Is new military fighter jet already out of date? (Bested by Indian AF?)

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04195/345591.stm

In a joint exercise in February, U.S. Air Force pilots flying the top U.S. fighter, the F-15C, got chewed up by Indian military pilots flying new, and not so new, Russian fighter planes.

The Air Force won't disclose exactly how the mock engagements turned out, but Gen. Hal Hornburg, head of Air Combat Command, said afterward, "We may not be as far ahead of the rest of the world as we once thought we were."

Part of the reason for the strong Indian performance could have been superior training, Air Force officials acknowledged. But the main reason, they said, was that the F-15C, first fielded in 1979, is showing its age.

"The major takeaway for the Air Force is that our prediction of needing to replace the F-15 with the F-22 is proving out as we get smarter about other countries' capabilities," said Col. Mike Snodgrass, commander of the Air Force fighters that took part in the exercise with the Indian pilots. "We've taken the F-15 about as far as we can and it's now time to move on to the next generation."

[madrchsod]

1. f-22 is a joke

the russian plane is the only plane in the world to break the sound barrier flyng straight up...

[smiley_glad_hands]

29. But is it Stealth?

[Redhead488]

36. It's "Stealthy"

Now like the F-117, but close.

[TheWraith]

32. Who said anything about the F-22?

The Americans were flying F-15Cs, which are what the F-22s are designed to replace.

And by the way, the reason the F-22 is facing cancellation is because they can't afford it in light of the massive hosing of money into Iraq.

[Ready4Change]

2. Weak article.

Doesn't say what aircraft the Indian pilots were flying.

Does say some correct things in places, allthough it takes a while to get there.

Latest generation Russian planes are very capable, and operate via a different concept. Fly low and detect opponents via passive IR immissions. It's a stealthy approach, and requires high powered, look down/ shoot down radars to compete. And those same radars make our planes stand out like arc lights on an electronic battlefield.

I suspect the US pilots first warning of danger was the announcement they were being locked onto by missiles. Expecting a more standard engagment they probably executed horizontal break turns, which are useless vs a missile rising from below. Pop go the F-15s.

Now, our pilots have had training on how to fight vs these newer Russian planes. It's odd that training doesn't seem to have been used?

[rooboy]

3. My business partner is ex RAAF (Australian air force)...

and he told me that US fighter pilots don't get anywhere near as many hours' training as those in a lot of other countries. But I would equate that to having a squad of 5 basketball players vs a group of 1000 - it's only natural that the smaller group can get more training with more intensity...

I don't know any real stats that I can share with you, I just remember the comment.

[Dragon Turtle]

5. SU-30, Mig-27 and MiG-21s

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/06/23/airforce.supremacy.reut/index.html

[Ready4Change]

14. Thanks.

The SU-30 is the upgraded version of the SU-27. Mig-27 is the upgraded Mig-23.

Reading about India's Mig-21's surprised me. Looks like their avionics and weapons systems were upgraded in 2001. Their manueverability isn't top notch, but their ability to get that first shot off in combat is improved, and that's half the fight.

This exercise took place on the Indian fighter pilots home turf, and their planes are better than I thought at first. I still think the US pilots should have had the upper hand.

Basically the exercise was a win-win for the Air Force brass. If we won, our pilots are #1. If we lose it's an indication we need new hardware.

Kudos to those Indian pilots, though. Sounds like some fine flying.

[Bandit]

38. I read an earlier article on this and they stated they used both Mig 29

and the earlier Mig model whatever that is, Mig 27 I believe. They also said that in a duel between two American pilots the Mig 29 also blew the American jets away. They do these tests in New Mexico as well as India.

[Avalon Sparks]

4. Hmmm....

We may not be as far ahead of the rest of the world as we once thought we were."


As higher thought process jobs continue to be outsourced, and our education system continues to tank, we are going to see statements like this made regarding many areas.

[tkmorris]

6. Yep

The next 50 years will see us surpassed in our technology on the battlefield. Our excessive spending will see us through in the short run but unless we get some progressive thinkers into office it will bankrupt us in the end, much like the Soviet Union.

[mhr]

7. Yep, I Have Made The Point Elsewhere That One Big Downside Of Outsourcing

is an effective brain drain. If young students and old pros know that the good high-valued added jobs are slowing being sent offshore to satisfy corporate profit projections, then this effectively shrinks our pool of high-valued added professionals over time. Why invest in training that is not valued or properly compensated?

The net effect is that we become less creative and entrepreneurial. And that can mean only one thing, we lose in the long run.

One wonders why this is so hard for people to see?

[midnight armadillo]

8. So naturally the F-22 is the solution?

Last I heard the extraordinarily expensive F-22 was having some of its operational objectives changed or eliminated so the program could proceed because it's a PIECE OF JUNK whose main purpose appears to be shoveling cash to Lockheed-Martin. The B-2 was treated in a similar fashion and is produced for a mere $2.1 billion apiece. The B-1 still doesn't have properly functioning electronics.

At least the F-15 appears to function the way it's supposed to.

[Pepperbelly]

9. if instead they had used F-14's with Phoenix missiles ...

they could've nailed them from a hundred miles away.

[baldguy]

10. But the Air Force doesn't have the F-14...

[Massacure]

11. Well perhaps they should consider getting them

Tomcats rule.

[baldguy]

12. But then Lockheed wouldn't get all that pretty money.

Now would they?

[Ready4Change]

17. Phoenix's are great.

But they are designed to shoot down large bombers over the ocean. I'm not up on how they fare against smaller targets manuevering amongst the mountains in Northern India.

But I'm not about to down-talk F-14s. Tomcats are great.

[Redhead488]

21. They could have nailed them BVR

with the F-15Cs as well, but the ROE prevented that. In a dogfight, the F-15C outperforms the F-14.

[tekriter]

13. This is a poorly titled post...

The F-15C is not a new fighter, which the article does explain correctly.

It is NOT correct to say that the "new military fighter jet (is) already out of date". The "new" fighter, the F-22, was not in that exercise.

The F-15C was first delivered in 1979, but it was an update of a plane first rolled out in 1972, the F-15A. It isn't even the latest version of the F-15 - that would be the F-15E.

By the way, Israel likes their F-15C's just fine. I'm thinking that training hours may have been drastically cut and our pilots got whupped by a group that trained more and tried harder.

[Ready4Change]

15. Or our best pilots are in the air over Iraq right now.

Although I'm not sure what they're guarding against.

[Redhead488]

22. Some are, some aren't

Our pilots still get lots of training and are still the best in the world, and that includes Israel.

[AngryAmish]

16. This smells

I have no evidence of this but USAF always wants new planes. Maybe they are losing these exercises so they can to go to Congress and beg for new airplanes.

USAF have trained with other nations and lost. However, it doesn't look good unless you want some more planes.

[tom_paine]

18. That would certainly be in keeping with the Fall of the Old Republic

Without Checks and Balances, our Military Procurement System, not very good even at the height of the Old Republic, will turn Iraqi-style.

Looking at the massive "Arab-level" fraud and theft and overcharging in Iraq now, we see the intital spread of Tyrannic Corruption of the military Procurement System.

[tom_paine]

19. On the other hand, who can believe Imperial Pravda, even in this case

Motive: To sell more planes, thus furthering the Bushevik Agenda of bankrupting the government.

This is a tough one, damned if we do and damned if we don't.

Besides when the EMPIRE falls, and everyone moves in to tear us to bits a century or two from now, these planes won't help shit, plus there won't be fuel to flyt them anyway in 150 years and probably less.

[reprobate]

39. I'd put it in terms of years, not centuries.

Our militarism, as in most empires, is destroying us by sucking all the wealth into supporting the more than 750 bases we have around the world. Add to that the voracious appetite for new and more expensive war toys, and there is little hope for a future in which the people have any more say in the direction of the country.

The military-industrial-congressional complex will bankrupt us, just like most every empire of the past. What makes us think that we can avoid the consequences of stupid economic decisions is just another example of the facts behind the Micheal Moore statement about americans: "They are probably the dumbest people on the planet....We americans are suffering from an enforced ignorance...."

[tom_paine]

40. You are probably correct. Just call me a starry-eyed optimist

:evilgrin:

[Minstrel Boy]

20. "bomber gap!" "missile gap!" "fighter gap!"

More scaremongering to whip up still more defense procurement. It has always been thus.

[TrueAmerican]

23. The next fighter planes need to be pilotless

Having a pilot in the cockpit in the future will be outdated thinking. Planes will be piloted from a distance thru satellites and planes like E-3's.

It's time to modernize the military and that involves technology where the planes are piloted from afar. Tanks are controlled via comm/satellites. Soldiers will be replaced with robots.

[Redhead488]

24. Have any idea

how many satellites we have to launch to command and control all thsoe aircraft? Open up the checkbook, baby!

[TrueAmerican]

26. I am sure Boeing has an idea

It will happen. Satellites are getting less expensive all the time.

[Redhead488]

30. Pergaps you need to read the DoDs

Transformational Communications Architecture....they can't afford to buy what'e even in there and that doesn't take into account all the CUAVs

[TrueAmerican]

And don't forget the lasers

Yes, lasers. We have them and they are just about ready.

[Redhead488]

31. But we don't have the laser terminals they are nowhere NEAR ready

in the quantities we would need

[Voice_of_Europe]

34. hmm..

"oh no!! don't turn that flashlight on me!"

I wonder if reflecting tinfoil is useful against lasers...
or ceramic/mirror armor...

[Minstrel Boy]

28. Not enough disconnect yet between the American populace and

the moral consequences of military action taken in its name? The armed forces needs to be wholly Borgified?

Remote-controlled planes and tanks, "robot" soldiers - this is the future you hope for the American military?

[Blue-Jay]

25. India, huh? Maybe we should out-source our pilots.

Seems like theirs did a better job on this particular exercise.

[Voice_of_Europe]

35. Switzerland currently doing tht... LOL

It's true.. haha...

Austria is having trouble with the delivery of their freshly ordered bunch of Euro Fighters and their old Saab Drakens tend to fall out off the sky, so Switzerland rents them out some (a little less old) F5 Tigers.

What actually amazes me is that Austria pilots are allowed to actually start them right off Swiss airbases through Swiss airspace... hope they're trustworthy.. hehe

[troublemaker]

27. So we have the greatest military except when it's time to ask for money

[TheWraith]

33. Precisely. NT

[tinrobot]

41. Here's some money....

From Harper's Index:

Minimum U.S. spending on missile defense each year since President Reagan's 1983 "Star Wars" speech : $2,700,000,000

Number of the ten missile-defense components to be deployed this fall that have been field-tested as a system : 0

21 years at a *minimum* of 2.7 billion per year - that's about $60 billion.

If they so desperately want a new fighter, then perhaps they should cancel missile defense. The lifetime of a fighter is about 20 years, it would be just about right...

[Zynx]

37. The Su-30 is a very good aircraft

The Su-27 series was never inferior to the F-15; that was a load of right wing warmonger propaganda. The more modern Russian missiles are also better than anything we've got. This is true in all fields in general-AT missile, anti-ship missile, anti-air missile, SAM.

The other problem is that our pilots probably don't have nearly as much emphesis on air-to-air as does India, which is right next door to China and Pakistan, both of which could fight in short order with large air forces.

[drool_n_yank]

42. did anyone consider the possibility

that the US Air Force pilots were encourage to perform poorly to get the $tremendous$contract$ for new fighters passed through ?

[LittleApple81]

43. We were thinking along the same lines. That is what I think is happening.

They want mo'e money... mo'e money.... mo'e money.....

[Randi_Listener]

44. Dog fighting with F-15s?!?

These are not our front line dog fighters. The F-16 is clearly superior in dog fighting to the F-15E and F-15C. Hell, even the F/A-18 is a better dog fighter than the F-15. The F-15 is meant as a medium/close range interceptor. The 16's were made for dog fighting with fly-by-wire controls and dynamically built to be unstable in flight which improves maneuverability.

Put F-16's with our best pilots against the Indian air force and retest.

[daleo]

45. Since the Indian pilots are so good, outsource the piloting

Anything less would be inefficient. To complete the analogy with corporations, the Secretary of Defense could be paid $50 million a year, with stock options. Rumsfeld should be on top of this idea shortly.