Chapter 49:
Chapter 49
The British Air Force ignited the last flame of resistance.
After the army was completely destroyed at Dunkirk, and the navy lost all its main ships to the bottom of the sea after a series of defeats, the air force was relatively less damaged, but it was also on the verge of collapse due to the accumulated losses since last year.
The starting point was France.
To stop the Nazi German army that advanced at high speed with the support of ground attack aircraft, Churchill generously sent the latest fighters that Britain had to France.
Nevertheless, France surrendered in six weeks, and the British expeditionary air force, which included many novice pilots who flew the latest fighters, suffered heavy losses.
There was a secret here.
Hugh Dowding, the commander of the fighter command, argued that he should save the latest fighters, but Churchill insisted on his claim until the end.
Even after France surrendered in six weeks, Churchill claimed that without Britain’s support, it would have been five weeks, or four weeks or less.
Even if Churchill was not wrong, the lost planes and pilots, and soldiers did not come back, so everyone remained silent.
The British Air Force also suffered a lot of damage in the Dunkirk evacuation operation to save the isolated British Army.
At this point, Dowding could not even oppose it.
In the midst of the British Army’s pillar shaking, opposing to preserve the Air Force could be seen as selfishness of the Air Force.
He reluctantly put in his fighters and they were again damaged and sunk into the English Channel.
Along with the army soldiers.
Dowding resigned and the air force gradually declined.
At Taranto, at Malta air battle, at African front.
The productivity increased compared to before the war broke out, but the damage came closer and closer.
The ace pilots had to fight while being overwhelmed by numbers, and the novice pilots died without even having a chance to become aces.
The average number of kills for British pilots was now about three.
A handful of ace pilots who survived after shooting down dozens of planes, and an absolute majority of rookies who had never shot down a single plane – or even their first real battle.
Of course, their fighting spirit was alive.
To stop the foreign army that set foot on British soil for the first time in almost a thousand years, both aces and rookies fought with their lives.
“Answer me! Answer me! Whiskey Tango, damn it… Lieutenant Holton!”
But even if they risked their lives, they did not easily shoot down the German veterans.
Squadron Leader Turk was one of the best aces who had shot down twenty-nine planes so far, but he barely managed to shoot down one and get out of this air battle.
Now thirty. And his wingman… shot down? Killed?
He didn’t know.
Lieutenant Holton was a rookie who was commissioned just two weeks ago and got into a cockpit due to the lack of pilots.
The first ones to die on the battlefield are brave ones.
Only cowards survive.
Turk bit his lips hard.
He was a coward.
He was one of the top aces who boasted a lot of kills from above, so he often received interview requests from the media, and also received autograph requests or fan letters, but he never responded to any of them.
The most courageous comrades had already disappeared into the English Channel, above their homeland’s sky, or into Africa’s desert or Mediterranean’s blue sea.
Only those who fought most cowardly survived.
“Bravo Squadron! Bravo Squad… Hrrrrrgh… Chzzz”
“What! What’s going on!”
Damn it.
He thought he knew who it was.
The desperate call for help from Delta Squadron Leader Major Blythe burst out on the radio and then stopped with a deflated moan.
Another casualty.
‘Do you know how people die?’
His poker buddy, an army officer, said that jokingly. Actually, there is not much difference between being hit by a knife or a bullet.
Whenever he got a bad poker hand, his friend always tried to distract him from betting by telling stories about all kinds of gruesome injuries.
When you get a hole in your chest, the pressure inside your chest and atmospheric pressure become equal so there is no good flow of air.
What does that mean? His friend laughed wickedly.
Hey! How do you think it sounds! You die without even making a squeak.
The organs inside your chest, esophagus, aorta and its branches…
He gave a long lecture on how humans can die with anatomical terms that were hard to understand.
Will I die like that too?
“Here is headquarters! Pilots who can escape should escape!”
This time it was headquarters. What’s going on on the ground?
Did the army approach near the airfield?
He couldn’t tell if he heard gunshots from radio or from ground.
But he understood that he should escape if he could.
Damn it.
He just wanted to smoke a cigarette if he had one.
And run away like a coward to live another day?
He had always chosen to survive and live with shame.
The headquarters was pleading on the radio.
We need you.
For the sake of resistance, don’t choose a futile death and escape to the emergency assembly point, Cambridge!
The voice of the usual headquarters radio operator changed to someone who sounded older and repeated the same message.
[My men, I am the air force commander… one… all…]
When the radio became too noisy to hear, Squadron Leader Turk knew.
Most of the friendly planes had disappeared from the battlefield.
Another one shot down.
Whose plane was it?
The plane spewed black smoke and burned fiercely as it quickly disappeared toward the ground.
He must have failed to bail out.
Even if he did…?
The ground must have been occupied by the Nazis by now.
Was there any meaning in resisting anymore?
Would I stop being a coward if I die?
Running away to death… coward.
He knew he was a coward.
“This is Bravo Squadron, Bravo Squadron. Reporting squadron leader.”
The headquarters probably couldn’t send radio messages because of shelling or bombing.
The remaining pilots were few anyway.
He started to laugh for some reason.
“Escape, escape one by one. I’ll cover your back. I repeat. Escape, escape. I’ll cover your back.”
“Bill Turk!”
Someone called his name on the radio.
Turk ignored the call with a snort.
Hey, you guys fight.
I’m… going to run away.
Damn it, I’m running away! Hahaha!!
The German planes were pretty good.
They were not inferior to his Spitfire fighter at this low and medium altitude.
The Spitfire had an advantage only in… turning?
He had the skills worthy of a British Air Force ace in dogfighting, and he thought he could handle it with planes of similar performance. But there were too many enemies.
The enemy squadron approached at high speed with the cover of their wingmen, and used hit-and-run tactics.
Normally, he would have challenged them to a dogfight and shot them down, but if he did that now, he would be caught by the overwhelming number of enemies and be reversed.
One by one, one by one, the fighters ran away.
The German fighters had a disadvantage in range and were originally an expeditionary battle, so they did not chase the fleeing fighters.
Yeah, let’s hold on.
Turk kept touching the handle that opened the canopy.
While doing so, he dodged the pouring machine gun bullets with a flip maneuver that turned him upside down, and then raised his altitude and adjusted his speed to approach from the direction of the sun and limit their visibility.
After that… escape.
Escape.
His head wanted to be a coward and his heart wanted to fight for his country kept fighting until the last moment.
There was only one friendly plane left in the sky besides him.
Six German fighters were chasing that one plane to prevent its escape.
Escape or death.
They were not much different.
Hit-and-run, he gave a few machine gun bullets to the left wing of an enemy fighter that was trying to catch up with his ally’s tail, and the enemy fighter gave up on fighting and headed for the other side of the sea.
There was no answer to his radio call or shout to his ally.
“I… I’m going to escape too! Escape! Before you die!”
“…”
POW camp or Folkstone (national cemetery)!
Sinister rumors crossed over the burning flames of war and came across the sea.
Rumors about prisoner camps run by Germans circulated around barracks from mouth to mouth.
The French army that surrendered in just six weeks was dragged somewhere in Eastern Europe and massacred, they said, only the navy survived by promising to participate in war.
If British pilots bailed out somewhere in continental Europe, German search teams would chase them down and kill them anyway.
The French exile pilots trembled at these rumors.
They firmly believed that Germany had abused their compatriots, and fought with a desperate will against Germany.
Was that pilot French too?
Some inconsiderate people criticized them from behind.
France received our support and surrendered in just six weeks.
Turk sometimes chuckled at various black humor jokes made about six weeks, but he didn’t like their inconsiderateness.
He heard an explosion from below.
Ha. It’s really over now.
He was reaching his physical limit soon.
He hesitated until the last moment when machine gun bullets pierced through his canopy and poured in.
Bullets and glass shards tore his body savagely, and his vision blurred in an instant.
‘Take care, friends. On the day we meet again… No, come later.’
The last British fighter disappeared into the cold waters of the English Channel, and the air battle was over.
The Germans began their harsh march into the British island.
The British fleet, which once made the five oceans tremble, could not resist the organized power of the united Axis.
The attempt of the British fleet to cut off the sea supply line was frustrated by the desperate inferiority of air superiority.
The fall of the British Empire was imminent.
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