Are you claiming Russia’s forces have received the same levels of maintanence NATO/US forces have?

Probably not, but irrelevant at best.

Have a look at it this way:

Through the 90s the US aircraft were kept at an “excellent” level of flight capability.

Through the 90s the Russian aircraft were left to dust somewhat, not used a lot, haven’t had their tires changed or engines oiled.

It’s 2000+

The US continues to maintain its jets at “excellent” rating.

The Russians go and oil their engines, change the tires that need to be changed and repaint / remove dust off the airframes. Now they are are “excellent” level of operational capability.

Another award winning concept right?

Uh, maybe because I’ve got a better chance of finding a crock of gold in my back yard than that scenario playing out. Big difference between reality and your fanboy fantasies.

Yeah, great evidence and argument from your side, “fanboy.” :rolleyes:

Well there are lots of photos about showing Backfires sitting out uncovered. Show us some pictures of Backfires in hangers that aren’t undergoing maintanence.

Just because there are not photos of the ones in reserve or under maintenance officially, doesn’t mean there aren’t any. Since when does anyone have good pictures of Russian Air Bases anyway?

What proof do you have that they aren’t?

What proof do you have they are?

I have already provided a source, Pavel Podvig, Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces Now stop lying.

What proof do you have that source is reliable.

Now stop lying!! :rolleyes:

No, it means the systems are on the planes. It doesn’t mean they work or that the crews are proficient at using them or that they have something to launch or something to tell them WHERE to launch the things.

Yeah, just like there probably aren’t more than a few of the latest SM missiles on each Tico or Burke, and they don’t practice anticipating an attack from hundreds of supersonic missiles.

And we’ve discussed how they launch these things. In terms of being at a real war over the Middle East, there’s really nowhere to look, so a few satellites and recon Bear variants or A-50s can easily track a carrier group, which in turn could guide the Backfires, or in terms of Oscar IIs, you have inertial + SAT update guidance.

http://www.nti.org/db/nisprofs/russia/weapons/bombers/lraovr.htm

The Kh-32 is also designed to perform anti-missile evasive maneuvers, likely designed to further degrade the performance of anything against it.

If the 37th Air Army is testing all of the weapons, including new anti-ship missiles, then so are the other non-naval aviation crews, which also means they probably have a pretty good idea of how to use the systems.

“So the 100+ in the Air Force just can’t engage ships right? More amazing logic you should report to the DoD I think . . .”

Its not as simple as just going out an engaging ships, the crews need to be trained for that mission, if there training isnt focused toward the anti ship mission there going to be utterly screwed facing a competent carrier strike, missions like that need full on training dedication and i doubt the regular aviation crews spend much time on naval strikes because thats naval aviations territory.

This is the most idiotic attempt so far here to discredit the ability of the Air Force / Naval Aviation here so far.

Every Backfire is equipped with the systems necessary to launch anti-shipping strikes. That means the crews can use the systems.

At this rate, might as well ask, how many US Navy crews are trained to regularly combat a saturation attack from various cruise missiles? I mean, nowadays, it’s all about sipping coffee in the Persian Gulf and sending out F-18s to bomb stuff since there’s no way anyone can actually attack a carrier there? :rolleyes:

With only 45 in naval aviation. And that is ignoring the obvious issues of maintenance and availability.

So the 100+ in the Air Force just can’t engage ships right? :rolleyes: More amazing logic you should report to the DoD I think . . .

With 250 in total available, I don’t know, lets see, maybe 150 are combat capabable?

120 / 160 in service?

another 30 from the reserve?

or maybe 100 / 160 in service

and another 50 from reserve?

So unless you can provide better information, I’m going to stick with about 150 in total service in both Naval and Regular Aviation (which work together, by the way, if need be, check out the exercises in the Mediterranean for a recent example). With 90 in reserve, I doubt the planes have just rotted away into rust and dirt there too.

Fact of the matter is, the US will never be attacking Russian soil directly. The most likely source of conflict will be over some other country, which means the most likely place will be the Middle East.

That probably means the fleet of surviving Oscar II subs and most of the Backfire fleet could participate in attacking us CVBGs in either the Mediterranean or Persian Gulf / Red Sea in hit and run attacks.