Chapter 1489: 1490 The secret weapon prepared by Tang State
The Tang Empire's air force not only has fourth-generation fighter jets like Yinglong and Feisha as its trump card, but they are also rapidly increasing their soft power.
In terms of transport aircraft, Hercules has obviously been somewhat unable to meet the demand, so the Tang Empire is producing more advanced and powerful long-distance transport aircraft.
Jet transport plane! And it’s a super huge transport plane! The famous beggar transport aircraft IL-76! It can transport more than 40 tons of supplies to places more than 4,000 kilometers away, and it is natural to airdrop paratroopers without any pressure.
Even if the return fuel consumption is calculated, it can fly 2,000 kilometers away to drop airborne troops, and its take-off and landing requirements at the airport are relatively low, and its speed is faster than the Hercules.
Of course, its excellent performance is not just that. It can also be improved into various special transport aircraft, such as early warning aircraft and tankers.
Although in terms of performance, it seems to be inferior to the terrifying C-5 transport aircraft of the Lighthouse Country, it is better in comprehensiveness, versatility, and cheaper!
Although Tang Mo feels that the Kunpeng Y-20 can replace the IL-76 in the future, its adequate performance indicators and reliable technology still make it worthy of trust.
As "another secret weapon" of the Air Force, nearly 100 aircraft have been put into service. The transportation capacity that these 100 aircraft can provide is already quite terrifying.
In addition, in order to support cross-sea landings, the Tang Air Force is also urgently purchasing more such aircraft, and directly ordered 40 tanker aircraft during production.
As a brand-new technology that has just been born, aerial refueling is a brand-new challenge for the air force pilots of the Tang Empire.
Handing and refueling aircraft in the air is actually a very thrilling operation. Among the various types of combat aircraft equipped by the Tang Army, only the Yinglong and Flying Shark fighter jets have this function.
Other than that, there are only the latest improved H-6 bombers and various other models of new transport aircraft.
The ability to refuel in the air means that the aircraft’s range can be increased by at least a quarter! This is simply a qualitative leap for the air force's strike range.
If there are enough tankers to provide aerial refueling for Yinglong fighter jets, then these Yinglong fighter jets can operate in areas 2,000 kilometers away. This is simply unimaginable in the past.
You must know that even the Tang Empire used to have to use expensive ballistic missiles to attack targets 2,000 kilometers away.
Not only is it expensive to use ballistic missiles to hit targets, the accuracy of the strikes is also very limited. Even Tang's missiles have an error of about 100 meters after flying two thousand kilometers. In fact, they are no longer able to destroy accurate targets.
Although with the advancement of technology, satellite positioning can provide higher hit accuracy for ballistic missiles, such attacks are still expensive and extremely inefficient.
Another reason why aircraft are more economical than missiles is the suppression time. After the attack, missiles no longer pose any threat. Even if the opponent suffers losses, it can continue its operations for a long time.
But aircraft are different. As long as these aircraft still have ammunition, they can continue to control the airspace and attack facilities on the ground.
Furthermore, after increasing the time in the air, these aircraft do not have to drop their ammunition hastily and return, and can choose to attack targets more calmly, thus avoiding waste.
Hence, being able to allow aircraft to fly 2,000 kilometers away for combat operations is tantamount to reducing attack costs and improving suppression efficiency. This is also the reason why countries with large air forces equip a large number of tankers: these are the amplifiers of the air force's strike power and are vital functional aircraft.
To equip a large number of advanced-performance transport aircraft in a short period of time, the IL-76 is obviously a good choice. It was able to produce more than 900 aircraft in the world Tang Mo was familiar with, which in itself speaks volumes.
Army General Feng Kezhi didn’t know the existence of this kind of aircraft, nor did he know the existence of Yinglong. Therefore, in Feng Kezhi’s eyes, the Air Force probably only had H-6 and Hercules transport aircraft that could almost cover the steel barrier area.
Such a weak support force will obviously not satisfy the landing troops, and the paratroopers will also face an unfavorable battle situation due to lack of support.
That's why Feng Kezhi said that, but Xiao Yun is confident. He not only knows that the Air Force is producing Yinglong and Type 76 transport aircraft in large quantities, but is also mass-producing a large number of new ground-attack ammunition.
With these weapons, the Air Force can basically guarantee to give the dwarves in the Steel Barrier a little bit of Tang Dynasty shock. The other side will regret building so many turtle shells, because those bunkers are just a bunch of decent tombs at best.
In fact, not only the air force, but also the navy is making a lot of preparations for the landing. The brand-new dock landing ship is one of the many preparations, which can provide more effective support for the landing troops in various aspects.
First of all, these dock landing ships can take off a large number of armed helicopters. These armed helicopters can provide strike firepower more directly, at closer range, and more accurately.
With the support of these helicopters, the landing troops can land three-dimensionally, avoid obstacles on the shore, and directly enter the enemy's rear to fight.
Traditional defense measures obviously pose no threat to these landing troops flying in the sky. Once these Tang Army helicopter troops are put in place, the dwarves' defense line will be almost penetrated.
Sea and air cooperation, three-dimensional landing, this is a new type of tactics that has not appeared in the past. Coupled with the electromagnetic and firepower advantages of the Tang Empire, the steel barriers built by the dwarves actually do not have much effect.
Although there will be losses, and although there may be many problems and troubles in actual operation, the tactics of the Datang Empire are generally an era, or even several eras ahead of the entire world. Under such circumstances, the so-called steel defense line, however, It's just a joke.
Even if the dwarves now know that the Tang army is targeting them, there is actually no way to continue to strengthen their defenses. In other words, reinforcement is useless.
Increasing the number of coastal defense troops will only increase casualties in the end. The actual effect that hundreds of thousands of troops can play may not be as good as hundreds of thousands of landmines.
Of course, the dwarves would not dare to use landmines, weapons that violate the convention, because the Tang Empire has things they are more afraid of: thermobaric bombs, napalm bombs, and white phosphorus bombs.
These things are even more terrifying against tunnels and bunkers. The dwarves would not dare to use unlocked mines in exchange for the various new weapons that the Tang Empire could use.
Because the known weapons of the Tang army have already made them very scared. If the Tang army comes up with something else, what will they do?
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I have something to do today, so the second update will be later. You can watch it tomorrow morning.