On 12 Jan 2004 17:47:59 GMT, (Denyav) wrote:

You garble apples and oranges here. While situational awareness is
critical, it's not the same issue as developing the principles of
three dimensional maneuver between two aircraft. The analytical tools
of P-sub-s diagramming to compare aircraft and optimize your own
performance are important and whether or not you possess total SA

I think you are contradicting yourself here,you gave an excellent answer to
another poster and explained how things are done in the era of full situational
awareness,as you correctly implied there is no need to acquire target with your
Mk.I eyeballs,you dont even need to acquire target with your own
sensors,somebody else could do it for you,what you need is only to fire your
missiles.
Do you need high energy manouvers or jack knife type fights for that?
If we had current SA tools in 60s,the Missilleer project would be a great
success.

If I am going to enter the air/air arena, I need SA, but I'd better
also have a good understanding of three dimensional maneuver and the
relative performance envelope of both my own aircraft and my potential
adversary's. While the BVR war is the ideal, reality often has a way
of screwing up the perfect world and then you wind up turning and
burning.

And, we still don't have total SA. AWACS and data-fusion/sharing are
great advances, but the "fog of war" will remain. We did have Disco,
Red Crown, T-Ball and Combat Tree as well as our own sensors and nav

You really should read a bit more history. While F-4s without guns got
a lot of notice, there were a lot more gun-equipped aircraft than
non-gun. The failures didn't relate to lack of SA as much as to
political gradualism and lack of will to win.

Factors you mentioned were obviously the main factors at the national decision
making level,but less relevant at air-air combat level.

Air-to-air combat was a minor component of the Vietnam air war. There
was none, absolutely none in S. Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia and little
in the panhandle of NVN. There were only A/A engagements in Route
Package V and VI and from late '68 to spring of '72, we weren't going
there. In 250 combat missions, 150 of which were into N. Vietnam, I
encountered enemy aircraft only a half dozen times.

Given the alternative of better SA tools or better A/A training, I
would have chosen the training.

You really should read a bit more history. While F-4s without guns got
a lot of notice, there were a lot more gun-equipped aircraft than
non-gun. The failures didn't relate to lack of SA as much as to
political gradualism and lack of will to win.

The answer is easy. It would be great. But, if you are running the war
for political purposes and trying to avoid major power nuclear
confrontation, it doesn't matter what your SA is.

Unless you bombed production bases of NV,which were located inside USSR and
China,you would not risk a nuclear war.

You better get a few more books. There was serious concern over the
possibility of any conflict during those years escalating. The
political posture of both the US/NATO and the USSR/WP was that an
"attack on one is an attack on all" and the umbrella of coverage was
repeatedly asserted as covering client states as well.

Politically it does not matter much how you shoot down an enemy plane,with guns
or with BVR missiles.I did not distinguish active or passive stealth, but
simply refuted

your contention that stealth is a failure. Loss rates for stealth
aircraft are statistically zero and target success rates are very
close to 100%. It makes little difference whether the opposition is
first or third world.

Target success rate during DS I is more close to 1/10 th of what you are
quoting and during Balkan conflict more f117s damaged than convantionel
ones,even though f117s made up only small part of allied air fleet.

Really? My statement on losses and target service are referring to
stealth aircraft performance, not the total air effort. To date there
has been only 1 F-117 lost in combat. During DS and IF, there were no
stealth aircraft -117s or B-2s lost or damaged.

Regarding target success rate during whole Balkan war only 3 serbian air
defense radars were destroyed.

Really?

Even simple internetting of old serbian radars proved to be very effective
aganist stealth aircraft.

Networking, not "internetting", but Serbian air defense radars, if we
discount one clueless F-16 "scared rabbit", were ineffective even
against non-stealthy aircraft.



Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
Smithsonian Institution Press
ISBN #1-58834-103-8