Chapter 57 "Barbarian Bull" volunteered to be a pioneer

The person Nimitz was particularly concerned about was Task Force Commander Halsey, who commanded all the aircraft carriers under the jurisdiction of the Pacific Fleet. At the time of the Pearl Harbor incident, Halsey happened to be transporting planes for Wake Island, and thus escaped, along with the aircraft carrier "Enterprise".Originally, Halsey would take away three other battleships, but because the speed of the battleships was too slow, he temporarily decided to leave them in Pearl Harbor. Halsey, nicknamed "Brave Bull", has a personality that adds fuel to the fire. If anyone offends him, he will dare to scrape a layer of gold off his face.After receiving the news of the attack on Pearl Harbor, he was furious, and immediately led his fleet to find the Japanese one-on-one, but he couldn't find it after searching for a day, so he had to return to the port angrily.

Since then, Halsey's mantra has become "Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill the Japanese."Among the high-level commanding officers of the U.S. Navy, he hated Yamamoto the most, and was one of the people who would say "Yamamoto is a beast" without opening his mouth. On the day of the meeting, Halsey had just returned to the port after returning from sea patrol, and went straight to the meeting room after landing. "Bull" is not as good-tempered as Nimitz. Seeing that so many people are against going to war, his temper immediately flares up again, and he scolds his head and face, saying that you guys are all defeatists, so he will talk about it. If not, how could the surprise attack fail?I want to lead the aircraft carrier to the battle, and I will definitely succeed immediately.

Nimitz himself was not a pilot, and he had never commanded an aircraft carrier. This was an important reason why he was questioned. Although it was inconvenient for everyone to tell, there was such a knot in their hearts more or less.Halsey is different. He is half sailor, half pilot, and belongs to the all-rounder naval service. As one of the earliest aircraft carrier commanders in the United States, Halsey has commanded the aircraft carrier for many years, and his speeches are very important at critical times.At the same time, he was willing to lead the battle with Feng Yin himself, and others could not find a reason to object even if they wanted to.

Nimitz and Halsey were actually classmates as early as in the Naval Academy. Although Halsey was a class higher than Nimitz, they have known each other since then and become friends. This relationship has been maintained until the two People officially entered the military. One year, I attended an international conference in New York. At the banquet, both brothers drank too much. When they came out of the hotel, they wobbled one after the other. A drunk man at the door mistook Halsey for the janitor and yelled at him, "janitor, find me a car." Halsey gave him a blank look: "Sir, please understand, I am an admiral of the US Navy."

The drunk man was still awake: "Oh, that's even better, just give me a boat!" This joke was unsurprisingly incorporated into Nimitz's joke collection, but Nimitz will give it a new twist.He summoned Halsey to the headquarters and said meaningfully: "Now, you have your 'ship'." On January 11, 1942, Halsey led two aircraft carrier formations to secretly approach the designated target, leaving only two aircraft carrier formations responsible for defending Hawaii. Just in the afternoon of the same day, the "Saratoga" in the escort formation was hit by a Japanese submarine torpedo in the boiler room, and had to return to the west coast of the United States for overhaul. Hawaii provided escort, and "Lexington" had to take on the additional task of attacking Wake Island.

Judging from the air intelligence obtained, the six aircraft carriers that the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor had already left Japan. If they attacked Hawaii again, the situation would be very dangerous.Nimitz never canceled the attack plan under heavy pressure, but he actually couldn't sleep at night, worried. Halsey is not as confident as people think.He knew at the time that the Japanese had fortified the Marshall Islands, and had judged the U.S. attack plan a failure in a past military exercise. However, Halsey firmly believes that the US Navy must fight this battle well.After the Pearl Harbor incident, the morale of the Pacific Fleet plummeted. Fearing that the Japanese army would attack again, it was in panic from top to bottom.The Pacific Fleet Command once ordered Halsey to lead a task force to attack. The reason was that a Japanese submarine was discovered. Halsey ran to see what kind of submarine it was, but it was just an ordinary marine life.

Similar things happened again and again.Once Halsey was ordered to search the sea off northern Hawaii.The sea observers repeatedly took the white waves as the periscope of the enemy submarine and reported the dolphins as torpedoes, and the whole fleet was frightened. Halsey really had no choice but to stand on the bridge to observe in person.After a while, another young officer yelled: "Oh no, our destroyer has sunk!" Halsey was standing next to him.In fact, nothing sank, it was just that the destroyer was blocked by the wave crest, and the ship was driving normally. The fire on Halsey's head was more than ten feet high. He stared at the officer and shouted: "Next time you say such stupid things, I will throw you into the sea!"

If the mood of despair cannot be changed, the Pacific Fleet will be defeated without a fight. Halsey, who is commanding operations on the front line, knows this very well, so he will take the initiative to stand up and become one of the very few generals who support Nimitz. one. The surprise attack process was indeed full of variables.First, the "Lexington", which was ordered to attack Wake Island, was unexpectedly delayed due to refueling on the way, forcing Nimitz to send the only oil tanker in Pearl Harbor to refuel it. As a result, the oil tanker was sunk by a Japanese submarine.

The plan to attack Wake Island had to be cancelled, and "Lexington" returned to Pearl Harbor dejectedly.At the same time, the "York City" formation that accompanied Halsey also encountered the problem of refueling and was unable to move forward for a while. Will the Pai plan fail because of this?Staring at the direction pointed by the Halsey fleet on the map, Nimitz had no choice but to pray silently in his heart.