"Sink and damage at least 50 US transport ships and landing ships of various types! Shooting down more than 100 enemy planes is a great victory......"

"The aviation is really powerful!"

"There must be a lot of American ghost animals drowning now, right?"

"This time, it seems that the US Pacific Fleet can be completely annihilated!"

At 3:22 p.m. on September 26, 1943, Hawaii time, the first attack wave sent back by the Japanese on Christmas Island sent back a preliminary battle report. The pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info war report only has the results of the battle, and there are no losses.

Of course, the results were great, sinking and damaging more than 30 US ships (in fact, 31, of which 13 were T2 tankers and 5 were escort carriers), and shooting down more than 100 US planes (in fact, only 53 US planes were shot down). However, the faces of the commander of the 10th Fleet, Takakijiro Onishi, and the chief of staff, Kuroshima Kameto, were unusually solemn.

Because they also know how big the American fleet is!

"There are hundreds of them!" Kuroshima Kameto whispered to Onishi Takijiro, "And the capital ships are not damaged, and the Americans will continue to approach Christmas Island." Even if they couldn't land, they would have razed Christmas Island to the ground with the battleship's guns. ”

Japan's current construction capacity cannot be compared with that of the United States, and Japan does not have any mechanized construction equipment, so it is not easy to build infrastructure on Christmas Island, which is more than 4,000 nautical miles from the mainland. If the Americans were to raze the ground with a cannon of artillery, it would take at least a few more months to build.

"And the underground oil depot on Christmas Island can't resist the bombardment of battleship artillery!" Kuroshima Kameto then asked a question that gave Onishi Takijiro a headache and a frightening question.

In order to fight the US military on Christmas Island, the Japanese built a large underground oil depot, in which tens of thousands of tons of precious aviation gasoline and various engine oils were stored - airplanes are also oil tigers, with the most fuel-efficient Zero Type 21 theory, an hour of horizontal flight needs to consume about 35 gallons (English), that is, 116.3 kilograms. And a sortie operation costs at least nearly 600 kilograms of gasoline for a Zero aircraft. There are now thousands of airplanes on Christmas Island, so you can imagine how expensive it is. That's why the Japanese army built an oil depot on Christmas Island to store so much gasoline. If the American artillery is blown up, Onishi Takijiro will definitely be so distressed that he will not be able to eat for several weeks.

"Commander, send a telegram to the First Mobile Fleet and let them attack the American fleet carriers with all their might," the Black Island Turtle Man thought for a moment and suggested.

Now the first attack wave sent from Christmas Island has been completed, and the anti-ship fire of the second attack wave is mainly torpedoes, and only a small number of dive bombers carrying armor-piercing shells are used to create chaos and cover torpedo planes to attack American ships that have been damaged. If they are allowed to change their targets to attack the main formation of the US army, which has strong anti-aircraft firepower, they will definitely die in vain. So Kuroshima thought of the First Mobile Fleet.

"Okay, let's generate electricity for the First Mobile Fleet." Onishi Takijiro nodded, now is not the time to think about face, the "unsinkable aircraft carrier" of Christmas Island cannot be in a situation, otherwise there will be a few hundred fewer (now it is estimated that there are no more than 1,000) shore bases on the Japanese side, and the next battle will be difficult to fight.

……

"Sir, the fire is getting bigger and bigger, and the 13 T2 tankers seem to be finished."

"Disposed of!"

Just when Onishi Takijiro was heartbroken for the possible loss of tens of thousands of tons of gasoline, his opponent Spruance ordered to "dispose" 13 T2 tankers loaded with nearly 200,000 tons of various oils without blinking an eyelid!

"There are 17 more ships, and if they are all lost, we may ...... the second phase of our operation," Rear Admiral Browning reminded with some concern.

One T2 can hold 16,000 tons of oil, and 30 T2s can hold a total of 480,000 tons of oil, which can be used by Task Force 58 at sea for up to 30 days. If all the T2s were lost, then Spruance's fleet would have to go home early.

"Send a telegram to the Pacific Fleet Command and ask them to quickly organize a fleet of oil tankers to support," Spruance said lightly, "and send 30 oil tankers to sea first." ”

That's another 480,000 tons of oil! If you take into account the fuel carried by the ships themselves and the fuel used in a refueling at sea a few days ago. Spruance's trip is almost going to burn the Japanese Navy's fuel quota for more than half a year!

And this kind of large-scale "oil war" is just the beginning!

By mid-1944, the Pacific Fleet would be more than twice as large as it is today. At that time, two "58th Task Forces" will take turns to "burn" Japan with oil!

At the same time, there will be at least four aircraft carrier cracking formations and 200 submarines operating in the western Pacific and the islands of the South Sea.

In short, the current way for Americans is to hurt others with their own ...... If you don't fight any war of annihilation, you will fight a war of attrition, and you will be brought down by consuming little Japan alive.

"Sir, the radar has detected enemy aircraft, the defense is 280, the altitude is 5000, the number is more than 200, and the distance is 120 ......"

Just as the American destroyer fired a torpedo at an oil tanker enveloped in flames, the fleet staff officer once again reported the radar detection of the Japanese attack aircraft group.

"It's the second attack wave on Christmas Island." Major General Browning frowned and said, "It seems that the scale will not be smaller than the first attack wave, and there are probably thousands of planes on Christmas Island!" ”

"Soon it won't be." Spruance now looked a little proud, because in the sea and air battle that had just ended, the losses of the American carrier-based aircraft were completely within his acceptable range.

In total, only 63 F4U and F6F were lost (53 were shot down by Japanese aircraft, 8 were mistakenly hit by our own artillery fire, and 2 were damaged during landing). Because the airspace was over our own fleet, the number of killed and missing pilots was only 44, a number that is still declining, and the final loss is estimated to be no more than 30.

And the Americans are now well aware of the tactics of the Japanese naval aviation, which is usually a "two-wave stream", the first wave is dominated by bombers (dive bombers and torpedo machines with bombs hung), and the second is dominated by torpedo machines...... And torpedo machines are much easier to deal with than dive bombers! Therefore, as long as the first wave of the Japanese army attacked, the gains in the second wave of operations would be greater.

If the current situation continues, the battle for Christmas Island will drain the blood of the Japanese pilots!

……

"Baga, how is this possible!?"

This exclamation was made by the commander-in-chief of the second attack wave sent from Christmas Island, Nakasa Kusumi Masa.

And the scene that made him exclaim was the American F6F and F4U fighter jets that filled the sky!

The two attack waves from Christmas Island were carefully planned, and the first and second attack waves were so closely connected that they did not give the US carrier-based aircraft time to land on board and refuel and take off.

Therefore, Kusumi Masasa was very surprised to see the dense US fighter planes in the sky -- according to the normal aircraft carrier aircraft configuration standards, the fighters accounted for 40 percent of the sky. The first wave reported that at least 500 fighters had been encountered, and now it seems that there are 500 fighters here.

So how many carrier-based aircraft did the attacking American fleet have? 2500? How many aircraft carriers should be installed?

However, surprise is surprise, Nanmi Masasa did not have any intention of fighting, and immediately arranged the attack mission. Like Takahashi before him, Kusumi ordered the escorting Tempest and Zero to block the enemy fighters, while dive bombers and torpedo bombers pounced on the convoy carriers and various transport ships that were in flames and smoke.

Fierce battles ensued in the air, although the Hurricane and Zero 52 were inferior to their opponents in overall performance and outnumbered. However, judging from the scenes of the air battle between the two sides, the Japanese fighters did not fall behind.

This is because most of the Japanese pilots who participate in combat today are elites trained before the war, and most of them have participated in actual combat and have a lot of experience. And there are too many novices among the American pilots, although each of them has flown at least 1,000 hours and is extremely skilled, but their combat experience is still lacking.

However, as the fighting continued, the Japanese fighter pilots found it difficult to cope. Their relatively rich combat experience can make up for the difference in aircraft performance, but the American aircraft also has a numerical advantage.

This time the Americans divided more fighters against the Japanese fighters, and the numerical advantage was doubled. That is to say, each Japanese fighter had to fight against an American two-plane formation, and the result was naturally one after another falling down.

It seems that today is the day of the gods of the Japanese air force again!

Kusumi Masasa, on the other hand, did not wait for the fighters to win the battle before leading the torpedo bombers and dive bombers to attack, so he would probably have to flee with the torpedo planes and bombers.

At the moment when the fighters of the two sides were fighting to the death, he immediately led the "Comet" dive bomber, the "Meteor" torpedo bomber, and the "Tianshan" torpedo bomber to launch a dive attack.

Regardless of whether the American planes came down from a high altitude to intercept or from a low altitude and faced the nose head-on, these torpedo bombers and dive bombers of the Japanese all charged with their heads covered.

After paying the price of more than thirty planes being shot down, they finally rushed into the dense net of fire played by American surface ships.

This time, the Japanese attack aircraft group launched a decisive assault on the sea where the US aircraft carrier fleet was concentrated! Although the anti-aircraft fire of the Americans was very intensive, it still could not stop the Japanese planes that bravely charged, and the loss of the American aircraft carrier soon appeared!

At 4:05 p.m., with a loud "boom", an 800-kilogram aviation torpedo dropped by a "Meteor" torpedo bomber pierced through the port side of the escort aircraft carrier USS Breton, blowing up a huge hole, and the sea water suddenly rushed in!