"emission!"
The red flag was waved cleanly.
Following the launch command, the Dongfeng-17 ballistic missile took off from the earth like an arrow off the string.
He left a long cloud of smoke behind him and quickly disappeared from everyone's sight.
"It's very fast!"
After watching the take-off process of Dongfeng-17, the old chief couldn't help but sigh.
Although he has not been exposed to Dongfeng-17 missiles before, he has been exposed to similar ballistic missiles.
Even without a professional speed measuring device, he could tell that the Dongfeng-17's take-off speed was at least twice that of other ballistic missiles.
The engineers on the side have completed the speed measurement work.
"The average speed in the initial stage reached Mach 7.5."
Zhang Xingyang looked at the data display on the display screen of the military notebook and reported a data to the old leader who was still waiting for the results.
"Ouch!"
"Isn't that nearly twice as fast as the long-range ballistic missiles we used before?"
Although the old chief had already made a rough guess in his mind, he was still shocked when he actually heard the data.
Faster take-off speed means that it can enter the outer atmosphere at a faster speed and avoid being intercepted by the enemy's anti-missile system during the take-off stage.
"Takeoff speed is only one aspect."
Zhang Xingyang said after reading the data during the take-off phase.
"The key is to greatly reduce the time of the rise."
"It reduces the possibility of the enemy intercepting the missile at this stage."
Although it is unlikely that the enemy will break into the country and intercept the ballistic missile during its take-off stage, scientific researchers must consider such an extreme situation.
"But the current speed is not the fastest."
"oh?"
"When can we reach the fastest speed?" The old chief was curious.
"When flying outside the atmosphere, it can reach up to 16 times the speed of sound."
This point has been simulated and tested as early as when the wind tunnel experiment was conducted in the YF-21 wind tunnel.
Therefore, Zhang Xingyang estimates that even taking into account various adverse real-life impacts.
The minimum speed of the missile will not be lower than Mach 15.5.
"However, because we adopt a waverider configuration and follow the Qian Xuesen trajectory, the distance at this stage will not be very far."
"The total range of the missile is 7,200 kilometers, and the distance it flies outside the atmosphere is only about 1,600 kilometers."
"This is also a compromise made to increase the missile's penetration capabilities."
The waverider configuration cannot have a very long range because of its short flight time outside the atmosphere.
If the time spent flying outside the atmosphere is taken into account, the proportion increases from 20% to 50%.
At least it can increase the range by about 3,000 kilometers, reaching a range of more than 10,000 kilometers.
If so, the Dongfeng-17 can be regarded as an intercontinental ballistic missile.
However, doing so will greatly increase the possibility of the missile being hit by the enemy's anti-missile system outside the atmosphere.
At this time, looking up to the sky, the missile has become invisible, and only the long smoke cloud can prove the traces of the missile that just flew by.
"It is estimated that we will be able to reach the designated location in twenty minutes."
Zhang Xingyang looked at his watch and said to the old chief next to him.
"Seven thousand kilometers, arriving in twenty minutes."
The old chief said with emotion:
"Twenty minutes, no matter how fast the enemy is, the window of reaction is less than ten minutes."
In fact, this was due to the old leader's overestimation of the enemy.
Generally speaking, if you want to detect the launch of such missiles, you can only rely on military reconnaissance satellites in space.
After discovering an abnormal heat source on the ground, the information is reported to the command center behind.
Then the command center will judge based on the existing information whether it is launching a rocket or a missile.
The launch of a rocket is to a large extent the same as that of a missile.
Even many rockets were originally modified from intercontinental ballistic missiles.
There has also been a precedent in China where a batch of intercontinental ballistic missiles that have exceeded their service life have been transformed into rockets.
However, rocket launch information is generally disclosed before launch.
The test launch or test launch of missiles is basically not disclosed to the public, so if it is heat source information that cannot be queried.
Then it can basically be regarded as a missile.
After completing the judgment, the command center will notify the anti-missile system to start working.
The supercomputer begins to calculate the missile's intended trajectory, and the anti-missile missile begins to position itself, preparing to attack in the middle or end of the ballistic missile.
The initial flight time of the Dongfeng-17 waverider ballistic missile is less than two minutes. Even including the flight time outside the atmosphere, it is only about seven minutes.
At this time, the command center on the opposite side probably just received the news about the missile taking off.
But at this time, Dongfeng-17 had completed its re-entry into the atmosphere and began to "fail" within the atmosphere.
It is basically impossible to complete missile interception at this stage.
Because of the most important premise, there is no way to complete the missile trajectory prediction work.
Even a supercomputer is difficult to calculate the accurate trajectory of a missile that moves up and down in an atmospheric disturbance environment.
Although the fluctuation range can be predicted, the accuracy is still too low compared to anti-missile work.
Unless they can have a large amount of data on Dongfeng-17's motion within the atmosphere to establish a sufficiently accurate motion model, there is only the slightest chance that the accuracy of the motion model can be improved to a sufficient level.
But now, even Zhang Xingyang and others who are in charge of missile research and development do not have that much data to build a model.
Let alone an enemy who doesn’t even know this.
Time passed quickly. After a short flight outside the atmosphere, the Dongfeng-17 waverider missile began to re-enter the atmosphere.
"Look, shooting stars!"
Although it was broad daylight, the warhead flying within the atmosphere at extremely high speed still emitted a burst of white flash.
The unknowing young urban girl smiled and chirped to her companions after seeing it.
"How come there are meteors in broad daylight?"
The male companion on the side was obviously a little surprised.
After all, in everyone's impression, meteors should appear at night.
In fact, meteors can also be seen during the day, but because the light is strong during the day, meteors need to reach a certain brightness to be seen.
"Why?!"
"This doesn't seem like a meteor?"
The girl who discovered it at the beginning looked at the unknown object that seemed to be "floating" in the sky and was doing irregular things, and shouted in surprise.
"It really doesn't look like it?"
"Is this a UFO?"
The male companion was also very surprised.
During this period, street literature about aliens and UFOs was popular.
Seeing such a phenomenon that goes against common sense, it is easy for people who don’t know the truth to think of UFOs they have learned about before.
There is not much time left for those who see the Dongfeng-17 warhead to think.
After leaving an irregular cloud trail in the sky, the warhead with a white flash disappeared into the horizon.
That is to say, in this era, personal equipment that can be used for shooting is not that developed, otherwise there will definitely be a lot of people taking pictures of this scene and posting it online.
Claimed to have seen a real UFO.
"How accurate do you estimate the missile can be?"
At the launch site, the old chief asked Zhang Xingyang such a question.
"A conservative estimate, within twenty meters."
Zhang Xingyang thought for a few seconds and gave a figure that others might think was bragging.
However, the old chief knew very well that this data was probably true.
And this is still reserved data, which means that the real error may be about ten meters.
To understand how astonishing this data is, it is equivalent to hitting the legs of a mosquito with a gun at a distance of 700 meters, rather than hitting the mosquito's torso.
Of course, unlike a bullet that can no longer control its direction after being launched, when the missile maneuvers at the end, it will make a lot of irregular maneuvers in order to avoid the opposite air defense and anti-missile system.
However, it is still possible to correct the position between itself and the target bit by bit during the continuous maneuvering process in order to achieve the goal of accurately hitting the target.
"How did you do it?"
Such accuracy really surprised the old chief.
You must know that previous long-range ballistic missiles can basically reach an accuracy of 100 meters, which is considered to be very accurate.
Of course, this is also related to their positioning in the entire ballistic missile system. Previous missiles of this type were basically equipped with nuclear warheads.
In the face of nuclear warheads, errors at the level of 100 meters can basically be regarded as non-existent errors.
After all, even a small nuclear warhead with a yield of only a few thousand tons can create a fireball of a hundred meters in diameter.
Therefore, for those long-range ballistic missiles equipped with nuclear warheads, the accuracy requirements are not that high. What they value more is the range.
However, the strategic positioning of the Dongfeng-17 is different from that of its predecessors. It is not a missile used to deliver nuclear warheads.
Its role is to deliver a fatal blow to the opponent's high-value military targets in conventional warfare, such as air defense positions, radar systems, command centers, airports, ports, etc.
Because nuclear weapons cannot be used in conventional wars, ballistic missiles equipped with conventional warheads have higher accuracy requirements.
Otherwise, it will be difficult to directly attack the enemy's key targets.
"In the past, long-range ballistic missiles mainly used starlight guidance."
Zhang Xingyang explained the missile guidance method to the old leader.
"Because we need to consider the possibility that after a nuclear bomb explodes, the nuclear electromagnetic pulse generated will seriously damage many electronic equipment including satellites."
"So basically, guidance can only be carried out using several neutron stars or pulsars in the sky as benchmarks."
"However, the accuracy of this guidance method is not very good, and it is mainly used as a last resort in nuclear war."
"In conventional wars that do not use nuclear weapons, we basically will not encounter such a situation where nuclear bombs explode in space and seriously interfere with the electromagnetic environment."
"So considering this realistic situation, we use a composite guidance method of satellite guidance combined with inertial guidance on the Dongfeng-17."
The Rocket Academy has extremely abundant technical reserves in guidance, which is also an important reason why they can achieve such high precision in guidance.
"In terms of satellite guidance, we mainly rely on our Beidou satellites."
Although the accuracy of the three Beidou satellites in the first phase is not very high, even with two-way transmission, it can only achieve an accuracy of twenty meters, but it can also greatly improve the strike accuracy of missiles.
However, the second phase of the Beidou project will start construction soon.
After completion, the accuracy of satellite guidance can be further improved.
Of course, if the low-orbit communication satellite is upgraded and the positioning function is added, the positioning accuracy is expected to reach centimeter level.
However, this goal will still take several years to carry out scientific research.
"If it weren't for our Beidou satellites, if we only used starlight guidance and inertial guidance, the guidance accuracy might only reach the fifty-meter level."
At this time, Zhang Xingyang thought of the deceased Beidou Phase 1 chief engineer Chen Zhongyan, and said with some emotion.
"Mr. Chen, if Izumi knows anything, he would be very pleased to see that our long-range ballistic missiles use the Beidou system."
Although the old chief didn't care about the aerospace system, he had worked with Chen Zhongyan when he was young.
Hearing Zhang Xingyang mention this old friend, he felt a little emotional:
"If Lao Chen saw this scene, he would probably laugh happily."
Just when the two were talking about the late Chen Zhongyan, the Dongfeng-17 ballistic missile had also entered its final penetration state.
A high-speed maneuver close to Mach 10 can eclipse all terminal anti-missile systems on the planet.
Generally speaking, terminal anti-missile missiles can only be regarded as luck. After all, the window time is very short, and at most, only one wave of anti-missile missiles can be launched.
In the desolate desert, within the circled target.
Everything is silent.
As if between lightning and flint, a spindle-shaped object flew from the sky and hit the target field at a speed that was difficult to track with the naked eye.
"The warhead has completed landing!"
From the communication equipment, a very excited voice came from the other side.
"Did you hit the target?"
Everyone at the launch site was nervous and looking forward to news from the other side.
"Hit the circled target."
"However, the smoke and dust at the target point are large, so the accuracy cannot be determined yet!"
In this test, the warhead did not carry any explosives. The main purpose was to test the operating status and guidance accuracy.
Therefore, there was only dust in the target point without any explosion fire.
The other side was also very happy at this time.
After all, judging from the state of the smoke and dust, the accuracy is at least within thirty meters, which has reached their preset passing line.
After waiting for a while, the other side was probably waiting for the smoke and dust to decrease slightly, allowing them to enter the site to measure the accuracy error.
After waiting for a short while, a piece of data came from the other side that surprised Zhang Xingyang.
"The actual error accuracy of the missile is only three meters!"
For a missile with extremely powerful explosive power, this error can be regarded as no error at all!
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(End of chapter)
