In the evening, after receiving the report from the front-line commander, Liu Zunshan's tense nerves relaxed a little.

After three hours of hard fighting, the front-line soldiers relied on the air support that came in turns, and thwarted the full-scale attack of the Van army at about 5 p.m.

At this point, the counterattack launched by the Vatican army during the day on the 10th officially came to an end.

Over the course of the battle, which lasted for most of the day, the Van army suffered more than 3,000 casualties, 74 Imperial Marines were killed, about 200 wounded, and thousands of civilians, many of whom were armed militias.

The decisive role is still played by air support.

It's just that the air forces that provide support in the afternoon do not come from the Air Force, nor do they belong to the Army Aviation, but are subordinate to the Special Operations Command.

18 Y-9EA fire support aircraft were put into battle in 3 batches.

In fact, it is often referred to as "gunboat machine".

At the beginning, after learning that the Newland Republic was secretly developing the AC-130 "Ghost Gunboat", neither the Imperial Air Force nor the Imperial Army were very interested in this kind of transport aircraft carrying artillery, or did not find its existence value, which can also be said to be the fact that the Imperial Army did not have similar needs.

The reason is also very simple: the Nuland military invested in the development of "ghost gunboats" to deal with small groups of enemies hiding in the jungle and fighting guerrilla warfare with the regular army, especially those guerrillas in the Southern Lonely Continent who were secretly supported by the Liangxia Empire and worked against the Nuland Republic.

To put it simply, the "ghost gunboats" are actually facing a low-intensity war.

As a result, the problems of transport aircraft, such as slow flight speed, low flight altitude, poor survivability and maneuverability, are not so prominent. On the contrary, the advantages of long range, long endurance, heavy load and flight stability are amplified.

The actual combat since then has also proved that in low-intensity battles, gunboats are simply invincible.

But the question is, how much is the gunboat worth in regular warfare?

Obviously, this is a debatable question.

In fact, as early as the end of the Second Global War, the then Imperial Army Aviation had a similar idea and made active attempts. That is, the installation of machine guns at the hatches of large transport aircraft to provide air support for paratroopers deep behind enemy lines during airborne combat operations.

According to the operational concept at the time, the gunboats converted from transport aircraft could follow the transport aircraft group and provide fire support to the paratroopers throughout the airborne combat operation, including suppressing the enemy's anti-aircraft fire before the airborne landing began, and blocking the enemy's ground forces during the airborne operation.

With a huge bomb load, as well as a longer endurance, the combat efficiency of gunboat aircraft is higher than that of attack aircraft.

It's just that, in the late stages of the war, no decent airborne operations were conducted.

As for the gunboats that were urgently refitted, except for a few preserved by the museum, all the others were disposed of as surplus military supplies.

Some of them fell into the hands of the Republic of There.

In the ensuing Polish-Iranian War, especially in the early stages of the war, these gunboats performed very well in the battle against the Polish-Iraqi partisans, who lacked air defense means. Especially in mountainous areas with complex terrain, the gunboat plane, with its huge bomb load and good low-speed performance, has exerted its combat capability far exceeding that of attack aircraft. In many cases, even the only suppressive force that can last.

Interestingly, it was the prominence of the early days of the Polish-Iranian War that made the Nuland Air Force realize the value of the gunboat in low-intensity warfare.

The Imperial Air Force, on the contrary, remained unmoved.

Of course, this is understandable.

In the first few years, the Polish-Iranian War was a low-intensity war of the nature of a regional conflict. Before the decision of the Republic of There to withdraw its troops from the Boi region, the imperial authorities did not consider intervening with troops. At that time, it did not even think of providing military support to the Republic of There, let alone directly sending troops to the war. Those weapons and equipment that performed prominently on the battlefield were naturally difficult to be recognized by the imperial military.

At that time, the next war envisaged by the imperial authorities was in fact the Third Global War.

After all, in the face of increasingly advanced air defense systems, gunboats and planes with surprisingly slow speeds are the targets of flight, not to mention long-range air defense missiles, and a single air defense missile can beat down the gunboat plane.

It has been proven that the empire is facing more than a global war.

Soon after the invasion of the Boi region, it became clear to the Imperial military that aerial platforms such as gunboats were needed to deal with the elusive guerrillas.

It was against this background that the Imperial Air Force and the Army jointly funded the development of the gunboat aircraft based on the Y-9.

Although the Imperial military never admitted it, the use of tactical transport aircraft as a platform is enough to prove that the design was borrowed from the "ghost gunboat" of the Nuland Republic. It is precisely because of this that the Imperial Air Force's gunboats are very similar to the "ghost gunboats" in many ways. For example, the main armament is a 100 mm gun with a short barrel, and the secondary armament is a 40 mm rapid-fire gun and two 25 mm Gatling guns. Because the 25-mm machine gun was eliminated by the Eastern Bloc, the later model was replaced with a 13-mm Gatling gun.

Of course, with a larger load capacity and interior space, the Imperial Air Force's gunboats can carry more ammunition, load more fuel, and gain greater sustained combat capability. If it is a battlefield patrol mission, it can also extend the time in the air through in-flight refueling.

If anything, the original idea of the imperial military was to load the artillery on the transport aircraft to solve the problems of insufficient range, insufficient impact accuracy and limited firing range. As for the specific tactics of use, it is a secondary issue, at least not seriously thought about before the project is established.

As a result, tactical applications became an obstacle to the official installation of gunboats.

To put it simply, is it a tactical aviation unit that is incorporated into the Air Force, or is it integrated into the Army Aviation Corps?

In this regard, the two sides have their own opinions.

The reason put forward by the Air Force is straightforward: the gunboat aircraft is a modified tactical transport aircraft, which is a fixed-wing aircraft, and therefore certainly belongs to the Air Force.

It's just that the Army also put forward a very good reason.

Gunboats are essentially flying artillery, and the only value of their existence is to support ground forces in combat, so it should be under the jurisdiction of the army.

This controversy has been going on for 3 years!

By the time the controversy ended, the Polish-Iranian war had also entered its final phase. Although the Air Force and the Army had already privately compromised to send more than a dozen gunboats for testing to Posha Bay to participate in combat operations before the official installation, by the end of the Polish-Iraqi War, neither the Air Force nor the Army had reached an agreement on the jurisdiction of the gunboats, and thus they were not able to obtain funding for the two houses of the Debate.

By the end of the Polish-Iranian war, it would be even more impossible to get grants.

Of course, after the test of the Polish-Iraqi war, the attitude of the air force and the army towards the tactical value of gunboat aircraft is highly unified.

Based on the performance of gunboats in the late stages of the Polish-Iranian War, even in large-scale wars, gunboats still have high tactical value. Especially in the case of absolute air supremacy, gunboat functions can provide more durable and accurate fire support for ground forces.

The point is that under the control of the electronic fire control system, the impact error of a 100-meter gun will not exceed 25 meters, and if a 40-mm rapid-fire gun is used, it can even suppress the enemy's fire at a distance of 15 meters from the defense line. In contrast, 80 mm rockets have an error of more than 25 meters, while the usual 250 kg bombs have a kill range of more than 50 meters, and 500 kg bombs are up to 150 meters.

As for power, it goes without saying.

Not to mention the 100 mm gun, the 40 mm rapid-fire gun, which shares ammunition with the Gatling cannon on the Attack-9, is capable of destroying most ground targets.

In order to be able to obtain the grant, the Air Force and the Army each made concessions.

The gunboats are still part of the Air Force and are part of the Support Aviation, but they are under the jurisdiction of the Special Operations Command, which is nominally part of the General Staff but is actually headed by the Army Command, for example, a general who has always been appointed by the Army Command as the supreme commander.

It's just that it wasn't until Zhou Yongtao became the first assistant of the empire that the gunboat machine project was reborn.

In the later period of the Slan Civil War, the gunboat machine can be said to shine, and its value is finally recognized.

In the later combat operations, the gunboats sent by the Empire became the most reliable, if not the only, support force that the Slan Defense Force could rely on. Almost all ground offensive operations were carried out with the support and cover of gunboats, and most of the high-value targets were destroyed by gunboats.

It was in this way that in the year 145 of the new calendar, the Imperial Air Force and the Army joined forces again to develop a new gunboat aircraft.

However, in the end, the "Y-9" was still chosen as the carrying platform, but it was the latest E-type, and some subsystems were upgraded. For example, the fuselage armor has been thickened, the key parts can withstand the direct attack of 20 mm shells, and the normal take-off weight has increased by about 5 tons compared with the "Y-9E".

However, the main improvement is actually the weapon system.

Represented by the "ghost gunboat", even the latest AC-130U, its main armament is artillery, and the improvements made by several models before and after, that is, by adopting a more advanced fire control system to improve the shooting accuracy of the artillery, did not make a fuss about the fire system.

Of course, the same goes for the gunboats that the Imperial Army had been equipped with one after another.

But the problem is that there must be an upper limit to the accuracy of artillery, not that as long as the fire control system is continuously improved, the shooting accuracy of artillery can be continuously improved.

Strictly speaking, the accuracy of firepower is already a key factor in the development of gunboat aircraft for combat use.

The reason is also very simple: With the increase of the enemy's anti-aircraft firepower, especially the appearance of individual anti-aircraft missiles with omnidirectional attack capability, it poses a serious threat to all low-flying combat aircraft, and it also requires gunboat aircraft to provide fire support to ground troops at a greater distance.

According to the assessment made by the Imperial Air Force, the distance of the gunboat's first fire must be increased from 1,500 meters to 5,500 meters, so that the survivability of the battlefield can be guaranteed sufficiently.

As the distance increases, the accuracy of shelling plummets.

Take the 100 mm gun, for example, when the firing range is increased to 5500 meters, the impact error of the first shot will reach 75 meters.

Obviously, such accuracy is certainly unacceptable.

That is, a weapon with greater accuracy is needed.

Undoubtedly, the only option is air-to-surface missiles.

Fortunately, before the development of the new gunboat was launched, the heavy anti-tank missile, which was mainly carried and used by armed helicopters, had matured and proved to be a fairly effective ground strike weapon, which could meet the needs of combat in terms of accuracy and power.

In addition, gunboat aircraft fly higher and are faster, capable of giving missiles a longer range.

It is precisely for this reason that gunboats are required to have the ability to carry and use heavy anti-tank missiles, and the number of them is not low.

There must be at least 40 pieces.

The reason is also very simple: the continuous combat time of gunboat aircraft is calculated in hours, usually about 6 hours, and a sortie often needs to deal with dozens or even more ground targets, so it needs to carry enough ammunition to obtain the corresponding sustained combat capability.

If the fuel is gone, you can refuel in the air, and if you run out of ammunition, you can only return home.

Unfortunately, yes, this is indeed a bit of a high demand.

It's not that it's technically impossible, but that adding 40 missiles, as well as a launch system and a fire control system, will be too high for the military to accept.

In addition, the integration of the launch system of anti-tank missiles leads to a lengthening of the design cycle.

After a comprehensive trade-off, the Imperial military made a trade-off, no longer requiring air-to-surface missiles to be placed inside the fuselage, and the plug-in scheme was acceptable.

It is precisely for this reason that there are four weapon hardpoints on the outside of the wings of the Y-9EA, and a maximum of 24 KD-28C short-range air-to-surface missiles can be mounted using composite pylons.

Interestingly, inside the cabin of the "Y-9EA", a place was reserved for the installation of 40 KD-28Cs.

It is a pity that the KD-28C, which uses the self-leading lead of millimeter-wave synthetic aperture radar, has not yet been mass-produced, and the supporting millimeter-wave radar has not been finalized, so the "Y-9EA" delivered before the outbreak of the war does not have the ability to carry air-to-surface missiles.

4 weapon hardpoints were set up in the outer section of the wing, which were usually used to carry drop fuel tanks.

If it is operating in high-risk areas, it can also mount two electronic countermeasures and jamming pods to enhance the ability to counter individual anti-aircraft missiles using infrared seeker.

As with other advanced combat aircraft, the sudden outbreak of a global war solved all the problems of the mass production of gunboat aircraft.

The key is that the "Y-9E" in service can be transformed. In the transport fleet of the Imperial Air Force, there were more than 5,000 such tactical transport aircraft, of which up to 2,500 were of the E type. Besides, the quest for tactical transport aircraft in front-line combat operations has not been very high.

To date, more than 200 Y-9EAs have been delivered.

Of course, under normal circumstances, 18 "Y-9EAs" of a brigade can take on the task of supporting in one tactical direction.

If anything, it was the fire support provided by these Y-9EAs from Kuah Harbor that the Marines were able to withstand the frantic counterattack of the Van army in the afternoon battle.

In addition, it is only with the Y-9EA that the Y-9EA is fighting on the front line that it will be able to continue to transport engineering equipment and materials to the landing site according to the original plan, so as to ensure the smooth progress of the construction of the field airfield. Otherwise, it would have been necessary to use vertical airlift forces to increase troops to the front line that afternoon.

As night fell, the assault operation entered the most critical night.