The Army Aviation Force in Shenyang is extremely efficient. From officers to soldiers, from pilots to ground technicians, everyone is working hard to perform their duties. The pilots gathered in the hangar with their lunch boxes, eating breakfast and listening to their superiors Briefing. The ground crews were like a group of busy ants, running around the airport pushing ammunition in small carts, checking, loading, and refueling fighter jets. Battery carts were driving on the runway, dragging bombs, and drove to the dive bombers. I was busy loading it up. Various instructions were transmitted from the loudspeaker at the airport. From time to time, several fighter jets roared onto the runway and flew into the sky to participate in distant battles.
The transport aircraft squadron that is airdropping supplies for the Andong Ming Army is also making intense preparations. The ground crew soldiers, shirtless, are loading large cylinders one after another onto the DC-3 transport aircraft. There are parachute bags on the cylinders, and there are various items inside. Supply items.
At seven o'clock in the morning on July 8, preparations for the second round of airdrops were completed. A flare flew into the sky from the control tower, and fifteen transport planes roared onto the runway one after another and taxied into the sky.
The transport planes circled in the sky and formed a formation, and then the fighters on the airport - the "Kingfishers" of two squadrons also climbed up one by one. After a squadron of transport planes and two squadrons of fighters merged, they flew toward the southeast.
At the same time, a squadron of "Goshawk" fighter jets at the Changshan Islands Airport in southern Liaoning has also taken off and flew toward the northeast. The two large fleets will meet on the sea west of Andong and fly to Anton together to implement airdrops .
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The two fleets of the Ming Army each encountered an air battle on the road. The Kingfisher fleet protecting the transport aircraft encountered a group of Japanese bombers over the mountainous area between Benxi and Fengcheng. The Japanese fighter planes happened to be two squadrons. Both sides were protected. The big planes immediately scattered to avoid the situation, and the escort fighter jets from both sides immediately fought with each other.
The Ming Army fighter pilots did not dare to slack off at all. Because they had been warned repeatedly before that although the Japanese pilots had no actual combat experience, they trained extremely hard and the flight time was relatively long. Sure enough, now that the battle was over, the Ming Army fighter jets The pilot immediately felt the strength of his opponent.
The Ming Army's fighter pilots adopt a system of matching old and new fighters. The squadron leaders who lead the team are all experienced ace pilots. Then, although the captains of the four-plane squadron below are not called "aces", they are also veterans of air combat. Each of the four-plane squadrons has four aircraft. The formation is composed of two two-aircraft formations, each with a pair of lead aircraft. One of the lead aircraft pilots is both the captain of the four-aircraft formation and the lead aircraft of the two-aircraft formation.
The leader of the other two-plane formation does not need to be an ace or a veteran, but at least they are pilots with actual combat experience. The two wingmen are generally novices with no actual combat experience, "trainees" who have just come out of aviation school. ". Their task is to follow the lead aircraft closely and cover the lead aircraft when it attacks the enemy aircraft. In general, the matching of Ming army pilots is "aces lead veterans, veterans lead novices, and novices lead rookies."
In the air battle, pilots of different levels in the Ming Army immediately had different feelings. Aces and veterans felt that the Japanese pilots were relatively weak and easier to fight than expected. Although they were not "shooting ducks", they were at least better than the Soviet pilots. There were too many to deal with. However, the novices and rookies of the Ming Army felt tremendous pressure. They felt that the Japanese pilots were simply masters and that they were in danger of being shot down every minute.
Amidst the radio orders, call signs, and curses all over the sky, the Ming army pilots gradually understood that the level of the Japanese pilots was relatively average. There were few who were too top-notch, and few who were too good. Anyway, it was not as obvious as the Ming army's.
level ladder. This is also in line with the actual situation of the Japanese army. The Japanese army
The pilots have never participated in a war before and have no actual combat experience. All experience comes from training and exercises. Although the training of Japanese pilots is very intense and hard, the training cannot compare with actual combat, and everyone's level is lower than that of the assembly line.
It's the same going up and down, there's not much difference.
The pilots of the Ming Army have experienced the baptism of war. A group of rookies fought a few battles, some were killed, and some survived. Those who were not good were eliminated in the first few battles, while those who were good were eliminated after several air battles.
The transformation from rookie to novice to veteran. And the best among them becomes the ace. The level is very wide.
In this air battle, the veterans of the Ming Army pilots showed off their skills and continuously shot down Japanese aircraft, while the novices and rookies were constantly shot down by Japanese aircraft.
After a short air battle, the fighter groups of both sides became farther apart and no longer entangled with each other. They each rendezvoused with their own escort groups and then went to the opposite goals. The Japanese army's 36 fighter jets were shot down 12, and the Ming army's 32
10 fighter jets were shot down.
The Goshawk fighter squadron flying from southern Liaoning achieved impressive results. The new fighters of this squadron were also flown by veteran pilots of the Ming Army and existed as an elite force. They encountered soldiers from the Ming Dynasty at sea.
The Japanese aircraft fleet flying from North Korea. The Japanese aircraft fleet has a squadron of horizontal bombers.
Bombers, a squadron of fighter jets, targeted Lushun and the Ming Army's Dongjiang Fleet. The Japanese army's purpose was not a sneak attack, but a kind of cooperation on the main battlefield, to harass the Ming Army's southern base. Their purpose was to continuously bomb the Ming Army's base.
The ports and ships of the Dongjiang fleet made it impossible for the Ming fleet to stay in the port.
However, it is obvious that the Japanese army underestimated the air power of the Ming army. In particular, they knew very little about the new fighter jets newly installed by the Ming army. In an air battle on the Yellow Sea, 16 Ming army Goshawk fighter jets shot down 13 Japanese bombers.
Out of 10 fighter jets, it only lost 3 fighter jets.
The remaining 5 bombers and 3 fighter jets of the Japanese army still flew tenaciously towards the Dongjiang Fleet base of the Ming Army. The Goshawk Squadron of the Ming Army did not pursue them. Instead, they prioritized the task of rendezvous and escort and continued to advance northeast. They just
Reported to the base via radio and asked the base to prepare air defense measures in advance.
The two fleets met 30 kilometers west of Andong and then headed east together.
They first flew to the Dadonggou port area and dropped a batch of ammunition and supplies amidst the explosions of anti-aircraft guns in the sky. Then they continued flying northeast and soon flew over Andong City.
This time it was broad daylight, and the Ming army below had marked the airdrop range with colored smoke bombs. There were no Japanese fighter jets around to intercept. The total number of Japanese aircraft was far inferior to that of the Ming army, and the various coordination, early warning, deployment, etc. were also inferior.
The Ming army has experience. Now the Japanese frontline combat aircraft have penetrated deep into the north and west, and the rest are resting at the North Korean airport. The Yalu River area happens to be a vacuum zone at the moment.
Some of the Ming army's fighter jets were on high-altitude alert, and some were diving downwards, strafing and suppressing anti-aircraft guns. The transport planes flew skillfully over the Ming army's controlled area, and quickly dropped cylinders. The sky was immediately filled with parachutes one after another.
When all 15 transport aircraft were airdropped, the entire fleet began to climb and turned around to return to the southwest. The Japanese anti-aircraft guns on the ground were still firing desperately. The dense black clouds behind the Ming army's fleet continued to explode until they flew several times.
kilometers, the Japanese army reluctantly ceased fire.
On the Ming army's position in Andong City, there was an overwhelming cheer. Hundreds of large cylinders dropped one after another with parachutes, and basically all landed in the area controlled by the Ming army. The soldiers of the Ming army happily surrounded them, opened the cylinders, and opened the cylinders.
Inside were taken out artillery shells, bullet boxes, bullet chains, bullet clips, grenades, compressed biscuits, cans, chocolates, various medicines, bandages, surgical instruments... Every time something was taken out, there was a burst of cheers from the surroundings.
In less than ten minutes, the machine guns on the Ming army's position began to fire intensively again.