They are rare because its rare for air forces to meet in the air. Last time that happened at any real scale was 30 years ago in ODS. Since then the active air forces of the west have been dropping bombs on groups like ISIS who don't have fighters. And even in ODS there weren't that many A2A kills because most Iraqi aircraft were destroyed on the ground.
Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
41–50 of 85 posts
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#42Because you're trying to shoot something flying at 500 miles an hour, piloted by a tiny lunatic who actually thought this sort of thing was a good career move and is probably on military-issued meth, with a projectile the size of your thumb, while also being the exact same sort of lunatic? :-D
> ... with a projectile the size of your thumb
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.
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#43Air to air combat kills are rare because the strategic circumstances that would make them numerous enough to be unexceptional would likely tree up to minor-to-major nuclear conflict. 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…
> 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.
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#441. Fighter jets in battle-ready condition are rare to start, even more so one flying in the right spot at the right time to shoot down a hostile jet
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
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#45I believe there were regular dogfights during the Falklands War in the 1980's.
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#46> "After the totally lopsided kill-to-loss ratio attained by the US Air Force and US Navy during the First Gulf War, it is a very rare thing for regimes under attack by the US and its allies to send fighters up in defence - since they know how it will end."
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")
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#47This is true. And this holds up until enemy forces have advanced electronic warfare capabilities.
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.
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#481. Fighter jets in battle-ready condition are rare to start, even more so one flying in the right spot at the right time to shoot down a hostile jet 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
> 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.
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_drugs_used_by_milita... Cousin of meth.
This is very strange to me considering that Adderall was a disqualifying factor when I joined the service. Very interesting, I had no idea this was used today. 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…
Anecdata and certainly wasn't officially sanctioned but the battalion medics made adderrall quite available to us in Afghanistan in 2012.
Re: Why are air combat kills so rare? (2017)
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
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Drink verification can to launch missile