LMFS@RALL:
The issue of the diverging RCS estimations has been already explained many times. The lowest value corresponds (if we are to believe that a plane maintained in field can keep such value) to a very concrete an optimized aspect of interest, while the bigger one corresponds to average RCS value. This has also been stated by officials and the chief designer of the Su-57, who are we to believe? Why are statements coming from US MIC to be taken at face value, when they have such an obvious interest in overstating the capacity of their armament?
As to those Red Flags:
> What were the vectors of approach of the F-22 to the F-15D? Where they outside of the angular radar coverage of the later? It is known that manoeuvring into that aspect while beyond the adversary’s radar range is one of the main tactics of stealth fighters to take advantage of their low radar detectability and also the reason why new fighters are including AESA side radar arrays or frontal ones on an orientable dish.
> Did the F-22s activate their radars? If yes, then the RWR on the F-15Ds suck. If not and they were guided by AWACs, did the red air have the same support? Did they have low frequency radars or other means that would realistically represent the Russian assets on the European front (OTH, PCL, multi-band overlapping radars, advanced passive detectors, IRST, human intelligence etc? Or where they just blind waiting to receive an incoming missile alert?
All these considerations would be important to understand the value of those statements you know…
LMFS@Inst:
I am not making any statement regarding how far a S-400 or S-300 can pick-up the F-35. I am only saying we don’t really know and have no practical way of knowing it.
@FBW:
you can call me revisionist, I don’t take that Irak’s AD was better than Soviet one or even close to it, nor was it put to work as it should, nor should it be a match for ta joint attack of the Western block, please let us be real. If you want to test real IADs dimensioned against NATO capabilities you have to take on Russia, period
Of course it is in the interests of SAM manufacturers to make claims about their capabilities, exactly the same as the West has interests in downplaying them.
The tactics you claim work very well as far as the enemy has very limited or no support assets, no modern multilayered, multiband radars, no ECM, no AWACS, no interceptors, no PCL, not OTH, no long range SAMs, no satellites, no training and no motivation to hit back hard. All new radars are linked an highly mobile. Modern SHORAD are not extremely altitude limited like in Serbia bombing. There are highly effective means against saturating attacks with PGM. Etc. etc. It is not easy to eliminate those AD assets unless your numbers are overwhelming, as recent experience shows.
@SpudmanWP:
squandering budget in impossibly negligent ways to the point that you cannot account for 21 trillion dollars is really out Russia’s MoD capabilities. To neuter ABM initiative, carrier groups and essentially every destabilising military threat from US is not. Things are cheaper in Russia and they have not been (yet) spoiled by delusions of “full-spectrum dominance” or by the need to shape their military to profit on colonial wars so they get to defend they country for peanuts compared to US military budget, get over it. Alas, main responsible for this is the US for over-stretching themselves.
You know, the Western perspective is always “we have the most money so we have the best technology”, as if this was a symmetric struggle for world domination (apart from pathological ego reassurance). OK, fine with it, obviously this advantage is true in many technological areas, especially those related to consumer markets. For Russia, nowadays, the struggle is about defending the country and its sovereignty. Does this technology allow you to force Russia into submission? Obviously not, so enjoy it if you will but it is a hollow title.
LMFS@RALL:
ok thanks, RCS value understood. Shaping in the F-35 seems worse, probably its technology is better.
Regarding the RWR… this is interesting because that was exactly the same argument many times used to refute the capability of a F-22 to attack undetected. The magic force involved then was named LPI and was apparently unassailable. Now the perspective has changed and so has done the argumentation. But I ultimately agree, and in fact radars in war time are not going to act like they were lighthouses for enemy attacks. The very concept of last generation Russian SAMs is to be very mobile and scattered, precisely because physics gives a big advantage to RWR.
As to Red Flag… no I don’t believe they are the closest to real war and much less the publicised data neutral. Why on Earth would this huge PR opportunity not be used by Western MIC? Involved servicemen have all my respect but that does not necessarily mean the approach and results are representative of those of a real conflict against an opponent like i.e. Russia. The particularity of war is precisely that nothing goes to plan… because the other side has a mortal interest in surprising you.
Stealth is a matter of prestige to a great extent, as you say everybody wants one… but still 4G remain the workhorse of even USAF
LMFS@Inst:
fact remains, we don’t know at what distance the S-400 may detect the F-35 and in what conditions. USAF was uneasy about the F-22s operating in the same air space than S-400s, way farther than 60 km from them. Russians stated on the other hand, that data from Syria confirms their RCS estimations and their belief VLO will not work against their IADs. In any case Russia is not going to get involved in Syrian-Israeli disputes.
@SpudmanWP:
have you considered, how to make stand-off jamming against a 400 km range SAM? That needs to be a hell of a jammer indeed…
@FBW:
what we have seen IMO time after time is the use of overwhelming, most modern western force against 3rd world / nearly defenceless countries with obsolete SAMs, poor training and even worse morale. Mind you, Irak didn’t even bother using their supposedly mighty military to stop the force build-up that that was later used to strike them. They were defeated even before starting the war, probably hoping that punishment wouldn’t last long if they didn’t resist. In Serbia the unbalance was even more exaggerated and ended with exactly the opposite results to what you state. That is, determined, well trained SAM crews with a fraction of resources and technology of the attackers can inflict attrition upon them with little own casualties and material loss.
Not that I disagree that a robust IAD needs to count also with interceptors and other means of the air force by the way…
LMFS@RALL:
Have to agree Krivakapa that we have (again) a discrepancy among claimed capabilities of the equipment and behaviour of a stealth plane operator with the issue of the S-300. My interpretation is this is nowhere as a lopsided case as to allow a F-35 to operate over Syria with impunity with the S-300 deployed in at least minimum numbers. Sadly for Syrian AD, their current resources (with few exceptions) are terribly outdated and scarce
Regarding the data in your post, you say you take a conservative RCS value based in the one from F-22 but used the same value… this does not match right?
Nevertheless, that value is tactically not relevant from what we know (not to say that these values are considered simply ridiculous by Russian sources, not going to push that argument since there is a clear discrepancy with what most in the West accept as valid). Any time the plane’s course is not 0º to the radar, operates aerodynamic surfaces etc it will change heavily. Add to this that several radars will be illuminating it at any time and VLO becomes real world technology with limitations and not some kind of panacea.
LMFS@Sab3r329:
agree on your post. I am simply pointing the obvious there: Israel prefers to deter their neighbours from any kind of conflict, be it high or low intensity and cultivates for that reason both a high capability but also importantly image of their military. There are many asymmetrical options that would make use of nukes very difficult to justify. You cannot use nukes against some Hezbollah rockets but they can disrupt your business, cause social alarm and cost you lots of money. Going further, it could be thought that Israel would not use nukes in case Syria tries to retake Golan Heights. So it is much better to convince their rivals they would be crushed in any kind of conflict.
LMFS@SpudmanWP:
sorry to say but this looks to me as a rather weak case. Any proof or at least reasonable bit of evidence that the F-35s have: 1) operated in Syria 2) not been detected by S-400 or other radars 3) their performance being different in that regard to other planes that do regularly strike Syria using traditional tactics (topography among them) to avoid detection?
BTW, since when is Israel a credible source in such matters? They have been systematically denying aircraft/military losses for years and overstating their capabilities, which is by the way logical considering they are a tiny state surrounded by a huge amount of potential enemies. According to them Iran has been about to nuke the world for decades and Irak’s WMD were an existential threat.
Additionally we don’t know what happens between Russia, Israel and Syria behind closed doors, where the strict military capacities end and where the politics begin.
I see no reason, following your logic, why US does not utterly crush Russia’s S-400 reputation by delivering Turkey their F-35s and proving they cannot see their stealth fighter instead of whining constantly about them being operated together. Until now all this hysteria is only giving reasons other “allied” states to negotiate the Russian system despite US “recommendations” not to do it.
LMFSStealth is both a missile countermeasure and an anti-detection mechanism. In the full-on American stealth aircraft system, you’ll have aircraft that are not only undetectable by radar until WVR ranges, but there’s also interesting reports that stealth aircraft can get very annoying WVR; even if you can see them, your electronic targeting system might not be able to pick them up due to RCS flicker.
You mean the full-on stealth system they are not wanting to fly anywhere near a S-400? Or the one designed with lower frequency radars in mind that was modified from high-altitude penetration bomber to low-altitude in order to survive Russian AD? Or the experimental one, ultra VLO one captured by the Iranians? 😀
Take no offence, low signature or rather signature management is almost mandatory today for many reasons but nowhere close to that effective as to be in close combat with the guy and not seeing it in the radar… that is out of question with modern radar systems.
LMFSRegarding super-agility:
having fighters designed with this feature in mind doesn’t mean that Russians bet it all on dog-fights due to the inferior nature of their stealth, missiles and avionics, or as if they ignored energy manoeuvrability. This is a frankly lame, self serving kind of BS frequently implied in Western military media. If it was so, their aircraft would load significantly more than 150 rounds for their 30 mm cannon, which is the bare minimum for self defence.
Reality is it was started by them not wanting their pilots not be concerned about handling issues while in the middle of a fight. This affected engine management to avoid chocking, FCS laws and many other aspects of fighter design. Result is they do not have AoA limits or concerns that they will loose the aircraft by moving the nose as much as needed to get the first shot. So just an additional resource in the tool box, nothing less and nothing more. And with the added advantage of avoiding aircraft losses unavoidable in planes with worse handling characteristics:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h97RUPvdg1o
(this video never gets old LOL)
LMFS@moon_light:
if I am not wrong, RVV-BD is the name for export version. Most modern domestic variant would be R-37M. Even when Meteor is a big step in terms of kinematics, R-37M is still much superior in range, speed, warhead and power of its seeker. Of course it is also a much bigger missile
@Inst:
modern IR missiles are ok but still launch position relative to the target matters, both in terms of pure kinematics and also in order to reliably identify and attack the target despite countermeasures. Among them by the way, Su-57 and apparently also F-35 in future will count on DIRCM which will be a hard nut to crack for IR seekers. You are also assuming that radar seekers on missiles will not be able to get a lock on a VLO fighter… this is not very likely, since the fighter will be manoeuvring, trying to run away and far from showing optimally low RCS to the missile’s seeker. And because modern seekers will catch even a low RCS once they are near enough. But even then, remind there are some MRAAMs equipped with IR seekers as well, so no need for a plane like in your example to come very near, launch a R-74M2 and outrun an AMRAAM.
LMFS@Inst:
where to start with the questions?
1) Do you have the Cd of the PAK-FA?
2) When you state max speed for that plane, what engine and thrust are you considering?
3) Where does this report about the J-20 doing Mach 2.9 come from? It has DSI intakes in the end, how are they supposed to operate at that speed?
4) Who says the PAK-FA can supercruise at 2.1 M?
Apart from the questions regarding the remarkable data you are submitting, advantage in speed is indeed an important issue that I suspect Russians have not put aside. Therefore the intakes equipped with adjustable ramps despite being heavier and more complex, for instance. I think also their oversized capture area have to do with a max speed probably above 2.5 M that would make it a very capable interceptor, even when MiG-31 is superior in that regard from what we know. Of course a F-35 would be in a dire situation when confronted with such a plane, not being capable of engaging and disengaging due to inferior kinematics and ceiling and having a relatively low A2A payload of MRAAM with only Mach 4 speed. In comparison, Su-57 would count on up to 4 x LRAAM with modern and powerful seekers and Mach 6 capable. Unless their VLO is magic, all aspect and wide band to incredible levels they will be toasted.
LMFSExcellent posts XB-70!
LMFSBTW, does anybody know if the MTOW of the plane has been detailed for all versions? All I know is “70,000 lb class”
LMFS@XB-70
Yes, besides the dry thrust will be increased notably. This is no small issue at all since the whole supercruise performance depends on it
LMFSThanks Austin
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