LevshaFrankly, selling large, fixed or vehicle-based air defence systems to another country’s military is hardly the same as giving man-portable missiles to an armed guerrila group.
Those systems went to the North Vietnam government. Are you suggesting that the Vietnamese are knuckledraggers? If you are then how much money and weapons did the US invest in South Vietnam… was it more or less
I never called anyone a ‘knuckledragger’.
The truth is that the Vietnamese, being on the receiving end of a massive terror/carpet-bombing campaign, courtesy of the Americans, had a right to protect themselves, and if the Soviets are willing to supply the Communist Vietnamese with enough hardware, including S-75 Dvina missiles, to create the World’s most effective and lethal AD system so be it, it’s just another detail of the ‘Cold war’, it’s history.
But let me remind you that the Soviet air campaign in Afghanistan in the 1980s was also nothing more than a glorified terror/carpet-bombing campaign, much of it carried out by Soviet Long-range Aviation using T-16s and Tu22Ms, aircraft not renowned for their precision attack abilities. Hundreds of thousands of tonnes of explosives were dropped in rural areas of Afghanistan, there was no distinction made between civilians and combatants. It’s estimated that between a million and a million and a half Afghans may have died in the war, along with a few million refugees as well.
Under such circumstances the Afghan people have a right to defend themselves as you know, and if the Americans, or Saudis or Pakistanis are willing to help the Afghans defend themselves so be it. It was the Cold War, history you know. To call those Afghans who took up arms against the Soviets and Afghan communist government ‘terrorists’ is just another example of double standards.
You don’t call the ‘Viet Cong’ terrorists do you, or the Iraqi insurgents who are now fighting the Americans?
The Soviet Union was, I believe, the first or second country in the world to recognise the State of Israel in 1948. As to why the Soviet Union then proceeded to supply thousands of missiles and tanks to Israel’s Arab neighbours to help these Arab countries destroy Israel defies explanation…
Post WWII the largest government supplier of effective MANPADs has been the US. The Soviets gave anyonewho wanted them SA-7s, but as they were about as effective as Red Eyes (which the US also handed out to anyone who wanted them) they are not seen as the problem. What is seen as the problem was the Stinger class weapons, which the US handed out in the thousands in places which later turned against them.
What you’ve written here is just rubbish so I won’t respond to it meaningfully.
For the most part the SA-7 ‘Strela’ is a far more successful MANPADS than the Stinger. What type of missile is shooting down all those American helicopters in Iraq, or all those Russian helicopters in Chechnya? Far more aircraft have been shot down by the Strela than by the Stinger missile in the last 20 years (I should think?).
Like the Sherman tank of WWII, the SA-7 is highly successful, not because of its technology or design, but because of its ready availability to those who should need it.
Or as Joseph Stalin once put it tartly “quantity possesses a quality all of its own”
Levsha.Also, Garry is right (though he doesn’t make enough of it) that the US was selling the world’s most advanced MANPADS to the Afghanis before the Soviets even had effective MANPADS developed.
And the 6000 or S-75s delivered to North Vietnam in the 1960s/1970s, or the thousands of SA-6/7/9s, Shilkas etc. sold to those various Arab countries engaged in trying to wipe another country ‘of the map’?
And yet people keep harping on about the the few hundred or so ‘Stingers’ that were delivered to the Mujahadeen in the 1980s – as if it had been greatest treat to world peace ever.
After all, the underlying reason for the success of nearly all Soviet weapon systems, be it an AK-47, SA-7, MiG-21, RPG-7 or whatever, was never so much the actual technical qualities of these weapons, so much as the fact of their widespread availability and supply to all and sundry who wanted to use them…
LevshaStrange mag…
This may seem off topic and I know very little about guns (so excuse my ignorance) but what sort of magazine is that shoved into that AR-15/M-16 type rifle?
It looks like a 9mm clip for a MAC-10/UZI, or some other type of sub-machinegun?:confused: :confused:
Very incongruous looking…
LevshaHave come across a late ’60s, apparently experimental STOL fighter bomber allegedly from the Mikoyan stable. Just a book photo of what looks like a tailed delta config and carrying the NATO codename ‘Faithless’.
Google gets me not very far. Anyone enlighten me?
It’s called the MiG-23PD, try this thread
LevshaAn interesting comparison may be with the Soviets in Afghanistan, anyone have details on their losses?
Armored Hinds would fare much better against the AAA, and would have enhanced survivability against MANPADS, but would it be to any significant extent?
The ‘HIND’ has never shown itself to be any less vulnerable to enemy fire, compared to say, an AH-64.
330 helicopters were lost in the Soviet-Afghan war of the 1980s, the majority of them Mil Mi-8s and 24s. The Russian army has also lost dozens of helicopters in the Caucasus region, especially in Chechnya, in the last 10-15 years or so.
Neither the Hind or the Apache have shown any kind of immmunity of MANPADS or RPGs. Both of these helicopters may be relatively well armoured (in comparision to other aircraft) but you can never design an aircraft to withstand a direct hit from a guided or unguided anti-tank weapon, which one can expect to find with any reasonably well equipped and trained opponent (which the Iraqi and Afghan insurgents aren’t…yet)
What chance an Apache against an opponent armed with a “Kornet” anti-tank missile or even against AT-4 SPIGOT!
LevshaAsk Eritrea ……..
You’re talking about the female piloted Ethiopian Flanker shooting down the Eritrean MiG-29?
It is still very much disputed as to whether that event ever happened or not…
and it’s still but one alleged kill to its name, nothing to shout from the rooftops over!
“The Flanker” – king of the Third World brushwar!!
LevshaI mainly centered my list on the airplane performance on the Field, since is what they are supposed to do, that is why you do not see any F-22, EF2000, Rafale etc…….
Well you probably shouldn’t have included the Su-27 either – what kind of record does it have “on the field”? 😉 :rolleyes: :rolleyes:
LevshaDon’t forget, that we are comparing what was a pretty basic design of wing with some much more complex ones – with current CFD capabilities, one could expect to improve significantly on the design. Did the F-14’s wing even incorporate LE slats?
I read somewhere recently that the F-14’s wing (or at least the outer pivoting part) is basically just the same design as the A-6 Intruder’s wing.
Is this true?
Levsha1. Mig-25
Why? Because it was the root cause of the F-15 and F-14 which also lead to the F-16 and F-18 and subsequently the Mig-29 and Su-27, not to mention the Mig-31. Although the Mig-25 was a fairly mediocre aircraft in service (aside from it’s speed) the influence it had on aircraft design because of it’s presence is hard to overstate.
and what provoked the development of the MiG-25 in the first place? the SR-71/A-12 and perhaps the B-70 – with only the “Habu” actually seeing service, and even then with only a few dozen actually built.
Quite a lineage if you ask me.:cool:
I think the development of the F-15 was influenced by the MiG-25 (without MiG-25 it would guess the max Mach would be at M2.2 or so), but that’s it. Later aircaft had other threats in mind, and were governed by other voundary conditions.
I always thought that the main specifications and performance criteria for the F-15’s basic design were decided by the lessons learned in the Vietnam war by the US air power establishment.
I’d almost say that it was combat against North Vietnamese MiG-17/19/21 which had a greater input into the F-15’s design than the apparent high speed of the MiG-25.
Levsha… that you have a 1970’s airframe, that has taken a lot of weight, maybe?
Aah… but the the F-18E/F is not a 1970s airframe. Despite its “F-18” designation and appearance the “E” has very little in common with the “A”. The “E” is an almost completely new 1990s design.
I quite like the Super Hornet and I can’t see how it is any worse than the navalised MiG-29K or Rafaele and I think that the Russians and Chinese (if they choose to order it) have made a big mistake in choosing the the Su-33 aiframe as their “palubniiy” carrier-borne aircraft. The’re not going to find it any easier to operate and maintain such a large and complex aircraft in the middle of the ocean – any more than the Americans found it easy operating the F-14.
Put it down to experience…
LevshaThe F-18E is an overgrown, compromised version of the loser of the Lightweight Fighter Competition.
What’s wrong with being the “loser” of the Lightweight Fighter Competition?:confused:
Would you have objected if the US Navy had chosen the YF-23A as the basis of its carrier-borne fighter instead?
It was, after all, the “loser” to the YF-22A in the ATF Competition:D :dev2:
LevshaIt had a small frontal cross section and narrow wings. I remember reading somewhere that it was possibly the first aircraft capable of supercruise in level flight but I don’t know if that applied to all versions
Well it had supercruise of sorts, and along with the F-104 Starfighter, it could indeed exceed the speed of sound without afterburner, but only in the clean configuration, so I don’t see how this “supercruise” ability was going to be of any use.
can remember a Flight magazine discussion from the late ’60s comparing the relative merits of the Lightning and MiG21 which went on for some length… only to finish with some statement like ‘of course, it’s unlikely the two would ever meet in combat’. Too true – given where they were based at the time in the Cold War, they would both have been running on empty well before hitting Red Top range…
Which aircraft actually had the shorter range/radius of action – the MiG-21 or the Lightning?:confused:
LevshaMIG-35 has one advantage over F-18E/Rafale/EF that it is not using extensive composite materials and advance manufacturing techniques. so ther is alot of potential for improvement in structure.
Such nonsense…:confused:
I haven’t got information about the actual MiG-35, but according to This month’s edition of “Vzlyot” magazine (http://www.take-off.ru) the MiG-29KUB has a substantial amount of its airframe made from composites “all that is not the colour yellow” according to a project chief.
I’m not sure, but I don’t see why the MiG-35 would be any different.
LevshaThen Tor-M1 already have done its job. Remember, every airforce in the world spend huge amount of money training low-level flights and terrain following. And believe me, its not becouse they find it funny.
…in which case you’d have to be the first person to admit that possibly the most successful air defence system in the cold war period could have have been the Mujhahadeen’s in the Soviet-Afghan war of the 1980s.
When the Soviets found out that the Mujahadeen had been supplied with Stinger missiles in 1986, the minimum allowed altitude that strike aircraft had to fly above was 4500 metres (15,000ft). But even before the arrival of ‘Stingers’ every effort was made by Soviet pilots to keep either above or outside the perimeter of the Afghan guerillas’ AD fire, i.e. 12.62/14.62mm machineguns or SA-7/Redeye MANPADS regardless of the detrimental effect this had on accuracy
The Soviet airforces were not reknowned for their bombing accuracy in the Afghan war…
LevshaToo bad the release points of PGMs are outside the SA-15’s engagement range.
I do faintly recall reading somewhere, that the Tor-M or some other Russian AD system(s) could shoot down targets as small or as fast moving as a PGM.:confused:
Could “low vis'” stealth technology be applied to a PGM? After all, the RCS of a PGM like a JDAM or HARM is extremely small, and applying the latest stealth tech could render the weapon almost invisible to the enemy’s AD radar – or at least until the last mile or so!:confused:
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