"Marson Lütjens sent a telegram saying that the maintenance and maintenance of most battleships had been completed and could participate in new battles at any time, but the Ludendolf and Tirpitz had to be overhauled, and it would be impossible to go to the battlefield again without 3-4 months.

In addition, French Prime Minister and Minister of Defense Darlan sent a telegram saying that the Richelieu can now participate in the battle. The French replaced the turret for the Richelieu, and now it has two 3-unit 406mm turrets. The French Navy wants to see how this kind of artillery performs in actual combat." Marshal Raidel first reported the situation of the naval battleship units at the Ministry of Defense combat meeting chaired by Hessman.

Most battleships that participated in the last night ice battle can now go to the battlefield again. Although there are fewer Rudendolph, Tirpiz and Barbarossa, there is an additional Richelieu equipped with a 406mm main gun.

"Enough, enough." Hessman tapped the conference table with his fingers. "The Allied fleets in Scapa Bay have all evacuated. Now there are only a few battleships to bombard the coast."

Scapa Bay is not a place to stay for the Allied Fleet, and German aircraft taking off from Ireland and Norway frequently visited there. So the fleet retreated in shame in mid-December 1942. Now the maritime forces defending the British Isle are destroyers, torpedo speedboats, submarines and mines.

"The main threat now is mines and torpedo speedboats," Raidel said with a smile. "There are definitely no large caliber shore guns near the landing site we chose, and there are few British submarines operating in the North Sea, which does not pose a threat."

According to Hessman's instructions, the General Staff and Naval Command formulated an invasion plan called "Operation Norman". The landing site was chosen on the east coast of England, which was the North Sea coast. It was not the focus of the British defense, and there were not many cargoes to be transported through the North Sea, so there were not many British submarines operating in the North Sea.

"What threat can mines and torpedo speedboats pose?" First Military Control Commissioner Halder smiled and shook his head, looking full of confidence. "And now is not a suitable season for landing. The British will not be able to prevent them with all their might. We will definitely succeed in the raid."

Under the recommendation of Hessman, Halder will command an army to invade Britain as a general. If the invasion is successful, Halder, as the conqueror of England, will become a marshal and be qualified to be promoted to Chief of Staff.

"Of course there will be no problem with logging in," Hessman stood up and walked to the large military map hanging on the wall of the conference room. A group of German generals who attended the meeting followed him. "The problem is that the counterattack from the British and American coalition forces that may be encountered after logging in... Especially 24 hours after the operation begins, it will be very critical. The enemy will be put into armor, and our air force may be greatly restricted due to weather."

Now is not the right season to land in England. There are often strong winds and waves in the North Sea, and the foggy weather is even more common.

Therefore, a large-scale landing with hundreds of thousands of people participating is impossible. Operation Norman is just a medium-scale landing operation. There will not be many troops on the first wave of landing, and it is very likely that they will be subject to fierce counterattacks.

"There won't be any big problem," Halder said with a smile. "The purpose of Operation Norman is to set up a bridgehead in the central coastal region of England to create conditions for a large-scale invasion in the spring. So just control small plots of land near the coastline, where our landing forces will receive fire support from battleships and heavy cruisers.

And we will also have tanks to land. Now we have the T9 tank landing ship, and we can directly send the Tiger tank to the beach!"

The T9 tank landing ship is the latest model of the T-type landing ship. Its light load displacement reaches 1,700 tons, full load displacement reaches 4,100 tons, and the restricted displacement is 2,700 tons.

The tank deck cabin of such a big guy has a capacity of 2,700 cubic meters. When carrying out beach battles, it can accommodate up to 10 Tiger heavy tanks.

So in "Operation Norman", the German army will invest in a terrible heavy armored battalion!

"Your Excellency, it will not be easy to mobilize the enemy's counterattack forces," said Marshal Wiffle, the commander-in-chief of the Air Force. "Because we will carry out large-scale bombings on the main and railways in central England before the landing operation begins. We now have a considerable number of heavy bombers that can carry out large-scale carpet air strikes!"

Valt Wiffle was originally the "strategic bomber faction" in the Luftwaffle. In the mid-1930s, he advocated the development of heavy long-range bombers. However, at that time, Hessmann and Kesseling insisted on the tactical air force and did not give long-range bombers any room for development. It was not until the victory of the Western Front Battle in 1940 that a large amount of resources began to be invested in the research and development of long-range bombers.

In October 1942, the Me264 long-range bomber jointly developed by Messerchmitt and Folk Company finally began mass production. In addition to the Me264, Folk Company, which is good at introducing excellent foreign aircraft models, also brought back the Italian p.108 heavy bomber for mass production.

So the Luftwaffe now has two heavy bombers with large bomb loads, me264 and p.108.

In addition, because British aircraft killed the Pope, the Italians had a very high enthusiasm for bombing Britain. Therefore, after the end of the Mediterranean Battle, the Italians began to work hard to develop bombing aviation troops, and now they have accumulated more than 500 p.108 heavy bombers that can perform bombing missions over the UK.

"If we include the Italians' p.108 bombers and the do217 with a considerable bomb load capacity (can carry 4 tons), we can now use more than 1,000 bombers to bomb in central England." Marshal Wiffle, commander-in-chief of the Air Force, said proudly, "In fact, through strategic cooperation, we can also force Britain to surrender."

Hessman smiled and said, "But I don't want a British that was bombed into ruins... There are so many factories, mines, and so many well-built cities there. What a pity that they all exploded? After all, Britain will not be a member of the European Community for a long time."

This is called "the country is the best, and the country is second to defeat it." Hessman remembers it as mentioned in "The Art of War".

He paused and asked again, "Walt, when will the bombing start?"

"Three days later, that is, on January 1, 1943," Marshal Wifel said, "the weather forecast will show good weather in central England from January 1 to 3."

"How many planes are deployed?"

"The bombers alone will be dispatched 2,000 times!" Wifle replied, "In addition, there will be a large number of Fokker Zero and F-190 fighters attacking."

Hessman smiled, "Very good, for Churchill, this is a very good New Year gift!"

...

"Is this an M4 medium tank?" British Prime Minister Churchill, who had just finished an inspiring New Year's speech, is now looking out the window rumble through the streets through the tank convoy.

"It's an m10 tank destroyer." U.S. Army Lieutenant General Stilwell, who stood with Churchill, replied.

Lieutenant General Stilwell is now the chief of staff of the newly established European Allied Forces Supreme Command. He smiled and said to Fatty Qiu: "Considering that the German tanks are relatively powerful, the m10 tank destroyers are now transported.

In addition, there is a type of m11 assault gun that is more powerful than m10, which will be transported to Europe soon. This type of assault gun is also modified with the body of the m4 tank. It has a 90mm anti-aircraft gun, which is enough to fight against the German Tiger tank."

Roosevelt, the transport captain, finally brought some good things to Churchill at the end of 1942, including 200 m10 tanks, 120 P47 fighters, more than 1,000 guns of various types, as well as a lot of ammunition and tens of thousands of tons of C3 fuel (Hitler also received 30,000 tons of C3 and 3 T2 oil tankers).

Now General Patton's 2nd Armored Division finally has tanks and cannons!

However, wheat and egg powder are still not able to be transported, so the British people still spent this New Year's Day in hunger.

In addition to starving, the British people also witnessed a political crisis in the last few days of 1942. Their King George VI did not return and is now stranded in Canada. Prime Minister Churchill used the authorization of the Imperial National Defense Act to declare martial law and a state of emergency. Deputy Prime Minister Attley led all Labor cabinet members to withdraw from the wartime cabinet!

Churchill then used the authorization of the Imperial Defense Act to ban all activities of the British Labor Party and at the same time banned the British fascist alliance...

Under these series of changes, the British people did not know whether they were living in a democratic and free progressive state or were ruled by a slander government.

The German propaganda to Britain (including broadcasts and flyers) claimed that a coup occurred in the UK! The coup was initiated by Churchill colluding with US President Roosevelt, and the Americans seized George VI who visited the United States. Churchill seized power in the UK, suppressed the opposition, and placed house arrest on Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Windsor, turning himself into a person who monopolizes power. This story was edited by Goebbels.

In order to calm the people, Churchill had to arrange a New Year's Day military parade attended by British and American soldiers, and also invited Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Windsor to inspect the troops.

The American tank destroyer that passes from Whitehall Street now goes to the military parade.
Chapter completed!