127TH KNIGHTSI have to add that the support equipment costs quite a bit of money as well.
Isn’t MOMO mostly ready to support those fulcrums anyway? I forgot about the simulators…it would be very conveniant to have 1 or 2 of those.
127TH KNIGHTSSOC…good responses all around. I think you and I only disagree on the potential threat serbia may have to face in the future. You think that NATO isn’t likely to attack serbia…I think if things keep going the way they are, there will not be any other option. As soon as the radical party takes over…kiss the EU goodbye b/c its not gonna happen and you’ll have a north korea or palestine in the heart of the East/West thoroughfare. I’ll concede to you that F-16C block 25-40 would be fantastic aircraft to have in comparison and retaliation to its current neighbors…For any country! But, At the same time…their engineers are already comfortable with and understand russian engineering and more importantly are equipped for it. MiG-29 upgrades (SMT, C, M, whatever…yadayadayada) would probably be a more cost effective solution. I think we all agree that those aircraft are very similar in regards to effectiveness and cost. However…those last two aircraft are based on the ideology that the balkan wars are over :dev2: My studied and somewhat educated opinion is that they’ll never be over. A Serb and an Albanian/Croat/Bosnian Muslim could be the last two people on earth, and it would be too small. We’re worse than Cane and Abel. There will always be a conflict that will inevitably draw some european power into the fray, and when it does…proper defensive mechanisms…whether they be aircraft, SAMs, Asymetrical warfare, terrorism, helicopters…will need to be ready, properly deployed and maintained, and used. So again, I think that our only disagreement is in regard to the potential threats in this theater.
127th Knights
127TH KNIGHTSThat makes the entire Serbian military garbage, doesn’t it?
ABSOLUTELY BUDDY! 😀 Who in their right mind would buy one of our galebs or fishbeds? By the way…the whole military isn’t garbage…just the AF…but I’ll let it slide.
Yes, Serbia getting F-16s in some form is a stupid idea, but not because there’s any fault with the aircraft itself. Anybody who gets F-16s from now on is pretty much shooting themselves in the foot potentially; supplies of spares and other equipment are going to start being hard to come by after the production lines close down to ramp up for F-35 production.
So you would support a purchase of f-16A aircraft as long as the line is still open for spares? Typical of an imperialist.
I’m sorry you didn’t bother reading into my post…b/c we stated the exact same thing. I stated that the f-16s aren’t bad planes. That the 52/60 models are great NEW planes and I also pointed out the fact that any aircraft that has been shot at, hit, flown for 15 years, and is now being replaced by a newer plane shouldn’t be purchased. Doesn’t that just make sense? Both economic and military? Here’s my statement again so you can reread it.
Anything that isn’t brand new and has been battle-tested, pushed to its limits, and possibly damaged in prior hostile engagements…is a piece of garbage. The plane (f-16) in and of itself is a phenomenal plane. As long as it is one of the block 52/60 models. But since they’re not…
I wonder how you would ever manage to maintain a military if you want to replace everything after every military conflict because the equipment you had is now “garbage”?
If you go into a war/conflict…you don’t need to replace EVERYTHING. However, if you are replacing an item for something newer…it then becomes garbage…right? It’s just going to be scrapped. So anybody purchasing that item is purchasing garbage. It may be new for them…but to the superpower that just clobbered the crap out of a third world country…its garbage headed for the scrapyard.
127TH KNIGHTSWhat exactly is your factual basis for believing the F-16 is a piece of garbage?
Anything that isn’t brand new and has been battle-tested, pushed to its limits, and possibly damaged in prior hostile engagements…is a piece of garbage. The plane (f-16) in and of itself is a phenomenal plane. As long as it is one of the block 52/60 models. But since they’re not…
Seriously now, i still think it is too early for that kind of visits. It is ironic that these F-16s will come to visit Batajnica, the base 204. Fighter Wing whose two pilots Zoran Radosavljevic and Milenko Pavlovic have died fighting the NATO airplanes. One cannot forget the 4 year old Milica Rakic that died at Batajnica when the bomb directly the house she lived in.
Therefore,i am of the opinon that it is too early for this kind of cooperation,because our recent history is painfull and a lot of people cannot forget what has happened. But in order to progress more and show we are worthy Allies,i guess we need to bend over,just like we have always done in the past.Shamefull!
I would prefer that we wait longer and get something decent than to buy something in the near future that will not fullfill our needs and be efficient.
I concur…on everything.
127TH KNIGHTSHey gents…I’m back. Sorry for the vacation…but between losing Crna Gora and the navy and our balls in general, I’ve been in a drunken stupor. I can’t imagine the G-4Ms being that expensive of an upgrade. A new one would probably run for less than 15-20 million, but definitely not more than half of what an f-16 would cost. So did you guys read the article about f-16s visiting batajnica?
F-16s to visit Serbia
Associated Press
BELGRADE, Serbia — Two U.S. fighter jets are to visit a Serbian army airport later this week as part of increased military cooperation, the Defense Ministry said Wednesday, as formerly tense ties between the two countries improve.
The ministry described the F-16 jets’ visit to Batajnica airport as a “historic” event — it will be the first time that American fighter planes have landed at a Serbian military airport.
The two aircraft will be part of the U.S. force stationed in Europe, the Defense Ministry said.
Military ties between the United States and Serbia have improved since the ouster in 2000 of former President Slobodan Milosevic
Milosevic, who died in April while in detention at a U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, had fomented four wars in the Balkans as Yugoslavia broke apart. In 1999, the United States led a NATO bombing campaign against Serbia to halt Milosevic’s crackdown against separatist ethnic Albanians in the southern Serb province of Kosovo.
Since Milosevic’s ouster, Belgrade’s new authorities have sought to establish closer ties with NATO and the West.
Belgrade’s inclusion in NATO’s Membership For Peace program — a first step toward eventual membership — hinges, however, on the arrest of another war crimes suspect: Bosnian Serb army commander Ratko Mladic.
What do you think Djnik, a precursor to purchasing those pieces of garbage?
127TH KNIGHTSI’m surprised at the high quality that the gazelles have been maintained at!!! There are still quite a few operational and in fantastic working order. At least somethings going right.
127TH KNIGHTSWeren’t there wargames between India’s Su-30MKI’s and American F-15C’s not too long ago???
127TH KNIGHTSYou guys are really messing up my sleeping habits…it’s 5 am over here and I’m waiting for your sunday morning posts.
127TH KNIGHTSNice links Eagleone. Why would you choose Eagleone as your name though? :diablo:
127TH KNIGHTSNo matter how far we progress…those people over there are always going to be shady as hell. I’m tired of reading between the lines all of the flipping time. :rolleyes:
127TH KNIGHTSCurrent budget for 2006 is ~730million USD with around 118million USD set aside for equipping.
I’m reading the White Book right now…the regular activities section has a budget of USD241 million and the construction has a budget of USD61 million. Regular activities include modernization, upkeep, and upgrade. The construction also includes fixing the remaining radar installations and facilities. Keep in mind we also have to see what the gov’t will do with the USD1.2 billion dollar surplus. They’ve announced some things but there is still USD500 million that needs to be voted on.
Nice pictures Djnik. I’d post my pictures of Ponikve, but I can’t find my camera cable.
127TH KNIGHTSCan anybody tell me how much (important) new stuff can serbian MoD buy with a 25% budget increase, if we all know that most of the equipment is in a bad shape?
The budget would be around USD900-1,000million; so after fuel, salaries, and maintenance. About half would be left for modernization and procurement a year. Now, the discussion has centered around what they should do with that money.
127TH KNIGHTSNew planes with new tech do not come cheap. So i am very sceptical towards the idea serbia will buy 24 new planes. At best, it would be a 12+2 deal like hungary or czechs did. But even that might be too great of a strain for the budget. Maybe the best solution is to go for used swedish A/B gripens, if indeed 60-70 of those will soon go on sale.
If that’s the case…then it’s not even worth purchasing. Invest the money into the AD instead of new fighter procurements. 12+2 isn’t worth it. Really, when is anyone going to use 14 planes in a war. It’s hilarious. Those 14 planes of hungary’s wouldn’t last 15 minutes in a hostile zone over Romania or Serbia or Czech republic. (NOT ENDORSING ANY SUCH HOSITILITY…JUST USING IT AS AN EXAMPLE) If we need flight patrolling aircraft…purchase 24 G-4M from local manufacturers and be done with it. Wait another 10 years. We’ve already waited this long. Isn’t having the newest, badest, most expensive plane a status anyway. To be really effective you need to have more than 50 at least.
Military runways for civilian flights
Good article…but it doesn’t really say anything about Ponikve. I’ll post some pictures of the base later tonight. But the Runway is still damaged near the end by the control tower. And the road to get to Ponikve is a pain in the a$$. If anybody’s been down that way before…to get to the base, you have to pull off of the main road right by the monument to the Uzice Republic. Like I said, pain in the a$$.
127TH KNIGHTSAs you can read in the PDF file attached,NATO claims 4 538 SEAD sorties conducted during the operation Allied Force,which were abut 21,5% of the total sorties
Correct…unfortunately for NATO, more than 50% of these sorties were outright cancelled due to weather mostly, and the other half had only another 15-25% actually carry out the mission to the end.
2) they were switched on for very short time periods
59 seconds to be exact. Not a whole lot of time.
I have heard otherwise,that they were retired before the Allied force. Namely,Sa-2 system is not road mobile and they would have been particularly easy targets to destroy. Maybe they were used as decoys in that purpose?
I was convinced that most of the “heavy” missiles fired at NATO airplanes were from Sa-3s. The units operating these systems were quite busy and were changing position twice per day and also the missiles for this system were in abundance.
Really?!?! I’ve got congressional reports and NATO reports saying that they destroyed about 2/3 or our Sa-2 and Sa-3 units. I know who accurate those latter reports are and all, but still…you’d like to think they were somewhat credible. :diablo:
Well,i woul not trust Janes too much. If we had Tor and Buk systems,they would have been far more effective than Sa-6 for example and the amount of aircraft shot down might have been different.But that is another story i do not wish to go in to again.
You’re beating yourself up over nothing. We did a great job with what we had and nobody could have asked better of the AD/AF. Again, Even if we only had SA-2/3/6 SAMs, were fighting against the Europeans, and the US didn’t get involved…I would have bet the shirt off my back that NATO/EU would never had strolled into kosovo. The American members on this forum should be proud of the fact that all AD arms of the world, set up their networks and units in a direct counter move to American Air Supremacy. If you train to fight the very best on this earth…true you may not beat them, but you’ve got a really good chance to bloody his sick little cousin up a little.
Now ,does not an Sa-6 battery also consist of radars.Why are they mentioning SAM radars separately?
Yes…each SAM has it’s own little IR radar. Every battery has a STRAIGHT FLUSH radar coordinating it’s surveillance (so every 4-6 SAMs). And every couple batteries (2-3 usually or a brigade as it’s referred to) has a LONG TRACK radar to detect bogies at even greater distances and heights. Even though these LONG TRACK radar technically belong to that brigade/regiment; maybe even a battery in cases of extreme SAM system attrition, They also belong to the regimental/brigade command or maybe the VOJIN Brigade. It’s also a conveniant way to pad numbers by putting it in a different category. It gets congress motivated to purchase new ARMs by seeing how effective they are. :rolleyes: I hope that answered your question.
PS. One more thing…I think “SAM Radars” is just a generic title for people to understand that they’re there to help coordinate AD in some way shape or form.
127TH KNIGHTSSlobo, I appreciate it bro…could you please send me that link so I could print off a hard copy of that article. For my own records.
First off, Shqiptari…or should I say Kapedani…I’d not log back in until your 2 week vacation is over. :diablo: Your obvious tone and spelling of Kosovo gave you away friend.
That said…
I’m talking about guidance radars and other associated systems of Sa-6…
A Sa-6 system is the SPU medium-tracked transporter (3 missiles, not 2 as in your picture), FIRE DOME H/I-band missile guidance illuminator radar (fitted on the end of each launcher assembly), Reload missile carrier (6×6 truck), and a loader vehicle that is armed with a crane to reload each transporter. Each SAM battery (4-6 units/systems) has a STRAIGHT FLUSH fire control radar with a maximum of 55-75km distance and 10,000m height. The STRAIGHT FLUSH radar can only track/lock 1 target at a time and control 3 missiles. The LONG TRACK target acquisition radar is also associated with the SA-6 system. LONG TRACK has a 150km radius and 30,000m altitude capability. After target data has been acquired by the SA-6 regiments LONG TRACK surveillance radar, target acquisition and fire control are taken over by the STRAIGHT FLUSH missile site radars. Based off of current Order of Battle, the 3 brigades equipped with SA-6 systems would have 12-18 STRAIGHT FLUSH and 4-6 LONG TRACK missile radars. The vagueness in numbers reflects my ignorance in exact quantity of systems per battery. If there are 6 in each battery, than the army would need less radar sites, if only 4 in each battery, more radars would be needed to cover the additional units. I’m voting for 6 per battery b/c it makes more economical sense.
I’m pretty sure thats more than 12 radars in total. What they’r talking about here are long-range survillance radars…those may be 12…obviously NOT guidance and other radars associated with a SAM unit
You’re right, there are more than 12 radars in country, but only 12 long distance radars of 200km+. However these radars are also guidance b/c they are the first line of defense in the integrated digital network associated with SAM units. 90% of 12 is 10.8…take it for what you want to believe. Either they have 10 or they have 11. :diablo:
Also I don’t know how many of those 12 were destroyed in 1999…but I’m pretty sure they were attacked by more than “29 anti-radiation missiles”. I think NATO fired about 2,000 ARMs during the conflict in total…though not all against these systems of course…but I’m guessing more than 29 😉
You’re right, they were targeted by 15 cruise missiles, 13 air-to-ground missiles, 29 anti-radiation missiles and 98 bombs. That means that each one was targeted 13 seperate times or once every six days. Not bad since NATO only had 7 days of “optimal” flight weather the first 22 days of combat. Also not bad since they had thousands of other targets like the hundreds of tanks, artillery, IFCs, APCs, and mortars they destroyed. :diablo:
I don’t know how many ARMs were fired so I’ll stay away from that comment until I can find an exact number.
And yes that is an Sa-6…it was found in Kosova by NATO.
Yeah, ok…or it’s a portable Sa-3 goa with it’s 2 rails. Judges anyone?
The main problem Sa-6 had in 1999 and why it was used so sporadically…was preciselly the availability of guidance radars for them
No, the main problem with the sa-6 systems was that they had to sit around and wait until NATO flew under it’s 15000 ft. parameter. Most of the time they flew at around 20000 ft. with the SEAD logistical aircraft up at around 30000ft.
of BUKs and such :rolleyes:
Why the rolleyes?!?! BUKs and TORs were shown on the news operating in the countryside. Hard to believe Kapedani?
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