The Osprey Goes to War

On Oct 2, 5:14?pm, Typhoon502 wrote:
On Oct 2, 5:20 am, Walt wrote:





On Oct 2, 2:48?am, Roger Conroy wrote:

BlackBeard wrote:
On Oct 1, 6:11 pm, Kerryn Offord wrote:
***
Maybe no more vulnerable to being shot at.. but the effect of being hit?

Although there are no perfect survivability systems out there, the
systems on the Osprey are 1) more numerous and 2) more advanced, than
the survivability systems on the CH-46

SNIP

If it has a cobra escort.. Well.. It loses it's altitude/ speed
advantage over alternative modern helicopters..

Rendevous scenario. The Cobras launch from a forward base and meet at
the LZ with the Osprey which has travelled from a base further away.

BB

Is the Cobra really the only possible escort?
I'm thinking that the AV-8 could do a pretty decent job during the
high speed transit phase.

Roger- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

AV-8's go too fast to really see what is on the ground. An AV-8 can't
supress a treeline the way a Cobra can.

I recall reading in the Marine Corps Gazette back in the early 1980's
what you've seen me post:

1. Doesn't matter what the range and speed of the V-22 is. It is
limited to the range and speed of the escorts

I'm not really sure why you think the Cobras will slow the V-22s
down...operationally, it would be idiocy for the troop carriers to
arrive over the battlefield at the same time as the gunships, since
you want the gunships (and Harriers, to boot) to have arrived overhead
and begun destroying targets and softening the LZ well before the
larger birds are in the threat zone. If you've got troop carriers, be
they CH-46s, Blackhawks, or V-22s cruising in looking for a place to
land WHILE the first wave of Cobras is coming in, then it doesn't
matter what airframe you're in, the bad guys will target the low,
slow, fat with Marines birds and hope they can kill those before the
snakes spot them.

But with the increased speed of the V-22s, they can make more trips
between the boat or base and the LZ in the same amount of time, which
means more boots getting on the ground while the enemy is still
recovering from the gunships' attention. Let the Cobras and Harriers
come and go as fuel and weapons are expended...there will be enough
that one flight can always be hitting the target zone while others are
en route to or from the launch point.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

That is mostly good info, thanks.

1. The Osprey is still limited to how far from the boat/field the
Cobras can go.

2. It is a violation of basic common sense to think they can zip
around at no escorts. Maybe that is how the Marines rationalized
buying the damn thing. But that would be, yes, why they are limited
to the speed of the Cobra. You need en route escorts.

3. Referencing the above, saying that the Ospreys can zip around with
no escorts makes plans based on assumptions versus capabilities. That
is what the Japs did at Midway. They made plans based on how they
thought the Amercians -would- react, not based on how they -could-
react.

This is how the epitaph of the MV-22 should read:

"Finally cancelled due to common sense"

Walt