Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR Miss

As the title says is there need for all the new advanced fighter aircraft, with all the performance enhancement? I mean , if we Furnish all the modern avionics in Mig 21 or any light fighter things like AESA Radar, IRST, Modern interface, BVR Missiles Etc, how does it compare in battle field to advanced fighters?


Also, considering new Electronic radars and possibilities of miniaturisation don't you think light fighters with their low RCS are better than more heavy fighters in point defence? what are the chances that a modern aircraft can evade a AAM than a Mig 21?

As the saying goes what difference does Aircraft make when you are facing each other BVR Missile?

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Titanium said:

As the title says is there need for all the new advanced fighter aircraft, with all the performance enhancement? I mean , if we Furnish all the modern avionics in Mig 21 or any light fighter things like AESA Radar, IRST, Modern interface, BVR Missiles Etc, how does it compare in battle field to advanced fighters?

Also, considering new Electronic radars and possibilities of miniaturisation don't you think light fighters with their low RCS are better than more heavy fighters in point defence? what are the chances that a modern aircraft can evade a AAM than a Mig 21?

As the saying goes what difference does Aircraft make when you are facing each other BVR Missile?

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Well, agile fighter aircraft looks better in the airshows, for starters. But really, I don't think manouverability does matter much in modern air combat. For starters, gunfighting is dead, and with helmet sights and off-boresight engagement capabilities even dogfights have more to do with sensor capabilities and weapon performance than ability to make cool looking tight turns.

What difference does an aircraft make in a BVR missile engagement? If the missile is already getting closer to you it is emitted signature and/or jamming capability which has significance. No manned aircraft can really evade modern missiles. With coming of UCAV's the evading manouevers have a new life.

With this in mind, if we could equip a MiG-21 with all the modern gizmos it would be about as effective as modern fighter. The real question is, whether this would be profitable or not? Aircraft modernization is not often worth it due to fact, that old airframes often do not have much flight time left in them. That makes investment them not profitable. Other facts are, that due to newer designs new aircraft often have lower operating costs, more possibilites to install new electronics modules etc.

The real revolution is, IMHO, networking capability. Sensors and launch platforms do not have to be in same physical location, which means new chances for ground launched SAM's, as well as it opens possibility of operating , for example, airborne missile trucks with no sensor capability of its own etc.
Possibilities are almost endless and I think we have seen almost nothing yet.

The wild cards are new generation SAM's and various directed energy weapons. In the age when airframes cost enormous sums and price margin between AAM's and SAM's are reducing, SAM's may well become primary air combat weapons.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

This all sounds like the bad old thinking that lead to the creation of solid, and legendary aircraft, but ultimately worthless dogfighters.


I'm thinking that with the advances in stealth, the likelihood that fighters will simply run in to each other and then be forced into an old-fashioned dogfight are increasingly likely.

Afterall, I don't believe that there's any such thing as a perfect ground based anti-air system.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

kyanges said:

This all sounds like the bad old thinking that lead to the creation of solid, and legendary aircraft, but ultimately worthless dogfighters.


I'm thinking that with the advances in stealth, the likelihood that fighters will simply run in to each other and then be forced into an old-fashioned dogfight are increasingly likely.

Afterall, I don't believe that there's any such thing as a perfect ground based anti-air system.

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You got a point, but with the proleferation of off boresight missiles (some with 90 degrees off the nose targetting capability) manueverability may not have as great an impact as it once have.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

kyanges said:

This all sounds like the bad old thinking that lead to the creation of solid, and legendary aircraft, but ultimately worthless dogfighters.

I'm thinking that with the advances in stealth, the likelihood that fighters will simply run in to each other and then be forced into an old-fashioned dogfight are increasingly likely.

Afterall, I don't believe that there's any such thing as a perfect ground based anti-air system.

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Actually the bad old thinking was right all along, but merely overestimated maturation level of missile technology. Dogfighting abilities of the fighters of fourth generation (such as F-16, MiG-29 etc.) are anachronisms, which have had no practical significance whatsoever. There has been no, and probably will be no, true dogfight between fourth generation aircraft during almost their 30 years of service.

Development of IRST together with radar stealth may put IR seekers (perhaps combined with radar and visual recognition) into long range air-to-air missiles, but even then dogfighting capabilities are not required.

Nowadays, in tactical terms, it is possible to feed the SAM exactly the same targeting information as the missile launched from aircraft would have. The difference is merely in mobility.

How about a design exercise? Fifth generation manned fighter without anachronist requirement for dogfighting? Think about the possibilities of speed and stealth this would mean...

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Jon K said:

Actually the bad old thinking was right all along, but merely overestimated maturation level of missile technology. Dogfighting abilities of the fighters of fourth generation (such as F-16, MiG-29 etc.) are anachronisms, which have had no practical significance whatsoever. There has been no, and probably will be no, true dogfight between fourth generation aircraft during almost their 30 years of service.

Development of IRST together with radar stealth may put IR seekers (perhaps combined with radar and visual recognition) into long range air-to-air missiles, but even then dogfighting capabilities are not required.

Nowadays, in tactical terms, it is possible to feed the SAM exactly the same targeting information as the missile launched from aircraft would have. The difference is merely in mobility.

How about a design exercise? Fifth generation manned fighter without anachronist requirement for dogfighting? Think about the possibilities of speed and stealth this would mean...

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I did consider that missiles and sensors have more or less finally reached the kind of performance needed to fulfill the old dreams of dogfighting being made obsolete. But surprise surprise, I've no real answer to that. .

The kind of situation where I figured dogfighting might still have some usage is in a sort of protracted war, between two relatively evenly matched adversaries, where ground based anti-air has largely been decimated, and stealth fighters on both sides are stuck without complete radar (The usage of which would give away their position, even with some sort of Low Probability of Intercept RADAR.) and pilots are forced to rely on their eyes to acquire targets.


So in short I guess my position is that, I agree that today the relevance of dogfighting has been reduced, but mainly because the current technology gap between possible enemies these days is so huge, and not really because the technology itself has made it obsolete, and that the likelihood of engaging in a dogfight has a negative correlation between the "power" gap (Technology, funding, training, etc.). Namely, the smaller the gap, the greater the possibility.


About your design exercise, I always felt that the F-22 seems to be that kind of fighter. the focus seems to be less on dogfighting, and more on always trying to engage the enemy on the US's terms, with all targets pre-acquired, pre-marked, and dead long before they had a chance.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Jon K said:

There has been no, and probably will be no, true dogfight between fourth generation aircraft during almost their 30 years of service.

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I'd say that there has been a few dogfight engagements, seen in Ethiopia, Israel, and Serbia over the past decade. Unfortunately for the Serbian pilots, those old Soviet electronics weren't very reliable. You can read accounts of these engagements over at the ACIG web site.

Wealthy nations can afford the luxuries of stealth or stealthy aircraft, AWACS, advanced AAM's. But only a small % of the world's nations are wealthy and can afford to give their pilots proper training.

Given a hypothetical (and unlikely) situation where the Burmese and Thai AF mix it up, we'd probably see F-16 vs. MiG-29 that ends with an AIM-9 or R-73 shooting someone down.

Poor-er nations have to make do with whatever their military budget allows, and usually only a small % can be used for new equipment acquisitions. So if you're stuck with MiG-21's and cannot afford to buy new aircraft, you just have to make do with what you have. The Burmese upgraded their J-7's with EL/M-2032 radar, Python 3 AAM, Litening laser targeting pods, and LGB's. It's not an advanced aircraft, but will drop a LGB where it needs to. The PLAAF still uses Q-5's.


Looking toward the future, I think for nations that could afford it, they'll move toward combat UAV's with the level of maneuverability that manned aircraft cannot match.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Well, first I don't think A-A combat at closer range (sometimes as close as dogfighting) is gone. I think there may be situations were one is forced to go closer for some reason. If a fight ensous you might find yourself in a situation were an adversary pops up rather close. Or you rzn across each other accidently.

A manned fighter cannot perfrom the high-G turns of a missile. But at the outer missile range, a highly agile fighter will have a better chance to evade. Thus reducing the no-escape-zone of the missile.
Maneuverability in the sence of high AoAs and 180° turns with the lowest possible radius are probably not really a must.
But good agility for maneuvers in a fight is a thing a modern aircraft should have. Perhaps unless it relies very much on it's own stealth.

And, I don't think so many coutries would invest that much money in maneuverability/agility if they could get the same result with MiG-21 aerodynamics.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Look at it this way, during WWII and Korea the dogfight was limited by the gun kill range of about a few hundred meters. The main goal was to manuever your aircraft behind your opponent a lead your shot. Aircraft manueverability was very important and gives you a very good edge.

In Vietnam and Arab Israeli Wars, dogfight kills involved the gun (same) and the rear aspect IR missiles. The goal is the same as the gun, manuever your aircraft behind your opponent to get a good IR lock, though this time you do not have to lead your opponent but keep it at your HUD for several seconds.

Modern all aspect IR missiles and off boresight helmet mounted sights reduces the effort of shooting down another aircraft to moving your head. If my enemy is at a 60 degree cone in front of me, I can get a target lock and he is in deep trouble.

Now the problem arises if both dogfighting aircraft have off boresight helmet mounted sighted missiles. The possibility of both of them shooting each other down simultaneously is very great. IF the enemy stood a good chance of shooting me down,even if I surprise him, I have no incentive to going in a knife fight with him. In fact, all my incentive is to shoot him down from BVR.

Re: Is agile, manuverable aircraft relevent in the era of advanced avainoics and BVR

Not all air combat will be like the USAF vs. Iraqi AF case, that is a highly superior AF in both quantity and quality vs. a much inferior AF, if both side have a large amount of advanced fighter, missles and BVR capabilities, close dog fight is unavoidable IMO, BVR missle will not be able to shoot down all or even most of the opponent aircraft, the rest will be engaged in close dog fight, at this point heavy fighter will also have an edge over light fighter, as they can carry more missle and stay in air longer, as well as fly faster.