The biggest problem with space targets is not "interception" but, interception, "groundwork". 【Reading.com】

Vigilance, presence, tracking and locking are the four most complex, most important and most difficult to implement in the whole interception process. Relatively speaking, the final "interception", which is often referred to as destruction, is the easiest stage of the entire interception process to achieve.

The biggest difference between intercepting satellites and intercepting missiles is the "alert" segment.

When the ballistic missile is in the booster stage, that is, the active stage, the rocket engine is in working condition. The infrared radiation and ultraviolet radiation emitted are very obvious and can be easily identified by far-infrared detection equipment and ultraviolet detection equipment. Satellites operate in space, basically rely on inertia, do not need additional power, only use small orbit change rocket motive when changing orbit and adjusting orbit, it is difficult to be detected by optoelectronic equipment; As a result, the vigilance system for satellites can only rely on radar, and it is a high-precision radar.

At the beginning of the century and the beginning of the century, radars to detect space targets were deployed on the ground.

With the advancement of technology and the reduction of the cost of space launches, the major powers led by the Republic and the United States have taken the lead in deploying so-called "missile warning radar satellites" in space. ”

Everyone knows that satellites with radars are not needed at all, if only against ballistic missiles.

After having a vigilance system, there must also be a presence and screening system.

To put it simply, the alert system is only responsible for wide-area dialing, and its main task is to determine the general orientation of the target; The main task of the screening system is to accurately determine the orientation of the target and determine the nature of the target. Because the work burden of the alert system is not heavy in the interception system for satellites, the Republic and the United States have combined the alert system with the current system. It's just that in the interception system against ballistic missiles, the alert system needs to work for a long time, while the current and screening system starts working after receiving an alert. Therefore, it has to be deployed separately to reduce the cost of daily use.

Comparatively speaking, it is more difficult to screen.

Because more and more countries have mastered space technology, and there are more and more satellites working in orbit and more and more satellites being scrapped, how to determine the nature of satellites has become a top priority. According to data released by the International Aerospace Organization, the total number of artificial spacecraft in orbit at the end of the year exceeded that of 10,000 cubic meters of space junk. Although the main intention of the report is to remind the space-faring powers that the massive increase in space junk in Earth's outer space poses a serious threat to the peaceful use of outer space, it also reflects the great difficulty of intercepting satellites. To put it simply, it is by no means easy to find out the true goals from among the nearly 10,000 goals and determine their nature.

It is obviously unrealistic to wait until after the war has broken out to search for the enemy's satellites.

The only way is to master the orbit of the enemy's satellites in peacetime.

In fact, the Republic, the United States, Russia, France, and other countries that have the ability to intercept satellites are doing so.

The Celestial Soldiers of the Republic have a specialized force known as the "Star Atlas", whose main task is to monitor all the satellites of the hostile country in peacetime. Because most military satellites have the ability to maneuver and change orbits. Before or during the war, the hostile country is very likely to let the military satellite carry out orbit change maneuver, so in order to keep abreast of the orbit of the hostile satellite, it is necessary to achieve "real-time monitoring", and it is necessary to set up observation points around the world. The most ideal way is to deploy the detection system around the world according to the range of the ground-based detection radar According to the standards of the Republic's Heavenly Soldiers, at least a set of ground-based detection systems need to be deployed on a global scale, and due to political, diplomatic, military, etc., no country can deploy ground-based detection systems on a global scale, so the Republic spent a huge amount of money to build 2 "ocean-going space mapping ships for the Heavenly Soldiers." "And invest huge sums of money in the development of space exploration systems.

The return on a huge investment is also huge.

Before the outbreak of the war in Japan, the Republic established a complete satellite tracking system. "Star Chart. The troops are not only able to grasp the operation of the hostile countries in orbit in real time, but also establish a "constellation map system." Relying on the working conditions of satellites in orbit recorded by the system, it is very convenient to find the real-time position of any satellite. When necessary, the nature of the target can be quickly determined based on the "constellation system" and the latest available information.

Once the nature of the target has been determined, follow-up is required.

Unlike attacking ground, sea, and air targets, even low-earth orbit is hundreds of kilometers away from the ground, and satellites in far-earth orbit, sun-synchronous orbit, and geosynchronous orbit are thousands of kilometers or even tens of thousands of kilometers from the ground. It is impossible for any anti-satellite system to cover the entire outer space, and there is an interval of tens to hundreds of seconds between the present target and the final destruction of the target. Because the satellite flies at 7 kilometers per second in the first cosmic degree, even a few seconds apart means that the target flies several kilometers. The volume of the satellite itself is negligible compared to this distance. As a result, the target must be continuously tracked before the attack.

Before the war in Japan, tracking satellites was not a hassle. The main reason is that the orbit of the satellite is relatively fixed, and even if it is a military satellite with the ability to change orbit, the number of orbit changes is very limited, and only the curtain must change the orbit as soon as possible. In general, they fly on a fixed track.

After the Japanese War, countries paid more attention to the orbit change capability of satellites, because in the case of limited defense means, improving the orbit change capability of satellites is the only means to improve the survivability of satellites. After the Republic and the United States embarked on the establishment of a detection system for the regulated satellites of all countries, the flight orbits of the satellites were often changed. In particular, changing the flight trajectory of a satellite outside the monitoring range of the detection system of a hostile country has become an important means of improving the survivability of the satellite. As a result, tracking satellites becomes more cumbersome.

Comparatively speaking, the combination of alert, present and screening systems, the difficulty of tracking satellites is still not very great.

Once the tracking is complete, it's time to lock down before the attack.

Compared with the tracking stage, the locking stage has higher requirements for detection accuracy. Before the detection accuracy is sufficient to meet the requirements of "precision strikes," the methods adopted by various countries are very "barbaric," such as using anti-satellite missiles or anti-satellite satellites carrying nuclear warheads to detonate nuclear warheads near the target and destroy all satellites within a radius of hundreds of kilometers or even hundreds of kilometers, so as to achieve the goal of destroying the target. In a situation where the number of satellites is increasing and outer space is becoming more and more crowded, such "barbaric" means are certainly not applicable. More importantly, after the Japanese war, the major powers successively included military satellite systems in the category of "strategic facilities", and even accidental injuries may lead to catastrophic consequences.

"Barbaric" means cannot be used, only the accuracy of the strike can be increased.

In order to improve the accuracy of the strike, it is necessary to improve the detection accuracy of the locking phase.

The main weapons of anti-satellite are nothing more than three. Fragmentation weapons, kinetic weapons, and energy weapons. Fragmentation weapons can form a large amount of space junk after exploding. Threatens your own satellites. It has been eliminated by the major powers. All Republics, including the Republic, have shifted their focus to kinetic and energy weapons. Relatively speaking, energy weapons are much "cleaner", do not produce much space junk in the process of destroying satellites, and are more "popular".

Whether it is a walking energy weapon or an energy weapon, there are very high requirements for strike accuracy.

Taking kinetic weapons as an example, even if a kinetic warhead made of Ji Weihao and Jin is used, the radial area of the warhead is increased by hundreds of times before attacking the target, and its actual coverage area is only several hundred square meters. In the vastness of outer space, this area is nothing at all. If the radial section of the interceptor is circular, the attack progress must be kept within the old meters. Obviously, for the interception of satellites tens of kilometers, or even hundreds of kilometers away. The navigation accuracy of the old meter is definitely a big problem today.

In fact, anti-satellite weapon systems. The most expensive is the detection and positioning system at the locking stage.

According to the calculation of the kinetic weapon interception system invested by the Heavenly Soldiers of the Republic, the detection and determination system in the locking stage accounts for about the cost of the entire system, plus the navigation system, these electronic equipment alone accounts for about the total cost. It is precisely because of this that the potential of kinetic weapon interception systems is far inferior to that of energy weapon interception systems. Because the energy weapon interception system does not require navigation equipment.

Of course, this does not mean that the energy weapon interception system does not have high requirements for locking accuracy.

In fact, energy weapon interception systems require much higher locking accuracy than kinetic weapon interception systems.

Due to the quality limitation of the launch platform, that is, the interception satellite, the output energy of the space-based energy weapon interception system is certainly not as good as that of the ground-based and air-based interception systems. In order to destroy targets with limited output energy, the space-based energy weapon interception system adopts many unique designs, for example, the interception satellite opened by the Republic is equipped with a mirror with a diameter of more than a meter of thugs, and the skeleton is made of memory alloy. The coated composite material is used to make the mirror, and the "sister satellite" of the otter is composed of an attack constellation, which focuses the laser beam twice and improves the energy density of the laser beam when it irradiates the target. The United States, with its advanced lens production technology, has used the "three-anti-focusing technology" on space-based energy weapon interception satellites to achieve the same goal. Regardless of the technology used, the ultimate goal is to increase the energy density of the energy weapon when it hits the target.

This involves the problem of energy scattering.

Although the laser is the most directional light source that humans have found so far, the laser is not an absolutely parallel light, but it is more directional than other light sources. For lasers of different wavelengths, the ratio of scattering rate, spot radius to irradiation distance is between 1/10,000 and 1/100,000. Other words. At a range of four meters for the beater. Because the light energy of the laser beam can be seen as evenly distributed, the degree of attenuation of the energy is proportional to the square of the range.

Use energy weapons to block satellites, all with a range of more than hundreds of kilometers.

In this way, even the laser weapon with the best directivity has a range of kilometers from the palm of the hand, and the utilization rate of energy is only O.

Even if the directivity of energy weapons can be increased by various technical means, for example, after the adoption of mirrors, the directivity of the republic's space-based laser interceptors can at least be increased? orders of magnitude. In the case of a range of kilometers of beating, the energy utilization rate is only 3 wishes. In other words, the locking accuracy of the energy weapon interception system still has to be controlled within the old meter. If the range continues to increase. The locking accuracy must be further improved.

It can be said that the lock has quietly become a key problem that restricts the rapid development of the energy weapon interception system

The fundamental reason why the Republic has repeatedly postponed the construction of the fourth phase of the national strategic defense system is that the research and development system of the energy weapon interception system is far from achieving the expected goal. According to the idea of deploying laser interception satellites put forward by the Heavenly Soldiers. The average interception distance of satellites aimed at enemy events is more than a concave kilometer. In the case that the output power of the laser cannot be increased and the directivity problem can be solved, the locking accuracy must be increased to less than 2 meters to meet the basic needs of intercepting the target.

It can be seen that the difficulty of the space-based interception system is far beyond the imagination of ordinary people.

In fact, there are many similarities between the early exhibitions of the Heavenly Soldiers and the early exhibitions of the Air Force. From the birth of the aircraft to the military power that dominated the war. It has not only taken nearly half a century, but also experienced many technological revolutions. In other words, if there is no turbo motor. Aircraft are, at best, the main force of war, not the dominant one; If there are no precision strike weapons. Aircraft are at best a devastating force, not a decisive one. The Heavenly Soldiers want to replace the Air Force. There is still a long way to go to become the dominant force in the war.

As one of the earliest Heavenly Soldiers in the world, the Celestial Soldiers of the Republic have been moving forward.

Space operations are fast-paced compared to other types of warfare.

Long before the outbreak of war, the Heavenly Soldiers of the Republic not only urgently launched a number of military satellites and set up a small space-based satellite interception system aimed at India, but also adopted a one-on-one approach to track and monitor many old Indian military satellites and made preparations for striking at any time.

After receiving the order of the former Chan Zhi Wave Division, the Heavenly Soldiers immediately took action.

With adequate preparation, the interception operation is not difficult.

At 4 o'clock, all the 4 stages of preparation before the attack were in place.

There was no warning, no warning. The attack began silently.

Although the details of this round of attacks have been locked in the top-secret database of the Ministry of Defense of the Republic. However, according to some surveillance data released by the Pentagon after the war, the Celestial Soldiers of the Republic used kinetic weapon interception systems and energy weapon interception systems in this round of attacks, but the frequency of using kinetic weapon interception systems was higher. This is more technically difficult with the energy weapon interception system. All kinds of related technologies are not yet mature, and there is a lot of laughter.

Later, the International Aerospace Organization also published some relevant data. Of the satellites attacked, the old ones were completely destroyed, and only three were "paralyzed." "From this, it can be concluded that the number of operations of the energy weapon interception system will not be less than 3, but it is not certain whether the republic's space-based laser interceptors have the ability to completely destroy targets. If there is, then the real combat capabilities of the space-based interception systems of the republic are significantly improved, since the complete destruction of the target requires much more energy than the paralyzing one.

It can be seen from this that the use of the energy weapon interception system against India's military satellites has a great taste of experimentation, and the test port is not to intercept satellites, but to intercept ballistic missiles and missile warheads. If the Republic's Heavenly Soldiers use high-energy laser interceptors in this round of attacks, then the Republic's space-based interception system will have the ability to intercept ballistic missiles and missile warheads, because the key to intercepting missiles and warheads is not to paralyze, but to destroy.

Regardless of the outcome, the interception was very successful.

More critically, the Indian Air Force's military satellites in India are under the jurisdiction of the Air Force and do not know what is going on.

Because satellites orbit the earth for a certain period, and India does not have many overseas military bases. The Republican Celestial Soldiers attacked India's military satellites after they left the skies over the Indian mainland, so the Indian Air Force would not know until four hours later that its military satellites had been destroyed. Although with the military communications satellites "failed. "The Indian Air Force will be alert. However, the failure of communication satellites is a very common thing, for example, the anomaly of the solar nucleus will have an impact on the ionosphere of the earth's atmosphere, so that the surface receiving station cannot receive the signal from the communication satellite for the time being, and the Indian Air Force must have more "evidence" if it wants to determine whether the military satellite has been attacked.

War is not about evidence, it's about opportunity.

Pei Chengyi wanted this opportunity.

The attack ends at 4 minutes, and after 4 hours, it is 8 minutes.

If all goes well, the massive bombing campaign will begin at 8 o'clock. At that time, even if the Indian Air Force reacted, missiles and bombs fell. There was simply no time to organize resistance.

After receiving the combat report of the Heavenly Soldiers, Pei Chengyi still did not adjust the battle plan.

There was no need for this at all, and all operations were carried out according to the initial calculations.

It was not until 6 o'clock that Pei Chengyi issued an operational order to combat troops at all levels. Other words. From this point onwards, combat units at all levels will act in accordance with the operational orders already issued and launch attacks before 8 o'clock, thus kicking off the prelude to the "strategic bombardment."

While Pei Chengyi waited patiently at the front-line headquarters, Wang Yuanqing was conducting diplomacy in the rear

To start the war in advance, there must be enough reasons.

Although Wang Yuanqing had already "prepared" the reason, the basic diplomatic work still had to be prepared, otherwise the republic would not be facing the problem of war.