Trondheim, Norway.▼

The Norwegian coast is beautiful in summer. The German Northern Fleet Command is located on a hillside outside the city of Trondheim. Through the windows, you can overlook the entire harbor.

In the dusk, the surfaces of the steel warships in the fjord were painted with a layer of gold. This bay is filled with almost all the main battleships of the German Northern Fleet. Among them, two "Shankhorst-class" battleships are the most conspicuous. These two battleships equipped with 12 41o mm main guns, and the standard displacement of 55ooo tons brings together all the Teutonic people's dreams of maritime hegemony, and are also the pinnacle of giant ships and cannons in this era. These two class battleships with a full load displacement of nearly 7ooo tons represent the highest level of the German shipbuilding industry: balanced coordination, heavy armor protection, excellent watertight compartment design, excellent survival, precise artillery manufacturing technology and the most advanced fire control system. The tenacity, precision, ferocity and cruelty of the Germans are all reflected in the body of this terrifying steel dragon.

It is a little regrettable that due to the wrong birth, the construction of the other three subsequent warships of the "Shankhorst-class" has been cancelled. ■Marine war has entered the aviation era. In fact, the main force of this fleet is the four "Graf Zeppelin-class" aircraft carriers of flat-topped cargo ships.

"Master Booker commanded the coalition forces to capture Saratov..."

"General Rendulick led an expeditionary force to sweep Australia and occupied Darwin Port in one fell swoop..."

"General Rommel occupied Perth, and the US-Australia coalition forces were defeated..."

...

The news in the newspapers is almost all about the 6th Army. Admiral Gunther Lukins, the new commander of the Northern Fleet, read these messages, but there was not much happy expression on his face. Compared with the continuous good news from the 6th Army, the German Navy is really feeling extremely "depressed".

The Northern Fleet, the main force of the German Navy, suffered consecutive losses in the Battle of the Denmark Strait, and suffered heavy losses. The base camp was not allowed to decide to give up Iceland and withdraw the remaining troops on the island back to Norway. Admiral Krankai was removed from the commander of the Northern Fleet as a scapegoat and transferred to Danze to serve as the commander of the garrison of the East Prussian Fortress.

As the Austro-Hungarian and Italian navies devoted their main forces to the Pacific battlefield, the only German navy left in the entire Atlantic Ocean was working hard to deal with the powerful US and British fleets. Facing their opponents who were far stronger, this reminded the German Navy Commander-in-Chief Raidel of the High Seas Fleet when facing Jelico in the early stage of the last war.

Now the entire German navy has to try its best to shrink its defense, except for Admiral Wilhem and Marshall, commanding the Far East fleet to make great progress in the Western Pacific, for nearly a year. The German navy has almost no big achievements.

Although the Axis powers have begun to adjust their strategies to shift the focus of industrial production to the navy, the German Navy is temporarily unable to compete with the US and British fleets before the new aircraft carriers are in service. ●◆.ww.▲All General Lukins and his Northern fleet can do is to cut off the maritime channels for the aid materials of Britain and the United States to the Soviet Union as much as possible.

Judging from the current situation, it is probably not possible for the Russians to hold on for long.

Before the war, the German Navy had four "York" class aircraft carriers with a standard displacement of 35ooo tons. In addition, two newly built "Graf Zeppelin-class" aircraft carriers have been launched and are being installed. After the war broke out, the Imperial Parliament quickly passed the Naval Expansion Act, urgently adding the construction budget for 5 "Scharnhorst-class" battleships and 6 "Zeppelin-class" aircraft carriers.

As the war progressed, aircraft carriers had replaced battleships in naval battles and played a decisive role. In the German naval construction plan in 1941, the Imperial Parliament passed the construction budget for the construction of six new aircraft carriers in 1942 and 1943, and at the same time approved the plan to convert the remaining three "Shankhorst-class" battleships that had completed the hull construction project into aircraft carriers. ≤≤net,

However, the construction of the navy takes time and cannot complete the dressing change in a short period of time like the 6th Army. Except in the early stages of the war, the German and Austrian Navy occupied the dominance of the Atlantic for a period of time after the German and Austrian Navy severely damaged the British Royal Navy. Later, with the participation of the United States in the war and the recovery of the Royal Navy's strength, especially after the Austro-Hungarian Navy devoted most of its main forces to the Far East, the British and American Navy took the initiative again.

The German Navy continued to play the role of a "spoiler" on the Atlantic Ocean.

In fact, besides the Nordic routes, Germany is indeed unable to utilize maritime transportation on the Atlantic Ocean. Compared with Britain, Germany's industrial raw materials supply is more dependent on the direction of the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. Since the Austro-Hungarian Navy has always firmly controlled the absolute sea control of these two seas, Germany's material supply has not been troubled. It's just that maritime transportation with South America requires detours through the Indian Ocean and then through South Africa.

The Austro-Hungarian Navy basically didn't care much about the sea control of the North Atlantic. In addition to sticking to the Strait of Gibraltar, they cared more about the security of the waterway between South Africa and South America. Most of their energy was devoted to the Far East, and the remaining half of their energy was spent in South Africa. In the Atlantic, except for the submarine forces, there was almost no decent maritime power.

This situation made the German navy extremely hate. But the fact is that, the different geographical locations have caused the naval strategies of the two countries to be almost completely opposite. The German navy's first goal was to defeat the British navy and break the cage they created, but the Austro-Hungarian Navy did not have such an intention. Their purpose was to firmly control the Mediterranean, followed by the Arabian Sea and East Africa routes. As for the Far East, it was just to obey political needs.

Marshal Redel was also very annoyed by the Austro-Hungarian Navy's unwillingness to cooperate, but he had no choice. From a global strategic perspective, the Austro-Hungarian Navy's combat plan was more in line with the political needs of the Axis powers, but because of the limited strength of the German navy, the benefits achieved by the German Second Empire in the Far East were somewhat inconsistent with their strong military strength, and they even had to promise to give the Italians more benefits.

The strength of the German navy is still unable to break through the blockade between Britain and the United States.

During peacetime, the construction period of the Zeppelin-class aircraft carrier will take nearly three years. Even if the construction progress is accelerated during the war, it will take nearly two years to build such a fleet aircraft carrier with a standard displacement of 275oo tons. In the second half of 1943, six aircraft carriers that were urgently built after the war began will continue to serve 6 times. At that time, the strength of the German naval surface ship fleet will be greatly improved again. But at the same time, the United States will serve 12 "Essex-class" aircraft carriers this year, and the British shipyard will have many difficulties due to the bombing of Germany, and 12 escort aircraft carriers will be added to the Royal Navy sequence.

As more and more escort aircraft carriers joined the escort fleet of the transport fleet, the activities of the submarine forces were increasingly restricted, and the dangers they faced became increasingly higher. Admiral Denitz's myth of "submarine victory theory" went bankrupt, and the German Navy continued to turn its attention to the construction of surface ship forces.

Even the front-line fleet commander was not optimistic that the German navy could break through the blockade of the US and British navies, but they did contain more than half of the US and British navies, allowing the Aoi Navy and even the Navy to run rampant in the Indian Ocean and even the Western Pacific, and no force could resist their attack. (To be continued.)
Chapter completed!