Just after Drachenko had climbed to four thousand meters, his wingman Bayev shouted, “Is there someone down there?”
Drachenko banked his wings and sure enough, he saw the barely visible small tanks below.
The tanks had clearly stopped, so there was no dust being kicked up, making them very difficult to spot.
Ivan, on the number three plane, was somewhat worried, “Could it be our own troops?”
To be honest, it was simply impossible to distinguish from the air which side the troops were on; rashly diving down could indeed result in hitting the wrong target.
The reason Drachenko had been certain the targets attacking on the ground were the enemy was because friendly twin-engine Pe-2 bombers would climb after dropping their bombs and wouldn’t strafe the ground with their cannons.
Facing the ground targets now, Drachenko found himself in a quandary. He decided to use the radio to ask.
“Eagle calling the vehicles below, what brand of pickles tastes good? What brand of pickles tastes good?”
No response.
At the same time, wingman Bayev indicated, “I hear a lot of very clear Prussian language chatter on the radio; I guess it’s the enemy.”
Drachenko clicked his tongue, steeled his resolve, “Go down, after all, we might not hit precisely, but let’s bomb first and talk later.”
Having said that, he pulled the stick straight, rolling the plane half a turn, tucked it under, and entered a dive.
He aimed the dive-bombing sight at the tiny tanks on the ground that looked like ants and went into a full-speed dive.
The P47 aircraft, diving at the speed of seven to eight hundred on the indicator could still be pulled up, something the Ante’s wooden aircraft simply couldn’t achieve. So the veteran pilots of the Air Force, quickly familiar with the planes, didn’t even throttle back during dives, as this meant faster speeds and quicker pull-ups, minimizing time within the enemy’s anti-aircraft fire range.
Therefore, when a P47 was bombing, it generally wouldn’t cut the throttle or deploy any airbrakes but dived at full speed, releasing bombs around 2000 meters—any lower and they might crash into the ground.
This method of bombing had questionable accuracy; first, because the altitude for the dive was too high to get a clear view of the ground target, and second, because the bombing height was too high and the speed too fast.
Moreover, the P47 didn’t have a specialized dive-bombing rack, so when bombs were dropped, they would be affected by the turbulence created by the plane pulling up.
To address the issue of low hit rates, the 4th Strike Fighter Group put their brains to work with the bomb loadout, equipping the P47s with two 500-kilogram bombs and two 250-kilogram bombs.
If I can’t throw precisely, I’ll release four at once, and surely one will land within the lethal radius, won’t it?
With such a bomb load method, the effects on soft targets were outstanding; a two-plane formation dropping bombs on a densely packed marching column could cause casualties upwards of four hundred, directly writing off an entire battalion.
And if it was a bombing of deployed enemies, then obliterating one or two companies was also normal.
Compared to this, the Stuka might be more accurate in bombing, but it only dropped one 500-kilogram bomb at a time, and the effects might not be better than the P47.
After dropping bombs, the P47 could still engage in air combat, while the Stuka could only flee.
At this moment, four P47s, carrying eight 500-kilogram bombs and eight 250-kilogram bombs, sped towards the enemy on the ground.
He didn’t even look at the altimeter, dropping bombs purely based on experience, and only glanced at the height when he started to pull up: 1500 meters, too low!
So, he pulled back on the stick with even more force as if it would make the plane climb faster.
The g-force made all of Drachenko’s blood rush to his feet, and due to the lack of blood, his head went light, darkening his vision.
He could only hold onto the stick with the last of his willpower.
At times like this, the exact moment to release the stick could only be judged by experience; let go too soon, and the plane wouldn’t have climbed enough, crashing into the ground.
Drachenko counted to three, then suddenly relaxed the stick, allowing the rudder to return to position under airflow resistance.
Dizziness gradually faded, and the blue sky filled his vision once more. Drachenko looked at the altimeter; it read 2100—he had managed to pull the plane up.
He leaned to the left, struggled to look back, wanting to see the effects of the bombardment.
The bomb’s fuse was set for one second; it should have detonated by now.
As expected, Drachenko saw sixteen plumes of dust of various sizes completely engulf the enemy’s formation on the ground.
He’d hit the target!
In his excitement, Drachenko asked over the radio, “Is everyone okay? No one crashed into the ground, right?”
“Nope.”
“Boss, you pulled up too late. I thought we wouldn’t make it and were about to sacrifice ourselves for our country.”
“Shouldn’t we do a strafing run? After all, we’ve got plenty of bullets.”
The P47 was armed with eight Browning 12.7 mm machine guns, the firepower of which was exceptionally fierce; that’s what had just sheared off the wings of the Do 215 bomber in an instant.
Such firepower was naturally very effective for strafing ground soft targets.
Drachenko: “No, didn’t you see the outcome of those four Prussian tactical bombers just now? If we indulge in strafing, lowering our speed greatly, we’ll become prey for the 109s! Now we’ve regained altitude and speed, and if we encounter a 109, we can still test our strength.”
The 109 and P47 could be considered evenly matched, utterly dependent on the altitude and speed at which each entered combat.
Thus, the four P47s headed towards the airfield.
————
On the ground, Lieutenant Linden of the Prosen Army opened the hatch and popped his head out from his own vehicle, number 217.
The surroundings were a complete mess, with injured soldiers everywhere.
The voice of the electromechanical operator came through the headphones, “Damn it, the enemy must have dropped twenty or thirty heavy bombs! Not one hit us, just goes to show that these inferior people can’t aim for shit!”
Before Linden could reply, the driver spoke up, “Not necessarily, it looks like vehicle 218’s tracks got blown off.”
Linden immediately turned to look at vehicle 218 and, indeed, saw its driver inspecting the tracks.
Lieutenant Linden picked up the microphone, “218, how are you holding up?”
“A bomb landed less than 30 meters from me, the tracks are done for, along with the infantry that was hiding next to the tank. It’s a terrible sight, it’s my first time seeing what it’s like to be killed by overpressure.” Enjoy exclusive content from empire
“Can you repair the tracks?” Linden skipped over the dead infantry and asked the most crucial question.
“Whether we can repair it or not depends on the driver’s inspection,” the commander of vehicle 218, who was on the turret, watched this side as his driver suddenly looked up and said something.
Linden asked, “What did he say?”
“He said it’s not just the tracks that are done for, but also the first road wheel. His suggestion is to remove the tracks from the other side and then have a Panzer VI tow us to retreat.”
The Panzer VI could also have its tracks removed and be towed by another vehicle, but that would seriously affect the Panzer VI’s running gear and easily lead to more faults.
Lieutenant Linden, “This means you guys won’t be able to participate in combat operations for at least half a month, you’re aware that our field repair camp hasn’t caught up yet, right?”
The commander of vehicle 218 did not reply but spoke a few words to the driver, who shook his head, then glanced in the direction of platoon leader Linden and lowered his head to continue to work on the tracks.
“My driver says we need at least until the day after tomorrow morning to do emergency repairs.”
Lieutenant Linden, “Then you do the repairs here, we continue to advance. We can wait for you in the village 20 kilometers from Yarvik!”
The commander of vehicle 218 hesitantly asked, “Should we continue to advance? Enemy air raids will become more frequent—”
He had barely finished speaking when someone nearby shouted, “Air raid! Enemy planes overhead, diving towards us!”
Linden looked up and saw the planes with zebra stripes painted on their wings diving down. Unlike the Stukas, these planes didn’t have that terrifying scream when diving, but Linden, who had experienced one bombing already, thought they were much more terrifying than the Stukas.
He quickly ducked back into the tank and closed the lid, then remembered his driver and electromechanical operator were still outside!
At that moment, the combat room’s bottom hatch, leading down to the ground, opened, and the driver seemed to want to crawl in from underneath the vehicle, but he had only just reached in when the bombs fell.
Linden felt the massive Panzer VI shake.
With each bomb explosion, the tank, like being slapped by an invisible hand, vibrated, and the armor facing the direction of the explosion buzzed.
The thing about air raids, as opposed to artillery barrages, is that they end quickly.
Once it quieted down outside, Linden pushed open the hatch again and climbed out.
This time the attacking enemy planes were five times as many as before, so the amount of bombs dropped was also fivefold—Linden saw that half of the accompanying half-track vehicles were burning, and a motorcycle seemed to have been flipped over by the blast wave.
The motorcyclist, wearing a trench coat, lay not far away, motionless.
Just as Linden was about to say something, he saw the commander of vehicle 218 in the distance gesturing, seeming to say, “Watch out for your vehicle’s tracks.”
“Bob, check the tracks!” Linden ordered the driver.
The driver, who had just come in through the bottom hatch, climbed out again through the driver’s exit on top of the vehicle and jumped to the ground.
After just one look, he reported, “Captain, bad news, our track is broken.”
Linden, “Any issues with the first road wheel?”
“At least it doesn’t look like it for now,” the driver shook his head, “but it might just fall apart while we’re moving. It could take a day to repair the track.”
Linden clicked his tongue, thought briefly, and then called over the commander of the accompanying troops.
The infantry captain climbed on top of the tank and asked, “What’s up?”
“As you can see, we’re stranded. The good news is, it’s just a broken track, and one of the vehicles also has an issue with a road wheel, but the bad news is, we’re stuck here until at least tomorrow night.”
Lieutenant Linden didn’t dare say until the day after tomorrow morning.
The captain’s eyebrows twisted into knots, “The enemy has bombed us once, they will bomb us a second time.”
Lieutenant Linden, “We can contact Colonel Busse and ask him to send anti-aircraft artillery over. Of course, if Colonel Busse directly advances and takes the village right in front of us, that would be even better.”
The captain sighed, “Lieutenant, I have a bad feeling, really, a bad feeling.”
Lieutenant Linden reassured, “Don’t worry, we have four Panzer VIs here, you’ve seen what they are capable of. The enemy, even with a hundred T34s, won’t be able to touch us!”
“It’s not that I’m worried about…” the captain looked towards the east—the direction of the enemy, “What I’m worried about is that General Rocossov, the White Horse, has already drawn near to us, and he’s one dangerous guy who has devoured many of our troops!”
Lieutenant Linden confidently stated, “Don’t worry, with the Panzer VI here, he can’t devour us! You’ve seen it, the Ante People have no weapons capable of threatening a Panzer VI!”