2019 F-35 News and Discussion

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look at the development of stand-off weapons for F-35 and tell me more about that stealth immunity against IADS... deeds matter, not only empty words.

Given that the first and only A2G munitions for the F-35A/B are regular JDAMS/Paveways at Block 2B/3i. Longer ranged standoff weapons don't come till 3F (SDB/JSOW) and longer still at Block4 (JASSM, Taurus, etc).

btw, SDB has more to do, in the F-35's case, with magazine depth. JSOW is there as a moving target anti-ship weapon.

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These recent posts stray pretty far from the thread topic and cross into morals and policy. Wouldn't it be great if there was a section on this forum to air such things? We could call it "General Discussion" and separate it from the aviation forum section.

[USER="40269"]FBW[/USER] - Hmmm... That is a very interesting objection. I mean, This is a Military Aviation Forum! It has to do with defense. And, I really don't see how you can disagree, defense is governed by policy. At the end of the day, it is policy that makes a defense project worth it. Pretty much all of them today experience substantial cost overruns and schedule delays, but they are deemed to be worth it for policy objectives such as jobs, sovereignty, growing the technical and industrial base, national prestige, etc. Nations do that. Right now on the Tejas thread, people are going back and forth over whether the Indians should abandon the project to quickly obtain modern fighters to mothball the old Migs, or to finish the program to develop the technical-industrial base. That is essentially an argument over two different policy objectives! See? Nobody else is separating policy from the discussion. Why? Because it can't be done. Now if "socialism" and "evil people" are trigger words, then I will choose my wording more carefully. But I can't promise more.

[USER="1724"]djcross[/USER] - No, that is a very poor example of a...

lack of understanding of "deterrence".

I mean, is China or anyone bombing Japan or South Korea right now? Threatening to invade them? No? Well then, I think that rests my case that their legacy aircraft provides adequate deterrence right now. And this is exactly what I stated with the above quote of mine: "

If all you need is a deterrence function then a good legacy platform will do well enough. This will be the case for the next 10-12 years still."

And, no, I never said or suggested that one would only obtain a stealth aircraft if they intended aggression. I only said they don't need one right now for defense. As you are certainly aware, people and nations also set aside funding, resources, and such not just for current needs but to meet future needs. These are called investments. As I have already stated, the deterrent potential of legacy aircraft will eventually become degraded as more 5th gen designs proliferate. I estimate around 10-12 years. Japan buying F-35s is an investment to meet future needs. Germany and France getting started on a 6th gen is the same (a longer term investment).

I'm sorry, but you read all of that into my statements all on your own!

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D


EDIT: BTW, look at the development of stand-off weapons for F-35 and tell me more about that stealth immunity against IADS... deeds matter, not only empty words.

There are mininature weapons being developed for F-35 as well, such as SIAW (stand in attack weapons), SACM , MSND.

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Secondly, extended range weapon offer others benefit rather than only keeping the aircraft out of harms way. With long range weapon, at any point you have a larger bubble of engagement, that is always a good thing if you can stay at point A and strike point B and C at the same time rather than have to fly through all points. Last but not least, the engagement radius of an aircraft carrier is the combat radius of its aircraft + the range of missiles on these aircraft, so long range missiles on aircraft give protections to the fleet as well, by letting them park outside the range of shore defense

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[USER="58228"]mig-31bm[/USER], [USER="20936"]SpudmanWP[/USER]

It is only normal and representative of military professionals with levelled heads to develop stand-off weapons for the F-35, all you say is ok but fact is there is an increasing interest in such long range weapons in US military too. They will be way more expensive and have smaller warheads than their shorter range equivalents, so there must be important imperatives that lead to their development.

I assume it is common knowledge that modern IADs use a very ample variety of overlapping sensors and means of EW, detection and targeting, that cannot be overcome simply by throwing VLO planes at them. What started as "one stealth plane will need no support or stand-off weapons" has changed due to technical advances and it is now "stealth plane, with support and stand-off weapons, may be successful where other assets would stand no chance" I see nothing highly surprising here to be honest.

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[USER="58228"]mig-31bm[/USER], [USER="20936"]SpudmanWP[/USER]fact is there is an increasing interest in such long range weapons in US military too. They will be way more expensive and have smaller warheads than their shorter range equivalents, so there must be important imperatives that lead to their development

The important imperative is like i have said, anti carrier weapons are gainning range, with weapons like DF-21 , it is better for your aircraft to have long range weapons as well so the aircraft carrier can stay out of harms way.
Secondly, it is beneficial to be able to strike deep inside enemy territory without having to fly there, because you might not have enough fuel to come to various important point.

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[USER="58228"]mig-31bm[/USER]

Regarding carrier operations:
> Russia fields Tu-22M3 with range of almost 7000 km carrying Kh-32 and Kh-47M2 with range in excess of 1000 km. Now with US withdrawing from INF treaty, they will be free to create M/IRBMs (by simply adding stages to a Iskander for instance) with the ranges they consider appropriate, manoeuvring RVs and extremely short flight times in the anti-ship role.
> China has already the DF-21 with 1700 km range but also the DF-26 with estimated 5400 km range.

Now tell me how a 400 km range CM changes anything in regards of carriers being massively outranged and therefore essentially unusable against those countries. If you had kept your claim limited to less capable militaries you would have a point, but the way you put it your statement is simply not accurate IMO

Besides: USAF has already JASSM planned for F-35, so it is not only in naval warfare that stand-off missiles are available for the plane. JSOW-ER by now only requested by Navy but compatible with F-35A. We will see whether this and JSM will be ordered by USAF in the future or not.

Regarding deep strike:
F-35 has a very limited internal payload capability, so I do not quite understand how many targets you need to meet in one sortie. At most you will release 2 big weapons. Maybe mixed carriage of SDB and one bigger ranged CM could be possible too but of little value in my opinion due to the very small amount of ordnance per target and the adverse effects of countermeasures in their terminal accuracy.

All recent attacks where something remotely close to a modern IADS is present (Syria due to Russian presence and new hardware deployed there) have been done with stand-off weapons, both by FUKUS or by IAF and despite the presence in their air forces of VLO planes. As said I try to focus on facts and they talk loud and clear.

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DF-21 is more a political tool than a really efficient design. Do you know how fast a carrier group can move ?

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[USER="41059"]halloweene[/USER]

How do you know it is not an effective design? From what I have been told, a CSG can move freakin' fast, actually much more than publicised... for a ship. That is, essentially motionless compared to a 10 or 15 M ballistic missile. Nevertheless, what is your point, that the RV will not find its target or something? How much distance can a CSG cover in 15 minutes? How do you hide a 300 m vessel and escort in the middle of the sea??

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[USER="41059"]halloweene[/USER]

How do you know it is not an effective design? From what I have been told, a CSG can move freakin' fast, actually much more than publicised... for a ship. That is, essentially motionless compared to a 10 or 15 M ballistic missile. Nevertheless, what is your point, that the RV will not find its target or something? How much distance can a CSG cover in 15 minutes? How do you hide a 300 m vessel and escort in the middle of the sea??

i understand your point, but on the other hand what will be the exact range of DF-21 impact?

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You mean CEP? It is said to be 20 m, but who knows? It has to hit a moving target amongst heavy countermeasures, so it is not the same kind of task as hitting a stationary target but on the other hand a carrier is not a stealthy target in any way. There seem to be some images of tests against stationary target of the size of a carrier:

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[USER="58228"]mig-31bm[/USER]

Regarding carrier operations:
> Russia fields Tu-22M3 with range of almost 7000 km carrying Kh-32 and Kh-47M2 with range in excess of 1000 km. Now with US withdrawing from INF treaty, they will be free to create M/IRBMs (by simply adding stages to a Iskander for instance) with the ranges they consider appropriate, manoeuvring RVs and extremely short flight times in the anti-ship role.
> China has already the DF-21 with 1700 km range but also the DF-26 with estimated 5400 km range.

Now tell me how a 400 km range CM changes anything in regards of carriers being massively outranged and therefore essentially unusable against those countries. If you had kept your claim limited to less capable militaries you would have a point, but the way you put it your statement is simply not accurate IMO


Firstly, no sane person want to eject a few thounsand km from the shore and in the middle of the ocean, so you can't use the 7000 km ferry range of Tu-22 , the bombers have to go back as well, so we are left with around 4400 km combat radius for Tu-22M3 and 2400 km for others version, very impressive, however Kh-32 range is 1000 km, that is deep within the combat radius of F-35, and therefore, Tu-22M can be shot down if they want to get inside strike distance with that missile.

Secondly, carrier aircraft don't just launch their missiles right on top of their aircraft carrier, so the strike range of a carrier will be the combat radius of its air wing+ the range of their missiles,
JSOW-ER/JSM max range is 550 km
LRASM/JASSM-ER/ MALD max range is 910-1000 km
JASSM-XR max range is 1852 km
F-35C combat radius is 650 nm, can be extended by 52% with MQ-25 refueling so it can fly 1829 km from the carrier then came back
=> max strike range of a carrier is 3618 km from its location.
That is enough to keep the carrier completely safe from Su-35/Mig-35 with Brahmos or Mig-31 with Kh-47M2 and similar assests as well as DF-21.
It is correct that DF-26 can fly longer, but the fewer weapons that can reach your carrier, the less Aegis defense have to work and the safer you will be. You sure understand that it is is safer to park the carrier 2000 km from the shores than parking it 10 km from the shores, same concept.

Last but not least, enemy don't automatic know where the carrier will be and the further its air wing can strike and fly, the bigger the area enemy will have to search for, and jamming work better at distance.


Besides: USAF has already JASSM planned for F-35, so it is not only in naval warfare that stand-off missiles are available for the plane. JSOW-ER by now only requested by Navy but compatible with F-35A. We will see whether this and JSM will be ordered by USAF in the future or not.

Regarding deep strike:
F-35 has a very limited internal payload capability, so I do not quite understand how many targets you need to meet in one sortie. At most you will release 2 big weapons. Maybe mixed carriage of SDB and one bigger ranged CM could be possible too but of little value in my opinion due to the very small amount of ordnance per target and the adverse effects of countermeasures in their terminal accuracy.


You don't send a single F-35 in deep strike mission. You can have several F-35 and the total number of missiles are much higher than 2, secondly, long range missiles give the benefit that the whole squadron can stay close together and strike targets several hundreds or thounsand km apart, instead of assigning 1 F-35 to fly to X, 1 F-35 fly to Y and 1 F-35 fly to Z , you can have them stay close together and strike all 3 locations while still able to protect each others if they got bounced


All recent attacks where something remotely close to a modern IADS is present (Syria due to Russian presence and new hardware deployed there) have been done with stand-off weapons, both by FUKUS or by IAF and despite the presence in their air forces of VLO planes. As said I try to focus on facts and they talk loud and clear.

I have to disagree
https://southfront.org/israeli-air-f...rike-on-syria/
and if you focus on fact, USA are developing short range mininature weapons as well, such as SACM small advanced capability missile and SiAW stand in attack weapons

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My bad Kinzhal range is 2000 km instead of 1000 km, but it is a very new weapon, we shall see how HSSW , HCSW , HAWC , TBG or a conventinal version of Silver/blue sparrow turn out

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[USER="58228"]mig-31bm[/USER]

however Kh-32 range is 1000 km, that is deep within the combat radius of F-35, and therefore, Tu-22M can be shot down if they want to get inside strike distance with that missile.


Today, the F-35C could fly 670 miles (like 1080 km, correct if I am wrong and the flight profile that apply is different) and launch AMRAAM against a Tu-22M3 which could dash to Mach 1.8+ and launch from ca. 1000 for Kh-32, probably more for Kh-47M2. To do that he would need to detect the Tu and do it with enough time to intercept at those extreme distances. Not an easy feat as far as I know.

JASSM-XR max range is 1852 km
F-35C combat radius is 650 nm, can be extended by 52% with MQ-25 refueling so it can fly 1829 km from the carrier then came back
=> max strike range of a carrier is 3618 km from its location.

AFAIK this version of JASSM is expected for 2023, and MQ-25 is also not operational. As said, let us concentrate in existing weapons systems. If you want to consider prospective weapons then you should consider Russian hypersonic missiles and ballistic missiles not any more banned by INF. My point is that it is easier and cheaper for the defending side.

It is correct that DF-26 can fly longer, but the fewer weapons that can reach your carrier, the less Aegis defense have to work and the safer you will be.

How many of those manoeuvring hypersonic targets can AEGIS reliably defeat? Considering that it has been tested zero times against it? You will have trouble finding someone wanting to take the responsibility for ensuring that there would be no leakers. From what I remember USN has said they have no defences against such missiles. And of course China can produce 1, 100 or 1000 missiles, this is no big deal.
You sure understand that it is is safer to park the carrier 2000 km from the shores than parking it 10 km from the shores, same concept.

Yes of course. But if you have park your carrier 3000 or 4000 km away from the target you can expect your capability to degrade the enemy´s defences will be simply negligible and you will have much better options than carrier based aviation, like long range bombers from land bases, LACM armed submarines etc.

Last but not least, enemy don't automatic know where the carrier will be and the further its air wing can strike and fly, the bigger the area enemy will have to search for, and jamming work better at distance.

The last part is of course true, but CSGs are constantly monitored and cannot vanish in the sea. Both Russia and China have naval surveillance satellites for this and also OTH radars, long range patrol aircraft etc. Plus electromagnetic, logistic footprint of CSG being simply huge. I would not count on detection and targeting being a very big problem today, but stand to be corrected

You don't send a single F-35 in deep strike mission. You can have several F-35 and the total number of missiles are much higher than 2, secondly, long range missiles give the benefit that the whole squadron can stay close together and strike targets several hundreds or thounsand km apart, instead of assigning 1 F-35 to fly to X, 1 F-35 fly to Y and 1 F-35 fly to Z , you can have them stay close together and strike all 3 locations while still able to protect each others if they got bounced

Yes of course, fighters don't normally do strike missions alone, but you have to consider your mission effectiveness too and there, F-35s with internally carried ordnance are not the most capable bomber in terms of warhead kg delivered to the target. In other words, you don't want to send a whole squadron to eliminate a target. I would expect some A2A armed planes to be a escort for a strike group. Don't think it is the best to send many, scarcely A2A armed strike planes together deep into enemy air space since they only would have 2 AMRAAM per plane to defend themselves. Also to consider, attack vectors are normally optimized for each target. So your scenario is a possibility but I am not sure this would work like that most of the time. On the contrary, striking with stand-off weapons makes sense all of the time since it shortens your flight time and your exposure to enemy AD decisively. Modern fighters and crews are very expensive and not easily replaceable to risk them just to save some $ on a longer ranged missile, it simply doesn't make sense today anymore IMO.
I have to disagree
https://southfront.org/israeli-air-f...rike-on-syria/

What is SDB but a stand-off weapon? This is Israeli MO ever since Syrian AD was modernized to less than prehistoric stand and cannot be fooled and jammed trivially. They don't enter Syrian air space, just hide behind mountainous terrain in Lebanon, pop up to launch and return. Now imagine if Syria had something similar to an air force, how difficult and risky it would be for Israel to attack. Most of instances of attack we see from Western nations are based in terribly lopsided situations like this, where the defending side is missing most of the defensive elements a capable military would count on.
and if you focus on fact, USA are developing short range mininature weapons as well, such as SACM small advanced capability missile and SiAW stand in attack weapons

Yes of course. My point is that certain weapons are simply not intended for first phase of conflict against peer rivals. And that applies to big parts of US arsenal actually, because their military has rather focused in more profitable colonial wars.

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Today, the F-35C could fly 670 miles (like 1080 km, correct if I am wrong and the flight profile that apply is different) and launch AMRAAM against a Tu-22M3 which could dash to Mach 1.8+ and launch from ca. 1000 for Kh-32, probably more for Kh-47M2. To do that he would need to detect the Tu and do it with enough time to intercept at those extreme distances. Not an easy feat as far as I know.

Yes you are wrong

F-35C in strike profile have combat radius of 768 nautical miles, that is 1422 km for one way (2844 km for both way)
F-35C in air to air profile will fly even further since it carry lighter load,
Tu-22 is not a stealth aircraft by any stretch of imagination, and it is not maneuver either so AIM-120D max engagement range can be used
Secondly, instead of making F-35 dash to Tu-22 location, you can set some of them patroling at 800-900 km ahead of the carrier, their engagement range with AIM-120 create a bubble that Tu-22 have to past through if it want to launch Kh-32


AFAIK this version of JASSM is expected for 2023, and MQ-25 is also not operational. As said, let us concentrate in existing weapons systems. If you want to consider prospective weapons then you should consider Russian hypersonic missiles and ballistic missiles not any more banned by INF. My point is that it is easier and cheaper for the defending side.

MQ-25 had been tested, eventually it will come to the fleet, just like JASSM-XR, neither system really use some super innovative technology
We can also consider Russian hypersonic weapons but then we shouldn't ignore US hypersonic counterpart such as ARRW, TBG, HAWC, HSSW ,HCSW ...etc it is a constant arm race after all.


How many of those manoeuvring hypersonic targets can AEGIS reliably defeat? Considering that it has been tested zero times against it?

I don't think AEGIS had never been tested against hypersonic maneuvering target, as we know Raytheon made Blue / black / silver Sparrow series

On the flip size, how many timw had DF-26 been tested against the jamming of USN fleet? Zero
how many time had it been tested against a moving target? Zero , eratic maneuver is one thing, eratic maneuver while acquiring target at flew to target is an order of magnitude harder


From what I remember USN has said they have no defences against such missiles. And of course China can produce 1, 100 or 1000 missiles, this is no big deal.

I also remember USN claim anti ship ballistic missiles aren't very useful, and it is a very big deal to produce 1000 ballistic missiles, both in term of time and cost, do China even have that many ballistic missiles currently?
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Yes of course. But if you have park your carrier 3000 or 4000 km away from the target you can expect your capability to degrade the enemy´s defences will be simply negligible and you will have much better options than carrier based aviation, like long range bombers from land bases, LACM armed submarines etc.

Weapons with extreme range like JASSM-XR aren't meant to attack SAM site, they are mainly to destroy high value stationary target such as head quarter, command center, bunker, OTH radars ..etc


The last part is of course true, but CSGs are constantly monitored and cannot vanish in the sea. Both Russia and China have naval surveillance satellites for this and also OTH radars, long range patrol aircraft etc. Plus electromagnetic, logistic footprint of CSG being simply huge. I would not count on detection and targeting being a very big problem today, but stand to be corected

A satellite have predictable trajectogy so their flight path can be evaded, radar guided satellite can be jammed as well, very easy in fact.
OTH radars are for early warning rather than firing solution, because they have terrible accuracy and ID capability, and they are vulnerable big stationary target
Long range patrol aircraft can detect carrier if they aren't downed by the carrier air wing


Yes of course, fighters don't normally do strike missions alone, but you have to consider your mission effectiveness too and there, F-35s with internally carried ordnance are not the most capable bomber in terms of warhead kg delivered to the target. In other words, you don't want to send a whole squadron to eliminate a target. I would expect some A2A armed planes to be a escort for a strike group. Don't think it is the best to send many, scarcely A2A armed strike planes together deep into enemy air space since they only would have 2 AMRAAM per plane to defend themselves. Also to consider, attack vectors are normally optimized for each target. So your scenario is a possibility but I am not sure this would work like that most of the time.

SACM will allow each F-35 to carry 2 CM and 4 A2A missiles each, having separate A2A armed F-35 as escort is not a bad idea, but even then, it is better for the group of escort and bomber to stay together as a large group than for them to divide and goes for separate targets, it is harder to deal with a group of 10 F-35 than a group of 5 F-35


On the contrary, striking with stand-off weapons makes sense all of the time since it shortens your flight time and your exposure to enemy AD decisively. Modern fighters and crews are very expensive and not easily replaceable to risk them just to save some $ on a longer ranged missile, it simply doesn't make sense today anymore IMO.

Short range weapons have their own niches:
you can carry more, in many case you need to go close to be able to detect targets


What is SDB but a stand-off weapon? This is Israeli MO ever since Syrian AD was modernized to less than prehistoric stand and cannot be fooled and jammed trivially. They don't enter Syrian air space, just hide behind mountainous terrain in Lebanon, pop up to launch and return.

Stand off is relative concept, compare to 20 mm cannon then AGM-114 is a stand off weapon, but compare to JSM then AGM-114 is a very short range weapons, here we had just talked about Kh-47 which can reach 2000 km and JASSM-XR that can fly 1850 km then by comparision SDB's range is very short, and it also put aircraft within engagement range of Syria defense such as S-200

I don't believe that Israel don't dare to enter Syrian air space or that they only hide behind the mountain terrain after Syrian AD was modernized either
In 2013 Syrian got JYL-1 3-D long-range surveillance radar, Type 120 (LLQ120) 2D low-altitude acquisition radar, and JY-27 VHF long-range surveillance radar, all very modern radar , among them JY-27 claimed anti stealth capability
www.google.com/amp/s/www.christianpost.com/amp/ben-carson-releases-proof-of-chinese-radar-station-in-syria.html

https://i-hls.com/archives/18805

But on April 2018, Israel still fly inside Syria to drop SDB, they sure can't fly nap of the earth and hide behind mountains because SDB is a glider bombs and need high altitude release otherwise it is visual range
https://southfront.org/israeli-air-f...rike-on-syria/


Yes of course. My point is that certain weapons are simply not intended for first phase of conflict against peer rivals.

They certainly intended to use SiaW and SACM against peer adversary
he U.S. Air Force is moving forward with two new weapons for its future fighters and bombers, the previously undisclosed Stand-in Attack Weapon (SiAW) and Small Advanced Capabilities Missile (SACM).
SiAW is an air-to-surface weapon, designed to “hold at risk the surface elements that make up the anti-access/area-denial environment,” the service says in written testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee on March 29

http://aviationweek.com/awindefense/...n-arm-f-x-b-21

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[USER="41059"]halloweene[/USER]

How do you know it is not an effective design? From what I have been told, a CSG can move freakin' fast, actually much more than publicised... for a ship. That is, essentially motionless compared to a 10 or 15 M ballistic missile. Nevertheless, what is your point, that the RV will not find its target or something? How much distance can a CSG cover in 15 minutes? How do you hide a 300 m vessel and escort in the middle of the sea??


It would need a mid-course update from targeting satellites. They can be jammed or shot down.

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[USER="58228"]mig-31bm[/USER]

F-35C in strike profile have combat radius of 768 nautical miles, that is 1422 km for one way (2844 km for both way)

Care indicating your source? Not that the difference is extremely relevant to the case but maybe mine is outdated.
Secondly, instead of making F-35 dash to Tu-22 location, you can set some of them patroling at 800-900 km ahead of the carrier, their engagement range with AIM-120 create a bubble that Tu-22 have to past through if it want to launch Kh-32

That means patrolling a perimeter of 5600 km against a plane faster than them and with much longer range, how many planes would you need for that considering the engagement range of AMRAAMS? How long can the F-35 remain on station at those distances, today? Easy to bypass I would say, but still we don't have exact ranges of Kh-32 or Kh-47M2 from Tu-22, so there is much uncertainty here in regards of exact numbers. Add some MiG-31K to the mix if you want. Defending those attacks it is not as trivial as you put it.
MQ-25 had been tested, eventually it will come to the fleet, just like JASSM-XR, neither system really use some super innovative technology
We can also consider Russian hypersonic weapons but then we shouldn't ignore US hypersonic counterpart such as ARRW, TBG, HAWC, HSSW ,HCSW ...etc it is a constant arm race after all.

No, either we stick to deployed weapons or this is simply pointless.
I don't think AEGIS had never been tested against hypersonic maneuvering target, as we know Raytheon made Blue / black / silver Sparrow series

What were the results? How accurately does that correlate to DF-21/26?
On the flip size, how many timw had DF-26 been tested against the jamming of USN fleet? Zero

Of course I hope it is zero. My point here is that calculating interception probability here with certainty is almost impossible and no serious expert would like to be responsible for an action that will put a whole CSG at risk. That gives the threat its deterrent value.
how many time had it been tested against a moving target? Zero ,

Sorry you don't know.
eratic maneuver is one thing, eratic maneuver while acquiring target at flew to target is an order of magnitude harder[/QUOTE]
That number is wild speculation, you don't know the geometry of the manoeuvring and the characteristics of the seeker (or seekers) to start with. Please consider that at the speeds considered, just varying the trajectory few degrees would change many km the interception point.
I also remember USN claim anti ship ballistic missiles aren't very useful

Why? Then why to spend billions on ABM systems and targets to test them? Why to increase the range of carrier air wing and their weapons, this was your point from the beginning.
and it is a very big deal to produce 1000 ballistic missiles,

BMs are dirt cheap compared to a CSG and its air wing. Even third world countries can allow themselves to have hundreds of them, then imagine China. If what they need is a saturation attack then they will go for it, you can bet your last cent on that. For instance IIRC, Soviets scrapped 620 RSD-10 Pioneer (>5000 km range, with three RVs each) because of INF treaty, and that was only one type of nuclear missile, conventional versions could be done way cheaper and more numerous.
A satellite have predictable trajectogy so their flight path can be evaded, radar guided satellite can be jammed as well, very easy in fact.
OTH radars are for early warning rather than firing solution, because they have terrible accuracy and ID capability, and they are vulnerable big stationary target
Long range patrol aircraft can detect carrier if they aren't downed by the carrier air wing

To suggest a CSG can be in the middle of the sea or even jam radars unnoticed is absurd.
SACM will allow each F-35 to carry 2 CM and 4 A2A missiles each,

No weapon fiction please.
it is harder to deal with a group of 10 F-35 than a group of 5 F-35

But also a better target and more interesting to shoot down.
Short range weapons have their own niches

Yes of course
I don't believe that Israel don't dare to enter Syrian air space or that they only hide behind the mountain terrain after Syrian AD was modernized either

Inform yourself. For Israel it does not make sense to risk their prestige, it is more valuable than their whole armed forces. Why to risk in any case? As they are doing now, they can attack Syria without fear of their planes being downed.
But on April 2018, Israel still fly inside Syria to drop SDB, they sure can't fly nap of the earth and hide behind mountains because SDB is a glider bombs and need high altitude release otherwise it is visual range

In the Il-20 incident they used those bombs too, from stand-off ranges (almost 100 km) and hiding behind another plane. They repeated hiding behind planes (civilian) more recently. In case of attacks from Lebanon they can climb and release the bombs and stay just very shortly visible to Syrian AD, then egressing or hiding fast behind mountains again. Without Syria having a proper air force to run after them and without wanting to retaliate heavily with BMs, this is a safe approach for Israel, as much as is irrelevant to the Syrian military capabilities is profitable as PR stunt. (on a side note, this may change if they attack too heavily as the last time though, Syria and Hezbollah have already warned)

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Care indicating your source? Not that the difference is extremely relevant to the case but maybe mine is outdated.

1) Please see the attached photo in my previous post for source
2) You mistaken between nautical miles and miles (should be 610 nm instead of 610 miles) and you also confuse between range and combat radius and your number is for F-35A in A2G mission while it should be F-35C in A2A profile, F-35C carry significantly more fuel than F-35A and A2A missions require lighter load also.
3) F-35A in A2A profile has 760 nm (1407 km ) combat radius is 40% higher than your value (see attached file) so the different is extremely relevant.


That means patrolling a perimeter of 5600 km against a plane faster than them and with much longer range, how many planes would you need for that considering the engagement range of AMRAAMS?

No they don't have to control a perimeter of 5600 km, KH-32 range is 1000 km, so Tu-22 need to get within 1000 km from the carrier to launch it, so the radius is 1000 km from the aircraft carrier, but they only need to cover the sector that face the land because Tu-22 cant take off from a carrier => the perimeter is 2800-3000 km , AIM-120 engagement range is 185 km, so you can make a barrier that Tu-22 have to pass through if it want to launch Kh-32 with 14-16 F-35.
Tu-22 being faster than F-35 is irrelevant, it don't know where the F-35 will be.


How long can the F-35 remain on station at those distances, today? Easy to bypass I would say

At 1000 km from aircraft carrier, F-35 still have 407 km combat radius left, which mean if it was a flying in a circle instead of going further, it can circling for another 814 km before it has to return to the carrier


but still we don't have exact ranges of Kh-32 or Kh-47M2 from Tu-22, so there is much uncertainty here in regards of exact numbers. Add some MiG-31K to the mix if you want. Defending those attacks it is not as trivial as you put it.

Aircraft carrier can park outside the engagement radius of Mig-31, if F-35 use long range cruise missiles and MQ-25 make big different too, currently there is only 4 MQ-25, but i don't think there are many Mig-31K either.

No, either we stick to deployed weapons or this is simply pointless.

So no Kinzhal for Tu-22 then, there hasn't been any separation test yet


What were the results? How accurately does that correlate to DF-21/26?

The missiles is intercepted, how accurately that correlate to DF-21/26? no civilian know, not you, not me, or anyone here


Of course I hope it is zero. My point here is that calculating interception probability here with certainty is almost impossible and no serious expert would like to be responsible for an action that will put a whole CSG at risk. That gives the threat its deterrent value.

Yes but nothing is certain so defending against 3 missiles is still easier than defending against 300 missiles, so that point to advantage of staying at stand off range


Sorry you don't know.

You can hide testing of cruise missiles, you can't hide testing of medium range ballistic missiles, because of the signature involved with the launch and the altitude the missile will reach.


.lPlease consider that at the speeds considered, just varying the trajectory few degrees would change many km the interception point.

That is all well an good for a normal ballistic missile when dozens km miss distance is still acceptable, you can still kill thounsands
But we are talking about anti ship version here, the seeker have to acquire the tảget and glide the warhead toward it, so a few degrees change in trajectory can mean you miss the target completely


Why? Then why to spend billions on ABM systems and targets to test them? Why to increase the range of carrier air wing and their weapons, this was your point from the beginning.

ABM is also useful against common nuclear ballistic missiles threat, which the majority are intended to attack city, any way, my point USN had made several contradicting claims regarding anti ship ballistic missiles m, so they shouldn't be taken at face value.


BMs are dirt cheap compared to a CSG and its air wing. Even third world countries can allow themselves to have hundreds of them, then imagine China. If what they need is a saturation attack then they will go for it, you can bet your last cent on that. For instance IIRC, Soviets scrapped 620 RSD-10 Pioneer (>5000 km range, with three RVs each) because of INF treaty, and that was only one type of nuclear missile, conventional versions could be done way cheaper and more numerous.

How much does DF-26 cost?
We are not talking about a common ballistic missiles here but one with ability to attack moving targets


To suggest a CSG can be in the middle of the sea or even jam radars unnoticed is absurd.

a CSG is big but compare to the vast area of the ocean , it is like a grant of sand in a desert


No weapon fiction please.

weapons fiction imply something only exist in movie or comic , sacm is actualy developed and funded, you won't call Russian hypersonic weapons fictional weapons then there is no reason to call SACM a fictional weapons, if you call it a future weapon or weapon under development then it is different.


But also a better target and more interesting to shoot down.

More interesting in the sense that you have higher probability of dying if you mess with them .


Inform yourself. For Israel it does not make sense to risk their prestige, it is more valuable than their whole armed forces. Why to risk in any case? As they are doing now, they can attack Syria without fear of their planes being downed.

There is no concrete evidence to show that Israel always fly nap of the earth to strike targets in syria, and i don't believe that tactic is usesable against all targets as well.
Secondly, Glide bombs range is altitude dependent , at low altitude, they can't fly further than a rocket, and aircraft can't climb faster than missiles, no where near as fast.
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[USER="58228"]mig-31bm[/USER]

1) Please see the attached photo in my previous post for source

That is dated 2010. See my source attached.
[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"KPPs FY2019 PB F-35 SAR TIF.gif","data-attachmentid":3850563}[/ATTACH]
2) You mistaken between nautical miles and miles (should be 610 nm instead of 610 miles

True, my bad! I am well aware of the difference but missed it this time.
and you also confuse between range and combat radius and your number is for F-35A in A2G mission while it should be F-35C in A2A profile, F-35C carry significantly more fuel than F-35A and A2A missions require lighter load also.

I am using the data from SAR for C version. Have not looked profile but also are other things to consider like reserve fuel for carrier landing, I am not aware of how this was accounted for. There is a limit to the data I can find and to the detail we can go into.

As to your points below those ones, I will not go in detail though I disagree in several aspects: intercepting supersonic planes at 1000 km from the carrier is not trivial, simply because area to cover is huge and on-station times increasingly small. You need to now the attack vector, you need to detect the carrier precisely, but due to long range of the Tu-22 / IFR of MiG-31, speed of the carriers and radar horizon this is not easy for a CSG, they don't need to come from one predictable direction only for you to wait them there and you cannot have the whole air wing flying to be where needed to intercept. We still don't know what is the exact range of the involved weapons so a bit more or less range for F-35 will not solve the discussion (for instance it is stated 2000 km for Kinzhal from MiG-31K, which would render your whole effort to calculate the interception pointless). You also seem to count on LPI radar of a F-35 being undetectable for a bomber-sized and accordingly protected plane? Many many details to address and not every and each one of them will be in favour of the carrier all of the time.

Will not discuss much further rest of points, I laid some info clearly enough IMO so you can check if you want. Have no issue with you having an opinion different to mine.

Member for

10 years 5 months

Posts: 2,014


I am using the data from SAR for C version. Have not looked profile but also are other things to consider like reserve fuel for carrier landing, I am not aware of how this was accounted for.

Iam looking at your table now, but the objective is still 730 nm for CV version (the mission profile should be the same as before which is A2G).
760 nm A2A combat radius is from 2016 for A version
All combat radius in SAR are for A2G profile.


As to your points below those ones, I will not go in detail though I disagree in several aspects: intercepting supersonic planes at 1000 km from the carrier is not trivial, simply because area to cover is huge and on-station times increasingly small. You need to now the attack vector, you need to detect the carrier precisely, but due to long range of the Tu-22 / IFR of MiG-31, speed of the carriers and radar horizon this is not easy for a CSG, they don't need to come from one predictable direction only for you to wait them there and you cannot have the whole air wing flying to be where needed to intercept. We still don't know what is the exact range of the involved weapons so a bit more or less range for F-35 will not solve the discussion (for instance it is stated 2000 km for Kinzhal from MiG-31K, which would render your whole effort to calculate the interception pointless). You also seem to count on LPI radar of a F-35 being undetectable for a bomber-sized and accordingly protected plane? Many many details to address and not every and each one of them will be in favour of the carrier all of the time.

Radar horizon limitation will apply to both side. Tu-22 and Mig-31 also need a way to locate the carrier, this is not the same as attacking stationary target.
My proposed method doesn't rely on knowing accurately where Tu-22 will be, but rather to make a intangible barrier infront of the carrier so that Tu-22 have to pass through if it want to launch Kh-32 ( Kinzhal is a different case though), whether Tu-22 RWR can detect APG-81 or not, doesn't matter because not all F-35 has to be online, some can keep their radar active and share information through datalink