5th generation jet fighters

[Raellus]

Originally Posted by Panther Al

While I won't speak as to the others, I do feel that I have to say something about the last example. The war with Georgia isn't as much as a glowing example of how good the russians are. The fact that it was pretty much all over in 10 days isn't something the Russians should be bragging about. While it is true that the Georgian's 'officially' started the mess by over reacting to what they felt was a minor provocation by mostly internal security concerns was proven pretty threadbare when all those russian divisions, who by merest of coincidences, just 'happened' be to right there, and by strange turn of luck, just 'happened' to be fully up and ready to invade another country. The Georgians was way way out of their league against the Russian Army. The best trained and equipped forces they had wasn't available, the air was natural at best, and downright hostile most of the time, and was outnumbered by a truly significant degree. The fact that they lasted 10 days is a knock on the russians inability to deliver a knockout blow and the sheer will to fight on in the Georgians. At the end, the russians had to fall back to the old fashioned soviet doctrine of throwing enough sh*t at the wall to get some to stick. I won't go into the political debacle that surrounded the US reaction to it, since its a rather inflammatory point of view on my hand, but be it as it may, I wouldn't call the invasion of Georgia as an example of how the russian army is getting its stuff together.

One could say many of the same things of the U.S.-led coalition's two "wars" against Iraq (i.e. the Iraqi army plainly sucked and was pounded by numerically superior forces at the points of attack).

One of the things that makes T2K so cool is the whole "what if?" of what a major war between NATO and the WTO would look like. One simply can't predict the outcome of WWIII based on the respective combatants' performance in proxy wars against third-rate powers (or guerrilla wars).

[Panther Al]

Originally Posted by Raellus

One could say many of the same things of the U.S.-led coalition's two "wars" against Iraq (i.e. the Iraqi army plainly sucked and was pounded by numerically superior forces at the points of attack).

One of the things that makes T2K so cool is the whole "what if?" of what a major war between NATO and the WTO would look like. One simply can't predict the outcome of WWIII based on the respective combatants' performance in proxy wars against third-rate powers (or guerrilla wars).

Very true: And to be fair, the terrain was very much on the Georgians side. The only point(s) in favor of the US invasion of Iraq on this subject is that while all organized resistance to the invasion was pretty much put down fast and hard (The size of Iraq should be taken in account on how long it took) our biggest, most massive, most unforgivable goof was Rummy's decision to override the Local Commander and totally disband the Iraqi Army. If it was left in place, all those soldiers who wound up arming, or even joining, the resistance would not have happened to the same degree. If for no other reason that staying in the Iraqi Army bases meant that the Allies would provide food and pay. Which, hindsight being what it is, would probably been the cheaper option of the two - in every measurable way.

[Panther Al]

Back OT(ish), a lot of attention has been paid to the Su series, but what of the good old MiG29?

Sure, its a 4th gen fighter, and lately, the russian ones have had nothing but issues. But India still has more than a few, and like them well enough that they are getting more. The German Luftwaffe liked the ones they inherited, and the Poles still use them as well as a number of other countries.

I think that you can't count out the MiG29. The Indian ones are getting avionics and ECM from the Israeli's, who are also giving a hand to Poland with theirs. Romania actually asked the Israeli's to do a total upgrade from the rubber up on the MiG29's they had, but eventually for cost reasons backed off and upgraded the snot out of the MiG21. Even the Israeli Air Force took a long hard look at the 29 - They leased a number for use as aggressors and to evaluate them for the possibility of a no holds barred upgrade building on the prototype of the MiG29 Sniper for the Romanian Air Force - which makes sense as you can probably get a good price on the Airframes from former users, as well as I am sure if you presented cash to the russians they would be more than happy to sell as well (Hence the 5 privately owned flyable MiG29's in the USA), providing a second source of Aircraft, second sources being a very important thing for the Israeli Military.