Chapter 379 Calculation
Under the order of Lieutenant General Guterres, the Thirteenth Federal Fleet began to gradually disperse from the intensive assault formation to the arc shelling formation.
The battleships and heavy cruisers, which were the absolute main force in the bombardment battle, also opened the heat sinks originally stored on both sides of the rear half of the battleship.
Compared with the gorgeous 'Angel Wings' of the Star Dragon Empire Royal Navy, the heat sinks of the Federation Navy ships are relatively simple, at least in appearance, they are not as 'gorgeous' as the other ships. .
In this process, although the relative speed of the entire fleet and the Atlas fleet will be affected or even reduced.
However, in Guterres' view, his fleet does not lack such a little time to pursue.
After all, Atlas’ fleet is now trapped in the orbit of the planet, basically equivalent to meat on the chopping board. If they want to leave here and try to enter the jump, the first thing to do is Orbital change to higher orbit.
But if you do this, the fleet will be within the attack range of the federal fleet for a relatively short period of time.
According to the information about the enemy and our fleets obtained by Guterres, Look, as long as the Atlas fleet dares to act like this, it will definitely suffer heavy losses under the salvo of the federal army.
At the moment, the commander of the opposing fleet is obviously aware of this, so he has been carrying The Thirteenth Federation Fleet was circling in orbit, obviously stalling for time.
Now that we have reached this juncture, I guess I have found that I can't drag it out any longer, so I am ready to break the pot and turn around for a decisive battle.
Guterres believed that he had completely grasped the thoughts and ideas of the opponent's fleet commander, which gave him a sense of confidence that he was "under control".
Although there have been emergencies in previous battles, I even watched helplessly as a detachment of orbital attack ships was defeated by a single aircraft while escorted by a cruiser.
But he believed that there couldn't be many such heaven-defying beings in Atlas's fleet, otherwise they wouldn't be chased around like they are now.
In addition, the 'God of Death' has now broken into the atmosphere and reached the surface, so the next headache is the ground troops. He and his naval fleet only need to enjoy the joy of completely crushing the enemy. .
"Report! Anti-ship missiles and torpedoes launched by the enemy entered the fleet's air defense circle!"
On the bridge, the voice of the tactical information coordination officer interrupted Guterres's thinking. He watched the enemy attack from the front. The federal navy vice-admiral shook his head in disdain at the incoming torpedoes and the anti-ship missiles that were bypassed from other directions with the help of attitude control engines.
“I thought I could come up with some new tricks to attack torpedoes, but luckily he was able to use them. The escort formation began to perform air defense operations!”
The destroyers and frigates of the Thirteenth Fleet, in the fleet After unfolding into a curved artillery formation, it was already distributed to the outer circle of the fleet.
After receiving the command from the flagship, this group immediately started to 'swim' like a school of fish. While continuing to disperse, they started air defense operations according to their assigned air defense blocks.
Compared with air defense operations in the atmosphere, the entire process and complexity of air defense operations in space are much reduced.
A clean cosmic background and extremely long combat distance. These factors allow weapons such as missiles and torpedoes, as well as independent combat units such as HCP, to be discovered from a long distance and attacked by directed energy. Weapon attack.
Just like now, the periphery of the Thirteenth Fleet is constantly flashing with slender laser beams and charged particle beams, as if it is enveloped in a very wide rain of light.
On the front hemisphere of the fleet's course, fireballs continued to burst out, announcing the failure of the penetration of these anti-ship missiles and torpedoes.
When directed energy weapons become extremely popular, the chance of traditional anti-ship missiles and torpedoes breaking through the fleet's air defense network has been infinitely close to zero.
Therefore, in many cases, this type of weapon is more used to 'draw prizes' after the two sides enter the shooting stage.
Anti-ship missiles equipped with rocket engines that can continuously maintain acceleration are generally used to find weaknesses in the air defense network from other directions to break through.
Weapons such as torpedoes, which were originally used in the ocean, have also retained certain characteristics of their ancestors after entering the era of space warfare.
Large amount of charge - the traditional warhead has been replaced by a plasma warhead. If you attack from the side or stern of the ship, it can basically paralyze or even sink it with one shot except for battleships. , especially when the plasma warhead hits the plasma propulsion array at the stern of the ship, it can cause a devastating blow to some small ships.
Concealment is relatively good - unlike anti-ship missiles that sprint all the way with their rocket engines for fear that others will not know their position, the thrusters of plasma torpedoes only attack during the acceleration phase of the launch and at the end. The sprint phase is enabled, and at other times it sails silently according to the preset trajectory, and only maintains the trajectory through the attitude nozzle powered by compressed gas.
In Guterres' view, the actions of the Atlas fleet on the opposite side can be regarded as a helpless move.
Their fleet commander was obviously very aware of the strength gap between the two sides, and knew that there was no hope of victory after entering the confrontation.
That’s why we are using anti-ship missiles and torpedoes at this moment. Weapons that can be launched over long distances without having to worry about them. I hope that they can be like a ‘lucky prize’ before they are chased into artillery range. Steal some distracted battleships. If you are fighting against a private armed force or a pirate fleet, this approach may really work wonders.
But when facing the Federation Navy fleet, it does not play any role other than wasting ammunition and letting the other party know that you lack the courage to engage in a head-on battle.
No matter how tough the Federal Navy is, it still outperforms the civilian armed forces in terms of combat discipline, and the air defense combat procedures written in combat doctrine will not be ignored just to save trouble.
"It is indeed a private armed force. After dealing with other private armed fleets on weekdays, do you really think that the navy is as amateur as those miscellaneous fish?"
The fleet operations staff looked at the activities outside the fleet. While carrying out air defense operations, he commented with a disdainful tone.
However, he did not wait for the response he expected from fleet commander Guterres.
The fleet combat staff glanced at Guterres calmly, and saw a look of confusion and solemnity on the Vice Admiral's face hidden behind the mask of his spacesuit.
"There's something wrong."
"Lieutenant General, is there any problem?"
"The number of torpedoes is a little too small. Look at the transmission of the escort formation currently performing air defense operations. The data returned. The other party is expected to have launched less than 412 torpedoes. Calculating that each ship only launched two torpedoes on average?”
Guterres pointed to the intercepted ones marked on the three-dimensional diagram? A group of torpedoes appeared, and the wrinkles between his eyebrows became a little deeper.
“Maybe they are saving ammunition? Or maybe they don’t have enough reserves?”
The fleet operations staff officer spoke with some uncertainty. Although the current situation was indeed a bit abnormal, in his opinion it shouldn't be a big problem.
“Do you think that a fleet that has been forced to a dead end will save ammunition at the last moment instead of firing at full strength? Or do you think that this company can build such a large fleet and develop advanced weapons on its own? The company can’t afford plasma torpedoes?”
“This”
After hearing Guterres’s words in a slightly lecturing tone, the fleet combat staff also thought in his heart. Somewhat panicked.
But unfortunately, his panic was not because of the unexplainable actions of the fleet on the opposite side, but because he was worried that his immediate boss would write some unfavorable comments about himself in the year-end personal performance evaluation
Time passed like this for more than 20 minutes. When the Atlas fleet was slowly being pursued to the bombardment distance, and Guterres' doubts became more and more serious, the tactical information coordination officer reported a concession. The news tightened in his heart.
"Unknown units were found in the G7 area of the air defense warning circle in the direction of 84 degrees of the celestial north pole, 21 degrees of the ecliptic, and 18 degrees of the ecliptic plane! The number is 63! The straight-line distance is 3200 kilometers!"
" What?!”
If it weren’t for the restraints on the captain’s seat, Guterres might have jumped to the ceiling of the bridge in excitement.
He looked at the sudden appearance of unknown units on the three-dimensional diagram, his eyes filled with disbelief.
A fleet that was performing air defense operations was actually approached by more than 60 unknown units to the rear hemisphere, and the straight-line distance was only 3,200 kilometers.
"What's going on? Did the air surveillance monitor Lonely?!"
"Report to the general, the commander of the peripheral protection formation sent news that this is a group of small units and it seems He was in covert action mode, so he was forced to this position, but he is already directing air defense operations."
Before the tactical information coordinator finished speaking, he was issued a series of messages from the shipboard control personality. Interrupted by alarm.
The next moment, huge fireballs caused by the explosion of more than a dozen ships also appeared in the outer escort formation.
"General, the air defense command ship was sunk"
(End of this chapter)