Chapter 20 Attack Awareness

When air defense warships in the Western Indian Ocean Fleet intercepted anti-ship missiles, air combat also began.

Although the f-44c is an improved type of f-44a and has greatly improved its performance, especially its combat capability, it still does not surpass the j-32 in air combat performance. You should know that in 2050, the Chinese Navy sent all j-32 back to the Chengdu aircraft manufacturer and upgraded its performance, mainly to enhance the strength of the fuselage mechanism, install a new anti-duty system, and increase the maximum maneuver overload to 18 g. Although this is still a little different from the twenty g required at the design of the j-32, it has been greatly improved compared with the first batch of fifteen g.

In air combat where fighting is the main focus, the slightest difference in mobility can influence the result.

In terms of performance, f-44c can reach a maximum overload of 18 g under certain specific conditions, while j-32 can fly out a maximum overload of 18 g under any allowable circumstances, and exceeds f-44c in many aspects such as hovering angular velocity, instantaneous steering angular velocity, climb rate, etc.

In this air battle, the only advantage of US fighter jets is that they have received direct support from early warning aircraft.

A large early warning aircraft can command more than fifty fighter jets at the same time, while a carrier-based early warning aircraft can only command up to twelve fighter jets.

At that time, there were only two carrier-based early warning aircraft in command of the J-32.

Fortunately, after entering the fighting stage, the value of early warning aircraft is not great. More often, the performance of the fighter and the ability of the fighter pilots must determine the outcome. However, in this case, air combat is no longer a simple process of launching missiles from each other, but a continuous battle, especially when both sides have enough fuel and do not have to worry about returning, the battle often lasts for more than ten minutes.

Just as the fighter jets of both sides were fighting, ninety-six US carrier-based fighters carrying anti-ship guided bombs arrived.

At that time, the first batch of J-32s that were launched could not intercept these US fighter jets, and the air defense warships that had just intercepted anti-ship missiles were also adjusting their combat status. It can be said that US fighter jets quickly approached the West Indian Ocean Fleet without stopping.

However, the US military pilots were not happy for long.

When he was able to see the West Indian Ocean fleet through a night vision instrument, twenty-four j-32s were divided into eight formations and dived from a height of ten thousand meters.

In the first round of battle, twenty-one US fighter jets were shot down.

The remaining seventy-five fighter jets were also washed away. Some directly threw away the bombs and instead fought with the J-32, while others lowered their flight altitude and continued to assault the Western Indian Ocean Fleet.

However, compared with air defense fighters, fighters that perform attack missions obviously have no advantage.

More importantly, when this batch of j-32 took off, it only carried one-third of the fuel, and the air combat weight was six tons lighter than the first batch of airlifts.

This means that the air combat thrust-weight ratio of these j-32s is 0.2 higher, and can make eighteen g maneuvering actions within a larger flight envelope.

In the second round of impact, twenty-three US fighter jets were shot down.

By this time, the US fighter pilot could not even bite a j-32.

The result is that when it was almost possible to attack the Western Indian Ocean Fleet, the US fighter jets had to throw bombs and switch to deal with air defense fighters.

At 9:15, the first round of attacks of the US military ended.

Tactically speaking, the US military only gained bitter fruits in this round of attack, but no results in battle.

According to the combat records of the Western Indian Ocean Fleet, in this battle, air defense fighters shot down 88 enemy planes, and air defense warships also shot down 17 enemy planes. Later, the US military also admitted that in the first round of attacks that night, 108 fighters were lost, three more than the results of the Chinese Navy statistics, of which 73 were carrier-based fighters. Among these shot down fighters, most of the pilots were either killed, captured, or disappeared, with less than twenty rescued, and only eight pilots had the opportunity to fly the fighter again.

Relatively speaking, the West Indian Ocean Fleet suffered much smaller losses.

According to the verified data, the West Indian Ocean Fleet lost at most twenty-three fighter jets in this battle, and most of the pilots were rescued. According to the surviving pilot meeting, there were no more than twenty carrier-based fighters shot down by the US military in the air combat that night.

Relatively speaking, the results achieved by the US military are insignificant.

At the end of the attack, no warship was hit by missiles or bombs, and only one ocean frigate had side collisions with adjacent destroyers when evading missiles at high speed. Moreover, the damage was not serious, and it had no impact on subsequent battles, and there were no casualties.

However, this round of attacks received an unexpected effect: Zhang Yuting relaxed his vigilance.

As mentioned earlier, Zhang Yuting believes that after the US Third Fleet departs from Perth, even if it sails along the shortest route at the fastest speed, it will not arrive until the afternoon of the 23rd. At this time, it should be three thousand kilometers away, and there is no way to dispatch carrier-based fighters to attack the Western Indian Ocean Fleet. The bombers deployed by the US military in Digo Garcia must have been withdrawn, otherwise they should have arrived as soon as possible.

In other words, according to Zhang Yuting's judgment, the US military is not able to launch a second wave of attacks.

Strictly speaking, his judgment is not wrong. If some of the US military still remain in Digo Garcia, more fighters should be sent to seize air supremacy, allowing the bombers to first launch attacks with heavy anti-ship missiles, and then allowing the fighters to use anti-ship guided bombs to supplement the attack.

In fact, the Third Fleet is indeed three thousand kilometers away.

However, in the intelligence sent by the Military Intelligence Agency to the Western Indian Ocean Fleet, it was not mentioned that the US military deployed twenty-four large tankers in Digo Garcia, so it was impossible for Zhang Yuting to know that these tankers were enough to support one hundred and ninety-two fighter jets to launch an attack.

More importantly, the Fourth Fleet and Digo Garcia still had hundreds of fighter jets not deployed.

Don't forget that the three aircraft carriers of the Fourth Fleet are super aircraft carriers with full load displacement of more than 140,000 tons. Under normal circumstances, the load capacity is more than 120, of which at least four squadrons each containing twenty-four fighters. Therefore, the Fourth Fleet has a total of 288 fighters, and only 48 of Digo Garcia's eighty fighters participated in the first round of attack.

In this way, the US military can not only launch attacks with the Third Fleet's carrier-based fighter jets, but also deploy a much larger number of escort fighter jets.

In comparison, Zhang Yuting believed that the battle was over.

At 9:25, Zhang Yuting asked the air defense fighter to return, and at this time he only allowed twelve j-32s to be launched on the air for patrol mission.

At this time, the second group of US attack aircraft was less than a thousand kilometers away from the Western Indian Ocean Fleet.

From a time perspective, the second attack will begin at 9:40.

In fact, during the second round of attacks, the US military dispatched only thirty-six fighter jets to escort, of which twenty-four came from the Fourth Fleet and twelve came from Digo Garcia.

It is obvious that the escort force of the US military is still insufficient.

According to the information disclosed after the war, at that time, Major General Kimmel, the commander of the Fourth Fleet, believed that it could achieve the effect of a sudden attack, so he did not arrange enough escort fighters. Because the second group of attacks had already set off before the first round of attacks, Kimmel was unable to send escort forces in time. However, around 9:20, he urgently dispatched twenty-four carrier-based fighters. Without the support of tankers, these fighters would not be able to catch up with the attack aircraft group that was dispatched an hour in advance.

Judging from the situation at that time, if the Western Indian Ocean Fleet maintained its air defense strength, even if the J-33 was hung with air ammunition and took off for patrol, the outcome would be completely different.

You should know that all the fighter jets sent by the Third Fleet carry anti-ship guided bombs.

In other words, as long as this batch of fighter jets is intercepted, it will be difficult to attack the West Indian Ocean Fleet, and the ending is similar to the second batch of attack aircraft groups in the first round of attacks.

Unfortunately, Zhang Yuting did not send additional air defense fighter jets.

More importantly, at that time, Zhang Yuting even called back two of the four carrier-based early warning aircraft that had already been launched.

According to the recollections of the surviving officers and soldiers, Zhang Yuting did not intend to evacuate the battlefield at that time, but decided to launch a counterattack after resisting the attack from the US military, because according to his judgment, the Fourth Fleet must be near Digo Garcia, and had lost a lot of fighter jets in the previous battle. Only by counterattacking in time can the Fourth Fleet be prevented from launching another attack, and blindly escaping will not solve the problem at all.

Strictly speaking, Zhang Yuting's judgment is correct, because the speed of the warship is much slower than that of the fighter jets.

If the Fourth Fleet was near Digo Garcia, it would be impossible for the West Indian Ocean Fleet to escape from the U.S. attack range within the next few hours.

In fact, the Fourth Fleet is indeed near Digo Garcia.

In other words, if Zhang Yuting did not try to launch a counterattack, even if the third fleet did not arrive, the fourth fleet could launch a second attack in three hours.

The problem is that the West Indian Ocean Fleet has only two aircraft carriers and has lost some fighter jets in air defense operations.

Affected by this, Zhang Yuting would definitely not use valuable air power to perform tactical reconnaissance missions, but decided to adopt the tactics of Mu Haoyang against the Indian Ocean Fleet seven years ago, so that the escort fighter jets could cover the early warning aircraft to come out, seize air supremacy when searching for the Fourth Fleet, and then organize carrier-based fighters to launch a decisive attack.

The surviving officers and soldiers have proved that before being attacked by the US military again, Zhang Yuting had ordered anti-ship guided bombs to the J-33, and asked the aviation combat staff to assign combat missions to the pilots. The returning air defense fighter jets were switched to perform escort missions and were arranged to be given priority to air launch.

Later, this statement was also proved through the verification of the remains of the wrecked ships in the West Indian Ocean Fleet.

The problem is that even if the quality of the officers and soldiers of the Western Indian Ocean Fleet ranks first in the Chinese Navy, it will take nearly an hour. The commander's will cannot change the objective facts, and the time left for Zhang Yuting is only fifteen minutes.

Chapter 20 Attack Awareness
Chapter completed!