Chapter 202: Changing Concepts

Andre was relieved to learn that the two MiG-25s had successfully docked and replenished with sufficient fuel. After all, the two MiG-25s were from the 513th Regiment. Although Andre has now been promoted to deputy commander of the Hokkaido region, he still cares about his old unit. If the refueling fails and he is forced to parachute, Andre will feel guilty. The whole plan was proposed by him, and the loss was also caused by him.

"In addition to conventional carrier-based aircraft, we also need a certain number." Andrei continued to talk about his ideas. Taking advantage of the fact that Marshal Gorshkov was in a good mood and was willing to listen to his opinions, Andrei wanted to correct these people's wrong ideas.

"For aircraft carriers, the embodiment of combat power is carrier-based aircraft. Every part of the space on an aircraft carrier must be prepared for carrier-based aircraft." Andrei said, "For example, if all the space on our current Kiev aircraft carrier is used to accommodate carrier-based aircraft, we can put 40 to 50 MiG-23s. At least we still have the courage to fight the Americans. If it is like now, at most we can put in 20 MiG-23s, and we will be powerless. We still don't have enough confidence if we are out of the combat radius of land-based fighters."

Gorshkov supports aircraft carriers, but he is also an advocate of missiles. He hopes that aircraft carriers will have strong anti-ship attack capabilities, and those huge SS-N-12s must be equipped on aircraft carriers.

And now, this contact with the US aircraft carrier formation at sea made him realize what the Red Navy needs.

The more carrier-based aircraft, the better, and the higher the performance, the better! Only by mastering air superiority can the Soviet Navy advance to the ocean and truly compete with the Americans at sea!

In later generations, it was not until the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the Russian era that they realized their original mistakes. Unfortunately, at that time they only had one Kuznetsov to work with. After more than 20 years of half-dead life, when the Russians had begun to recover, they planned to take action on the Kuznetsov, improve the internal space, and equip it with more carrier-based aircraft.

At this time, China had already improved the empty shell of its second ship, the Varyag, into its own aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, and the space for anti-ship missiles in the front was all used to equip carrier-based aircraft.

Don't take the same detour again. When building an aircraft carrier, just throw away all those miscellaneous things and install only carrier-based aircraft!

"But in this case, our aircraft carrier cannot be deployed alone. We must have a large escort fleet every time." Hearing Andrei's words, Captain Bekovsky said. This time, the Kiev dared to come across the ocean alone. If it were changed to the United States, there would have to be escort warships.

"We have escort warships, but few of them can take off and land fighter jets. Wouldn't it be more efficient to fill our warships that can take off and land aircraft with aircraft and let other warships do the escort?" Andre said, "From the perspective of national strength, we cannot have as many aircraft carriers as the United States for the time being. If the combat effectiveness of a single aircraft carrier is less than half of that of an American aircraft carrier, how can we fight the Americans in the Pacific? How can we fight Hawaii and the United States? We must have a strong fleet aviation! Aircraft carriers are for carrying aircraft! Without carrier-based aircraft to seize air superiority, our guidance helicopters cannot take off at all and cannot provide guidance for our huge anti-ship missile group."

Andrei's words made Gorshkov's eyes light up. Obviously, these words touched him.

The Soviet Navy must be able to fight a naval battle with the Americans in the depths of the ocean! The Soviet Union must have a strong carrier-based aviation force! Without these forces, the powerful anti-ship missiles will not be able to play their advantages at all.

After the Soviet Union had long-range anti-ship missiles, it was also developing supporting systems for anti-aircraft carrier and anti-ship missile attack systems. In addition to the guidance of helicopters equipped on aircraft carriers, the main system was the air signal-intelligence (SIGINT) system composed of Tu-16 and Tu-95.

These aircraft must use land-based bases. The Soviet Union can at most deploy these aircraft to overseas bases to conduct maritime aerial reconnaissance in waters far from the Soviet mainland and use them to guide their own anti-ship missiles when necessary. If they go deep into the ocean and fight the US Navy in the ocean, they will not be able to use them.

In order to cooperate with the SS-N-12/19 system, especially the needs of cruise missile nuclear submarines to operate independently in the ocean, the Soviet Union was also developing a space-based search and positioning system. The platform was composed of search satellites with nuclear batteries and was not restricted by ship-borne search and guidance helicopters. However, this system would not be deployed until 1979 at the earliest, and the system was expensive.

"Yes, it seems that we have to change our mindset." Gorshkov said, "For our ocean-going strategy, we need more carrier-based fixed-wing fighters and leave the rest of the tasks to the escort warships. It is a wise decision to let our aircraft carriers carry more fighters. I will propose this to my superiors."

Andrei breathed a sigh of relief. With his intervention, history was constantly changing. Andrei really hoped that the Soviet aircraft carrier could change the status quo as soon as possible and become a real aircraft carrier! The subsequent development was not something Andrei could intervene in.

"In fact, we can do a test now. If the leaping device on our angled deck can allow the MiG-23 to take off, it should not be difficult to convert the second and third ships into aircraft carriers mainly equipped with MiG-23." At this time, Lieutenant Colonel Matkovsky, director of the carrier-based aircraft of the aviation force, said.

The Yak-36M is too useless. As the first commander of the carrier-based aircraft unit to operate the Yak-36M, Matkovsky has never liked this type of aircraft. The ideal is beautiful, but the reality is cruel. This type of aircraft is not suitable for military equipment at all!

Without moving the bow, a runway is installed on the angled deck. If this allows the MiG-23 to take off, its performance will definitely be ten times higher than that of the existing Yak-36!

The Kiev is no longer usable and needs major modifications. It should not be difficult to modify the subsequent warships on the slipway.

Andre's eyes lit up. If this were true, it would indeed more than double the combat effectiveness of subsequent aircraft carriers! Although it was more out of place, it was definitely more practical than it was now!

"Andrei, do you think it's okay?" Gorshkov asked Andrei.