Beating Syria’s dense air defenses is more than a matter of mere weapons. You need doctrine, tactics, appropriate C4W and proper aircrew training and preparation. It’s best to remember that Israel’s success against Syria’s air defenses in 1982 was the culmination of a decade-long process. I am not entirely sure the TuAF is entirely up to the task, certainly not by itself. Has it been preparing for such a scenario?

In 1982 the Syrian air defenses, and what they set up over the Bekaa Valley, were vastly more modern and capable (by comparison) than what they are now, never mind the Air Force.

The past record of the “Syrian Air Defense Force” (its an independent arm) its far from flatering (Operation Orchad by example), that crossed with an awfull lot of kit with an urgent need of a complete overhaul and a civil warfare…

I would be astounded to discover that the Türk Hava Kuvvetleri were not prepared to breach Syria´s air defenses.

lol wishful thinking. just because its not PS doesn’t mean its a stealth airplane. It could be a model, it could be a trainer, it could be something else. Given the size of the aircraft in comparison to the truck, i’m leaning more towards trainer or another light aircraft.. or a model

Or something in the line of a demonstrator…
I can remember an awfull lot of identical reactions to the first grainy images of the J-20, or the Xianglong, or this:

SAC’s F60 finally transforming from model to reality:

You are aware this photo was of a model/RC plane (for a UAV!) made by students for the “AVIC UAV Cup”?

Erm right Chaffers?! You do realise how massive the gun system on the Zumwalt is to deliver a 155mm projectile! Even if we used a stripped out Astute as you are suggesting we wouldn’t be able to fit this single gun tube. Even if we could somehow shoehorn in the gun we would be left with a lousy Submarine unable to do any task well. The UK doesn’t need a patrol submarine and nobody has done NGFS from a Submarine since WW2 for good reason…it usually ends up bad for the submarine! A submarine doing NGFS has to give up its main advantage in the littoral…STEALTH. So in your scenario it comes up to periscope depth sticks up an antenna to await instructions then lobs off a few rounds at a target inshore. Well the crew had better hope and pray that there are no ASW aircraft or corvette/frigates nearby as they would be dead meat pretty rapidly! Anyhow any NGFS usually has to be for a sustained period meaning the submarine has to stay shallow for a sustained period to do anything worthwhile. You also forget that the Submarine will need to carry significant amounts of shells, again where is the space. Also say a shell explodes as it exits the gun tube, well now your submarine is stuck on the surface as it will be severely damaged and unlikely able to dive.

If NGFS is needed its usually because you are trying to coerce somebody on shore like in the recent Libya action or you are supporting the Amphibs. If it coercion you want the enemy to know you are there and if it is an amphibious operation the enemy are darn well going to know you are there so you are going to want your frigates and destroyers up to provide goalkeeper protection for the amphibs. If the frigates are forward with the amphibs then they can do NGFS.

Now I understand you have put together a pet theory and are eagerly trying to defend it but the concept of diesel subs with guns was proven to be flawed sixty+ years ago (even earlier actually going on the events of WW1). In later years it was only ever done in situations where you had nobody who could shoot back.

Dont bother. Sound logic doesnt compete with theology…

I’m very definitely in the pro-Vigilance corner based on what I’ve seen released so far. I don’t doubt Searchwater will have advantages in key areas (not least range and total coverage), but, the sheer potential that Vigilance offers for non-conventional EW support to any platform able to deploy and support a Merlin is massive. Developed properly it could be a very significant enabling platform and far more valuable than a simple AEW capability.

Fair point, i admit.
I have a few reservations about using whatever cames out of crows nest in a “non-conventional EW support” mission in any other platform other than CVF, for budgetary reasons the chances of acquiring enough equipment to use in any other mission outside of training and wherever/whatever QE/POW are being used might be slim (a bit like TLAMING the T45´s, great idea for a twelve units fleet, lousy for a fleet of six ships).
Using Vigilance for EW in CVF might be a bit redundant, on a good day (a very good one!) there are another 36 AN/APG-81 on those decks, its true that DAVE B wont have a few chaps looking at consoles, and it doesnt fly for six hours, on the other hand its bloody fast, something that might be handy when you are doing some EW “effects” on someone´s else kit using what amounts to be a small AESA antena with some limited power output.
But, yes, i admit, thats something worthwhile to study. In the end without the actual numbers we can only speculate.
Maybe Swerve gave the correct answer, crows nest doing AEW and another platform (Dave?) doing EW?

Cheers

Every typhoon fan should rush to buy this month’ Air International 😮

Nic

You were right. One of the best issues in a long, long time.
To Mark Ayton, Jon Lake and the other guys and galls who contributed, thanks, dam good job.

A few snipets, in Libya not only the Typhoons did “spike” for themselves and other platforms (that was already known), but by the end, groups of Typhoons were doing ATG work independently of the Tornado fleet (pairs of Phoons flying without Tornado´s, mixed in large COMAO strike packages), a pilot describing a 8h30m combat mission also caught my atention (it must have been exausting!), and lots of other stuff.

Spat my coffee out at this one, it took you a day to realise that a 155mm naval mount wouldn’t fit in a single VLS cell!

You could have spared your coffee, the original work for a ship VGAS was based on a theoretical gun mount fit for a MK41 module dimensions (Oh, i see, module versus cell).

Using nothing but google for research is indeed folly, I think you will agree on that.

Indeed, but lets be honest, the chap who wrote “As I say most of the work has already been done”, obviously didnt even use google, nevermind anything else, did he?

Most of the work done, indeed…

Lets be honest you´ve read the 1999 General Dynamics (Martin Soifer and Teophil Kuriata) presentation and thought “WOW, nice idea” and never ocurred to you why no one picked the idea.
And then to add injury to insult, you want it on a conventional sub!
A soft skinned, slow (very slow), completely dependent on stealth to survive machine, and you want the biggest ever built to be used right next to enemy shores involved in coastal artillary fire! Hey, why not a neon saying “LOOOOK I´M HERE”?
And developing the biggest conventional submarine ever, crammed with 1999 “paper proven” technology is going to be “cheap”!

Ok, i am convinced, excelent idea.

I wonder where signtory went 🙁 Hope it is not health related.

X2

He completely disapeared. He was THE SAAB Gripen reference source on open forúns, i´ve seen him quoted in French and Portuguese.