Chapter 1525: The Result of Being Frightened

In fact, judging from past experience, it seems that no one would be crazy enough to actively attack an aircraft carrier formation sailing on the high seas.

The target that was approaching at a speed exceeding Mach 4 only awakened Lieutenant General Swift's memories of the Cold War. At this critical moment of life and death (as he thought), he had no time to consider so many possibilities.

But then, Colonel Solomon responded with worse news: "The target's altitude is completely beyond the interception envelope of the Standard 6 missile... We can only wait for it to turn into a dive before attempting a terminal interception!"

Swift's breathing stagnated when he heard this conclusion, and he almost passed out with his hands spread out behind his back.

Are you kidding? The mid-stage flight speed can exceed four times the speed of sound. What's the difference between waiting for the opponent to dive down and then intercepting it and waiting to die?

"Evade, all members of the fleet, attention, aerial target is approaching, evade immediately!"

Fortunately, the fleet did not adopt the compact formation commonly seen in propaganda photos, but maintained a loose formation with a distance of more than one nautical mile between them.

Following the order from the fleet commander, the USS Washington was the first to begin drastic maneuvers and turns.

The giant ship with a displacement of more than 10 tons drew a compact white wake on the sea. The 330-meter-long hull turned rapidly like a mountain, and its side created waves on the calm water.

The officers in the CIC were thrown around by inertia. Rothman managed to avoid falling by grabbing the console, while Swift accidentally dropped his military cap to the ground.

Shortly thereafter, the USS Ronald Reagan, a few nautical miles away, also began a similar emergency evasive maneuver, but in the opposite direction to avoid a collision.

After a few seconds, Colonel Rosman finally stabilized his body.

Through the night vision monitoring screen, he saw that the deck of the Reagan was tilting outwards violently due to the turn in the distance. In the chaos, it seemed that something slid into the sea from the front of the island...

"commander!"

Before he could report to Swift what he had just seen, the communications officer spoke again:

"Reagan reporting an emergency!"

The latter's voice was shaking. The USS Washington had never faced such an embarrassing situation in its 20 years of service.

"An E-2C and tractor crashed into the sea!"

The next minute seemed as long as a century. Vice Admiral Swift even forgot to respond to the captain of the Reagan's report. He just stared blankly at the air situation display in front of him.

It wasn't until Colonel Solomon's update brought him back to reality: "The target is not diving! It is turning... passing by the side of the fleet about 30 kilometers!"

On the display screen, the mysterious light spot drew a huge arc, maintaining an altitude of more than 36 kilometers and a speed of more than 3.3 Mach, elegantly avoiding the fleet's air defense circle.

"The USS Cowpens and USS Latzen, which were closest to the target, attempted to intercept, but it was completely ineffective." Solomon spoke with a distinct hissing sound, perhaps because he was shouting too loudly or because he was afraid. "The target remained outside the firing envelope the entire time, and there was no condition for interception."

The F18 fighter can only barely exceed the speed of sound when carrying missiles, let alone pose any threat to the target.

In fact, the three planes had just taken off and did not even have time to climb to an effective altitude, and were unable to capture the target's echo signal.

"This... doesn't seem to be a missile."

After a moment of silence, Lausman first said something nonsense:

No missile would be designed to fly on a trajectory that would cause it to miss its target at the last moment.

But at least it broke the awkward silence.

"Maybe... something like the D-21 drone?"

The radar commander gave his own guess.

Lieutenant General Swift seemed to be so shocked by this series of events that he was speechless. He slumped in his command chair, his face pale.

After a long while, he finally blinked, showing that he was not scared to death by heart problems.

It was not until this time that the people in the CIC remembered that the Reagan seemed to have reported the loss of an aircraft.

"That E2C..." Swift covered his chest in pain, "What happened?"

The communications officer quickly transmitted the clearer night vision images to the big screen.

Before the aircraft carrier made an evasive turn, an E-2C early warning aircraft on the edge of the deck had just been freed from all its fixing ropes and connected to a tractor.

Due to the sudden and violent outward tilt, the plane, which had no fulcrum, lost its balance and was thrown into the sea along with the towing vehicle by inertia.

The moment the water splashed, Lausman felt dizzy.

An early warning aircraft worth hundreds of millions of dollars was lost, along with a tractor and possible casualties.

The only good news was that it didn't happen on his ship.

"Reagan reported no casualties, but the E-2C was a total loss and one MH-60 was damaged."

The communications officer continued reporting.

Lieutenant General Swift was not as relaxed as Rossman.

The first thing that came to his mind was not technical analysis, but the E-2C that crashed into the sea and the subsequent responsibility issues.

This loss came out of nowhere. Since there was no attack and the target did not actually pass over the fleet, it certainly could not be counted as combat damage.

But if you think it was an improper operation, then you must bear joint and several liability...

"Record all the data!" Swift suddenly ordered, "Copy all the communication records between the Hyuga and us. Their failure to be alert led to this incident!"

Soon, the Hyuga received an accusatory communication from the Washington.

Inside the CIC, Oe Michiyama sneered and turned to Yamada Yuki: "Americans are always like this, looking for scapegoats when something goes wrong."

"Sir, our radar did not continue to track the target..." the latter reminded cautiously.

Dajiang's face changed slightly, but he still said firmly, "That's because we are carrying out a secret mission!" Then he lowered his voice and said, "Besides, who would have thought that China would have a flying machine of that height?"

Yamada was silent for a moment:

"Should we warn the Soryuu?"

"The Canglong has entered a submerged state, and there is no way to communicate." Dajiang shook his head, "Besides, there is no reason for a high-altitude, high-speed reconnaissance aircraft to have anti-submarine capabilities."

While the fleet was in chaos, WZ-8 had completed its reconnaissance mission and began to return.

Due to the limitation of communication capacity, it has no way to transmit the reconnaissance results back in real time and can only conduct unified analysis after returning.

Of course, for a strategic reconnaissance aircraft, this is not a problem.

At least, this test operation itself has been a complete success——

Whether it is the technical level of the aircraft or the deterrent effect of this penetration...

……

Forty minutes later.

On the deck of the USS Washington, two F-18Es and an EA-18G returned one after another.

Pilots reported no visual confirmation of any high-altitude, high-speed targets, and only saw regular civilian traffic in the designated area—

That's right.

The maximum ceiling of the F18 is only about 1.8 meters, and there is still a height difference of more than 20km from the mysterious target.

What's more, the three planes took about three minutes to climb, and they couldn't even get a whiff of each other's exhaust gas.

After regaining command, Swift's first order was for the fleet to turn immediately and retreat to the Sulawesi Sea at full speed.

Ultimately, he decided to classify the incident as an "unidentified aerial phenomenon" and ordered the fleet to resume normal patrols.

But privately, the vice admiral had begun drafting a report placing the blame on the Hyuga for "failure to remain alert" and "delayed information."

Of course, to some extent, this is not entirely blame-shifting.

The captain of the Reagan faced a more immediate problem - how to explain the loss of an E-2C.

The ship's surveillance video showed that the ground crew did not have time to secure the aircraft during the emergency turn, but this was a helpless move under standard procedures.

"We can only attribute it to an unforeseen emergency," he told the second-in-command. "I hope the higher-ups will accept this explanation."

Oe Michiyama stood on the bridge of the Hyuga, looking at the dark sea. He thought of the mysterious target he saw during the day, and had an ominous premonition in his heart - the military balance in East Asia might be undergoing some subtle and far-reaching changes.

"Yamada-kun," he suddenly asked, "what do you think is the purpose of China developing this kind of high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft?"

Yamada Yuki thought for a moment: "Maybe it is to break through our air defense network and obtain reconnaissance intelligence within the first island chain."

Dajiang shook his head. “No, I think they are looking further ahead… They are building eyes and ears for future large-scale conflicts.” He paused, then looked at the location on the electronic chart where the Canglong last disappeared. “It’s just like what we are doing, but their pace is much faster than we imagined.”