—” not an afterburner mode as used in regular turbojets.”
Same thing only different?
“The Pratt & Whitney J58 (company designation JT11D-20) was an American jet engine that powered the Lockheed A-12, and subsequently the YF-12 and the SR-71 aircraft. It was an afterburning turbojet with a unique compressor bleed to the afterburner which gave increased thrust at high speeds. Because of the wide speed range of the aircraft, the engine needed two modes of operation to take it from stationary on the ground to 2,000 mph (3,200 km/h) at altitude. It was a conventional afterburning turbojet for take-off and acceleration to Mach 2 and then used permanent compressor bleed to the afterburner above Mach 2. The way the engine worked at cruise led it to be described as “acting like a turboramjet”.[1] It has also been described as a turboramjet based on incorrect statements describing the turbomachinery as being completely bypassed”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pratt_%26_Whitney_J58
An en fine guy would know, but it was my understanding that the air was pretty much just bypassed around all the usual turbine stuff and rammed into the combustion chamber.
Almost like you could take away all the turbine bits in the high speed mode and it would happily chug along.