The night on August 23, 1944 enveloped the estuary of the Demerala River. The cloudless night sky was clearly visible, and the Atlantic Ocean surface reflecting light under the moonlight was almost connected. Such a good weather night is really suitable for a landing war that can change the fate of mankind.

On the south bank of the Demerala River, the city of Georgetown, with densely packed shanty town, seemed to have become an empty city without people. The whole city was dark, and there was no sign of defense on the beach suitable for landing. Only the several old bulk cargo ships that were sunk near the estuary and Georgetown's small port, with the superstructure exposed to the water, and the dock facilities that were dismantled and destroyed, showed that the European Community army did take some defensive measures.

The Fletcher-class destroyer "William D. Porter" belonging to the 31.8th Destroyer Brigade of the US Navy, ventured near the estuary of the Demerala River at around 9 pm on the 24th under the cover of night.

The bow of this "Fletcher-class destroyer" is now hung with a "Thunder Breaking Guard" specifically for dealing with anchors and lightnings. Three or four thousand meters ahead of it, there is also a "Rope" class minesweeper with a demagnetization. The 890-ton hull is not only equipped with "Thunder Breaking Guard" that can cut the anchors and lightning chains, but also drags an electromagnetic minesweeper that can simulate the magnetic emitted by the hull.

These two US ships formed a small mine-sweeping formation. Together with more than a dozen other formations of the same formation, they had to sweep out a sea area that could be attacked for the US landing formation that was preparing to launch a landing operation in the shortest time.

In the bridge of the "William D. Porter", Captain Wilfred Walter, while steering himself, silently praying to the omnipotent God in his heart to never encounter any unlucky things again.

His concerns were not unreasonable, because the destroyer William D. Porter has often encountered all kinds of unlucky things since he entered service, either colliding with friendly ships or accidentally throwing deep-water bombs into the sea, causing false alarms in the entire fleet, or torpedoes accidentally shot and almost sank the Soviet Union (this happened in the operation of the Soviet Union breaking through the Denmark Strait at the end of June 1943), or the artillery on the ship accidentally fired the naval base...

In short, all kinds of unlucky things have happened. If the US Navy had not expanded too fast in recent years, the officer who could serve as the captain was not as good as the captain. Captain Walter felt that he might have been expelled from the navy.

However, this time the "William.d.Potter" carried out an unlucky mine-sweeping mission! If there is a little mistake, it will not be as simple as losing his job, but rather sending his life away.

Captain Walter and all the crew members on the "William D. Porter" need to be careful now not only the German mines that will explode at any time under the water, but also be careful of the elusive torpedo speedboats and submarines of the Germans, and of course the Krupp cannons that don't know where they are!

With the thin hull of the destroyer "William D. Porter", no matter whether it encounters mines, torpedo speedboats, submarines or shore defense artillery above 200mm, it may not end well.

Just as everyone in the bridge of the destroyer "William.d.Potter" held their breath and was so nervous that they were about to faint, the phone ringing suddenly rang, and then the second deputy of the destroyer shouted: "Sir, the radar discovered the enemy plane! The distance is 80, the azimuth degree is 200, the quantity is 10, and the height is 800..."

"What? What? The orientation is 200?" Captain Walter was stunned. "The height of the land in British Guiana is only 800... Are you flying towards us? Ask it quickly."

A few minutes later, the second deputy reported loudly again: "Sir, the enemy plane disappeared from the radar screen, maybe it was a false alarm."

"It must be a false alarm again!" Captain Walter shook his head, "The situation report says that the Germans have no airport near Georgetown."

"Sir, do you need to report?" The second mate of the destroyer was a little uncertain.

"Report..." When Captain Walter was not sure of his idea, a loud "boom" suddenly came from the front, which scared everyone. Captain Walter had no intention of considering the "radar false alarm" incident. Such a thing as "Radar false alarm" was not an accident at all for the destroyer "William.d. Porter". He quickly narrowed his eyes and looked forward.

There was no fire on the sea surface, and the minesweeper in front of him could still see clearly that the moonlight was turning slowly. At this time, another loud bang came. Captain Walter gave out a light sigh: "Turning, the 'Little Branch' is throwing deep-water bombs, let's turn to throw deep-water bombs."

Losing a deep-water bomb is a method of rapid mine sweeping. It is impossible to use it in narrow seas and throw deep-water bombs all the way on long routes. The cost is too high. Moreover, there is a high probability that using deep-water bombs to detonate mines will be missed, so it can only be used as an emergency measure.

Moreover, the movement of dropping deep-water bombs is very static, and it is very easy to attract bombardment from shore cannons. The hull that drops deep-water bombs to sweep mines before landing and fighting is really a big risk.

When the sound of the deep-water bomb explosion reached the Atlantic Ocean in the distance, it was almost impossible to hear. The large fleet loading and guarding the main force of the 5th Amphibious Army was already murderously deploying a battle formation of hundreds of square miles on the ocean outside Georgetown.

This is of course an unprecedented fleet. Perhaps only the US offensive fleet in the second Battle of the Hawaiian Islands can be compared with it. The 9 most powerful battleships in the world (4 Iowa class, 4 Soviet class, 1 North Carolina class), 4 large fleet aircraft carriers and 20 escort aircraft carriers, as well as two or three hundred other types of combat ships, covering hundreds of transport ships and landing ships, have already launched landing formations on the dark sea. Hundreds of light cruisers have been shipped.

A semicircular guard circle was formed with the destroyers on the periphery. The center of the guard circle was a battleship and aircraft carrier that was also firmly guarded by destroyers and light cruisers. In front of the battleships and aircraft carriers were landing ships preparing to land on the beach. Some of them had already put down landing craft of all sizes. The fully equipped American soldiers or the tanks and cars they drove had already squeezed into the "beauty" of the landing craft, waiting to fight the Germans for the democracy and freedom of the Guyana people.

In order to avoid being discovered by German aircraft or submarines, all ships on the sea have not turned on their searchlights, but hundreds of air-to-air, sea-to-sea search radars, and numerous sonars, they detect any suspicious targets in the sky, sea surface and underwater over and over again.

"Sir, Destroyer Battalion 31.8 reported that the minesweeping operation has been completed. During the minesweeping process, they were not fired by German shore artillery. Except for the two minesweeping ships that were injured by mines, no losses were reported for the rest of the ships."

At around 11:30 on August 23, the commander of the US 3rd Fleet and commander of the 31st Fleet, General Halsey, who was on the battleship of the USS Iahua, received a report that the minesweeping mission was successfully completed. Moreover, during the minesweeping process, the German army did not bombard or interfere with shore artillery.

This may indicate that Germany really did not deploy heavy troops in British Guiana, otherwise it would not have even been large-caliber coastal artillery.

Halsey's nerves that had been tense after hearing the report finally relaxed a little, and then he shouted: "Tell Lieutenant General Turner that the landing operation can begin. Before dawn, Georgetown must be occupied!"

At this time, less than 40 nautical miles southeast of the US fleet, close to the coastline of New Amsterdam (a small town in Guyana), next to a shallow, 16 S100 torpedo speedboats had already started their diesel engines, put away their anchor chains, and began to drive towards the US fleet 40 nautical miles away. These are 16 torpedo speedboats of the 5th torpedo speedboat detachment led by Colonel Johnson himself. Their maximum speed can reach 42 knots. If you advance at full speed, you can launch an attack within an hour at most!

But tonight, they are not the only sneak attackers. In fact, these 16 torpedo speedboats alone cannot break through the guard circle composed of destroyers and light cruisers. American destroyers and escort destroyers have good sea search radars, and it is still possible to find the torpedo speedboats that are telling them that they are approaching.

Moreover, there is no radar on the torpedo speedboat, so you can only rely on the "Cat Eye Magic" to discover opponents. Therefore, when the visibility is extremely low at night, the probability of destroyers discovering torpedo speedboats first is much higher than the probability of the torpedo speedboats first.

Therefore, it is unlikely that the US landing fleet will succeed by relying solely on a torpedo speedboat attack with a large number of destroyer guards. However, tonight, Kamhuber prepared a set of combined punches for the Americans!

Just as 16 S100 torpedo speedboats began to quietly head towards the target, underwater closer to the US fleet, six Type 21 submarines were submersible at a high speed of nearly 14 knots, and the target was also a huge formation of the US landing fleet on the sea.

In the air, at an altitude less than 100 meters away from the sea level, 36 ju188e-2 torpedo bombers that had just taken off from the Georgetown Island airport are relying on the guidance of radar and radio GROE to search for the American fleet at a low flight speed in the vast ocean!
Chapter completed!