World Affairs Board - View Single Post - Land based SAM systems against fighter jets?

gamercube · 09-03-2007, 04:44 AM

I was wondering whether batteries of SAM missiles (specifically the Akash missile, link here: AKASH) can be used to bring down enemy aircraft like the F-16/J-10/J-7 etc. According to the website, the missile has an intercept range of 30 km, is fire-and-forget, which makes it immune to electronic countermeasures, and a speed of Mach 2.6, which is more than enough to catch many fighter aircraft.

Would it be possible to deploy thousands of batteries of these effectively against an enemy who has a numerical advantage in terms of air power? They certainly seem much cheaper/less maintenance intensive to build and deploy than aircraft.

09-03-2007, 04:44 AM	#1 (permalink)
gamercube Banished *Senior Contributor* Join Date: 11-20-06 Location: Barbados Posts: 771 Country:	Land based SAM systems against fighter jets? I was wondering whether batteries of SAM missiles (specifically the Akash missile, link here: AKASH) can be used to bring down enemy aircraft like the F-16/J-10/J-7 etc. According to the website, the missile has an intercept range of 30 km, is fire-and-forget, which makes it immune to electronic countermeasures, and a speed of Mach 2.6, which is more than enough to catch many fighter aircraft. Would it be possible to deploy thousands of batteries of these effectively against an enemy who has a numerical advantage in terms of air power? They certainly seem much cheaper/less maintenance intensive to build and deploy than aircraft.