On carrier airwing, I think you are not considering two core issues in your numbers projection. The first is operational flexibility and the second is attrition.
If you base your fleet acquisition purely on a proportional scaled-up of what a ‘typical’ peacetime general purpose airwing will look like, you won’t have the ability to mix and match types as specific mission parameters arise.
You also need to build in attrition replacements in combat aircraft numbers because they take years to build and are not items you can easily build to replace wartime looses quickly. This is especially important if there is a good chance your carriers will be fighting near-peer opponents where high combat attrition is likely
Having carriers but no planes to fly off them is the same as having no carriers.
But I think a core part of our disagreement on carrier manned 5th gen numbers also stems from our very different views on what UCAVs would have on air combat in the age of 5th gens.
In this regard, I think I must take issue with some of your fundamental assumptions underpinning your arguments because I just do not find them credible.
Firstly, you list the design features criterial for the kinds of UCAVs you wanted fielded as:
- long range
- high performance (both in terms of sensors, airframe/engines and avionics)
- LVO
- multirole
Yet at the same time you expect them to come out at 1/3 to 1/4 the cost of a manned 5th gen?!
Please sketch out, even in broad terms, just how you expect to attain those design characteristics and achieve that kind of drastic cost reduction.
I also find it highly contradictory that you would list LVO as a key design requirement, yet want to use these drones as active sensor platforms. Why bother with LVO if you just intend to actively emit with them all the time?!
I think even you recognised the major contradictions in your own reasoning, hence this LVO requirement, because without LVO, we are basically taking about something at the same performance as a conventional 4th gen fighters even in ideal circumstances. But we all know you won’t get anything close to the kind of exchange rate you need to make these UCAVs economically viable in such a scenario, which is why you added in LVO to make it so manned 5th gens don’t achieve double digit exchange rates against them. However, by adding LVO, you also make it impossible to achieve anything like the cost savings you need.
That is the core flaw with your calculations and assumptions - either you need top end sensors, engines, LVO and avionics on your UCAVs so they can achieve something like acceptable exchange rates against enemy manned 5th gens (but will end up costing 80-90% what a manned 5th gen will come out as); or you make something to the budget you described but which will be absolutely slaughtered by enemy 5th gens and end up as little more than very expensive missile decoys.
The other fundamental area of difference between us is that you don’t really seem to want to fully factor in the game changing nature of 5th gens on BVR combat.
You seem to be of the opinion that modern ASEA can effectively counter stealth and allow BVR against them like conventional 4th gens when literally no contest between ASEA equipped 4th gens and 5th gens have gone that way. That is even before we take into account the impact of stealth on missile seekers even if you can achieve a lock at BVR ranges.
My view is that given the fact that even against legacy fighters, BVR takes place at far closer rangers than what most people assume, and the massive reduction in detection ranges and missile effectiveness stealth has on radars, it is very unlikely we will see much in the way of BVR kills in a 5th gen v 5th gen scenario.
It is uncharacteristically unsubtle for you to essentially argue for a sheer brute force approach to a problem, whereby your solution to 5th gen is essentially one of human wave tactics in the sky where you throw more planes at the enemy then they have missiles to shoot you down with. At the same time as accepting China is unlikely to match American stealth fighter production numbers.
My solution is to sidestep the primary strength of stealths (radar stealth) and engage them in WVR.
UCAVs will still be important, but I would ditch expensive ASEA and instead use IRSTs as primary sensors.
I will also remove the multirole requirement and have them focus exclusively on AA to further cut down on cost.
IRST with LVO gives you the kind of survivable forward sensor network you want; while also giving at least a chance at achieving worthwhile cost reductions compared to manned fighters (which is still not going to be the 2/3 to 3/4 cost reduction you want). The issue is going to be software, where I don’t think AI will be able to fully compete with manned pilots in WVR for some time to come still. Which is why I don’t think UCAVs will be viable in air combat against 5th gens for at least another generation, and hence why manned 5th gens numbers still matter, especially in the naval arena where there are no geographical limitations stopping them US from bring the entire might of its fleet to bear if it wanted to.
For the next 15-20 years, I see first gen AA UCAVs as loyal wingmen glorified missile magazine extensions for manned fighters, with very limited (by design as well as cost) automatous engagement capabilities.
That may change with a full blown new Cold War arms race as ethical concerns are tossed assigned and investments in military R&D massively accelerated, but we are not there yet, and due to COVID, short of a war, we are unlikely to get there within the next 5-10 years IMO.
