Military Plane discussion thread - Let’s talk Fighter/Attacker planes.

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TiggerNits said:
The stealth wasn't the issue, it was the mission planners

That F-117 flew that exact same route for strikes for 3 weeks straight. All the SAM crew had to do to shoot it down was adjust bandwidth super low, and just hold scan over one specific area and shoot at the first thing that flew over it at a speed greater than that of a large bird. They had tried it a week earlier and missed because the launch command was given too late. The USAF misread the situation and just thought that it meant the stealth worked extra good and just told the fighter wing they didn't have to worry about it or fly evasively.

All in all it was the most Air Force fucking thing thats ever happened
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Wasn't it also the first flight to not have EA-6 support?

MAPK phosphatase said:
This would be better worded as.
"The Lightning had a number of glide characteristics in the way that zero is a number."
As you have it I was confused. I read is like you were saying zero isn't a full fledged number compared to other numbers.
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@Spunt's point was that the Lightning had a glide slope of basically zero which is a conceptual number since you can't count to zero.
 
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Sho'nuff said:
The V22 had been pretty reliable as of the past 5 years or so. She had all kinds of teething issues, seeing her get dropped by some branches.

In Afghanistan, at least for our year push out there, the Osprey was by far the most reliable for us, we had numerous other platforms go down to environmental and occasional enemy action. But the v22s kept on trucking with low downtime. Granted, as a platform, it is also 20 to 30 years newer compared to the other helicopters we were using.
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Yeah, the osprey also gets punts just for retiring the fucking Phrog. The 46 was the worst fucking airframe in the corps. Which honestly says a whole lot
 
TiggerNits said:
Yeah, the osprey also gets punts just for retiring the fucking Phrog. The 46 was the worst fucking airframe in the corps. Which honestly says a whole lot
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Ughh...
The 46.
We would send those out to help recover other downed 46, and they would go down... happened more than once. Got to the point where we would send ground crews out to recover and just blow the downed 46 to crap instead of recovering the air frame.
 
Sho'nuff said:
Ughh...
The 46.
We would send those out to help recover other downed 46, and they would go down... happened more than once. Got to the point where we would send ground crews out to recover and just blow the downed 46 to crap instead of recovering the air frame.
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My kid brother spent an extra week in Iraq helping clean out their FOB because if he waited he could ride back out to the LHA on one of his squadron's 53's instead of their sister's 46s. It was a wise choice
 
TiggerNits said:
The Su15 wasn't exported for fear of falling in to American hands. They knew it was a terrible intercepter and feared that the US learning that the most numerous bomber killer was a paper tiger would lead to American aggression. It was wildy unreliable, had terrible flight characteristics, couldn't fly for long at any real speed or altitude and the onboard radar was terrible. The MiG25 was ordered to help bolster the defensive capabilities, but when Belenko defected we learned the 25 was an absolute shit heap as well
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Yes, wasn't the MiG25 supposed to leverage what the Russians had stolen from the superb Avro Arrow in terms of titanium construction and engine improvements from the never finished Iriquois? If so they didn't learn sweet fuck all from the Arrow program no matter how many spies had supposedly infilitrated it. Other then a vague similarity in airframe, it was a literal paper airplane. if you flew it in anything but a streight line it wouldn't go anywhere near it's rated speed, and had a miles-per-gallon ratio worse then a top fuel dragster.
 
BScCollateral said:
My understanding is that the MiG-25 was built to shoot down the Valkyrie. It would be interesting to see how well it could have performed its designed mission.
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It was, but it was done by taking a ton of hijacked info from the Arrow program and a (hilariously inept) West German company's attempt to make a low cost personal computer for a radar/fire control system
 
Northrop YA-9 > Fairchild A-10
1526422938156234789.jpg
 
Cedric_Eff said:
Northrop YA-9 > Fairchild A-10
1526422938156234789.jpg
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Nah, it wouldn;t be able to carry the same payload or be nearly as durable against ground fire. Plus the biggest strike against it was the fact that IR seeking missiles would have probably removed the tail section in most shots, while the A-10 had the placed in a good spot to only suffer one engine lost and still maintain rudder and elevator authority. In reality it was just a less well thought out Su-25.

That said, the A-10 is a boondoggle now and doesn't do anything better than a modern attack chopper, a hellfire equipped drone or a modern strike fighterlike the Rhino, Strike Eagle or even a late block Viper. It only exists because of a few members of congress not wanting to piss off grunts who have never understood the importance of speed in coming on to station with CAS. The 30mm gun is cool and all, but modern tanks can't really be damaged by the thing outside of a low chance detread. The hog is also less survivable now thanks to the fact that any enemy that can realisticlly contest their own airspace will be more than properly equipped to down them with MANPADS, much less proper SAMs and AAA
 
TiggerNits said:
Nah, it wouldn;t be able to carry the same payload or be nearly as durable against ground fire. Plus the biggest strike against it was the fact that IR seeking missiles would have probably removed the tail section in most shots, while the A-10 had the placed in a good spot to only suffer one engine lost and still maintain rudder and elevator authority. In reality it was just a less well thought out Su-25.

That said, the A-10 is a boondoggle now and doesn't do anything better than a modern attack chopper, a hellfire equipped drone or a modern strike fighterlike the Rhino, Strike Eagle or even a late block Viper. It only exists because of a few members of congress not wanting to piss off grunts who have never understood the importance of speed in coming on to station with CAS. The 30mm gun is cool and all, but modern tanks can't really be damaged by the thing outside of a low chance detread. The hog is also less survivable now thanks to the fact that any enemy that can realisticlly contest their own airspace will be more than properly equipped to down them with MANPADS, much less proper SAMs and AAA
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Is it true that the real reason the airforce built the A-10 was to force the Army to scrap the Cheyenne?
 
Mister Qwerty said:
Is it true that the real reason the airforce built the A-10 was to force the Army to scrap the Cheyenne?
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And the Bronco, the Mohawk and the gunship CH-47s and gunship/fire support UH-60s. Thats where the budget came from and why the "OA-10" exists (its just an A-10 where the pilot is a certified JTAC/FAC)

The Air Force is really good at budget games. When they build an airbase, the never build airfield first, they waste the entire budget on hangars, comms, housing, etc and then go to Congress and say "We need more cash to build the runways, but everything else is there"
 
TiggerNits said:
That said, the A-10 is a boondoggle now and doesn't do anything better than a modern attack chopper, a hellfire equipped drone or a modern strike fighterlike the Rhino, Strike Eagle or even a late block Viper.
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Attack choppers still do not have the payload, durability, range and speed to be equal to the A-10 or SU-25. Current drones at the moment do not have the payload capability to replace the A-10.

It only exists because of a few members of congress not wanting to piss off grunts who have never understood the importance of speed in coming on to station with CAS.
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Speed is no good if the fast zoomer can not stay in the area for more than a few minutes.

The 30mm gun is cool and all, but modern tanks can't really be damaged by the thing outside of a low chance detread.
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The 30mm gun always been for soft skins and light armor not heavy armor like medium tanks, heavy tanks, and MBTs. A-10 carried ATGMs, conventional bombs, JDAMs and rockets for tanks.

The hog is also less survivable now thanks to the fact that any enemy that can realisticlly contest their own airspace will be more than properly equipped to down them with MANPADS, much less proper SAMs and AAA
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If A-10s are being continuously shot at with anything bigger then MANPADs or heavy autocannons the air compaign has already gone pear shape as SEAD was never one of the A-10 missions nor was it built or refitted for it.
 
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Im not saying the A10 isn't cool, I'm saying it's just not practical anymore. Just like the Harrier, which I've actually got some experience with.

Cold war CAS requirements aren't optimal anymore, sure the avionics upgrades are definitely an improvement, and the A10s loiter is seriously fucking impressive, but it's still not as precise in a way that offers a significant advantage over the incredibly stable platform that is a modern attack helo with its front seater aiming, lasing and sharing target data in real time with ABIT and other datalink shit while someone else flies the bird.

The same can be said of the hogs ability when directly compared to a faster 2 seat platform like the strike eagle or the super hornet. Hell, there were a decent amount of early A10 guys who were vocal as shit about the A10 not offering any actual advantage over the Korean and Vietnam era Sandy other than price tag.

All that said, the A10 is still useful in low intensity conflict mostly thanks to how incredibly good the pilot training is, because those drivers are a very dedicated bunch and i won't say a bad word about them even though i think their platform is at the point of diminishing returns.
 
TiggerNits said:
Im not saying the A10 isn't cool, I'm saying it's just not practical anymore. Just like the Harrier, which I've actually got some experience with.

Cold war CAS requirements aren't optimal anymore, sure the avionics upgrades are definitely an improvement, and the A10s loiter is seriously fucking impressive, but it's still not as precise in a way that offers a significant advantage over the incredibly stable platform that is a modern attack helo with its front seater aiming, lasing and sharing target data in real time with ABIT and other datalink shit while someone else flies the bird.

The same can be said of the hogs ability when directly compared to a faster 2 seat platform like the strike eagle or the super hornet. Hell, there were a decent amount of early A10 guys who were vocal as shit about the A10 not offering any actual advantage over the Korean and Vietnam era Sandy other than price tag.

All that said, the A10 is still useful in low intensity conflict mostly thanks to how incredibly good the pilot training is, because those drivers are a very dedicated bunch and i won't say a bad word about them even though i think their platform is at the point of diminishing returns.
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I think we need to bring back the A-1 Skyraider.
 
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