Chapter 1004 Satellite Staring Reconnaissance
“Kitty Hawk?”
Hearing this conclusion, the eyes of several naval officers in front of the big screen lit up almost at the same time.
The expressions on his face are even more wonderful.
In fact, just now, everyone has speculated on the nature of this goal.
Just because they were worried about rejoicing in vain, no one dared to jump to conclusions.
But now, with the news that happened to be released by the United States as circumstantial evidence, it is basically stable.
?This sea area was not a busy international waterway to begin with, but suddenly something with a size of about 300 meters * 40 meters appeared, and the course and time period were consistent.
It is almost impossible to think otherwise.
“Finally…”
??The one with the highest rank among the people let out a long sigh, then walked to the big screen, put his hands behind his back, and stared up at the small, slightly distorted light-colored shadow.
I don’t know if it’s due to psychological factors. After hearing the news just now, when I look at it with the naked eye, it seems that the deck of an aircraft carrier has some angular appearance...
“I finally caught you…”
He murmured to himself in a low voice.
As the flagship of the Seventh Fleet for a long time, the Kitty Hawk has been active in various hotspots around China for most of its service life.
? ? Thanks to the fact that conventionally powered aircraft carriers do not need to undergo ultra-long maintenance and replacement of nuclear fuel, their effective operational time is much longer than that of their later nuclear-powered descendants.
Especially since the 1990s, he has been acting as a vanguard.
Although the Kitty Hawk did not appear in the most well-known incident in 1996, it had a confrontation with the Chinese navy and air force, which was fashionable and weak at the time, two years earlier in 1994.
After entering the 21st century, due to the long service time and the fact that it went to the North Arabian Sea to participate in a round of Operation Enduring Freedom in 2001, it has slightly faded out of sight in the past two years.
But no matter what, the Kitty Hawk is definitely an old acquaintance to the Chinese Navy.
And it’s the kind that’s not easy to deal with—
?In terms of dispatch rate alone, aircraft carriers certainly cannot compete with land airports.
With multiple models of second-and-a-half-generation and third-generation aircraft in service, the quality of the Chinese Air Force''s small-scale top combat capabilities is not inferior to those of the F14 or F18.
But the problem is.
As a mobile airport on the sea, aircraft carriers have unparalleled initiative.
As a defender lacking countermeasures, China often needs to infer the whereabouts of the opponent''s fleet through public information as just now.
Unless it docks at a certain port, this speculation is inaccurate
?Moreover, if others really want to do something, they will often hide it or even deliberately provide false fleet navigation information.
In this case, only when the target is very close to the coastline, the opposite position can be tracked through sea detection radar or reconnaissance aircraft.
However, the over-the-horizon radar is subject to principles, and its accuracy is generally very poor.
It is difficult for reconnaissance aircraft to break through the air defense circle, intercept and rush to the opposite side.
?This is why, even when the navy was about to undergo a high-speed replacement, it still squeezed out part of the funds to support the technology verification project of Ocean One.
However, today’s experience can be described as ups and downs, with twists and turns.
First of all, the first time Haiyang-1 was powered on, it actually captured a valid target.
?Before I could feel happy, a basin of cold water was poured down my head—
Few people thought that under certain circumstances, the imaging effect of ocean remote sensing would be so abstract.
The imagined scenario where a large number of remote sensing images are sent back by satellites, and then are analyzed and judged by the staff unit, and finally a strike chain is formed. Obviously, it is not that easy to get around. On the other hand, however, the final results seemed to prove that the spaceborne program''s ability to identify target features was stronger than expected.
The staff unit is under a lot of pressure, but the staff unit is not under that much pressure…
“The effect of this satellite is almost as good as all the reconnaissance methods we used in the past..."
Chen Da from the General Armament Department came up behind Chang Haonan:
"Comrade Weiyong, and Xiao Chang, in your opinion, if we want to achieve uninterrupted continuous surveillance in the Pacific Ocean...at least the waters surrounding our country in the western Pacific, how many satellites like Haiyang-1 need to be launched?"
Chen Dazhi served as deputy director of the Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense for a period of time before taking up the post of deputy director of the General Armament Department. Although he was transferred before Chang Haonan became successful, he was still among the first group of people to have contact with Chang Haonan.
The title has thus been habitually retained.
?This somewhat sudden question made it difficult for Zhang Weiyong and Chang Haonan to answer for a while.
Obviously, the equipment department is very encouraged by what happened today.
So that I have some new ideas.
According to the original plan, after the successful technical verification of Haiyang-1, the real ocean surveillance satellite will be developed and launched in 5-6 years.
But looking at what it means now, users don’t seem to want to wait anymore…
The two looked at each other, and it was Zhang Weiyong, a satellite expert, who gave his opinion first:
“Director Chen, if we want to achieve truly effective military reconnaissance and surveillance, we may not be able to achieve it by relying solely on satellites like Haiyang-1.”
"The sun-synchronous orbit satellite has an approximately circular orbit. The advantage is that a satellite can scan almost the entire earth''s surface in one day, and it scans the same point at the same time every day. As for Haiyang-1, it will scan at 9 a.m. every day. By passing through my country’s Kashgar Measurement and Control Station.”
"But the height of the sun-synchronous orbit is not high, and due to the performance of the current satellite equipment, it cannot provide a particularly wide viewing angle, so the range of each shooting is actually very limited... Such a satellite is more suitable for global coverage Monitoring, rather than revisiting a certain point frequently..."
“In short, achieving 24-hour uninterrupted reconnaissance and surveillance around our country is as difficult as conducting 24-hour uninterrupted reconnaissance and surveillance at any point in the world..."
“What about geosynchronous orbit?”
? Chen Dazhi still refused to give up. He studied missile technology in school. Although he was not completely familiar with it, he was not blind.
"Geosynchronous orbit can indeed ensure continuous monitoring of a relatively large range, but the orbital height is too high and requires very advanced imaging equipment... There is almost no demand for this type of equipment except for military use, and the core components are monopolized by the Americans. , even if we have good relations with Europe now, it will be difficult to get finished products.”
"In addition, even if the equipment problem is really solved, it will still require a very large satellite to carry it, and it will also require a large energy supply, and the weight will increase accordingly... The current Dongfanghong 4 is not enough in any case. In addition, to launch a behemoth of more than ten or twenty tons into geosynchronous orbit requires a heavy-duty rocket much larger than the Changsanyi..."
…”
Obviously, although China has developed quite rapidly in recent years, facing this kind of systemic backwardness, it is still not something that can be easily recovered.
Looking at Chen Dazhi with an expression of "Master, please stop reading", Luan Wenjie, who is in charge of the development of the entire aerospace industry, shook his head helplessly and said comfortingly:
"It''s not that there is no good news. Now the 10-ton Dongfanghong-5 satellite platform and several new launch vehicles with take-off weights in the 500-1,000-ton range have begun to be demonstrated. It is estimated that the project will be approved soon. The 20-ton I dare not say, but it shouldn’t be a big problem to put a 15-ton object into geosynchronous orbit in the future..."
Chen Da said frankly that you are coaxing children here. From the beginning of demonstration to the completion of research and development, it is normal to have a gap of more than ten years...
?But when he finished speaking, he looked at Chang Haonan, who was standing beside him with his head bowed in silence, and finally held it back.
“Actually...it’s not necessarily impossible.”
At this moment, Chang Haonan suddenly spoke:
“The current Haiyang-1 is a technology verification satellite, so the shooting angle of the on-board equipment is fixed and is limited to just below the satellite. If you want to adjust the shooting angle, you need to spend fuel to adjust the attitude of the satellite itself.”
“But if we remove other functions from a specialized ocean reconnaissance satellite, and use the extra space and power supply to install a set of gazing equipment... it will be similar to a human neck... uh... or an owl''s neck."
Chang Haonan felt that language alone might not be intuitive, so he asked a staff member next to him for a piece of paper and drew a schematic diagram with a few strokes:
“The shooting angle can be adjusted without the satellite itself moving, so that the effective reconnaissance time provided by one satellite will be greatly improved, and the number of satellites required can also be reduced to...probably single digits.”
(End of this chapter)