Babylonian Empire

Page 424

"No problem at all! Commander, please organize the fleet and follow our beacons." The other party shouted very spontaneously on the radio.

The operation to clear the channel has officially begun!

At this time, the Saudi navy has cleared an area of ​​nearly [-] square nautical miles, which has already consumed a lot of their energy. Therefore, when the minesweepers saw that the Iraqi navy who came to support them did this, there was a feeling. Feeling like vomiting blood.

Walking in front were two ships dedicated to death. Those two ships were remotely controlled, and they were emitting strong sound signals and water pressure at the same time. The sonar of the Saudi minesweeper could clearly hear the sound of the two ships. Acoustic signal.

In the back, there is a row of minesweepers sailing forward side by side like casting a net for fishing. As colleagues, they know that this is a simple and direct way to deal with anchor mines. The knife that severed Letho.

Soon, I saw a "thorn head" floating on the sea surface, which was an old-fashioned M08 mine.

Good luck catching a guy so quickly!

Then, one of the two missile boats behind used the 30mm naval gun in front to hit the anchor mine that was exposed to the water, causing it to explode immediately, and the splashed water column was several meters high.

And the last two unremarkable cargo ships began to drop buoys into the sea water. Looking at the route formed by several buoys, their eyes widened, because they understood the intention of the Iraqi Navy, which meant that they could follow their Open up the next waterway and move forward!

Chapter 471 Super Hornet Helicopter

Using this kind of violent mine-sweeping method, the Iraqi mine-sweeping ships moved forward at a relatively fast speed, with a working speed of ten knots per hour. According to this progress, a safe passage would be sorted out in less than a day.

The news spread throughout the cargo ship in the rear, the crew was very happy, the whistle blew and cheered and celebrated.

Before dark, a channel of more than 30 nautical miles was opened up.

At the same time, the news was also sent back to Riyadh in the rear.

King Fahd was very happy to learn that the mine-sweeping formation dispatched by Qusay quickly opened up the waterway. As long as the shipping can be resumed, the Gulf countries will have nothing to fear.

Especially in Kuwait, where even going to the toilet now has to save using toilet paper, they are looking forward to the cargo ships outside entering as soon as possible.

"Your Majesty, Your Excellency Qusay of Iraq would like to call you." The secretary came in and said.

"Okay." King Fahd picked up the phone and the call was transferred.

This is a secret telephone line between Iraq and Saudi Arabia, so there is no need to worry about being tapped.

"Your Majesty, is our minesweeping going well?" Qusay said on the phone.

"Yes, very well." King Fahd replied very happily.

"We have now solved the problem of mine clearance, but there is another problem that has not been solved." Qusay's words on the phone were somewhat intriguing.

"What's the question?" King Fahd asked.

"We have cleared the channel, but what if the Iranians re-mine us at night?" Qusay said.

King Fahd felt his head explode. He was only interested in being happy just now, and he never thought that this was an infinite endless loop of chicken and egg.

Although the Iranians have placed a lot of mines everywhere, maybe the Iranians themselves cannot confirm where it is safe. However, this does not mean that the Iranians are afraid to come in. They are likely to write down some possible safe waterways. , and then ran to the main channel where the threat had been eliminated, and quietly dropped a few sea mines.

If you see your own minesweeping during the day, you can almost be sure that the Iranians will definitely do it at night!

What should I do?

"Your Majesty the King?" Qusay asked tentatively on the phone, because he already felt that King Fahd had been thinking.

"Yes, the Iranians are likely to do this." King Fahd said: "So, how should we respond?"

Up to now, Qusay's military command genius has been recognized by almost everyone. Since Qusay raised this point of view, he must have a solution.

"We must ensure the safety of the waterway," Qusay said, "Iranian boats dare not come out during the day, but at night, they will definitely come out again to lay mines, so we have to monitor the sea at any time. Can hit Iranian dinghies."

Surveillance at sea?"What do we need to monitor the sea?" King Fahd asked.

The best way to monitor the sea is to use the pre-warning aircraft. Qusay knows that although Saudi Arabia ordered the E-3 pre-warning planes from the United States, these pre-warning planes were not delivered until 86. Therefore, at this stage , There will be no good air warning capability at all.

If there is no opportunity, it can only create opportunities, and Iraq has shaken off all its wealth.

"Our navy has seven Super Hornet helicopters that can be used for temporary surveillance of the sea," Qusay said.

The SA321 "Super Wasp" helicopter is a three-engine medium-sized multi-purpose helicopter developed by the French national aerospace company, which is developed from the smaller SA320 "Wasp" helicopter.The aircraft has a large body, a total length of more than 20 meters, and an empty weight of more than six tons. It can perform various tasks, such as transportation, evacuating the wounded, searching, calling for help, coastal guarding, anti-submarine, and laying mines.

Usual helicopters have twin engines at the top, but this kind of 3-engine is rather peculiar. During the design process, it got the help of Sikorsky Company of the United States and Fiat Company of Italy. The output power of the three engines is transmitted to the intermediate transmission shaft through their respective clutches and engine reducers.The rear engine and the front left engine share an intermediate transmission shaft and are paralleled.Then parallel with the front right engine, and input the final drive through a pair of bevel gears.Then the rotor main shaft is driven through the two-stage pinion gear in the main reducer.The tail rotor is driven by the left intermediate drive shaft through the intermediate reducer and the tail reducer.The rotor brake is driven by the intermediate transmission shaft.Rotor speed is 3 rpm at low speed and 207 rpm at cruise.The tail rotor speed is 212 rpm.

这种直升机在1960年开始研制，1962年12月7rì首次试飞。1966年开始交付。作为一种主力的海军直升机，该机的主要型就是SA321G，反潜型。

The one purchased by Iraq is the naval anti-submarine type. The most notable feature is that it is equipped with an ORB-32 search radar on the nose. It looks like it has a big nose, which is specially used to search the sea surface. It can find the snorkel of the submarine. For a target the size of a speedboat, it is definitely detectable.

Moreover, since this anti-submarine helicopter needs to be active at sea all year round, in addition to the ordinary all-metal semi-monocoque fuselage, the boat-shaped belly is composed of watertight compartments.It adopts non-retractable landing gear, which can take off and land on the sea when necessary.

(This kind of helicopter should be quite familiar to military fans, because in China, it has a louder number: Zhiba!)

The helicopters purchased by Iraq have been in Basra with the Navy. Now, Qusay suddenly thought of the purpose of these helicopters, to monitor the Iranian minelayers on the sea!

It is impossible to monitor the entire Persian Gulf comprehensively, but it is enough to monitor the most important Strait of Hormuz.

Moreover, this Super Hornet not only has a radar that can detect sea targets, but also has weapons that can destroy ships at sea: two Exocet anti-ship missiles can be mounted on both sides!

This kind of helicopter has a full set of detection, tracking and attack equipment, including an autonomous navigation system and an ORB31D radar for target designation, hoisting sonar.Two homing torpedoes or two "flying fish" missiles and their launching devices can be carried on each side of the main cabin.

The only disadvantage is that this kind of helicopter only has a battery life of four hours, so if you want to monitor all night, you need at least three helicopters.

Then, there will be another problem, how to solve the takeoff and landing of the helicopter?

Not only does Iraq have no large warships, but the Saudi Navy, and only the Medina class has a flight deck. However, it is absolutely impossible to stop that far, and it will take time to return to land, even to the nearest Oman. It will reduce the patrol time.

Fortunately, Qu Sai turned his mind and thought of a very simple solution: there are many sea giants on the current sea, behemoths bigger than aircraft carriers: super tankers!

Oil tankers store crude oil in their bellies, and the [-]-meter-long deck at the front is flat, and the bridge is at the rear. Therefore, three helicopters are prepared to perform surveillance tasks in turn. The deck is fine as a landing platform.

Helicopters take off and land on the deck at the rear of a warship, requiring repeated training and superb skills, and landing in strong winds and waves is even more thrilling, but on the deck of this wide supertanker, there is almost no need Any landing aid measures, as long as a few searchlights of the tanker pass, they can land!

Therefore, Qusay was keenly aware of the ensuing risks, made arrangements in advance, and notified King Fahd of the situation.

"Our Iraqi Navy will dispatch several Super Hornet helicopters to conduct surveillance." Qusay said: "We use the tanker as the mother ship, and we can conduct operations to monitor the Strait of Hormuz at night."

Unlike Prince Sultan, King Fahd is not clear about the specific details of these operations, but he knows that as long as His Excellency Qusay says yes, there will be absolutely no problem!

"So, what are we required to do in Saudi Arabia?" King Fahd asked.

"Several countries that need the peninsula defense force jointly issued a statement that any ship that sneaks into the main channel of the Strait of Hormuz at night will be regarded as a mine-laying operation that violates international conventions and will be punished by us." It is a heavy blow, and we want to warn them that laying mines on the high seas, especially on the busiest sea lanes, is a very bad act and will arouse strong opposition from the countries along the Gulf!" Qusai said loudly.

The Iranians have indeed gone too far, so it is time to let them know that it is best not to do this kind of thing that has caused public outrage!

King Fahd made up his mind: "No problem!"

"Also, even if we use helicopters to detect the sea surface, it can only be a short-term solution to urgent needs." Qusay said: "As long as we are negligent, the Iranians may come out to lay mines at any time, so we have to There is a more reliable means of monitoring the movements of those ships at sea, especially at night."