"Reporting to the Chief, we have just received a report from Water Reconnaissance No. 1o. An enemy cruiser fleet appeared in the northwest of Grand Bahamas. No trace of battleships and aircraft carriers has been observed yet. You can read the book ww?w?·1k?a?nshu·cc."

On the combat bridge of the flagship "Ohio" of the US Atlantic Fleet, the US Navy staff officer in a white uniform reported the latest information about the enemy fleet to Harold Stark, the current commander of the US Atlantic Fleet in a handsome standing posture and a thick tone. The tall, thin and slightly thin US Navy general was looking at the distant sea with a silent look. The dark clouds in front of him were rolling and the surging waves always gave people a depressing and dangerous sensory experience. Indeed, Stark just now looked at the distance.

He just led the American Atlantic Fleet to win two naval battles, "Emerald Night Battle" and "Emerald Morning Battle", and thus quickly became a household name, but the glory of victory did not penetrate his mind. This US Navy general who had experienced the Battle of the Yar Islands knew how tenacity his opponent was, and he also knew that some pain would not only not make a beast afraid, but would arouse its violent beast nature. The American Atlantic Fleet seemed to be fighting a battle with a downwind, but in fact it was a big adventure with uncertain future.

After listening to the report, Stark said nothing, but nodded slightly. In such a bad weather, it was not easy for the pilot of the water reconnaissance plane to persist in flying, and he could also detect information about the enemy fleet. Not to mention whether this information can help his fleet with its own fleet, this extraordinary courage alone deserves a Navy Cross.

The Chief of Staff of the Fleet standing beside Stark, the fashionable and unknown Brigadier General Chester William Nimitz said: "Although the weather is very bad, I feel that the opponent is fully prepared to fight."

Stark took out a piece of chocolate wrapped in tinfoil from his pocket, broke off a piece of finger-sized body and stuffed it into his mouth, as if he was replenishing energy for his intense brain activity. At the end of reading 1 cc, he took out his handkerchief, wiped his lips roughly, and then responded to Nimitz's words: "I hope they are willing to have a dignified duel with us, so that we still have 30% chance of winning. If they plan to win by strategy, we may only have 10% chance of winning... and 70% chance of getting out of here."

Nimitz responded with a humility and arrogance: "But we are fighting for that 10% chance of victory. Retreat without any loss will not change the current bad situation. Once MacArthur's legion cannot defend the Florida Peninsula, we can only hope for a decisive victory in the six areas of Marshall's armored legion. However, to achieve such a deep reversal, the army and the people need to have enough mental tenacity, which is what we currently lack."

"We are not inconvenient to evaluate the 6th Army and are not qualified to say more. After all, in the Yar Islands, our failure implicated the 6th Army and the Air Force, causing them to discard a large number of experienced officers and soldiers and a large number of heavy equipment there." At this point, Stark seemed a little disappointed.

Nimitz stood up to this: "I am bluntly speaking, General, if the top leaders of the 6th Army had the courage to spare no expense, we would have carried out the Battle of San Miguel as scheduled, so that the Yar Islands would not have had any subsequent changes."

As a responsible general, Stark admitted: "The 6th Army had the 6th Army's concerns, and we and the British Navy felt that they were more than 90% sure to win the naval battle, so that the 6th Army would take down the last two islands with as little as possible. At that time, except for a few naturally pessimistic factions, no one questioned this, including me. Objectively speaking, it was the enemy's outstanding move and our hesitation that together caused the final result. The 6th Army did not need to bear too much responsibility for this."

Nimitz fell silent, his eyes seemingly confused.

At this moment, the left-wing warning ship of the US fleet, the light cruiser "St. Louis" equipped with a new sea detection radar, suddenly came to the battle alarm. The large enemy fleet appeared more than 40 miles in the left front of the fleet. However, just a few minutes later, the combat alarm that made all officers and soldiers nervous was lifted. The reason was that the radar operator of the USS St. Louis regarded the echo signal of the waves as a huge Allied fleet, and in fact there was nothing but the rolling waves there.

In the following time, the US Atlantic Fleet continued to travel south, and new intelligence followed one after another. First, another water reconnaissance aircraft captured the traces of the Allied main fleet under extremely difficult circumstances, but the pilot lost contact before he could send all the information back. Immediately afterwards, two destroyers on the right wing of the fleet appeared enemy ships moving nearby, and they quickly detected strong radio signals.

At 6 pm, the US Atlantic Fleet had sailed to more than 50 nautical miles northwest of Grand Bahamas Island, and the outline of the islands and reefs in the northern part of Grand Bahamas Island began to appear on the radar screen of the "St. Louis".

At 6:11, the "St. Louis" issued a combat alarm for the second time, and this time the radar operator's judgment was accurate. A Allied combat fleet composed of more than 60 large and small ships, roughly divided into front and back teams, formed into an arrow battle formation, and rushed from the left wing of the US fleet with 2O junctions.

At first glance, the US fleet occupied most of the T-shaped horizontal head, which was conducive to wielding the fleet's firepower, but both sides were outside the normal combat range at this time. The Allied fleet only needed a slight adjustment to concentrate artillery fire to attack the advance formation or left-wing guard formation of the US fleet, and then set aside again before the US main warship swayed its power.

At that time, the US fleet will be passive in chasing or not.

At 6:14, the flagship of the US fleet, the USS Ohio, issued combat commands to the entire fleet. While maintaining radar contact, the left-wing guard team moved closer to the battleship itself, and the right-wing guard team joined forces with the lightning strike team coming from Jacksonville Port to simultaneously narrow the distance with the battleship itself.

Six minutes later, the "Ohio"'s shooting command room got the first shooting parameters: the enemy fleet's distance is 40,000 yards, the azimuth o33, and the 21 knots!

In a suffocating atmosphere, time quietly passed, and the distance between the two sides gradually narrowed from 36,000 meters to 30,000 meters, which was getting closer and closer to the firefighting distance between the main fleets of the two sides in the first naval battle of San Miguel.

"Report to the sir, the enemy fleet is changing its course counterclockwise, and the current distance from us is...thirty thousand seven hundred yards!"

In the battle bridge protected by heavy armor, the staff officer reported the latest enemy situation to the fleet commander with a nervous expression. The officers present did not distinguish between military ranks, and it seemed that everyone was paying attention to these sensitive data.

Stark raised his jaw slightly and ordered in Kong Wu's powerful tone: "Transfer, all ships must abide by their respective combat positions, obey the flagship orders, keep calm, be sure to keep calm!"

The messenger did not dare to have any delay and immediately forwarded the order to the radio room via phone.

As expected, the Allied Fleet completed the first round of tactical maneuvers and took the initiative to attack. The front team was in a sudden increase, and the front line pointed directly at the advance formation in the US fleet, and fired the first artillery of the naval battle at 6:29.

The cruiser fleet under Gunther Lütjens has 5 heavy cruisers and 3 light cruisers. It is good at mid-range saturated artillery like a storm. Torpedo launching at critical moments is also a very sharp killer weapon. In addition to the Italian heavy cruiser "Glicia", the other four heavy cruisers are equipped with German fire control radars. Stark's cruiser suffered a considerable loss in the morning battle of Jade. At this time, although the advance formation responsible for the reconnaissance had 9 light cruisers and 7 destroyers, only 2 New Orleans-class heavy cruisers that were in service during the war were equipped with fire control radars. The other 14 ships could only conduct night battles through a combination of detection radar and visual observation.

At the beginning of the battle, the vanguard teams of both sides were 24,000 yards apart, about 22 ooo meters. This was the combat range that could only be achieved by the main guns of the battleships during the last battle. The development and innovation of technology have greatly improved the effective range of the carrier-based artillery. Under the guidance of the fire control radar, the cruiser formations of the Allied countries quickly made the opponent feel the huge pressure on the tactical and psychological levels. The US organized heavy cruisers to invest in this long-range artillery battle, and formed six of the seven destroyers into a team, and launched a tentative attack on the enemy with the help of the cover of the rain curtain.

The enemy destroyers, which are now in a separate formation and are attacking high, quickly adjusted the direction of the muzzle with the Allied advance ships of the Griffon and Dagda. When the American destroyer team approached 18ooo meters, the 9 24o mm main guns of the Griffon instantly roared, and the three rounds of accurate shooting caused near-loss damage to the leader of the American destroyer "Ronard". Under the leadership of the Griffon, the Irish heavy patrol "Dagda", the German heavy patrol "Augsburg", and the Puerfatz

The "Soviet" and the Italian Navy's "Grisia" poured artillery fire on the US destroyers, and the three light cruisers also used fire control radars or target parameters from the lead ship to shoot at the enemy. In an instant, the storm and storm were covered with red artillery flames. How could those American destroyers with displacement between 14oo and 18oo tons resist such fierce artillery fire? In a short while, three of them were reduced due to war damage. Seeing that the tactic of frontal assault could not work, the commander of the US advance formation quickly recalled the destroyer team that was attacking.

Listening to the rumbling cannons passing through the rain screen, Stark, who seemed calm, was always paying attention to the exchange of fire between the two advance teams. Hearing that his outpost troops were in a disadvantage, he couldn't help but frown: Should he draw combat power to reinforce, or let the advance formation fight and retreat, and lead the enemy to his own gun? Mobile phone users should visit http://m.piaotian.net
Chapter completed!