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General: U.S. dominance of skies may wane

Recent exercise against Indian pilots is ‘wake-up call’The Associated Press


Updated: 3:31 p.m. ET June 23, 2004WASHINGTON -

The success of the Indian air force against American fighter planes in a recent exercise suggests other countries may soon be able to threaten U.S. military dominance of the skies, a top Air Force general said Wednesday.

“We may not be as far ahead of the rest of the world as we thought we were,” said Gen. Hal M. Hornburg, the chief of Air Combat Command, which oversees U.S. fighter and bomber wings.

The U.S.-India joint exercise, “Cope India,” took place in February near Gwalior in central, India. It pitted some F-15C Eagle fighters from the 3rd Wing at Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, in mock combat against Indian MiG, Sukhoi and Mirage fighters.

The F-15Cs are the Air Force’s primary air superiority aircraft. The Indian fighters, of Russian and French design, are the type of planes U.S. fighters would most likely face in any overseas conflict.

Hornburg, speaking to reporters, called the results of the exercise “a wake-up call” in some respects, but he declined to provide details, other than to suggest the Indian air force scored several unexpected successes against the American planes.

For the last 15 years, the U.S. military has enjoyed almost total command of the air during conflicts. A few fighters and fighter-bombers have gone down, usually victims of surface-to-air missile fire, but in general, American planes have been able to target enemy ground forces at will.

In the most recent invasion of Iraq, Saddam Hussein’s air force stayed grounded.

World ‘starting to catch up’
Still, new tactics, better Russian fighters like the Su-30, and a new generation of surface-to-air missiles mean that U.S. dominance could be ending, said Loren Thompson, who follows military issues for the Lexington Institute, a Washington think tank.

“The United States has grown accustomed to having global air superiority, yet we haven’t put much very much money in the last generation into maintaining that advantage,” he said, noting the F-15 first flew in the 1970s.

“So, of course, the rest of the world is finally starting to catch up,” he said.

Hornburg said the exercise shows the need for some new Air Force fighters, particularly the F/A-22 Raptor, which is intended to replace the F-15C. But critics deride the aircraft as too expensive and built to counter a threat that hasn’t existed since the Soviet Union collapsed.

© 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.




http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5279329/



Edited by - chadrewsky on Jun 23 2004 6:02 PM

seems as good a time as ant to post this here. They are specifically talking about the SuperHornets AESA, but I suspect it would apply to the Alaskan F-15s as well.

<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote><font size=1 face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>A couple of blurbs within an article about AESA RADARs left me wondering just what the extreme range of AMRAAM really is. Scroll down to the highlighted part if you dont want to read the whole thing.



Network-Centric Warfare
Innovations Cluster Around F/A-18E/Fs New Radar
Aviation Week & Space Technology
05/31/2004, page 54


David A. Fulghum
China Lake and El Segundo, Calif.



Innovations cluster around performance of F/A-18E/F's new, electronically steered radar


Net Changes

At the leading edge of the network-centric constellation is an array of new-generation sensors that jump-start the whole system by providing a more detailed view of the battlefield and seeking out key targets.

For the moment, the crown jewel in that collection of sensors is the active electronically scanned aperture (AESA) radar that is being installed on a wide range of aircraft. Each AESA radar--more powerful and acute by far than its predecessors--is made up of at least scores, sometimes thousands, of individual transmitter/receivers (T/R), that are sometimes as little as a half-inch square and a quarter-inch deep. These T/R modules are used like the keyboard of a piano to produce combinations of simultaneous uses such as searching for new targets, tracking, making key identifications or jamming the targets' sensors with electronic noise.

By focusing the radar's output power in a limited area of the sky with a small number of its total modules, the radar can extend its detection range.<b> In fact, for the first time, U.S. fighter aircraft will have a radar that can locate targets beyond the range of its Aim-120 advanced medium-range air-to-air (Amraam) missiles</b> which allow critical additional time for tactical maneuvering.

Because the radar can also gather the detail to confirm the identity of targets at long distance, and thereby meet strict criteria for rules of engagement, the U.S. now has the operational ability to destroy enemy aircraft at distances beyond the visual range of the aircrew.

AESA radars on upgraded F-15Cs, the latest F/A-18E/Fs and the F/A-22 will be paired with a new version of the Aim-130 air-to-air missiles to form the first lines of defense against small, even stealthy, low-flying cruise missiles.

Moreover, those same basic AESA T/R modules are expected to one day form the arrays for space-based radars that will begin service by sending alerts to command-and-control aircraft about moving objects like the enemy's mobile missiles or low-flying missiles and aircraft.

Finally, AESA-equipped unmanned combat aircraft are eventually expected to help directly in the fight against combat cruise missiles, according to Pentagon officials. The mission is deemed a first step in developing the UCAV's air-to-air combat capabilities since cruise missiles maneuver very little and thus would be a somewhat easier target.

However, talk of cruise missile defense intertwined with unmanned aircraft operations leaps far ahead of today's program. Right now, the Navy's F/A-18 officials are looking toward 2008-09 as a seminal period when the various services start interoperating as easily as they operate within a service or warfighting community.


The modified radome for the new AESA radar simply slides forward since the radar antenna will seldom, if ever, have to be repaired or replaced. Credit: U.S. NAVY

Only this month the F/A-18/EA-18G program manager, Capt. Donald Gaddis, opened meetings at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, with the Air Force's B-1 and F-15 (many AESA-radar equipped) program managers to begin looking at joint test and evaluation and operational testing among all three communities. The initiative follows closely some groundbreaking work with the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (AESA-equipped) that would also foster early operational linkages between the aircraft with an eye to developing cooperative warfighting techniques.

As a major driver in the aggressive pursuit of cross-service contacts, top Navy officials have identified the ability of the services to readily exchange information as the toughest nut to crack in making network-centric warfare work.

"The challenging part is going to be the test and evaluation and joint experimentation," Gaddis says. "When you start talking about trying to link platforms together through communications devices like the Joint Tactical Radio System or Link 16 or variable message format, it's tremendously hard because everybody interprets the standards and protocols a little differently. You find that out in flight tests. Information isn't passed like you wanted or it takes way too long. We look at the tapes and find out that the 1s and 0s aren't lining up and we're not communicating. Technically, it's probably more challenging than anything we've done before."

THE F/A-18E/F RADAR program at the China Lake Naval Air Warfare Center will begin a new round of testing with three AESA systems beginning in June. The flight test community there has been told to develop a test plan that involves going to Ft. Bragg, N.C., to talk to the Special Operations Forces, NAS Fallon, Nev., the Navy strike community's home, and Eglin AFB, Fla., where the Air Force's munitions are developed and tested. Researchers also will be expected to develop and exercise links with command ships to demonstrate what information the F/A-18E/Fs and EA-18Gs can provide.

"I'm trying to hammer away at other aircraft platforms, data link and avionics program managers to form this group that would allow us to [shape] lower-level detailed test plans to get us from today to 2008-09" when joint testing is officially scheduled to begin, Gaddis says. Analysts applaud Gaddis' effort and note that while virtually everybody recognizes the looming problem, many are counting on someone else to somehow resolve it before cross-service testing begins.

"We've had an ongoing working group inside Navair for the last 11 months," he says. "What we've done now is expand that to make contact with the JSF and F-15 folks. My hope is that the contact expands in its scope to talk about joint test and evaluation and experimentation and to form working groups to review standards, architectures and protocols."

The test team at China Lake is scheduling 12 flights per aircraft each month. The results will be fed back to a group of operators charged by the Navy to develop a concept of operations and tactics for the APG-79 AESA-equipped F/A-18E/Fs. Current priorities include standoff attack (hence the need for the new synthetic aperture radar mapping mode) and survivability enhancements that would allow such attack profiles.


The F/A-18E/F's first radar was protected by a radome that had to be swung to the side for maintenance. In cramped spaces on aircraft carriers, it was often damaged.Credit: U.S. NAVY

In addition, "We've asked for the Air Force's help," says Stu Johnson, AESA acquisition lead for the F/A-18 advanced weapons laboratory. "F/A-22 and F-15 AESA are many years ahead of us. We're looking at what they did in testing this technology. We went to Elmendorf [AFB, Alaska, where modified F-15Cs are based] a year ago. After talking to the F-15 guys, we did some reprioritizing. We realized we wanted more operator control [instead of some automated functions]. We simply didn't have the functions in place to give the operator direct control in changing, for example, from air-to-ground targets to air-to-air targets that are beyond visual range. The radar gives you a lot of flexibility in how the pilot can split his time between different tasks."

There are several key questions the test team will be seeking to answer:

*<b>What new tactics could develop now that targets can be detected at twice the old radar range?</b>

*How does a two- or four-ship formation split up the air-to-air and air-to-ground tasks?

*How might a single AESA-equipped aircraft increase the offensive power of a large group of non-AESA aircraft?

In addition to new AESA air-to-air and ground-attack radar capabilities, the F/A-18E/Fs will carry advanced infrared, electro-optical and electronic surveillance sensors.

"Part of our net-centric effort is to determine how all this ties into the network," says Tom Kennedy, vice president for Raytheon's unmanned and reconnaissance systems. "One key thing is that we have some very advanced communications--something called Fibre Channel--within the jet. This supports a very high bandwidth exchange of data between the sensors on board. Each of those sensors has its own IP (Internet Protocol) address for a tie-in to the weapons. The next step is to tie that into the information grid. You don't want to keep all that information on the jet."

ONCE MANNED aircraft have been tuned to exchange data with ease, a subsequent step would be to fold unmanned aircraft and rotorcraft into the net-centric construct. Based on the losses and damage inflicted on manned helicopters during the most recent conflict in Iraq, fielding a survivable unmanned attack aircraft is moving up in the Pentagon's priority.

"How does a soldier on the ground with a hand-held device get that unmanned helicopter to fly over the next hill and gather imagery or drop [weapons]?" Kennedy said. "He may not know which [unmanned helicopter] he's talking to. Most likely he won't. Why would the guy in the foxhole, while being shot at, have to be overwhelmed with picking out [unmanned helicopter] No. 6 or J-UCAS [unmanned strike aircraft] No. 9 to go do imagery?" He doesn't care. He just wants the weapon on target. He doesn't have to be involved in how it gets there." That's the role of the net-centric system.
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"We sleep safely in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would harm us". George Orwell

Fighting For Justice With Brains Of Steel !
<img src="http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ac/atengun2X.GIF" border=0>

_________________
The only time you have too much fuel is when you're on fire.

depends on weather we want to operate AG aircraft over a modern battlefield. Chances are in 10 years F-16 and Superhornet will be useless except for launching long range missles. After 2 wars we STILL havent gotten all the AA threats out of Iraq.

"We sleep safely in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would harm us". George Orwell

Fighting For Justice With Brains Of Steel !
<img src="http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ac/atengun2X.GIF" border=0>

_________________
The only time you have too much fuel is when you're on fire.

Does the USAF need the JSF that bad?


IMHO...No

The Navy needs the USAF to need the JSF that bad, because the Navy needs the JSF that bad. The only way the program will be cost effective in todays world is to build the aircraft in such numbers that the cost is fleshed out between many services. The USN's F-35C looks to be a great aircraft. The F-18E/F ironicaly is perfect for the USMC, and the USAF for that matter in the strike fighter role. The USAF should aquire the F-18E/F to augment its F-22 force, The USMC should use the F-18E/F and only the F-18E/F for its needs, the JSF should be shitcanned and the Navy should be allowed to develope a true Naval Strike fighter to augment the F-18E/F...In a perfect world the F-18E/F would be the JSF, with the Navy getting a more capable multi role strike fighter....But, since that is not going to happen the Navy needs the next best thing, which is the F-35C. Its ironic that the F-35C is what the Navy needs, but the F-18E/F would fill the USAF strike fighter role quite well, if complimented with an F-22 fleet...

Would the COrps give up STOVL?

STVOL in my mind is overated...Rotary wing technology has advanced as such, that CTOL or STOL aircraft can fill the needs of whatever a STVOL aircraft can do...When is the last time marine AV-8B's have done anything significant?

<BLOCKQUOTE id=quote><font size=1 face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id=quote>quote:<hr height=1 noshade id=quote>
When is the last time marine AV-8B's have done anything significant?
<hr height=1 noshade id=quote></BLOCKQUOTE id=quote></font id=quote><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size=2 id=quote>


<i>I wish I knew. There must be something. How about Harriers in the Falklands? Kind of ancient history, and mixed results, but it's something. There must be more modern exploits to tell about.

Here's what I could find. I would say that praise for the type's military utility is low key.</i>


http://www.airtoaircombat.com/backgroun ... =24&bg=153

The Marines fielded two ground-based Harrier squadrons to the Gulf War in early 1991, the type being one of the first USMC aircraft into action. They also flew a detachment operating off the assault ship USS SAIPAN. A total of 86 AV-8Bs were committed. The AV-8B (NA) was still being introduced at the time and did not participate. (Harriers flew 3,342 sorties in more than 4,317 flight hours.http://www.danshistory.com/av8b.html)

The USMC Harriers performed 7.7% of the sorties in the war. Their effectiveness met the expectations of their owners, though five were lost. They flew missions with standard "dumb" ordnance, including general purpose high-explosive bombs, napalm bombs, and cluster bomb units, as well as "smart" weapons such as laser-guided Maverick missiles.

Although the Harriers have their detractors in the USMC who pointed to the losses as indicating the type's vulnerability, with the four-nozzle exhaust configuration giving heat-seeking missiles a dead-center target, General Norman Schwarzkopf, the Coalition theater commander, claimed it was one of the nine weapons that won the war, the other aircraft in the list being the AH-64 Apache helicopter and the F-117 Stealth Fighter.

USMC Harrier IIs also saw action in the Afghanistan campaign in the winter of 2001:2002, operating from the assault ship USS PELELIU at sea and performing strikes with dumb bombs, providing support for Marine special operations forces operating in the country.


http://www.atwar.net/content.php?article.113

Operation Desert Storm
On Jan. 17, the Tomcats became the first Marine squadron to employ the V-8B Harrier in combat, striking Iraqi positions in southern Kuwait in preparation for the coalition ground offensive. During the Persian Gulf War, the squadron flew 1,017 combat sorties and droped 840 tons of ordnance on enemy targets. The average turnaround time during the ground war surge was 23 minutes. A total of 86 Marine Harriers flew 3,567 sorties against Iraqi targets in Kuwait and Iraq. Five Harriers were lost, four in combat.

The Harrier was recognized by Secretary of Defense Cohen as one of the three most significant weapon systems in Desert Storm. Following the war, Marine Corps analysis showed that the placement of the engine nozzles that allow for the Harrier's Vertical Take-Off/Landing made the aircraft far more vulnerable to infrared surface-to-air missile fire than other aircraft.

Operation Iraqi Freedom
In the Iraq campaign of 2003, the Harrier II saw extensive usage by both the USMC and RAF. USMC Harriers were based on two USMC amphibious assault ships, USS Bataan (LHD-5) and USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD-6). Each carried 24 Harriers, about four times their normal complement of fixed wing aircraft, and tried out the long dormant secondary purpose of the LHDs and LHAs, that of a small aircraft carrier, or sea control ship. RAF Harriers were shore based in Kuwait. Two detachments from RAF Cottesmore were sent to the region, with one known to have been based at the al Jaber airbase in Kuwait, and the other at an undisclosed location. A total of 23 RAF Harriers took part in the campaign.



THE CRAPTOR ENGINEERING TEAM <img src=icon_smile_big.gif border=0 align=middle>
"The F-22...It's the poo"

Edited by - a10stress on Jun 25 2004 1:11 PM

_________________
????

Just think what the Brits could have done in the Falklands with a convential CVW...Harriers did perform miracles in that campaign, but much of that had to do with the fact that Argentine Mirages, Super Entendards, and Skyhawks where operating at the extreme edge of their fuel endurance, not unlike what the German Luftwaffe experienced in the Battle of Britan. The Brits managed to marginaly protect their shipping from air strikes, but did not achieve maritime air superiority. Remember a number of ships where lost, and had the Argies not had issues with their "dumb ordanance" not detonating, the bloodletting of the Royal Navy would have been signifigant. I would say the Argies botched the Falklands, more than I would say the Royal Navy and the Sea Harrier won it...

That been said...The Harrier is a remarkable jet, but...Is the VTOL aspect of its capabilities that important in todays military? I am not knocking the jet, but it doesn't seem to grab the headlines like the A-10...









Edited by - chadrewsky on Jun 25 2004 1:42 PM

I think the biggest differance in the Falklands seems to have been the AIM-9L. The Brits could face shoot the Argies, but the Argies had to try and get tail shots on the Harriers AFTER taking one right up the nose first.

"We sleep safely in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would harm us". George Orwell

Fighting For Justice With Brains Of Steel !
<img src="http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ac/atengun2X.GIF" border=0>

_________________
The only time you have too much fuel is when you're on fire.