3:30 am.

The transport ship was in place, and the amphibious landing vehicle and the landing craft entered the water. With a "rumble" sound of motors, it drove to the bottom of the transport ship side by side against the transport ship.

What the Sino-US coalition landing personnel must do is climb down the mesh rope of the transport ship and board the amphibious landing vehicle and landing craft.

This process seems simple, but it is actually full of dangers.

The main reason is that these must be completed in the dark. Each of them has to carry 45.36 kilograms of equipment to climb down the net rope. The speed cannot be too fast or too slow. If it is too fast, it will step on the hands or head of the comrades below, which will bring danger to the comrades above. If it is too slow, it will be stepped on by the comrades above, which will put themselves in danger... Needless to say what this danger is, if it is stepped on and falls down, luckily one person will fall down, but more often it will fall down and fall down, and many people will fall down together, so a large number of falls and injuries will occur.

However, this is nothing to the soldiers of the new 28th Division. After all, they have participated in the battle and seen what is real danger. This danger is nothing to them. Moreover, they also had relevant training when they were in Rabaul, so they climbed onto the landing craft without any danger to prepare for landing.

By the time all the landing craft and landing craft were ready, it was already more than an hour later.

Countless pairs of eyes staring at Bito Island in the battleship group. Although they could not see anything because of the darkness, everyone was waiting for that moment. They were waiting for the moment when the US Navy started the battle. But unexpectedly, it was not the US military that started the battle, but the Japanese army, who were considered to have no resistance.

Five o'clock in the morning.

The Kingfisher-style water reconnaissance aircraft took off from the Maryland catapult. Its mission is to observe the upcoming naval bombing and send back corrected data on range and orientation with radio, simply to prepare for the caliber shooting.

But the flashes emitted during the ejection took off were very conspicuous in the darkness, and the Japanese immediately determined the location of the Maryland.

Then the cannon sounded...

With a few disgusting howling sounds, several shells fell on the sea area only more than 400 meters away from the Maryland and exploded. The splashes caused could even splash on the sailors on the side of the Maryland.

Therefore, no one would think that the Japanese had given up on Tarawa or that all the Japanese on Tarawa had been bombed to death.

But some people would be lucky, thinking that this was just the last firepower gathered by the Japanese as they rode the blank space of the US Navy bombing.

However, what followed soon made this luck become a broken soap bubble.

The "Maryland" is the flagship of the US Navy. It is obviously intolerable for the flagship to be bombarded, and of course it is also something that Major General Harry Hill cannot tolerate, because he just swore at the press conference that he would not encounter decent resistance from the enemy, but the flagship was immediately bombarded by the Japanese.

So the US Navy immediately launched a retaliatory counterattack against the Japanese army. With the roaring sound, the Sino-US coalition forces on the landing craft watched with awe as a large number of shells roaring over their heads and pouring towards Bito Island.

Bunches of smoke and fire broke out on Bito Island soon, and there were also columns of water soaring into the sky.

The US Navy's shooting once again exposed the location of the warship, so the Japanese artillery launched a counterattack.

So the bombing was constantly coming and going, and the fire in the sky was shining brightly, and waves of volleys roared across the water, and then raised a series of water columns in the sea.

Amid the bombing sound, Zhang Chi, who was further away from the artillery fire area, only said: "These idiots!"

The first mistake made by the US Navy is that the Maryland should not have ejected reconnaissance aircraft near the Tarawa coast... The range of the US Kingfisher-type water reconnaissance aircraft is 1,860 kilometers and a speed of 264 kilometers per hour. In other words, even if the Maryland catapults the Kingfisher several dozen kilometers away, it will only take more than ten minutes to reach Tarawa.

But Major General Harry Hill believed that this kind of caution was completely unnecessary, because at this time, the Japanese army in Tarawa could not have any threat to the US Navy. However, the fact is that the flagship "Maryland" was almost hit by the Japanese 203mm howitzer. If it was hit... the landing commander in the direction of Tarawa would probably die at the first time.

What is even more frustrating is that the Kingfisher, which exposed the flagship position of the Maryland, did not play any role, because once the shells passed, the Tarawa was covered with smoke and water vapor again, and the pilots on the Kingfisher-style water reconnaissance could not see anything, let alone the shooting.

The second mistake made by the US Navy is that they should not have artillery battles with the Japanese army near the sea.

Because it is obvious that the navy, which also advocates giant cannon ships, had the range of artillery on destroyers, cruisers and battleships, all exceeded the range of artillery of the Japanese army in Tarava.

The Japanese troops stationed on Bito Island cannot move, but the US warships can move.

In other words, the US Navy could easily drive beyond the range of Japanese artillery to launch bombing, but they did not do so.

Of course, this is not to say that the US Navy is really stupid. They actually understand this, but they underestimated the enemy too much. They thought that the Japanese artillery fire on Bito Island was just a little remnant, and a few more rounds of artillery fire could be solved.

But this is not the case... No matter how the US Navy's warships exploded, the Japanese artillery shells were still coming to the US Navy's fleet one after another, and even becoming more and more accurate.

It was not until several landing craft were thrown into the sky because they were hit by Japanese artillery shells that Major General Hill realized that this would not only put the warships in danger, but also implicate the landing troops.

So Major General Hill immediately ordered the main force of the fleet to transfer positions and distance from Tarava to carry out anti-aircraft fire counterattack.

However, at this time, problems arose... The Maryland battleship was severely damaged in the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor on December 8, 1941. Although it has been repaired, various equipment is very fragile. In contrast, the main gun on the battleship reached 406 mm.

When the Maryland was bombarded by the Japanese army, Major General Hill ordered the Maryland to attack against the enemy without thinking.

As a result... After two volleys, the vibration and pressure generated by 406 mm turned off the "Maryland" lights and radio communication was interrupted.

Therefore, from this moment until the end of the battle, Major General Harry Hill had serious problems with the command and communication of the troops.
Chapter completed!