Figure the action over Serbia was the blind leading the blind. You had 1-meter resolution of the entire countryside every 2-6 hours depending on the time of day, but a talent shortage to scan over it. And the air crews were not exactly getting top performance out of the green intelligence staff operating in Aviano; support that makes all the difference in the world. They had to basically train on the job because few of them had any real time experience. Staff cuts in all of the services before that point in time needlessly discarded so much talent which left little to no talent in many places out in the field.

Excactly. Pilot and “helmsman” on the ground did “comunicate” and the “helmsman” did order what do! The “helmsman” on the ground did read the “battle”, but was in need of constant “visual” reports from the shooter too. Such a system is effective, but can be overtaxed easily.
Western pilots do listen to the wing-mates at first, when the ground control did still allow the pilots to operate independly most of the time.

The difference in the soviet doctrine is that the guy leading the ground crew had seniority over the pilot. In western doctrine the pilot is ultimately responsible for the machine therefore has the onus on his shoulders to make the right decisions based on his best information. Neither doctrine really allows for renegade behavior, although you wouldn’t get that simple truth from watching the more popular movies out there.

Are you sure the pilot of the MiG-23 only flew the plane and let the gci team aim his weapons? I don’t think that’s how it worked. The MiG-25 may have had some ability to let the gci aim his weapons, but that was only because it was designed around its own electronic limitations. The early Foxbat models couldn’t paint its target with enough energy for the missiles to really reach their potential. The Foxbat could pass control of the missile down to a ground crew, but we’re talking a missile that was the size of an tactical SAM. The MiG-23 was designed around smaller but better technology, so I have a hard time believing it would operate in such a crude way.

It’s not quite as small but the Jane’s aircraft recognition guide is about the only counterpart I can think of that is published on a regular basis. I’ve found some small pocket guides over the years that are comparable to Observer’s but they appeared to have been one-off publications. Observer’s was a great little reference work, I have three or four of them on the shelf myself. It was always interesting to see the three views of an aircraft like the Su-27 or Tu-160 become more accurate with each edition as more information became known.

About every operation enjoys its own version of the little books complete with army, navy, environment, etc. threats. The government must pretty much cut & paste those images out of both versions.

I really wish the F-35 program cost arguments could stay in its respective own thread and not pollute every other thread throughout the forum. The immaturity of members to separate arguments in really killing the integrity of this forum.

While the costs of the F-35 may be relevant on some scale, these arguments are thin disguises for territorial disputes among our members. They really take away from the spirit of the original post.

For the benefit of the others. See the different Tranche 1-3 of the Typhoon or the F1-3 of the Rafale about that. Like the F-16s all had become multi role, when the A2A capability was reduced in favour of the A2G capability. The FA-22B was dropped and the number of F-22A is limited below 200, when all money is directed to the F-35. 😉

The terms swing role and omni role are not the same as multi role. Not so sure we want a one task aircraft from mission to mission like the latter. The two aforementioned terms imply more than one task per mission.

Round trip and it was an indirect transit so as to catch the Argentinians by surprise. One rendezvous was over Neverneverland.

The problem is the f135 is going through stubborn teething pains. It is not ready for the prime time over the arctic waters.