Empire Conquest-Chapter 836 - 88: Ambitious Aspirations (Part 2)

Additionally, find ways to improve the effective range of the missiles.

The latest DK-8D has already reached 200 kilometers, while the DK-8E, still in design, theoretically can intercept targets up to 400 kilometers away due to its high parabolic trajectory. As for the DK-8F, which has just begun development, the Navy has explicitly demanded it to have the capability to intercept ballistic missiles.

However, the problem is that these efforts have not fundamentally solved the issue.

In a carrier battle group, there are only 2 Anti-Air Cruisers, making it difficult to cover all directions, and there are inevitably gaps in the air defense network.

For this reason, when operating in high-risk sea areas, the Empire’s Navy usually forms a carrier battle group with 2 or even 3 carriers to cover the entire battle group with 3 to 6 Anti-Air Cruisers, using more Anti-Air Warships to deal with larger threats.

However, this tactic also has its issues.

The most prominent one is that the size of the carrier battle group cannot be expanded indefinitely.

A three-carrier battle group is already the limit.

The reason is simple. During combat operations, carriers must maintain a safe separation distance, and the Empire’s Navy requires this to be at least 20 kilometers. The escort battleships must also maintain a distance of over 10 kilometers from the carriers to avoid affecting ship-borne aircraft taking off or landing. Even with 3 carriers arranged in a triangular formation and Anti-Air Warships distributed around them, the coverage radius exceeds 40 kilometers.

Beyond that, it is out of visual range.

In other words, adding another carrier, even with more Anti-Air Cruisers, does not significantly enhance the protection for the carriers.

Clearly, this also negates the purpose of expanding the battle group size.

Of course, there are also significant command issues.

In summary, after exploring various methods, the Empire’s Navy eventually returned to the fundamentals, or rather, faced the issue of insufficient Anti-Air Warships.

Ensure that all escort battleships in the battle group have area air defense combat capabilities!

The first chosen ones are the Destroyers, with tonnage only second to cruisers.

Even before the "Qingzhou" class, the Empire’s Navy had considered Destroyers and had designed and built three classes of missile Destroyers. However, these missile Destroyers were not very successful. Two classes had experimental natures, and after building two ships each, they ended quickly. The other class constructed six ships, but with a full-load displacement of 15,000 tons, they were incorporated into the cruiser category after entering service.

Simply put, the air defense missile system was too complex to be installed on smaller-tonnage Destroyers.

In the Empire’s Navy, the most numerous are still the so-called "General-purpose Destroyers," anti-submarine Destroyers with medium-range point air defense capabilities.

For decades, the primary mission of Destroyers has been anti-submarine warfare.

Fortunately, after the birth of the "Golden Bell Shield" system, equipping Destroyers under 10,000 tons with area air defense systems is no longer a problem.

Don’t forget, the "Qingzhou" class has a full-load displacement of less than 12,000 tons.

In other words, by appropriately lowering the requirements, such as reducing the number of fire control channels, installing one-third fewer missiles, and appropriately skipping other combat indicators, a warship equipped with the "Golden Bell Shield" system can be kept under 10,000 tons and thus classified as a Destroyer.

Of course, the key is significantly reducing construction costs.

When the construction of the "Qingzhou" class entered the fast track, about 8 years ago, the Empire’s Navy initiated the bidding process for a new generation of General-purpose Destroyers.

Still using the title "General-purpose Destroyer" was actually to more easily obtain funding from the two debating houses.

Under these constraints, the full-load displacement of the new General-purpose Destroyer was limited to 8,000 tons.

This criterion directly restricted the performance of the new General-purpose Destroyer.

The Empire’s Navy clearly required the new General-purpose Destroyer to be equipped with the "Golden Bell Shield" system, with area air defense combat capability reaching 70% of the "Qingzhou" class. This meant at least three illumination radars must be equipped, and the Vertical Launch System’s missile load must not be less than 90 rounds.

Although scaled down in proportion, constructing a warship is not simply about scaling!

The basic performance, such as a speed of at least 30 knots, a cruising range of no less than 7,500 nautical miles, maintaining enough damage control personnel, a minimum endurance of 45 days, and even post-damage survival capabilities, were neither reduced nor diminished, hence requiring adequate tonnage.

Strictly speaking, it is an improvement over traditional General-purpose Destroyers.

Because the "Golden Bell Shield" system has higher stability requirements for warships, deploying it on smaller-tonnage Destroyers requires a "wide-body" hull design to enhance navigation stability under high sea conditions, which increases sailing resistance and therefore requires a more powerful propulsion system.

Thus, integrating all of this onto an 8,000-ton full-load displacement warship remains very challenging.

Even when the Empire’s Navy allowed an increase of full-load displacement to 8,500 tons during design, and the cruising range was reduced from 7,500 to 5,000 nautical miles, suggesting saving a few hundred tons of fuel and reducing a few oil tanks to lighten structural weight, it was still difficult to achieve all design indicators.

In the end, the Empire’s Navy had to make compromises again.

Directly forego the capability to carry helicopters, keeping only the helicopter landing deck and a full set of basic support equipment capable of providing fuel and anti-submarine torpedoes for Anti-submarine Helicopters, even allowing for simple maintenance, supporting Anti-submarine Helicopter operations fleet-wide.

This move saved approximately 800 tons of displacement.

During solo missions, not carrying Anti-submarine Helicopters means lacking long-range anti-submarine capabilities, and basically renders independent anti-submarine missions unfeasible. However, within a carrier battle group, there are many ships capable of carrying Anti-submarine Helicopters, not to mention the carrier itself can carry over a dozen Anti-submarine Helicopters, so even if the Destroyers lack Anti-submarine Helicopters, it does not significantly impact the carrier battle group’s anti-submarine warfare capability.

Importantly, in the Empire’s Navy carrier battle groups, the main force for long-range anti-submarine warfare is ship-borne anti-submarine patrol aircraft, while Anti-submarine Helicopters are actually just supplementary forces.

Interestingly, the Empire’s Navy retained the anti-ship missile launch device on the Destroyers, even upgrading to heavy Anti-ship Missiles, but did not include reloading capabilities or an internal missile bay.

Given the context at the time, this compromise by the Empire’s Navy was obviously aimed at the Newland Navy.

Nevertheless, the Empire’s Navy is a global navy and must face all challenges, meaning it must equip warships for all potential adversaries. Although dealing with the West Continent group’s navy does not require strong anti-ship combat capabilities and focuses mainly on anti-submarine warfare, when facing the Newland Navy, anti-ship combat capabilities must be considered, and cannot rely solely on shipborne air force; the warships themselves must have anti-ship combat capabilities.

Besides, two sets of quad-launch Anti-ship Missile launch devices, plus 8 heavy Anti-ship Missiles, total less than 100 tons.

As a result, the "Yang City" class General-purpose Destroyer was born.

However, the lead ship of this class only launched at the end of last year, and the Empire’s Navy is not very optimistic about this type of warship, with only an order for 8 ships in the first batch.

Of course, they might be waiting for the situation to improve before purchasing the improved version.

Even if the war has already erupted, the first batch of four "Yang City" class ships will only be delivered by the beginning of next year, meaning the Empire’s Navy can currently rely only on the "Qingzhou" class.

The 51st Special Mixed Fleet includes 3 "Qingzhou" class ships.

In fact, there are 4 in total, but one remains in Alexandria Bay, tasked with covering the transport convoy destined to enter the Land Heart Sea through the Narrow Sea.

Arguably, convoy protection is one of the primary missions for the "Qingzhou" class.

After all, not all missions require deploying a carrier battle group; many escort missions do not necessitate a carrier’s deployment.

Three "Qingzhou" class Anti-Air Cruisers, plus five "Lu City" class General-purpose Destroyers and six "Nan’an" class Anti-submarine Escort Ships, even if both Destroyers and Escort Ships have point air defense capabilities, Li Shenzhi is still worried because, in his judgment, this level of air defense force cannot withstand the enemy’s attack. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

The chief issue is that the Land Heart Sea is too narrow.

Indeed, Li Shenzhi has long wondered why aircraft carriers must be deployed in the East Continent Heart Sea.

Any Navy General can see that the Land Heart Sea is unsuitable for carrier operations, even in the relatively open eastern region.

Deploying carriers to the Land Heart Sea is almost a death sentence.

Yet Li Shenzhi also understands that without a carrier battle group, they certainly cannot hold the Xifan Canal, let alone advance into the Mo Sea.

Regardless, there’s no choice now but to press onward.