Time Slip Reiwa Japan

034 - Siberian War of Independence - 7

In terms of air superiority near Irkutsk, the two sides were almost evenly matched. In terms of quality, the US fighter groups developed with the support of the Republic of Guam were modern fighters with metal wings, retractable gears, enclosed cockpits, and other concepts that were ahead of their time. In particular, the US Army Siberian Expeditionary Force, which was dispatched to Siberia, had a collection of state-of-the-art aircraft.

The Soviet aircraft, which did not benefit from any of Japan's technological capabilities, were inferior to the American planes in terms of quality. However, since the US would not be able to develop and deploy a 2.000 horsepower engine in a single step, the performance of the Soviet aircraft was not extremely different from that of the US, and it was possible for the Soviet planes to resist. If this was the case, the Soviets would have responded by gathering 500 fighters in the Irkutsk area. It was truly a battle of quality versus quantity.

The US, supported by Japanese AWACS aircraft, succeeded in efficiently intercepting the fighters, but was at a disadvantage in terms of numbers. For this reason, the US requested that Japan send F-5 fighters to the Irkutsk area.

In response to this request, Japan formed the 11th Air Wing with two squadrons from the JASDF and the Republic of Taiwan, which had just finished training on the Japanese mainland, and sent them in. *1 The support unit was split off from the 10th Air Wing.

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Battle of Irkutsk (D-Day+38~52)

The battle for Irkutsk was also a battle for air superiority. Both the US and the Soviet Union were fully aware of the horrors of ground attack by aircraft as a result of the strategic bombing by Japan, and were focused on gaining air superiority first.

The Soviets were in control of the air battle. They were using their numerical superiority as a shield to imitate saturation raids from multiple directions, and the Americans were occupied with defending their own forces through mission kills rather than gaining air superiority through shootdowns. For this reason, the American plan to advance to Irkutsk was stalled. This was an ideal development for the 14th Division of the 1st Red Banner Front, which wanted to hold out until the arrival of the 3rd Red Banner Front's main unit.

Therefore, the Americans also took countermeasures. It asked the Japanese air force to join the battle. This tipped the balance of air combat in favor of the Americans. The arrival of the Japanese squadron equipped with F-5 fighters, which also served as a publicity stunt for the Japanese, was followed by interviews with the American press.

The F-5 fighter, which was one size larger than the American fighter, looked like a fighter of the future in the eyes of the American journalists, partly because of its sleek and sophisticated design based on the aerodynamics of the windshield and other parts of the aircraft. In a newspaper article for the home country, an American journalist called it a "Samurai Cavalry" that had come to support freedom in Siberia. Their reputation grew as they actually engaged the Soviet air force. As soon as they began to fly sorties, the 11th Air Wing was consistently victorious against the Soviet air force, and no air raid alarms were sounded at American bases to warn of approaching Soviet aircraft. The American journalists praised the F-5s, calling them "freedom fighters". *2

The Soviets panicked. The fighters, which had destroyed more than 200 Soviet aircraft and had quickly taken over the skies of eastern Siberia, came to the front of Irkutsk and began to wage a fierce battle. Such panic was to be expected. For the time being, the Soviets adopted a strategy of holding off on aggressive fighting to reduce attrition. They only conducted small-scale reconnaissance and tried to think of a response in the meantime.

However, the Americans, who were no less aggressive, seized the air initiative in the Irkutsk area and began to act aggressively. They began attacking the Soviet air bases that were already known. For this reason, the Soviet side, which did not have radar, etc., placed a forward anti-air warning base between Irkutsk and Ulan-Ude, where American forces were gathering, in order to make early detection by human eyes. As soon as the approach of American aircraft become known, the aircraft that could fly were evacuated into the air or lowered to bases in the rear.