Iron Cross

In the early morning, the rapid ringing of the phone woke up Arnold in a daze. He turned over and struggled to pick up the phone.

"Sir, Pearl Harbor was attacked, and the Japanese were blowing up the oil depot!"

"I know." Arnold replied vaguely, put down the phone, turned over and fell asleep again - he was too tired these past two days.

But less than 20 seconds later, he suddenly lifted the quilt and sat up, sweating profusely. The dream just now was so weird that he woke up with a fright.

As he wiped his sweat, he thought: "It seems that my health is really bad. A dream actually scared me out of my mind. Could it be a neurasthenia, right?"

After looking at his watch, it was almost time to get up. Just as he was about to get out of bed and change clothes, the "dream" was still vaguely lingering on him, and suddenly an idea came to his mind: Pearl Harbor was attacked? Did the Japanese fry oil depots? And the phone ringing just now, there was always something wrong.

Is this dream too real?

He immediately picked up the phone and called back, shouting in a hysterical voice: "What's going on at Pearl Harbor now?"

Several officers on duty were surprised just now that their superiors were indifferent to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Now they suddenly heard this roar and were frightened and stuttered: "Sir...sir...Pearl Harbor...has...encountered...an attack." …Japanese…Japanese…planes are…exploding…exploding oil depots!”

"Asshole! Asshole! Doolittle, that bastard! Fight back right away!"

The bastard in Arnold's mouth, Major General Doolittle, commander of the Army Aviation at Pearl Harbor, entered a state of madness earlier than he did.

As soon as the Pearl Harbor air defense siren sounded, the major general who was a pilot woke up. His instinctive reaction was to go out to find the plane. It took him two steps to come to his senses. He was wearing pajamas. What mattered now was command. He hurriedly rushed over to prepare for the fighter jets on duty to take off. When he heard that there were already many planes preparing to take off, he relaxed a little. Although 15 minutes was not enough time, dozens of fighter jets could still take off.

But within 4 minutes, as he was rushing to the headquarters in a jeep, he saw a flash of light in the sky, illuminating the area below as bright as day. This was a flare dropped by the Japanese army to target the bombing of Tokyo. For Doolittle, he knew very well what this meant, and his heart sank suddenly: the Japanese army moved much faster than imagined. Sure enough, after another minute, before he even stepped into the headquarters, the explosion sounded violently.

From the sound of the air defense siren to the Japanese bombing, the total time was only 5 minutes, 307 seconds to be exact! The U.S. military notified the entire army at the 15th second, the first anti-aircraft gun ejected from the chamber at the 29th second, and the first fighter jet on duty taxied and took off at the 87th second. The reaction speed was unknown how many times faster than the first attack on Pearl Harbor, but it was still Too late.

Doolittle did not know that the ultra-low-altitude flight of the Japanese army caused the warning time to be greatly shortened. He thought that there was another problem with the radar station and the duty room. Making the same mistake twice was simply intolerable. He jumped to his feet in the headquarters and cursed: " If anyone falls asleep on duty, I will kill them one by one!"

After a huge fire broke out in the oil storage area, more than 20 US military fighter jets hurriedly gathered and rushed to the oil depot. At this time, thick smoke and fire began to rise continuously. The situation was very unfavorable to the US military - the Japanese army had adapted to three Hours of darkness, and the U.S. military had just taken off for only 3-4 minutes. They were completely unorganized and clueless. They could only fight on their own, bravely pounced on them, and then were entangled in the escorting gale.

The level of US military pilots who can work the night shift is not bad, but the number of more than 20 aircraft is too small. There are 170 Japanese aircraft in the air, and there are 48 Guangleifeng Kai. No matter how hard the U.S. military tried, the Japanese troops still launched bombing attacks in an orderly manner, setting off waves of violent explosions, causing blazing fires one after another.

The planes on both sides continued to fall, and the downed American pilot suddenly discovered that parachuting was also a troublesome matter: Where could he jump when the ground was a sea of ​​fire? The downed Japanese fighter and attack aircraft members did not parachute. Almost all of them, like Murata, chose to dive before losing control, either to find anti-aircraft guns or oil storage tanks for suicide attacks. There are still more than half a tank of aviation fuel in the fuel tanks of these aircraft. When they fall to the ground, they cause more violent explosions and combustion...

Thirty minutes after the first attack wave engaged, Jiang Cao Tongfu led the murderous second attack wave and arrived. The sky had begun to lighten up, and the entire Pearl Harbor was shrouded in a layer of smoke from heavy oil burning...

"Sir, there is an aircraft carrier in the port!"

"What?" Jiang Caolongfan lowered his head and looked. Sure enough, there were several aircraft carriers parked at Pearl Harbor. They were not moving very fast. There seemed to be planes on them taxiing to take off, but the first one was obviously too impatient and rushed out without pulling up. The deck fell directly into the sea... He could only shake his head when he saw it.

These are all Casablanca-class escort aircraft carriers. Halsey took away 12 of them, and the remaining 6 were left in Pearl Harbor for pilots to train. After receiving the alarm, these aircraft carriers immediately started to use maximum horsepower to increase speed and prepare to release fighter jets ( The speed is not enough to generate enough deck wind), but except for a few instructors, the warships are all half-stupid with average training level - the plane that Jiangcao Takaban saw crashing into the sea was piloted by a Level 1 pilot.

"Ogura Squadron goes to attack the aircraft carrier, and the rest of the formations continue to attack the original target with me!"

As soon as he finished speaking, 24 Meteor Kais and 8 Gale Kais swooped down according to Jiang Cao Rongfan's order.

After two loud noises of "boom", "boom", Lieutenant Ogura took the lead in completing the "double attack" with a 400 kg bomb (both bombs fell on a warship), and the escort aircraft carrier Wendan Bay exploded violently and slowly sank.

In the following minutes, the remaining 5 aircraft carriers suffered the same fate. The only one that did not sink was paralyzed on the water and could not move. Although the sailors on the ship fought back with all their strength, they only shot down one Japanese plane. The 6 aircraft carriers only successfully launched 2 fighters - all driven by instructors, but they were ruthlessly shot down by the Gale Kai because they were too hasty.

A total of 6 escort aircraft carriers, more than 160 naval fighters, more than 200 flight trainees and thousands of naval officers and soldiers were all soaked in cold water in less than 8 minutes.

In the first attack on Pearl Harbor, Isoroku Yamamoto tried his best to attack the aircraft carriers, but failed; in the second attack on Pearl Harbor, Teikichi Hori did not even intend to attack the warships, but ended up running into the US escort aircraft carrier formation.

The Kokura Squadron that destroyed all six escort aircraft carriers did not even participate in the attack, and finally dropped bombs on several other Fletcher-class destroyers. The unlucky US military subsequently lost three more destroyers.

24 Meteor-Kai and 8 Gale-Kai carried a total of 81 bombs (some carried 2 400 kg bombs, some carried 3 250 kg bombs), with an overall hit rate of over 74%. In just 10 minutes, the Pacific Fleet training troops in the port were wiped out...

The sky was getting brighter and brighter, and the ground oil storage tanks were burning more and more fiercely. Everyone felt an omnipresent burning sensation - the temperature rose sharply after the heavy oil burned. More than 6,000 tons of heavy oil was enough to drive the boiler to allow the 70,000-ton Yamato to run 7,000 nautical miles. The scene of 300,000 tons of heavy oil burning can be imagined, directly pushing Hawaii from the cool autumn back to the hot summer.

Ingram was also alarmed after the air defense alarm, and was even more dumbfounded when he heard that the oil depot was attacked. Now the most difficult problem in Hawaii is the fuel problem. If the oil depot is destroyed again, how can the subsequent battles be fought?

He rushed over desperately and asked the army to find a way to save the oil depot, but everyone shook their heads in despair: the fire in the oil depot had burned into an ocean, and it spread wantonly with the flow of heavy oil - after the temperature rose, the heavy oil softened and the flow force increased. By 7 o'clock, not to mention extinguishing the fire, even controlling the spread of the fire became a big problem. Many defensive positions, buildings and facilities were all engulfed by the flames, and then the fire caused other flammable items to burn. Clouds of black smoke rushed up, and the air was filled with a choking smell that was suffocating.

The residents who were awakened from their sleep were wearing pajamas and fled in panic. The roads were drastically blocked, which not only prevented the fire trucks from entering the scene, but also exacerbated the panic in the city.

At 7:29, the most tragic scene came: the underground fuel depot set up by the US military near the fuel area was not directly destroyed by the Japanese heavy bombs - the meteor dropped more than ten 800 kg bombs, and although many large holes were drilled around it, none of them hit directly, and it was peaceful for a short time. However, these holes and ruins destroyed the sealing system of the underground oil depot, and finally became the absorption and penetration of the heavy oil after burning and flowing. The hot and wanton flowing river of fire quickly rushed into the oil depot along these gaps. The guarding officers and soldiers watched the fire dragon rush in and had no way to stop it. After burning for half a minute, the entire underground oil depot was detonated, and an explosion like a landslide occurred!

This explosion, which was more violent than an earthquake, immediately turned all the high-octane aviation fuel into explosive air waves, which gushed out. The Japanese pilots flying freely in the air were also shocked: thousands of meters of air waves mixed with steel fragments, concrete ruins, and earth and rocks violently surged out, forming a mushroom cloud as high as thousands of meters. Almost all the buildings within 2 kilometers were fatally damaged, and all the glass windows within 5 kilometers were shattered. The mushroom cloud even swept up the Japanese and American planes at low altitudes and became sacrificial objects.

Doolittle fell to the ground with a "thump" in the command center. Of course, he knew what was wrong - the largest underground fuel depot in Hawaii was over!

"Egasa Takashige sent a war report, the bombing was extremely successful, the giant fuel depot was detonated, and the entire Pearl Harbor turned into a sea of ​​fire..."

"Caiyun sent a telegram, even more than 50 kilometers away, you can see the flames and smoke of Pearl Harbor, like a hell on earth..."

Hori Teikichi nodded, silent, and sighed: "Countless innocent American civilians must have been destroyed by the fire. I have committed this killing and sinned deeply. How will it end in the future?"

Hearing this, several jubilant staff officers felt as if they were poured with a basin of snow water on their heads, and they didn't know how to respond.

But in the next second, he issued another order: "Tell the whole army not to be soft on the US troops, and kill them with all their strength. I will be the only one to bear the blame after the war!"