Air superiority fighters

[M.TurabMehdi]

Can someone explain me here what aircrafts we (PAF) have for air-superiority role and for BVR roles respectively? We have heard F-7PG are good in interception, are they also good at air-superiority and dog-fight?

And my second question: What do we mean by a force-multiplier aircraft? Does it just mean having A-A refuelling capabilty too?

 

[Pakistanisage]

Can someone explain me here what aircrafts we (PAF) have for air-superiority role and for BVR roles respectively? We have heard F-7PG are good in interception, are they also good at air-superiority and dog-fight?

And my second question: What do we mean by a force-multiplier aircraft? Does it just mean having A-A refuelling capabilty too?

An air superiority aircraft is generally a fighter aircraft that is so technologically superior to every other aircraft that it dominates the Air Space. Even though fighter pilots are still taught how to Dogfight, BVR engagements are becoming more important in today's Air Battles. Todays Air superiority Fighters have to be BVR capable because WVR aircrafts rely solely on Dogfights and a WVR aircraft will get shot down by a BVR Fighter 300 Miles away. For example an F15 Eagle was considered an air Superiority aircraft and these days an F22 Raftor is considered the ultimate Air Superiority Fighter Aircraft of today.

Force Multiplier is any concept that makes the fighter force more effective so that a smaller number of Aircrafts can do as much damage as a larger Air Force. This could include but not limited to Aircrafts that have multi-role capability, Air to air refueling capability, a higher level of technology, bigger payloads etc.

In other words any advantage you have that makes the operation of your Air Force more effecient.

 

[M.TurabMehdi]

An air superiority aircraft is generally a fighter aircraft that is so technologically superior to every other aircraft that it dominates the Air Space. Even though fighter pilots are still taught how to Dogfight, BVR engagements are becoming more important in today's Air Battles. Todays Air superiority Fighters have to be BVR capable because WVR aircrafts rely solely on Dogfights and a WVR aircraft will get shot down by a BVR Fighter 300 Miles away. For example an F15 Eagle was considered an air Superiority aircraft and these days an F22 Raftor is considered the ultimate Air Superiority Fighter Aircraft of today.

Force Multiplier is any concept that makes the fighter force more effective so that a smaller number of Aircrafts can do as much damage as a larger Air Force. This could include but not limited toAircrafts that have multi-role capability, Air to air refueling capability, a higher level of technology, bigger payloads etc.

In other words any advantage you have that makes the operation of your Air Force more effecient.

Thanks for your response. I have got the answer of my second question thru ur explanation, but my first question which is about PAF, I am still looking someone to respond to it.

 

[SBD-3]

Thanks for your response. I have got the answer of my second question thru ur explanation, but my first question which is about PAF, I am still looking someone to respond to it.

PAF's F-7PG are used as airsuperiority and interception platforms. They are named as airsuperiority because of them being dedicated to A2A purposes only. The AS aircraft predominently carries A2A capabilities with either no or limited ground capabilities. Btw there is a complete thread on this topic opened by Antibody. Just search for it and you'll be able to find a lot of useful information on the topic.

 

[acetophenol]

Can someone explain me here what aircrafts we (PAF) have for air-superiority role and for BVR roles respectively? We have heard F-7PG are good in interception, are they also good at air-superiority and dog-fight?

And my second question: What do we mean by a force-multiplier aircraft? Does it just mean having A-A refuelling capabilty too?

A force multiplier is an aircraft or an asset that will boost the capability of the existing fleet of aircrafts.
Eg: A-A refuelers,AWACS etc

 

[Farooqi1]

Thanks for your response. I have got the answer of my second question thru ur explanation, but my first question which is about PAF, I am still looking someone to respond to it.

Unfortunately PAF don't have any Air Superiority fighter. There is a big difference between assigning the role of air superiority and a true air superiority fighter. Examples of current air superiority fighters are F15, F18, SU 27, SU 30 Mig 29, Mig 35 Rafael and Typhoone. Also Chinese J11 is also an air superiority fighter. F22 has class of its own.

 

[joekrish]

Would it be right if I called the F16 block 50 of PAF as an Air superiority fighter?

 

[M.TurabMehdi]

PAF's F-7PG are used as airsuperiority and interception platforms. They are named as airsuperiority because of them being dedicated to A2A purposes only. The AS aircraft predominently carries A2A capabilities with either no or limited ground capabilities. Btw there is a complete thread on this topic opened by Antibody. Just search for it and you'll be able to find a lot of useful information on the topic.

Thanks hasnain0099, can u please share the link of that thread? I cannot find it.
Also do you think that F-7PG is also good at dog-fight? Air-superiority demands an aircraft to be good at that too.
And my second question, will you agree that we don;t have any decent BVR platforms against India? Our JF-17 can just trace targets upto 105 km, and our F-16s only till 120 kms, but Sukhois can trace and shoot us down from their on-board radar from a range of 400 km ! What's ur opinion on it?

 

[SBD-3]

Unfortunately PAF don't have any Air Superiority fighter. There is a big difference between assigning the role of air superiority and a true air superiority fighter. Examples of current air superiority fighters are F15, F18, SU 27, SU 30 Mig 29, Mig 35 Rafael and Typhoone. Also Chinese J11 is also an air superiority fighter. F22 has class of its own.

Again
F-15A and C are Airsuperiority Fighters F-15E,SG,SK,SA are all Fighters with Strike roles capabilities and precision attack (MR)
F-18 C/D/E/F are all multirole fighters
SU-27 were AS fighters uptil UBK variants, the variants since UBM inclusing SU-30,35 are with multirole capabilities.
Mig-29 variants since SMT,OVT and carry multirole capabilities
Mig-35 also comes with multirole capabilities
Rafale is a multirole aircraft
Typhoon is an AS aircraft but with limited MR capabilities till Trench II. From Trench III it is expected to be completely multirole
Again, you're still revolving around the same point.

 

[M.TurabMehdi]

Unfortunately PAF don't have any Air Superiority fighter. There is a big difference between assigning the role of air superiority and a true air superiority fighter. Examples of current air superiority fighters are F15, F18, SU 27, SU 30 Mig 29, Mig 35 Rafael and Typhoone. Also Chinese J11 is also an air superiority fighter. F22 has class of its own.

True! But what about our Block-52? and J-10 we will be acquiring in near future?

 

[SBD-3]

Thanks hasnain0099, can u please share the link of that thread? I cannot find it.
Also do you think that F-7PG is also good at dog-fight? Air-superiority demands an aircraft to be good at that too.
And my second question, will you agree that we don;t have any decent BVR platforms against India? Our JF-17 can just trace targets upto 105 km, and our F-16s only till 120 kms, but Sukhois can trace and shoot us down from their on-board radar from a range of 400 km ! What's ur opinion on it?

http://www.defence.pk/forums/air-wa...aracteristics-canard-non-canard-fighters.html
http://www.defence.pk/forums/air-warfare/171913-air-superiority.html

 

[M.TurabMehdi]

Again
F-15A and C are Airsuperiority Fighters F-15E,SG,SK,SA are all Fighters with Strike roles capabilities and precision attack (MR)
F-18 C/D/E/F are all multirole fighters
SU-27 were AS fighters uptil UBK variants, the variants since UBM inclusing SU-30,35 are with multirole capabilities.
Mig-29 variants since SMT,OVT and carry multirole capabilities
Mig-35 also comes with multirole capabilities
Rafale is a multirole aircraft
Typhoon is an AS aircraft but with limited MR capabilities till Trench II. From Trench III it is expected to be completely multirole
Again, you're still revolving around the same point.

What about F-16s? they have also got precision attack capabilities, and decent BVR and WVR performance. Do we have IRST too in them or they just rely on their radar?

 

[SBD-3]

Thanks hasnain0099, can u please share the link of that thread? I cannot find it.
Also do you think that F-7PG is also good at dog-fight? Air-superiority demands an aircraft to be good at that too.
And my second question, will you agree that we don;t have any decent BVR platforms against India? Our JF-17 can just trace targets upto 105 km, and our F-16s only till 120 kms, but Sukhois can trace and shoot us down from their on-board radar from a range of 400 km ! What's ur opinion on it?

1-F-7PG have been used as interceptors against the Invading platforms from eastern side along f-16s. Should PAF had no faith in its capabilities,we would not have seen these fighters scrambling for interceptions (rather alone F-16s).
2-Again the proponents of the range theory forget that there are two broad type of sensing: 1)Passive 2)Active. The pesive sensing has significantly longer range than the active sensing since it works like ears. It receives what is available out there (e.g a radar echo), so if a fighter turns his eco off, the sensor becomes deaf.Secondly, the determination of precise location of target is another issue as these sensor carry out detection on target characteristics. The active sensor, on the other hand, work like the eyes. Significantly short ranged vis-a-vis passive sensors, but more precise and are not dependent upon the input of target. Secondly, the radar range varies with the size of target, for example the radar range reduced with the RCS of target, so absolute figures don't mean anything. for a complete understanding of radar ranges, read this thread
http://www.defence.pk/forums/air-warfare/94948-radar-ranges-different-fighters-2.html

What about F-16s? they have also got precision attack capabilities, and decent BVR and WVR performance. Do we have IRST too in them or they just rely on their radar?

PGMs, Yes. BVRs, Yes. WVR, Yes. IRST, nops

 

[M.TurabMehdi]

1-F-7PG have been used as interceptors against the Invading platforms from eastern side along f-16s. Should PAF had no faith in its capabilities,we would not have seen these fighters scrambling for interceptions (rather alone F-16s).
2-Again the proponents of the range theory forget that there are two broad type of sensing: 1)Passive 2)Active. The pesive sensing has significantly longer range than the active sensing since it works like ears. It receives what is available out there (e.g a radar echo), so if a fighter turns his eco off, the sensor becomes deaf.Secondly, the determination of precise location of target is another issue as these sensor carry out detection on target characteristics. The active sensor, on the other hand, work like the eyes. Significantly short ranged vis-a-vis passive sensors, but more precise and are not dependent upon the input of target. Secondly, the radar range varies with the size of target, for example the radar range reduced with the RCS of target, so absolute figures don't mean anything. for a complete understanding of radar ranges, read this thread
http://www.defence.pk/forums/air-warfare/94948-radar-ranges-different-fighters-2.html


PGMs, Yes. BVRs, Yes. WVR, Yes. IRST, nops

Thanks very much hasnain0099 for all. One more thing, neither our Thunders nor our F-16s can though can trace more but cannot engage more than two fighters at the same time in dog-fight and bvr, whereas our rivals aircrafts can engage more numbers of targets at the same time. Shed some light on this too please.

 

[MastanKhan]

Force multiplier---

A good example---the BVR truck---the SU 30 with 8 BVR missiles compare it to JF 17 2 BVR's---+ its massive radar---twin engines---twin tails---.

But then otoh---the F16 with 2 BVR's---aim120's---much better and more capable than the russians missiles used on su30's---so again a force multiplier----.

F7PG is no air superiority fighter---it never was---it is an interceptor with extremely limited capabilities---. In the last 30 + years F7pg has never been an air superiority fighter---actually it never was an air superiority fighter---it was always a fighter interceptor---.

An air superiority fighter is designed just to simply dominate the arena