While they were resting at Moroni, the British and French expeditionary forces were expanding their sphere of influence at the southern tip of the African continent, and the specific action was to establish strongholds in important areas. The information on the establishment of a stronghold by the British and French expeditionary forces was sent to Tan Renhao long before the fleet departed. When planning combat operations, Tan Renhao put the operation of eradicating the strongholds of the British and French expeditionary forces at the forefront, and after destroying these strongholds, he could force Cunningham to lead the fleet to retreat, until it could no longer retreat, and then he would inevitably fight to the death with Tan Renhao!

The first stronghold of the British and French expeditionary forces to be bombed was Durban. This was the first important stronghold established by the Anglo-French Expeditionary Force after the capture of Cape Town. Durban itself is a small town with more than 50,000 inhabitants, mainly indigenous people, as well as some immigrants and people of mixed ancestry. The Anglo-French expeditionary force arrived in Durban at the end of February with Cunningham's fleet, and when Cunningham led the fleet north to attack Moroni, the Anglo-French expeditionary force occupied Durban and established a stronghold. By the beginning of April, the British and French expeditionary forces had established a seaplane base here, deployed more than a dozen water patrol planes, and garrisoned more than 500 troops. Because of the non-cooperation of the local population, as well as the small number of expeditionary forces, the planned field airfield was never completed. According to the latest information obtained by Tan Renhao, the British and French expeditionary forces did not deploy combat aircraft in Durban.

The day before the bombing of Durban, the reconnaissance planes of the First Task Force carefully searched the surrounding waters and made sure that there was no threat nearby. He did not send Task Force 3 to shell Durban, while bombing Durban. Task Force 3 remained near Task Force 1.

On 12 April, Task Force 1 carried out two rounds of bombardment of the British and French Expeditionary Force strongholds in Durban, dropping hundreds of bombs. General's barracks, warehouses. and the complete destruction of the infrastructure of the airfield in the unfinished area. That evening, as Task Force 1 continued southward, a group of cruisers and destroyers from Task Force 3 arrived outside Durban and shelled enemy positions in Durban for several hours.

Throughout the bombing and shelling campaign, both Tan Renhao and Chang Jianxin strictly limited the scope of the strike. Even before the bombing, Tan Renhao arranged for several seaplanes to drop propaganda bombs on the city of Durban, so that the citizens of Durban could stay at home as much as possible and not get close to the enemy's stronghold during the bombing and shelling. These arrangements were made in response to the specific situation in southern Africa at the time.

Before the First Global War, the Empire controlled almost half of the continent's colonies, with Southern Africa (later the Republic of South Africa) being the Empire's most important colony on the continent. For hundreds of years, the empire had adopted a policy of softness on the continent, gaining a lot of resources from the colonies while trying to respect the indigenous inhabitants of the colonies. For example, the empire at that time was very respectful of the primitive religion of the indigenous people of the colonies, on the contrary, the European colonists often arranged for missionaries to go to the colonies. The natives of the colony should be Catholic or Christian.

It is precisely because of this that the prestige of the empire in Africa is still quite high. During the First World War, Western coalition forces conquered southern Africa. In order to eradicate the influence of the empire in southern Africa, a policy of terror was carried out, which aroused extreme resentment among the inhabitants of southern Africa, and even broke out several large-scale armed struggles. It was precisely for this reason that the image of the Anglo-French expeditionary force in the minds of the inhabitants of southern Africa was quite bad.

It is for this reason that Tan Renhao and Chang recommended the new restrictions on the scope of the crackdown and the distribution of leaflets to the citizens of Durban, so that if you want to return to southern Africa and gain a foothold here, you must strive for the recognition and support of the residents of southern Africa. In fact, this problem has already manifested, the infrastructure of the port of Cape Town has not been repaired, and the British and French expeditionary forces have been unable to build airfields in various strongholds, all because of the uncooperative attitude of the local population, and even the covert sabotage to provide intelligence and assistance to the Imperial Marines who have retreated inland. All these are also affecting the situation on the battlefield.

After it was established that the enemy stronghold in Durban had been destroyed and that the remnants of the Anglo-French expeditionary force were retreating south by land, the fleet continued south.

On 15 April, the fleet bombed and shelled Mdanchane, completely destroying the stronghold of the British and French expeditionary forces there, and destroying more than a dozen seaplanes, so that there was no time to escape. Mdanchane is a small town of about 20,000 people, and there is a small fishing port, which was an important commercial port a few hundred years ago, but now it is in decline. The inhabitants are also predominantly indigenous. In the crackdown, Tan Renhao and Chang recommended the new script, and while controlling the scope of the crackdown, they also put a batch of leaflets.

On 17 April, the fleet reached about 35 nautical miles southeast of Port Elizabeth.

Port Elizabeth was the third target, and it was the largest stronghold of the Anglo-French Expeditionary Force in Southern Africa outside of Cape Town at the time, and it was also the only deep-water port outside of Cape Town that could accommodate warships.

"This is the information we have received about the location of the strongholds of the British and French expeditionary forces." On a map of Port Elizabeth, Zheng Guanhua marked the location of the British and French expeditionary force strongholds. "Tomorrow, I will arrange a reconnaissance plane to determine the specific situation. Judging by the information obtained now, it is necessary to ensure that there are at least five targets destroyed, while three of them are in the vicinity of residential areas. I discussed with Yang Qinkai that even if a dive bomber was used to bomb, it was impossible to guarantee that the bomb would not be dropped on nearby houses. ”

Tan Renhao frowned. "In other words, it will be impossible to avoid large-scale accidental injuries this time?"

Zheng Guanhua sighed. "We have already thought of a variety of solutions, but these three bases are built almost next to each other in residential areas, and even if we do not consider the anti-aircraft fire on the ground, there is no guarantee that there will be no accidental injuries."

Tan Renhao thought for a while and said, "It seems that we have to think of another way." How many troops were there in the Anglo-French Expeditionary Force stationed in Port Elizabeth? ”

"It won't be less than 2000. This is still based on the ground intelligence previously obtained, and perhaps in the meantime, the forces here have been strengthened. Zheng Guanhua knew what Tan Renhao wanted to do.

"There were less than 500 officers and men of the Marine Corps operating with the ship, and they could not take Port Elizabeth together. And the marines arranged by General Jiang Zhongmin will probably arrive in ten days, and unless we wait, we will have to bear the accidental injury. ”

"There's no way the fleet is going to wait here." Tan Renhao sighed, "You printed a new batch of leaflets to warn the residents near the barracks to take shelter as soon as possible. Delay the bombing time by four hours. ”

"Delay the bombing?" Zheng Guanhua was secretly surprised, "Port Elizabeth is less than 300 nautical miles from Cape Town, and the British and French fighters deployed in Cape Town will definitely arrive in time, if the British and French fighters cannot complete the bombing before they arrive, our bombers will definitely have greater losses." ”

Tan Renhao smiled bitterly, he had already thought of this question. "According to the arrangement I said at the beginning, provide a squadron of escort fighters for the bomber group, and let Ellsloth be responsible for directing the escort operation."

Zheng Guanhua also did not say anything more, he had already made a proposal, and at the insistence of the commander of the fleet. There is little point in making further comments.

When Zheng Guanhua went to arrange reconnaissance and bombing missions, Tan Renhao came to the outside of the commander's cabin. It was not that he was unaware of the dangers of delayed bombing. The fleet is now more than 1,000 nautical miles from Moroni, and even the nearest seaplane base is 800 nautical miles away. Other words. After the loss of the fleet's combat aircraft, it will be difficult to replenish them in a short time unless they return home. And if the bomber is intercepted by enemy fighters while carrying out a bombing mission, there will definitely be losses.

Other than that. If the bomber had been shot down over Port Elizabeth, the chances of the pilot being rescued after a parachute jump or forced landing were quite slim. But as the commander of the fleet, Tan Renhao needs to consider more than just the loss of air forces.

If the bombing is carried out indiscriminately, the number of bomber losses can be controlled, and the result is that if there are large-scale civilian casualties, the residents of Port Elizabeth will definitely complain and even provoke hostility. And as long as this sentiment spreads, it will have a serious negative impact on the future return of the empire to southern Africa. It may even lead to a colonial rebellion, which will sacrifice more Imperial soldiers and consume the Empire's military forces. This is also the main reason why Tan Renhao has always avoided dropping bombs on civilians. The situation in southern Africa was already complicated, and it would not have been acceptable if it had created a little more incident, even if it could be explained and in the interests of the empire at the time.

In addition, the fleet has reached the southern Indian Ocean, and it is only a few hundred nautical miles from the Cape of Good Hope. This is an absolute danger zone, the Anglo-French expeditionary fleet could appear at any time, and the fleet has carried out several bombing operations along the way. It was obviously impossible to retreat at this time, or to wait for the arrival of the marines. While Tan Renhao was thinking about the bombing of Port Elizabeth, he also had to consider the safety of the fleet itself, as well as the possible threats.

The bombing of Port Elizabeth began according to Tan Renhao's revised plan, and this time, Tan Renhao did not let the Third Task Force bombard Port Elizabeth, but left the Third Task Force about 50 nautical miles southwest of the First Task Force to be responsible for close cover.

After the bombers departed, Tan Renhao sent reconnaissance planes on reconnaissance and search missions.

Seaplanes carried by Task Force 3 also took part in the search operation. On top of that, Tan Renhao left half of the bombers on the aircraft carrier and made them ready to take off at any time, while Qiu Gengbo and his men waited for orders at the aviation operations center. The Anglo-French joint expeditionary fleet could appear in any direction in the vicinity at any time, and as soon as it came into contact with the enemy fleet, the bombers had to take off immediately and carry out the task of bombing the enemy fleet.

At this time, Tan Renhao also felt a little nervous, the only way the fleet moved south, the greater the danger, and what made him feel a little uneasy was that there was still no information from the Anglo-French joint expeditionary fleet. According to the plan, tomorrow, he will arrange a group of fighters with the longest range to go to Cape Town to investigate the truth and confirm whether the British and French joint expeditionary fleet has stayed in Cape Town Harbor. But the problem is, maybe before tomorrow comes, Cunningham will suddenly appear on the battlefield!

At two o'clock in the afternoon, the bomber group led by Yang Qinkai returned to the fleet. Soon, the bombing report was sent to Tan Renhao. The bombing of Port Elizabeth was relatively successful, the bombers on the bombing mission were intercepted by British and French fighters, but most of the enemy fighters were routed by the escort fighters led by Ellsler, and the "Golden Eagle" had a huge performance advantage in front of the British "Spitfire" (early model). Only five bombers and fighters did not return, three of them were still forced to land in the open sea, the seaplanes responsible for the rescue work had flown over, while the other three were shot down inland, and the whereabouts of the pilots are unknown. During the entire bombing, about four bombs fell into residential areas near enemy strongholds, and judging from the photos taken by reconnaissance planes, the residents near the strongholds had basically fled before the bombing began, and the incidental civilian casualties should not be very large.

Tan Renhao couldn't relax at this time. Until about five o'clock, the reconnaissance planes had returned one after another, and still nothing had been found, and the Anglo-French joint expeditionary fleet had not appeared at all. Before dark, Tan Renhao ordered the fleet to sail fifty nautical miles to the north, while bringing the Third Task Force a little closer. If Cunningham wanted to attack Task Force 1, he would only be able to attack it at night, so night was the most dangerous.

In the evening, Tan Renhao asked Zheng Guanhua to arrange the next day's reconnaissance of Cape Town Harbor as planned. Because the fleet had to be kept as far away as possible from the strike range of British and French shore-based tactical bombers, fighters with a longer range could only be arranged to carry out reconnaissance missions in the port of Cape Town. To be precise, this is not a reconnaissance mission, the main purpose is to determine whether the Anglo-French joint expeditionary fleet is in Cape Town, if so, then the problem will be easy to handle, but most of the possibilities, the British and French joint expeditionary fleet will not stay in Cape Town, Tan Renhao has to continue to follow the previously determined plan, compress Cunningham's activity space, and force Cunningham out to fight a decisive battle with him!