Although Mu Haoyang made an accurate judgment on the situation, he could not prove that his judgment was correct by means at that time. The reason was that the shore-based anti-submarine patrol aircraft deployed in Fuso, Ryukyu Islands and the Philippine Islands could not reach Micronesia at all. Moreover, Zhou Yusheng had already sent attack nuclear submarines with strong range of endurance to the Eastern Pacific and Southern Atlantic Oceans. The remaining attack nuclear submarines were old and were not suitable for reconnaissance missions. Although the eastern region of Indonesia is only more than one thousand kilometers away from Micronesia, the area is very remote and there is no base to support shore-based anti-submarine patrol aircraft, so it is impossible to deploy anti-submarine patrol aircraft.

At that time, only the carrier-based aviation force could rely on.

The problem is that if a carrier-based aviation force is used, it is very likely to be exposed, because the carrier-based early warning function can find reconnaissance aircraft at a long distance. You should know that Mu Haoyang tried his best to use forty-eight fully electric submarines to expand the "submarine restricted area" just because he did not want to expose his whereabouts. If the Chinese Navy's carrier-based fighter jets appeared in Micronesia, even if France was a fool, he could think that the Chinese fleet had already moved south.[]

In this way, a huge problem was encountered in tactical planning, or in reconnaissance tactics.

At this time, the fleet aviation combat staff made a suggestion: use warships to replace carrier-based fighter jets to perform reconnaissance missions.

It seems that this suggestion is extremely ridiculous.

You should know that the speed of warships is very slow, and the sea detection distance is only a few dozen kilometers, which is not suitable for performing reconnaissance missions.

But if you think about it carefully, this suggestion is very valuable.

The reason is that the US fleet will definitely strengthen air defense alert. Even if the air defense patrol range is not expanded, carrier-based early warning aircraft will patrol over the fleet. More importantly, in order to avoid exposing whereabouts, carrier-based early warning aircraft will definitely allow radar to work passively. The result is that carrier-based early warning aircraft can detect approaching reconnaissance aircraft in a timely manner, but may not be able to detect warships in a timely manner. The reason is very simple. When carrier-based early warning aircraft conducts passive patrols, the detection distance of warships will not exceed 300 kilometers. On the contrary, when the radar on the warship works passively, the detection distance of aircraft with a flight altitude of about 10,000 meters exceeds 300 kilometers. In other words, the warship can detect high-flying carrier-based early warning aircraft in advance, so that the general orientation of the US fleet can be judged by this.

Mu Haoyang adopted this suggestion and formed two "reconnaissance formations".

According to his arrangement, each reconnaissance fleet had four large ground strike integrated warships and four anti-submarine warships, one sailing eastward and the other sailing southward.

From this arrangement, we can see that this is definitely not just a "reconnaissance formation".

You should know that after these warships leave the "submarine restricted area", they are likely to be discovered by US submarines and may be exposed.

It can be seen from this that Mu Haoyang mainly released two baits when he did this.

If the US fleet discovers these two "reconnaissance formations", it is very likely to make a wrong judgment and concentrate its efforts to attack the "reconnaissance formations".

It is undeniable that the "reconnaissance formation" is very likely to be severely damaged.

Importantly, Mu Haoyang can get a crucial opportunity to counterattack, that is, launch an attack when the US fleet attacks the "reconnaissance formation".

Of course, not everyone agrees with doing so.

Gong Jifei raised an objection, believing that doing so would greatly weaken the fleet's air defense power and make it difficult for the fleet to deal with when attacked.

However, Gong Jifei only objected and had no right to modify the order issued by Mu Haoyang.

From a post-event perspective, Mu Haoyang's tactics are indeed problematic, and the most fundamental problem is that the tactics themselves are too complex.

Given the situation at that time, Mu Haoyang had no reason to disperse his troops.

You should know that in 2053, the air defense barrier built by four large integrated warships could cope with almost any size of air strikes. There are 32 final interception systems on the four large integrated warships and one aircraft carrier, which can cope with more than 2,000 anti-ship missiles or direct attacks of one thousand anti-ship guided bombs. The US Pacific Fleet has only nine carrier-based aviation gangs, with less than 650 combat aircraft. It can only throw more than 2,000 anti-ship missiles and more than 1,000 anti-ship guided bombs in one attack. These ammunition will disperse the battle groups of four aircraft carriers, and it is impossible to achieve major gains.

To put it bluntly, Mu Haoyang could enter Micronesia based on the previous judgment and directly fight the US fleet. It can be said that Mu Haoyang didn't have to worry about anything at all, and could even take the initiative to expose his whereabouts and lure the US fleet to launch an attack first.

The problem was that no one had absolute confidence in the last-stage defense system at that time.

Although the value of the last-stage defense system has been proven in the Navy's test, especially the ability of the 70mm electromagnetic rapid-fire gun to deal with anti-ship guided bombs, the test is only a test and is essentially different from actual combat. Before achieving a major victory, or before undergoing actual combat tests, any fleet commander will have some concerns and will not place his hopes entirely on the last-stage interception system.

In fact, this is not Mu Haoyang's problem. If it were someone else, he would do similar things.

For example, at this time, French was considering the same problem.

For him, the problems caused by reconnaissance methods were even more serious because in the Western Pacific, the US Pacific Fleet could not receive cover from shore-based aviation.

However, French chose a completely different approach from Mu Haoyang.

The reason is very simple. He did not know that the Chinese Pacific Fleet had already moved south, and he did not believe that the Chinese fleet commander would lead the fleet to move south.

In this way, France had enough reason to believe that he could successfully raid the Chinese fleet.

In other words, he had no reason to disperse his troops.

On April 7 and April 8, the Chinese Air Force was still bombing the Mariana Islands, while the Chinese fleet still did not participate in the bombing operation.

On the afternoon of April 8, French received news that the Chinese Navy had stepped up patrols east of the Mariana Islands.

The intelligence was provided by four US submarines, which encountered Chinese anti-submarine patrol aircraft on the same day, but only one of them was attacked.

It is obvious that these anti-submarine patrol aircraft are not performing anti-submarine missions, but sea search missions.

Although the staff around France all believed that the Chinese fleet should be near the Mariana Islands, otherwise they would not strengthen their sea search efforts, France became suspicious because it was equivalent to telling the opponent that his main purpose was to cover the landing of the Marine Corps. But in fact, the primary task of the Chinese fleet was to seize sea control, or to fight the US fleet in a decisive battle. Before this, the Chinese fleet would definitely not participate in landing operations.

Don't forget that there is at least one amphibious assault ship in the landing fleet, and there are at least twenty inclined rotary wing aircraft with ground strike capabilities on this warship. If the target of the Chinese Marine Corps' attack was Anathahan Island, there is no need for air support from the fleet.

That's why French became suspicious.

In his opinion, the launch of "smoke bombs" by the Chinese Navy must be related to fleet combat, and the Chinese fleet is likely to have left the "submarine restricted area".

So, where will the Chinese fleet go?

At this time, the US Pacific Fleet was already south of Sorol Atoll, about 1,500 kilometers southwest of Guam, less than 2,000 kilometers from the activity area of ​​the Chinese fleet. According to French's arrangement, the first reconnaissance will be conducted that night, and he is expected to encounter the Chinese fleet during the day of the 9th.

Shortly after dark, a message from the Ministry of Defense scared France.

It is very likely that Mu Haoyang, the chief of staff of China, has left the General Staff!

Although it was not mentioned whether Mu Haoyang had gone to the fleet, French could not think of a better reason. In his opinion, Mu Haoyang left the General Staff at this time, the only place to go was the fleet. In other words, it is likely that Mu Haoyang was the one who commanded the Chinese fleet to fight.

Of course, this is just a speculation and has not been proven by the US intelligence agencies.

According to the information disclosed after the war, the US intelligence agency made this speculation related to something that happened a few days ago, that is, on April 4, the Chinese Army won a great victory in the Siberian battlefield, and the General Staff did not issue an order to replace the 38th Army until April 8. The transfer report sent by the Army Command to the General Staff was suppressed.

Obviously, if Mu Haoyang had been in the General Staff, the order to transfer would have been issued long ago.

For French, just guessing is enough.

Of course, this is not all.

At around 10 o'clock in the evening, the Pacific Theater Command sent a more important piece of information: the six submarines that had previously been operating west of Guam were interrupted from contact with the base for more than 48 hours, and the six submarines were all performing alert missions and should report the situation every 24 hours.

French dared not be careless, so he immediately asked the staff to retrieve the deployment information of the six submarines.

The six submarines are basically lined up in the north-south direction to the west of Guam, and the north-most one is about 800 kilometers away from the south-most one.

Obviously, in such a vast area, six submarines could not be attacked by anti-submarine patrol aircraft at the same time, and they could not be sunk all before sending telegrams.

There is only one possibility that the Chinese fleet has moved south and has extremely powerful anti-submarine power cover.

More importantly, the one that provides anti-submarine cover must be the submarine, because only the submarines can attack the submarine, and the submarines that were attacked were not too late to send a message.

Now, French immediately concluded that it must be Mu Haoyang who commanded the Chinese fleet.

You must know that only Mu Haoyang has such great courage and can adopt such bold tactics in such an important battle.

By this time, French had realized that if his judgment was not wrong, the Chinese fleet would be north of it, and the distance would not exceed 1,500 kilometers.

For fleet operations, this is a distance that is enough to determine the outcome.
Chapter completed!