When Richthofen wanted to show his skills in the construction of the bomber force, he encountered a problem, which was not a technical problem, but a problem of profit distribution, and the Junker Aircraft Factory, the Henschel Aircraft Factory and the Dornier Aircraft Factory all wanted a piece of the future Air Force bomber project. Because he knew that the bomber project was too big, and if any of the three wins, then it will be fatal for the other two. This means that the remaining two will be squeezed out of the market. As the holder of the highest power in Germany, Kaiser Wilhelm II also did not want a monopoly to happen. "We have to give everyone a share of the benefits, and too much monopoly is definitely not a good thing," Wilhelm II said to Richthofen more than once. This is the attitude of the emperor, he must carry it out!

History repeats itself at this moment, and almost all of the twin-engine bombers that have ever appeared in Germany were manufactured by the Junkers, Henschel and Dornier aircraft factories. Among them, there are the following types of twin-engine bombers with relatively large output, namely the JU88 series, HE111 series and DO217 series...... Corresponding to the above three aircraft factories, respectively. The JU88 series became the model with the highest output of twin-engine bombers in Germany in World War II because of its production of tens of thousands. At the same time, it is known as a universal bomber because of its good bomb load and range, as well as good dive performance (it is said that it can dive bomb at a 65-degree angle). Although it may be inferior in terms of performance compared to the DO217 (the latter is larger, and the range and bomb load are also longer. But it still shouldered the heavy responsibility of the Third Reich's ground attack..........

Of course, in addition to the above three aircraft, Junkers also has bombers like JU188, JU288, and JU388, and Dornier also has bombers like DO317, many of which are advanced in performance, but either because of too late production or insufficient production, it has no impact on the war. In addition to being a bomber, Germany also used it as a night fighting aircraft in the middle and late periods of history. Both the JU88 and DO217 have a professional Night War version. After being equipped with radar and a large number of machine guns. These bombers turned into night killers.

From a performance point of view. The performance of these bombers is approximate and the capabilities overlap with each other. There is indeed a suspicion of wasting resources. After all, from the point of view of function. A single JU88 is capable of performing almost all the tasks, and there is no need for three factories to design three aircraft at the same time. If only from the point of view of feeding other bid-losers. It would be enough for the other two factories to share part of the production tasks.

Because in the future, twin-engine bombers will become the main force of the Luftwaffe's ground-to-sea attack, so Richthofen and others are very concerned about the tender for medium bombers, as early as the initial stage of the tender, the Luftwaffe has very clear requirements for the upgrade potential and versatility of bombers. "The bomber had to have enough range to cover the entire continent of Western Europe from Germany. At the same time, the bomb load must be more than 1.5 tons. The space inside the machine must be large enough. The internal single layer could accommodate 500kg of bombs. And there is an internal magazine, and there is also the potential to accommodate 800kg class bombs. The external pylons should have the ability to hang 1800kg bombs (in the history of attacking the Sevastopol fortress, the JU88 really carried 1800kg bombs). But the author estimates that under such loads, it is almost impossible to dive. "In the Luftwaffe tender, this is how the definition of a medium bomber ..........

In addition to this, the German Navy wanted to request the development of a twin-engine torpedo bomber capable of flying torpedoes to carry out long-range attack missions on the basis of medium bombers. And it was proposed that such a bomber could mount at least 2 torpedoes at a time. The German Army is considering whether it is possible to install a 50mm or even larger caliber gun for medium bombers to strike at ground point targets, if the 20mm or 37mm guns are not powerful enough to guarantee the destruction of tanks, then a twin-engine aircraft with a 50mm or even 75mm cannon will become an out-and-out tank opener! …。

On the one hand, the Germans realized that it was obviously beyond the technical requirements to let the big guys weighing dozens of tons dive, and on the other hand, Germany in this plane had enough materials for them to squander. Historically, the Third Reich's emphasis on blitzkrieg and the precision of ground attacks was partly due to tactical and strategic objectives, but also due to poor resource endowments. Single-engine and twin-engine bombers dive bombing accuracy is high. Even if the four-engine bomber bombs horizontally at low altitude, the accuracy is still not comparable to that of dive bombing. In fact, the accuracy of the bombing of Germany by the United States and Britain was not too high. Even with the legendary Norton bombing sight, the accuracy was not good. The reason for the huge results was completely due to the bombing volume of bombers! It is different from the United States and Britain, which often sent hundreds or thousands of four-round heavy bombers to bomb in the middle and late stages. The production of the HE177, the only mass-produced heavy bomber in Germany in World War II, ended up being just over 1,000. Strategic bombing was really not something Germany could afford to play. And it's not just that production capacity can't keep up...... Fuel is also not keeping up with ..........

Take HE177A0 as an example, the fuel carrying capacity of the aircraft varies between 8800L and 12660L according to the different bomb loads, that is, this bomber makes one sortie, and the fuel consumption is at least 6 tons or more! What is this concept? The full fuel load of the F190 fighter is only 500kg, and the fuel consumption of one HE177 is at least equivalent to the internal fuel of 12 F190s. With the maximum internal oil, it is even close to the required internal oil of 20 F190s! How much jet fuel did Germany produce in a year at that time? Taking a step back, if German industrial capacity is fine. If you do a thousand-plane bombing. At least about 8,000 tons of fuel will be consumed! And if we consider the fuel consumption of long-range fighters that need to cooperate with the bombing. Then the price of such a wave is really high and scary. At least not what historical Germany could afford.

But this plane was different, and not only did Germany not lose a large part of East Prussia. There were even large tracts of land from the remains of the Normanov dynasty, and even the Caucasus oil fields were under the control of the German allies. The other oil-producing countries of Iraq and Kuwait are also under the control of Turkey. So Germany has three oil depots in Romania, Transcaucasia and the Middle East at the same time! Such an abundant supply of fuel can naturally meet the needs of Germany's foreign expansion, and at the same time, it also gives Germany's strategic bomber force a certain material basis! At the same time, because the strength of the Allies covered almost the entire European and West Asian regions, and even Germany wanted to expand in the direction of the Indian Ocean, it also made the existence of the German strategic air force necessary, and it was almost unimaginable to carry out combat missions with twin-engine bombers in such a vast place! …。

Speaking of the historical HE177 bomber. The most influential thing is definitely the DB610 engine formed by two DB605 engines in parallel. In order to reduce wind resistance and have a certain dive capability, the Germans abandoned the conventional layout of 4 engines in favor of this somewhat non-mainstream arrangement. As a result, the problem is poor engine heat dissipation. This leads to the fact that sometimes it is easy to fail when the engine is at a high speed, and the problem is not solved in the end. Therefore, it is generally believed that the HE177 is not as good as the Italian P108. But on paper, HE177 is about the same as B17 and Lancaster at the same time. As for the later improvements, for example, the post-war HE274V1 engine performed well because of the layout of 4 engines, of course, at that time, the United States already had B29, and HE177 and B29 must not be compared. In short, for Germany, which still has two engine technologies, there is no big problem in technology to build a strategic bomber, the key is design and industrial capacity. …。

After abandoning the need for dive bombing, the Germans went relatively smoothly on the road to strategic bombers. Messerschmidt, Juncker and Henschel simultaneously came up with their own bomber proposals. Originally, this matter was already enough, but a week before the tender for strategic bombers, Wilhelm II suddenly summoned Richthofen and took out a document. "Both the Americans and China are engaged in a six-engine heavy bomber, and if they succeed, then the US Air Force can bomb Europe from the mainland, which is quite unfavorable for us. They call it an intercontinental bomber! And we should have such weapons as well. Wilhelm II said indignantly..........

"That was an absolute nightmare, Your Majesty. If they dare to do so. Richthofen's eyebrows jumped when he heard this. This was simply unimaginable for him. In terms of the complexity of the aircraft, as well as in terms of cost and efficacy...... Such intercontinental bombers are currently almost impossible to equip in large quantities. And Germany does not have such a need at the moment. The German General Staff also has no intention of attacking the American mainland, so this plan is a bit chicken! "This could be the disinformation they unleashed." Richthofen said in his heart.

This time Richthofen guessed correctly, the Germans did have a problem with intelligence, the United States wanted to build a six-engine bomber, but gave up because of the technical difficulty, and Huaxia also wanted to build a six-engine aircraft, but this plane was not a bomber but a transport plane. If it weren't for the fact that now the power of the engine is too small and forced to compensate for the quality with quantity. Huaxia also doesn't want to make this kind of 6-round Dongdong.

"Your Majesty, this will be a very long process, we need experience and technology accumulation, if the 4-engine heavy bomber can be successfully developed, I think the future 6-engine bomber is still feasible." In the face of the Kaiser's request, Richthofen had no way to make a hard top, so he could only find a way to delay it first. The Kaiser knew that this plan was a bit too presumptuous, and was quite satisfied with Richthofen's answer.........

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