Russian vs US/NATO tactical aviation

Arrow wrote:
oth long range bombers that tactical aircraft that already enjoy a combat range advantage against western counterparts wrote:

Mindstorm, what advantage does Russian tactical aviation have over Western aviation?  

In the statement you have reported it clearly specified the parameter to which i refere.

Precisely i was attempting to highlight how combat range of tactical aircraft force of the Federation surpass sensibly those of western counterparts and how this parameter would be used (togheter with the higher engagement range of the air to ground theatre to strategic missiles) to attack the enemy air bases , to progressively degrade its air forces potential, starting from froendly air bases effectively unreachable for enemy aviation.


Су-30CМ, Су-34, Су-35C and Су-57 all outrange ,often significantly, theirs western counterparts.

There is no real need to carrybthe missile internally if it has enough stand off range to stay outside of the enemy engagement zone.

Intercepting a su-57 or any fighter jet that can supercruise more than 500km away is very difficult.

First because of the range (most of jets will cruise at subsonic speed).

And second because of the detection range which can't be more than 500km anyday soon. Awacs huge ranges are against big rcs targets. Against cruise missiles and new fighter-bombers with coating that absorbs radar waves, even if they use L band, the range will be less than 200km. I even want to say less than 100km... add to that the su-57 pilot will choose the best terrain to hide from any radar by flying low before the launch of the missile.

Arrow wrote:Western aviation has many cruise missiles with such capabilities. Russia has such capabilities but only through strategic aviation. Tactical aviation can only attack targets from a direct distance.

Name those western air delivered cruise missiles that allow to attack from "safe distance" ,excluding obviously JASSM and JASSM-ER , that are the weapons in debate.

Isos wrote:There is no real need to carrybthe missile internally if it has enough stand off range to stay outside of the enemy engagement zone.

Intercepting a su-57 or any fighter jet that can supercruise more than 500km away is very difficult.

If the range of the missile is measured in thousands of Km (such as some strategic range cruise missiles) your line of reasoning is perfectly shareable; the problem arise when you must attack enemy REAR (second and third echelon) air bases ,in particular those hosting not only just the carrying platforms of enemy stand off missiles (and obviously theirs weapon depots) but also enemy aircraft used for command and control (in western nations AWACS and J-STAR)and air-refueling aircraft.

The effects of similar deep attacks, if successful, are obvious : the enemy Air Force lose, almost completely, any capability to endanger own key rear installations and the IAD's nodes at theirs defence -even only of moderate density- but in this instance you must deliver from hundreds of km within the enemy airspace

An F-35, for example, with externally mounted JASSM/JASSM-ER could at maximum attack enemy's first echelon command and control installations and air bases (moreover defended hundreds of times more than any OTAN counterparts) where no critical assets are ever deployed and evacuation and dispersion measures are much more pressing , an Су-57 could attack, thanks to much greater volume of its internal weapon bays and combat radius, directly the hosting air bases of those same F-35s, the weapon depots of its JASSM/JASSM-ER and all theirs supporting assets such as AWACS and tankers.

Yes and no. If you want to attack so deep you will need a kalibr with 2500/4000km range. The su-57 with a kh-59mk2 may have the range but it would be suicide mission to send it attack US bases in Germany because even if it is stealth and all that it will be dead alone so deep in enemy territory.

F-35 has a not so great range and if they want it to fly above the front line they will use airbases at less than 1000km away from the front. Then it will be in range of mig-31D+Kinzhal and other new iskander disrupting their air operations allowing su-57 to go a little bit in enemy territory and launches its missiles at targets in range. You don't send him to take out targets very far when you have kalibr for them and when you have plenty of targets near the front or as you call them on the first echelon.

Isos wrote:The su-57 with a kh-59mk2 may have the range but it would be suicide mission to send it attack US bases in Germany because even if it is stealth and all that it will be dead alone so deep in enemy territory.

Well that is not the informed opinion, as result of extensive simulations, among MoD planners.

The model take into account 4 main points :

1) The almost complete absence, in western military architecture, of high-gain, multi-band radar with integrated signal processing (the development of which was an almost two decades long affair....).
2) The lack of high performance very-long-range air defense systems to the level ,such as C-400 or С-300В4.
3) The lack of any high mobile modern medium and short range defense, with optronic tracking back-up channels, capable to possibly ambush incoming Cu-57 passing in theirs defended area or to neutralize the delivered missiles at the target's position.
4) The commitment by part of western Air Forces ,within the next three decades, for interception and air denial missions , on a fleet of almost exclusively subsonic tactical aircraft - F-35 -

A squadron of 12 Cu-57 with 4 internal Х-59МК2, with probably another one with air superiority weapon configuration, will take-off from air bases placed well beyond range of attack of enemy tactical aviation with JASSM/JASSM-ER proceeding at high altitude and subsonic speed in friendly air space, possibly receiving air refueling in proximity of the limits of the area controled by Federation Ground Forces; those squadron will maintain this flight regime up to 150-200 km from first echelon of ground forces (for the presence of umbrella coverege offered by С-300В4 and C-400 divisions and division level EW that will also hamper the work of enemy radar and surveillance sateliltes) then it will accelerate to supersonic cruise speed to reach the optimal and more safe point of delivery for the 48 Х-59МК2 and at the same supercruising speed it will egress toward protection of friendly IADS.

The chances that ,even already-in-the-air squadrons of F-35A (having much lower altitude limits that hinder the kinematic performances of theirs air to air missiles and lower theirs authonomy) will be capable to intercept a similar stand-off attack group of Cu-57, maintaining reduced RCS configuration, would be abysmally low., those F-35s would moreover not receive any guidance from any multi-spectral long range radar or space-based surveillance systems.

The most complex situations and scenario would be the one taking into account the deployment of the entire fleet of F-22s in the European theatre ,that will obviously complicate thosew kind of mission and operations in the South Western European sectors for the effect of French Nostradamus OTH radar.

Mindstorm wrote:

Isos wrote:The su-57 with a kh-59mk2 may have the range but it would be suicide mission to send it attack US bases in Germany because even if it is stealth and all that it will be dead alone so deep in enemy territory.

Well that is not the informed opinion, as result of extensive simulations, among MoD planners.

The model take into account 4 main points :

1) The almost complete absence, in western military architecture, of high-gain, multi-band radar with integrated signal processing (the development of which was an almost two decades long affair....).
2) The lack of high performance very-long-range air defense systems to the level ,such as C-400 or С-300В4.
3) The lack of any high mobile modern medium and short range defense, with optronic tracking back-up channels, capable to possibly ambush incoming Cu-57 passing in theirs defended area or to neutralize the delivered missiles at the target's position.
4) The commitment by part of western Air Forces ,within the next three decades, for interception and air denial missions   , on a fleet of almost exclusively subsonic tactical aircraft - F-35 -



The chances that ,even already-in-the-air squadrons of F-35A  (having much lower altitude limits that hinder the kinematic performances of theirs air to air missiles and lower theirs authonomy) will be capable to intercept a similar stand-off attack group of Cu-57, maintaining reduced RCS configuration, would be abysmally low., those F-35s would moreover not receive any guidance from any multi-spectral long range radar or space-based surveillance systems.

The most complex situations and scenario would be the one taking into account the deployment of the entire fleet of F-22s in the European theatre ,that will obviously complicate thosew kind of mission and operations in the South Western European sectors for the effect of French Nostradamus OTH radar.    

 

Point four is an utter and complete BS.

France has no F-35, Germany neither and Italy and UK would take them as mere substitutes of  A2G planes of the like of Tornado, Harrier and AMX and not as AD fighters.
The rest of tiny European AF that would acquire F-35 even all together would have less planes than the least of the above listed ones.

Deploying more than a group of F-22 in Europe would mean leave continental US defenseless against long range bombers.

Arrow wrote:Why ? Since France has OTH radar, they see air traffic in quite a large part of European Russia.

Nostradamus do not have such a detection range, it is very efficient and ,for the technology of the time of its construction, also surprisingly accurate, significantly more than what initially computed by Federation's specialists, (like someone has highlighted here it in 1999, a still in development Nostradamus, constantly detected and followed F-117 and B-2 operations against Serbian targets) ,but its range barely reach Warsaw - and therefore would be incapable to early warn an attack against a target placed at this distance -.

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.

Arrow wrote: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.



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

Enough to maintain track of the area and the vectors of motion of several thousands of incoming aircraft (and/or UAVs and cruise missiles) and guide supersonic interceptors, proceeding in perfect radar silence and possibly outside the frontal angle of coverage of radar such as AN-APG-70 or AN-APG-81, toward them so to allow theirs engagement using exclusively passive optical tracking systems (aided by the beam or rear aspect angle of inception).

Ironically what will happen in the reality is that those wester "supposedly" VLO aircraft will be attacked from short (DAS range) to very close range by enemy tactical aircraft or interceptors with way better kinematic performances and superior missiles and moreover completely by surprise.

It is just for this "mirror thinking" that all the latest domestic radars incorporate always constructive measures aimed to obtain very wide angle of coverage; examples of that are the very wide 3D steering capabilities of Н035 Ирбис or the distributed arrays of the Ш-121.

Ironically what will happen in the reality is that those wester "supposedly" VLO aircraft will be attacked from short (DAS range) to very close range by enemy tactical aircraft or interceptors with way better kinematic performances and superior missiles and moreover completely by surprise.

Awacs can track at very long range su-27/30/35 or mig-29/31 and mig-31. There won't be surprise attack by any side.

The mini aerial war between india and pakistan shows what new wars will be: everyone sees everything and the one with more fighters/missiles at the right place and right moment wins the battle.

Radars have expended and they are much better than during cold war.

If Russia wants to take advantage of the irbis they need to include r-77M on the su-35 quickly. Because right now even if it can spot an f-15 400km away the engagement zone are matched by both aircraft with their respective missiles with max theorical ranges of ~100km. At such distance both aircraft will have spoted the other for a good time.

Isos wrote:Awacs can track at very long range su-27/30/35 or mig-29/31 and mig-31. There won't be surprise attack by any side.

E3 Awacs with a low observable strike group ? Maybe in area denial missions well within OTAN territory and against.  

It would not only represent the absolute negation of the whole concept of low observable tactical aircraft but would not resolve in any way the situation; leaving even a part the chances of survival, close to zero literally, of a similar aircraft in area defended by any domestic long range air defense systems (and against a similar trivial target theirs effective engagement range would be significantly greater than the, already understimated publicly, available.....) merely a pair of МиГ-31БМ, to assure the overkill, would proceed at very high supersonic speed at very high altitude  toward a point of delivery of theirs Р-37M, literally at hundreds of km from theirs DCA squads .....if present.....it would not survive a minute ,not in enemy airspace, but at hundreds of km from the border.

The same idea of penetration in enemy air space with independent, supposedly low observable, tactical aircraft was conceived purposely to adress those kind of unsolvable problems,, in reality the proponents of those idea was very efficient, long 25 years, in allowing the US military industrial complex to absorb titanic amount of resources from the Congress; but nowdays not even the most deceived people with specidfic technical knowledges in the US MIC still believe that similar concepts would really have a single chance of success in an open conventional conflict against an enemy of the level Federation or China, but would achieve acceptable results against much less sophisticated enemies that are the real targets of USA expeditionary doctrine for expansion of its sphere of influence.

Isos wrote:The mini aerial war between india and pakistan shows what new wars will be: everyone sees everything and the one with more fighters/missiles at the right place and right moment wins the battle.

That is not true for war between most advanced nations.

AWACS type of both sides would be near to unemployable except well deep in friendly territory in defensive mission behind the protection of several layers of IAD nodes and DCA screens and also so theirs average survival rate would be marketedly low.

AWACS has been, in the latest 35 years of western type of air warfare, the single "allowing element" for the realization of operational routines that appear almost expected by default in western Air Force mindset: from Israeli operations in middle East to US Air Campaigns around the world capabilities to be guided toward enemy aircraft avoiding where possible the area of coverage of its nose radar (just what we are debating here...) has been an expected pre-condition at the beginning of the hostilities.

It was not thanks to secret magical capabilities of western aircraft or theirs pilots that fought in the latest 35 years, even if only against incomparably less advanced opponent, that the loss in air to air engagements was very low, but merely thanks to 16-17 people in a clumsy modified civil aircraft with a powerful high-gain radar mounted overhead that through radio communication guided each pilot toward its targets providing all the commands necessary to circumvent enemy aircraft's radar footprint allowing to attack them usually by surprise.  
Eliminating this single element you would have obtained very likely a negative exchange ratio in air to air engagements even against the outnumbered outdated enemy aircraft when operating in theirs airspace.



In an air war without AWACS ,  , like that between great powers, the detection advantage shift immediately toward the aircraft that can boast the wider angle of coverge of its sensor suits and at today western aircraft are anything except prepared ,in its constructive technical architecture, to comply with similar necessity of hiigh-end conflicts.....

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.

Isos wrote: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.

Isos we must try to remain focused when we reason.

An AWACS can indeed detect at very long range an aircraft such as Су-30CM ,Су-27СМ3 or Су-34 ,let put even in total absence of jamming (that in an offensive missions ,like those we were examining, would very likely come from ground based EW having power output and band agility absolutely unavailable for any air based one), but how that would come into play in the scenario we were debating ?

We were debating the material measures in forces and the military thought behind the Federation and western approach to the deep strike missions against enemy command structures, radar structures, weapon depots and above all air bases.

 
I had highlighted 4 points of analysis of western military structure that has been at the basis of technical choices made by part of Federation's MoD in the requirements for its offensive and defensive systems.

I recall that the aim of those missions is to degrade progressiively faster the potential of enemy forces ,in this instance the enemy Air Forces, up to the point where it cannot cope anymore with the potential of friendly IAD and therefore is doomed to annihilation, the air bases targets of those operations are those hosting not only tactical avaiation armed with substrategic munitions but just fuel tankers and also AWACS, the number of which are very very low and incredibly difficult and slow to produce.

Western approach ,that must take into account the enormous amount of long, medium, short range and point AD systems, ground based EW and masking elements and specialized interceptors available to Federation defensive structure.....and all lacking in theris defensive structure.....and therefore the very low chance of success of stand off missions, has been to bet anything on a fleet of supposedly "low observable" networked tactical aviation .

Those networked "stealth" aircraft should have been supposedly capable to penetrate undetected for 600-800 km in the enemy air space passing through the holes of the supposedly reduced radar footprint of theirs IAD elements so to deliver from close range (because theirs overall size and the volume of theirs internal weapon bays do not allow to host stand-off long range munitions) the PGMs on those deep targets.

That mission ,that is the same reason of existence of the entire western air doctrine centered around very low observability do not foresee any role for AWACS, or J-STAR or any other not low observable platform for the simple reason that those few aircraft, to avoid to be transformed in few minutes in a burning and twisted amass of falling metal should remain at, at least, 500-600 km from the first echelon of enemy forces and therefore could provide zero aid for the stealth aircraft squadrons that should supposedly endanger the Federation air bases hosting the platforms and weapons that should be emplyed to destroy theris air bases.

At this point the debate turned around the important role played by some of the most advanced OTH radars in guiding defenses against enemy deep strike groups.

I 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 sqaudrons.

What majority of scarcely knowledgeable people or enthusiasts ignore is that it is just in this way (turn around the angle of coverage of enemy aircraft's radar) that low observable aircraft attack enemies aircraft remaining undetected , not proceeding head-on against those targets and opening fire.

In substance the postulate of low observability has been to allow western aircraft to attain in a modern air battle what AWACS guidance (that could be not assured anymore against adavanced opponent) had permitted to achieve in the past : catch the enemy aircraft by total surprise attacking it from outside the angle of coverage of its radar.

The almost totality of the air to air downings in the latest 35 years, included the latest ones, has been achieved against enemies totally unaware to be under attack simply because the enemy was outside the angle of coverage of its sensors, very often through third part guidance.

In substance an aircraft attain real invisibility against an enemy aircraft when it manage to manoeuvre around the angle of coverage of enemy radar and attack from there.

That is what happen also today in exercise such as Red Flag with aircraft like F-35 and F-22: low observability ,in its real effects and parameters, give simply the spacial edge, in the struggle against radar footprint, to manouevre around it and attack from a blind spot; in this way the enemy is downed without even knowing from where the attack come from.

But if at Red Flag you provide an F/A-18 with the overall uptdated position and vector of motion of an F-22 , you can bet anything you have that this F-22 would be downed (at least in those exercise where medium range missiles launched down always theirs targets ....in reality it would be very different) without even knowing what hit him.

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.

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...

Mindstorm wrote:
That is not true for war between most advanced nations.

That's true. But it's only because NATO and Russian pilots are way better trained than third world AF pilots from India & Pakistan. Moreover, NATO and Russia will also have access to far more resources, military hardware than any third world country.

Mindstorm wrote:AWACS type of both sides would be near to unemployable except well deep in friendly territory in defensive mission behind the protection of several layers of IAD nodes and DCA screens and also so theirs average survival rate would be marketedly low.

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

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

MiG-31s/Su-34s, J-20s & S-400/500 (land &/ ship based) can shoot them down deep inside "friendly" airspace.
The 40N6 missile of the S-400 has a claimed range of 400km and uses active radar homing to intercept air targets at great distances. It can be launched against AWACS, J-STARS, EA-6B support jammers and other high-value targets.
https://www.army-technology.com/projects/s-400-triumph-air-defence-missile-system/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-400_missile_system

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-500_missile_system

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/who-cares-about-s-300-or-s-400-s-500-could-be-real-killer-32697

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrYjL0QnSUg

Some H-6s & Tu-22Ms can also be modified to carry long range AAMs & act like the Soviet AF Tu-128s long range interceptors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xian_H-6#Current_operators

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-28#Specifications_(Tu-128)

RTN wrote:If AWACS are indeed not that useful then why is Russia using the IL-76?.

You mean А-50У and in future A-100 ?

Just for the reasons previously named

- Against an advanced opponent: Remain well within friendly airspace to provide search/detection/ and guidance against mostly enemy cruise missiles and coverage of area not densely covered by IAD.
- Against an inferor opponent : Employ it in a very similar way to western AWACS in the air campaigns in the latest 35 years.

RTN wrote:
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, JSTARS operate from inside friendly airspace and provide real time information to blue forces

The fighter aircraft of USA established air superiority in Iraq, Serbia, Afghanistan with active guidance of AWACS; in all the pasted wars the USAF was stationed in very close air bases in neighboring countries and AWACS operated practically from the borders of those attacked nation providing guidance for the USAF squadron.
Those very close air bases in Arabia Saudita or Italy where USAF was amassed in a war against a major enemy would have reduced to hot powder in a matter of minutes and those AWACS would have not get a single chance to guide USAF fighters within the enemy airspace simply because those kind of enemies is equiped with long range air defense that would force AWACS to operate at hundreds of km of distance from the border.

If you remove the friendly voices of AWACS operators from those USAF's aircraft cockpits those aircraft in enemy airspace become suddenly from hunters to preys of enemy fighters and the losses ,even against those widely inferior enemies, increase enormously.

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.

Isos wrote: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.

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