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Cobra Maneuver

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Re: Cobra Maneuver

#151

Post by unity1001 »

hef19898 wrote: post #137
unity1001 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unfortunately the circumstances where this is useful is very limited. Even worse: Advancing missile technology has mostly invalidated the need for aircraft in a major war since a long while, and drones will literally sweep what's left of it. The Iranian drones' amazing performance in Ukraine shows that warfare has changed forever. The drones can travel 1700 km autonomously, very hard to jam, and they are cheaper th…

Yeah, aircraft are as obsolete as tanks, the Ukrainian War showed us as much. And all major powers are only developing new generation fighters, bombers and tanks to keep the military-industrial complex busy. Or not. A Javelin can take out a tank, but not replace it. A drone, or cruise missile, can take a ground target, a missile can take out aircraft, but they cannot replace their roles. The reason tanks get destroye…

> Yeah, aircraft are as obsolete as tanks, the Ukrainian War showed us as much

I wouldnt go THAT far yet because there are still some uses for the aircraft. Especially very long range missions are economical by using aircraft. Ie, 2000 km and more ranges. Including interception and air defense. There are missiles that can travel such distances, but they are expensive still.

However true, very soon that kind of range will also be covered by drones, making aircraft totall obsolete.

> As far as dogfights are concerned, they were declared dead prior to Vietnam. To the point fighter jets didn't get cannons anymore. Vietnam caused the creation of Top Gun, when the Navy realized their pilots were not up to par in airial combat.

That was a time in which the missiles were still in their infancy. Hence the miss rate and the need to dogfight. Today its not like that.

> one of the following scenarios will happen

I propose that none of those scenarios will happen. Existing air defense systems now can reach distances up to 500 km and shoot down literally, actually anything. (S-500 and above). Suicide drones can travel 1700 km. Strike drones even more.

There is no need to have any aircraft take off and do mission at a long distance, in which they would get promptly shot down by advanced air defense systems. Just spam drones.

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#152

Post by unity1001 »

dragonwriter wrote: post #147
unity1001 wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can google 'Intel Slava Z' telegram channel and join it to access such stuff. Its one of the larger slavic intelligence channels. There are others too. Such stuff wouldnt be in mass media ever because first, it reduces the competition chances of US armament makers, and second, its something that Iran did, who is obviously evil according to such corporate Angloamerican media like the Politico. I have to add, follo…

> Such stuff wouldnt be in mass media ever because first, it reduces the competition chances of US armament makers Mass media with global reach exists that is headquartered in, and has as much relationship to local arms makers as exists in the US media in countries whose armament makers are the competition to US armament makers, so that explanation seems inadequate and parochial. > Anglosaxon Pro tip: you’ll look les…

> Mass media with global reach exists that is headquartered in, and has as much relationship to local arms makers as exists in the US media in countries whose armament makers are the competition to US armament makers, so that explanation seems inadequate and parochial.

The basic tenet of the US military-industry has been destroying local arms makers in any way they can to replace them. What was done to German and British air defense industries during the Cold War are examples of them. Moreover, the majority of mass media have networked shareholders which include US entities. The immense pushing of US foreign policy in all mass media even in Europe is an indicator of how extensive the control is.

> Pro tip: you’ll look less like a propaganda shill if you don’t start using contextually unusual and inaccurate labels

Pro tip: Anglosaxon is a long-standing history and political science term. And those who are students of either won't stop using it because a certain segment of the Angloamerican public now has an aversion to the term because a certain enemy of their establishment used them. It describes a certain social, political and economic construct, and the term still remains valid today.

If you are offended by such a widely used term in history and political science, heaven knows how much you would be offended by some other terms that are used in those sciences. Here is a 300-year old example.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfidious_Albion

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#153

Post by dragonwriter »

ivalm wrote: post #111
mizzao wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you referring to the Turkish Bayraktars or a different drone?

No, Russians are buying Iranian drones that are surprisingly capable. Also funny that Russians are so behind the times that they need to buy advanced military tech from Iran. Edit: apparently Russians have advanced but uneconomical drones, Iran strikes a better balance!

> No, Russians are buying Iranian drones that are surprisingly capable

“Loitering munitions”, which sensationalist media refers to as “suicide drones”. Basically, slow, long-range, very-small-warhead prop-driven GPS-guided missiles.

Not “drones” in the “reusable unmanned aerial vehicle” sense.

> Also funny that Russians are so behind the times that they need to buy advanced military tech from Iran.

These aren’t particularly advanced. They are pretty old tech with commercial GPS added for guidance. They have a pretty narrow niche, but its one that is particularly relevant to Russia’s current situation, especially given political constraints relating to Ukraine’s operations and the equipment they are being supplied with.

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#154

Post by giantrobot »

trevorishere wrote: post #98
giantrobot wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And of course, the strike package would have been accompanied by the EA-18G Growler to jam SAM radar. Well it should have been preceded by a Wild Weasel mission to take out the SAM radars and launchers. The Growler mission would just be extra SAM defense. There also should have been a counter-air element to deal with the enemy fighters flying CAP. There was enough intelligence available for the mission every fixed…

Good point about the B-2. Does the Navy even perform Wild Weasel? That's usually the F-16's job and we can only "assume" that it was out of range of any USAF or collation airbase. Of course, the country in question would have to be Iran due to the F-14... though the Felon hasn't been shipped outside (or inside of...heh) Russia. And of course we come back to 'it's a movie' :-)

I don't think the Navy calls their SEAD Wild Weasel. Their SEAD missions are similar to the Air Force's Wild Weasel missions but without the naming. They're both SEAD and use similar tactics and weapons.

But the movie's mission not including any SEAD was 100% suspenders of disbelief. The whole mission seemed to be planned by people that were the pilots' life insurance beneficiaries.

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#155

Post by TylerE »

NovemberWhiskey wrote: post #148
ninkendo wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the operative question is, why must the guns be fixed? Wouldn’t it be useful for guns to be on turrets that can aim in other directions? We do it with helicopters (complete with automated aiming), and we used do it with bombers in WW2, after all. I’m sure the answer has to do with aerodynamics, and the general rarity of close-range dogfighting in the first place, that make such a design impractical.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/13476480@N07/38271566385 The 20mm cannon on an F-16 is the entire assembly labeled as items 63, 72, 73 and the ammunition is 78. How do you envisage this as other than a fixed installation?

Yeah. The guns in a typical WW2 bomber were M2 brownings...which are less than 100lbs.

It's the square-cube law in action (twice over). Going from a 12.7mm to a 20-25mm bullet... twice the diameter, four times the crosssection, eight times the mass.

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#156

Post by trevorishere »

jabl wrote: post #132
trevorishere wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course this is a hypothetical now that we've seen how "well kept" Russian equipment is, but the R-37M will technically reach out and touch American aircraft long before the AMRAAM is in range. Gotta wait for the AIM-260.

Well, the R-37M is an absolute monster missile at 600kg, even bigger than the AIM-54 Phoenix at around 450kg. For comparison the AMRAAM is about 150kg. So even if, hypothetically, Russia could sort out their issues with actually producing their ostensibly high tech designs, I find it hard to imagine this would be a mass produced missile comparable to AMRAAM. More like a special missile to take out high value targets…

100% agreed on all points. Evading the Phoenix on its terminal guidance near max range should be a viable strategy for avoiding it due to the bleed of kinetic energy. Though like the HARM (which an F-16 Wild Weasel pilot _hated_ due to the huge plume of smoke it creates; listen to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EI2rYxMPHM), it should be launched at high altitude for the best probability of a kill at long range.

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#157

Post by hef19898 »

unity1001 wrote: post #151
hef19898 wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, aircraft are as obsolete as tanks, the Ukrainian War showed us as much. And all major powers are only developing new generation fighters, bombers and tanks to keep the military-industrial complex busy. Or not. A Javelin can take out a tank, but not replace it. A drone, or cruise missile, can take a ground target, a missile can take out aircraft, but they cannot replace their roles. The reason tanks get destroye…

> Yeah, aircraft are as obsolete as tanks, the Ukrainian War showed us as much I wouldnt go THAT far yet because there are still some uses for the aircraft. Especially very long range missions are economical by using aircraft. Ie, 2000 km and more ranges. Including interception and air defense. There are missiles that can travel such distances, but they are expensive still. However true, very soon that kind of range…

I think there are very valid reason every Gen 5 fighter has a cannon. I also think neither manned fighters nor tanks are going anywhere soon. The war in Ukraine just painted a fastly wrong picture, for valid reasons for sure, but still wrong concerning modern weapon systems.

As long as someone needs something on the ground been blown up from up close, or protect infantry from being blown up frok up close, tanks are your weapon of choice. You want something on the ground blown up from a distance comparatively cheap? Artillery, idealy self propelled for mobility, is your friend. You want to blow up stuff on the ground far away, and fast, you go for fighter aircraft. Or if you don't want to your enemy to do just that, as those are fast, can cover a lot of groind and controlled locally, so no jaming of any kind. If you want to do the same thing from really far away, use a cruise missile. Or in contested airspace where your piloted aircraft are too valuable? Use a drone, same for long endurance surveillance of uncontested airspace.

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#159

Post by dotancohen »

unity1001 wrote: post #101
hatsunearu wrote: post #10

Unfortunately the circumstances where this is useful is very limited. You'd have to be in very close range and in a very bad disadvantage, which honestly doesn't last long (you'd blow up very fast) and when you start decelerating you become a very easy target to hit. And after your opponent overshoots--you just lost a ton of energy--and energy is everything in aerial combat. Energy is the currency you spend to maneuv…

> Unfortunately the circumstances where this is useful is very limited. Even worse: Advancing missile technology has mostly invalidated the need for aircraft in a major war since a long while, and drones will literally sweep what's left of it. The Iranian drones' amazing performance in Ukraine shows that warfare has changed forever. The drones can travel 1700 km autonomously, very hard to jam, and they are cheaper th…

  > So that at this point you could bankrupt an enemy by just sending drones
Isn't this already the case with the Hamas rockets and the Iron Dome? The Hamas rockets are sawed-down telephone poles, and the Iron Dome interceptors are $100,000 precision instruments.

Re: Cobra Maneuver

#160

Post by lumost »

Sightline wrote: post #104
lumost wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In dcs, when a player cobras successfully it typically just results in them missing the next turn and getting shot. The delta v between the attacker, and the cobra’s aircraft is typically doesn’t allow enough time to get a missile off or guns. bin mind that dog fights happen in a one or two circle high g turn as each fighter attempts to out turn the other, cobra maneuvers require that the (losing fighter) exit the ci…

>The delta v between the attacker, and the cobra’s aircraft is typically doesn’t allow enough time to get a missile off or guns. That's what the HMD and R-73 are made for: (ignore the shit music) https://youtu.be/-D9ZhmFxz3M?t=194

Based on the canyon, they were trying to simulate the top gun movie. While entertaining, this is not how real fighter aircraft fight. The tail fighter in this scenario would have been 30k feet higher, 10+ miles away, and traveling at at least Mach 1.5.

The only time fighters are in direct contact in this situation is a dog fight. Which the above video is not. Checkout the YouTube category for “DCS BVR” as well as “DCS dogfight”. There are a few videos analyzing cobra in both as well as the use of terrain. TL;DR there are some interesting uses of terrain at the end of both engagements, however in a realistic setting the pilots would head home rather than risk dying to a “maneuver kill” where they accidentally crash into the ground while trying to “out rate” or “out turn” the other fighter.

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