Iron Cross

What made the British officers and soldiers furious was that even the most fragile seaplanes that would try to escape when they saw fighter planes now dared to set up machine guns to fire at ground troops, but they could not come up with any way to defend against the air - the anti-aircraft guns that were finally found were either destroyed by bombers or by fast-moving tanks.

Finally, after emergency repairs in the morning, the Kandy Air Force Base deployed in the central part of Ceylon used several abandoned dirt runways to barely take off the remaining dozen aircraft, but these Hurricanes and Spitfires were quickly overwhelmed by the Bf-219s that were several times larger than themselves. At most, three pairs of Japanese fighters (6) surrounded a Spitfire 8 and fought in groups. This scene made Akamatsu Sadaaki, who was commanding the scene in the air, feel that the victory was unfair, and finally set a rule: train more young people, lead the formation, and let the pilots who have just served on the ship serve as wingmen to launch attacks.

Even so, the Royal Air Force pilots could not beat their opponents. The new Japanese carrier-based pilots were graduates of the Devil Aviation School on Socotra Island. Their usual training opponents were all German air combat aces. When they encountered the rookies of the Far East Royal Air Force, and the Bf-219 they drove was much better than the Hurricane, they were accurate in the fight, and in less than half an hour, the score was 1:14.

In the afternoon, the three British squadrons that took off from Tamil Nadu in southern India finally added some changes to this one-sided war. Under the desperate search of Admiral Charles, the commander of the Southeast Asian Theater Air Force, 16 SBD dive bombers, 27 Hurricanes, and 9 Spitfires were finally gathered to support Ceylon Island.

Originally, Mountbatten's order was to attack the Japanese aircraft carrier at sea, but Charles knew that the enemy situation was unclear and Ceylon was in danger. If he reluctantly executed Mountbatten's order, he was afraid that the Japanese aircraft carrier would not be found and Ceylon would be lost first, so he changed the attack order to reinforce the ground forces in Ceylon.

This wave of planes arrived just in time for the rotation of Japanese aircraft. The British pilots shot down two Ju-98 attack aircraft that were attacking ground targets, blew up four rapidly advancing German tanks, and used fierce air strafing to force a German armored grenadier company to stop and find cover, which won extremely precious breathing time for the British and Indian officers and soldiers who fled in panic.

But that was all they could do. In less than 20 minutes, the carrier-based aircraft of the mobile fleet rushed over fiercely. 44 Bf-219s fought desperately with British aircraft. In the end, the Japanese army won the final victory with a large score of 9:44 by relying on the performance of the aircraft and the quality of the pilots, destroying the last hope of the Ceylon defenders and almost clearing the air force that might reinforce in southern India.

At first, when they received the news that more than a dozen planes were shot down in front, Kusaka Ryunosuke, who was supervising the battle on the Shokaku, was a little nervous. Later, he heard that most of the pilots had successfully parachuted and felt relieved: now the transport fleet is carrying a large number of aircraft, and the most lacking is aircraft supplies. As long as the pilots are fine, the mobile fleet will be alive and well tomorrow. In the evening, 9 pilots (groups) returned to the team smoothly, and the whereabouts of the remaining 4 were unknown. Everyone finally breathed a sigh of relief - the loss was far less than the pre-war estimate.

After the second landing attack wave (except artillery) landed in the evening, the outcome of the Ceylon Campaign was completely clear. It was originally a tough battle, but Sher won the battle with great success. Not only were the two most important ports of Colombo and Trincomalee occupied, but the port facilities that Hori Teiki wanted to keep were also safe. Only the Borg, which everyone wanted to capture, had some troubles - the sea valve was closed by the sailors, but the water that had poured into the cabin was difficult to deal with. In the end, they had to decide to unload the aircraft on the deck first, and leave the rest of the problems to be dealt with later.

In addition to the Borg, a large amount of military supplies were also found on other merchant ships, from trucks, jeeps, gasoline to howitzers, rifles, shells, aircraft engines and other accessories, and even more than 20 brand-new Sherman tanks. Kusaka Renji accepted them all without hesitation. The fleet was beaming with joy, as if they had returned to the happy days of salvaging supplies from the British and American fleets in the Horn of East Africa.

On June 25, the battle in the port area was over, and all the troops were pursuing in depth. Kondo Nobutake and Hori Teikichi led the bombardment fleet to enter Colombo and Trincomalee respectively. Only Tsukahara Jishisan remained highly vigilant and temporarily let the mobile fleet drift in the open sea to prevent the sudden emergence of the US reinforcement fleet.

That afternoon, the most hilarious thing happened in the entire Ceylon Campaign. A regiment of British Indian officers and soldiers was surrounded by a battalion of Japanese Marines. They were repeatedly called to surrender but they refused to listen. They had no choice but to launch an attack. But just before the attack was launched, a company of German armored grenadiers also interspersed in place. The company commander dissuaded the Japanese army and decided to send someone to call for their surrender.

A jaw-dropping scene appeared: the Indian soldiers who had refused to surrender just now raised their hands and threw away their weapons to surrender, as obedient as lambs. What made the Japanese army even more angry was that they turned a blind eye to their own side with more people, but surrendered to the German troops with far fewer people, and only reluctantly accepted the management of the Japanese army after the German company commander issued an order.

The confidential staff who witnessed the whole scene reported this incident to the fleet headquarters as a story that night.

Kusaka Renji also felt strange and asked the person involved: "Why are those Indians unwilling to surrender to our army, but they are fine once the Germans go?"

"This..." Major Ikeda, who was leading the team, seemed to have something to hide. He held it in for a long time before finally squeezing out a sentence, "I also found it strange. I caught the British officer in private and asked him about it. He complained to me. He had long ago I wanted to surrender, but the Indians under my command said that we were not fair enough and were not sure whether we were the masters who could make the decision, so they refused to surrender!"

Cole next to him couldn't help laughing when he heard the whole thing. Even Scheer, who was always serious, had a smile on his face after hearing the translation.

"What?! Bastard! Bastard!" The Japanese generals who felt insulted were about to go crazy. They subconsciously believed that if the British felt that surrendering to the German army would provide more security in the treatment of prisoners, they could still accept it, but not To use skin color to decide whether to surrender is simply blatant racial discrimination - and it was actually discriminated against by the defeated Indian soldiers.

To be honest, few Japanese officers and soldiers who served in the navy all year round and were exposed to rain and rain were white, and the Marines were obviously darker and shinier than the average sailors.

Caolu Renyi said angrily: "If you encounter this kind of situation in the future, don't talk nonsense, we will all be shot!"

Horikichi couldn't help but laugh, but he still dissuaded the chief of staff: "Don't be impulsive and be lenient to the Indians. From now on, Ceylon will be the navy's base camp in the Indian Ocean. If we kill all the people, who will do anything for us? Send a telegram to At home, Indians have a superstitious belief that fair skin is noble. Officers and soldiers sent to fight in India, especially the main officers, should try their best to select tall and fair-skinned people!”

After speaking, he turned to Cole: "During the Ceylon campaign and subsequent campaigns, I would like to trouble your army to come out to capture more prisoners. We can guarantee that they will be treated humanely."

"Okay, we'll cover it."

Due to the time difference, Nimitz received the news on the morning of the 25th. When he read the telegram, he frowned: "The Japanese army is attacking Ceylon in a large scale? Have we been deceived - those transport ships are not actually materials but troops? Actually And the Germans?”

"They should be part of the German Marines." Halsey was also surprised. "Could Hitler's next target be the Indian subcontinent? So he couldn't wait to send troops to attack, and he didn't even want to wait for the main force of the Japanese army to arrive. Now the British are really in big trouble. Otherwise, India might be lost..."

"How long can Ceylon be defended?"

Major General Smith next to him made some calculations: "I don't know what the British defense system is in Ceylon, but I know there are 50,000 troops above. No matter what, it shouldn't be a problem to defend for 10-15 days."

"We must seize the time to attack Tarawa. If we delay, it is possible that when the fighting is at its fiercest, the combined fleet will have completed the Ceylon Island raid and come to support." MacArthur reminded, "This can easily fail."

Nimitz nodded: "The fleet will set off tomorrow!"

No senior general in the Pacific Theater believed that the British could hold Ceylon!

Hoffman saw the battle report sent by Cole later than Nimitz, but it was obviously much more detailed. He was surprised to hear that Scheer led his troops to successfully attack on the first day and occupied the crucial port. Inexplicable: "This is a very important place in India, and it was captured so easily? And it was not an ordinary landing success. The battleships of the United Fleet docked smoothly at the dock."

When he heard that an escort aircraft carrier had been captured, he couldn't help but comment: "The British's will to resist seems to have declined severely. If this continues, if the Japanese army can invest 200,000 troops in the attack, it will only take three months." can occupy important coastal areas of India.”

Speaking of the will to resist, Keitel reported immediately: "Today, the Navy forwarded a telegram. They discovered a British civilian transport ship when they were breaking diplomatic ties in the North Atlantic and were preparing to go to the United States. After interrogation, it was found that many of them were related to shipbuilding. Skilled workers, technicians, engineers, and the whole family moved, and the scale was very large.”

"It's very large? How big is it?" Hoffman frowned, "Why did Churchill send these people to North America?"

"The telegram was not written."

"Find out immediately what tricks the British are up to." Thinking of the British army's lack of fighting spirit in India, Hoffman was suddenly startled by his own inference, "Isn't he preparing to move the government to Canada?"

Zeitzler and Keitel, the two chiefs of general staff, looked at each other and nodded solemnly, thinking that this was a very important and critical move...