Chapter 232 The End of France (2)

Hundreds of fighters, bombers, and attack planes crossed the border in a mighty manner, and fiercely bombed French airports, railway hubs, and heavily-armed areas, including the Sedan Fortress.

Hearing the shrill air defense alarms in the fortress, Brigadier General Henri Jean Lafontaine, commander of the 55th Infantry Division, remained calm. The Sedan Fortress was not like the Eben-Emael Fortress in Belgium, which only had a few anti-aircraft machine guns. The air defense issue had been considered during the construction of the fortress, and a considerable number of air defense positions were deployed to allow enemy bombers to conduct low-altitude bombing. High-altitude bombing had no accuracy at all, and there was no way to accurately hit the fortress facilities.

Moreover, the French high-level officials unanimously believed that Germany's move was nothing more than a clumsy plot to lure the main British and French forces in Belgium back so that they could attack Brussels.

Brigadier General Lafontaine was right. It was indeed difficult to accurately hit ground targets with horizontal bombing in this era, but this time it was the Stuka formation that attacked.

When dense Stukas flew over the fortress, the fortress's anti-aircraft guns began to fight back, desperately firing strings of shells into the air. The air-burst shells continued to shoot out black "roses" one after another in the sky; unfortunately, these did not stop the "cordial greetings" from the Stuka bombers.

One after another, the Stukas dived to the ground, and the screams they made were breathtaking. Bombs of various types fell accurately on the fortress's air defense positions. Almost every time they dived, an air defense position would be silenced.

Listening to the continuous reports of loss of contact from the air defense positions outside, Brigadier General Lafontaine's face became extremely ugly. "Damn, when did the German bombers become so powerful?!"

It was less than half an hour, and the German bombers had not shot down a few, and the fortress's air defense positions had lost half.

The Stuka formation, which had thrown all its bombs, left. Before the French troops in the fortress could breathe a sigh of relief, the second batch of Stuka formations came again and continued to dive and drop bombs to destroy the air defense positions.

In less than an hour, all the air defense positions in the fortress were wiped out.

Brigadier General Lafontaine stared at the staff who came to report in amazement, not knowing what to say. A strong sense of uneasiness surged in his heart. Without the air defense positions, wouldn't those bombers be more unscrupulous? How long can this fortress last? "Where are our fighters?!"

The staff officer cried. "They came a long time ago, but they were intercepted by German fighters and couldn't get through at all!"

Brigadier General Lafontaine said in disbelief. "Didn't we use the latest 520 fighters? Can't we beat the German planes?!" The previous air battles have proved that the 406 fighters are no match for the German fighters. Therefore, they hurriedly put in the latest 520 fighters.

The 520 fighter is the best fighter independently designed and manufactured by France. Although the performance of this type of fighter is similar to that of the Zero fighter, its stability and protection are better than that of the Zero fighter. Its maximum speed reaches 534 kilometers per hour. The fighter is equipped with a 20mm cannon in the nose and 4 5mm machine guns on the wings. It can be said that the firepower is very powerful.

However, compared with the German BF-109F, the 520 fighter only has an advantage in range (maximum range 1530km), and it is inferior in other aspects.

As for the short leg problem of the BF-109, although the aerial refueling technology was introduced as early as 1923, it is not realistic to refuel hundreds or even thousands of fighters in the air.

With the current technology, the only way to extend the range or stay in the air is to carry fuel on auxiliary fuel tanks.

This has to be said about Britain.

Although the various incredible black technologies of Germany in World War II were talked about with relish, the British also had a lot of good things.

The Rolls-Royce Merlin liquid-cooled engine that even Americans covet, if the American Mustang fighter had not been replaced with the British Merlin engine, it would not have become the pinnacle of piston fighters.

The British Gloster "Meteor" jet fighter was the only jet aircraft that the Allies could use in actual combat during World War II.

The British invented airborne jammers such as "airborne cigar" and "aluminum foil jammer", opening the prelude to electronic warfare.

The sonar, anti-submarine searchlights, and hedgehog bombs that frightened German submarines were all British inventions.

The British Army was no less impressive, developing various types of tanks, including the Comet tank that could compete with the German "Panther" and the "Centurion" heavy tank that was most in service in Western countries after the war. Britain's infrared detection and night vision technology has been applied to various fields, and weapons such as sticky anti-tank grenades and folding military motorcycles have made other countries only envious. In addition, Britain has also developed radar and radar-guided surface-to-air missiles. Even a nuclear weapons development project was launched, but it was later merged with the Manhattan Project in the United States for security reasons.

In order to extend the fighter's stay time over the European continent, the British designed an ingenious paper auxiliary fuel tank.

The fuel tank is made of kraft paper impregnated with resorcinol glue and is divided into three main components: nose cone, tail cone and body. In order to ensure the uniformity of the shell, the components are formed in wooden molds, and the manufacturing process is similar to that of today's composite parts. After the auxiliary fuel tank is manufactured, it will be pressure tested, and after passing it, it will be coated with two layers of cellulose paint and two layers of metal paint.

The paper auxiliary fuel tank made in this way is not only waterproof, but also has excellent tolerance to extremely cold and hot environments.

Although paper auxiliary fuel tanks have the advantages of low cost, light weight, easy handling by ground crews, and saving a lot of metal materials, they are not without disadvantages. Because the glue of the fuel tank will slowly dissolve when soaked in gasoline, causing the fuel tank to leak after a few hours, the paper auxiliary fuel tank is a disposable item and is only filled with oil before takeoff. Moreover, the strength of the auxiliary fuel tank cannot support the aircraft to land with the aircraft mounted, so sometimes even if the pilot has not used up the fuel in the auxiliary fuel tank, the auxiliary fuel tank must be thrown away on the return flight to ensure safety.

However, in general, this kind of paper auxiliary fuel tank is still quite suitable for Germany, which is not very rich in resources. It greatly increases the hovering time and range of the short-legged BF-109, and intercepts the French fighters that come to support and fights with them.

When the second batch of Stukas left, the French fighters were unable to break through the interception of the German fighters when the third batch arrived. Brigadier General Lafontaine could only listen to the explosions one after another in frustration, which was the sound of the fortress's firepower points being destroyed one by one by the Stukas.

At this moment, a staff officer ran over in panic. "General, General, it's bad! German armored forces!!"

"What?!" Brigadier General Lafontaine was shocked. "German armored forces? Why are there Germans here? Where did they come from?!"

"Ardennes Forest, they rushed out of the Ardennes Forest!!"