An Arab-Persian Air War- A simulated look

Right now with a weak air force Iran will try to avoid an air war at all costs.Just like Russia avoided an air war with Turkey despite the fact that Turkey shot down a Russian Su 24 plane.If Russia had responded in kind then it could have escalated to a world war with NATO.
Although a covert war is fair game for Iran. Iran armed and trained Hisbullah in Lebanon and it gave a tough time to Israel. Iran armed the Houttis in Yamen and they are giving a tough time to Saudi Arabian coalition. The world should watch out who is armed by Iran next.

Iran will avoid direct conflict with GCC for at least Fifteen more years

They have lost last fifteen years due to Nuclear brinkmanship and gained nothing

Iran has Huge potential ; GCC knows it

But this meaningless hatred for Israel and USA has brought them to this
Decrepit state of affairs

Oscar said:

The Iraqi element I have purposely ignored out of an assumption that the GCC have used their leverage with the west to go into Iraq under the guise of killing radical terrorists. In such a scenario, how much leverage would Iraq have and whether its F-16s would be in play is anyone's guess.

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That's your mistake for few reasons first Iraqis today don't really depend on their army 2nd our regime still alive because we Iraqis still having hope some change take place also we don't want a real problem with this or that 3rd we depend heavily on our PM forces 4th once there is some kind of danger from this government it will be dealt with at least by containing it.

Don't you see since the PM forces came to exist ISIS in fall back status.

About the leverage the GCC has with west that's their business they can't use it in Iraq trust me no one in Iraq trust these people just by making a diplomatic relationship let alone they bring in their forces.

Oscar said:

1) They do, Ive only shown a snippet due to the need to keep it short and sweet of a total gameplay time for Day-1 at 3 hours. Within that time, there were Iranian S-300 batteries near Bandar-e-Kangan, Khark Island and Bushehr that caused losses of some 4 Mirage 2000's(the entire flight flew into the net and ended up being engaged at low level by HQ-7(Shahab Saqeb) of the UAEAF along with 2 F-15SA's and 2 Typhoons each. Eventually though, they fell to later dedicated SEAD flights which put their radar's out of operation.

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This is very impressive...Cost of war is very high for day one. 8 aircraft down with SAM's.

What were the accumulated losses of the GCC on day one?

The GCC countries operate both Apache and Cobra which could have been sent ahead before the fighter aircraft like the US did during the Gulf War I against Iraq.

Oscar said:

2)The Iranian Navy was actually not that active for some reason due to the engine, they stuck around Bandar Abbas.

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This is may be due to the fact you have replied by saying "simulation: more focused on the air war."

Oscar said:

3) Day-1 was the opening round and the simulated Iranian side chose to stick to ADA whilst only carrying out night CAS raids at GCC ground forces attempting to break through border crossings.

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Very true...Keeping in mind the planning of Iran at the start of Iraq - Iran War. The first day Iran only looked at ADA.
Second day how ever was very different. Expect some surprise which would be very well planned.

Oscar said:

4) There is no JFT in KSA;s plan for now so I have not shown it.

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1) This raises the question where is Pakistan in all this?

2) US lawmakers impose arms embargo on KSA for starting a war with Yemen.
http://www.dawn.com/news/1254439/us-lawmakers-step-up-efforts-for-cut-in-arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia

3) Role of SANG?

Oscar said:

5)There are simulated Zelzal sites within the AO along which were the targets of the opening round. There are also various PAC-3 and a few THAAD sites near the UAEAF and QATARI bases. However, the ballistic missiles are not simulated in engagements as per the platform's limitations.

Once again, its only a somewhat descriptive simulation, more focused on the air war.

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Zelzal and other ballistic missile strikes would constitute Army (land to land) hence would post no danger to aircraft. Logical for an air war simulation.

What is the approximate date of this conflict since some of the aircraft mentioned here have not been delivered to their respective air forces.

Also missing from this scenario is the Qaher 313 fighter even if placed as a target dummy strategically placed around various Iranian air fields. Is it possible to add this aircraft to the simulation?

ACE OF THE AIR said:

Zelzal and other ballistic missile strikes would constitute Army (land to land) hence would post no danger to aircraft. Logical for an air war simulation.

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Actually they would pose real danger to the air effort as their primary target ought to be FOBs of the GCC.

JamD said:

Actually they would pose real danger to the air effort as their primary target ought to be FOBs of the GCC.

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That is very true. This is what my earlier post wanted to know but the reply that was given by @Oscar that there is a limitation in the simulation.


"However, the ballistic missiles are not simulated in engagements as per the platform's limitations. Once again, its only a somewhat descriptive simulation, more focused on the air war."

Source: https://defence.pk/threads/an-arab-persian-air-war-a-simulated-look.428109/page-2#ixzz46x28EQ7T

If this game is based on Army then these would definitely be used for certain strategic important airbases as the Yemen conflict has shown.

ACE OF THE AIR said:

That is very true. This is what my earlier post wanted to know but the reply that was given by @Oscar that there is a limitation in the simulation.


"However, the ballistic missiles are not simulated in engagements as per the platform's limitations. Once again, its only a somewhat descriptive simulation, more focused on the air war."

Source: https://defence.pk/threads/an-arab-persian-air-war-a-simulated-look.428109/page-2#ixzz46x28EQ7T

If this game is based on Army then these would definitely be used for certain strategic important airbases as the Yemen conflict has shown.

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Sorry I misunderstood.

What are you running these simulations on @Oscar, I am very curious.

@Oscar waiting for day two action.

DAY-1 to DAY-2

Day-1 operations stuck to night attacks for the most part, with focus on softening up Iranian positions, Close Air support and SEAD. Fairly large packages were launched to hit deep inside Iran which included targeting its Strategic capabilities such as MRBMs and SRBMs that continued onto the night and onto Day-2 morning.

What was important was that the Iranians were fighting back tooth and nail as expected and despite an older fleet as such were taking a toll on GCC forces. The most effective asset still remained the Iranian F-14 which kept using its sniping technique to take out many an unsuspecting aircraft. The GCC forced however at large managed to inflict quite a few losses on the Iranians in the BVR arena with many Iranian Su-30's falling to Meteors and AIM-120s despite their volleys of R-77s. However, the Arabs found themselves matched in WVR and in the case of the Mig-29/R-73 outplayed a Rafale strike flight and took 4 of them down. Although the rafale's engaged a lot of targets and probably killed more.

In terms of progress on the ground, the GCC forces managed to push in 70nm into the southern sector(the same way Saddam did) but found themselves bogged down in the north.
The Air War is tilting as such in the GCC's favour now with the Iranians losing a lot of aircraft but not without bleeding the attackers fairly badly.

It was interesting to watch how the AH-64s were used again in SEAD operations and being pretty good at sneaking past radar systems. I flew quite a few types but to capture video I stuck to an "action" camera which displays "action" events such as weapons firing, radar locks or shoot downs. As you will see, at one point the fight got so intense across the battlefield that it looked like chaos less than a choreographic event or recording .. Cry Havoc!.. let slip the dogs of war then..
At the end its more like a spectator view of aircraft going down, one would expect some turning combat to take place but due to the effectiveness of missiles such as the Aim-9M/X, Mica and R-73..the only turning combat seen was between similarly matched turning fighters such as the J-10 and Rafale.

You get to Saudi M-1s engaging Zulfiqar tanks that outnumbered them 2.5 to 1, they took losses but tore through the Iranian defences eventually. There was also the attack on the Zelzal site with GBU-10s that made a huge hole the ground.

member.exe said:

What is the approximate date of this conflict since some of the aircraft mentioned here have not been delivered to their respective air forces.

Also missing from this scenario is the Qaher 313 fighter even if placed as a target dummy strategically placed around various Iranian air fields. Is it possible to add this aircraft to the simulation?

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2020-2021.

The Qaher-313 is a total bluff. No self respecting Iranian Air Force pilot would ever want to be seen next to it.

ACE OF THE AIR said:

This is very impressive...Cost of war is very high for day one. 8 aircraft down with SAM's.

What were the accumulated losses of the GCC on day one?

The GCC countries operate both Apache and Cobra which could have been sent ahead before the fighter aircraft like the US did during the Gulf War I against Iraq.


This is may be due to the fact you have replied by saying "simulation: more focused on the air war."


Very true...Keeping in mind the planning of Iran at the start of Iraq - Iran War. The first day Iran only looked at ADA.
Second day how ever was very different. Expect some surprise which would be very well planned.


1) This raises the question where is Pakistan in all this?

2) US lawmakers impose arms embargo on KSA for starting a war with Yemen.
http://www.dawn.com/news/1254439/us-lawmakers-step-up-efforts-for-cut-in-arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia

3) Role of SANG?


Zelzal and other ballistic missile strikes would constitute Army (land to land) hence would post no danger to aircraft. Logical for an air war simulation.

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Total 24 hours of Day is 15 Aircraft down I think... compared to that the Iranians lost 24 or 26.
I dont think Pakistan will play a role as such since we'll be too busy nursing India's diplomatic checkmates and trying to keep the peace.

The KSA embargo wont last as such, even then they have bought a MASSIVE stockpile of spares.
SANG is represented by the AH-6..which was not flying in the sorties I took.

JamD said:

Sorry I misunderstood.

What are you running these simulations on @Oscar, I am very curious.

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A sim called Strike Fighters. Its very moddable if around 70-80% real depending upon how you look at things. . Although I am waiting for DCS to bring the Iran-Iraq theatre, that will be a very close deal and much better graphics.

Oscar said:

Total 24 hours of Day is 15 Aircraft down I think... compared to that the Iranians lost 24 or 26.
I dont think Pakistan will play a role as such since we'll be too busy nursing India's diplomatic checkmates and trying to keep the peace.

The KSA embargo wont last as such, even then they have bought a MASSIVE stockpile of spares.
SANG is represented by the AH-6..which was not flying in the sorties I took.

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15 aircraft lost !! The cost of war has gone too high.

Iran has got an advantage, with the vintage aircraft. Mig-29's capability to shoot down Rafales is really interesting.

An other interesting thing is the Apache firing an air to air missile kill, where as I have a doubt why one did not see a bvr or a wvr fire on the Apache. The radar of a fighter aircraft would engage targets at a longer range then that of an Apache.

Ground forces tank vs tank battle is not going to take place on a very large scale. The missing link is the anti-tank missile systems. Can not see if these were used by both the forces.

As far as Pakistan in concerned it would have a decent number of aircraft and could possibly spare a few. By 2020-2021 PAF would have replaced their Mirages and F-7's with JF-17's. Total strike force of 400-450 aircraft a few could be spared...

SANG is also supposed to have fighter fleet...though no orders have been placed. Don't you think they would have developed this capability in the next 4-5 years?

ACE OF THE AIR said:

15 aircraft lost !! The cost of war has gone too high.

Iran has got an advantage, with the vintage aircraft. Mig-29's capability to shoot down Rafales is really interesting.

An other interesting thing is the Apache firing an air to air missile kill, where as I have a doubt why one did not see a bvr or a wvr fire on the Apache. The radar of a fighter aircraft would engage targets at a longer range then that of an Apache.

Ground forces tank vs tank battle is not going to take place on a very large scale. The missing link is the anti-tank missile systems. Can not see if these were used by both the forces.

As far as Pakistan in concerned it would have a decent number of aircraft and could possibly spare a few. By 2020-2021 PAF would have replaced their Mirages and F-7's with JF-17's. Total strike force of 400-450 aircraft a few could be spared...

SANG is also supposed to have fighter fleet...though no orders have been placed. Don't you think they would have developed this capability in the next 4-5 years?

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The cost of war was going to be high considering that this isnt a case of completely unevenly matched adversaries.

The Apache's flew in at an average of 300Ft and snuck lower at any semblance of radar tracking. It is not easy to kill a chopper at low altitude especially with BVR. As you saw, the Su-30s were screaming in almost at 1.2M to get to area and attack the Apache's. Interestingly, the aircraft that has the most success in taking down helicopters is the f-7 and Su-25.

Oscar said:

Interestingly, the aircraft that has the most success in taking down helicopters is the f-7 and Su-25.

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Iran operates both these types...

Iran also has a very large fleet of helicopters that were provided by USA and also local copies. Did not see them in action.
http://www.ainonline.com/aviation-n...iran-shows-new-attack-helicopter-and-missiles

https://defence.pk/threads/iran-tests-home-made-helicopter.359939/






Here is a very interesting video of F-313.

ACE OF THE AIR said:

Iran operates both these types...

Iran also has a very large fleet of helicopters that were provided by USA and also local copies. Did not see them in action.

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I have the Iranian Ah-1Js flying somewhere but as such the rest of these "experimental" types I do not have and really have no care of trying to simulate.

Oscar said:

I have the Iranian Ah-1Js flying somewhere but as such the rest of these "experimental" types I do not have and really have no care of trying to simulate.

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They are supposed to have around 50 AH-1Js I think. They should've had some significant impact if used smartly.

Also is there a way to simulate UCAVs in your simulations? I would imagine they would have 100s of Shahed-129s by the time this conflict takes place. Swarm attacks using these might be effective against formations of tanks. Or simply to saturate air defences to allow the air force to strike with easier skies.