Chapter 998: Home

Why did the Germans choose to bomb during the day? The simplest reason was that the results were far better. Being able to visually confirm their targets and fly over them in denser formations was the best guarantee of bombing accuracy in 1939.

More than 150 aircraft flew in tight formations over the Allies’ largest and most important airfields on Iceland. The most direct result was that these two main airfields were reduced to rubble. Another 110 aircraft were tasked with attacking the port, which was similarly bombed back to the stone age.

The remaining 100-plus aircraft bombed the main cities on Iceland, dropping incendiary and high-explosive bombs on nearly every inhabited place. More than half of the infrastructure was scrapped, and the 100,000 British refugees who had fled there also suffered an unprecedented blow.

There is an old saying in Europe: when the weak provoke the strong, it’s just idle taunting. But once the strong begin to retaliate, the weak are utterly destroyed. The Germans clearly had the means to utterly destroy Iceland. Now they had begun their retaliation, and so the disaster facing Iceland began to unfold.

To increase their range, the German “Butcher” bombers’ bomb loads had been significantly reduced. Each plane carried only a little over 3 tons of bombs, but the total bomb load that more than 300 aircraft could drop still exceeded 1,000 tons. These bombs had taken the Germans several days to stockpile and transport, yet it had taken these bombers less than half an hour to drop them all.

This was the power of technology. For the first time in war, humanity possessed such a terrifying capability. They could use their ingenuity to hurl over a thousand tons of bombs to a place 2,000 kilometers away, destroying everything there and sending it back to the dark ages, or perhaps even worse.

Watching the German bombers recede into the distance, all the British soldiers and American officers on Iceland felt a sudden wave of relief wash over their bodies. They were thankful to be alive, thankful that the enemy’s devastating bombing attack was finally over.

The sounds of secondary explosions were everywhere. Fire devoured the buildings, leaping like a monster, destroying everything it could find. The fuel depots the Allies had deployed here were completely ablaze, and the hundred or so B-17 bombers parked at the airfield had been almost entirely destroyed.

There was no need for a detailed investigation. As long as you weren’t blind, you could see the utter destruction. A brief question to any of the panicked, running soldiers was all it took to know that all of Iceland was finished, completely and utterly finished.

Three radar stations were destroyed. The radar equipment, housed in reinforced concrete structures, had all been blown up by aerial bombs. These radar stations had been too close to other infrastructure and had been hit by the bombs that had been dropped “randomly.”

The cities had also been destroyed by the sudden German bombing. Reykjavik, crowded with British refugees, had been attacked by over 40 German bombers. A hundred tons of bombs had been dropped on the city. Lacking air defense facilities, over a thousand people had been killed in the first moments.

The most tragic, however, were the military bases and airfield facilities that the British had built at great expense. This area had been attacked by nearly half of the German bombers, which had dropped nearly 500 tons of various bombs. The entire airfield was covered in billowing smoke. The German planes had been gone for a long time, but the sound of explosions was still incessant.

Tens of thousands of tons of American fuel had been ignited and had exploded, setting off several ammunition storage points that had been piled up in the open. Like firecrackers, these munitions had exploded one after another, in turn igniting more of the fragile buildings and destroying everything nearby.

The flat runway was so pockmarked with craters that it was impossible to use. Even to repair it would take a great deal of effort. The reinforced concrete command centers and control towers that had been so painstakingly built had also been almost completely destroyed by this one bombing. Some buildings were left with only half a structure, or were covered in cracks. Who would dare to continue using such a place?

For at least two months, the Iceland base would be unusable. By the most optimistic estimate, it would take a dozen or so fleet resupplies before this place could be restored to its original operational level. This time, the British had been truly hamstrung. Their painstakingly built forward outpost had been so easily destroyed by the Germans.

Compared to the results of the Allied bombing of Norway, the German bombing of Iceland was truly a case of “you kick dirt on me, I’ll break two of your bones.” The only thing the American side could be thankful for was that they had indeed destroyed a portion of Norway’s production equipment, while Germany could only vent its anger on an Iceland base that had no production capacity.

“The damage assessment will have to wait until later to come out, but from the current situation, we’ve lost almost everything,” Hugh Dowding reported to several British ministers on what had just happened. “I’m not clear on the port, but the airbase here is pretty much scrapped.”

“The losses at the port are very heavy. We need time to repair it,” the naval commander, Admiral Dudley Pound, said. Although his headquarters was on Iceland, he was a complete commander-without-a-fleet here. The main fleet of his Royal Navy was now deployed in Canada, and he did not dare to easily venture into the waters east of Iceland.

“Your Majesty, the fortunate thing is that the backup airfield in the northwest and the few temporary ports there were not attacked by the enemy. As long as the United States and Canada continue to provide aid, it is still possible to maintain our presence,” General Hugh Dowding said reassuringly to King George VI, who was still somewhat uneasy. The bombing, just over an hour ago, had been even more despairing than the terrifying bombing of London. After all, the number of planes the Germans had sortied this time was much larger than when they had bombed Britain.

At that time, the German Air Force planes that had graced the skies of Britain had been mainly the smaller, medium-sized Do-217s. Only on a few occasions had they used the “Butcher” bomber. The result was that after more than a year of accumulation, the German Air Force was actually capable of sending more than 300 “Butcher” bombers at once to a place as distant as Iceland. This had made King George, who was holding the fort on Iceland, tremble with fear. His neck, it seemed, had once again been placed under the Germans’ butcher’s knife.

The fighter losses were not great, but the loss of pilots was simply despairing. Of the pilots who had escaped from the British homeland, a portion had been lost in the North African campaign, another portion had been deployed to Canada, and a small number had gone to India to help in the operations against the Japanese. Although there were still more than 100 on Iceland, in this one air defense battle, 21 had been lost, including 4 precious jet fighter pilots.

Of the remaining 80 pilots, more than 30 had only flown the old-fashioned Hurricane. It wasn’t that they weren’t allowed to fly new planes, but that the American P-40 production was insufficient, and most of them had been sent to the Pacific theater to be consumed in the fight against the Japanese Navy.

The main reason they had not deployed that many fighters on Iceland was because this place had hardly ever been subjected to any form of German attack. With the idea of “be frugal where you can,” a few months ago, they had even transferred dozens of fighters to the Pacific theater. Even a production powerhouse like the United States was feeling the pressure at a time like this. After all, most of the Allies’ equipment was now being produced by the United States.

“We must strengthen the fighter force here! Transfer some from Canada!” King George, who was clearly still shaken by the bombing just now, said. Although he had had a good air-raid shelter to hide in, the sight of the destroyed city had left him with no sense of security.

“The backup airfield cannot accommodate many fighters. If the Americans want to continue to bomb Norway… I think our fighter force can at most be increased by only 30 or so,” Hugh Dowding replied helplessly to his King’s request. “With all due respect, even if these planes are all the latest P-40 Rolls-Royce improved models, they will not pose much of a threat to the German bombers.”

The King of England, George VI, fixed his gaze on Dowding’s face. In the end, he reined in his anger from the brink of an outburst. He looked at his air force commander and, from between clenched teeth, squeezed out a sentence. “Then! My General! You must think of a way to prevent this place from being bombed by the Germans again, mustn’t you?”

Suddenly, the ground trembled slightly. Everyone looked out the window in terror. At the end of the distant mountains, a wisp of blue smoke was rising straight into the sky. This island of Iceland was full of all kinds of volcanoes. Even in times of peace, they would erupt once or twice from time to time. The nearest volcano on the brink of eruption was only 125 kilometers from Iceland’s largest city, Reykjavik…

“They… why didn’t they drop some bombs into those volcanoes…” a government official in a suit, wiping the cold sweat from his forehead, asked with some lingering fear.

“Who knows,” Hugh Dowding said, looking at His Majesty the King, who had not yet withdrawn his gaze. “I will order the several units stationed in Canada to assemble on Iceland and to draw out as many of the better aircraft as possible to set up an ambush here and to shoot down those damn German planes.”

He had to change his strategy, because who knew if, after a few large-scale bombings, the bombs dropped by the German planes would actually trigger an active volcano. That would be even more thorough than dozens of bombings. It was estimated that everything on Iceland would be reduced to nothing at that time.

While the British were cleaning up the mess on Iceland, the German bombers had already flown past the German submarine that was navigating for them. Because no enemy planes were in pursuit, the hundred or so FW-190D fighters that had been waiting here had already returned to base. The lead German commander finally relaxed and sent out an uplifting message over the radio: “We’re going home!”

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