Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
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More directly, am struck that the average person has yet to internalize that in modern high-intensity conflict detection roughly = mission kill if not outright destruction. Everything operationally important (air, sea, ground) that wants to survive needs to avoid emission/detection long enough to detect something else first and destroy it.
Only if you're willing to go in the enemy's weapons engagement zones - whether that's a fighter or surface-based system. Detection/track ranges are generally much higher.
This is absolutely not true. For modern weapons, the effective range is generally limited by detection, whether you are talking about heavy SAM (like the S-400, with it's 400km range) or modern AAM (like the Meteor or R77M, with ranges ~200km).
As a rule, it's relatively cheap and easy to increase missile range, so they are not limited by ability but by choice. SAM ranges are pushed past reasonable detection ranges because it allows siting the missiles more to the rear, which is safer, and for the missile batteries to provide mutual support. AAM ranges are pushed past detection to increase the size of the no-escape zone, which is usually thought to be more important than the actual maximum range.
I’d say that a simulator is marginally less “lunatic” but still :)
<< This is what V2 is for. >>
Checkmate Aceist.
Project Wingman is the superior game /s
Both games are great and crazy in their own right.
Shooting up (well trying to) some 110s in a P39 in multiplayer: https://twitter.com/meheleventyone/status/141347312227197337...
I blame Joseph Heller.
The US military issues meth? Source?
On the other hand while Amphetamine can be compared to substances like meth or coke (it might actually be closer to cocaine as far as user experience goes), it's also has key differences. Cocaine is generally taken all at once, and the methyl family of amphetamine has specific, more drastic effects. Basically, meth's special, and shoots through barriers in the brain, that normally slow down other substances.
Amphetamine, on the other hand, has a more medium potential for abuse. Also, it's thought that people can generally keep up with therapeutic doses. In other words, while there may be some effect on the brain, you'll eventually reach a point where you're not constantly being drained of neurochemicals. This isn't possible with meth/coke, which is why they prescribe adderall fairly readily, but not meth.
I researched this recently after being prescribed adderall. I've heard that slow release cocaine is a better metaphor than meth, but I think there's probably issues with that too.
Appears that Amphetamine is no longer used but Modafinil is not even close to being "meth"
> Modafinil is not considered to be a classical psychostimulant, but rather is classified as a eugeroic (wakefulness-promoting drug) and is used primarily for treatment of narcolepsy, shift work sleep disorder, and excessive daytime sleepiness associated with obstructive sleep apnea.
But from what I know, this also comes from the logistics standpoint. If you need a prescription of any kind to "function normal", they would need to supply that prescription anywhere anytime. I would assume the same with wisdom teeth. The risk of getting any problems during service are not worth taking.
So yeah, there is a difference between "I need this for functioning normally" versus "Take this in case of an emergency"
Not defending that viewpoint or assertion but that's very likely the justification that would be used. Needing it for HS or college is disqualifying while choosing to use it for a particular operation is not.
I see only benefits -- maybe I'm a little bit too talkative and too many things seem interesting/worth exploring/doing, but for a pilot, that would he detrimental, I'd think.
I've never taken Modafinil so I have no idea how much that jives with the actual effects, but there have been some people who have gotten waivers if the usage was long enough in the past. Personally I don't see why it can't be like alcohol (if you haven't had it in the last n hours/days, you're good to go).
> in 1960 the United States Air Force sanctioned use of Amphetamine as a counter-fatigue measure in flight operations. The medication was used widely by USAF and Army aircrew during the Vietnam Conflict. [...] > In the USAF, three sleep aids (temazepam aka Restoril, zolpidem aka Ambien, & zaleplon aka Sonata)and two stimulants (dextroamphetamine aka Dexedrine & modafanil aka Provigil) are approved for use by certain aircrew in particular operational situations.
I don't know whether this is done for basic 3-4 hour missions as a matter of course, or whether they're reserved for unusual, 24-hour-plus missions
I have a dummy shell from an A10 at my desk. Here's an image (not mine) (the nearly 12" shell on the far left):
https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-23308fca719553f998cbc4...
Now, the A10 is air to ground, and these shells are made for killing tanks and not aircraft and you're not wrong in that the projectile isn't that much larger than a thumb, but just seeing the dang thing. I mean, it's crazy what we come up with to destroy.
0: https://fbcinc.com/source/Northrop_Resources/30_x_173mm_Full...
2. No one is dumb enough to even try fighting US jets with their own. US have the best aircraft, missiles, and more flying hours than anyone else
Well said.
That arrogance must come in handy for bombing goat herders in the desert.
I'm sure that if the same effort was put into self-driving self-shooting tanks as in teslas, the result would be more than adequate vs humans.
It seems that during active conflicts the main job of air forces remains focused on causing lots of damage on the ground rather than sweeping the skies clear. Just as in old bi-plane days, drive by and dump hand grenades into tranches from above...
On the other hand, in peace time, sweeping skies is the main job. I think each successful intercept of enemy craft or in-air detection should be counted as a kill-surrogate.
Sure there are plenty of aces on current duty by this count in Northern Europe airforces and in Alaska/Arctic zones, where intercepts of Russia's warring air-cosmic-force activities have dramatically increased in frequency recently.
I remember watching some newscast about a politician meeting at an airbase somewhere in Lithuania, with a NATO fighter jet as a background; the in-progress meeting suddenly had to be cancelled, as we could see pilots all dressed up running to the jet to scramble it for an intercept alert. Here it is:
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/41459/presidential-pre...
Radar and radio jammers are usual in modern warfare. And the worst case is an EMP. The Russians considered elctronic warfare already in the Russo-Japanese War. During WWII the British jammed the German radio navigation. Technology isn't making you automatically superior - you need to able to able apply it. And if not, a reliable fallback is needed. Remember the F4 which initially had no internal cannon because the US believed the "superior" rockets will do everything? It didn't worked well in Vietnam. The internal cannon is a feature of every modern fighter and the Navy founded TOPGUN.
I've no clue what happens in future. But I would keep a close look on who is doing well with electronic protection (EP). And we didn't speak about the elephant in the room, computer networks. Which are hopefully autonomous without the need of an network support. Don't connect anything important - like a fighter aircraft - to a network.
The same with cannons in fighter planes.
https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/news/pilot-talk/2021/10/04/...
Symmetric warfare is old hat. It's all asymmetric warfare now: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/17/yemens-houthis-claim-suspect...
("tanker" appears to mean "truck" rather than "ship" in this context, and "drone" is probably the small quadcopter style rather than what the USAF means by "drone")
There were three primary Argentine aircraft used in the conflict; the Super Entendard, the Dagger (an Israeli Mirage derivative) and the A-4 Skyhawk. The Super Entendard gained fame because of its successful use of the Exocet ASM. It never engaged in A2A combat with any British forces.
The Daggers and Skyhawks could have tried to engage the Harriers, but that wasn't their mission tasking. They carried nothing but bombs and attacked the RN ships (sinking 7 and damaging many more). They were operating at the very edge of their range, and didn't have enough fuel to do more than skim in, drop bombs, and flee. The Skyhawks had airborne refueling capabilities, but this was very limited since the Argentines only had 2 tankers.
Asymmetry is the key to airpower, if you don't have it you won't have it.
Look-first shoot-first is only one kind of asymmetric advantage.
No -- it can't be possible! I always hear people say "flexibility is the key to airpower." I feel so lost.
I'm doubtful they're(the F-whatever) technologically superior to our little Swedish beast the "Jas-Gripen"[0].
The US just has more military than anyone they're messing with.
Because you go to war with what you have, which has long lead times to design and build and position and train and maintain and employ and resupply.
In my opinion, we are about to have another 'big one' within the next 5-10 years. When that happens, people will be saying "Why are there so many air combat kills?"
HOW DO I SAY YES?!
It says nothing about surface-to-air missiles.