Nicolas10I know its a claim that its quieter thanks to the Fenestron, and perhaps true at a distance but up close I have always considered it to be horrifically loud. Its an awful piercing shriek from the gazelle whereas the lynx was a more throaty rumble.
Well maybe some sort of sound fades away quicker in the distance. I quoted it from an article in a magasine about the helicopter regiment for the french special forces. Apparently they like to drive around at at night at about 80 km/h with all lights switched off and a gazelle opening the way and telling them where to pass.
Nic
Nicolas10Gazelle is really easy to maintain, and also very silent for a helicopter, making it very useful for night time special forces operations.
Unfortunately it is getting old and needs to be replaced at some point.
Nic
Nicolas10Airbus will turn out just like Lockheed in the US. A totally out of control corporate behemoth milking everyone’s tax dollar to built stuff that is only going to be used to attack countries that we have no business attacking in the first place.
Next thing you know it will create a subsidiary that will be its own private army à la blackwater/XE/whatever it is now named after perpretrating yet another massacre.
Huxley & Orwell are going to have the last laugh on this one.
Nic
Nicolas10Well I’m sure the garrison knows its job, which is why you need to make AASM/klubs rain on the garrison at about the time your invasion force is going to be detected. Destroy the island’s air defenses and you can rain C130s bringing in assault troops and you can paradrop some more to take over the island.
Coordination will be paramount.
Nic
Nicolas10While I love the Klub-K missiles, the next solution is a 24 Mirage F1 buy uptated to ASTRAC standard with AASM & Mica. An attack by, say 8-12 of them with 4 AASM each would pretty much allow the obliteration of MPA. They can be refueled by other Mirages or by offshore based super étendards to extend their range enough.
A 24 Mirage F1 build up wouldn’t be too alarming because the Argies need some new fighters if only for air policing.
Nic
Nicolas10May I ask why any Argentinean government would ever consider a new invasion of the Falkland/Malvinas?
I am not sure at all that any Argentinean Government or the Argentinean people would consider entering in another conflict. For what? Trying to affabulate the people?
The previous experience to use the islands to win the national consent was not healthy for the dictator Galtieri, not to mention for the Argentinean people.Every Argentinean government will obviously consider the risks of a military defeat, and now they have evidence that the UK will not sit down and watch (maybe Galtieri inorrectly ruled this obvious possibility out).
Also, I cannot understand the title of this thread: Invade the Falklands, with the verb in the imperative form.
Because there are major natural ressources in the area, including offshore oil. Why do you think the UK are so keen to retaining the falklands in the first place?
Nic
Nicolas10The article mentions a delay due to Dassault having fiscal problems. I had not heard that Dassault has fiscal (did the writer mean financial?) problems. Is this article inaccurate?
This is maybe bad translation of the fact that the contract has to take into account currency fluctuation during the period of the deal, which must be a very complicated matter in this day and age.
Nic
Nicolas10What’s the relevance of a ship accident on the California coast in 2007 to this thread?
Big container ships run predictable schedules that don’t generally take them anywhere near the Falklands. There’s also the little matter of getting those special containers aboard such a ship surreptitiously. In practice, this is a capability for rapidly fitting out relatively small vessels (e.g. the landing ship shown, or a small merchant vessel out of an Argentinean port), or for ground launch (again, as shown). In either case, it’s unlikely to be a strategic surprise, as the sale would probably not be secret.
It was just an illustration to show how many of those quatruple launchers you could fit on a container carrier.
Say you fit 6 containers on 3 or 4 ships and you’re capable of launching 72 to 96 missiles + say about 48 from 4 improved Kilos for a total of up to 144 missiles. I doubt the Falkland’s defenses could counter such a number of missiles targeted at such a low number of targets.
The 4 Kilos then sail at full speed towards Argentina to get rearmed with their anti submarine loadout and take on the defense of Argentina, and say another 3-4 come with their anti shipping loadout to take on the defense of the Falklands and harrass the invasion force.
You add 24-36 Su27 type aircrafts to defend the mainland & 12 you station on the Falklands to escort your R/P99s. The range of the Su 27 allows to use mainland based fighters to reinforce the island based ones if need be.
Nic
Nicolas10Nicolas10Not really Nic. The Kilo’s loadout will be perhaps a dozen weapons to keep a minimum torpedo onload and the land attack Klub variant is a conventional cruise profile weapon. In event of escalated threat level and a submarine cruise threat it would be quite conceivable that, in this timeframe, FLAADS-G would deploy to Mount Pleasant and possibly even Phalanx C-RAM now we’ve had some experience with it. With a few Kilo’s the Armada is going to be no more capable of launching saturation cruise strikes than the RN SSN force would be able to with TLAM…and those weapons would be flying right into the teeth of AD systems well capable of engaging them.
Its not a high percentage of success attack and, to deliver that attack, they would have to induct the submarines, train the crews up on them, build up a pattern of operational experience and get past some of the best SSN’s deployed. Remember that the SSK threat is now taken a lot more seriously than it was in 1982 and training to counter it has been part of RN focus ever since.
The heavy SSM element, of that concept, is key as its an attack vector that UK forces have no fielded counter to and, even if the defending forces ramped up to match Argentine capability increases, it would be something that would be initially unaddressed. Chinese heavy missiles appearing on the Argentine mainland would naturally trigger a UK drive to gain land-based ATBM capability of course….but this would be something new that the deployed forces would have to work up….and the only options would be PAC-3 or Arrow UOR’d. Even then there would be the ready-round limit for the deployed interceptors so the advantage is decidedly with the Argentine heavy rocket forces.
Yes the Kilo launched klubs would be too little to make a real saturation attack, but the Kilo’s main role would be to provide coastal defense against the RN when you want to defend the islands. This is why a few ‘civilian’ cargos can carry a bunch of klub-K for a one-shot missile salvo, while at the same time carrying troops and supplies.
While argentina couldn’t hold the purchase of a few kilo submarines secret, if they managed to secretly buy a few dozens of klub-k containers, it could tip the balance of forces and make for a nasty surprise. Then it can re-use the klub containers to use anti-shipping missiles and disperse them on the harbours amongst the many other containers, making it hard to hit their anti-shipping capabilities without destroying the whole harbours.
Lastly I think your proposition of JAS39, Mica & so on is unrealistic, because those material wouldn’t be sold to Argentina, and even if they were, they would be seriously compromised by their origin. Which is why I’d go for moslty russian & chinese hardware, except for the R99 & P99 which should come with very high stocks of spares and tech transfer.
Last but not least, using ballistic missiles could trigger an escalation that could turn out to be dangerous for Argentina.
Nic
Nicolas10He is suggesting vast investment and a massive attack with stand off missiles. Which is more realistic then your proposal Nic, also I think using paratroops is the weakest aspect of his plan. His plan hinges on getting transport planes down at Stanley. I would say that any landing would be heavily opposed regardless of this missile attack. So my criticism stands.
Obviously you would have to be attacking the airbase & air defenses prior to/while landing your commandos and dropping your paratroops. That goes without saying. The hardest part of it is to keep the island, which is what my post focused on.
This is where the Kilo subs come in handy. Before doing the coastal defense agaisnt british SSNs and surface shipping, they can launch a saturation attack of the british airbase and air defenses with 3M-14E klub missiles. Then you quickly rearm them with 3M-54E1 and a few 91RE1 for mainland and falklands defense.
The RN would have to spend a leg and an arm to defend against an hypothetical argie invasion using klub equipped Kilos.
You could also purchase a number of klub-K missiles to fire from merchant vessels which could be on their way to land the bulk of the occupation forces.
Nic
Nicolas10Oh boy and that was with… wait for it… paratroops. It’s low even for me but not for jonesy apparently.
Nic
Nicolas10I wonder just how stealthy the 229 was.
Appartently, it was supposed to be stealthy enough to warrant being rebuilt by a US team to check out its RCS.
Nic
Nicolas10haha thanks for the insult.
Nic
Nicolas10Saturate the island with paratroops and commandos to take control of a port and the airports. Have cargos ready to carry the most heavy stuff before the UK can send a few nuclear subs in the area and cut your supply lines, then set up an aerial bridge to bring the rest and supplies.
What you need to keep the island:
– Latest S300 model you can get your hands on integrated with dispersed and mobile ground radars and with 3 – 5 R99s AEW aircrafts. Also double up with missile defense systems against sub-sea-launched missiles, which are your most likely threats.
– A few Kilo submarines supported by a few P99 MPA aircrafts to interdict shipping.
– A number of small patrol crafts to make sure no commando attacks are carried out from civilian shipping in the area.
– Highly trained and motivated troops to secure the sensitive locations (S300 sites, port and airport), and keep the SAS/SBS at bay (harder said than done).
– A sound political solution to the government of the locals.
Fighters should hardly come into play in this affair. So no need to stack up on aircrafts except for the defense of the mainland. A squadron of the latest Mig 29s would be preferable for the defense of the island though. Plus a few of Su30s to make sure the mainland isn’t attacked in reprisal.
My 2cts
Nic
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