For years the Clone strategy was to assume they could not match the DDS in space and so retain their strong conventional forces to deter an attack. The advent of serious ground attack capabilities by the DDS totally ruined that strategy and the HCS, for the last couple of years, have been working on reducing their vulnerability to an attack from space.
The HCSAF have announced they will build 24 new airbases on Cloneworld which will be "dispersal airfields". The airbases are likely to be well hidden and have a deployable semi-permanent runway. Most HCSAF combat aircraft and many transports have a good rough field capabilty. Some like the A-85 COIN aicraft can literally operate from fields that are "reasonably" flat.
The idea of these new airbases is to allow the HCSAF to retain strike back capability against a ground invasion in the event of the DDS gaining space superiority and being able to strike HCS facilities at will. The HCSAF are also working on an anti-space vehicle missile that can be fired by the F-45 though unlike the TPM-A it will not have a transphasic warhead. A nuclear warhead would do just the job though.
