Because Ding Zhennan slept and rested during the flight, it was not until the next morning, after he returned to the front headquarters, that he received a battle report from the Silan garrison headquarters.

Overall, the battle from the night of the 23rd to the early morning of the 24th was full of drama.

As mentioned earlier, the first fighters of the Nuland Expeditionary Air Force were to intercept bombers, and as a result, they encountered the escort fighters of the Imperial Air Force. Because they were too far away from their own AWACS planes to detect the oncoming escort fighters in time, all the Nuland expeditionary air forces were defeated in the first round of engagement, and almost all of the dozens of heavy fighters dispatched were shot down, and they were not able to complete the interception mission.

This is just the beginning, though.

Under the circumstances, the commander of the Nuland Expeditionary Air Force had already been mentally prepared and did not expect to thwart the offensive operations of the Liangxia Air Force in the first round of engagement.

In any case, the Liangxia Air Force deployed several times more combat aircraft in Silan than the Nuland Expeditionary Air Force.

Even if the bombers deployed on the mainland are not considered, and only the tactical aviation on the Silan side is used, the Liangxia Air Force can crush the Nuland Expeditionary Air Force.

To this end, the commander of the Nuland Expeditionary Air Force deployed a second line of air defense.

Behind the F-15C/D group, about 100 kilometers ahead of AWACS, is a formation of 60 F-16C/D supremacy fighters.

In addition, a second E-3B has also been lifted into the air, and it is just northwest of Trivan.

That is, after the F-15C/D group on interception missions was defeated, the Nuland Expeditionary Air Force was still able to organize dozens of fighters for air defense operations.

Crucially, these F-16C/Ds are capable of using medium-range air-to-air missiles.

Although it is not the latest AIM-120A, the AIM-7F "Sparrow" missile has a range of tens of kilometers, at least there is no problem of not being able to fight back.

With two E-3Bs in support, combat effectiveness can certainly be guaranteed.

Of course, the support of the escort fighters of the Imperial Air Force will inevitably weaken as the distance between them and their AWACS aircraft increases after they accelerate forward.

Here, there is another very crucial factor.

In the battle with the F-15C/D group, most of the "Zhan-11B" that came out of the front used up medium-range missiles, and the over-range air combat capability is definitely not as good as before.

Then, after encountering the F-16C/D fleet, it will soon enter the stage of combat air combat.

Combat itself is the forte of light fighters such as the F-16C/D, and in the state of air combat, the thrust-to-weight ratio of the third-generation light fighter is not lower than that of the heavy fighter, so in the traditional weakness, that is, energy maneuverability, the light fighter does not suffer.

Whether it is the "Battle-10" of the Imperial Air Force or the F-16 of the Nuland Air Force, special emphasis is placed on the ability to conduct combat air combat in the design stage, and the F-16C/D is also the first light fighter designed in full accordance with the theory of energy mobility, and its performance exceeds that of the "Battle-10" in some aspects. After all, the "Zhan-10" considered multi-purpose performance in the design stage, so it had to make trade-offs, such as improving the structural strength of the airframe.

If anything, the F-16 is the most capable third-generation fighter in combat air combat, and it is the most popular in the early A-type.

The reason is also very simple, the F-16A is a very simple air superiority fighter, which does not consider multi-purpose at all, and in the later model, that is, from the C type, the mission requirements such as ground strikes are added to it, and the fuselage is strengthened to adapt to the new combat needs.

As a result, the first batches of Type C had an empty weight of almost 1 ton more than Type A, and subsequent batches increased even more.

Of course, with an appropriate reduction of internal oil and ammunition, the air combat performance of the Type C is still very outstanding. It was only when a deep modification of the type tank was installed that the maneuverability of the F-16 decreased significantly. At least during the Great War, the F-16 was one of the most effective fighters in combat.

Under the circumstances, it was very likely that the "Zhan-11B" group in front of the sudden attack would be attacked head-on by the F-16C/D group.

The point is that the "Finger-8C" of the Imperial Air Force did not keep up.

As already mentioned, in order to deal with the assault F-15C/D, the escort fighters accelerated forward and then continued to fly to the northwest, that is, in the direction of Trivan. Even though the two "Kn-8Cs" had turned to follow, they were too slow to keep up with the pace of the fighters.

Because the F-16C/D is in the air combat mounted state, the maximum RCS value is not more than 10 square meters, and the frontal is between 3 and 5 square meters, so even in an ideal state, the detection range of the "Finger-8C" to the F-16/CD will not exceed 450 kilometers, generally about 400 kilometers.

At that time, the two "Finger-8Cs" were more than 500 kilometers away from the nearest F-16C/D formation.

As a result, the Finger-8C did not find those F-16C/Ds.

In addition, the distance between the "Battle-11B" group and the F-16C/D is not very close, exceeding 150 kilometers.

This means that the fire control radar of the "Zh-11B" is also unable to detect the F-16C/D.

It must be said that the tactical literacy of the Nuland Expeditionary Air Force is very good.

In order to avoid early exposure, these dozens of F-16C/D planes all use a two-plane formation, and they are in a dense formation, with the long plane leading the flight in front and the wingman following up in the rear, with a separation distance of only a few tens of meters and a height difference of only a few meters, so as to shorten the detection range of the enemy's radar to the greatest extent.

For light fighters such as the F-16C/D, the fire control radar of the "Battle-11B" has a detection range of about 120 kilometers.

In addition, the E-3B has long discovered the assault "Zhan-11B" aircraft group, that is, the detection range of the E-3B to the "Zhan-11B" will definitely not be less than 400 kilometers, and in an ideal state it can exceed 500 kilometers, while the distance between the "Zhan-11B" and the nearest E-3B is less than 300 kilometers.

What is even worse is that because the "Finger-8C" followed behind and showed great courage in the previous battle, after defeating the F-15C/D group, dozens of "Zh-11B" all turned off the fire control radar and prepared to use the radar after the "Finger-8C" discovered the enemy plane.

Obviously, this is exactly the same as the previous against the F-15C/D, but the positions were exchanged.

At that time, 60 F-16C/Ds had been dispersed, ready to encircle and annihilate the rapid assault "Battle-11B" group, and there were only 12 in front, that is, in front of the E-3B.

This arrangement is related to the AIM-7F "Sparrow" missile.

To put it more bluntly, the performance of the "Sparrow" missile is too poor and the hit rate is extremely low, so the pilots of the F-16C/D are more willing to use the AIM-9L "Sidewinder" combat missile, which means that they have to maneuver and occupy a favorable position, such as the rear hemisphere of the enemy aircraft.

The AIM-9L was the Nuland Air Force's first combat missile with omnidirectional attack capabilities, theoretically capable of attacking oncoming enemy aircraft. However, in actual use, in order to improve the hit rate, it is still necessary to launch missiles as far as possible in the rear of enemy aircraft, that is, in the tail where infrared radiation is most intense.

For this purpose, it is necessary to go around from both sides.

As a matter of fact, leaving only a small number of fighters to meet the enemy head-on and allowing more fighters to maneuver and seize positions is also the basic tactic of air combat in large air groups.

If nothing else, the "Zhan-11B" fleet will be defeated, and more than 40 "Zhan-11B" aircraft are likely to be wiped out.

It's just that there was really an accident!

This accident came from the Van Rowe Air Force.

According to the battle report sent by the Silan Garrison Command, about 15 minutes after the defeat of the F-15C/D group, the Van Rowe Air Force fighter group arrived.

Almost 100 F-4E heavy fighters!

Fatally, these fighters were divided into several large formations, and the size of each formation was about 20 aircraft, that is, a brigade.

As a result, it was discovered by the "Finger-8C" 500 kilometers away.

Subsequently, the "Zhan-11B" received a warning from the "Finger-8C", activated the fire control radar, and found the F-16C/D closer when searching for the Van Luo fighter. More importantly, the "Finger-8C" in front of it adjusted the working mode of the radar in time, reducing the scanning angle of the radar beam by half, which is equivalent to doubling the unit power, and increasing the detection range by tens of kilometers.

It was in this way that the "Finger-8C" discovered the F-16C/D that was outflanked from both sides in time.

The situation on the battlefield became clear, and the advantage of the Nuland expeditionary air force was suddenly lost.

Of course, the front-line commanders of the Imperial Air Force also adjusted their tactics in a timely manner, such as letting the "Zhan-11B" group take advantage of the speed advantage to surprise the Nuland early warning aircraft.

As for the orientation of the Nuland AWACS aircraft, it was provided by a large electronic reconnaissance aircraft accompanying the activities of the "Finger-8C".

Although only the general direction was measured and no accurate distance parameters were obtained, the F-16C/D could be outflanked from both sides, which was enough to prove that the E-3B was not too far away, and it must be within the combat radius of the "Zhan-11B".

As the distance decreases, the radar of the "Zh-11B" will be able to detect the E-3B.

More than 40 "Zhan-11B" sprinted at full speed, and it was by no means a joke.

Even if there are not a few KK-12A left of these fighters, as long as they are close enough, even with the use of machine guns, they can beat the AWACS aircraft down. If the red eye is really killed, even if the shells run out, the pilot may fly the fighter jet to directly hit the AWACS aircraft.

What's even more serious is that there are only 12 F-16C/D facing head-on!

As for the F-16C/D, which is outflanked from both sides, even if the ammunition is sufficient and the acceleration performance is very good, it may not be able to catch up with the "Zhan-11B" that sprints at full speed.

As a result, it became clear that the E-3B in the front, as soon as it was threatened, turned to evade.

It's just that the AWACS aircraft flies at a speed of less than 900 kilometers per hour, while the "Zhan-11B" can exceed Mach 2 after completing the acceleration.

As for the 12 F-16C/D that are facing head-on, even if they are intercepted by "Sparrow", they will not be able to shoot down all of the "Zhan-11B".

Subsequently, the E-3B in the rear also had to turn to evade.

In order to deal with the "Zhan-11B", the Nuland AWACS aircraft had to give orders to the Van Luo fighters to let those bulky second-generation aircraft intercept the "Zhan-11B".

To put it simply, the scene suddenly got out of control.

On the side of the Imperial Air Force, the situation is different.

Although the main force of air supremacy is heavy fighters such as the "Zhan-11B", due to production capacity constraints, not all units can obtain heavy fighters.

In fact, after the outbreak of the Great War, the Reich was unable to solve the bottleneck of the production capacity of the "Zhan-11B", or the Imperial Air Force did not have the motivation to improve the production efficiency of the "Zhan-11B". The reason is very simple, the design of the "Zhan-11C/D" has been fully upgraded in terms of configuration, the former is a multi-role heavy fighter that retains air supremacy combat capability, and the latter is an air superiority fighter that has comprehensively strengthened air supremacy combat capability, all equipped with active phased array radars, and the latter is also equipped with a comprehensive photoelectric detection system, and the air supremacy combat capability has been increased several times compared with the "Zhan-11B". After the completion of acceptance tests, these two improved versions of the "Zhan-11" will be put into production and become the main fighters before the "Zhan-20A" officially enters service.

According to the plan of the Imperial Air Force, the previous model will also be improved at the level of C/D.

It is precisely for this that many front-line combat units of tactical aviation are armed with "Zhan-10B".

Strictly speaking, the "Zhan-10B" is somewhat stronger than the "Zhan-11B" in terms of air combat capabilities, especially over-the-horizon air combat capabilities, mainly because it is equipped with passive phased array radar.

Although after solving the technical problems of miniaturization, the Imperial Air Force did not develop passive phased array radars, especially the fire control radars of fighters, all of which were on par with active phased array radars, and the "Zhan-10B" became the only fighter equipped with passive phased array radars in the Imperial Air Force, but in terms of performance, passive phased array radars must surpass traditional Doppler radars in terms of detection range and multi-target engagement capabilities.

If you want to say, the "Battle-10B" is a little smaller.

Because it is a light fighter, both the size of the nose radome and the curb weight of the radar are far inferior to that of heavy fighters, and the performance is limited. In the case of a heavy fighter, the performance of the radar can be greatly improved simply by increasing the antenna size and increasing the transmitting power. Take the "Zhan-11B" level fighter as an example, if it is replaced with a passive phased array radar, the maximum detection range can be increased to more than 400 kilometers and the tracking distance can reach 150 kilometers for targets with an RCS of 5 square meters.

Of course, thanks to the passive phased array radar, the "Zhan-10B" has acquired an over-the-horizon air combat capability that is no less than that of the "Zhan-11B".

Compared with the "Zhan-11B", the biggest drawback of the "Zhan-10B" is actually the short combat radius.

With three large auxiliary fuel tanks attached and 2+4 air combat mounts, the combat radius of the "Zhan-10B" is only 1,200 kilometers, which is 300 kilometers shorter than the "Zhan-11B", which does not have auxiliary fuel tanks and has two more medium-range air-to-air missiles. If the number of medium-range air-to-air missiles is increased by two, the combat radius will be shortened to less than 1,000 kilometers. Only by attaching 3 auxiliary fuel tanks and 2 combat missiles, the combat radius can reach 1,500 kilometers.

It is precisely for this reason that the front-line commanders of the Air Force generally let the "Zhan-10B" carry out theater air defense tasks to protect important military bases such as airfields. If it is on offensive mission, the "Battle-10B" is often behind heavy fighters, covering AWACS aircraft, as well as acting as a reserve.

Normally, the Air Force will also dispatch tankers, so the "Battle-10B" that remains in the rear can be more convenient for in-flight refueling.

This time was no exception.

In the rear of the "Zhan-11B" group, there are 32 "Zhan-10B" planes divided into four formations, of which two formations are responsible for covering early warning aircraft and electronic reconnaissance aircraft, and the other two formations are positioned slightly ahead, and they have already begun to accelerate and shorten the distance with the heavy fighter formation.

According to typical air combat tactics, the main task of the 16 "Zhan-10Bs" of these two formations is to provide cover for the "Zhan-11Bs."

Because they were so far apart, the E-3B did not find these "Battle-10Bs".

By the time the distance was shortened, the two E-3Bs had turned to evade and were still directing and guiding Van Luo fighters, so even if they discovered the "Battle-10B", they might not be able to warn their own fighters in time, let alone command the F-16C/D, which was already in chaos, to meet the battle.

In addition, these "Battle-10Bs" are all in a "full blood" state, and all of them have 4 KK-12A on them!

This is definitely not a good thing for dozens of F-16C/Ds flanked from both sides.

That is, when it was attacked by the "Zhan-10B", most of the F-16C/D were not able to complete the task of flanking the "Zhan-11B", and they were not able to prevent the "Zhan-11B" from attacking at full speed.

At this point in the battle, there is not much suspense left.