When Luo Jinming's telegram was sent back to the fleet, the second wave of bombers led by Major Deng Zichao was taking off. Tan Renhao was not surprised, nor did he feel nervous, but breathed a sigh of relief. The reason is simple, the departure time of the Japanese fleet turned out to be half an hour later than his worst judgment. In other words, Task Force 1 had half an hour more time to prepare for combat.

The "Osprey" piloted by Deng Zichao was the last to leave the "Taizu" aircraft carrier. By this time, 40 dive bombers, 44 torpedo bombers, and 24 reinforced escort fighters that had carried out the first round of bombing of the Ryukyu Islands had already left the carrier. The 108 fighters divided into three formations, and then left the sky over the fleet and headed for the direction of the Japanese First Air Fleet.

Instead of immediately returning to the core of the fleet, the three carriers continued to eject 36 fighters. This is the main force of the fleet's air defense that Tan Renhao took out, and this is also the last batch of fighters he has left. Counting the 24 fighters that have been carrying out air defense patrol missions over the fleet, at this time, 60 air defense fighters have been concentrated over the first task force. Although the performance of the "Sparrowhawk" is not as good as that of the "Zero Battle", the huge number can still determine the situation of air defense operations. More importantly, the high-speed dive performance of the "Sparrowhawk" is the most important performance of the air defense interceptor. It may not work to fight a "zero battle", but it is more than enough to fight a "99 ship explosion" and "97 ship attack".

As soon as the 36 fighters took to the skies, the group led by Major Zhang Naiding returned to the skies over the fleet. The crews on the three aircraft carriers were busy again. There are 110 fighters in this group, and according to Tan Renhao's requirements, all the fighters must be recovered within 20 minutes and then all of them must be put into the hangar.

Prior to this, Lei Shaoqing suggested that Tan Renhao should quickly send out a third wave of bombers, so that the strike force of the fleet could be brought into full play before the aircraft carrier suffered losses. However, Tan Renhao refused, for the simple reason that there was no time to refuel these bombers, mount bombs, and let them take off. This is a very important decision, if Tan Renhao adopted Lei Shaoqing's opinion at that time, then the First Air Force would definitely be finished.

After receiving all the returning fighters, the three carriers returned to the core of the fleet. At the same time, the 1st Task Force formed an air defense formation, and all heavy cruisers, destroyers, including anti-aircraft artillery on aircraft carriers, were pointed to the sky. After the anti-aircraft sirens sounded, all the anti-aircraft gunners went to their positions and waited for the arrival of the Japanese bomber group.

"Chief of Staff, the radar of the 'Li Jing' has detected a large number of planes approaching 50 nautical miles."

"Is it Colonel Luo Jinming's fighter plane?" A staff officer for a very idiotic question.

Tan Renhao sneered and immediately said: "Sound the air raid siren, the air defense fighters immediately go to intercept the enemy planes, and the fleet enters a combat state." ”

It was the bomber group led by Mishio Fuchizu who came. However, he did not know that the heavy cruisers of the Tang Empire were equipped with radars, and the performance of the radars on the "Li Jing" had improved a lot, and even in bad weather, it was possible to detect a group of aircraft 50 nautical miles away and a single fighter 30 nautical miles away. If the weather is good, it can even detect a fleet of aircraft up to 70 nautical miles away.

The 60 "Sparrowhawks" that received the call quickly killed in the direction of the Japanese bomber group. Japanese naval aviation still took the approach of close escort. The escort fighters were in front of the bombers, about 5 minutes ahead of schedule, and they flew at an altitude of 1,000 meters higher than the bomber group. This escort tactic had its own advantages and disadvantages with the forward escort tactics adopted by the Tang Imperial Navy. However, in the face of a large fleet of anti-aircraft fighters, the shortcomings of this escort tactic are extremely obvious.

The first batch of 8 Sparrowhawks swooped down directly from a height of 5,000 meters and attacked the 24 "Zeros" flying in front of the Japanese bomber group. Hao Dongjue, who was in charge of air defense command, gave these eight "Sparrowhawks" the task of entangled the escort in the "Zero Battle" and created an opportunity for other air defense fighters to attack the Japanese bombers behind.

Just as the "Zero Battle" was engaged with the "Sparrowhawk", the "Sparrowhawk" from two other directions quickly attacked the Japanese bomber group at an altitude of 3,000 meters. More than 30 Sparrowhawks killed more than a dozen Japanese bombers in the first round of dive attacks. Then, the last group of "Sparrowhawks" rushed to the battlefield and immediately attacked.

In the sky, more than 80 Japanese bombers were immediately blindfolded, but Mishio Fuchizu did not forget to call the escort fighters, and at the same time ordered the surrounding bombers to gather together and cover each other with machine guns in the back seat to resist the attack of the Tang Imperial Navy fighters. The command of Miyuo Fuchizu saved a lot of bombers, and he was an experienced pilot who knew very well that when attacked by air defense fighters, the only way was for the bombers to cover each other, and if they acted alone, they would soon be shot down by the fighters.

The air battle entered a white-hot stage, and more than 20 "Zero Battles" immediately got rid of the "Sparrowhawks" that were pestering them, turned back to the sky over the bomber formation, and met the "Sparrowhawks" that were attacking the bombers. The fighter pilots of the Tang Empire did not care about the attack of the "Zero Battle" at all, they knew very well that in order to ensure the safety of the aircraft carrier, it was necessary to shoot down the Japanese bombers, and those "Zero Battles" did not pose a threat to the aircraft carrier. Similarly, the Japanese fighter pilots knew very well that in order to destroy the aircraft carriers of the Tang Empire, they had to protect the bombers and let the bombers reach the skies above the Tang Empire's fleet.

There was a very strange scene in the air. The Sparrowhawk chased the Japanese bombers and opened fire, while behind the Sparrowhawk was the "Zero Battle" firing fiercely. Pilots on both sides are desperate. The pilots of the Sparrowhawk no longer even make evasive maneuvers, they all had only one idea, that is, to shoot down a Japanese bomber before they were shot down, then even if they were shot down, it would be a good deal.

Air battles were fought from the air at a distance of 50 nautical miles from the fleet to the vicinity of the fleet. More than thirty Japanese bombers have already been shot down. At this time, the Japanese aircraft group was also divided into two groups, the "99 Ship Explosion" continued to attack the aircraft carrier at the core of the fleet, and the "97 Ship Attack" circled and lowered its altitude, preparing to enter from a low altitude.

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