Winter Warriors

Aren’t they all? The U.S. Navy had Chance-Vought, Douglas, Martin, Lockheed. They had aircraft carriers, the Germans had battleships. What had they been thinking? Over to his left, Dash saw a single battleship, slowly, painfully, turning south. She was listing, leaving a trail of oil in the water behind her, black smoke staining the sky behind her. Marko lead his formation over to the position of the ship and looked at her more closely. She was one of the smallest German battleships, two twin turrets forward, one twin aft. Scharnhorst class. What looked like her sister ship was way behind, dead in the water. The other eight aircraft from Marko’s squadron already making their attack runs on her. This one, the mobile one, was Marko’s.

“All Sugar aircraft, split into two groups of four. Hit her from either side of the bows. 45 degrees off centerline; first flight hit port, my flight hit starboard.” Marko’s voice was confident as he rapped out the orders. TG58.5 had only enough aircraft and munitions left for a single strike and this wave was a mixture of serviceable aircraft from the squadrons on board the carriers. One good strike.

He took his plane down, skimming the waves in the now-familiar pattern of the torpedo-bomber pilot. There was some flak; a tiny amount, a few tracers here and there. Nothing like the storm that had greeted them when they’d hit the enemy carriers that morning. He knew it was a perfect hammerhead attack. The torpedoes would interlock to form a web from which even a fully-mobile ship found it hard to escape. This cripple didn’t even have that chance. Marko’s rockets streaked towards the target. The battleship’s battered bridge vanished under the flashes of the impacts, then his torpedoes were gone. His wing cannon added to the chaos on the target. Then his formation flashed over the ship and their work was all done.

Behind him, seven columns of water rose from the ship. Two up by the bows severed the raking structure, causing it to collapse downwards. Two more hit portside, just under the funnel; three more starboard side, under what was left of the aft superstructure. That had to hurt. Marko watched the battleship lose the last vestige of movement. She went dead in the water, her wake faded away as she lost speed.

Marko’s formation had got in and out clean. Eight aircraft had gone in, eight come out. He led the formation higher, ready for the return flight home. Below him, he saw the battleship he’d watched foundering had already gone and the one behind her was on her beam ends. That made it time to report.

“Saber control, this is Ink Five-Two Leader. Have seen two battleships sink, one explode. Fourth is on her beam ends. Attacked one battleship heading south, estimated seven hits. All torpedoes released.” Marko paused. “Control, we’re doing murder out here.”

“Ink Five-Two leader, Washington wants a clean sweep on this one. Do a circuit of the area, see if any other hostiles are heading south.”

“Roger, sweeping south now.”

Marko’s group swung south and started its search arc. It didn’t take long. They didn’t have to go very far. There was a formation beneath them; a capital ship, five escorts. For a second, Marko debated whether to call the sighting in. Hadn’t enough ships been sunk, hadn’t enough men died? That doubt lasted only a second.

“Saber Control. Ink Five-Two leader here. Sighted enemy formation. Estimated one capital ship, five destroyers, about 20 miles south-east of main formation.”

“Acknowledged Five-Two Leader.” There was a long pause. “Be advised that one squadron of Adies from your group is being diverted to hit them. We are contacting Excaliber and Knife to have Formations Jack and King diverted to take down that group. Come on home. The sun’s going down.”

Admiral’s Bridge, USS Gettysburg CVB-43, Flagship Task Force 58

“Sir, Word from Saber.” Halsey grunted. Shangri-La and her task group had opened the battle and her crews now had more experience at attacking ships than his other pilots. “Sir, Formation Ink reports that three enemy battleships have sunk. One more is going down now, the other four are dead in the water. The survivors, one large ship reported as a battleship but we think it’s a cruiser, and five destroyers heading south. Saber requests Jack and King hit them. They’re all-Corsair waves, Admiral. So are Log and Mike. We’re ready to launch Nan now Sir, but we’re running out of time. We’ll be well into dusk by the time they recover.”

Halsey thought for a minute. “Nan is Able reloaded. Get them off. They started the battle, they can finish it. Then get the Tigercats loaded up for a night torpedo attack. They’ll go in if any of the Germans survive the daylight strikes.” He broke off, another messenger had arrived on the bridge.

“Sir, final report from Ink just in. Two more battleships gone down, total is now five. Confirmed losses are identified as two Derfflinger class, two Bismarck class, one Scharnhorst class. Smaller units wiped out. At least three cruisers and twelve destroyers sunk.

“Very well. Transmit the following message to Washington.” Halsey took a message blank and scribbled a few words on it.

The messenger read the five words and grinned broadly. “Yes SIR!”

Captain’s Bridge, KMS Lutzow, High Seas Fleet, North Atlantic

One of Captain Becker’s secret vices was that he was a hopeless addict to American cowboy films. He particularly loved the endings where the good guys were holed up, either cavalry in a fort or a wagon train drawn up in a circle, hoping for rescue but determined to sell their lives dearly. That was his situation now, except he knew no rescue was coming. He’d seen the cloud of smoke on the horizon as Seydlitz had exploded. He’d heard the reports as von der Tann and Tirpitz had capsized. Bismarck and Gneisenau had gone as well, they’d just taken too much damage, too many hits, and had foundered. No, there was no rescue coming, that left only selling their lives dearly. At least, Lutzow still had her anti-aircraft guns working. She could still fight.

“Maximum power. It doesn’t matter what the gauges say, get this ship moving.” That was a decisive enough order. There were 16 torpedo planes coming in, already splitting into two groups of eight to catch him in a scissors attack. “Concentrate fire on the portside group. Hard to starboard.” Try and shoot down as many of the torpedo planes on one side as possible, try to take the other group head on.

His anti-aircraft guns ranged in on the formation he’d selected. He was rewarded, first one Douglas erupted into flame and plowed into the sea, then another blew up. Probably a direct hit form his 105s. His 20mm guns chewed up a third, sending it spinning into the sea. The remaining five dropped at perilously close range, then passed overhead. Becker heard the roar of their rockets but his whole attention was focused on the tracks of the torpedoes. Only eight? Two must have broken up or sunk, perhaps a Douglas hit by 20mm fire at just the wrong second? His ship was turning hard, the tracks were slowly drifting aft of him. Seven missed, somehow, the last caught his ship under his rear turret. Becker braced himself for the explosion that never came. A dud?

His relief lasted only a second. Lutzow shuddered as two explosions up forward racked his cruiser. He cursed the bad luck that had brought them. He’d dodged the deadly beam attack that should have raked his ship with hits, only to get hit twice by torpedoes from a bow-on attack, where the book said the chances of getting hit were but slight. He could feel the ship slowing, her movement in the water changing as the buoyancy of the bows were lost. The torpedoes had hit either side of the ship, precisely between the peak of the bow and Anton turret. Now, the whole bow had gone, sheared off just forward of Anton turret.

“Report.”

There was an interminable delay from up front as the damage control crews tried to get a handle on the effects of the hits. Meanwhile Becker looked around at the rest of his squadron. 2-38 and 2-29 were burning, the Douglases must have hit them with rockets as they passed. It looked like they’d hit at least one more of the Ami bombers though.

“Damage control. The forward bulkhead is holding, we’re reinforcing with timbers and sealing off now. We can’t move though. If we get any way on, the bulkhead will split wide open.”

Becket grimaced. Staying here meant death. Then inspiration struck. “You mean we can’t get any forward speed on. No reason why we can’t go backwards.” He flipped to the engine room telegraph. “Full power astern. If we have to, we’ll back all the way home!”

Admiral’s Bridge, USS Gettysburg CVB-43, Flagship Task Force 58

“Nan is making its run now, Sir. It’s the big finale. 58.2 and 58.3 got off four full squadrons of Adies and