Betty dared to intercept the American transport fleet, not only because the Japanese joint fleet was strong enough, but also because the British intelligence network was indeed powerful. Although the British Empire had declined and the once arrogant fleet had failed. However, the British Empire's war wisdom for hundreds of years was still preserved. In the new era, when the British could no longer defeat everything, the British invested more in intelligence and had new developments! The Pacific War was also a detection of the British new intelligence system.

"The Americans are gathering their transport fleet again." William, the captain of the Flying Fish, stood on the bridge and used a telescope to observe the American transport fleet on the distant sea. At this time, in the A35 waters marked on the map, the US Navy once again concentrated a large number of transport ships, and then uniformly covered by the escort fleet. Then he passed directly across half the Pacific Ocean to deliver a large amount of supplies to the front lines of New Guinea and Bismarck Island.

In order to find out the assembly time, navigation time and route of the US transport fleet, the British intelligence department also cast a big net on the ocean. Considering the current relationship between Britain and the United States, the British naturally could not use merchant ships with British flags to track the American fleet, so the method they adopted was to use merchant ships registered in third countries and then use personnel from the British Royal Navy to observe the US transport fleet.

This observation requires great care. First of all, reconnaissance ships must not be too close, nor can they stay for too long. There are more than ten destroyers or armed merchant ships on the periphery of the huge transport fleet. The US Navy will never be ruthless for suspected targets, so these reconnaissance ships must maintain a certain distance and must not stay for too long at a time. Well, if this is the method of relay stapling, the British must prepare quite a lot of reconnaissance ships, which is obviously not a good choice in terms of economics.

The British also have a way to deal with it. They can change their identities every time they come out. The ship is loaded with a large amount of plates and paint. After completing a close-up reconnaissance and conducting another reconnaissance, the British will pretend to the ship carefully. For example, the Flying Fish, this time it is a fishing boat from Peru, and the next time it will become a transport boat from Chile. The crew will carefully repaint the ship and change the superstructure of some hulls. Think about it, the British Navy can cosplay a merchant ship into a super fearless one. How difficult is it to add several chimneys or demolish some bridges?

In addition to conducting reconnaissance at the assembly location of the US Navy, the British Navy will also arrange "accidental encounters" with the US transport fleet on the vast ocean! Of course, this "accidental encounter" must also be handled seriously. For example, the location of the encounter should be near the intersection of the US transport fleet and normal commercial routes, and the "accidental" ships must also be "diversified". When implementing the tracking plan for the same batch of transport fleets, the ships participating in the "accidental" operation will come from France, Brazil, Turkey or some other countries that seem to have no connection.

Even so, about 40% of the ships participating in the reconnaissance plan may not find the target at the first time, because the Americans did not use the original commercial route to transport supplies. They will choose some rare sea areas where few ships pass. These sea areas may have bad weather and may detour long routes, but at least safe! As a US officer assisting with maritime escort said: "I would rather let 70 ships sail together than lose a merchant ship because of taking shortcuts!"

This American caution is rewarding. Because the Japanese submarine force's probability of discovering targets has been greatly reduced by choosing relatively remote waters, and the number and command system of Japanese submarines are far less than that of the Germans, so it is very difficult to establish a network spread throughout the war zone. More than 30% of the transport fleet did not find a Japanese submarine during the entire voyage.

Of course, Americans' sailing is definitely not full of oceans. After all, the seemingly calm sea is not safe. The routes must always avoid storm-prone areas or typhoons passing through the border. In this era, there were actually not many large ships. Generally, the average tonnage of ocean-going transport fleets was about 6,000 tons. Therefore, after avoiding too remote seas and storm areas, the areas that can pass through were relatively limited. The British did the method to find American transport fleets in these areas, and then sort out several commonly used routes of American transport fleets based on the results of multiple stalking.

After months of tracking and stalking, the British Navy has gradually figured out the movement laws of the US transport fleet. It is based on this intelligence that the British people tried to convince the Japanese to take action on the US Navy's transportation lines.

"The U.S. fleet assembly time takes about 6 to 8 hours depending on the fleet size. Their radio contact is kept open before the fleet sails from ports across the United States to the target assembly area. That is to say, if we get closer, we can use radio lateral technology to explore the location of the U.S. fleet."

"After completing the assembly and entering the route, although the Americans tried their best to keep radio silent, in some low-frequency bands, Americans still maintain regular communication. Is this contact period about 6 hours? According to the wavelength, it should be long-distance long-wave communication, and the content of the notification should also be about the fleet's navigation."

"The time required for the sea navigation of the US fleet varies depending on the assembly point and the destination location. It takes about 150 hours to reach the A1 target from A. It takes about 165 hours to get from B to B1, it takes 170 hours to get from C1 from C., and it takes 160 hours to get to C2."

"The U.S. Navy seems to adhere to the principle of randomness in the choice of routes. Before the transport fleet leaves the port, they do not know which route they will take after the convergence. The only people who really know the route are the commanders and guides of the escort fleet. After the convergence, they will walk with the fleet. In this process, the fleet personnel do not know which route they are going to. Perhaps only experienced crew members can determine their approximate location through simple equipment such as sextant. Considering that the Americans will arrange military personnel on each merchant ship, the idea of ​​relying on the merchant ship to get in and send a report is almost unfeasible."
Chapter completed!