Battle of the Third Reich Chapter 38: Assaulted
The British Royal Navy heavy cruiser Devonshire. This is a behemoth with a displacement of more than 13,300 tons. The 110mm thick armor and the built-in lightning protection compartment gave her Perfect protection, and the eight huge 204mm main guns are enough to send enemy ships of the same level into the cold hell.
The powerful steam engine in her body can provide 80,000 horsepower, which allows her to make a variety of stunning maneuvers like a destroyer and enables her to have a top speed of more than 30 knots.
"This is a perfect cruiser." The Captain of the Devonshire, Colonel Carson, looked at the majestic guns pointing straight ahead under the bridge and exclaimed triumphantly. He imagined himself commanding this ship. Elite warships sent those **** Nazi warships one by one to the bottom of the sea.
"Captain Carterson, how far are we from our destination now." A voice pulled the captain back from his dream.
The navy colonel felt a little dissatisfied, and he turned his head to wonder who broke his dream.
The first thing that came into Catson’s eyes was a set of stiff tawny military uniforms, with two rows of neatly decorated badges on the chest pockets. The fiery red collar and the beautiful crown on the shoulders and a diamond-shaped star emblem proved this. The identity of the owner of the uniform.
"Ah, Lieutenant Colonel Sanders, why are you here? What can I do for you?" Carterson immediately said with a smile on his face.
"Nothing, Mr. Captain." Sanders knew that the question before him was raised in vain, and the navy officer didn't listen to anything.
"I just want to ask, when will we reach our destination."
"Oh, my dear Lieutenant Colonel, according to our current speed, it is estimated that we will be able to reach our destination early tomorrow morning." Carterson answered with a smile.
"This, Mr. Captain, you know the importance of our mission. I hope to be able to land tonight. Can you speed up our progress and can you reach our landing site before midnight today." Sanders frowned.
"It's difficult to do, Lieutenant Colonel. You have to know that we are on the edge of the enemy-controlled sea and close to the minefields laid by the Norwegians. Any trouble here will not surprise me." Cartson turned and looked at the vast sea outside the window and said.
"If possible, of course I am willing to use the fastest speed to pass through this dangerous place everywhere. But the current situation does not allow me to do so. We have to guard against enemy submarine attacks. Intelligence says the enemy may We will send submarines to patrol this area. If we move forward at full speed, we will not be able to use our underwater listening devices. Our own noise will completely mask the sound of German submarines.
And the noise made by the ship at high speed is likely to expose our position to those submarines. We are not worried that any German submarine that is not afraid of death will dare to attack us, but they will turn those **** German torpedo boats And the plane leads over. To know that it would be very dangerous to be attacked by torpedo boats and bombers in such a place. I don't want to use my warship to take such unnecessary risks, so now we can only move forward at this speed. "Carterson looked helpless.
"But Captain Carterson, you have to understand the arduousness of our mission, and even London attaches great importance to this operation." Sanders felt that carrying out the background of this mission might give this stubbornness. The navy colonel added a little sense of urgency. But he obviously failed, and Carterson didn't seem to care about it at all.
"Lieutenant Colonel, I know the importance of this mission, and I also know how it will help our empire. But this is on the sea, not London. This is my battleship, it’s me The fleet. You are responsible for your mission, and I am also responsible for my warships. On land, you have to listen to the orders of your War Department, but when you arrive at sea, you have to listen to my command. And there is no time for this mission. Clearly stipulate when and where we must arrive, and those planners also understand the difficulty of navigating at sea. My task is to send you and your soldiers safely to Norway and then safely take you back to Britain. The fleet must Reach the destination in concealed safety, and now this speed is the limit to ensure that I complete this task. I must bring this precious fleet back to the UK intact. Now the Royal Navy has no power to consume anymore. "Carterson said seriously.
"Ming... Understood." Sanders knew that he couldn't persuade the navy officer, so he had to give up his opinion temporarily.
"Then I will leave, and I have to prepare my soldiers for landing. By the way, you said that you will arrive early tomorrow morning, right?"
"Yes, Mr. Lieutenant Colonel, I can assure you of this." Cartson was very uncomfortable with the army officer not only using London to press himself, but also wanting to intervene in the command of the fleet. He raised his binoculars and pretended to observe the sea, and answered coldly without looking back, adding a trace of impatience to his usual gentleness.
Sanders heard the meaning in the captain's tone, and he didn't want to be boring anymore, so he turned around and left the bridge after paying a standard military salute.
When Sanders walked down the stairs inside the bridge, he found that his adjutant was waiting for him under the stairs with several other officers.
"Sir, how did you ask?" his adjutant asked.
"We will land early tomorrow morning to prepare all the soldiers. After dinner, all the officers will meet in my room to discuss the landing details."
"What! Tomorrow morning, don't we need to act during the day? What does the captain think, landing in broad daylight under the noses of the Germans, this is not for us to die." The adjutant said loudly To.
"Enough, Captain Willis, you must pay attention to your tone. You are attacking a high-ranking officer." Sanders stopped his adjutant from continuing to complain, and then he lowered his voice and said, "What's up to me? Let’s talk about the room where I complained that the decision made by a senior officer had a bad influence, understand?"
"Yes, Lieutenant Colonel." The adjutant nodded quickly.
Sanderson led his men out of the bridge and walked along the deck to the officer’s cabin at the stern.
"Now I find it really boring, we are walking back and forth in the S-type at sea, I doubt that tomorrow morning we will be able to reach our destination." An officer looked at a destroyer that was turning in front of the warship. To.
"I believe the captain's words, he should be responsible for what he promised, how can the Royal Navy regard honor as life like us, and he will definitely fulfill his promise." Sanderson also turned his head towards that. The destroyer looked out.
Suddenly, a sharp sirens rang from the destroyer in the distance, which sounded heart-piercing even if it was so far away.
"What happened, did you find the enemy?" The army officers all turned around and gathered by the railing of the deck, and everyone looked at the warship that was screaming frantically in doubt.
"Alarm, alarm, everyone is in position, everyone arrives at their respective combat positions. Alarm, alarm." At this time, the first officer's command sounded from the huge speaker at the top of the bridge, followed by Devonshire. The number also began to raise a deafening battle alert.
The deck of this battleship suddenly became turbulent. Countless sailors got out of their large and small hatches, and then rushed towards their respective posts. The anti-aircraft gunners hurriedly took out the shells from the ammunition box, and then desperately turned the control wheel, the dense muzzle of the 40mm anti-aircraft gun pointed straight into the air and searched for the enemy plane back and forth. The huge turret of the secondary battery also began to rotate slowly, and the muzzle pointed in any direction that might encounter the enemy. The sailors yelled to encourage each other, no one asked, no one doubted, everyone was excited about being able to participate in the battle, and the Royal Navy maintained their pride and high morale. The entire battleship is now like an enraged hedgehog, revealing its sharp spikes in all directions.
"Where is the enemy? Why didn't I see it." Captain Willis asked Sanders.
"I don't know, I didn't find anything." Sanders also looked confused. He looked at the destroyer that had stopped turning and was desperately trying to turn around in the other direction. He didn't understand what happened. whats the matter.
"Excuse me, did we meet the enemy?" An officer under Sanders grabbed an old sailor who was running past them and asked eagerly.
"I don't know, you should go to the officer's room, it is not safe on the deck. Please let me go, I still have a job, sir." The old sailor struggled to get rid of the officer's palm, anxious Hastily ran towards the stern of the ship.
"He's right, let's go to the cabin. We stay on the deck and do nothing but hinder the soldiers."
Sanders led his officers and hurriedly walked towards the nearby officers’ restaurant. Sanders noticed that the deck of the Devonshire suddenly began to tremble, and the warship had significantly increased its speed. Now Devonshire is working hard to turn.
"Now I think something is wrong." Sanders stopped. The soldier's special premonition of danger made him think that he must be in big trouble this time.
"Boom!" A dull explosion sounded not far away, and Sanders quickly turned his head and looked at the place where the explosion occurred. As a result, he saw only a thick water column falling from the side of the destroyer that was turning in a panic. The destroyer's hull was obviously distorted by some force and then restored to its original shape, but the kind of steel friction. The harsh noise still passed into Sanders' ears clearly. The sight in front of him stunned the lieutenant colonel.
"Is it a shelling?" Sanders searched the nearby sea carefully with his eyes to know where the shelling came from.
At this moment, another dull explosion sounded from the destroyer, and an equally huge water column once again rose from the side of the battleship. The position where the destroyer was shot seemed to have a huge hand out of the sea. Leaving the surface of the water as if holding her, the entire battleship suddenly turned into an arch bridge, and the middle of the battleship suddenly protruded, and then restored to its original shape in the next second, smashing back into the water fiercely, causing splashes. Exceed the height of the mast.
"It's a torpedo!"
Sanders finally understood why the warship had to turn so panicked, she was avoiding the threat of approaching from the bottom of the sea. It's a pity that she discovered this threat was too late, and after the final efforts, she still couldn't escape the catastrophe.
"God, there is a German submarine here!" Sanders exclaimed: "We were attacked by a German submarine."
He stared at the poor destroyer dumbfounded. Now the destroyer has been torpedoed in two, the stern is mostly submerged in the sea, and the bow has been lifted off the water and continued to slowly Leaning upward, you can now clearly see the red bottom of the ship covered with vine gourds under the battleship's waterline. Those sailors who survived were crying and fell into the sea from the gradually vertical deck, and then were sucked into the hull by the swirling vortex of the hull. The sailors who had escaped the catastrophe were trying hard to swim out of the sunken ship. We all know that the next vortex will be much larger than this, and that will be the last struggle of this destroyer.
The Devonshire did not slow down her speed. She continued her turning motion. Sanders watched the destroyer tremble violently on the sea surface, followed by the wailing of metal twisting and breaking. It sank to the bottom of the sea at an incredible speed.
Devon drove past the wreck of the poor destroyer, and now she can do nothing about the sailors who are struggling in the sea, because the underwater demon who sunk them must still be there watching this All in all, she couldn't stop and save these poor people at the risk of being attacked. The sailors can only desperately throw their life-saving equipment into the sea, and shout loudly to encourage those comrades who are struggling in the water.
"Damn German submarine, these poor sailors, can't we help them." Looking at the tragic scene before him, Willis called Sanders angrily. But Sanders didn't answer his question. He watched those people bowed their heads, and his eyes were full of hatred anger. He secretly vowed in his heart that one day he would demand this blood debt from the Germans.
At this moment, there were two more violent explosions coming from the direction of the stern of the ship. The two explosions occurred almost simultaneously, but Sanders felt strange that they sounded like they came from different directions.
"Lieutenant Colonel, our two other destroyers were also shot." An officer called out loudly. I don't know when, he climbed onto the platform of the high stern aircraft catapult, and now he pointed to the rising smoke of the two destroyers not far away and shouted.
"How could it be like this?" Sanders murmured while looking at the two warships that were 1,500 meters apart.
"It must be like this. We must have encountered more than just a submarine. Oh my God, we were so foolishly entering a well-designed ambush circle."
Sanders remembered that his father had told him the same experience. During World War I, his father was a naval officer. As a result, his fleet was made up of two German submarines while transporting supplies to France. As a result, the entire fleet was sent to the bottom of the sea by the Germans. Every time he talks about that terrible night, the old man’s eyes are filled with fear, and then there are tears of old people. He is the only survivor of that massacre. , Where he lost all his friends and subordinates as well as his pride and confidence.
Is it your turn now? Sanderson felt his scalp numb~IndoMTL.com~ The horrible impression of German submarines was deeply ingrained in the minds of every generation of British who had gone through that war, including those born after the war.
"This is not the last war, and this is not a merchant ship without the ability to resist. Now I am riding on the most elite warship of the Royal Navy. My father's encounter will definitely not happen to me again." Sanderson comforted himself, but when he looked up and saw the two destroyers that were burning, he couldn't help but start to drum up again.
The continuous blows have made the Devonshire panicked. Now she has lost most of her **** force. What’s more terrifying is that all this happened in just two minutes, which made this heavy cruiser A little at a loss. The morale that had once boiled with blood disappeared without a trace in the face of this cruel reality.
There are only two options before Devonshire. One is to abandon those struggling compatriots and speed up to leave this place of right and wrong. The second option is to lead the remaining destroyers to deal with the German submarines to the end to save their compatriots and the British Royal Navy with little honor left.
Sanders ran towards the bridge desperately. He wanted to stop the stubborn Carterson before he made that kind of wrong and stupid decision. Because he had a vague premonition in his heart, which naval colonel would choose A road, a road that might push everyone into hell.
Sanders felt a strong ominous premonition in his heart, and what worries him is that his premonition has always been very accurate.
There is something else that can scare Sanders right now, and that is, him. . . . can not swim.