A question often asked is why are Sukhoi Flanker variants equipped to carry between eight and twelve BVR missiles? The answer is a simple one - so they can fire more than one three or four round BVR missile salvo during the opening phases of an engagement. In this fashion the aircraft being targeted has a difficult problem as it must jam, decoy and/or outmanoeuvre three or four tightly spaced inbound missiles. Even if we assume a mediocre per round kill probability of 30 percent, a four round salvo still exceeds a total kill probability of 75 percent.
This has been a long-time Soviet/Russian philosophy that even EAF pilots learned from them and applied them in the wars against Israel. Primary example was El-Mansouri's MiG-21 attack on the 6 unsuspecting Israeli F-4Phantoms over the Gulf of Suez in that now famous air battle. When he talks about it, he always mentions how he blew right into the merge head on and fired both his Atolls at once and scored the kill on the lead Phantom.
Makes you wonder if they keep utilizing that same concept even with the western aircraft or they have different strategies. Interesting stuff.
The performance of the AIM-120A/B/C models in combat to date has not been spectacular. Test range trials have resulted in stated kill probabilities of 85 percent out of 214 launches for the AIM-120C variant. Combat statistics for all three variants are less stellar, amounting to, according to US sources, ten kills (including a friendly fire incident against a UH-60) of which six were genuine BVR shots, for the expenditure of just over a dozen AIM-120 rounds. The important parameter is that every single target was not equipped with a modern defensive electronic warfare package and therefore not representative of a state-of-the-art Flanker in a modern BVR engagement. Against such "soft" targets the AIM-120 has displayed a kill probability of less than 50 percent [
1].
Interesting and damming statistic on the AIM-120. There is a point in what's being said there, but I suppose the same applies to the other side as well. I think the only missile currently capable of withstanding any type of counter jamming is the Meteor. It also has some other incredible features that increase its PK.
Currently classified capabilities such as the use of the APG-79 or APG-81 AESA radar as an X-band high power jammer against the Russian BARS or Irbis E radar are not a panacea, and may actually hasten the demise of the F/A-18E/F or F-35 JSF in a BVR shootout. This is for the simple reason that to jam the Russian radar, the APG-79 or APG-81 AESA radar must jam the frequencies being used by the Russian radar, and this then turns the APG-79 or APG-81 AESA radar into a wholly electronically predictable X-band high power beacon for an anti-radiation seeker equipped Russian BVR missile such as the R-27EP or R-77P. The act of jamming the Russian radar effectively surrenders the frequency hopping agility in the emissions of the APG-79 or APG-81 AESA radar, denying it the only defence it has against the anti-radiation missile. A smart Russian radar software designer will include a "seduction mode" to this effect, with narrowband emissions to make it very easy even for an early model 9B-1032 anti-radiation seeker.
Fascinating stuff. So to counter an F/A-18's or F-35's AESA radar jamming the missile is to fire the pair of missiles but occupy the enemy radar with a radar homing missile in whichever variant, probably the R-77 and then make the other alternative missile a heak-seaker so that the R-77 becomes the sacrificial missile, so to speak while the R-27EP takes down the enemy aircraft. That's some pretty interesting thinking. Sounds like it would be effective but I think it also relies on the enemy's predictability which is not a definite.
The flipside of the electronic combat game is no better. The F-14A/B/D included the AAS-42 Infrared Search and Track set which allowed a target to be tracked despite hostile jamming of the AWG-9/APG-71 radar. It is clear that the addition of the podded AAS-42 to the Super Hornet and "air to air" use of the JSF EOTS are intended for much the same purpose. While this may permit the continuing use of the AESA radar to datalink midcourse guidance commands to the AIM-120s, it does nothing to deny the Flanker its own BVR shot. The notion that the defensive jamming equipment and infrared decoys will be highly effective against late model Russian digital missile seekers can only be regarded to be optimistic.
Hahaha, I like it, especially that last sentence. And this sounds like it was before the advent or the realization of the Su-35's leading wing edge AESA radar and how effective that is with datalinking midcourse guidance to R-77s and R-27s and God forbid for the enemy, the R-37M! That AESA radar changing the ballgame completely. What a great feature on an already deadly platform with its 400km range IRBIS-E radar.
In electronic warfare terms neither side has a decisive advantage, but the Flanker does have a decisive advantage in aircraft and missile kinematics and in having up to six times the payload of BVR missiles to expend. The simple conclusion to be drawn is that operators of the F/A-18E/F or F-35 JSF should make every effort to avoid Beyond Visual Range combat with late model Flankers, as the best case outcome is parity in exchange rates, and the worst case outcome a decisive exchange ratio advantage to the Flanker. Given the evident design choices the Russians have made, this is not an accident, but rather a consequence of well thought through operational analysis of capabilities and limitations of contemporary BVR weapon systems.
Fascinating stuff.
Until the 1980s Soviet missile technology lagged the West in propellants, airframe designs, and guidance designs. That changed with the deployment of the R-27 and R-73 missiles during the 1980s, as these competed on a equal footing, or outperformed their Western equivalents. In kinematic terms, the WVR R-73 series, and the BVR R-27 and R-77 are highly competitive against their Western equivalents, and the long burn variants of the R-27 outperform all Western solid propellant competitors.
I think we're going to need to see a large percentage of the R-27 in its different forms. Given the Indians actually requested that missile after whatever issue it was with the storage of the R-77s tells you that at least they can vouch for the usefulness and need to have the R-27 as well. It seems this is quite the BVR missile and might even bump the R-77-1 with this "long-burn" capability they keep bringing up.
In terms of kinematic performance, a key factor which is almost universally ignored by Western planners other than the F-22 and F-111 communities, is the impact of the launch aircraft's kinematics at the point of missile launch. A supersonic Su-35 sitting at Mach 1.5 and 45,000 ft will add of the order of 30 percent more range to an R-27 or R-77 missile. Low performance fighters like the F/A-18E/F and F-35 JSF simply do not have this option in the real world, and the reach of their missiles is wholly determined by the parameters of the propellant load inside the missile casing, and the ability of the midcourse guidance algorithms to extract every bit of range from that stored energy. The result of this is that an AIM-120C/D which might look better on paper compared to an equivalent R-77 subtype will be outranged decisively in actual combat.
"Low performance fighters like the F/A-18E/F and F-35 JSF"? lol, not sure about that implication. Maybe the F-35 isn't as agile at dogfighting but the F/A-18E & F can hold their own pretty well. Granted they're no Rafales or Typhoons with their agility, let alone Su-30/35 with their maneuverability, but they're not slouches for sure. Not sure what the extent of "low performance" the writer is implying, but I would think it's not as drastic as he suggests.
The other concept being discussed in that paragraph is firing these missiles at supersonic speeds. I would think there is an inherent danger in doing so and that there is a limit to the air speed of an aircraft when it is to launch these missiles since they don't achieve their maximum speed right off the bat and that they actually leave the rail at a relatively slower speed and in some cases before their booster either ignites and it starts moving fast enough to surpass the aircraft's air speed or, even if it does ignite right at the rail, it still takes a few seconds to reach it's max speed and so I would think that the aircraft has to maintain a relatively even-keeled speed in order for the missile launch to be carried out successfully. Flying at mach 1,5 or greater and firing a missile at that airspeed is probably not a good idea, I would think.
Early R-27 Alamo variants used the legacy Geofizika 36T seeker. There are claims that more recent variants use the far more agile Arsenal Central Design Bureau Mayak/MK-80M seeker series, developed for the R-73M Adder WVR missile, and since then announced by Vympel as the seeker for the initial heatseeking variants of the R-77 Adder. The R-73 series WVR missiles have evolved, to the extent that the 'digital' K-74E variant is a highly competitive scanning two colour design, inherently resistant to many flares and with the counter-countermeasures flexibility inherent in software programmable guidance systems. Given the established pattern of migrating extant WVR missile seekers into BVR missiles, it is a safe prediction that late build heatseeking R-27ET/Ts and early build heatseeking R-77Ts are likely to use late build derivatives of the Arsenal MK-80M series, such as the MM2000 subtype.
Ooof. This is one of those things that some have claimed that the R-73 which when it originally came out and could shoot aircraft behind it because it essentially invented the High Boresight concept and that the AIM-9X was the west's answer to that missile because of the shock factor it created and that the AIM-9X has surpassed the R-73 because the Russians never upgraded the missile's capabilities, supposedly. Well, this paragraph says much more to the contrary.
And the AIM-9X is essentially the western child born to counter exactly the R-73. To think that the Russians never improved or upgraded the missile throughout its lifetime is reckless, to say the least.
They'er not so different after all, ey?
