VVS Russian Airforce Force: News #2

I wonder how accurate the OTH container is. Apparently he was observing the F-35 in the Middle East near the Iranian border. With the fact that F-35 is easier to detect than B-2 and F-117.

As said deep air operations, like that previously described, in the Western and South-western european targets would be very difficult to carry on because interceptors could be cued toward the incoming aircraft by Nostradamus and therefore would require a level of corollary asset for the strike squadrons very big and also with them the success would be seriously in question. wrote:

So all that remains is hypersonic missile attack? Kindzal, Gzur, Zirkon. Zircon is a little short range.

Yes but they will see the sukhoi. Maybe not the su-57 but all the other have big rcs. So the Awacs will tell the other jets where they are before beung destroyed or retreating.

But most european jets would also see those non stealthy Russian aircraft if they used their own radars.... the value of the AWACS is that they don't normally have to look or think for themselves... once the AWACS are taken out or forced to withdraw then HATO fights one plane at a time with little or no coordination... can you not understand how much less effective that makes them in a single stroke?

I'm not debating about how good awacs are but only saying that they will see older sukhoi pretty far away and the surprise attacks are very unlikely.

But then like you say it depends of what you do. R-37M is a dangerous weapon for them.

Air to air missiles are a long way from 100% kill probability, but it is not an accident that the R-33 was intended to hit targets pulling up to 4 gs, but the R-37M is able to deal with targets pulling 8gs.

With its lofted trajectory the R-37M will likely be coming down at a very steep angle at perhaps mach 6... one second before impact it will be a tiny dot at a 60-70 degree angle upwards about 1.5km distant and one second later boom the 60kg HE warhead will be spraying the target with fragments... would be tricky to dodge even if you saw it coming...

That's true. But it's only because NATO and Russian pilots are way better trained than third world AF pilots from India & Pakistan.

Not really... various training exercises show Indian pilots in Indian planes can be just as capable as US pilots, and I would expect the same for Pakistani pilots... though the Indian pilots against the Americans have the advantage of using unfamiliar Soviet and Russian planes and weapons, while the Pakistani pilots have to beat the Americans with American jets... and not their best ones either.

HATO and Russian pilots will perform better because HATO uses AWACS to effectively act as a mobile IADS, while Russian pilots have a real fixed and mobile IADS structure with the support of radars and SAMs and other systems.

HATO is vulnerable because if you have long range AAMs then those AWACS and JSTARS can be shot down... effectively blinding their forces and making them have to use their own radar making them all much more visible to Russian IADS assets.

If AWACS are indeed not that useful then why is Russia using the IL-76? AWACS at least in the US were never designed to enter enemy airspace. But we did enter enemy airspace in Iraq, Afghanistan once our fighters established air superiority.

AWACS is your mobile IADS that you take with you to control your air power... Russia has it because having a radar in the air is useful, but their entire IADS is not centred around large slow vulnerable AWACS planes. They are enormously useful but also vulnerable and clearly a target for your enemy.

If the US operates anywhere it needs to take AWACS planes with it to direct its aircraft... it tries to avoid getting too close to the enemy but to manage air operations it needs to operate within radar range... and it is not an accident that Russian anti AWACS missiles have ranges of about 400km and can be carried by the Russian equivalent of the F-22 internally....

Now imagine a Kh-31 with its ramjet motor replaced with a scramjet motor that allows it to fly at mach 9 for 800km at 40km altitude to then dive down at mach 12 on an AWACS aircraft based solely on the radar signal from the AWACS platform... SURPRISE!!!!

AWACS, JSTARS operate from inside friendly airspace and provide real time information to blue forces.

Indeed they do and the information they provide friendly forces is critical to the effective use of air power for HATO... over europe and in foreign conflicts... you guys based your whole game around them... what happens when they are not there?

US won't send AWACS inside enemy territory. They will try to clean step by step enemy airspace from the front line. They are not stupid.

They are not stupid... in situations like Kosovo where the threat of MANPADS was high they didn't even bother sending Apache attack helos because of the risk and killed a lot of friendlies because they refused to fly low and properly identify that is a tank and not a tractor...

In a situation where the enemy has S-400 they wont operate their AWACS within 400km of known or suspected positions which dramatically reduces its potential to manage engagements over any front line against Russia, but what are they going to do about a flight of MiG-31s flying at 20km altitude at mach 2.8 with 300km range R-37s or the upgraded replacement... they are subsonic aircraft.... they can't run away effectively... they can direct fighters to intercept but by the time any missiles launched reached their targets the MiGs might have already launched all their weapons... they wouldn't attack alone they would likely be supported by Su-35s that are engaging any aircraft trying to stop them, or any SAMs launched against them too... the AWACS is a very capable system that HATO air power is built around...

I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't a ground launched 2,500km range version of Iskander intended to shoot down AWACS and JSTARS planes... it wouldn't take much modification... they already come with multiple choices of seekers and warheads...

Those bases where the AWACS would sit or go for refueling would be hit.

Refuelling planes would also be a high priority because taking them out would dramatically reduce the reach of HATO aircraft and the speeds they could operate at...

have pointed that domestic OTH sensors, such as 29Б6 Контейнер, even leaving a part the considerations about the total fallacy of the western assumptions on low observability of those aircraft against modern samples of domestic air defense that by itself would render useless any further elaboration, is perfectly capable to guide interceptors ,proceeding in toal radar silence, around the frontal radar footprint of those stealth aircraft so to attack them by total surprise using passive optronic systems, opening fire with medium range missiles delivered at supersonic speed from relatively close range to increase the Pk and then proceeding to very close range to destroy the remaining of the sqaudron wrote:

Mindstorm, currently tactical USAF / NATO forces would have a very big problem with penetrating the Russian airspace and trying to destroy bases, command centers, etc. Without AWACS, without tankers in such a large space at all, they have some chance to operate in the Russian airspace with such a strong IADS. It is true that USAF / NATO has many more aircraft. So they have an advantage in aviation. Strategic aviation also has no chance for any action in Russian airspace?

As well as all these missiles coming from the east, the UK in particular, with its air tanker/AWACS bases, will be under assault from the west as well, with missiles rising out of the sea.

Attacks don't even need to disable their runways, although that would be an objective, once the over/under ground fuel tanks are gone or seriously reduced its game over.

The UK and most of Europe took the 'peace dividend' and cut significantly the number of military airfields, I think from the top of my head that we only have 10 now. Although many did turn into civilian airfields so can still probably refuel AWACS at least.

They say that Generals fight the last war but in this aspect, blinding the enemy air defences, the lesson of the Luftwaffe not destroying the UK's radar stations and airfields, has been well learnt.

Mindstorm wrote:

The attacks toward deep OTAN bases ,instead, will see the massive employment of the bulk of the long range munitions and will not be directed against runways, fuel storage and flight command but directly against the AWACS, tankers, advanced  5th generation tactical aircraft and air-launched cruise missiles and PGM in the airfield's weapon depots  

Air bases in the United Kingdom will not be a primary targets because the center of actions on the continent would happen much more to the South; the situation moreover would be significantly different from WWII also for technical reasons : just for example today some MRLS could reach London area from North France  

The major NATO air tanker base is Mildenhall and I suspect that Waddington would be the AWACS base as neither function could be performed out of Germany. That would I suggest make them primary targets.

dino00 wrote:What I think is absent in the discussion is the F-15 EX with JASSM-XR, that because of the combat radius of the carrier and the range of the weapon could target Russian sites in less forward positions.

The F-15EX are single seat interceptor replacements for the end of life F-15C/D. Although it will have a dual seat capability that functionality has not been purchased yet, the USAF regarding the current F-15E as still sufficient.

It is true that USAF / NATO has many more aircraft. So they have an advantage in aviation. Strategic aviation also has no chance for any action in Russian airspace?

AWACS is more than just a flying radar... it is airborne command and control... it is effectively their IADS.

When US led forces took down Iraq in 1990 they didn't just shoot down all their planes.... what they did was use cruise missiles and stealth bombers and even attack helicopters to hit main radar sites, HQs, command and control centres, communication centres... effectively what they did was take down there command and control and communications of their forces... they didn't need to kill their leaders and commanders... just destroy their commanders ability to communicate with their forces... essentially turning the fight into a mop up operation where each enemy unit is on its own against your entire team...

Shooting down HATOs AWACS and JSTARS planes makes the job for HATO much much harder because they will need to use their own radar to determine the air situation and they will only see what their radar can see... and also they don't have anyone at a higher level managing their moves...

AWACS was developed with an air war like that in Vietnam in mind.

AEW aircraft are old, and have evolved and developed over time. Over time features like command and control were added to improve the on the fly performance of air power.

With todays 40N6 and R-37M missiles the best way to use an AWACS is to try to guard your own airspace against an attack = defensive. Which is a loss for NATO.

Soviet and Russian development of long range weapons to defeat AWACS and JSTARS is mainly because they are so effective in coordinating and managing an attack of air power.

The value of the aircraft means that the suspicion of long range weapons designed to engage them will directly impact on their effectiveness because they will be held back more and this alone will make them less effective...

They say that Generals fight the last war but in this aspect, blinding the enemy air defences, the lesson of the Luftwaffe not destroying the UK's radar stations and airfields, has been well learnt.

Ironically it could possibly be because of western assessments of Russian air power being rather biased.... they think the MiG-29 and subsequent aircraft are mediocre, and don't really rate other aircraft very highly either.... I mean when Sweden describes a Gripen as an Su-35 killer and most western experts don't just openly laugh in their faces suggests a real lack of respect.

And their biggest problem is that Russia recognises that the west focusses on air power more than anything else... Europes primary defence from cruise missile attack is their air power... apart from new radars for Americas ABM system you really don't seem to have proper coordinated radars networked to work together...

What I think is absent in the discussion is the F-15 EX with JASSM-XR, that because of the combat radius of the carrier and the range of the weapon could target Russian sites in less forward positions.

The problem there is that F-15EX with external weapon loads is not going to be stealthy, and if F-35s can be detected and tracked then the chances of sneaky attacks by stealthy aircraft and weapons when the aircraft are not actually stealthy becomes interesting. Russian air defences are layered so to reach targets behind the front line they will have to pass over multiple areas defended by various systems... the IADS will detect such an attack relatively early and while it might not be clear as to the actual target the weapons are trying to reach... every little bubble these weapons pass over will be a chance for interception and for rather long range missiles like JASSM-XR you would probably have the time to launch interceptor aircraft to shoot it down with an R-73...

The E-3 AWACS can also be Refueled in Flight:

Refuelling aircraft will be as high a priority as AWACS aircraft and JSTARs... they will likely be either shot down or withdrawn too...

They would be used closer to/over enemy territory only after massive missile strikes to degrade the IAD & destroy airfields, to help achieve air superiority & clean the skies of any remaining defending fighters.

As the Serbs showed in the conflict in Kosovo... even with air domination... which they are not likely to get with Russia... even after a month of hitting target after target... or should I say decoy after target... the Serbian air defence was still a real threat without having the mobile systems modern Russia has that makes them rather more of a danger.... in fact I would say that even if you grounded every Russian aircraft HATO still couldn't operate over Russia because the air defence would be too strong.