Thanks Arctic. I hadn't made it back to page 20 yet, I'm somewhere in the teens!
That was an interesting post, especially from BaldEagle, basically saying it didn't work for him either at 40nm.
I will try adding an AWACs and see how that works.
In the meantime, I had already drawn the same conclusion as BaldEagle, and am using flags to launch the "AI" fighters, instead of the AI action itself. Works everytime!