1945 Read Free Page A

Earlier wisdom had been that Germany would not build a bomber fleet capable of reaching New York. The Germans, analysts had argued, simply could not afford the fuel consumption: Five hundred bombers flying five missions a month would devour one sixth of all avgas produced in the Reich. In a classic example of the perils of depending on narrow-gauge experts for strategic decision-making, the capture of Russia's Baku oil fields had changed all that. Still, it could have been worse; Intel believed that only a few 264s had been built. So far they had been pretty competent at that sort of analysis, thanks to code breaking and in-country agents — and anyway, the conclusion seemed reasonable to Martel. German air doctrine remained focused on tactical support, not strategic bombing. Furthermore, they had enough Arados and older twin-engine stuff to keep England quietly in her place.
    As the last of the 264s passed, another even higher-pitched whine made itself heard in rapidly increasing intensity. Suddenly, gone almost in a blink, batlike forms shot across the avenue at right angles to the thoroughfare. A few oddly empty minutes in which the loudest noise was the chatter of the crowd followed. Then, "There they are!" Mason shouted excitedly.
    Martel looked up past the Brandenburg Gate where Mason was pointing. A few miles away the formation that had just passed overhead was swooping around in an impossibly tight turn to come racing up the boulevard in precise single file, literally below rooftop level. He had seen the early intelligence specs, and had been specifically instructed to photograph the Gothas if they appeared. Though he would have vasdy preferred to continue direct visual observation, Martel dutifully picked up his own camera and started to mimic Masons efforts, snapping off shots and trying to keep a single plane centered in the viewfinder as they passed.
    To Jim the Gothas looked utterly bizarre, and very, very threatening. Based on a flying-wing design, they had no fuselage, and in place of a tail showed only two tiny vertical stabilizers mounted on the outside trailing edges. Except for their exhaust oudets, the planes' twin engines were invisible.
    Their boomerang shape, Jim thought, would be entirely at home in a Flash Gordon serial. Scary as they looked though, he knew that the Germans had discovered some serious flaws inherent in the flying-wing concept; if the Luftwaffe had, as rumored, really achieved supersonic velocities, they hadn't done so with flying wings. But subsonic or not, the Gothas were fast, highly maneuverable, and presented a razor-thin target silhouette when approached from astern. Martel found the mere thought of going up against them in a Corsair or Bearcat chilling.
    Not that the US had entirely ceased weapons development since Martel had missed the deck of the Enterprise. The Navy's new FD-1 Phantoms could go head to head with any German jet yet in production—it was more than a match for the 262—but so far only a few were actually aboard the carriers. As for designs not in production, part of his job today was to write up a detailed analysis of any new German craft glimpsed during the parade. One thing he already knew would go in that report: any prop plane the Navy flew would be in for a rough time if it stumbled on one of these jet-propelled monsters; it was time and more than time to move on to the next generation of aircraft.
    A carrier fleet depended for its life on its ability to knock out enemy ship killers before they got in range. With Gothas to protect them even the older bombers became a major threat. As for the Arados, if the German admiralty could arrange for Gothas to arrive in the neighborhood simultaneously with that winged annihilation . . . with Gothas flying in support, Arados might as well have been custom-made carrier killers.
    As the last of the bat-shapes swept past, Martel swung his camera around to the main reviewing stand and snapped off a final human-interest