Your Nation's Air Force Mark III: Best Korea Edition

[Crookfur]

F-14s would not have been given away as "bribes" especially not to someone who wasn't a rock solid ally.
You want F-14s then you had better be willing to shell out all the big bucks like the Shah was.

Well, a possibility could be that these are "second-hand" F-14As sold somewhere around the early-to-mid 1990s, at the time when the F-14D was delivered to the US Navy.

It's a possibility but I doubt it would come without a hefty bill for reconditioning and upgrades and without a major shift into the American sphere.

[Zhouran]

I just read somewhere that apparently during Red Flag exercises, the US Air Force lets the other sides win in order to learn what tactics they would use against any USAF fighter jet. If that's the case, then that makes way more sense than third world air forces beating the USAF. But then again, WVR dogfights don't generally happen due to BVR combat, which begs the question: why would the US Air Force hold mock-dogfight exercises to understand the dogfight tactics of another air force when they could simply easily shoot down their targets several kilometers away?

I think a bit of it comes from realising that they might need to fight in an environment where they don't have an air picture/information dominance and that thete will be situations where they will get bounced. Most US squadrons learn that lesson when they deploy to the UK and find themselves prey for roaming tornados and typhoons.
There is also a belief that keeping up your WVR ACM stuff makes you a much better pilot in general as it involves using all your skills in a faster changing and more stressful environment. At least that was the line being putfirward in an article I read about the USAF paying for the Bulgarians to keep thier MiG-29s flying at a reasonable level to act as aggressors for F-16 squadrons deployed to Europe. Said MiGs were strictly WVR only as the Bulgarians were never sold the electronics or missiles for BVR.

Well, since WVR dogfights would be pretty stressful (in comparison to BVR combat, which you just simply fire a missile at an enemy several kilometers away), it makes sense to train pilots to handle stressful situations and keep their situational awareness up to date. Here in Australia, the RAAF's No. 2 Operational Conversion Unit does refresher courses for Hornet pilots who haven't flown for more than nine months so that their flying skills and stress handling doesn't diminish.

It's a possibility but I doubt it would come without a hefty bill for reconditioning and upgrades and without a major shift into the American sphere.

Having to pay an expensive bill for upgrading second-hand F-14As would probably be a better choice than acquiring newly-made F-14Ds. I don't know what the price is for both the F-14D and the upgrades and reconditioning for the F-14As, although I assume that upgrading second-hand F-14As would be slightly cheaper than acquiring new F-14Ds.

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

While we're at it, have some maymays.

[Kanugues Wed]

F-14s would not have been given away as "bribes" especially not to someone who wasn't a rock solid ally.
You want F-14s then you had better be willing to shell out all the big bucks like the Shah was.

Well, a possibility could be that these are "second-hand" F-14As sold somewhere around the early-to-mid 1990s, at the time when the F-14D was delivered to the US Navy.

They were a bought around 89-92 so yeah, a few second hand F-14a. None of the planes except the F-35, indigenous fighter and a few others came new.

Basically we got bribed into neutrality and kicking out the soviet nukes. It took more than planes, there were things like agricultural and industrial equipment too. Given my geographic position, it must’ve made the Philippines feel a whole lot safer.

[Zhouran]

Given my geographic position, it must’ve made the Philippines feel a whole lot safer.

Lol that's a good thing since corruption and incompetence exist within the ranks of the Philippine military.

Also, the US doesn't have to "bribe" your nation into neutrality, in reality they'd bribe your nation into siding with them. Also, receiving weapons from the Soviets doesn't often mean you're communist, rather you're either anti-west or non-aligned neutral. Indonesia used to be a non-aligned socialist state that received support from China and the Soviets until the early 60s. Meanwhile Finland acquired MiG-21 fighter jets from the Soviet despite being a neutral nation.

[Kanugues Wed]

Given my geographic position, it must’ve made the Philippines feel a whole lot safer.

Lol that's a good thing since corruption and incompetence exist within the ranks of the Philippine military.

Also, the US doesn't have to "bribe" your nation into neutrality, in reality they'd bribe your nation into siding with them. Also, receiving weapons from the Soviets doesn't often mean you're communist, rather you're either anti-west or non-aligned neutral. Indonesia used to be a non-aligned socialist state that received support from China and the Soviets until the early 60s. Meanwhile Finland acquired MiG-21 fighter jets from the Soviet despite being a neutral nation.

Well, I mean we were more like communism lite. We got rid of the rich landowners, but didn’t go for full farming collectivism. And we introduced democracy in the mid/late 70s, once old dictator died. Stuff like that.

The reason I think the US would be trying to win a decent relationship with us is because I feel like our location could really harm their operations in the pacific. I’m considering having us adopt a policy of “whoever got attacked first might get a nice, heavily fortified naval base and unsinkable carrier right in the opening of the South China Sea.” We also have tensions with China over some islands, which I think could help drive us closer to the US once we start floating away.

[Gallia-]

Uhhh no?

The USA literally has both those things.

[The Akasha Colony]

I just read somewhere that apparently during Red Flag exercises, the US Air Force lets the other sides win in order to learn what tactics they would use against any USAF fighter jet. If that's the case, then that makes way more sense than third world air forces beating the USAF. But then again, WVR dogfights don't generally happen due to BVR combat, which begs the question: why would the US Air Force hold mock-dogfight exercises to understand the dogfight tactics of another air force when they could simply easily shoot down their targets several kilometers away?

If you train harder than you expect to fight, then the real fighting will be easy in comparison. And this is better than the reverse.

The whole point of exercises like Red Flag and NTC are to present the worst possible case scenario for USAF and participating allied forces. The scenarios are usually heavily stacked against the "friendly forces" by giving OPFOR all sorts of advantages. This is to push the friendly forces as hard as they can and to keep friendly pilots on their toes and alert, rather than let them get complacent and rusty. This has always been the case, especially after the USAF and USN learned the price of poor pilot training in Vietnam. The ACEVAL/AIMVAL evaluations were also designed to stack the deck in favor of the small F-5s and against the big F-14s and F-15s to figure out what the shortcomings of those big jets were against light fighters, and the ways to address that problem.

Practical BVR requires a lot of integrated components and if any of these are jammed or destroyed by a competent adversary, it becomes much more troublesome. It's not actually as simple as "we have longer range missiles lol." The USAF has been able to rely more heavily on BVR engagements since the 1990s in large part thanks to its AEW&C advantage. E-3 Sentries could be counted on to track aircraft at extreme ranges and developments in NCTR made it easier to identify potentially hostile aircraft. It was particularly easy in Iraq since once the E-3s were orbiting inside Iraqi airspace, they could detect Iraqi aircraft as they took off from their airbases, and thus immediately identify enemy planes to be engaged by friendly CAPs. The AEW&C advantage made the trickiest part of BVR combat, target identification, easy. US fighters were given instructions to engage well before they had even detected the enemy on their own because the E-3s had already handled target identification.

But this airborne intelligence and control advantage is by no means guaranteed against a near-peer adversary, since AEW&C aircraft have widely proliferated and counter-AEW&C weapons have been a major subject of interest in Russia, China, and other nations that expect they might engage in a serious air war. Take away or impede the E-3s and the most common method of target identification goes out the window, as does the command and control necessary to avoid friendly units from wandering into each other. The introduction of newer ECM suites and opposing stealth aircraft further complicate this matter. The likelihood of WVR combat is still relatively high. Perhaps not as high as in the past, but it's far from zero. It should also be noted that "several kilometers" is still WVR anyway; a real BVR engagement will take place 30+ km plus away.

[Zhouran]

I just read somewhere that apparently during Red Flag exercises, the US Air Force lets the other sides win in order to learn what tactics they would use against any USAF fighter jet. If that's the case, then that makes way more sense than third world air forces beating the USAF. But then again, WVR dogfights don't generally happen due to BVR combat, which begs the question: why would the US Air Force hold mock-dogfight exercises to understand the dogfight tactics of another air force when they could simply easily shoot down their targets several kilometers away?

If you train harder than you expect to fight, then the real fighting will be easy in comparison. And this is better than the reverse.

The whole point of exercises like Red Flag and NTC are to present the worst possible case scenario for USAF and participating allied forces. The scenarios are usually heavily stacked against the "friendly forces" by giving OPFOR all sorts of advantages. This is to push the friendly forces as hard as they can and to keep friendly pilots on their toes and alert, rather than let them get complacent and rusty. This has always been the case, especially after the USAF and USN learned the price of poor pilot training in Vietnam. The ACEVAL/AIMVAL evaluations were also designed to stack the deck in favor of the small F-5s and against the big F-14s and F-15s to figure out what the shortcomings of those big jets were against light fighters, and the ways to address that problem.

I remember reading a quote from a USAF pilot and he said that the aggressors were more difficult than the actual enemies they fought.

Also, rules of engagement in the Vietnam War in which American pilots would need visual identification before engagement meant WVR combat would of been the only way to fight the Vietnamese. The F-4 has superior avionics and ordnance payload compared to the MiGs, but its drawback was its maneuverability which made it a target especially for the slower, more-nimble MiG-17/19s. If the USN chose the XF8U-3 Crusader III instead, maybe they would of dominated WVR dogfights against the Vietnamese.

Practical BVR requires a lot of integrated components and if any of these are jammed or destroyed by a competent adversary, it becomes much more troublesome. It's not actually as simple as "we have longer range missiles lol." The USAF has been able to rely more heavily on BVR engagements since the 1990s in large part thanks to its AEW&C advantage. E-3 Sentries could be counted on to track aircraft at extreme ranges and developments in NCTR made it easier to identify potentially hostile aircraft. It was particularly easy in Iraq since once the E-3s were orbiting inside Iraqi airspace, they could detect Iraqi aircraft as they took off from their airbases, and thus immediately identify enemy planes to be engaged by friendly CAPs. The AEW&C advantage made the trickiest part of BVR combat, target identification, easy. US fighters were given instructions to engage well before they had even detected the enemy on their own because the E-3s had already handled target identification.

The US Air Force no doubt benefited a lot from AEW&Cs, in comparison air forces that used Soviet doctrines such as Iraq had to rely on ground-controlled intercept. Superior avionics would play an important role in the decisive outcome of an air war.

But this airborne intelligence and control advantage is by no means guaranteed against a near-peer adversary, since AEW&C aircraft have widely proliferated and counter-AEW&C weapons have been a major subject of interest in Russia, China, and other nations that expect they might engage in a serious air war. Take away or impede the E-3s and the most common method of target identification goes out the window, as does the command and control necessary to avoid friendly units from wandering into each other. The introduction of newer ECM suites and opposing stealth aircraft further complicate this matter. The likelihood of WVR combat is still relatively high. Perhaps not as high as in the past, but it's far from zero. It should also be noted that "several kilometers" is still WVR anyway; a real BVR engagement will take place 30+ km plus away.

Well, considering how 4th gen. fighter jets have become a lot more proliferated with 3rd world air forces, this would probably have an effect too. Before, only a few nations such as the US, the USSR, and France would of had 4th gen. fighters.

Also, I thought WVR is some around 15 km and below? I know newer short-range AAMs such as IRIS-T, R-74, ASRAAM, and AIM-9X have ranges comparable to that of early radar-guided missiles such as K-8, R-23R, and AIM-7C/E, but 15-30km sounds kinda a lot further away for WVR combat.

Well, I mean we were more like communism lite. We got rid of the rich landowners, but didn’t go for full farming collectivism. And we introduced democracy in the mid/late 70s, once old dictator died. Stuff like that.

Socialism doesn't always mean communism. Syria is baathist, which means they are socialist, but at the same time they're not communist. Indonesia's Sukarno was socialist but not communist. You don't really need to be a socialist just to acquire soviet weaponry, you just have to be anti-west and anti-us.

Anyway, your situation sounds a little similar to Egypt's, except that Egypt sided with the US because of the Camp David Accords.

[The Akasha Colony]

I remember reading a quote from a USAF pilot and he said that the aggressors were more difficult than the actual enemies they fought.

OPFOR units are practically always harder opponents than real enemies, for several reasons. OPFOR units usually spend more time flying than any other unit, since they are always participating in exercises, while the blue force units get rotated in for a short period and then get rotated back home so a new unit can conduct exercises. OPFOR units are intimately familiar with standard blue force tactics since they are also trained in those tactics. And the exercises are usually set up to favor them over the blue forces.

Also, rules of engagement in the Vietnam War in which American pilots would need visual identification before engagement meant WVR combat would of been the only way to fight the Vietnamese. The F-4 has superior avionics and ordnance payload compared to the MiGs, but its drawback was its maneuverability which made it a target especially for the slower, more-nimble MiG-17/19s. If the USN chose the XF8U-3 Crusader III instead, maybe they would of dominated WVR dogfights against the Vietnamese.

The US Air Force no doubt benefited a lot from AEW&Cs, in comparison air forces that used Soviet doctrines such as Iraq had to rely on ground-controlled intercept. Superior avionics would play an important role in the decisive outcome of an air war.

The actual rules of engagement were largely the same in both Vietnam and ODS. And for the same reason: friendly aircraft hugely outnumbered hostile aircraft, such that engaging an unidentified target would more than likely lead to a friendly fire incident. Visual identification was not actually needed, but was usually done because it was the simplest and most reliable way to identify a target. Some alternatives existed but more reliable ones (TISEO, Combat Tree) did not become available until the tail end of the Vietnam War, or well after.

The difference was that by the time ODS rolled around, improvements in NCTR and IFF allowed E-3s to handle positive identification on their own at significant range, and then vector the nearest fighter patrol on target. In 82% of engagements, E-3s both detected and identified the targets on their own before they could be detected by US fighter patrols. This allowed the E-3s to vector friendly fighters against those targets and authorize them to fire even before the fighters could identify the targets themselves. Even in cases where E-3s could not properly identify the targets, they could still alert F-15 and F/A-18s to the targets who could in turn use their own radar to conduct NCTR.

Take out the E-3s though and suddenly that becomes a lot more problematic. Detection and identification ranges drop dramatically. Especially in a fight between stealth aircraft, both of which have strong incentives to avoid emissions as much as possible. The chances of a short-range engagement occurring increase significantly.

US losses against MiGs in Vietnam had little to do with F-4 itself, and more to do with insufficient training and unreliable ordnance. The successful hit rate of AIM-7s and AIM-9s fired in Vietnam was well under 20%, but by ODS upgraded versions were getting success rates above 50%. Phantom II was a better choice than Crusader III, and the Navy was correct to choose it.

Well, considering how 4th gen. fighter jets have become a lot more proliferated with 3rd world air forces, this would probably have an effect too. Before, only a few nations such as the US, the USSR, and France would of had 4th gen. fighters.

Also, I thought WVR is some around 15 km and below? I know newer short-range AAMs such as IRIS-T, R-74, ASRAAM, and AIM-9X have ranges comparable to that of early radar-guided missiles such as K-8, R-23R, and AIM-7C/E, but 15-30km sounds kinda a lot further away for WVR combat.

WVR doesn't literally mean that the combatants are in eyeball range of each other.

WVR is basically the range at which maneuvering starts to matter, largely because IIR SRAAMs can be used. Given that most modern SRAAMs can easily reach 30 km at least in a head-on engagement, this seems to be a reasonably good approximation of the demarcation point.

[Taihei Tengoku]

The Navy already did dominate WVR dogfights against the Vietnamese because they trained for fighter combat unlike the USAF.

No guns, fox only, final destination

[Zhouran]

The Navy already did dominate WVR dogfights against the Vietnamese because they trained for fighter combat unlike the USAF.

No guns, fox only, final destination

Apparently the USAF did poorly compared the USN, in fact they were the one who asked for onboard cannons on their F-4s. I don't think there were any naval variants of the F-4 like the F-4J that had any onboard cannons at all.

But yeah, by the time the US entered the Vietnam War, the US Navy would still have experience in dogfights compared to the US Air Force since at the time the USAF was strongly focused on missile-oriented interceptors while the Navy still had dedicated dogfighters consisting of the F-8 and F-11.

The actual rules of engagement were largely the same in both Vietnam and ODS. And for the same reason: friendly aircraft hugely outnumbered hostile aircraft, such that engaging an unidentified target would more than likely lead to a friendly fire incident. Visual identification was not actually needed, but was usually done because it was the simplest and most reliable way to identify a target. Some alternatives existed but more reliable ones (TISEO, Combat Tree) did not become available until the tail end of the Vietnam War, or well after.

The difference was that by the time ODS rolled around, improvements in NCTR and IFF allowed E-3s to handle positive identification on their own at significant range, and then vector the nearest fighter patrol on target. In 82% of engagements, E-3s both detected and identified the targets on their own before they could be detected by US fighter patrols. This allowed the E-3s to vector friendly fighters against those targets and authorize them to fire even before the fighters could identify the targets themselves. Even in cases where E-3s could not properly identify the targets, they could still alert F-15 and F/A-18s to the targets who could in turn use their own radar to conduct NCTR.

Take out the E-3s though and suddenly that becomes a lot more problematic. Detection and identification ranges drop dramatically. Especially in a fight between stealth aircraft, both of which have strong incentives to avoid emissions as much as possible. The chances of a short-range engagement occurring increase significantly.

Did American fighter pilots rely on AEW&C during the Vietnam War? From what I know, the EC-121 Warning Star was deployed in Southeast Asia, but I guess the technology back then meant AEW&Cs weren't always reliable.

US losses against MiGs in Vietnam had little to do with F-4 itself, and more to do with insufficient training and unreliable ordnance. The successful hit rate of AIM-7s and AIM-9s fired in Vietnam was well under 20%, but by ODS upgraded versions were getting success rates above 50%. Phantom II was a better choice than Crusader III, and the Navy was correct to choose it.

Wasn't there an air-to-air missile the USAF used that proved to be unreliable? It was an anti-bomber missile and apparently since it lacked proximity fuze, it would need a direct hit while its design as an anti-bomber AAM made it difficult to engage against MiGs.

And yeah, the F-4 was indeed a good choice over the Crusader III. Although I did enjoy reading about how Crusader III test pilots would engage in mock dogfights with the F-4 and annoy the hell out of the Navy.

[Taihei Tengoku]

It's not so much "missileer." The USN was also accepting the all-missile future with the very F-4 we're talking about and the FB-111 they wanted, but they had dedicated fighter pilots who would fly only flighters. The USAF at that time considered all fixed-wing aircraft pilots interchangeable, so an Air Force officer could fly B-52s one tour and then be stuck in fighters the next.

[Gallia-]

The U.S. Navy was the foremost developer and showrunner of the "missile fighter" concept in the first place.

The USAF was just hamstrung by excessive safety culture and bad policy. It had nothing to do with the fact that 1950s radars were garbage or 1950s air generals correctly predicted the death of the aviation cannon.

e: GODDAMMIT

[Taihei Tengoku]

The USAF was just hamstrung by excessive safety culture

this is the brize of insitutional aggressiveness's :::::::-----DDDDDD

[Gallia-]

F u c k i n g
w
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[Zhouran]

The U.S. Navy was the foremost developer and showrunner of the "missile fighter" concept in the first place.

The USAF was just hamstrung by excessive safety culture and bad policy. It had nothing to do with the fact that 1950s radars were garbage or 1950s air generals correctly predicted the death of the aviation cannon.

e: GODDAMMIT

When did the USAF start having an excessive safety culture?

The USAF at that time considered all fixed-wing aircraft pilots interchangeable, so an Air Force officer could fly B-52s one tour and then be stuck in fighters the next.

I didn't know USAF officers were rotated and interchangeable. I thought combat pilots would be trained to fly a specific type of planes only.

[The Akasha Colony]

But yeah, by the time the US entered the Vietnam War, the US Navy would still have experience in dogfights compared to the US Air Force since at the time the USAF was strongly focused on missile-oriented interceptors while the Navy still had dedicated dogfighters consisting of the F-8 and F-11.

They weren't wrong about the missiles. Just too early. The technology hadn't yet matured to make them sufficiently reliable and sufficiently long-ranged. But they're a lot more mature now.

Did American fighter pilots rely on AEW&C during the Vietnam War? From what I know, the EC-121 Warning Star was deployed in Southeast Asia, but I guess the technology back then meant AEW&Cs weren't always reliable.

Not nearly to the same extent, for both technological and design reasons.

EC-121 had a radar, but it was not a command station. It required lots of radar operators but lacked the same command and control facilities that made E-3 so effective at guiding fighter patrols on target. On top of that, it had a much shorter radar range and was much more susceptible to ground clutter. E-3s in ODS could blanket Iraqi airspace with radar coverage without even having to enter Iraqi airspace, and admittedly the flat terrain of Iraq was much more amenable to low-altitude coverage than Vietnam's mountains and jungles.

Lastly, radar technology simply was not as developed as it was by ODS, unsurprisingly. The introduction of pulse doppler radar allowed sufficient resolution for radar-based NCTR, which eliminated the need for optical solutions like TISEO and electronic solutions like Combat Tree, the latter of which could be defeated by new IFF transponders in newer Soviet aircraft. More accurately, pulse doppler radar makes it possible to detect things like engine fan blades in exposed intakes and measure their speed as well as other defining aircraft characteristics in order to identify a target.

Wasn't there an air-to-air missile the USAF used that proved to be unreliable? It was an anti-bomber missile and apparently since it lacked proximity fuze, it would need a direct hit while its design as an anti-bomber AAM made it difficult to engage against MiGs.

That was AIM-4. But AIM-4 was dumped pretty quickly in favor of AIM-9, which was better. But still had all of the reliability issues one would expect of a 1960s-1970s-era missile.

I didn't know USAF officers were rotated and interchangeable. I thought combat pilots would be trained to fly a specific type of planes only.

That's how it is now. It's possible to switch aircraft but it usually requires a decent amount of retraining, they aren't truly interchangeable.

[Taihei Tengoku]

The U.S. Navy was the foremost developer and showrunner of the "missile fighter" concept in the first place.

The USAF was just hamstrung by excessive safety culture and bad policy. It had nothing to do with the fact that 1950s radars were garbage or 1950s air generals correctly predicted the death of the aviation cannon.

e: GODDAMMIT

When did the USAF start having an excessive safety culture?

Since the beginning, really. Atomic bomber culture meant that 1) everything had to be 100% matching with protocol 2) the crews had to be relied on to carry out that protocol 100%. Anyone who had doubts about annihilating millions was encouraged to stay on the ground (if it was a case of the nerves) or relieved on the spot (if they were asking questions).

[Gallia-]

TAC and SAC's rivalry was at least as bad as the U.S. Navy and USAF rivalry TBH.

There was someone's master's dissertation (there are a lot of dissertations about this) about the impact of excessive safety culture on flying performance leading up to Vietnam, but I can't find it and I'm too lazy to search.'

The USAF should really exist as two separate air forces: Strategic bomber force and tactical air force. Like how they had the cyber warfare mission split from them.

Sadly the USA limited itself to an arbitrary number of UCCs and it can no longer afford a "U.S. Tactical Air Command", "U.S. Strategic Air Command", "U.S. Cyber Command", and "U.S. Space Command".

USSAC might try to eat the boomers too though.

[Taihei Tengoku]

oh christ

the subs are the part of the navy that works

[Gallia-]

If USSAC were its own UCC it would get the hammer down on it from Washington to improve TBF.

12th AF is shit because LeMay died and it's been competing with TAC for resources and TAC has been winning constant home runs since F-15's first rivets.

Also the Cold War ended and I don't think anyone takes the 12th AF mission seriously anymore since they aren't even targeted at Russia. They're targeted at some random point in the Pacific.

[Iltica]

WVR is basically the range at which maneuvering starts to matter, largely because IIR SRAAMs can be used. Given that most modern SRAAMs can easily reach 30 km at least in a head-on engagement, this seems to be a reasonably good approximation of the demarcation point.

What, so if maneuvering doesn't matter, how does one survive engagements at beyond "visual" range then? is it just countermeasures and stealth?

[Austrasien]

It does matter. It is just there is more to manoeuvering than turning in the smallest possible circles. Speed, manoeuvrability, stealth, ECM and situational awareness all complement each other - together different aspects of survivability equal more than the sum of their parts. Which is the why F-22 is so much better than Generation 4.whatever+++++++ fighters.

[Theodosiya]

Is there any point to maintain and even develop specialized interceptor fighter like MiG-25/31 and F-106, or multiroles and air superiority fighters are adequate enough?