"Damo" writes:


"John Schilling" wrote in message
...
(George William Herbert) writes:

John Schilling wrote:

Likewise, if your idea is that it doesn't matter how easy an individual
missile is to find and kill because you are going to saturate US/NATO
style air defenses with numbers, you don't match it against the present
standard of an F-15 with four each AMRAAMs and Sidewinders but against
an F-22 packed to the limit with air-to-air Stingers; fourty-five stowed
kills at 0.8 Pk per shot, if my math is correct.

I was under the impression (mistaken?) that the F-22 can only carry 4
air-to-air missiles, if it carries more it loses what stealth it had and you
might as well send in F-15s??


The F-22 carries, internally and stealthily, six AIM-120 AMRAAMs and two
AIM-9 Sidewinders. It can carry four missiles (2 ea AIM-9 and AIM-120)
*and* two JDAMs internally, as a self-escorting strike aircraft. That
may be where you got the four missiles bit from.

But AMRAAMS are gross overkill against the sort of cruise missile being
postulated here. You only need the long range, midcourse guidance,
high energy and terminal maneuverability if the target is going to
evade and/or shoot back, or if it's moving fast enough that even a
supercruising F-22 can't engage closely.

Against minimal cruise missiles, an air-to-air Stinger is more than
enough. Yes, the Stinger has an air-to-air variant, and yes, the
seeker will lock onto the exhaust of a small piston engine. And
you can pack eight of them in the weight and volume envelope of an
AIM-120, or four for an AIM-9. Fifty-six total in an F-22, without
compromising stealth or supercruise[1].

This is not to say you could do it tomorrow. You'd have to design
4- and 8-rail extendable launchers, and integrate the missiles and
launchers with the F-22 weapons control system. But it could be
done faster than the hypothetical opposition could field their
cruise missile swarms, at which point American fighter pilots get
to have more fun than they've had since the Marianas Turkey Shoot.


[1] A competent adversary not irrationally wedded to the Great
Cruise Missile Swarm tactic would keep just enough MiG-29s or
the like in inventory that American pilots would reasonably
insist on a couple of AMRAAMs at all times Just In Case. So
maybe fourty Stingers and two AIM-120s would be a more realistic
loadout for this scenario, ~34 stowed kills at 0.8 Pk. Probably
a couple more with the gun :-)


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