Chapter 1536 Resurrection of F14?
Later in the day.
Pentagon.
In the conference room of the National Military Command Center (NMCC), the air seemed to solidify into lead.
On the huge electronic situation map, the preset areas of the "Confrontation-North" exercise - the Sulu Sea and the Sulawesi Sea - are being covered with glaring red marks.
The blue symbols representing the participating fleets are moving southeastward toward the Basilan Strait and the Sulawesi Sea at an alarming speed, completely deviating from the original plan to reunite with the Australian Navy west of Palawan Island.
The top military figures gathered around the oval conference table, each with a gloomy look on his face.
Robert Gates sat at the head of the table, scanning the generals present with sharp eyes.
"Let's start," Gates said in a low voice, but with an unquestionable heavy pressure, "Gary, you go first."
In the past twenty-four hours, the Pentagon has gained a preliminary understanding of the general course of the entire incident, but has not had time to conduct a complete review.
On the one hand, this was because almost a huge amount of information was gathered in Washington, resulting in information congestion. On the other hand, it was also because the incident happened suddenly and so many bigwigs found it difficult to rush back to Washington for the meeting in the first place.
Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Gary Roughead cleared his throat and stood up. The large screen behind him simultaneously displayed the latest position and status briefings of the USS Washington and USS Reagan aircraft carriers.
"Mr. Minister, everyone." His voice was a little hoarse, revealing the fatigue of a sleepless night. "The progress of the 'Confrontation-North' exercise... as you can see, has completely gone off track. The main force of the 5th Carrier Strike Group commanded by Vice Admiral Scott Swift has now completely withdrawn from the Sulu Sea..."
He paused, then pulled up an emergency report signed by Swift and Lawsman.
"The fleet was sailing southwest normally at the time of the incident, preparing to rendezvous with the Australian Navy's participating fleet as planned. During this process, the USS Cowpens, which was located on the periphery of the fleet, suddenly captured a high-threat target, which was approaching the core area of the fleet at a speed of more than Mach 4, and the altitude... exceeded 13 feet (about 4 meters)."
Roughhead pointed to the simulated trajectory diagram on the screen. A glaring red dot broke through all air defense circles in just two minutes as if it were in an empty space, and finally drew a strange arc as it approached the fleet.
"In the first few seconds, based on the characteristics of the target - high speed, high altitude, high radial speed, and pointing directly at the fleet, the fleet commander reasonably determined that it was an extremely deadly hypersonic anti-ship missile of unknown origin, and then ordered an evasive maneuver, causing an E2C early warning aircraft that had just been unstabilized to crash into the sea."
Navy Secretary Admiral Ray Mabus took over the conversation, his tone was clearly dissatisfied and pointed:
"The core cause of this major accident was the failure of the Hyuga squadron to provide timely and accurate early warning intelligence, which led to the fleet's misjudgment of the real threat source and nature, and failed to reserve sufficient safety redundancy time for deck operations when the evasive action was initiated."
Mabuse looked around and slowed down his tone a little:
"Of course, frankly speaking, even in an ideal situation, if we take off the E2C and fighter jets in advance, there is no means in our existing arsenal that can intercept the target at that altitude and speed. At most, we can recover some losses..."
There was silence in the conference room.
Obviously, it was the consensus of everyone present to put the main responsibility on the Self-Defense Forces.
"It's not the right time to talk about accountability." Gates' face was so gloomy that water could drip out of it. "The White House and Capitol Hill are more concerned about the nature of the target. I guess from the report that it was an unmanned reconnaissance aircraft. Do you have more details?"
Roughead took a deep breath:
"The radar showed that when the target approached to about 12 nautical miles from the core of the fleet, it made a sharp, non-aggressive horizontal turn and returned to the northwest at high speed... Judging from this trajectory, its design concept and technical characteristics may be similar to our D21 unmanned reconnaissance aircraft during the Cold War, but the specific model is completely unknown."
Gates looked gloomy, obviously not satisfied with the result.
In this suffocating silence, a slightly low but unusually clear voice sounded:
"Mr. Minister, perhaps... we are not completely 'unknown'."
Everyone's eyes were focused on the person speaking, Lieutenant General John Raymond, the acting head of the Air Force Space Command.
In just a few years, he jumped two levels from an inconspicuous brigadier general to a position qualified to sit in on meetings at the Pentagon.
He signaled the conference assistant to switch the signal channel, and the main screen immediately switched to a set of satellite images: "After learning of the incident, we immediately mobilized reconnaissance satellite resources passing over East Asia and Southeast Asia to conduct retrospective analysis."
Several blurry satellite photos were displayed on the screen, with the photos taken about an hour after the incident.
"This is a satellite image of the Lingshui Naval Air Base at dusk." Raymond pointed a laser pointer at one of the apron areas, which had been specially magnified and enhanced.
The outline of a slender, shuttle-shaped black object was vaguely visible, quietly parked next to a large aircraft, with people and vehicles moving around it.
"Due to the poor lighting conditions, the optical channel imaging quality is very poor, and the infrared channel cannot capture the surface features. Fortunately, the overall shuttle-shaped outline is still very clear, and its parking position is independent, which does not match the shape of any known Chinese active fighter or missile."
He then switched to the next picture:
"The time when this object appeared is highly consistent with the possible return time of the unidentified aircraft after completing its reconnaissance mission. Moreover, according to the research results of the Aurora Goddess Project, this type of aerodynamic aircraft will show a certain radar stealth capability when flying at high speeds. This can also explain why the FCS3 radar on the Hyuga, which has good performance, did not respond at all."
Gates nodded slightly, and his expression softened a little.
Although these conclusions are still incomplete, they can at least provide a preliminary response to subsequent inquiries.
"and many more!"
At this moment, Michael Flynn, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), suddenly spoke up, attracting almost everyone's attention.
He quickly operated on the laptop in front of him:
"The photo of General Raymond...reminds me of a report."
Soon, an extremely blurry and grainy photo appeared on the screen, as if it had been taken secretly from a distance with a low-resolution device.
The center of the picture is basically blurred, but if combined with the satellite image just now, you can indeed vaguely imagine a long black object hanging under the belly of a large aircraft, with a sharp head and a tail that seems to be shrinking.
"A routine report from the Open Source Intelligence Analysis Service two months ago," Flynn showed the blurry photo side by side with Raymond's satellite photo. "It mentioned that this drone might be called 'Wuzhen 8', but it was classified as low importance at the time for obvious reasons."
This result is completely understandable.
If there were no satellite images for comparison, it would not be far-fetched to say that this thing was a flying saucer.
"I think it's unlikely," Air Force Chief of Staff General Mitchell Moseley immediately retorted, "Regarding the WZ-8, our Air Force Intelligence Office has very clear intelligence that it is a verification/disposable drone based on mature rocket technology with a short range, mainly used for short-term tactical reconnaissance missions."
"Gary, did the trajectory of the high-speed target you saw show obvious kinetic energy decay in the final stage?" He turned to Roughead. "Rocket-powered aircraft have a limited working time of their power."
Roughead recalled the report: "No, it still maintained its energy after turning, and even accelerated."
"That's it," Mosley said, emphasizing the point.
"General Mosley, I understand your doubts. But apart from the WZ-8 project, China does not have any other models that meet the requirements." Flynn immediately responded, "Both the WZ-7 and WZ-9 are subsonic high-altitude, long-endurance drones. It is impossible for manned aircraft to achieve such high speeds and altitudes..."
"..."
"Stop for a moment." Admiral Michael Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in a deep voice to stop the increasingly heated debate.
His voice was not loud, but it instantly suppressed all the sounds.
"These situations are enough to deal with the White House and Congress temporarily, so let's get back to the core of the problem." Mullen's eyes swept over each general, "No matter what the nature of the target is, it is certain that it was launched by a large aircraft from hundreds of kilometers away, and it can be basically confirmed that it is an improved version of the H-6."
He pointed to the satellite image on the screen:
"That is to say, China can mass-produce, equip and launch this kind of thing, and ensure that the launch platform is outside the strike range of air defense firepower, or even at the edge of the combat radius of carrier-based aircraft. If this technology is applied to anti-ship weapons, the threat to the fleet and the flexibility of use will be even greater than that of Dongfeng 21 and Dongfeng 26."
Mullen's conclusion hit everyone like a hammer.
"We must improve the air defense interception capability of the fleet, especially the aircraft carrier formation, especially the interception capability against this kind of close space and targets... We can't just watch helplessly like this time!"
Mullen's words plunged the conference room into silence again, but this time it was a silence filled with a sense of crisis.
"The problem now is," Roufhead frowned and responded first, "it is difficult for current ship-to-air missiles to effectively cover the near-space airspace at an altitude of 40 to 100 kilometers, and this... thing happens to be in the window area."
"So, if you want to form combat effectiveness as soon as possible," Mosley concluded, "you should still consider using carrier-based aircraft to intercept the launch platform or the missiles that have not yet accelerated in the initial stage of launch, just like you did when you faced the combination of Tu-22M3 and KH22 in the past..."
At the end of his speech, his own voice became quieter.
There was no one around to talk to.
The F18 is not a carrier-based aircraft that excels in flying altitude and speed, and the future main force F35C performs even worse in terms of energy. It is obviously unable to complete a face-to-face interception like the F14 faced the Tu-22.
The JSF project is the absolute core of the current US military-industrial complex and political correctness. No one dares to publicly say that it is "not good enough" or "not good enough".
But everyone present understood that facing this new hypersonic threat, the F35C was not an ideal interception platform.
So we can only think of solutions from other angles.
"Speaking of the F14..." Roughead seemed to be talking to himself, or reminiscing, "Back then there was a 'Super Tomcat' program, which was to install more powerful engines and improve the fuselage structure... In theory, the practical ceiling could be pushed to more than 7 feet (2.1 meters), and the speed could be further increased. If it is further upgraded..."
Most of his combat career was completed with the F14, and he has a deep affection for this model.
Of course, the mention of F14 now is not to really revive this antique model, but to use it as a name to extend another possibility -
F22N.
