5th generation jet fighters

[95th Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Raellus

The Su-50 airframe might end up being as stealthy as the F22 (although I doubt that it will be) and, if the MiG-29 and SU-27 series are any indication of a trend in this direction, it will probably be more manouverable. But the Russians are still a bit behind the west in terms of avionics. So, I'll have to give the edge to the Raptor.

Dunno about that, the Russians have been ahead of the curve with thrust vectoring. I think the SU-50 and Raptor will end up more balanced than people think. The Raptor will have a tech advantage with avionics and perhaps better stealth but the Su-50 is likely to be far more manouverable. In a one on one fight the Raptor will need to get the first strike kill because I think the Su-50 will turn out to be the superior dogfighter.

[Raellus]

Originally Posted by 95th Rifleman

Dunno about that, the Russians have been ahead of the curve with thrust vectoring. I think the SU-50 and Raptor will end up more balanced than people think. The Raptor will have a tech advantage with avionics and perhaps better stealth but the Su-50 is likely to be far more manouverable. In a one on one fight the Raptor will need to get the first strike kill because I think the Su-50 will turn out to be the superior dogfighter.

That's pretty much exactly what I wrote. Not sure where the disagreement is.

[95th Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Raellus

That's pretty much exactly what I wrote. Not sure where the disagreement is.

I disagree the Raptor has the edge. My interpretation of the available data is that only in the event of the raptor achieving an early, surprise kill does the raptor have an advantage.

In a situation where the SU-50 has warning of the kill shot advanced countermeasures combined with the, superior, Russian thrust vectoring will give the SU-50 an above average to good cance of avoiding a kill. After that it goes to an old fashioned dogfight and I think the SU-50 will have the edge.

Allot of Western advantage is in long range, kill shots from surprise and the east is rapidly developing the technologies to reduce this element of surprise. I think it's a dangerous weakness that the west has in relying too much on stealth and a surprise kill.

[Sanjuro]

Ever since the first world war, the essence of aerial combat (especially between fighters) has been surprise- most of the Red Baron's 80 victims never saw him. Even in a dogfight, it is less often the aircraft you are manouvering to avoid who shoots you down, than his wingman who you never knew was there...

[Mohoender]

Originally Posted by 95th Rifleman

Allot of Western advantage is in long range, kill shots from surprise and the east is rapidly developing the technologies to reduce this element of surprise. I think it's a dangerous weakness that the west has in relying too much on stealth and a surprise kill.

I agree to this. I recently learned that GPS had been shot down during the Russo-Georgian conflict of 2008, not surprising and explaining part of what appeared to be weaknesses of the Russian forces (who could not use precision ammo and had to attack at shorter range than the West now do). This weakness has already been overcome by Russia (Glonass) and probably by China (Compass).

Also, I don't wish it, I would be very interested in seeing the result of a long conflict were both sides would have tremendous difficulties to maintain the actual technological level.

Another weakness in the West comes from the fact that we have not fought anything outside of petty wars since 1991 (also true for Russia and China). Over the past 20 years, all our offensive actions have been conducted using overwhelming superiority against greatly weakened foe and we, as Russia, are not always doing that well. Actually, I'm even tempted to say that Russia did slightly better than NATO over the last 10 years: the Second Chechen War can compare to the war in Iraq or Afghanistan and the South Ossetia War was won in less than ten days. Remember that the First Chechen War had been lost by Russia, they have already gone a long way.

[Panther Al]

Originally Posted by Mohoender

I agree to this. I recently learned that GPS had been shot down during the Russo-Georgian conflict of 2008, not surprising and explaining part of what appeared to be weaknesses of the Russian forces (who could not use precision ammo and had to attack at shorter range than the West now do). This weakness has already been overcome by Russia (Glonass) and probably by China (Compass).

Also, I don't wish it, I would be very interested in seeing the result of a long conflict were both sides would have tremendous difficulties to maintain the actual technological level.

Another weakness in the West comes from the fact that we have not fought anything outside of petty wars since 1991 (also true for Russia and China). Over the past 20 years, all our offensive actions have been conducted using overwhelming superiority against greatly weakened foe and we, as Russia, are not always doing that well. Actually, I'm even tempted to say that Russia did slightly better than NATO over the last 10 years: the Second Chechen War can compare to the war in Iraq or Afghanistan and the South Ossetia War was won in less than ten days. Remember that the First Chechen War had been lost by Russia, they have already gone a long way.

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.

[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.

[ArmySGT.]

Does it have a net centric war fighting capability?

The Raptor can get all of its targeting information from other friendly Active radar in the area.

The AWACs or J-STARS will be feeding the Raptor squadron targeting info by satellite down link. Each plane becomes an extension of the squadron leaders plane after that. The Squadron Leader then designates targets and when he fires,the systems on the other raptors fire also. Each independently targeted so that a missile is not wasted targeting an enemy airframe twice.

The Raptors would be vectored to their targets and would have firing solutions before even coming into range of the enemy aircraft radar and IR sysytems, assuming those systems could see the Raptor in the first place.

This precludes the assist from Modified F-111s that are being changed to a payload of AIM-120 AAMRAMS. Something like the ability to carry 20+ engaging at medium range and using the F-111s speed to avoid a dog fight.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjyJT9wAaWY

[Raellus]

Originally Posted by ArmySGT.

Does it have a net centric war fighting capability?

The Raptor can get all of its targeting information from other friendly Active radar in the area.

The AWACs or J-STARS will be feeding the Raptor squadron targeting info by satellite down link. Each plane becomes an extension of the squadron leaders plane after that. The Squadron Leader then designates targets and when he fires,the systems on the other raptors fire also. Each independently targeted so that a missile is not wasted targeting an enemy airframe twice.

The Raptors would be vectored to their targets and would have firing solutions before even coming into range of the enemy aircraft radar and IR sysytems, assuming those systems could see the Raptor in the first place.

This precludes the assist from Modified F-111s that are being changed to a payload of AIM-120 AAMRAMS. Something like the ability to carry 20+ engaging at medium range and using the F-111s speed to avoid a dog fight.

Someone watched Dogfights of the Future.

[Mohoender]

Originally Posted by Panther Al

The war with Georgia isn't as much as a glowing example of how good the russians are.

I didn't meant it that way and agree with you about the political debate. I said they had done slightly better not much better. I only thought of military performance and don't argue that it was outstanding. I'm neither saying that the West is performing baddly. I'm only saying that neither the West nor the Russian, Chinese or Indian have had much experience with large scale operation against a challenging foe.

Back to the fighter/equipement part. Over the past 70 years, the advantage has moved constantly and neither side had the oportunity to really test its best against the other side's best. When they first appeared over Israel Mig-25 outrun everything Israel had (that was a surprise that conducted US to produce its best aircrafts: F14, F15, F16, F18 and the other way around). These are terrific warbird and IMO Rafale, Grippen, Mig-29 or Su-27 are equally impressive. Still all these aircrafts had been created using a technology dating back 30-40 years. They are as old as I'm and we have yet to see the next generation at work.

F-16 outmatch Mig-21 and 23
Su-27 outmatch Mig-29
NATO loses little aircraft as it conducts long range strike, operating away from the threat of air defense (fair but what would be the result if it had to face Patriot/SA-10/SA-20 missiles?)
The Russian lose a Backfire to a SA-11 when they had to mount improvised recon missions (relevant only to their own long range capability at the time)
A F-117 is shot down by a SA-3 Goa being tracked by a WW2 technology radar (that's a surprise but it simply means that every technology has its drawback).
A10 Thunderbolt would have been retired if not for the 1991 Gulf War.
US aircraft could freely flight over USSR until a certain U2 was shot down by an SA2.
In time, SA6 proved a real threat to Israeli aircrafts.
We are now making a big deal about all these MRAP vehicles but we forget that the South Africans have used them for almost 40 years as the rest of the world was looking at them with amusement. Nobody laughs anymore.

Things change
...

[Panther Al]

From what I recall, loosing the 117 to the SA3 wasn't that big a shock to those that knew what the situation was. At the time I was gaming with an AF guy whose job was to portray Russian Air Defense. I asked him about it and he laughed. Basically, he pointed out the usual rule of warfare: Don't do the same thing at the same time at the same place for days in a row. In this case, the pilots, knowing they was in an invincible aircraft would make its runs down that Mountain Valley night after night. The Serbs noted that their people in the valley reported that a jet would scream over them at the same time for the past few days. Well, on night four, they placed a Goa Battery aimed at the point where any aircraft screaming down it would have to exit at, and placed a guy at the other end with a telephone. As soon as that guy heard the plane, the battery pumped out massive amounts of power into a *very* small area, and placed the finger on the launch button. As soon as they heard the aircraft, they launched blind, and as soon as the missile was halfway to the valley opening, the 117 exited right at the focus of all that Radar energy. Oops.

Less a dig on the technology of neither plane nor missile, but massive props to the Serb Commander who came up with that plan - like it or not, that was genius. Even if the circumstances that he took advantage of will never happen again.