In fact, the Soviet army sent out many more fighter planes than the Germans imagined. They sent out almost all the fighter planes of the two aviation divisions.
I say "almost" because there is only one group of 10 fighters left as a reserve.
Alexei objected to Shulka's suggestion.
"We have an attack aircraft aviation division, Comrade Shulka!" Alexei said: "The attack aircraft aviation division does not have much advantage in the air. In fact... it can usually only be passively beaten!"
Originally, attack aircraft were mainly used for ground attacks. In addition, the Soviet pilots lacked combat experience, so they were only used in air combat to "passively be beaten".
but……
"It's different this time, Alexei!" Shulka said: "The Germans' target is our tanks and ground troops, so they will send more attack aircraft, that is, their fleet is mainly attack aircraft, and then
Supplemented by fighter aircraft cover! If possible, I also hope that we can ambush the enemy with two aviation divisions of fighters, but now we only have one fighter aviation division and one attack aircraft division. If we only send one fighter aviation division, we will not be able to attack the enemy.
The enemy fighter force has formed an absolute numerical advantage!"
"You mean..." Alexei said: "We use attack planes to fight the enemy's attack planes, and fighter planes to fight the enemy's fighter planes?"
"Yes!" Shulka replied: "And both have an absolute numerical advantage over the enemy!"
Alexey was silent for a while before agreeing to Shulka's plan and reporting it to his superiors.
Major General Samlov, commander of the Aviation Corps, was also surprised when he heard this plan. What he didn't expect was that Shulka would retreat in full force during the first battle.
One Soviet aviation division has about 60 fighter planes, and two aviation divisions have 10 fighter planes. Excluding a brigade as a reserve force, there are 110 fighter planes in action. This scale is a big war. (Note: The Soviet Air Force's organization is relatively smaller than that of the German army.
Smaller, an air group only has 10 aircraft instead of 0)
"If..." Major General Samlov asked with some worry: "The Germans use more fighter planes than we thought, then these two aviation divisions may never come back!"
"We are the ambush party, Comrade General!" Shulka replied: "We can know the number of enemy planes from the radar, or if we know that the strength of the enemy planes is beyond our control, we can also choose to retreat!"
Radar during this period was unreliable, especially in rainy weather, which was one of the reasons why it was difficult for the Germans to detect Soviet fighter planes ambush.
Major General Samlov did not speak. He was a little worried that this was a mistake made by Shulka, who did not understand air combat... because air combat is not as simple as outsiders imagine. For example, the Germans can set up a trap and make it clear.
Some of the fighter planes were sent out to lure the enemy into ambush, while another group was waiting in the clouds.
If the Soviet fighter planes came out in full force, the German fighter planes waiting in the dark would immediately join the battle group.
By then, it would be too late for the Soviet fighter planes to withdraw.
If there is any way to save this situation, it is to prepare enough reserves before committing or to cover the retreat of the main force. However, Shulka only used one group of fighters as a reserve.
What can a group of 10 fighters do?
"I have only one question, Comrade Shulka!" Major General Samlov asked: "How do you plan to use your reserves?"
"In fact, they are not even reserves, Comrade General!" Shulka replied: "I use them to chase the enemy's scattered fighter planes!"
Samlov was speechless for a moment. This Shulka did not consider the failure at all, but only considered the victory.
"Why are you so confident?" Samlov asked: "I mean, are you sure the Germans will be fooled?"
"I'm not sure, Comrade General!" Shulka replied: "I'm just trying my luck!"
Samlov almost fainted when he heard this. More than a hundred planes, try your luck?
Samlov did not support Shulka's approach, but because of Khrushchev's order, he finally chose to follow Shulka's plan.
Khrushchev's order was very simple: "Either you give the order, or I let someone else give the order!"
Of course Samlov knew what this meant... You must know that his aviation corps has two aviation divisions, and each aviation division has a command system. It is enough to promote one of the division commanders to commander to replace him.
In fact, Shulka was not entirely lucky.
On the one hand, Shurka believed that the German fighter planes were already out of strength after the battle, at least in terms of quantity. In fact, the number of German fighter planes had never been an advantage.
On the other hand, Shulka knew that this was the time for Goering to prepare airlift to meet the supply needs of the trapped German Sixth Group.
Therefore, Göring needed a large number of transport aircraft, in addition to saving a large amount of aviation fuel, and also needed to organize a large number of fighters... The transport aircraft needed the protection of fighter aircraft.
Shulka even knew that due to the serious shortage of transport aircraft, Goering even ordered bombers to be used as transport aircraft to transport supplies for the Sixth Army.
So, in this case, the German army is unlikely to send a group of fighter planes as bait as Samlov feared, and then hide a large number of fighter planes in the dark waiting for the Soviet army to take the bait.
Of course, it is never possible to determine what the enemy will be like on the battlefield, so there is still an element of luck.
Schulka won the bet because the Germans had no such "trick". In addition to the lack of German fighter planes, another reason was that they underestimated the enemy... The Germans believed that a large group of fighter planes was fully capable of repelling any incoming attack.
The enemy, after all, the enemy pilots are all "baby cabbages".
But this is not the case.
A Soviet fighter aviation division swooped down on the German fighter group... 70 aircraft against 0 aircraft, more than twice the numerical advantage. The sky was immediately filled with the roar of aircraft engines and the roar of machine guns like tearing cloth.
Then fighter planes fell from the sky one after another, puffing out black smoke.
On the other hand, the German "Henschel" fleet obeyed the order and turned around and left.
To a certain extent, the fighter group commanded by William did not abandon the attack aircraft group, but used itself to hold back the enemy fighter group so that Group B could escape.
The idea is good, but the reality is cruel.
Before the German B fleet had flown far, fighter planes swooped down from the sky and rushed into the German fleet... Another aviation division fighter plane. Although it was a Soviet attack aircraft, with 80 to 60, it also had a numerical advantage.
.
What's more important is to be prepared and unprepared. One dive downed a dozen German attack planes immediately. (To be continued)