3:30 a.m.

The transport ship was in position, the amphibious landing vehicle and the landing craft entered the water, and with a "rumbling" motor sound, they drove to the bottom of the transport ship and docked the transport ship side by side.

All the Chinese and American landers had to do was climb down the net rope of the transport ship and board the amphibious landing vehicle and landing craft.

This process may seem simple, but it is fraught with dangers.

The main reason is that these have to be done in the dark, each of them has to carry 45.36 kg of equipment to climb down on the net rope, the speed can not be too fast and not too slow, too fast will step on the hands or heads of the comrades below, which will bring danger to the comrades, too slow will be stepped on by the hands or heads of the comrades above, which will put themselves in danger...... Needless to say, what the danger is, if you are stepped on and fall down, if you are lucky, you will fall down alone, but more often you will fall down with many people at the same time, so there will be a large number of falls and crushes.

However, this is nothing to the soldiers of the new 28th Division, after all, they have participated in the battle and seen what is the real danger, this danger is nothing to them at all, not to mention that they have also had relevant training in Rabaul before, so they climbed onto the landing craft to prepare for the landing without any danger.

By the time all the landing craft and landing vehicles were ready, it was already more than an hour later.

Countless pairs of eyes on the battle ship group were staring at Beato Island, although they couldn't see anything because of the darkness, but everyone was waiting for that moment, they were waiting for the moment when the American Navy started the battle, but surprisingly it was not the American army that started the battle, but the Japanese army, the Japanese army who was thought to have no ability to resist.

Five o'clock in the morning.

The Kingfisher water reconnaissance aircraft catapulted off from the USS Maryland, and its mission was to observe the upcoming naval bombardment and send back corrected data on range and bearing by radio, simply put, in preparation for school firing.

However, the flash of light emitted during the ejection took off was very conspicuous in the dark, and the Japanese immediately determined the location of the "Maryland".

Then the cannon rang out......

With a few sickeningly sharp whistling sounds, several shells landed in the sea area just over 400 meters away from the "Maryland" and exploded, setting off a splash that could even splash the sailors on the side of the "Maryland."

As a result, no one would think that the Japanese had abandoned Tarawa or that all the Japanese on Tarawa had been blown up.

However, there are still people who will take chances, thinking that this is just the last firepower that the Japanese have gathered by taking advantage of the gap in the bombing of the US Navy.

However, what happened next soon turned this fluke into a burst soap bubble.

The "Maryland" is the flagship of the US Navy, and the shelling of the flagship is obviously intolerable, and of course Rear Admiral Harry Hill cannot tolerate it, because he has just sworn at a press conference that he will not encounter decent resistance from the enemy, but immediately the flagship was shelled by the Japanese.

The U.S. Navy immediately retaliated against the Japanese troops, and with a burst of roars, the Chinese and American forces on the landing craft watched with awe as a large number of artillery shells whizzed over their heads and poured towards Beato Island.

Beato Island soon erupted in clouds of smoke and fire, and in the flames, there were columns of water that soared into the sky.

The U.S. Navy's firing once again revealed the position of the warship, so the Japanese artillery returned fire.

So the bombardment continued to come and go, and the sky shimmered brightly, and one volley after another roared over the water, and then set off columns of water in the sea.

In the midst of the bombardment, Zhang Chi, who was further away, outside the area of artillery fire, only said: "These fools! ”

The first mistake made by the US Navy was that the USS Maryland should not have catapulted a reconnaissance plane off the coast of Tarawa...... The US "Kingfisher" water reconnaissance plane has a range of 1,860 kilometers and a speed of 264 kilometers per hour, which means that even if the "Maryland" catapults the "Kingfisher" from a distance of several tens of kilometers, it will only take more than 10 minutes to reach Tarawa.

However, Rear Admiral Harry Hill thought that such caution was completely unnecessary, because at this time the Japanese army in Tarawa could not pose any threat to the US Navy, but the fact was that the flagship of the "Maryland" was almost hit by the Japanese 203MM howitzer at the first time, and if it was hit...... It is likely that the commander of the landing in the Tarawa direction will be killed in the first place.

What is even more frustrating is that the "Kingfisher", which exposed the flagship position of the "Maryland", did not play any role, because as soon as the shells passed the Tarawa were again covered with smoke and water vapor, the pilots of the "Kingfisher" water reconnaissance could not see anything, let alone school fire.

The second mistake the U.S. Navy made was that they should not engage in artillery battles with the Japanese in the coastal waters.

Because it is obvious that the range of the guns on the destroyers, cruisers, and battleships of the navy, which at this time still admired the cannon giants, exceeded the range of the Japanese guns in Tarawa.

The Japanese troops stationed on Beato Island could not move, but the American warships could move.

In other words, the U.S. Navy could easily drive out of range of Japanese artillery and bombard, but they didn't.

Of course, this is not to say that the US Navy is really stupid, they actually understand this, but they are too light on the enemy, they think that the Japanese artillery fire on Beato Island is just a little remnant, and a few more artillery fires can solve it.

But that's not the case...... No matter how the warships of the US Navy were bombed, the Japanese artillery shells continued to fire one after another at the US Navy ship group, and even became more and more accurate.

It was only when several landing craft were lifted into the sky because they were hit by Japanese shells that Rear Admiral Hill realized that this would not only put the warship in danger, but also implicate the landing force.

Rear Admiral Hill immediately ordered the main force of the fleet to move its position away from Tarawa in order to return fire with counter-artillery fire.

However, there was a problem with the USS Maryland...... which had been badly damaged during the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 8, 1941, and although it had been repaired, the equipment was very fragile, in contrast to the battleship's main guns of 406 mm.

When the "Maryland" was shelled by the Japanese, Rear Admiral Hill ordered the "Maryland" to counterattack without thinking about it.

Outcome...... After two salvos, the shock and pressure generated by the 406 mm caused the lights of the "Maryland" to be extinguished and radio communications to be disrupted.

So, from this moment until the end of the battle, Major General Harry Hill had serious problems with the command and communications of the troops.

(To be continued.) )