After savaging the Royal Navy in the Indian Ocean, Admiral Sun Wei had been forced to withdraw on the port of Karachi, yielding the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea to the US and Great Britain, whereupon Aden and Djibouti were cleared and captured as Admiral Wells swept through the Gulf of Aden. In his initial clashes with US carriers, Sun Wei had seen the difficulty of his situation in the Gulf of Oman, learning the same hard lesson being taught by the Enterprise .
It was really just a question of simple math. Outside the range of 300 miles, the Chinese air force and navy had a limited strike capability. For SSM’s it was restricted to the YJ-100, with its 430 mile range. For the Air force, the JH-7B Flying Leopard could carry a YJ-12 out to a target 535 miles away. They had nothing else that could get at a target beyond the range of 300 miles. That meant that Admiral Sun Wei had 120 YJ-100’s to throw from his ships, and after losses, only 13 JH-7B Flying Leopards that could bring 26 YJ-12’s to the fight. It was 146 weapons, and every battle fought to date in the war had clearly shown that was just not enough saturation to break through the highly effective and potent defensive shell of a US Carrier Strike Group.
While Admiral Wu Jinlong was pitching his plan to strike east at the American Pacific island bases, Admiral Sun Wei got news of the operation, and he would not sit mute in Karachi bemoaning his fate. He had hoped Wu Jinlong would have been sent through the risky transit of the Malacca Strait, but that was not going to happen. So when he learned that the Air Force had allocated 36 heavy bombers to Operation Sea Eagle in the Celebes Sea, he was quite irate.
“Here I have been struggling for weeks, with few resources, and look what they give to Wu Jinlong! I must make my voice heard with the Naval General Staff, and protest if this theater is not supported with equal strategic assets.”
As it happened, the General Staff had been generous. China was realizing that if it was to have any chance to prevail, it simply had to start committing its strategic assets to support the tactical operations of the Admirals at sea. So Admiral Sun Wei would get his wish. The air force had 120 H-6 Bombers, and while Wu Jinlong had received 36, another 24 would be sent into Pakistan, a commitment now of half the total bomber force. The remaining 60 planes would be locked down on mainland China bases, and would not be touched for any reason.
China also had a total of 120 Flying Leopard strike planes, and by now half of those were deployed or lost. 36 had been sent to Wu Jinlong, with half of them killed on the field at Clark AFB. Admiral Sun Wei had lost about half of those sent to his theater, and so the Air Force vowed to send replacements and bring him back to two full squadrons of 12 planes each. That still left 60 planes in China, again, reserved for the defense of the East and South China Seas.
In fighter strength, both theaters had been allocated 60 of the land based J-20’s, which accounted for a little over a third of China’s total production on that plane. While Wu Jinlong had augmented his fighter strength with his carrier based J-31’s, Admiral Sun Wei had received one squadron of J-31A, land based versions of that fighter, and had ten left. No more would be forthcoming, but he was promised another squadron of 12 J-20’s would arrive with the bombers. Hyderabad AFB in Pakistan was the chosen bomber base, and it would be defended by two new batteries of HQ-9A SAM’s.
The War Gods of Hyderabad were the H-6M variant, capable of carrying three anti-ship missiles, the YJ-100, YJ-12, and C-803, a short range missile that was not sent to the base. The preferred weapon would be those YJ-100’s but only 60 had been sent to Hyderabad. After that, there were 60 of the shorter range YJ-12’s.
These much needed reinforcements took three days to arrive, but that gave Sun Wei time to refuel and rearm his ships in Karachi. Now when he sortied, his long range strength had nearly doubled with the 96 missiles the bombers and extra Flying Leopards might deliver. That would give him the ability to put 236 weapons on enemy targets, assuming all the planes got to their release points safely, and that was beginning to reach a saturation level that might get hits. If, by any chance he could get inside 290 miles, he could then deliver another 100 YJ-18’s.
That was the math, and the numbers were unforgiving in defining his actual wartime offensive strength. While he sortied from Karachi at midnight on the 18th with all 20 ships in his fleet, most of his YJ-100’s were on just three of those ships, the Type 055’s. These were the Flying Dragon, Eagle God and Dragon God, where he himself stood on the bridge, eager to see if he could put fire on his enemy. Out in front of the fleet this time was every submarine that had been in Karachi, departing 12 hours earlier. This sent four Yuan Class boats out to join the single Song Class boat that was already at sea, and three Pakistani subs would join to watch the coastal areas of Northwest India.
It was once more into the breach, a brave war face on the Admiral as they set out. The bombers and Flying Leopards were on call when he needed them, and there was one more weapon he had coaxed from the Strategic Rocket Forces, three batteries of DF-21D ship killers.
My plan now is a simple one, thought Sun Wei. I will attack, and with everything I have. I must coordinate the bombers and air strike squadrons effectively with my ship launched attack. The two American carriers are out there, a little over 350 miles away. Do they know if I Have left Karachi tonight? The moon is dark, which is why I chose this hour to sortie, and the sun is over seven hours away. Out of this blackness, I will bring fire. The Dragon God has wakened, and woe to my enemies. But first I must find them! The satellites can only give me their general location, which will not be good enough for my DF-21’s to get after them. So it will once again be up to my J-20s to dash on the targets and get me radar locks—more brave pilots that I will ask to risk their lives this hour.
Captain Avery Holmes had been burning the midnight oil, looking over his list of available aircraft and the strike packages they were forming. They were out in the middle of the Arabian Sea, about 225 miles east of Masirah AFB on the island off the coast of Oman. Captain James Simpson and the Roosevelt were just 11 miles north of the Independence—good company. Both carriers had taken on ordnance from the AOE ships, and though they were still a little light on SAM’s each group was well defended.
They had spent the last three days undergoing the laborious and often dangerous work of at-sea replenishment, an art the Navy had insisted on returning to its operational capabilities. Chief on their list in that interval was the loading and installation of Standard Missile-6, which had nearly been depleted in the duels fought earlier. That missile was the outer crust of the carrier’s defense, and with forward deployed planes, presented a most formidable defense.[5] A big missile at 21 feet in length, the Navy had installed a special crane for these loading operations on every ship that was to carry it, which required slow speeds and calm seas to conduct.
It’s damn dark tonight, he thought. A good night for a fight. CAP is light right now, but we’ll have a Hawkeye rotation soon, and I’ll double it to six fighters. Seatiger reported an enemy submarine contact, but that’s 120 miles out and they are on the way to investigate it. So let’s hope it will be another quiet night. Things look good on paper, so its time I turned in.
5
Only about 200 SM-6 missiles have been built in our history as of this writing, but here, the missile is broadly available in good numbers.