Another issue is of how the Russians did pilot training. In most western AF’s, the pilots are all trained to a common standard. I remember reading the Soviet AF/s used to have “sniper pilots”- the experten, and the line pilots, and the former got better resources, etc.

Could be absolute BS for all I know.

Pit, might have more details. This appears to be his area of expertise, or RSM55/ Martinez’s.

There was/is no such thing as “line” and “non-line” pilots in the USSR/Russia. It’s a term coined by journalists or people who have lost contact with the military since WWI. The USSR did not have “reserve” pilots, the way the Swedes or the Swiss do, so there is no such term as “line/non-line” pilot when applied to the Sovs/Russians.
There was, however, a gradation sistem that was intended to reflect the pilot’s expertise and take into account the fact that pilots are a bl**dy infatuated folk worldwide 😀 and badly need nice badges to feel special.
So after graduating from a Military Flight High School/Institute, every Soviet pilot basically had a minimum flying hours in his logbook – in the Russia of the 90’s, this requirement was of course often disregarded. In the course of his learning years, a Soviet pilot received basic squadron tactics and technics education, and quite extensive flight experience. But the schoolwork did not stop by then – the cadet receives a “pilot 3rd class” badge and proceeds to master the combat duty proper in a given regiment – depending on the aircraft type he was specialising into during the final years in the Flight School.
The 2nd grade – 1st grade progression was not only a function of flying hours but also of the number of specialisations aquired by the pilot – for example basic combat tactic; basic combat application, night operations, air-to-ground operations, clearance for different weapon systems etc etc.
1st grade pilots could then become flight instructors – but that necessitates a new “schooling” programme.
“Sniper pilots” were/are a über-1st-class gradation – it’s mostly honorific and certifies that the pilot is a pilot 1st class who has vastly exceeded the minimal flying hours requirements, has been cleared to fly several types of aircraft/helos, has had constitutive combat/combat application experience and a conclusive experience in combat/combat training use of all the types of ammunition he is cleared to use. That’s why test pilots are usually “simply” 1st class pilots and not sniper pilots, as their qualification presupposes little real combat/combat application experience but much more testing/flight research/tech expertise.

Now, concerning the real/supposed/official performance of Soviet/Russian tech: Soviet military hardware was very officially designed with several levels of “limitations”. For example, the official “G-force limitation” could well be beyond the military “combat” limitation and be in turn below the real max. G-limit. The reasons for this are multifold and would vastly expand the scope of this post, so I won’t elaborate here.
But the fact is that we know that:
– in a famous incident in the mid-80’s, a Foxbat survived a 7G and returned to base before safely landing with critical rivets simply blown away and the canopy incrusted in its casing
– a Tu-95 returned to base with its upper fuselage resembling a waffle after surviving a violent dive recovery
– what was the range at which the infamous Ukrainian S-200 downed the civilian Tu again?
– what was the range that the famous pilotless MiG-23 covered before crashing somewhere in Western Europe again? 😉

The GELA project was rumored to have been a spin-off development of the Meteorit for the military, even though it was displayed as a technology research vehicle. Beyond that, there’s probably no direct successor to Meteorit as it never entered service, and the Yakhont should be the logical successor to Granit at this point.

Some reports suggested that the budget for hypersonic projects (unspecified) has more than doubled in Russia since last year. They have also cancelled all cooperation with the EU regarding hypersonic projects (RADUGA D-2, hypersonic engine and the like). The declassifying of the Meteorit has been interpreted by some analysts as a sign that they were near something better. But I doubt that it will be a air-launched system.

RuAF post Georgia review outlook:

http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/the-dewline/2008/09/russian-air-force-after-georgi.html

It’s not utter rubbish, but still very bad analysis:

Additional measures may include reducing vulnerability for the Su-25, which accounted for three of the air force’s four losses.

What “additional measures” are feasible here? Of course they could ruin the budget by adding towed decoys, but why should they? A CAS bomber is always exposed to all kinds of threats. The Frogfoot is quite robust anyway, and there is no avalaible and cheap way to escape modern MANPADS. Not for a CAS aircraft. Improving the overall SEAD and el-warfare capacity of other assets would protect the Su-25 much better.

Immediate and medium-term actions are expected in relation to the Tupolev Tu-22M fleet. This may well be given a top priority in the view of the humiliating loss in Georgian airspace of a Tu-22M3-R

They might upgrade them a bit, but the best improvement would be not to send such an aircraft in a space where Buk-like systems operate anymore, at least not before the suppression of these systems.

At the same time, restarting Ruslan production may look less attractive to Moscow now, in the view of Antonov design house’s location in Kiev

That’s not true. The Ruslan can effectively be built in Russia from scratch, they got everything they need to do (production facilities, equipment, documentation), the only reason why they didn’t do it on a large scale till now is ownership rights and funding issues – both can and will change as all the Ukrainian aerospace industry is slowly drifting towards Russia-based integration and as the political relationship down the tube.

It may choose to spend the money on Il-476 (reincarnation of the Il-76)

That’s BS. Il-476 is dead in the water. Il-76MF – yes, but the “analyst” forgot it.

may help RSK MiG materialize its dream of selling rejected Algerian MiG-29SMT/UBTs to the Russian air force

That’s BS redux. First of all, Algerian SMTs have little in common with the Russian version and basically were refurbished old stuff. Second, the RuAF will most certainly not buy the SMT anymore. They might opt for some new 35s, but the focus will be on the Su-35 and the upgrade of the existing fleet.

Most importantly, the guy completely ignored several official statements deploring the lack of modern C3I and ELINT systems, and most of all U(C)AVs. If there is a system that has the chance of getting more funding right now, it’s the Skat-lookalikes that are under dev. at MiG and Sukhoi.

Some of the latest technology radars (APG-79 and APG-81) have airborne and ground moving target indication (AMTI/GMTI) modes. They can detect and classify targets at ridiculously slow speeds.

Soviet S-75 had an unnerving tendency to track ground targets in the 80’s already. There even was an incident in 1985 involving a Polish bus a S-75 radar rendering it as a target moving towards Russia. The operators had a firm lock-on on it till someone thought about checking the target speed.. 😀

There are no first and second pictures, both show the same aircraft. Thing is that nobody seems to know where this video originally came from, so there’s no way of judging whether it’s genuine or not. Even if it is an actual Russian RCS simulation however, it is unlikely to be the PAK-FA due to the forward-swept wings that Sukhoi is widely believed to have abandoned.

This video has nothing to do with the PAK FA. Some nerd played with the layout of the Berkut/Raptor, that’s all. Sorry to kill all the hype.

well its not about the range , but about the very short flight time to the target and ability to do fire at depressed trajectory , in both ways advantage for the SLBM

Nah, that’s a very common misunderstanding. It’s valid for single warhead missiles, such as Topol or Pershing. But multiple warhead buses still need to separate their load exoatmospherically. That takes time and needs height, not a pure flat trajectory. That’s why every SLBM/MIRV-ed ICBM has a effective minimum combat range. And that’s why IRBMs/SRMBs have an independent combat value.
BTW – today’s Topol launch was intended to test a new re-entry vehicle and new control surfaces (unclear yet whether it was the launcher’s or the vehicle’s control surfaces). IMHO they try to turn the Topol into a Pershing-2 of some sorts 😀

Everyone please calm down. We’re not devising a new scenario for a Fallout gameplay follow-on. OK? No one wants to live in a world where 6000+ strategic charges have exploded, plus countless tactical nukes. No one. Period.

Now, my thoughts about Ukraine, Transnistria etc etc.
IMHO this is a very sexed-up issue at the moment, put forward only in order to put pressure on Russia and belatedly provide Georgia’s now-to-become-unpopular and Ukraine’s ever-since-unpopular presidents with the backing they so desperately need at the moment. No one in Russia is seriously considering taking some offensive action in the Crimean peninsula, Ukraine, Moldova or even the poor little tiny NATO-owned Baltic. On the condition that the govs of the mentioned countries do not intend to send tanks against ethnic Russians, that is, which I suppose they will refrain from now.

Another issue altogether is presented by Russian interests in the region (legitimate interests or not is not the issue here). Clearly, they don’t want to lose Sebastopol as a base. They don’t want NATO to expand further. EU is ok, fine, and doesn’t bother them, but NATO is a different issue. They don’t want to alienate the Russophone and Russophile population(s) in Transnistria, Crimea and Eastern Ukraine, but they don’t want the Ukrainian nationalists to gain the upper hand either.

So my guess is that they will continue to play chess while ignoring their opponent(s) claims that they are in zeitnot. The best thing they could do is to plant their own nationalistic, pro-NATO, pro-Western Saakashvili-type guy in Western Ukraine who will exarcebate the nationalistic, xenophobic and anti-Russian sentiments there so much that Western Ukraine will declare secession first, thus enabling the Eastern part, the Crimea and the Odessa district to follow suit and be naturally absorbed in the Russian sphere of influence without any bloodshed or gunshot while the central Ukrainian government will struggle to gain recognition for its new Central Ukrainian Town-Republic. Split Ukraine in 2 or 3 and wait till they sort it out by themselves, even asking Poland for policying and peace enforcement for good measure, would be their best option.
Just conspiracy-theorising here, of course 😀

If that vote ratios are correct, we are back in former times. In democratic states such vote-ratios are something strange, when we keep in mind that opposition members are part of that houses too. 😮

“When it comes to declare war, achieve peace, defeat an enemy, help a friend, a stand for the values of the good and perfect man (kalos kagatos) , a demos must unite more forcefully than a dictatorship”. Just quoting my Herodotus 😉