The offensive operation can be described as smooth sailing.

Before 7 o'clock, Stark received a report from the escort fighters.

In the vicinity of the sea area where the attack was planned, it was encountered by the Liang Xia Navy to the fighters. Because of the support provided by EA-6B, it was not suppressed by the opponent.

The key is that there are only 8 fighters in the first batch to kill Liangxia.

Relying on numerical superiority, escort fighters can meet air defense fighters supported by carrier-based early warning aircraft with the help of electronic attack aircraft.

Strictly speaking, they are entangled with each other, looking for an opportunity to attack.

Before the air battle was over, the 20 bombers on the attack mission had already been killed.

It was not until a quarter past 7 o'clock that the assault officially began.

The reason is also very simple: it was only at this time that the escort fighters defeated the air defense fighters, let the electronic reconnaissance planes that followed them go forward, and used the method of passive detection to find an exceptional aircraft carrier battle group of the 61st Task Force and determine the general direction.

Only after obtaining information from electronic attack aircraft did the bomber group attack.

The attack was clean.

In just a few minutes, 20 B-52Gs divided into 5 formations successively dropped the anti-ship missiles they carried, that is, the air-launched version of the BGM-109B.

Earlier, this missile was introduced.

Because of the opposition of the Air Force and the reluctance of Congress to allocate funds for the development of a second air-launched cruise missile, this type of missile was transferred to a technical reserve when it had already been successfully developed, and was not purchased in bulk, let alone officially added to the equipment sequence of the Nuland Navy.

The point is that before dismounting, it has passed the acceptance test of the Navy.

In addition, the prototype missile of the BGM-109 participated in the bidding of the Air Force's "air-launched cruise missile" project, but because of its excessive size and quality, it lost to the competitor, and later the AGM-86 was officially installed. During the bidding period, the prototype missile was mounted on several bombers, including the B-52, and was also launched, and can be fully mounted and used by the Air Force's bombers.

After that, the competition for the Navy was won, and after the official equipping it received the military designation "BGM-109".

It is precisely in this way that the Nuland Navy came up with the idea of developing an air-launched anti-ship missile on the basis of the BGM-109B to enhance the combat capability of long-range anti-ship sea dominance.

The Nuland Navy never thought about equipping carrier-based attack aircraft with such missiles.

Because of its huge size, the AGM-109B was used as a heavy anti-ship missile from the very beginning, mounted by large combat aircraft.

Compared with traditional anti-ship missiles, the most prominent feature of the "AGM-109B" is that it actually has very strong autonomous combat capabilities.

Strictly speaking, the "AGM-109B" can be considered a low-profile version of the "Silent Rainbow" anti-ship version.

Compared with the "Silent Rainbow" anti-ship type, the "AGM = 109B" in addition to more relaxed quality restrictions, the main thing is to reduce some performance indicators, such as the ability to fly at supersonic speeds. In other respects, the "AGM-109B" can be said to be very advanced.

If I want to say, it is similar to the KD-30.

From a practical point of view, both missiles are actually the product of compromise, that is, in the face of insurmountable technical obstacles in the short term, the performance indicators are reduced.

However, it is also a very smart choice.

Without compromises, "AGM = 109B" would certainly not have been able to reach service status before the outbreak of the Great War, or that there would have been no such missiles at all.

According to typical offensive tactics, it is only necessary to input the target's azimuth information for the missile, to be precise, the position deviation is no more than 60 kilometers, and the "AGM-109B" can rely on the radar on board, fly along the spiral route, and complete the search before the attack. After finding the target warship, the "AGM-109B" will rely on the missile radar to lock on to the warship, and actively attack the whole process, without the need for guidance from the carrier aircraft.

The key is that in the attack phase, to be precise, at the end of the attack trajectory, the "AGM-109B" will take the initiative to carry out a large-angle serpentine maneuver to evade the anti-aircraft missiles launched by the target warship and increase the probability of penetrating the defense. Before hitting the target warship, the flight altitude will be further reduced to ensure that the hit point is near the waterline of the target warship, so as to enhance the destructive power and achieve the purpose of severely damaging or sinking the target warship.

Of course, with a semi-armor-piercing warhead weighing 1000 pounds, that is, 454 kg, the power of the "AGM-109B" is absolutely not to be underestimated.

If anything, even more than the KD-30.

According to the tests conducted by the Nuland Navy, one "AGM-109B" can sink a 5,000-ton destroyer, or severely damage a 10,000-ton cruiser. Even against a supercarrier with a displacement of 100,000 tons, only 4 to 6 of them can make it incapacitated.

However, "AGM-109B" is not flawless.

For example, the body of the projectile is too large and the target characteristics are too obvious, so it is easy to be intercepted.

If you compare it with the KD-30, you have a very intuitive impression.

In the case of similar performance, the launch mass of the "AGM-109B" is up to 1400 kg, which is a full 400 kg more than the KD-30, and the volume is also 30% larger than that of the KD-30. As a result, the AGM-109B has higher requirements for the platform to be carried.

Even the B-52G can only be mounted with 24 pieces in the case of overload.

In other words, after hanging 24 "AGM-109Bs", the B-52G needs to refuel in the air on each way back and forth to be able to gain a combat radius of 5,000 kilometers. In order to expand the combat radius to 8,000 kilometers, it is necessary to arrange one more in-flight refueling.

Obviously, this is a very troublesome matter.

However, compared with the KD-30, the biggest problem with the "AGM-109B" is actually the use of BGM-109B's projectile body, which is equivalent to new wine in old bottles.

Although many new technologies are adopted, they cannot fundamentally solve the shortcomings of the basic design.

The dead weight of up to 1400 kg has a lot to do with the old missile body, after all, in the era when the BGM-109 was designed, composite materials such as carbon fiber, which were used to replace traditional metal materials and greatly reduce the weight of the missile body structure, had not been widely used.

It's just that the most prominent thing is actually the lack of stealth performance.

Don't forget that the KD-30 was designed from the ground up from the ground up, and stealth performance was put in the first place, making it the world's first stealth anti-ship missile.

Fundamentally, the "soul" of the KD-30 is also stealth performance.

To put it bluntly, at the design stage, the Liang Xia Navy made clear the tactical idea of relying on advanced stealth performance to improve the penetration efficiency of anti-ship missiles.

Obviously, it is on this basis that the KD-30 can be called the most advanced anti-ship missile today.

It's a pity that the "AGM-109B" did not work on stealth performance.

Although the RCS value of cruise missiles is much smaller than that of combat aircraft, usually less than 0.5 square meters, almost all air defense systems are optimized for targets such as cruise missiles, not to mention the more important AWACS aircraft in the modern fleet air defense system.

This is the main reason why the Nuland Navy abandoned the AGM-109B project and switched to the Air Force-led Silent Rainbow project after being vetoed by Congress. In the equipment system of the Nuland army, the "Silent Rainbow" is the real stealth missile.

Unfortunately, the development of the "Silent Rainbow" did not go well.

If it were not for the outbreak of the Great War, the Nuland Navy would not have purchased 1,000 guidance systems, and before the war, 1,000 stocks of BGM-109B were converted into air-launched versions.

Stark has a very clear understanding of this shortcoming.

To put it bluntly, in a high-intensity naval and air war, especially in the face of a fully organized aircraft carrier battle group, anti-ship missiles that lack stealth capability or do not have supersonic flight capability are basically useless, and the probability of breaking through the enemy's air defense network is extremely low.

Theoretically, one "Qingzhou" class ship can intercept dozens of anti-ship missiles of the "AGM-109B" class in one battle.

In addition, when dealing with subsonic anti-ship missiles, air defense fighters are the main force.

To deal with anti-ship missiles, it is not necessary to use heavy fighters, multi-role fighters are enough.

The reason is also very simple, the anti-ship missile is controlled by an inertial navigation system during the cruise flight stage, flies along a fixed route, and basically does not maneuver.

In fact, it was on the basis of this characteristic that the Liangxia Navy and the Nuland Navy accepted multi-role fighters such as the "Zhan-12" and the F/A-18.

In the establishment system of the Liangxia Navy, the "Zhan-12" has two purposes.

The first is to act as a light attack aircraft in ground strike operations, that is, to replace the "Attack-6". The second is to play a supporting role in the air defense operations of the fleet and assist the "Battle-9". When playing the latter role, the position of the "Zhan-12" is actually behind the "Zhan-9", and its main mission is to deal with the fish that slip through the net. Among them, there are not only enemy bombers, but also anti-ship missiles launched by the enemy outside the range of interception.

It is precisely because of this that the "Zhan-12B" is equipped with a fairly advanced fire control system, and it is capable of using a new generation of medium-range air-to-air missiles developed by the Liangxia Air Force, and can even control the missiles to attack four targets at the same time. You know, the ability to engage multiple targets has always been the preserve of heavy fighters.

Strictly speaking, the KK-12 is the key.

With this advanced missile, the over-the-horizon air combat capability of the "Zhan-12B" is no longer under the "Zhan-9B", and strictly speaking it is slightly stronger.

The main thing is that the "Battle-9B" does not yet have the ability to use the KK-12.

Even if the KK-9 has a longer range, because of the lack of the ability to actively attack the target, the whole process needs to be guided by fighters, and often cannot reach the nominal maximum range, especially when dealing with flexible fighters, the actual effective range is not as good as the KK-12.

On any aircraft carrier of the Liangxia Navy, there is at least 1 group, that is, 24 "Zhan-12".

Well, for the Nuland Navy, the tactical options are very limited.

Because the target signal of the "AGM-109B" is too obvious, even if the bomber successfully projects it, it may not be able to break through the air defense network of the Liangxia fleet, and it is very likely that it will be discovered by the carrier-based early warning aircraft at a long enough distance, and then intercepted by the carrier-based fighters, so when making tactical arrangements, it can only win by numbers, launch more missiles, and let it directly exceed the upper limit of the fleet's air defense interception capability.

This is the "super-saturated" attack tactic.

Compared with the "saturation" tactic, the key to the "super-saturation" tactic lies in this "super" word.

The exact amount exceeded depends on the actual situation.

For example, this time, against an aircraft carrier battle group, Stark used 20 bombers, and the number of anti-ship missiles put into it reached 480!

This number certainly exceeds the maximum interception capacity of an aircraft carrier battle group.

Theoretically, an aircraft carrier battle group with a maximum of 2 air defense cruisers, as well as 2 universal destroyers, 3 ocean-going frigates with only point air defense capabilities. As for the air defense fighters, get rid of the "Battle-9" for long-range interception, that is, 24 "Battle-12" for a brigade.

Although within the normal establishment system, a carrier-based aviation wing of the Liangxia Navy has two multi-role fighter groups, when carrying out high-intensity naval control combat missions, it often replaces one multi-role fighter group with heavy fighters or heavy attack aircraft.

In this way, relying on 24 "Battle-12" and 2 air defense cruisers, even if other warships and the aircraft carrier's own air defense capabilities are counted, it will be able to intercept about 300 anti-ship missiles in a single battle. The point is, this is an ideal outcome.

Obviously, the actual combat state is certainly not ideal.

Then, if 480 anti-ship missiles are used, even if the completion rate is only 80 percent, that is, the total number of anti-ship missiles launched is only about 380, after removing the missiles shot down by the Liang Xia fleet, the remaining dozens of anti-ship missiles can completely wipe out an aircraft carrier battle group.

In fact, this is the main theoretical basis for Stark's strike plan.

As for the results of the attack, it did not exceed expectations.

After the bombers dropped their missiles, the Liangxia fighters who had come out of the way retreated, to be precise, no longer entangled with the escort fighters.

It's just that the escorted F-14B did not turn to return home.

According to Stark's arrangement, these escort fighters continued to strike westward, and in addition to preventing air defense fighters from intercepting anti-ship missiles launched by bombers, they also shouldered a very important mission. The results of the attack were screened to determine whether the 61st Task Force had lost its combat effectiveness.

The point is also whether there is a need for supplementary bombing.

To this end, the leaders of the three squadrons hung a special reconnaissance pod on the external hardpoint under the engine pod on the left side.

By following the EA-6B and the E-2C on the periphery of Task Force 51 acting as a communications relay node, Fleet Command was able to obtain the photographs taken by the F-14B in a timely manner, allowing them to be immediately screened and analyzed to determine the next operational move.

It was so, after the attack operation began, Smith went to the combat command center below.

He immediately reported the results of the attack to Stark.

The aircraft carrier previously detected by EA-6B through passive means has been heavily damaged, and judging from the external dimensions, it is indeed a "Xue Yuanzheng"-class supercarrier. Judging by the damage, even if the aircraft carrier does not sink, it will certainly not be able to continue operations.

In addition, several warships, including 1 cruiser and 2 destroyers, were hit by missiles.

Obviously, the results of the attack can be said to be very ideal.

Counting the results of the first round of attacks, two supercarriers have been "killed", and the 61st Task Force is already in name only.

It is not difficult to sink the two aircraft carriers, which have lost their combat capability and have few escort warships left.

It's just that Stark isn't thinking about this issue right now. Or rather, he was overjoyed by the great results he had achieved.

The reason is also simple, the total number of air defense fighters involved in the battle did not exceed 10.

Previously, Smith deduced that the 61st Task Force had doubled the number of heavy fighters, and that one aircraft carrier carried more than 40 "Battle-9s".

So, where did the other heavy fighters go?

Also, in the hours between the two rounds of attacks, what was Task Force 61 doing?