Anon

"I'm sure some of you know why CVs have a smaller but more capable airwing now than in days of old. (A-6/F-14 days)
"

Smaller, yes.

More capable?

LOMFL....hardly.

The answer of course is money- or rather- the lack thereof.

The F-14D outmatches the F-18E/F in every demonstrable performance category.

B.Smitty

RCS? Radar performance? ECM capabilities? Weapons integration? Cockpit sophistication? Cost of operation?

So maybe not 'every' performance category.

TheGreenSmoke

Why did the navy retire the phoenix missiles anyways? I believe that and the retirement of the tomcat is a big mistake for the navy.

Gun Grape

Maint, cost and the thing never did live up to its hype. Same as the Tomcat.

They missed the only time they were used. I discount the Iranian AF claims.
The 4 kills made with the Tomcat were with AIMs 7 and 9.

The last version of the 54 was upgraded to intercept low alt, cruise missiles. But the Navy relised that we had cheaper missiles already in the inventory. Ant the AMRAAM has an 80% sucess rate.

Also the mission, intercepting fleets of high alt long range bombers, just isn't there anymore.

Anon

"RCS? Radar performance? ECM capabilities? Weapons integration? Cockpit sophistication? Cost of operation?

So maybe not 'every' performance category."

Surely you realize that by performance i meant FLIGHT performance.

And further, had the F-14D been upgraded to the ST-21 as was planned, it would exceed the capabilities of the F-18E/F in all the categories you mentioned as well.

Of course, that's all water under the bridge now.

Anon

" Maint, cost and the thing never did live up to its hype. Same as the Tomcat."

Wrong on both counts. Look to the success both the Tom and the AIM-54 had against Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war.

"They missed the only time they were used. I discount the Iranian AF claims."

Just because you discount it does not change the fact that by all avialable evidence, the Tom and Phoenix performed very well. If you choose to discount those exploits, you are willingly choosing to bias your opinion on the systems in question.

"The 4 kills made with the Tomcat were with AIMs 7 and 9."

Yep. Sure seems to me that the F-14s lived up to their hype on those two occasions.

"The last version of the 54 was upgraded to intercept low alt, cruise missiles. But the Navy relised that we had cheaper missiles already in the inventory. Ant the AMRAAM has an 80% sucess rate."

The AMRAAM actually has about a 60% combat success rate in real combat(last i checked). And we have NO missile in the inventory that matches the Phoenix's flight performance or range.

None.

In fact, any that we do have are still paper designs.

"Also the mission, intercepting fleets of high alt long range bombers, just isn't there anymore.""

You sure better hope so.

If you're wrong a lot of your Marine pals will end up on the bottom of the ocean some day....

B.Smitty

Of course, but flight performance isn't everything.

Except RCS and cost of operation.

Gun Grape

About the only person that believes all the Iranian claims is Tom Cooper,
he is the reference used in the ACIG database. And even he had this to say in the Osprey Iranian F-14 book "It remains unclear exactly how many air-to-air kills were scored by IRIAF [Iran Air Force] F-14s between 7 September 1980 and 7 July 1988, as Air Force records were repeatedly tampered with during and after the war, mainly for political, religious or personal reasons. This has led to considerable confusion."

If you go through the book "Iranian F-14 tomcat units in combat, he claims the 14s had 159 confirmed kills. By the table in the book F-14s shot down 50 iraqi fighters in the first 3 months of the war with no losses. Which would have been 17.5 % of the fighter strength of entire Iraqi AF. (50/285)



He later admits that a post-war conference in Tehran of the Iranian military the claim was lowered to 24 "confirmed kills" with 6 other "probables."

There have been only 4 kills that are verified by more than 1 source. Most western intel agencies give the Iranian F-14s 4 kills and 4 losses.

Looking at the ACIG database I counted 73 claimed AIM-54A kills. With a 3 plane for 1 missile claim and a 2 plane with 1 missile claim.
(Damn we need pilots like that, even Tom Cruise can't do that with a 14)

We delivered 284 missiles from 1976-1979. And these were a degraded variant, just like the avionics in the planes were degraded. And there is the story that the F-14 avionic were sabotaged so they couldn't fire Phoenix missiles. We say it was done by Grumman tech reps prior to leaving, most IAF sources say that it was only some missiles (20-30) not radar systems, it was done by IAF pilots loyal to the Shah and they were all repaired.


It is also known that after the revolution most tech people were executed/persecuted/kicked out of the military and only 2 F-14 pilots were retained in the AF. (Capt. Shahram Roostami and Capt. Reza Attaee.)

Now if they were shooting down planes with 10 year old missiles. That havn't had any tech support, or supply of repair parts. Don't know what the shelf life on a 54A is but those solid fuel rockets and the guidance batteries must have been getting weak or dead.

During the same time the Iraqi AF initially claimed over 70 F-14 kills, 11 were
later claimed and broadcast in news services picked up by the west. Iran AF says that the Iraqi's shot down 1 and they lost 12 to compressor stalls. Since these Cats had P-414s vice the stall prone 412s it sounds like BS to me.


Thats just some of the reasons I discount the Iranian claims.

Feel free to tell my why I should change my opinion


well if you use the western kills for the Iranian AF and add the US kills we have a plane with a 8(and 1 helo) and 4 record. Not real good,

No we don't have any long range missiles designed to hit large bombers flying straight and level high altitude. And we cancelled any we had on the drawing board after the demise of the "Evil Empire"

Name the potential enemy that has a large fleet of bombers that could threaten a CBG.

Guess we will just depend on Aegis with SM-2 Block 3s and F-18s with AIM 120.
I trust the Navy to protect jarheads.

Swift Sword

Hi Guys,

I voted for amphibious assault ships but not as assault craft per se but the fact that they appear to be quite capable multi role vessels.

Specifically, I would think that the Navy could use more vessels like the USS Wasp and USS Tarawa.

These types of vessels can handle the grunt transport and grunt support roles that seem to be important these days as well as serve as floating bases for littoral combat and patrol.in the future.

By varying the mix of aircraft, standoff weapons, small boats and troops, these types of craft might be very ideal for proposed littoral missions. Such a ship could stay outside of littoral waters and use aircraft and standoff weapons to support small patrol craft that it could depoly into those waters as well as put ashore quite deadly landing parties and infantry patrols as neccessary with good air support.

When we consider the possible addition of "ski jump" type flight decks and land attack and antiship cruise missles, the capabilities look even more attractive.

While I have a soft spot for battleships, I think that the arguments against new builds are quite strong and there just are not enought hulls available to make reactivation of the Iowa class practical.

If six hulls were available, I would be much hotter on the prospect.

While combat capability and general utility of the Iowa class ships is not in doubt, I would think that spares and staffing would be a serious issue. There are a lot of parts that have become unavailable and alot of occupational specialties that might be hard to shake out of the staffing tree.

Too, many potential and existing troublespots are landlocked or otherwise beyond the range of battleship guns even with 100 to 200 mile range gee whiz rounds.

Swift Sword

M21 Sniper, Praxus and Big Gun Proponents,

Is there any reason why one could not cobble together a simple missle by strapping a lofting charge or booster onto a GBU-39 and putting a bunch of them in vertical launch cells on existing surface warfare platforms?

If made to work, this might be a good way to distribute meaningful naval fire support throughout the fleet at a very low cost using existing platforms rather than concentrate it on a few BB type platforms refitted at great cost or new builds at greater cost.

I suspect such a critter could have a 70 mile range---possibly more---with enviable accuracy.

__________________
Pharoh was pimp but now he is dead. What are you going to do today?

B.Smitty

Well I doubt it could be an actual charge, the VLS cells aren't designed to handle those types of pressures.

Plus, I doubt the SDB's electronics could either.

And, IIRC, GBU-39's are looking to cost around $50k each right now, so it wouldn't be as cheap as an unguided gun round.

Personally, I'd like to see the development of a small, relatively inexpensive cruise missile that could be packed four or more per VLS cell. Something like the USAF SMACM or Top Cover UAV.

http://www.defense-update.com/products/s/smacm.htm

http://www.flightinternational.com/A...UAV+plans.html

Top Cover is particularly interesting, IMHO. It's meant to be a hybrid UAV and cruise missile with up to 24 hours of endurance and the ability to carry sensors and a warhead.

Swift Sword

I suspect you are right; I used poor terminology. A booster of some sort or weight would certainly be the order of the day.

I am not sure for at least two reasons. First, SDB's electronics have to be proof to the various forces and shocks of whatever the deployment aboard the F35 would bring. Secondly, electronics and telemetry have long been been capable of withstanding a beating as evidenced by the USAR's Copperhead round and the work of Canada's own Dr. Bull.

As to cost, I have two points as well. First, economies of scale viz the widespread use of the the GBU-39 aboard F35 aircraft both foreign and domestic should be taken into account. Secondly, the cost of gee whiz rounds for the proposed AGS ala DDX/DDG is expected to run towards $100,000, if IIRC.

Too, one accurate, effective and relatively smart round is probably worth more than a fusilade of lower cost and dumb rounds in the grand scheme of things but ultimately there are are various levels of cost v. volume considertions.

If my understanding of the dimensions is correct, if we assume, say, at least a 300 pound booster for our hypothetical critter, I suspect that three of them might stack where one TLAM resides in existing VLS cells.

On a related note, this kind of GBU-39 hybrid might be saboted and fired from the MLRS and HIMARS platforms as well as a navalized variant such as the POLAR proposal.

These ideas are not without merit but I should point out that as we discuss these technologies I am a satisfied Lockheed-Martin shareholder (LMT on the NYSE).

SMACM is nice but something like that is ultimately probably best dropped on demand from Earth orbit if you really think about it. As to Top Cover, I can see a few problems with that.

Anon

"Except RCS and cost of operation."

Probably RCS too. But no F-14(or F-15) is ever cheap to operate.

Anon

"No we don't have any long range missiles designed to hit large bombers flying straight and level high altitude. And we cancelled any we had on the drawing board after the demise of the "Evil Empire""


Straight and level huh? Well....that's pretty funny, seeing as how the Phoenix can pull 19gs and attacks with the most energy efficient profile one can imagine. That big 135lb warhead aint too bad either.

You were a gun bunny....you know what kind of radius a 135lb blast/frag warhead will cover.

"Name the potential enemy that has a large fleet of bombers that could threaten a CBG."

Mate any of the SU-27 operator nations with some decent AShMs, it's a legitimate threat. China has a ton of old Russian bombers, btw.

"Guess we will just depend on Aegis with SM-2 Block 3s and F-18s with AIM 120."

Aint no other choice, is there?

"I trust the Navy to protect jarheads."

That makes one of us.

Tom Cooper used to post here, btw. His story added up as far as i'm concerned after having had actual discussions with him.

TopHatter

Don't forget trained pilots who are able to fly often, sound doctrine and supporting units etc

__________________
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~John Quincy Adams