133: Chapter 133 An Unprecedented Spectacle! The Eagle, Roasted on the Fire! Charles Was on the Verge of Tears!

CCTV's online livestream was being flooded with four-character barrage comments.

Even if a stray pessimistic comment occasionally popped up, it was instantly drowned out by "Far Ahead."

Although more than a month had passed, Chinese netizens still remembered the words of Chief Li from the General Armament Department at the Supreme Military Region press conference; it had even become a popular meme.

There was no other reason; it was mainly because those four words were just too damn addictive!

...

Across the ocean, in Los Angeles.

Near the massive plaza inside the Eagle Country International Airshow Center, crowds were surging; there were at least a hundred thousand people!

In previous years, it would have been considered good if attendance at the airshow exceeded ten thousand.

This year's Eagle Country International Airshow had suddenly exploded in popularity, mainly thanks to the frenzied hype generated by major Eagle Country media outlets over the recent period.

These media outlets had received inside information from The Pentagon several days ago.

At this year's Eagle Country International Airshow, they would officially announce Eagle Country's sixth-generation fighter and hold a maiden flight ceremony for the new aircraft!

Upon receiving this news, all Eagle Country media outlets went into a frenzy.

One had to remember that just over a month ago, China had just unveiled an epoch-making new fighter jet capable of aerospace combat!

At such a critical juncture, the fact that Eagle Country dared to directly announce a new-generation fighter, what did that mean?

It meant that the top military brass at The Pentagon in Eagle Country were full of confidence, believing that Eagle Country's sixth-generation fighter would inevitably crush that so-called Aerospace Fighter from China!

In any case, that was what all the major Eagle Country media outlets believed...

Consequently, mainstream Eagle Country media outlets like CCN, BBS, Fux, and ABD, while hyping up their own, also aggressively disparaged and severely belittled China's new Aerospace Fighter.

They claimed that it wasn't as if Eagle Country didn't know how to build aerospace vehicles.

As early as the 1980s, Eagle Country had successfully developed space shuttles capable of aerospace flight.

Why hadn't they invested effort into R&D iteration afterwards? The reason was simple!

Because this path of development was wrong to begin with! If you want to do aerospace, do aerospace; if you want to do aviation, do aviation. It's not that the two can't be compatible, but rather that there is simply no need!

One must understand that in modern military warfare on Blue Star, the primary combat theater for fighter jets is within the atmosphere.

To expend great effort to give a fighter jet aerospace combat capabilities would require a complete overhaul of the aircraft's design, from the inside out!

Even if they barely achieved aerospace integration, the overall combat performance of the fighter would inevitably suffer.

After all, the volume of a fighter jet is limited; you can't have your cake and eat it too.

To sacrifice so much actual combat capability just to gain a so-called aerospace combat capability was completely counterproductive!

To support this viewpoint, major Eagle Country media outlets specifically interviewed a well-known military expert, a former Eagle Country Air Force general.

This Eagle Country Air Force general asserted confidently that while China's so-called Aerospace Fighter did indeed have many merits, they were all achieved at the expense of various combat performances within the atmosphere, and its overall performance might not even compare to a fifth-generation fighter!

Otherwise, why didn't China demonstrate the actual combat capabilities of its Aerospace Fighter during the last multinational maritime live-fire exercise, and instead played around with fancy boarding operations?

And why, after more than a month, had China remained evasive, completely afraid to officially release the performance parameters of the Aerospace Fighter?

In front of Eagle Country's sixth-generation fighter, that so-called Aerospace Fighter of China could only be considered an industrial flying toy!

This argument sounded logical and well-founded, and was very persuasive; it was quickly accepted by the general public in many Eagle Country and Western Alliance nations.

They believed that China's Aerospace Fighter was all hype and actually useless!

The most awesome one was, of course, Eagle Country's new sixth-generation fighter!

Bewildered by these maneuvers from Eagle Country and Western Alliance media, many military enthusiasts from various countries had their curiosity piqued; they skipped work, took leave, and traveled specifically to Los Angeles just to witness the maiden flight of Eagle Country's sixth-generation fighter!

However, when this news reached The Pentagon, the top brass of the Eagle Country military were extremely embarrassed, and Secretary of Defense Charles was infuriated to the point of a mental breakdown.

"Who the hell told you to publicize it like this? Are space shuttles the same thing as China's Aerospace Fighter?"

"Just that epoch-making stealth capability and laser weaponry alone are incomparable to those firework machines called space shuttles!"

Even now, Charles remained in a state of extreme anxiety.

So much time had passed since the failure of the nine-nation maritime exercise, and despite investing vast amounts of manpower, financial resources, and material resources, the Eagle Country research team still hadn't broken through with the new radar technology.

This meant that all of Eagle Country's current satellites were still under constant threat from China at every moment!

Once war broke out, if China took out their satellites in the first wave, all their missiles would be duds; then, if they repeated a 'divine soldiers descending from the sky' maneuver and planted the dragon flag atop the White House, and they were still claiming the Aerospace Fighter was useless...

"If you're so awesome, you come and fight!"

It could be said that as long as the radar technology didn't break through and they couldn't neutralize China's stealth threat, Eagle Country could only be described as strong on the outside but weak on the inside!

For this international airshow, Charles's original intention was actually just to save some face so that Eagle Country wouldn't lose too much prestige before they could overcome the threat of China's stealth technology.

As it turned out, these media outlets were blindly hyping and disparaging, effectively roasting them on the fire!

Charles gnashed his teeth in hatred; the plans he had originally prepared were now completely disrupted.

These Eagle Country media outlets, every single one of them, were all damn geniuses!

But helplessly, the media campaign had already been widely launched, and there was absolutely no room for retraction.

What was particularly hilarious was that their very own President Te-Li-Pu was crazily retweeting these idiotic media reports on Blue Bird, and even specifically called him to heap praise on them, leaving Charles completely at his wit's end.

There was no other way; matters had reached this point, so they could only take it one step at a time...

At this moment, on one side of the plaza inside the Eagle Country International Airshow Center, there was a small open-air stage that staff had set up as a venue.

"Dear audience members, what is being broadcast to you now is the opening scene of the 2012 Eagle Country International Airshow! ... "

"... This year's Eagle Country International Airshow is an unprecedented spectacle, with defense commissioners from 134 Blue Star countries arriving at the scene, whereas last year, only 61 countries participated! ... "

Inside the venue at this time, it was already packed with defense commissioners from various countries acting as guests.

In the back were the long lenses and short microphones of major media outlets; media reporters were concentrated at the back of the venue, conducting a global live broadcast.

Because there were so many people at the venue, it appeared exceptionally crowded, and with the muggy weather, everyone was sweating profusely and waiting anxiously.