Quote:
Originally Posted by Homer
And they can also be used as obstacles by shaping air avenues of approach to either deny routes or altitude bands turning aircraft into preplanned air defense engagement areas where massed AAA or older generation SAMs can be more effective.
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That's a really interesting point- one that I'd never considered. Barrage balloons always seemed so quaint and not particularly useful. I'd come to think of them as akin to today's "Cope Cages"- more something to make one
feel safer from air attacks rather than actually protecting against them. However, now that you mention it, I'm quite surprised barrage balloons didn't have a resurgence during the Cold War.
Given that most NATO tactical strike aircraft of the late Cold War (namely the Tornado IDS, F-111 Aardvark, and F-15E Strike Eagle) were optimized for low level attacks, barrage balloons could actually be useful when employed in the ways that you mentioned. In addition, I can't imagine that they'd be particularly expensive, especially compared to ground-based active air defense systems. Yeah, now I'm quite surprised the Soviets didn't field them. NATO, on the other hand, has always been too enamored with high tech to go for something so primitive.
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