Tu-160 "White Swan" #2

Bombers have no other means of self-defence aside from turning tail, going full-throttle and betting that their fuel reserves outlast their pursuers. However even the SR-71 designed purely for speed could be run over by a combination of a supersonic interceptor firing hypersonic missiles and bombers are a lot slower...

GarryB wrote:
Regarding the missile in question it sounds like Morfei... or 9M100 which might be ARH or IIR or have both... the core feature is its two way datalink with the launch platform so the missile is launched without a lock on the target. On land or at sea that means the missile can be stored vertically and launched and will fly in the direction the target is detected to be... for S-350 or Redut that means 360 degree engagement performance, but for aircraft it means the missile can be carried in an internal weapons bay in full stealthy mode... when a target is detected the location and information about the target is fed to the missile which would then be thrown out the weapon bay... it fires up its rocket motor and turns and accelerates towards the target location and starts looking for the target either with an ARH seeker or an IIR sensor or perhaps both. If it has trouble finding the target it can communicate with the launcher to establish what might have happened to the target and chase it down.

An interceptor merely has to catch up to the missile - with a high explosive warhead it really doesn't matter if the closing velocity is 3000 m/s or 3 m/s. The rear firing missile would still be burning forward it only has to be slightly slower than the missile for the latter to catch-up.

Where will they store AA missiles?

The internal weapon bay, but actually as part of the upgraded design they might have added missile launch positions similar to the internal wing mounted missile stations on the Su-57.

An interceptor merely has to catch up to the missile - with a high explosive warhead it really doesn't matter if the closing velocity is 3000 m/s or 3 m/s. The rear firing missile would still be burning forward it only has to be slightly slower than the missile for the latter to catch-up.

In terms of efficiency firing a missile at a target behind you it would actually be more useful to release a missile with a parachute that it hangs from its nose by... the parachute would rapidly slow the missile down and when it is falling vertically it can start its rocket motor and climb up and turn to intercept the threat or target... making it based on a TOR would be useful in that regard... cut the parachute and fire up the main rocket motor and use the nose mounted side thrusters to turn the missile towards the target... and accelerate for the kill.

Edit: what would be really cool is if they were small Tor missiles that eject underneath, have their orienting charges point thr missile in the right direction while the missile engages its motor like the tor missiles usually do. Though I think a Tor type missile system might have issues since it not IR or semiactive/active radar homing.

We have seen patents for vertically stacked missiles launched vertically from an aircraft in flight... for an aircraft the size of the Tu-160 or PAK DA you could have a large cell array of them on the upper surface of the aircraft that could launch up and then towards the target in normal forward flight... firing vertically while flying forward would mean less energy wasted doing a 180 degree turn most of the time... it would normally be a 90 degree turn...

The concept is not that new. In the early 90's the Russians revealed a rear firing missile based on the R-73. It was slightly longer at 3.2m and was also heavier at 115kg.

The missile - facing rearward - was launched by a gas ejection charge from a special rail launcher. The rear control surfaces are locked and the rocket motor was covered by a cone plug.

Once launched the missile continues ass first for a short distance and is stabilized by four gas actuators. It also slows the missile down to near zero. Only then are the control surfaces activated and the rear plug for the rocket motor is ejected.

At the time it was said to be experimental but it was probably a concept dating back from Soviet times. The system was successfully tested on a Su-27 but it was never intended for air superiority fighters - only for bombers, maritime patrol and strike aircraft.

I would think that this concept is not only restricted to IR seeker missiles.

magnumcromagnon wrote:

Were you talking about this?

Exactly that yes.

Mir wrote:

magnumcromagnon wrote:

Were you talking about this?

Exactly that yes.

They have tried some more reasonable approach as well, but can't remember the name now
The concept was a missile catapulted downward, with no motor ignition, until it was speeded up by the chasing opponent. It locked on it, ignited the engine, and attacked.
I suppose that IFF would be a factor here, same as the capability to lock on the target while falling down :-) but we can't say that they didn't try

What really cames up to my mind, is a battery of inexpensive, laser beam riding or semi active laser homing missiles, plus a rear facing laser targeting pod. All AR solutions would be expensive, while attacking a chasing missile with laser beam riding antimissile, or antimissile homing on the laser dot on the body of attacking one ... Plain&simple, inexpensive, easy to construct ... You can get a battery of short ranged laser homing missiles & targeting pod for a fraction of a cost for same solution made as active radar option. Plus those can be light&compact.

Safer firing down, to avoid the tail? Wouldn't the slipstream would force a 90 degree turn?

Some ejection seats go down but the vast majority go up.

It all depends on the flight speed and altitude of course and how quickly the missiles are ejected, but most of the time I think the extra few fractions of a second the front control surfaces are exposed to the slipstream might turn the missile back a small amount but not enough to require a huge amount of energy to counter.

A slow initial rear rotation would be good for most targets approaching from behind and not so important for targets approaching from the side.

For targets from the front I would expect weapons mounted internally inside weapon bays could be more efficient for that role.

The fact that it's on the Tu-160, which I've always thought to be a standoff platform (with fighter escorts) that can throw missiles thousand of kilometers away instead of dropping bomb. Who can even attack it. Then again, they could be testing that for the PAK DA. But if that's the case, why put it on a serially produced aircraft instead of a test bed

They have been talking about 360 degree radar coverage for aircraft for a while now, with talk of new generation radar being surface mounted... ie skin surface radar antenna, that can provide 360 degree radar coverage.

In this case on the Tu-160 it won't be broadcasting radar scanning beams in all directions all the time... much of the time the rear facing radar would be listening only trying to detect the radars of aircraft searching for the White Swan.

From the sounds of things the AESA radars have potential for EW weapons... the size and power of radar you could mount in an aircraft this size means you might be able to fry the seeker of an AMRAAM as it approaches, and certainly get very precise range information on targets behind the aircraft without needing to turn around.

Many aircraft have vertically launching chaff and flare launchers on the spine or just surface mounted to launch vertically on the top surface and backs of aircraft...

Rodion_Romanovic wrote:There is a Tu160 (the only one that was not cut by the ukroamericans) in an air museum in Poltava. Do you believe the Russians could reactivate it?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poltava_Museum_of_Long-Range_and_Strategic_Aviation
There is also a Tu-95MS and a Tu-22M3

Would make a nice war trophy.

Would need a lot of work and might not be anywhere near complete and bits might have gone missing and the money got tight.

They are producing new build models likely made with newer materials with a slightly modified shape... not sure they are that desperate anymore.

Before when they only had 15-16 an extra one might have been valuable, but now they are going to be serial producing these things, so I would say not... leave it where it is... lets not rob museums.

Tsavo Lion wrote:Does he have a point? https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/2022/01/22/letet-to-mozhno-no-kuda

It is debatable. For one the B-1 comments he makes are kind of BS. B-1 was the most cost effective bomber aircraft in the War on Afghanistan campaign.
More cost effective than even the B-52. The B-1 was also converted from a supersonic to a subsonic aircraft for cost reasons not stealth like he insinuates.
All comments about lack of sensors on Tu-160 are no fundamental issue with the platform itself and could be remedied with upgrades.

The Soviets did nothing of the sort in copying anything... if anything the B-1 was probably a copy of Soviet models and plans of the time... they had a failed supersonic civilian transport that didn't enter service because they couldn't make it work how were they going to get a supersonic bomber to work?

They didn't have suitable engines, and their designs were wrong, plus they wanted a bomber, while Russia wanted a stand off cruise missile carrier... the American plane was supposed to penetrate enemy airspace at low level at high subsonic speed... there was no point in a high altitude dash speed because climbing to altitude to achieve that speed to escape would lead to it being shot down by the air defence systems in the Soviet Union at the time.

For the Soviets, the dash speed would be for about 1000 going in and coming out, so you subsonic cruise to 1000km from your launch position which is going to be 1,500km or more from your target... you dash the 1,000km and then slow down to turn around... launch your missiles... turn and accelerate away at mach 2 till you are 1,000km away from where you launched your missiles from and then disengage ABs and gradually slow down to subsonic cruise back to base... no low altitude flight at all.

Saves fuel and extends range and the standoff distance keeps you safe from SAMs and your radar and electronics and SPEED protect you from intercepting aircraft.

Most western aircraft that can even fly at mach 2 can only do so for 10 minutes or much less... it simply burns too much fuel so their interception radius at supersonic speeds will be tiny.

(note the MiG-31 flys its entire interception flight at mach 2.4 and can operate for 13 minutes on the outward leg and 13 minutes back, meaning a radius of 750km with 200km+ range AAMs).

Superficially the Tu-160 does look like the B-1A which is much bigger and heavier than the B-1B, but they are no more a copy than the F-15 is a copy of the MiG-25... they are peer solutions to the same problem using the same materials and design fashions.

The Americans cancelled the B-1A because while it is supersonic and faster at altitude it is not much faster than the B-1B at low altitude and is much bigger and rather more expensive to operate.

The irony is that it is a repeat of history really, the west turns up its nose at the Bear because it is a slow propeller driven aircraft, but ironically at low altitude evading air defences the Bear is actually faster and longer ranged than the B-52.

The Bear is the worlds fastest propeller driven aircraft (and that includes all the upgraded up powered mustangs etc from the west even today).

Actually the Tu-160 does have reduced radar visibility and has blades in the front stage of the engine that are treated with radar absorbent materials.

It is not the barn door it should be.

The US has been wanting to cancel the B-1B for ages because it was very expensive and it had lots of problems including its jamming EW suite disabling its own nav attack system, but it has eventually turned into a useful mature system... the engines it uses are about 13 ton thrust, so they are less powerful than the engines in the Su-35, so there is potential to make it a better aircraft... to put it into perspective the backfire which has only two engines has very similar installed thrust, and if they can get more power out of the upgraded engines... which they should, it should be even better.

One controversy about the B-1B is its payload, with fanboys claiming enormous potential payload weights, but those are for internal and external loads carried at one time which has never happened in service because the external weapon points were removed as per treaty... of course the US and treaties...

Writing off the PAK DA before we have even seen it sounds like a Navalny fan... Russia can't make anything good and should just buy western stuff and not bother...

Well they currently have three heavy Tupolevs with two supersonic, of which one is a bomber or missile carrier and the other carries missiles, and the third aircraft is a subsonic cruise missile carrier too... but cheaper to operate.

The Tu-160 is not cheap to operate but its performance is the best available in the world and their next generation cruise missiles will likely be 10,000km range subsonic stealthy missiles and 10,000km range hypersonic multi stage high flying manouvering missiles, to be loaded in its 11 metre long weapon bays, which means it wont need supersonic dash capability as much but it will be available if needed.

It should also be able to carry self defence air to air missiles too.

The PAK DA will be a subsonic flying wing design that will be naturally rather stealthy simply because the shape is low visible, but the low drag design and stealthy shape means it will still be a standoff weapons platform so even with twice the RCS of the B-2 it will be a serious problem for western air defences because it will never get anywhere near them to launch its extremely long range weapons.

It will in effect be a bomb truck for shorter ranged missions and a missile arsenal vehicle for strategic missions.

It will compliment the White Swan very very nicely and allow the Russian air arm of the nuclear triad be made rather more capable than it ever was before.

It will also carry self defence air to air missiles for dealing with SAMs and AAMs launched at it or enemy aircraft that get too close.

The B-1 was also converted from a supersonic to a subsonic aircraft for cost reasons not stealth like he insinuates.

It is important to note the F-16 had its spec speed reduced from mach 2.3 to match Soviet fighters of the time to just mach 2, which meant the air intake could be made much simpler and lighter because it didn't have to manipulate the high speed air at mach 2.3 so it didn't choke and stall the jet engine.

The F-18 also had reduced requirements for flight speed to only mach 1.8 which simplified the design of the intakes and made maintenance simpler and cheaper and also made the aircraft cheaper to operate.

A mach 2.3 fighter like a MiG-23 would have to fly straight and level at medium to high altitude for 10 minutes or longer in full AB to get anywhere near its top speed... it makes you a sitting duck and it burns a lot of fuel and it is speed you quickly lose as soon as you come off AB and start to manouver, so most fighter pilots never bother even when the specs say their plane can fly that fast.

The exception is trying to fly at your highest altitude where speed is useful, or the MiG-25 or MiG-31 interceptors which often operate at top speed to get to a target while it is still as far away as possible to try to intercept it before it releases standoff weapons which multiplies the interception problem for the interceptor.

Both aircraft are essentially huge fuel tanks which is burned up in less than half an hour for a full speed interception... not something you do unless it is necessary.

Therefore, it will only be used for strikes on the most important targets — for example, on the territory of the United States or aircraft carriers.

Except they were sort of used in Syria though weren't they?

Due to the fact that the visibility of the Tu-160 is many times higher than the visibility of the B-1B, enemy air defense radars will detect it at any range up to the radio horizon, which at an altitude of 10 km is 400 km.

But that is the amusing thing, the Soviets and now Russians are looking for stealth bombers and also stealthy cruise missiles so their radars can pick B-52s and B-1Bs from thousands of kms. If western defences pick up Tu-160s at 400km that is fantastic, because they currently carry missiles with flight ranges of 5,000km (the nuclear models have lighter warheads than the missiles with conventional HE, which have a range of 4,500km), so the western air defence systems will have no idea the Tu-160 has even launched an attack.

All those support vehicles the original Tu-160s needed was probably because of the ancient 1970s and 1980s avionics they had, I would expect rather more capable and more autonomous electronics these days and significantly fewer support vehicles will be needed.... if any... other than fuel of course.

And they don't need to completely fill the tanks for shorter missions.

To add, the PAK DA does not need to fly supersonic so it can have engines like an airliner... turbofans, which are rather fuel efficient even at lower altitudes, the flying wing design is already very low drag and stealthy so fuel efficiency should be excellent, and its requirements for being stealthy will allow for its standoff weapons capability which is only getting better and better... they might even make a non stealthy version that could be an airliner or super long range subsonic transport... but certainly embed radar arrays in the leading and trailing edges and you could make a very low drag fuel efficient AWACS platform and add the enormous internal fuel capacity with fuel instead of payload as well and it would be a good inflight refuelling platform as well.

The probability that the missiles will fly through the air defense 5000 km (which will take six hours) and remain unaffected is extremely small. Accordingly, the efficiency of an expensive operation is also low.

They are working on the Grom II which is supposed to be an 11 metre long 10-12,000km range hypersonic missile... carrying 12 of those in each Blackjack which will get to its launch positions before any PAK DA because of its higher flight speed means most air defence and air fields will not be operating normally when the subsonic stealthy cruise missiles fly past so their chances of reaching their targets are actually pretty good.

The second task of the Tu-160-attack of the carrier strike group-is also not solved. It will not be possible to reach the range of 450 km from which the Tu-160 radar can detect an aircraft carrier — the carrier's fighters controlled by the Hawkeye long-range detection aircraft and the Aegis air defense system will not be allowed to approach.

The radar emissions from those Hawkeyes and presumably the F-35s operating with them will indicate the presence and general location of the carrier group... submarines and satellites and other resources will also give them a bit of a clue as well without them needing to fly over the carrier itself.

If it is carrying Zircon or other related hypersonic long range missile it should be able to launch attacks on US carrier groups from outside the effective range of F-35s in their current form, and I would expect a simple modification of the Zircon could be to shorten the solid rocket booster used to accelerate it so it can fire up its scramjet motor and replace it with a stage with a turbojet engine and wings to fly the Zircon 1,000km before it lights up its internal rocket to climb and accelerate to mach 10 for the attack.

You could double or triple its range simply by adding more fuel and making it bigger to fit in the 11 metre long weapon bays of the Blackjack.

To fly at a speed of more than 2000 km / h, the Tu-160 must rise to an altitude of 14-16 km, where the air density is five times less than that of the ground. But at such altitudes, fuel consumption increases by two to three times compared to flying at the optimal altitude at subsonic. As a result, out of a typical total flight range of 10 thousand km, the length of the supersonic section will not exceed 300-500 km.

That is a lie... do the maths yourself... to fly at mach 2 he says the fuel consumption increases 2 to three times so a 10,000km range aircraft can only fly 300-500km... really?


Because flying twice as fast  and burning twice as much fuel sounds like you are traveling faster and covering the same distance in half the time.

Flying at 850km/h which would be a normal subsonic cruise speed, means covering 850km every hour and using x amount of fuel. Putting on full AB and burning twice the fuel, or 2X... but moving at mach 2 which is more than 2,000km per hour, means you are twice as much fuel as the subsonic flight profile burns... so you are burning enough fuel to fly 1,700km... but you are covering 2,000km every hour and you are doing it in half the time you would at subsonic speeds.

Obviously it is more like three times the burn rate, but it still ends up covering more distance faster and burning a little more fuel... it is a supersonic bomber... they expect it to fly each mission at mach 2 for about 2,000km after probably flying three or four thousand kms to get there in the first place.

The 10,000km flight range includes the supersonic component...

Flying at high speed at low altitude is stupid and only makes sense against an enormous IADS that you can't break in time before you attack it, which is what killed the B-1A... flying at mach 2 at altitude didn't make it safe at all over Russia.... hell the Valkyrie was supposed to fly even faster than the B-1A and they knew it wouldn't survive either.

The Tu-160, with the primary enemy fighter being an F-35 on land and at sea is in a much easier situation, because it is not a bomber, it is a cruise missile carrier.

The B-52 is junk... it should be a four or twin engine design but they fucked it up and are worried that if one engine fails it will break it because it is a poor design the control surfaces can't compensate for a lost engine if it only had four or two...

The electron wielding used to build the Blackjack can be used to make the PAK DA in larger pieces which will make it more stealthy and easier to maintain and operate... and also stronger and lighter.

With the same bomb load, the Tu-160 is 60 tons heavier than the B-1.

It doesn't carry bombs.

And we don't know because the B1A doesn't exist and the B-1Bs bomb load includes external weapons stores that don't exist which makes it totally theoretical.

Each weapon bay on the Black jack is the size and capacity of both weapon bays on the B-1B, but half of one of its bays is normally used for extra fuel to compensate its low fuel fraction. The US rotary launchers carry 8 weapons instead of the Soviet aircrafts 6, but the Russian missiles are bigger and longer ranged and proven better.

Any long-range bomber is an easily hit target due to its large size and low maneuverability.

Should tell that to all the countries that tried to hit them and couldn't...

At ranges of up to 1000 km, it is better to use not the Tu-160, but the Su-34 front-line bomber, since it is much less noticeable and more maneuverable.

Depends on what you want to hit the target with... if you want to use the FOABs then an Su-34 can't carry such a heavy munition any distance.

If you really want to have a long-range bomber, then you need to develop a new subsonic one.

Why, the Bear and Backfire and Blackjack can all fly subsonic missions if required...

Well, it is best to completely close the Tu-160M program and use the money saved to develop several types of drones, for which we have a large backlog.

Hahahaha... there it is... scrap everything and make drones.... what a dick.

So all the money spent on the Tu-160M programme is flushed down the toilet and the 16 operational aircraft scrapped too perhaps and of course the factory for the Blackjack that will also be making PAK DAs should be scrapped too and perhaps Il-96s converted to carry cruise missiles instead.

What an idiot... also you don't write an article and discuss the situation and then introduce something in teh conclusion you never mentioned in the body of your article... any University would give him a zero just for that.