Munitions Empire

In the command room of the Tang Empire's aircraft carrier, Sun Guang saw the integrated command system for the first time, marked with various circles and dots on a huge transparent panel perpendicular to the ground using a fluorescent pen.

The commander responsible for the introduction pointed at two dots and explained, "The positions of the two early warning aircraft we've dispatched are marked here. They are now patrolling 110 kilometers away from the fleet at an altitude of 8,000 meters..."

While speaking, he circled two huge circles: "These two circles are their detection ranges... In theory, these areas are completely transparent to us now."

With the assistance of the early warning aircraft, the Tang Empire's navy is collecting comprehensive intelligence on the surrounding areas. The fleet usually deploys only one early warning aircraft, but this time, to protect Sun Guang, they approached the Dorne coastline, naturally raising the alert level, hence the dispatch of two early warning aircraft, making it seem quite grand.

After finishing, the commander pointed to another annotated dot: "Here marks our carrier-based fighter jets. They are conducting patrols, and if any targets appear, they will intercept them promptly."

With the extraordinary speed of the Phantom Fighters, the air defense of the Tang Imperial Fleet is quite robust. Similarly, as the opposing fleet cannot approach the Tang Country's aircraft carrier fleet, the patrol areas of these Phantom Fighters are indeed very targeted.

They don't need to fly around the entire fleet like before but can simply patrol between the aircraft carrier and the Dorne coastline, ensuring patrol density and thickness with fewer sorties.

Regarding other directions, equipped with anti-air missiles from the destroyers within the fleet, there won't be any issues either.

Pointing at a small highlighted mark in front of the fleet, the navy commander continued speaking to Sun Guang: "This is our helicopter, responsible for searching the enemies' submarines in the fleet's forward direction... As for why it's directly ahead, because the fleet maintains a speed above 10 knots, no submarine can catch up to us and attack."

The significance of nuclear submarines is that they can pursue the enemy fleet at full speed when necessary, as nuclear-powered submarines can achieve a terrifying speed of over 20 knots underwater.

Once your opponent can deploy nuclear submarines into combat, the basic tactic to avoid enemy submarines by maintaining a high fleet speed will fail.

Therefore, to ensure safety, we must not only eliminate enemy submarines in the fleet's direction of travel, but the fleet's anti-submarine combat forces must be greatly increased, affecting the fleet's route and combat capability.

Thus, as long as there is a nuclear submarine put into actual combat, its speed can force the enemy fleet to make many unnecessary maneuvers. The value of nuclear submarines lies in this.

No country in this world has yet been able to build nuclear submarines, so the fleet's anti-submarine missions are relatively infrequent.

Conventional submarines relying on batteries cannot guarantee an underwater speed of 20 knots unless they expose their diesel engine air intake pipes.

But once the air intake pipes are exposed, the early warning aircraft will immediately detect the exposed submarine, and the fleet's anti-submarine planes and destroyers can attack directly at the submarine.

"Our fleet appears more spread out than traditional fleets because the combat effectiveness of our warships is higher..." Then the officer pointed at the marks shaped like elongated willow leaves and explained, "They can detect the airspace and maritime space where the entire fleet is located. Once any vessel approaches, they can fire immediately and sink it."

This is the world's most powerful fleet, and those who command such a fleet are proud. From his words, you can hear the pride of the Tang Empire's officer.

Sun Guang looked enviously at the circles marked on the transparent map and asked, "Are these circles all your radar detection ranges?"

"Yes." The officer nodded, answering Sun Guang's question.

Having witnessed the process of the Allied Fleet's annihilation, Sun Guang finally understood why Mike Ravel never found traces of the enemy from start to finish.

The performance of the opponent's carrier-based aircraft is much more formidable than anticipated, and their fleet is even more advanced and powerful than speculated. Under such circumstances, all judgments are wrong, and all common sense becomes the reason for erroneous decisions.

He whispered in reflection, "No wonder... No wonder we couldn't locate your fleet outside Qingluan Port! The planes we dispatched couldn't approach your fleet, right?"

"Correct." The navy officer smiled and nodded. That naval battle remains memorable for him as a participant, with the opponent like a child being taunted by an adult, failing to organize a proper counterattack until the end.

Ten aircraft carriers, seven hundred planes, over a thousand pilots, tens of thousands of navy personnel, and yet they hadn't seen their opponent before being wiped out.

With a triumphant smile on his face, the Tang Country officer continued explaining, "But the truth is, if it's simply intercepting your reconnaissance aircraft, a clever commander can still deduce our fleet's approximate location by launching a large number of planes simultaneously and using losses for estimates."

"So what truly blinded you was this... Voyagers electronic warfare aircraft. It can use high-intensity electromagnetic interference to block a lot of your communications, causing the whole region's communications to collapse entirely." As he spoke, he pointed at a black dot closer to the Dorne coastline.

Upon hearing this, Sun Guang gasped and then asked somewhat puzzled, "Hiss... So that's why! You guys actually have such terrifying aircraft! But, if you do this, wouldn't your own communications be paralyzed as well?"

"We use higher frequency communications and higher radar bands, so we are not affected ourselves." The navy commander wasn't a technical officer, so he could only give a general explanation.

Yet these few words had already shocked Sun Guang: "Amazing! Amazing! The entire battlefield is almost transparent to you; you know everything you want to know, whereas the battlefield to us is completely dark. We don't know where you are, not even what you have."

"Now it's 'us'." Said the navy officer in a crisp white uniform.

Sun Guang didn't reject his new identity and role, but expressed a bit of sentiment: "I feel I have a lot to learn... You have so many mysterious things, and I almost understand nothing right now."

The officer smiled and reassured his future comrade: "Don't worry, you'll see plenty here, and after seeing a lot, you'll naturally understand. At least, students from other naval academies have never seen a real aircraft carrier before graduation."

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Today there's only one update, another one will be published tomorrow during the day.