Feeling good that its strike on Richwar base had achieved devastating results while holding its own losses to a minimum, the FAF had adopted a similar strategy of launching an all-out attack on the JAM’s main base, despite the misgivings of Major Booker and the rest of the SAF. The plan was to gather their forces at a front-line base, then attack in continuous waves until the enemy base had been wiped out. To that end, the FAF had committed nearly half of its tactical air forces from their bases. They’d be moved to TAB-8, the largest front-line base nearest the target. From there, they would make their attacks, making the round trip between there and the target as many times as it took. The SAF would be on full rotation to provide recon for the operation. Even a new arrival like Lieutenant Katsuragi was going to get a taste of real combat, whether he liked it or not.
Operations as large as this had been attempted several times by the SAF, but they’d never been effective till now. When they’d try to concentrate on one target, the JAM would come in from an unexpected direction to attack Faery base and then attempt to penetrate the entrance to the Passageway that led to Earth. The FAF would then have to pull its forces back from the front lines in order to repel the threat, and in the end they would fall back into fighting a defensive battle. Aside from that, each time the SAF thought that they’d wiped out a major enemy base, either a new one would be discovered or else the base that had been presumed destroyed would unexpectedly spring back to life. Where the supply routes were that supported these bases was a question that had plagued the SAF for a long time. Their Strategic Reconnaissance Corps had sent out recon planes, launched strategic spy sats, and kept the bases under surveillance till their eyes were bloodshot, but thus far their efforts had borne no fruit.
Thanks to their constant scouting, a map of Faery had been compiled. However, try as they might, they could never discover the location of the JAM’s main forces. Against the advanced interceptors the JAM fielded, the FAF sent out dedicated strategic recon planes that, unlike Yukikaze, lacked the means to repel them in order to see which would get shot down. If the planes returned home, that meant there were no JAM in the area. If they did, then at least it would tell them that the JAM were hidden in the area under surveillance. Up to this point, no manned planes had been sent out for strategic reconnaissance. Even strategic spy satellites didn’t last long before they too were shot down by the JAM.
After decades of fighting this way, the Strategic Recon Corps claimed that they had identified a single pattern: JAM bases seemed to be related most closely with the one that was furthest away in the opposite direction, rather than with the next closest one. In other words, what they took to be the JAM’s main bases scattered in a rough circle around the Passageway were paired, not with their immediate partners, but symmetrically with the ones on the side opposite them.
Each time the FAF would attack one of these bases, there would be no sign of any of their neighboring bases sending aid. However, while they repelled attacks on the Passageway or Faery base launched from another base, the base the FAF had first attacked would recover behind their backs. The only explanation that seemed to fit was that the attacking base was also resupplying the one previously hit. The Strategic Reconnaissance Corps claimed that the behavior pattern they’d discovered indicated that the JAM did not keep all of their bases constantly active. Instead, they would mainly use one pair of widely separated bases, shifting through the pairs one after another as they’d launch their attacks. They had no actual proof of this, though. The neighboring bases, which should have been inactive, did not go completely unused, and the JAM did occasionally launch counterattacks from them. There were also no traces of transport or materials used for repairing the damaged bases coming from the paired bases. Not one JAM transport plane had ever been spotted, nor any JAM vehicles moving overground. Either the JAM used underground tunnels or had access to dimensional transport technology similar to the Passageway. In short, while the supply routes between their bases was a mystery, years’ worth of accumulated recon data suggested some sort of relationship between these pairs of bases. At the very least, the FAF could seize on this point to set up an attack operation that wouldn’t be a waste of time and possibly even break the stalemate they were in. To this end, the FAF authorities had considered the Strategic Reconnaissance Corps’ proposal, but realized that their proposed attack operation would take an enormous amount of resources and planning to carry out.
First of all, the FAF needed to find out what sort of attacks would be effective against the JAM bases. Once they knew that, they’d need to hit both of the paired bases simultaneously. As their forces stood, this was a difficult proposition. Hitting even one of the enemy’s main bases was a major operation in the best of times. Losses would be high. To hit two of them at the same time would require double the number of forces, just in case the Strategic Reconnaissance Corps were wrong. Carrying it out would be a gamble. If they lost, the JAM would swarm the Passageway and invade Earth, which was too high a wager to risk. It was the decision of the FAF’s highest level strategy session that they would have to wait to carry it out in the future. However, the work of the recon corps wasn’t simply ignored. When the operation to hit Richwar base had been put together, Cookie had been declared a secondary target, based on the recon corps’ determination that the bases were paired.
Although the FAF’s mission was nominally to intercept airborne enemy attacks and prevent the JAM from invading Earth, the FAF also knew that launching proactive attacks against the enemy would be met with retaliatory strikes. If the FAF could determine the direction from which the retaliation would originate, they could use that intel to adopt a more aggressive strategy. While the preparations for a counterattack had previously been tentative, FAF fighters would be able to more effectively form a defensive line if they knew where the enemy would be coming from. In any case, unless they discovered the means to completely destroy the JAM infestation, the war would never end.
What was the point of this battle? Rei wondered as he guided Yukikaze to the target airspace. The organization known as the FAF was fighting the JAM so that the organization itself could survive. If the authorities on Earth decided that the war was no longer necessary, then the FAF would be dismantled. Even though that wasn’t a realistic possibility at that point, if FAF methods were judged ineffective then the FAF would be reorganized, with a shakeup occurring at the top. The people who lived in the organization probably feared losing their political lives. Their attitude was that, so long as the battle against the JAM was effective, there was no problem. However, if it appeared that they weren’t getting results on the battlefield, their political influence would be in question. That was why they were desperate. Even as they battled the JAM, there were internal battles that needed to be won if the people at the top were to survive within the organization. The ones fighting these battles worried more about losing their positions than about losing their lives to the JAM. The Strategic Recon Corps is a good example, Rei realized. They’d proposed this plan based on JAM behavior patterns in combat so that their organization would survive. Declaring a major discovery, sans proof, was the act of an organization that needed to report something in order to justify its existence. Now their reputation for providing effective recon results was on the rise. If someone claimed their corps was unneeded, any move to dismantle it and let it be absorbed by the Strategic Air Corps or the Tactical Combat Air Corps would face opposition. If things worked out well, their organization might achieve stability and become an influential voice in the FAF. It was for this purpose, for this effect, that the JAM bases were being targeted.