Giant birds of steel, speeding through the deep night sky.

The control movements in his hands were precise and violent, and Long Yun held the control stick steadily, silently approaching the enemy plane invisible in the distance in a radar silence.

Speed and altitude are accumulating, and the movements of the two MiG-31s must be fast enough, and at this time the "Blackbird" is already whizzing at three times the speed of sound from hundreds of kilometers away; If it does not reach the predetermined airspace within six minutes and is ready for interception, it will miss the effective interception window demarcated by the ground guidance station -- and if the opportunity is missed, the MiG-31, which is inferior in speed, will no longer have a chance to catch up with the "Blackbird", but will have to hand over the task to other interception forces in the latter part of the target route.

The afterburner is full of violent sprints, and the process of climbing and accelerating can be said to be both violent and savage; The MiG-31, which has an adjustable tail nozzle open to the maximum and bursts out more than 30 tons of thrust, is accelerating to break through the sound barrier while advancing to an altitude of more than 10,000 meters, which is extremely fuel-intensive, and the high-temperature gas and flames emitted from the afterburner can even be observed by sensitive infrared channel reconnaissance satellites.

Yes, many fighters will become a unique scenery in the sky when they turn on the afterburner with all their strength and devour a lot of fuel just to accelerate and accelerate again; Not only satellites hanging high in the sky, but even on the ground, if the lighting conditions are right, people can see these warplanes flying across the sky like meteors with the naked eye.

However, the scenery is certainly a landscape, and for the pilots sitting on the fighter planes, the accelerated rhythm has no other unique feeling other than the frantic turbulence and the roar in the ears. Just as Long Yun carefully controlled the angle of attack of the fighter planes and continued to frantically pounce into the sky at a climb rate of more than 300 meters per second, the ground guidance information continued to correct their tracks. And informed that at four o'clock in their direction, the mysterious and arrogant SR-71 "Blackbird" strategic reconnaissance aircraft was also climbing; I don't know if it was a premonition of the imminent interceptor ahead, or if it was originally planned. The SR-71, which was originally fixed at an altitude of 22,000 kilometers, not only gradually increased to an altitude of 26,000 kilometers, but also increased its speed from Mach 3.0 to Mach 3.2.

Such an abrupt change in flight status. Of course, he couldn't escape the tracking of the Soviet long-range warning radar, and knowing that the high speed and speed of the target were increasing, Long Yun couldn't help but be a little worried.

"Apex, 'Torch' is now at 263 at height and 3425 at speed;

"Apex received! Please give the expected contact track calibration, done. ”

"There is not enough information about the location right now to predict. - The height of the 'torch' is 265, and it continues to increase. Complete. ”

At a height of 26,500 meters, this guy is still climbing?

Long Yun frowned, could it be that the Americans had already noticed it.

Based on a large amount of real-world data, Long Yun knew that the SR-71 was by no means a wasted person, and he fully believed that this thing could climb all the way to the theoretical ceiling of 35,000 kilometers, and then be able to maintain a flight speed close to three times the speed of sound; It is believed that the "Blackbird" has successfully evaded the 5V55K surface-to-air missiles launched at it many times by relying on its perverted flight ability.

The S300 surface-to-air missile can't do anything with him, right?

Whether the opponent will continue to climb or not, it is useless to think about it at this time. Long Yun is more concerned about how high and fast the MiG-31 in his hand can fly?

This is a difficult question to answer.

The MiG-25, which was born from the MiG-31, is believed by many to be stimulated by the flight of fighters; In fact, of course, this is not the case. It should be said that the latter is a continuation of the former's operational thinking.

As a heavy shield in the huge arsenal of the Soviet Air Force, the MiG-31 can be said to be tailor-made for the Homeland Defense Force, and on the basis of the MiG-25, it is equipped with a larger thrust D-30F series turbofan engine and "Shield" M passive phased array radar. And strengthened the airframe structure, in fact, the most powerful air interception platform ever built in the USSR.

Comprehensive combat performance of the MiG-31. Of course, it is not a little bit higher than the MiG-25; But at this very moment, those enhancements and improvements mentioned earlier. It can be said that it is not of much use to Long Yun's combat mission. Passive phased array radar radar is of course very good, but something like the SR-71 that is racing at high speed and emitting high-temperature radiation signals can be easily detected by Long Yun at a distance of more than 20 kilometers without any electronic equipment; It is able to withstand greater maneuverability overloads, but now it is a question of whether to chase or not, what maneuverability is there to talk about?

Finally, the D-30F engine, with its increased thrust, looks beautiful, but at high altitudes with thin air, the thrust output of the turbofan engine drops dramatically, and is even less powerful than the more primitive turbojet engine.

All in all, the MiG-31's role is actually at high altitudes - note not more than 20,000 meters of perverted altitude - to outright the enemy with super-powerful phased array radar, and to launch a dense missile assault with long-range missiles: he is more like a heavy sniper with a quick change, and is less suitable for attacking enemies at high speed like a snitch.

But what can be done now?

Looking at the flat display and the dim and blurry night sky outside the cabin, Long Yun didn't need to read carefully to be able to know that they were now far away from the upper stratosphere, and the sonic boom they experienced dozens of seconds ago also suggested that their speed had long exceeded the speed of sound, and now it was about Mach 1.6 and was continuing to climb. According to the information triggered by the ground guide, the "Blackbird" attacking from the south has now flown to a straight course about 40 kilometers away on the side, and has reached an altitude of 27,000 kilometers, but its speed has not increased again, and it still remains at about Mach 3.2.

The target is approaching, and you must try your best to cut into the route and attack!

Long Yun clearly knew that with the current MiG-31, he would not be able to catch up with that target by chasing.

The maximum speed of the MiG-31, Long Yun, of course, did not try it personally; He remembered that this model had a speed record of flying out of Mach 3 at an altitude of 21,000 meters, but he guessed that the MiG at that time must not have carried missiles, maybe it was just a test plane that did not even have a radar. From take-off to the present. Feeling the heavy feel of manipulation, Long Yun intuitively realized the heavy clumsiness of a behemoth with a weight of nearly thirty tons. And now it's half-fueled and heavily armed, and the four stout and heavy R-40 missiles add a lot of load to the airframe. His rather pessimistic estimate is that it would be quite good to be able to fly to Mach 2.4.

But in any case, even if he is inferior in speed, as long as the radar can complete the target interception and lock, then he is still confident that he can fly the heavy MiG to the cross course, and then use the R-40R's maneuverability at high altitude to kill the opponent.

As the course gradually turned east, Long Yun finally got Simonov's report that the radar was turned on and immediately after the radar was turned on, the target was found at an altitude of 269 at an altitude of 269. Speed 3393!

"Keep the route steady, and after tracking for five seconds, you can lock it!"

"Understood, keep the pursuit!"

Ma Li's beckoning wingman was ready to attack, but Long Yun did not urge Simonov behind him, not because he was not familiar with him, but because he knew in his heart that he was struggling with the complicated fire control system at this time. For perverted targets such as the SR-71, it takes some time for the fire control system to calculate the probability of missile damage and give a launch cue; But at this time, the situation of friend and foe can be said to be changing rapidly, waiting for the fire control to solve the answer to the problem. The enemy plane may be gone.

Previously, when drawing up the battle plan, some people suggested that Long Yun use the R-33 with a thick body and a super long range, but he did not accept this design that seemed reasonable but was actually not practical.

R-33。 A long-range air-to-air missile finalized by the Soviet Pennant Design Bureau in the sixties, this heavy missile weighing more than 500 kilograms uses semi-active radar or infrared guidance, and can reach a maximum range of 120 kilometers. If you look only at the range. It seems that it is best used to fight "blackbirds"; However, Long Yun noticed that its maximum speed was only Mach 3.5, which meant that the actual range when chasing an attack would be greatly reduced.

And the most difficult thing for him to accept: missiles with such a long range. However, the relatively backward semi-active radar guidance method is adopted -- not to mention the infrared guidance, and the maximum speed is even lower. Basically, there is no threat to the "Blackbird" -- that is to say, after the fighter plane launches the missile, it must continue to follow the target to maintain radar irradiation, and according to Long Yun's estimate, even if the Blackbird, whose speed has soared to Mach 3.2, can quickly shake off the MiG-31 that provides irradiation in the back, and the missile will naturally lose its effectiveness after losing the irradiation of the carrier aircraft.

Oh, and as for head-to-head mode?

Head-on interception is a typical attack method for most interceptors to deal with high-speed targets, but the requirements for ground guidance and fighter maneuvering are too high, and basically there is no chance to intercept again after a failure, and Long Yun does not want to try his luck for the time being. So he still chose the same semi-active radar guidance of the R-40R, which is also a product with the technology of the sixties, although the anti-jamming performance is not satisfactory, and the range is only about 40 kilometers, but it has a maximum speed close to Mach 5!

Speed, when tail-chasing an attack, is naturally very important for missiles.

At this time, with the continuous sideways of the heavy landline, the track of the two MiG-31s has faintly formed a tail pursuit of the SR-71, and in the dark boundless sky, the "black bird" with a bright tail flame in front of it has appeared in Long Yun's sight.

Because it has been flying at a speed of Mach 3 or more, the "Blackbird" with radar stealth design has a gas cloud formed by high temperature exhaust gas and friction, and the radar reflection characteristics are simply unusual. The radar that had just been turned on quickly locked on to the fireball in front, and the fire control system transmitted the target parameters to the missile, at a distance of 11 kilometers, and the fighter had a speed of Mach 2.3, prompting that it could be launched!

Just after the fire control system indicated that the launch conditions were met, Simonov, who was in charge of the operation of the weapon, immediately fired the first batch of two R-40Rs in a row, and launched the second batch of attacks after an interval of six seconds! (To be continued......)

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