On the afternoon of December 14, 99 years of the imperial calendar, in the northeast of Yanhai, the flagship of the First Air Task Force "Longjiang".

After staring at the dozens of carrier-based aircraft neatly placed on the flight deck for a while, Bai Zhizhan glanced at his watch.

There are five minutes left until two o'clock in the afternoon.

This is already the thirteenth day of the annual fleet exercise, and if nothing is achieved today, I am afraid it will drag on for another half a month.

Thinking of what had happened in the past ten days, Bai Zhizhan couldn't help but be a little upset.

Seventeen years ago, in the 82nd year of the Imperial New Era, after obtaining the approval of the Cabinet, the Navy resumed fleet exercises that had been interrupted for eight years due to the Great War.

The full name is "Exploration and Discovery of Fleet Tactics and Existing Problems Confrontation Exercise", but generally no one uses this title.

Prior to this, at the end of the 81st year of the new calendar, the "Sea Dragon" mothership was officially put into service.

This is the first mothership of the Imperial Navy, and like the USS Langley of the Newland Federation, it was converted from a 10,000-ton fast freighter. Because it is mainly training, it does not require actual combat ability, so it only took four months to complete the transformation, and then it took several months to carry out acceptance tests. It was delivered to the Imperial Navy at the end of the 80 year of the new calendar, only the training of personnel was completed until the following year.

The main thing is that training carrier-based aircraft pilots requires a lot of time, and there is no hurry.

With the "Sea Dragon", there will be fleet exercises in the new era.

This is precisely the focus of the fleet's exercise after the resumption of the exercise, which is to explore ways and means of aviation combat and establish a new tactical system.

In the first five years, that is, in the five fleet exercises from 82 to 86, the "Sea Dragon" and the carrier-based aviation were basically playing soy sauce.

There is nothing surprising, because these five times, there is only one mothership "Sea Dragon".

In order to make the exercise more realistic, or to imitate a fleet with several carriers, the Imperial Navy also used several seaplane carriers to replace carrier-based aircraft and perform some low-difficulty tasks. It was also during this period that the Imperial Navy officially named warships carrying conventional take-off and landing aircraft "aircraft carriers" to distinguish them from seaplane carriers and other types of carriers.

In the five fleet exercises, the carrier-based aviation units were mainly engaged in reconnaissance missions. It was during the last two exercises that several opportunities for air defense battles were obtained.

In these five exercises, the protagonists of naval battles were still battleships.

Not to mention anything else, the five exercises were ultimately decided by "artillery battles" with capital ships.

It was not until the 7th Fleet Exercise, held in 87 of the new calendar, that aircraft carriers and carrier-based aviation really became the protagonists, because in this year, two real aircraft carriers joined the battle sequence of the Imperial Navy, namely the "Longjiang" built in Puzhou and the "Hengjiang" built in Piercing.

The two aircraft carriers were launched in the same month, just a few days short of completion.

For the same reason, the former was supervised by the Home Fleet and the latter by the Southern Fleet. The command of the Navy has long made it clear that after completion, it will belong to the two fleets. Therefore, during the construction phase, the two fleets secretly competed, and both wanted to get fleet aircraft carriers ahead of each other.

Because the combat effectiveness was so strong, far surpassing the "Sea Dragon", the Imperial Navy put forward the concept of "fleet aircraft carrier", and set a threshold by limiting the speed, tonnage and number of aircraft carried by this kind of warship, and promoted this kind of warship.

It's just that the "Longjiang" and "Hengjiang" were not the largest aircraft carriers at that time.

As early as two years ago, the "Leke" and "Sarah" of the Newland Federation had been launched, both of which were completed and put into service in the 87th year of the Imperial New Calendar.

In terms of tonnage, "Lek" and "Sarah" are forty percent larger.

In addition, the "Chicheng" of the Sayi Imperial Kingdom was also delivered and put into service in the 87th year of the imperial calendar, and the "Jiahe" was commissioned in the 88th year of the new calendar. The tonnage of the two warships also surpassed that of the "Longjiang" and the "Hengjiang", and competed with the two giant ships of the Newland Federation.

The fleet exercises of that year were also the most complicated, lasting nearly three months, with a total of three confrontations according to different hypothetical scenarios.

As for the manner and outcome of the confrontation, that was the number one secret of the Imperial Navy.

Of course, it is not a secret at all for the White Stop War, which participated in the entire exercise.

It was precisely this fleet exercise that laid the foundation for the position of aircraft carriers and carrier-based aviation in the navy and established the direction of development with aviation as the core.

In that year, Bai Zhizhan was promoted to major in the navy and stepped into the ranks of senior officers.

Over the next three years, all three fleet exercises revolved around two motherships.

By the year 91 of the Imperial New Calendar, that is, the tenth fleet exercise after the restart, it was pushed to a new peak because of the addition of two brand new warships.

These are the "Mohe" and "Linghe".

Like the previous two sister ships, the "Mohe" and "Linghe" also belong to the two fleets respectively, and on this basis, both fleets have formed separate air fleets, so as to strengthen the status of the aircraft carrier and improve the tactical flexibility of the aircraft carrier.

That year's fleet exercise once again set a new record for duration, and it was brilliant.

It was also in this year, after the end of the fleet exercises, that Bai Zhizhan was promoted to chief of staff of the air detachment of the home fleet and was exceptionally promoted to lieutenant colonel.

It was also in this year that a comprehensive reform of the Imperial Navy began.

Although he encountered huge resistance and could not cancel the two fleets, Zhu Shijian withstood the pressure and brought all the aircraft carriers under the command of the Navy to form a separate aviation task force. Because this move made the cake of the two fleets, and it can even be said that it was cut from the two fleets, Zhu Shijian took the lead and concurrently served as the commander of the aviation task force, but he retained the original establishment system.

To put it simply, the air fleet is divided into the first air task force and the second air task force, which are the original crew of the air task force of the home fleet and the air force of the southern fleet, respectively.

From an after-view perspective, before initiating the reform, Zhu Shijian knew that he would be opposed, so he adopted the style of playing high and low.

At this time, from the original commander of the detachment to the grassroots soldiers, they have all become the descendants of the naval command.

It's just that it's hard to say what the weight of this lineage is.

The White Cessation War was a staunch supporter of reform.

Not only because he is the main beneficiary, but also because the reform can give more effective play to the combat effectiveness of aircraft carriers and air forces, which is the trend of the times.

Among other things, the Narrow-Wing Navy and the Nuland Navy have carried out similar reforms, building fleets around aircraft carriers.

It can be seen that time is quite urgent, and it can be said that time is not waiting for me.

Drag on for a few years, then there will be no need for reform.

In the following years, the fleet exercises were mainly based on running-in training, so that the officers and men who were originally part of the two fleets could get to know each other and show a more tacit understanding during the exercises.

For this reason, Zhu Shijian even ordered the cancellation of the confrontational part.

It was not until last year, after Liu Xiangzhen, who had also been promoted to colonel, took the position of chief of staff of the Second Air Task Force, after he had been promoted to colonel after the battle at Bai Zhi and became chief of staff of the First Air Task Force, that Zhu Shijian lifted the ban and added confrontation to the exercise.

Actually, this year is the main event.