What the hell is a private enterprise?

Chapter 512 The Empire's Unmanned Wingman Technology Tree

"Going south won't be easy."

Yamamoto Takano picked up the measuring tape and gestured:
"The original Sea Lion Project was only a little over 100 kilometers across the strait, but from Greenland, and then around Iceland in between, it's almost 2000 kilometers. The key question is... should we develop a landing plan?"

"Just make a show of it; if the fleet can reach Ireland, that's a victory."

Tang Wen grasped with his five fingers:
"Prepare dozens of World War II civilian ships and ordinary landing ships. Make sure to create a strong impression, at least to convince people that the landing plan really exists."

"Do you want to..."

"That's right. If the London Stock Exchange becomes unstable, we can earn countless high seas fleets just from the stock market."

Tang Wen pursed his lips, unable to help but marvel at the allure of finance.

The old-fashioned approach of robbing armored trucks like Da Linzi is outdated. Using fleets to speculate in stocks is the fastest way to make money in the new era.

If international finance weren't regulated by the empire, a little unbridled profit might have yielded more than a year's worth of oil drilling in the Spratly Islands.

Yamamoto Takano: "..."

"Commander, if we head south, we'll probably only be able to affect the northern islands at most."

"So in addition to the fleet, we also need some other small tools."

Tang Wen drew a line with a pencil from the sea near the three islands all the way to London:
"The range is 700 to 800 kilometers. Now, a redesigned V1 missile should be able to achieve this range. Just put some promotional brochures in the warhead."

As soon as a single flyer landed on Downing Street, we witnessed the most intense financial storm before the millennium.

Send a dozen or so submarines to Greenland, and also gather some intelligence about Iceland.

……

Yuma Air Force Test Range, Arizona

Wayne's plane was about to land, but his mind was still on the massive air raid that night.

Almost 10 days have passed since the Battle of Guyana. The official narrative is that the Imperial and French air forces achieved a great victory, perfectly thwarting Hans's plot.

After all, with a score of about 1:5, it's like a newbie being promoted to ace. The F-16 pilot with the most kills shot down 8 aircraft and was immediately treated like a star and given countless interviews after returning home.

As for the loss of one F117? There is no mention of any stealth fighter airstrike in the official reports, and it is naturally unrelated to the retaliatory airstrikes by the Hans.

But behind the scenes, the investigation into this incident has never stopped.

Just the day before, Prism Building finally defined the nature of the matter:
Rash advance.

There are three reasons:
-
The 9th Squadron's F117s took off despite knowing that they had common defects and malfunctions that needed to be resolved, thus violating the pilots' right to know.
-
The bombing raid was launched without obtaining detailed intelligence, resulting in the downing of an F-117.
The study failed to consider that Hans' counterattack led to the Empire losing air superiority in the south of the Mei, as well as the direct equipment loss of several warplanes and $10 billion.

Another unspoken issue is personnel losses. After realizing that the Lost Empire had once again deployed drones on a large scale and that personnel losses were far lower than expected, Rams did not want to let his precious pilots be worn down by the vacuum tubes.

One of the operations room staff officers in charge of the operation was dismissed and thrown into the aircraft graveyard, but it was obvious to everyone that he was taking the blame for Wayne.

Following this, the Prism Building issued a "stay-at-home order" to the Air Force, prohibiting it from launching attacks of a certain scale until preparations were complete and the plan was submitted to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The last time the Navy received such treatment was when the Enterprise was severely damaged, almost driving Calvin to suicide. Since then, the Navy has been much more cautious in deploying warships. Now, both the elite and the second-tier ships have paid the price for underestimating the enemy.

"Hello, General Huai'en."

After the plane landed, General Atomics CEO Rich warmly welcomed the Secretary of the Air Force.

However, Huai En only gave him a wary look:
"You said you've found a way to counter the Hans' unmanned combat aircraft, it can't be a 'flood,' right?"

"Of course not. 'Flood' is a lose-lose situation, and it's not something that can be developed quickly... We are inviting you to witness the future."

Richie led Wayne to the hangar, where an F100 "Super Sabre" was located.

(As shown in the picture)
The F100, a supersonic jet aircraft improved from the F86, was a product of the same era as the MiG-19. It was enhanced by incorporating a large amount of titanium alloy into its airframe. As an early supersonic fighter, its production numbers were not large, with only more than 2300 aircraft produced. Most of them were later sold to allies and are still in service today.

Wayne: "The future you're talking about is an F100 that was produced 40 years ago and whose parent company has already gone out of business? Where did you pull this thing out of, some aircraft graveyard or museum?"

"This is certainly not an ordinary F100. Come with me to see the cockpit."

When Wayne climbed the ladder, he discovered that the pilot's seat in the cockpit had been removed, and the throttle, control stick, rudder, and other control components had also disappeared, replaced by many hydraulic mechanisms and a large iron box fixed in the cabin.

"By combining hydraulic devices and computers, this F100 can now be completely controlled by computers, autonomously completing takeoff and landing, and even launching missiles, becoming a qualified unmanned combat aircraft."

This includes ultra-low-altitude penetration; through the addition of a terrain-matching calculation system, it can complete ultra-low-altitude flight completely autonomously without ground intervention.

Huai En snapped out of his daze and stared wide-eyed as he asked:

"So, does that mean our F-15s can also carry five F-100s for an attack? And engage in close combat with those gnats?"

"Uh... actually we think dogfighting capability is unnecessary; we just need to carry enough missiles."

Richie knew that Wayne might have misunderstood something, so he quickly explained:

The unmanned version of the F100 developed by General Atoms is very different from the unmanned gnat. The purpose of its development is not actually to create an "unmanned fighter jet", but rather an "unmanned wingman" or a mobile weapon pylon to accompany human pilots in combat.

Simply put, GA equipped the F100 with the brain of a Tomahawk cruise missile, as well as an automatic take-off and landing system.

Automatic landing and takeoff are not difficult; even commercial airliners have been using them for a long time. The difference lies in the most crucial combat components:
The unmanned F100 can carry external fuel tanks and missiles, and can achieve formation escort by establishing communication with manned fighter jets (such as the F-15). It can also share target data with the F-15 and launch missiles together, which is A firing and B guiding, with the F100 being A.

Low-altitude penetration? Just transplant the cruise missile code; no one will die even if it crashes.

Flight formation? Just write fixed code to execute, such as fixing that it can only be in front of or to the side of the F-15 at a certain distance, and add more ranging radars to the fuselage.

As for the dogfighting capabilities demonstrated by the unmanned version of the gnats, F100 did not consider it at all. After research, General Atom believed that instead of spending a lot of effort on researching unmanned dogfighting, it would be better to use a composite rack to stuff more sparrows or rattlesnakes.

"Our F100 unmanned aircraft has only one target, which solves the problem of the disparity in numbers with the enemy."

Richie's summary:

"Hans is using the tactic of 'bad money drives out good' to wage a war of attrition, but if he were to launch an attack with a swarm of F100 drones, he could overcome the numerical disadvantage and reduce pilot casualties."

Not just the F-100, but any aircraft capable of keeping up with combat operations, even the A-4, can be converted into a wingman!

(End of this chapter)