Posted on 02/09/2011 4:34:03 PM PST by ErnstStavroBlofeld
The RSK MiG-29UPG had its maiden flight at the Gromov LII airfield near Moscow on 4 February. The MiG-29UPG has been developed by RSK MiG at the request of the Indian Air Force (IAF).
A Russian-Indian contract, worth $964 million, was signed on 7 March 2008 to upgrade 63 IAF MiG-29s.
Six MiG-29s, including four single and two twin-seaters, will be upgraded at the RSK MiG facilities in Russia while the remaining 57 are to be fitted at the IAF's eleventh aircraft repair plant in India.
(Excerpt) Read more at flightglobal.com ...
I’m more concerned about aircraft missile systems.
From what I see the US hasn’t had a long range fire & forget AA/cruise missile defense system since Phoenix was retired, and that means no long range carrier defense systems at all carried on aircraft.
The Amraam has a 30 mile fire and forget range.
Please do some research on air-to-air missiles. Hint: BVR.
Yes, but the AIM-54 had a range of 100 nautical miles (115 statute miles).
Why would you need it, the old patriot, has a 44 mile range and 85,000 feet of altitude. No plane can survive get shot at by one.
The Patriot is a land-based system in service with the US Army. Aegis serves a similar roll for the Navy.
The point is to have a multi-tiered defense net to improve survivability rates. You also need air-to-air systems that can lock onto and destroy multiple targets a long ranges. I certainly would prefer “killing” enemy targets at greater distances and not letting them get near our Carrier Groups.
A capability now mitigated by Aegis Combat System equipped cruisers and destroyers, and it's SM-2ER missile for fleet defense.
The PAC-3, new navy version of the patriot, went into production, last may, it is faster, higher and longer range than the patriot. Smart weapon, will kill any type of aircraft within 100 miles. You cannot out run it, you cannot hide from it and you cannot out turn it, the only option is for the pilot to kiss his rear by.
Mitigated, but not replaced. I would be very surprised if ultimately the JDRADRM doesn’t have similar range/capability of the AIM-54. I understand why the Navy retired the Phoenix...but there is still a hole in capability that needs to be plugged.
You’re right...I stand corrected. However, I still see a need for a BVR air-to-air missile in the class of the AIM-54.
>Why would you need it, the old patriot,
Standoff aircraft firing cruise missiles in waves at long range.
I believe that the original Phoenix was designed for exactly that, as in the Soviet Backfire & its cruise missile capability
>The Amraam has a 30 mile fire and forget range.
Exactly - the Phoenix had a 115 nautical mile range.
30 miles is not enough to stop cruise missile firing aircraft
Yes, but the were dumb weapons,
Thank you.
I assume that you are referring to the AIM-120D
This AMRAAM has a range of 95 km installed on the F-22
Aside from the fact that we will only achieve a total of 187 Raptors, I have real questions about the effectiveness of its ECM and that concerns me.
The mathematics of multiple round missile engagements are unambiguous - the size of a missile salvo launched is a stronger driver of success than the actual kill probability of the individual missiles.
If the missiles are wholly identical by type, any factor degrading the kill probability of one missile is apt to have a similar effect on its siblings in a salvo.
However, where the missiles differ by seeker type and guidance control laws, then the assumption of statistically independent missile shots is very much stronger.
Russian BVR missile launch strategy was to salvo two rounds, a semi-active radar homing weapon and a heatseeking weapon.
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 technology is applicable to Russian BVR missiles.
The western made tech is the AIM-120 AMRAAM.
The AIM-120C-4 has better kinematic performance introducing a larger rocket motor and shorter control section, and a better warhead, while the AIM-120C-6 introduced a better fuse.
The latest AIM-120D introduces a redesigned seeker built for better durability in high vibration carriage environments, a two way datalink, GPS to supplement inertial guidance, incrementally improved kinematics, and better seeker performance against high off-boresight targets.
Since all of the AIM-120s fired are identical in kinematic performance and seeker jam resistance, any measure applied by the enemy which is effective against one AIM-120 round in the salvo is apt to produce the same effect against all AIM-120 rounds - a problem the Russian BVR does not have due to diversity in seeker types and missile kinematics.
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 failure.
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 defense it has against the anti-radiation missile
However a Rim-67 has a range of 100 miles so the task force can deal with the threat. They retired the Phoenix because they did not feel threatened.
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