Chapter 253: The Cold Seawater

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Anti-aircraft shells were being thrown into the sky as if they were free. The sailors on the British warships were frantically defending their beloved vessels. They fired wildly with their iconic 40mm pom-pom guns, trying to shoot down the German planes.

But it was clear that the speed of these German planes was something the British Navy was not used to. And the pom-pom guns in their hands had a noticeably short range. Traversing them was also difficult due to their weight, which made them somewhat ineffective against the German planes.

A plane whistled past the warship’s broadside, its wings glinting coldly in the sunlight. Behind it followed two British Gladiator fighters. Soon, the British carrier’s anti-aircraft guns found this godsent opportunity. A dense barrage of shells hit this Fw-190 torpedo bomber. The German pilot had no time to bail out and plunged into the cold seawater with his plane.

“Number 1, the enemy fighters are not coming up to dogfight us at high altitude,” the wingman of the Fw-190 torpedo bomber squadron’s lead plane said loudly in the headset. “They are interfering with our bomb drops at low altitude, driving us to become targets for the naval guns.”

This was indeed the case. The British pilots were very experienced. They took advantage of the moment when the German planes slowed down to drop their torpedoes to rush in and attack. This purely defensive tactic was something the German naval air arm, which lacked attack experience, was very unaccustomed to. Just over a minute after the attack began, one of their torpedo bombers had been shot down, yet their attack targets were still completely unscathed.

“You’re right! We can’t let these backward planes fool us like this,” the commander said, nodding in agreement. “Drop torpedoes from a distance! Interfere with the navigational speed of these warships! Create some opportunities for the Stukas.”

“Number 2 understands! You lead the way!” the wingman replied loudly.

Soon, the German fighters began to break off from the melee and started a rapid climb. The old-fashioned British Gladiator fighters simply could not keep up with the speed of the German fighters and had to give up the chase, continuing to circle at low altitude over their own fleet, looking for opportunities.

“The Stukas are here!” the pilot of an Fw-190 fighter shouted in his headset, seeing the friendly forces on the horizon.

“Stuka formation, this is the commander of the Fw-190 fighter formation. We cannot break through the enemy’s anti-aircraft defenses. We need your cooperation,” the lead plane’s pilot said loudly, circling at high altitude.

The Stuka bomber’s lead plane replied, “It seems you’ve had a rough time. What do you need us to do?”

The Fw-190’s commander thought for a moment and replied, “You dive and attack. My torpedo bombers will follow your dive! If those old biplanes dare to come over, leave them to us! You concentrate on the warships!”

“Alright!” The Stuka’s lead pilot immediately agreed to this tactical arrangement. “All bombers, according to the attack mission assigned just now! Lock on to your targets! Bomber 2, you follow me! We’re going to deal with that battleship.”

He gave a signal to the pilot of his plane. The pilot in the front seat nodded, pushed the control stick, and the entire plane began to dive violently. The commander leaned back in his seat, feeling as if he were lying back, getting closer and closer to horizontal.

The siren on the Stuka began to let out a piercing howl, like a falcon descending from the sky to pounce on its prey. The gunsight on the pilot’s instrument panel locked onto the largest target in the center of the British fleet, shaking violently between the warship’s funnel and bridge.

“Rat-tat! Rat-tat!” The 20mm cannons on the Stuka’s wings opened fire fiercely. Tracer rounds flew toward their target with a brilliant glow. Soon, a shower of sparks and smoke erupted from the middle of the warship directly in front of them. A pom-pom gun there was completely silenced. And at this time, the Stuka’s dive became even faster.

The British biplane Gladiator fighters, circling at low altitude, saw that their main protected target was in danger and hurriedly accelerated and charged up. They hoped to use their old tactics to interfere with the Stuka’s bomb drop and to reduce the warship’s losses.

But they soon learned a hard lesson. As they began to pull up, the Fw-190 fighters descending from the sky had just accelerated to their most advantageous state. The speed of the entire fighter was already close to 600 km/h. The cannons began to spit fire fiercely. These old-fashioned British biplanes had no time to react and were blown to pieces one after another.

“Steady! Bombs away!” the pilot of the Stuka bomber shouted, yanking the plane up. The plane’s speed seemed to drop all at once. The commander sitting behind him felt as if his internal organs were stuck to his back. But the violent shaking of the fuselage told him that the 600-pound bomb slung under the center of the belly had been released.

And behind this Stuka, another was also pulling up and climbing. The release mechanism under its belly where the bomb had been was still swinging. It was clear at a glance that a heavy object had just been jettisoned.

Sitting behind the pilot, the commander endured the huge G-forces of the pull-out. He manned his machine gun and watched as the sky grew farther and farther away from him. Finally, he could see the distant sea horizon through the plane’s tail. And then, one after another, the British destroyers and cruisers, spitting fire, appeared in his line of sight.

At the very end, he finally saw the target his plane had attacked in this dive. On both sides of the warship, all kinds of cannons were firing fiercely at his plane. He saw a bullet hit the tail of his plane, leaving a small hole in it.

He squeezed the trigger. The MG42 machine gun made its unique cloth-ripping sound. The tracer rounds clearly told him that his bullets were indeed flying toward that target. But he couldn’t feel his bullets hitting anything, because the target was too big, so big that he couldn’t even see if the sailors running on it were being hit and falling.

On the bridge of the British battleship HMS Malaya, the commander was carefully observing the unfolding drama of the battle in the sky through the glass windows. To be honest, as a naval veteran of the First World War, this captain did not believe that the German naval air arm could do any damage to his warship.

He knew just how sturdy his warship was. Below the deck were armored steel plates more than a decimeter thick. This armor was designed to ensure the safety of the warship during large-caliber gun battles! And below that were countless watertight compartments and steel bulkheads. The ammunition magazines were also protected by reinforced armor. This warship could be said to be a steel fortress floating on the sea—how could it possibly be sunk by a small carrier-based aircraft?

But when he saw the German planes in the sky begin to change tactics, circling and rendezvousing with another batch of planes that had arrived, and then begin to dive at high speed, his heart still inexplicably trembled. He didn’t understand what these German pilots were trying to do, but he had an ominous premonition.

Suddenly, he felt a tremor under his feet. His warship seemed to have been hit by something. Then his warship suddenly lurched to the left, as if a huge wave had hit his starboard side. He looked to his starboard, and water was splashing against the glass there.

“My God! Can carrier-based aircraft carry such large bombs?” the captain muttered. As he was speaking, he began to walk toward his starboard side. He had only taken two steps when the entire warship suddenly jumped. He felt his feet leave the floor, and his whole body lost its balance and he slammed into the chart table in front of him.

“My God! You hit it!” the commander of the Stuka bomber formation shouted, manning his machine gun. He had seen the entire event. His wingman’s bomb had hit the target they had wanted to destroy.

The bomb dropped by his bomber had hit the railing on the starboard side of the warship, taking a row of railings with it as it plunged into the sea. And the bomb from the Stuka following behind him had accurately hit a pom-pom gun mount, destroying the pom-pom gun there and then smashing into the deck of the battleship Malaya, tumbling all the way into the interior of the warship.

Then his plane continued to pull up. He saw his own delayed-fuse bomb explode in the sea, kicking up a huge waterspout several dozen meters high. This waterspout made the battleship on the side shake slightly. Subsequently, he saw a terrifying scene that he would never forget for the rest of his life.

The entire battleship Malaya trembled—it was indeed a tremble, a very violent tremble. Then the middle of the warship was suddenly pushed up by something, as if it were an inflating balloon.

Can you imagine the scene of tens of thousands of tons of steel being twisted, stretched, and then completely torn apart and destroyed? Can you believe the sight of a road a hundred meters long suddenly cracking and being destroyed? Can you picture in your mind a scene where a powerful blast wave throws people high into the air? Have you ever heard a violent explosion that is still deafening through the thick canopy of an airplane and a headset?

The entire battlefield seemed to fall silent for a moment. The roar of the plane’s engine could not be heard, the frantic shouts of his teammates in the headset could not be heard, the explosion of the anti-aircraft shells could not be heard, as if God had appeared in the sky, welcoming people into his embrace.

As the plane climbed higher, the sounds gradually returned to reality. The commander, forgetting his composure, grabbed the intercom and shouted, “Number 2! Number 2! You hit it! My God! You hit it!”

The massive explosion had stunned the British who were fighting back desperately. They stared blankly at what was happening before them, not even knowing what to do. A thick black smoke spewed from the funnel of the battleship Malaya.

“Did you see that, Lead? I hit him! I hit him!” the frantic shouts of his wingman came through his headset. “My God! I’ve been hit too! My navigator has been hit! He’s been hit!”

The water of the Atlantic was still cold, and this naval battle was destined to change something.