launched JF-35Bs suddenly appeared on the screens of the startled Chinese pilots. The F-35s in relied on front- quarter Low Observabilty to gain the all important advantage of ‘first look — first shot — first kill’ beyond visual range. Missiles were away and the Lightnings struck the J-11’s hard, with each plane claiming a quick kill.
Then the scene became a wild dance of inexperienced pilots wheeling super high performance aircraft about in a dizzying display of flying. One of the Japanese pilots lost his concentration, too jubilant after his guns had ripped a J-10 to pieces, and his Eagle was damaged by a near miss from a P-12 fragmentation warhead explosion. He dove, struggled for control and eventually managed to get his plane down low and head east for Naha. The last three were caught up in the chaos of the swirling aerial maneuvers, and soon joined the J-10s bugging out and heading west for friendly shores. It had been the first real combat mission flown by any of the pilots involved, and the small accumulation of advantages possessed by the Japanese planes and pilots had proved more than decisive. Yet the Chinese would learn quickly, and the next time their J-10s sortied that would have better missiles.
Aboard the Akagi, Captain Yoshida had been listening to the frantic calls of the pilots as they engaged the enemy planes. When it was over he heard the report. “Enemy breaking off. We have fourteen kills! Fuel low, returning to base.”
The men on the bridge of Akagi cheered, though the word bonzai was not uttered by a single man. When he heard them Captain Yoshida, raised his voice in a sharp rebuke. “We do not cheer the death of our enemy, nor would we have them do the same when our brothers have fallen in battle.”
He considered the situation, realizing that he now would quickly need to launch his second shotai of JF-35s, and soon the bridge was all business again, the flight boss on the radio giving the order to launch. Yoshida came to the radar operator’s station and pointed.
“Is that the KJ-2000?”
“Yes, sir. It had been orbiting at 40,000 feet for the last hour.”
“Send it home. Vector in a J-35 from the second shotai.”
Yoshida wanted to scratch out the enemy’s eyes, blinding him to the battle space and insuring that he could now move his task force to the Senkaku archipelago with impunity, but he was too late. The Chinese had seen and fixed his position long ago and had a deadly surprise in store for the Japanese that day.
The radar operator shouted out the alarm. “Sir, I have a high speed, high altitude missile inbound!”
The battle was evolving yet again. The Chinese had sent their second string fighters to the fray, fixing the attention of their enemy on the air duel above the islands, but high in space a watching American spy satellite suddenly flashed a warning to Pacific Command in Honolulu, Hawaii indicating ballistic missiles had been launched. While the brave ships had been dueling on the sea, and the planes locked in their deadly dance in the skies, Chinese archers had fired a volley of DongFeng -15C short range ballistic missiles, and their bigger brothers, the lethal DF-21s. Named for the east wind that was a harbinger of good favor, this wind would bring a rain of fire and anger on the unwary enemy.
They were coming for Yoshida’s ships at over Mach 6 terminal velocity, and extremely difficult target to track and hit. With just seconds to react, he gave the order to engage with his SM3 Anti Ballistic Missile system, with a blistering speed of just under Mach 8. Four were fired, but they had seen the incoming missiles too late, and they would claim only one successful interception. Five of the six missiles in the first volley would get through to the target zone, and of these two would fulfill their mission.
The first exploded high above the task force with an electromagnetic shockwave warhead designed to knock down the enemy’s electronics. The second was a straight conventional warhead, 950 kilograms of rip snorting armor piercing anger coming in at a plunging angle that went clean through the flight deck of the unlucky ship DDH Hyuga, and continued penetrating until it had blown completely through the bottom hull. The resulting explosion of mission ready helicopters, aviation fuel, and munitions was catastrophic. Hyuga had been dealt a fatal blow and the ship would keel over to starboard side, the last of her Seahawks sliding into the ocean, and die an agonizing death within minutes.
While not a true aircraft carrier per se, Hyuga was close enough, the third unit in Carrier Division two, now composed of Akagi, Kaga and the stricken DDH. No aircraft carrier had been sunk in the world since the Japanese carrier Amagi in Kure harbor on July 24th, 1945. The sting of bad fate now sent Hyuga to the bottom of the East China Sea, a painful reprisal in exchange for the near lifeless hunks of rock Japan had been so keen to secure.
Aboard Akagi Captain Yoshida stared aft in shock and dismay, watching the Hyuga burn and capsize within minutes. He had more on his hands now that he had first thought when he mused over the launch of those first three JF-35s. Just when the battle seemed to be within his grasp, the missiles had found his task force at sea, a feat that had been considered, planned for, and yet not believed possible until this very moment. China had sunk a fast moving ship with a single ballistic missile. He knew that the systems that had guided this missile to its target were high above in the airless domain of outer space, with satellite GPS navigation playing a major part in the success of the attack.
If this “incident” actually expanded to a general war, something would have to be done about that, but Japan did not have the means to insure ABM defense that involved taking out enemy satellites. It would be a task for the Americans, pledged to defend Japan by treaty since the conclusion of WWII. And if the Americans come to the fight, he thought, how long before the Russians come?
Yoshida could not think about that now. The electromagnetic shock warhead had caused its own measure of additional trouble, though it did not function as intended. A number of his unshielded systems were affected, but his essential electronics weathered the pulse and continued to function. Still, it was enough to cause some disruption to his operations, and the loss of Hyuga was a hard blow to ship’s morale.
Yoshida looked sullenly at his bridge crew now, reinforcing the lesson he had barked out earlier. “Who now wishes to hear the jubilant song of our enemies?” His dark eyes found one officer after another. “This is only the beginning,” he said. “And should war come to our homeland again in earnest, believe me, we will not find him a welcome guest.”
Yoshida did not know it at that moment, but that uninvited guest was already knocking on the back porch of the Japanese homeland. The salvo of deadly missiles that had blown in on the east wind was just the first fitful stirring of the storm to come. China had burrowed into the ancient soil of its homeland, digging up the bones of dynasties past to build an amazing network of over 3,000 miles of underground tunnels and hardened bunkers. Slow mobile launchers were creeping through the dark subterranean tunnels, moving to deploy for the main event that had been planned long ago.
In a matter of minutes, China had taken the deadly tactical duel for the islands to a new level. What began as a potential small unit engagement by a few squads of Naval Marines, had soon escalated to a wide area air/sea battle, and then to a strategic strike against the bases that were most essential in supporting further Japanese operations in the area. The one saving grace had been the fact that no nuclear weapons had been brought to bear. Both sides were still wearing gloves in the fight, and the “rules” of combat had been assiduously followed.
China had been unprepared for the ferocity and determination of the Japanese counter to their planned occupation of the Diaoyutai islands, and had been beaten in a fair duel of ships, planes and missiles over the deep blue sea. Yet to beat them the Japanese had played out their very best assets in the region. The odds would get much steeper, and the Chinese promised to be a much more formidable fore than the brief action had foreshadowed. They boldly played a trump card that the Japanese had not expected this early in the game, and to the discerning minds of the military analysts back in Honolulu watching from their KH-11 satellites high in space, more was afoot than this limited hot engagement at sea.
The battle Captain Yoshida would claim as a pyrrhic victory was nothing more than shadow play on the wall, a mere distraction meant to draw the eye and ear of the enemy, and lead him astray. That afternoon the first missiles fell on Okinawa, longer range DongFeng-21s that employed terminally guided maneuvering re-entry vehicles and brought a rain of incendiary and high explosive warheads to the Japanese air base at Naha. The US base at Kadena was spared for the moment, but it remained on the target list should the Americans enter the fray any time soon. It was a subtle signal to the Americans-stay out of it and we will have no quarrel with you. The little battle that began with troops landing on distant, deserted Pacific islands had ended with ballistic missiles on Japanese soil in a strange mirroring of the last great war. But Yoshida’s rebuke to his bridge crew had been truly prophetic. This was only the beginning.
