Chapter 705 Successor Inorganic

"Boom!"

The sound of artillery sounded on the large playground of the Japanese Army Tank School in Chiba Prefecture. This was a "Weasel" II tank destroyer purchased from Germany. The 48-caliber 75mm gun fired a high-speed armor-piercing bullet with a Ukrainian alloy core. In just a moment, the projectile accurately hit a thick steel plate placed vertically on a concrete base 1,000 meters away.

"Effective penetration!"

An officer in charge of checking the shooting results ran over, looked at the steel plate penetrated by the projectile, then waved a flag in his hand vigorously and shouted.

"Yashi!"

Watching the shooting of the Weasel II tank destroyer, Japanese Prime Minister and Army Minister Tojo Hideki nodded with satisfaction, and said to the foolish Yuan and Navy Minister Shimada Shigetaro beside him: "If we can penetrate the front armor of the American M4 tank from 1,000 meters away, then the army should have no problem... We should be able to carry out operations south to Australia next year. If the army and navy can work together, the empire can expand its territory greatly."

"Prime Minister, there is no problem with the army." Sugiyama Yuan laughed "We have discussed with Mitsubishi Corporation and engineers from the Osaka Arsenal that the 15-ton Type 97 medium tank can definitely be modified into a better tank destroyer than the 'Weasel'. The specific design work can be completed within the year, and the modification of 300-500 vehicles can be completed by the end of June 1949. Now we only need to import a few hundred Kwk40 75mm tank guns from Germany."

The Germans can modify the "Weasel" with the 7.2-ton No. 2, so it is naturally not difficult for the Japanese to modify the 15-ton Type 97. However, Japan does not have a suitable 75mm gun now, so it can only import the German Kwk40 first and then imitate it.

"However, the production of the Type 97 tank destroyer is always a stopgap measure," said Tojo Hideki, "The research on the Tiger tank needs to be accelerated. We must quickly master the Tiger's technology, and then develop the world's first heavy tank based on the Tiger!"

"Hai!" Sugiyama Moto smiled and answered loudly.

The Japanese have always liked things that are "world's first". Now the navy has the world's first battleship "Yamato". How can the army fall behind? It must build the world's first tank, right?

In fact, before the introduction of the Tiger tank, the Japanese Army was already developing a 100-ton super-heavy tank. However, this heavy tank code-named "100-style" has no practical possibility because it is too big a step and the brain hole is also too big. It can only be regarded as a scientific research project. This is also the purpose of the Japanese Army to introduce the Tiger tank. With the Tiger as a foundation, it will be much easier for Japan to develop a "world's first" tank.

Tojo Hideki smiled and nodded to the Minister of the Navy Shimada, "Shimada, the ultimate operation to attack Australia in the second half of 18, do you think you are sure?"

Australia is now the end point of the Japanese Empire's southward march! It was put on the agenda after the Hawaiian campaign.

However, at that time, the Japanese Imperial Army had too many places to attack, and the fuel consumption of the Hawaiian campaign and a series of southward operations that were carried out later was too large, almost making the oil depot of Wu Jungang empty.

In addition, going south to Australia is not something that can be accomplished overnight, but a steady process.

The first step is to take control of the main islands of the Bismarck Archipelago and the Solomon Islands, and then control the Bismarck Sea, the Solomon Sea and the Coral Sea. Then pull out Port Moresby, an important stronghold of the US and Australian troops on the island of New Guinea. After controlling the Solomon Islands and Port Moresby, the gateway to Australia is completely controlled by Japan. After that, it becomes possible to implement the Australian landing operation.

Now, the Japanese army has firmly controlled the Bismarck Archipelago, and is also building a large-scale construction in Rabaul on New Britain Island, preparing to build it into a major stronghold of Japan in the South Pacific. The Japanese Army's 8th Front Army and the Navy's Southeast Fleet are now stationed there.

As for the Solomon Islands, it is now basically controlled by Japan. In this time and space, the United States lost Hawaii and was beaten up by the German Navy in the Atlantic Ocean. It has no ability to compete with Japan for Guadalcanal Island. Therefore, important islands in the Solomon Islands such as Tulagi Island and Guadalcanal Island are also controlled by the Japanese army.

The U.S. military's frontier base in the South Pacific is on Espiritu Santo (belongs to Vanuatu) more than 500 nautical miles southeast of Guadalcanal and New Caledonia near Espiritu Santo. These two large islands, together with Rockhampton, Gladstone, Downsville, Cairns on the east coast of Australia, Cape York at the northeastern end of the Australian continent, and Port Moresby, together constitute the defense line of the U.S. and Australian troops in eastern Australia.

If the Japanese Navy can break through this line of defense, the war will be fought on the Australian continent!

However, when Tojo Hideki asked him if he was sure, Navy Minister Shigetaro Shimada frowned.

"Prime Minister," Shigetaro Shimada said, "If we want to launch the Australian campaign in the second half of 18, the Navy will indeed have some difficulties. If we can advance the time to go south to Australia to this year, the Navy will be more confident."

"Oh? Why is that?"

Shimada shook his head and said, "Because the Zero fighter that the Navy currently relies on is losing its advancedness, and the successor model '14 Test Fighter' is not very successful."

"14 Test Fighter" was the later "Thunder" fighter, a successor to the Zero designed by Jiro Horikoshi (the designer of the Zero). However, this aircraft is far less successful than the Zero. In addition to its better dive performance, better defense capabilities, strong firepower, and the ability to install high-power engines, it cannot be compared with the Zero. Moreover, during test flights, it was found that the drive shaft of this aircraft is prone to breakage and its reliability is also problematic.

Hideki Tojo also heard about the failure of "14 Test Fighter". In fact, the Japanese Army's Type II fighter (Zhong Kui) is also unsatisfactory. Now it has to develop new fighters while trying to introduce German technology for improvement.

"Can we consider introducing new aircraft from Germany?" Tojo Hideki made a suggestion.

Shimada shook his head repeatedly and sighed: "Your Excellency Prime Minister, in fact, Germany's own new carrier-based fighter Fw-190T is not very successful. If it were not for the 2,000-horsepower BMW801S engine, this aircraft must have failed. But even if the Fw-190T is barely successful, its hovering performance and low-altitude performance are far inferior to the Zero. "

The Fw-190T is a carrier-based aircraft developed by the Fokker Company based on the Fw-190A-4. Although it still uses the name Fw-190, it is actually very different from the Fw-190A-4. The aerodynamic shape has been greatly modified so that it can take off and land on aircraft carriers. It also increased the capacity of the internal fuel tank and designed foldable wings.

However, after many improvements, the Fokker Company and the German Naval Aviation were still very sorry to find that the combat capability of this aircraft at medium and low altitudes was not as good as the Fokker Zero, the range was not comparable to the latter, and the climb was about the same. Only high-altitude performance, dive performance and bomb load exceed the Fokker Zero. Therefore, it is impossible for this aircraft to replace the Fokker Zero and can only exist as a supplement to the Fokker Zero.

In the end, this aircraft was used as a medium-altitude escort aircraft and was accepted by the German Naval Aviation. It is said that its greatest role is to cooperate with the Ju288, allowing the latter to drop Fritz-X remote-controlled glide bombs at an altitude of 7,000 meters - this tactic It was very effective in the Atlantic Ocean. Anyway, the British and American fleets avoided the Ju288's combat radius throughout the spring and summer.

However, the method of using ultra-long-range land bombers to drop remote-controlled gliding bombs cannot be used in the Pacific. Because the Pacific Ocean is much larger than the Atlantic Ocean, a combat radius of more than 2,000 kilometers is very powerful in the Atlantic Ocean, but it is still not enough in the Pacific Ocean.

Moreover... the Germans have no spare Ju288 to sell to Japan. This ultra-long-range, high-altitude, high-speed bomber will never be enough for the German Air Force and Naval Aviation!

As for Japan's own imitation, it is impossible. They can't do it with just one engine. The Japanese have not even fully understood the 12-cylinder DB601 liquid-cooled engine. Is it impossible to imitate the 24-cylinder Jumo222 series engine?

Shitaro Shimada said very worriedly: "The progress of the successor aircraft of the Zero is slow. At the same time, the Americans have many excellent models in service. Their P51 is enough to fight against the Zero at medium and low altitudes, and this P51 fighter It has a large bomb load and a sturdy fuselage, and can be used as a fighter-bomber.

In addition, according to German intelligence, a carrier-based fighter code-named F4U that may have superior performance than the Fw-190T is likely to have entered service. This kind of aircraft may not be as good as the Zero in low-altitude combat, but it is also difficult for the Zero to destroy it.

If the Navy seeks a decisive battle with the US Navy in the second half of 2018, the situation will be quite unfavorable. "

Since the Fokker Zero has been arrogant in Europe from 1939 to the present, its performance has long been understood by its opponents. In low- and medium-altitude combat, except for the P51, which can compete (that is, fight against it), no other aircraft can. But as long as you raise the altitude, avoid the Fokker Zero or adopt a dive attack, you can still deal with the Fokker Zero.

"Then the navy means..." Tojo Hideki looked at Shitaro Shimada.

"The decisive battle should be provoked as soon as possible, the sooner the better!" Shimada said, "The repairs of the Yamato have now been completed, the Musashi has been commissioned, and the advanced nature of the Zero fighter has not been completely lost. Therefore, the combined fleet is now in a The strongest state!”