In the middle of the East Ocean, south of the Hovay Islands, the flagship "Liu Changxun" of the 41st Special Mixed Fleet.

Although the Imperial Navy still has two full-time flagships, the one assigned to the East Viagra has remained in that Ball Port, and only left the dock during the annual fleet confrontation exercise, carrying the fleet commander and more than 100 staff officers and soldiers to sea for dozens of days.

Because the ship is more than 30 years old, the Imperial Navy no longer modernizes it.

The flagship of the Special Mixed Fleet is still the aircraft carrier commanded by the commander.

In the decades after the war, the formation of the Imperial Navy fleet and the tactical system underwent earth-shaking changes, and generally underwent three changes.

The first change happened after the war ended.

In the late stage of the war, the first generation of jet fighters was born and sent to the battlefield by the Tyman Air Force. Because the battle situation was under the control of the Allied Group, its strategic advantages were extremely obvious, and the range of jet fighters was relatively short, so they did not receive the attention of the empire.

It was not until the end of the war and after the establishment of the Air Force, the first type of jet fighter was equipped.

In just a few years, around the 110th year of the New Calendar, jet fighters eliminated all the piston propeller fighters equipped by the Air Force and dominated the sky.

But the Navy is not so lucky.

Although the jet fighter developed after the war solved many performance defects, such as the "War-1A", the first jet fighter equipped by the Imperial Air Force, had a combat radius of 700 kilometers. The later improved model exceeded 1,000 kilometers after carrying two sub-fuel tanks, compared with the piston propeller aircraft, the jet fighter still has a very prominent problem that cannot be ignored for the naval aviation.

The landing speed is too high, and the minimum allowed speed is far beyond the piston propeller aircraft.

Air Force fighter jets can land on runways with a length of more than 2,000 meters, so it is not a big deal to land faster.

The navy's carrier-based fighter jets are not so lucky.

Because the flight deck length is limited, the landing speed of the carrier-based aircraft is sufficiently low.

This problem is particularly prominent for aircraft carriers built during the war, especially dozens of large "provincial" aircraft carriers. Because the flight deck is limited by the length of the hull and cannot be extended, even if these aircraft carriers have undergone modernization and improvements after the war and used beveled decks, the length of the landing area is not enough, and strict restrictions must be placed on the landing speed of the carrier-based aircraft.

In this way, jet fighters with poor low-speed performance cannot be boarded at all.

The result is that when the Imperial Air Force and even the global air force are entering, or when the Jet Age is about to enter, the Imperial Navy Air Force is still using piston propeller aircraft.

The influence of the Imperial Navy has fallen to the bottom in recent years.

Because the performance of piston propeller fighters is too poor and cannot ensure fleet air supremacy, there was a saying that "aircraft carriers are useless".

During this period, the only thing the Imperial Navy could rely on was the family foundation accumulated during the war.

Carrier-based fighter jets are not good enough, but there are dozens of aircraft carriers!

The key is that the Navy can also benefit from technological progress.

With the completion and service of the Imperial Navy's first aircraft carrier designed and built after the war, the "Imperial Capital" class with strong experimental nature, at the end of the 112th year of the New Calendar, the Imperial Navy's carrier-based aviation also entered the jet era.

Then there was the blowout after a long period of suppression.

In the 112th year of the New Calendar, the first "Provincial 2" class completed the modernization improvement of the code-named "Contract" and replaced the straight deck with an oblique deck that was tilted 11 degrees to the left. In the following years, except for the three ships that were retired in advance due to damage, the remaining 23 "Provincial" and "Provincial 2" class had undergone similar modernization improvements and replaced them with oblique decks, thus meeting the conditions for carrying and using jet carrier-based aircraft.

At the same time, aerodynamics is also developing rapidly. Coupled with more advanced performance and higher reliability, a large number of jet fighters with advanced performance have been launched one after another. Many technical problems that were insurmountable before have been solved one by one in the hands of engineers.

By the 119th year of the New Calendar, the last "Provincial 2" class completed modernization, and with the newly built large aircraft carrier, the Imperial Navy had a total of 36 attack aircraft carriers.

In addition, there are 27 anti-submarine aircraft carriers and 17 amphibious assault ships that can carry fixed-wing carrier-based aircraft.

During this period, the Imperial Navy was at its peak!

Of course, it mainly refers to quantity.

For example, among the 36 attack aircraft carriers, none of them had a full load displacement of more than 70,000 tons, which was epoch-making. The "Chen Bingxun" class, which was highly anticipated by the Imperial Navy, was still built on the ship platform. As for the more powerful "Xue Yuanzheng" class, it was not even completed.

The Imperial Navy at that time was actually big and unreasonable.

In response to this issue, the Imperial Navy launched the first post-war organization and tactical changes.

It is mainly aimed at aircraft carriers.

The main problem is that the combat effectiveness of the aircraft carrier is not strong enough.

Take the "Imperial Capital" class as an example. This large aircraft carrier with a full load displacement of more than 60,000 tons can only carry 80 aircraft, and the number of aircraft carriers is not as good as that of the large aircraft carriers during the war. If carrier-based aircraft are required to perform strike missions, they cannot carry too many anti-submarine patrol aircraft. Because carrier-based aircraft performing attack missions occupy the flight deck, even if several anti-submarine patrol aircraft are installed, they may not be able to be sent out to perform missions.

The solution is also very simple.

If one aircraft carrier is not enough, then put several aircraft carriers together and incorporate several different types of aircraft carriers into a combat group according to different combat requirements.

Obviously, this is a very prominent change.

Before this, in order to maintain the consistency of the battle group, two or three aircraft carriers of the same level were often grouped into one battle group.

According to the new organizational system, usually, an aircraft carrier battle group will be organized into one to three attack aircraft carriers and one or two anti-submarine aircraft carriers according to the combat intensity, such as possible threats. If you perform ground strike missions or support the Marines to launch amphibious landing operations, you need to provide support to the ground forces, and you can also be organized into one to three amphibious assault ships.

In this way, a battle group has up to 8 "flat-topped ships" and can carry about 400 fixed-wing carrier-based aircraft.

An aircraft carrier battle group like this could defeat almost any opponent at that time!

Even when facing Xilu Group and Beigu Group, you only need to mobilize three aircraft carrier battle groups to gain an absolute advantage in sea control.

Of course, the problem is also very prominent.

The aircraft carrier battle group under the "full unit" state requires about 30 escort warships and support ships, and nearly 30,000 naval officers and soldiers must control these ships. If the personnel from the rear base are included and maintaining a fully-packed aircraft carrier battle group, almost 100,000 officers and soldiers are required.

In peacetime after the war, this was an unbearable heavy burden.

According to this organizational system, if the Imperial Navy reduced its troops to 1.2 million according to the arrangements of the first round of military reforms, it would be possible to maintain a maximum of 7 aircraft carrier combat groups after deducting non-combatants. At that time, the Imperial Navy needed 18 aircraft carrier combat groups to maintain global deployment.

In fact, this is also the key to the Imperial Navy's efforts to "big" when building aircraft carriers.

Although the larger the aircraft carrier is, the more officers and soldiers are configured, overall, a large and complete aircraft carrier requires fewer officers and soldiers than two smaller aircraft carriers, and there are fewer escort warships required to cover a large aircraft carrier, that is, the demand for personnel of a large aircraft carrier is much smaller.

The key is that building an aircraft carrier is larger is also a demand of the times.

Here is the second organization and tactical change carried out by the Imperial Navy after the war.

This change also started with carrier-based aircraft, that is, the improvement of carrier-based aircraft performance requires the Navy to build a platform with better performance.

The supersonic era had arrived 120 years before the New Calendar.

Unfortunately, the navy was once again behind.

It was not until the 121st year of the New Calendar that the "Chen Bingxun" was completed and delivered, and the Imperial Navy aviation company entered the supersonic era. At that time, only the "Chen Bingxun" class could carry the Imperial Navy's equipment. Other aircraft carriers were unable to carry and operate this new carrier-based fighter because the flight deck size was too small, the catapult power was insufficient, or the hangar height was too low.

After that, with the advancement of technology, small carrier-based aircraft had supersonic flight capabilities, and other aircraft carriers of the Navy had the ability to carry supersonic carrier-based fighters.

However, the "Chen Bingxun" class has ushered in a new era.

At this time, the Imperial Navy changed the "Aircraft Carrier Battle Group" to "Aircraft Carrier Strike Group", emphasizing the offensive nature of the carrier-based aviation.

The powerful large-scale aircraft carrier of "Chen Bingxun" class is the material basis of this reform.

Because it is larger in size and fully learns from the previous large aircraft carriers, especially the "Imperial Capital" level, the "Chen Bingxun" level relies on a full load displacement of 80,000 tons to obtain unparalleled performance at the time, such as powerful comprehensive combat capabilities.

To put it simply, the "Chen Bingxun" class actually simplifies the complex and brings the Imperial Navy back on the old path.

One more than 90 carrier-based aircraft carried by the Chen Bingxun class can cope with a low-intensity war, and there is no need to be incorporated into other "flat-topped ships".

If you are performing high-intensity combat missions, two or three "Chen Bingxun" class will form a special mixed fleet.

Of course, this is also related to the advanced carrier-based fighter jets.

This is the famous "War-6".

The "War-6" is the first twin-engine heavy carrier-based fighter of the Imperial Navy, the first multi-purpose carrier-based aircraft, the first double-sonic carrier-based aircraft and the first two-seater carrier-based fighter aircraft, and the first multi-purpose fighter aircraft, and the first carrier-based aircraft that completely surpasses the contemporary Air Force fighter aircraft in terms of performance!

"War-6" greatly simplifies the organizational system of carrier-based aviation.

Before this, a carrier-based aviation gang needed at least 5 types of combat aircraft. After the "War-6", it was reduced to 3 types at once.

If the Navy had not emphasized long-range strike capabilities, the "War-6" had a combat radius shorter than that of heavy carrier-based attack aircraft when performing attack missions, and could even replace the "Attack-5", allowing the Imperial Navy to reduce the carrier-based combat aircraft to two types 30 years ago.

To be said, the Imperial Navy has been working hard to reduce the types of carrier-based aircraft, because it is the best choice for improving the combat efficiency of carrier-based aviation and reducing logistics burden.

Unfortunately, even after 30 years, the aircraft carrier will still carry three types of combat aircraft.

Because of its excellent performance, the "War-6" not only dominated the aircraft carrier deck of the Imperial Navy, but also took away the export market that had always belonged to the Air Force.

Before the suspension of production, the "War-6" produced a total of more than 5,000 aircraft, of which about 3,000 were used for export.

In addition, many of the "War-6" retired by the Imperial Navy were regarded as surplus materials, and after necessary improvements were made, they were assisted to friendly countries.

The Air Force's "War-8" in the same era had a total output of less than 3,000 aircraft, and almost all of them were used for their own use.

However, changing the aircraft carrier battle group into an aircraft carrier strike group and emphasizing the offensiveness of the carrier-based aviation forces also had a lot to do with the general environment at that time.

Shortly after serving at the "Chen Bingxun", the empire suffered its first crushing defeat after the war and lost the Boei War.

Although this war almost exhausted the empire's national strength and the dividends of the war were squandered. The empire was forced to begin strategic contraction, before the New Calendar 130, the Imperial Navy, which was responsible for safeguarding global interests, still needed to maintain its expansion momentum.

This is not a show of strength, but a must stand up and hold up the scene.

To put it bluntly, if the Liangxia Empire immediately contracted completely after the Bo-Iran War, then the international order established after the war would inevitably fall apart, the empire's reputation would inevitably suffer heavy damage, and it is even possible that the Third Global War would break out at this time.

If the confrontation of super hegemony on a global scale is compared to combat, then when the large army retreats, there must be troops left to stop the rear.

Obviously, the Imperial Navy is responsible for "cutting off the rear".

The key is that the expansion of the Imperial Navy must be strictly restricted. Overall, it is more like a bluff used to deceive the enemy.

Adjusting the navy's fist and aircraft carrier battle group is undoubtedly the most ideal choice.

At that time, the Imperial Navy promoted offensiveness and exaggerated the combat capabilities of the "Chen Bingxun" level, saying that it was guiding the development trend of the navy, but in fact it was a strategic deception.

The reason is also very simple, the expansion momentum of the Imperial Navy has only been maintained for a few years.

In the 137th year of the New Calendar, the imperial authorities formally recognized the Republic of Newland and established ambassador-level diplomatic relations with it, and the "expansion" of the Imperial Navy officially ended.

Strictly speaking, as early as 10 years ago in the 127th year of the New Calendar, the strength of the Imperial Navy fell to the bottom.

In fact, this was also the second low period encountered by the Imperial Navy after the war.

No matter how magical the Imperial Navy boasted the "Aircraft Carrier Strike Group" as it was, only 15 aircraft carriers were retained, which was enough to illustrate the problem.

Fortunately, the efforts of the Imperial Navy were not in vain.

In a sense, the second round of changes in the Imperial Navy after the war was actually preparing for the third round of changes, and it was even more like laying the groundwork before the climax came.

To put it bluntly, the main purpose of the second round of reforms is not to enhance combat effectiveness, but to emerge from the loss caused by the post-war dominance of the world in order to cope with a new international situation, that is, after the revitalization of the Republic of Newland, the era of the Imperial Navy dominance of the world was over.

No matter what the senior executives of the Imperial Navy think, they must take this opponent of equal strength seriously.

It was against this background that after Zhou Yongtao took office, in the 144th year of the New Calendar, the Imperial Navy began the third round of re-creational changes.
Chapter completed!