldn't speak for a while.

Hideki Tojo on the side saw that Nishiura was so out of shape, and he had always been very strict with his appearance, and he was very annoyed and reprimanded: "Nishiura-kun, what are you doing?" ”

XJTLU pointed out the window and stammered, "Your Excellency Prime Minister...... Outside...... There are ...... outside There are American bombers! ”

"Nani?"

At this time, Hideki Tojo had not yet received the telegram sent to him by Yamamoto Isoroku, so he naturally did not know that an American fleet was approaching Hichimoto, and after hearing Nishiura's words, he was surprised to come to the bed to take a look, and the eye-catching logo of the American Army Air Corps on the wings of the B-25 bomber immediately appeared in front of his eyes.

Taken aback, Hideki Tojo immediately asked Nishiura Daisa to give an order to the surrounding escort planes to pursue the American bomber formation, but by the time they gave the order, Doolittle and their bomber formation had already flown away, and the two fighter formations did not dare to leave the surroundings of Hideki Tojo's plane to pursue the formation.

Sharp air defense sirens sounded on the streets of Tokyo, where the alarm was received, and ground anti-aircraft artillery began to shoot into the sky, and planes on the ground also began to take off to intercept. But the air raid sirens that have been sounded have long been accustomed to the citizens who are busy commuting to work on the streets of Tokyo, because they regard the air raid sirens as another routine air raid exercise. These citizens did not expect and could not have imagined that the American bombers had already flown over them.

When Doolittle led sixteen B-25 bomber planes over the city of Tokyo, they looked down from the sky and saw the still lively streets and crowded crowds of people in Tokyo.

One after another, 500-pound bombs and incendiary bombs left the magazine of the B-25 bomber and fell straight down, and the rumbling explosion mixed with the piercing air raid sirens ruthlessly poured into the ears of Hichimoto, and the soldiers and civilians of Hichimoto, who had been carried away by the victory of the imperial army since the beginning of the war, believed that the "wolf" was really coming.

It was a real air raid, and the whole of Tokyo was in chaos as the explosions kept ringing out. Stations, steel mills, oil refineries, junior high schools, oil depots, and some buildings in Yokohama, Kobe, Nagoya, and other places were destroyed, and a raging fire was ignited, and many Hikami themselves were stunned by the sudden bombardment, and in just 30 seconds, the bombing formation dropped all the bombs.

Looking at the falling bombs and the flames on the ground, the members of Crew 1 were elated, and the bombardier Fred Bremer shouted with excitement.

"God, these bombs must be enough for the Ri Lai himself to drink a pot, they must be very uncomfortable, Henry...... What do you think? ”

Navigator Henry shrugged his shoulders, "I don't know if those days are uncomfortable, but it's certain that all the days will remember today!" ”

Just as the crew members were talking happily, Doolittle spoke, "Okay boys, the happy hour is over, and we're going to Huaxia next!" ”

After saying that, Doolittle swung the joystick, and the heavy fuselage of the nearly ten-ton B-25 bomber slowly turned around and flew towards the west. Under the leadership of Doolittle, the bombing formation flew towards the coast of China, and by the time the Japanese fighters arrived, the bombing formation had disappeared without a trace.

The Japanese themselves thought that the US troops who had finished dropping the bombs must have returned to the east, so they dispatched almost all the planes to search for the east, but an hour passed, not to mention the planes, and not even a single plane hair was seen, and the US bomber formation disappeared without a trace after the bomb was dropped.

After the Japanese Yamamoto Air Force reported the information to Yamamoto 56, the most famous naval general in Yamamoto pondered for a long time, looked at the map again and then exclaimed: "I know, the American bombers did not return to the US aircraft carrier formation, they must have flown directly towards China, and I can be sure that this place must be the ZJ Province of China!" ”

As soon as Yamamoto Fifty-six said this, the surrounding Japanese generals suddenly realized, no wonder hundreds of Japanese planes couldn't find them after looking for so long, it turned out that these Americans were flying towards Huaxia, thinking of this, these generals shouted angrily.

"We must not let those American bombers fly to China alive, otherwise we will have nothing to do with them once they fly to ZJ!"

"Immediately notify the Central China Front, and immediately dispatch planes to sink all these bombers!"

The howls of the Japanese generals rang out in the battle hall.

Not to mention the anger of Ri Ying himself, the bomber group that left the RB and flew towards Huaxia at this time was also in trouble. Due to the machine gun hitting the cabin glass of the No. 8 machine, a lot of fuel was consumed, and the remaining fuel could no longer support them to go to China, so they had to be diverted to Vladivostok, which was under Soviet control, and the other fifteen planes followed Doolittle in the direction of ZJ.

At 15:20 p.m., the excitement of the crew members of the successful bombing a few hours earlier had subsided, replaced by worries about the future. Henry, the navigator, looked at the oil gauge that was getting more and more bottoming out, and then looked at the still sparkling sea ahead, showing a trace of worry on his face. He looked at Doolittle and asked Doolittle what he wanted to say, but he held back when the words came to his lips.

Doolittle naturally knew the anxiety of the crew members at the moment, and he comforted: "Young men, we are about to fly to the Zhejiang River in China, which is the territory of our allies, and our government has already greeted them, and the ruler of the ZJ, General Su, has promised to send fighter jets to protect us, so as long as we get to the Zhejiang River, we will be safe!" ”

As soon as Doolittle's words fell, Paul Leonard, the gunner above them, suddenly shouted: "Oh no, there is Hichi's own plane ahead!" (To be continued.) )