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Aircraft Vs Thread 4


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Heh, perhaps they are planning to mount a GAU-8 Avenger on the nose of a C-17 and market it as an A-10 replacement. :D

Graham

what a lovely idea, and put a couple of 105 mm on the left side, along with a chain gun and have a bay for SBDs, I bet the C-17 can carry a few dozen of those without a problem. :lol:

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August 2008, Nellis AFB:

Su-30MKI vs F-22 at Red Flag.

Oh come on you've gotta have a story to go with that David!

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Not much more than that. The F-22 is not confirmed, but you KNOW they're going to be there anyways, especially with the MKI's coming. Basically:

India says they're coming to Red Flag, and bringing their MKI's. They are also making a big public fuss that the MKI's radar is so advanced, it will not be used at all, so that its frequency etc cannot be monitored by the Americans.

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India says they're coming to Red Flag, and bringing their MKI's. They are also making a big public fuss that the MKI's radar is so advanced, it will not be used at all, so that its frequency etc cannot be monitored by the Americans.

Yes that's aparently how things have gone in the past few international exercises. Actually the Air Force might handle things the same way the RAF did and not actually have Raptors go up against MKIs in direct combat, but have them work togethere in mixed formations (exactly what the RAF did with their Typhoons).

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Yeah, and deny us all our fun comparing the two. Of course, they can't really "risk" even one "shoot down" of any plane by a Flanker, or congress will cut all funding. "Why are we paying for this when INDIA can shoot down our billion-dollar planes?"

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Here's the article:

India bans Su-30MKI fighters from using radars during 'Red Flag Nellis' exercise

By Radhakrishna Rao

India's defence ministry has confirmed that the six Sukhoi Su-30MKI multirole fighters that will participate in "Red Flag Nellis" manoeuvres at Nellis AFB, Nevada in August 2008 will operate without using their NIIP Bars radars.

"The radar frequencies are top secret, as they can be used to block vital functions of the fighter," says the Indian air force, which adds: "While we have a good equation with the USA, we have to be careful about the future."

US interest in the system stems from China's large inventory of Russian-made Su-30s, and Moscow has previously stated that the MKI's radar frequencies should not be revealed.

India's Red Flag commitment builds on its air force's mid-2007 deployment of six Su-30MKIs to the UK for a bilateral exercise with Royal Air Force types including the Eurofighter Typhoon and Panavia Tornado F3. The Indian service is also expected to send an Ilyushin Il-76 tanker and two Il-76 transports to accompany its fighters to the USA.

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Yeah, and deny us all our fun comparing the two. Of course, they can't really "risk" even one "shoot down" of any plane by a Flanker, or congress will cut all funding. "Why are we paying for this when INDIA can shoot down our billion-dollar planes?"

Why not, it would be equivalent of the F-15 ploy, so that we can say that the current generation isn't cutting mustard, and we need full speed ahead on the next generation.

I wonder how hard it would be to buy a MKI anyway, it's not as if there wasn't a plethora of Flankers out in the world already.

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The Indian AF did the same thing when the Su-30's were over here for an exercise against RAF Typhoon's earlier in the year. I remember "Air Forces Monthly" making mention of it in an article on the exercise. Apparently it was something that the Russian suppliers (who provide maintenance support after all, giving them a heck of a lot of leverage) insisted on. Makes a lot of sense to me - if I were the Russian's the last thing I would want to do his hand out to NATO, the US or the UK the frequencies that the Su-30's radar would be using in wartime. I'm fairly sure that the RAF do something similar when they exercise with the IAF and other airforces. You always want to keep something back to keep a potential opponent guessing.

Karl

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A counter-argument I saw is that India doesn't want everyone to realize their MKI's radar really isn't that good, little better than a basic Flanker B. If it's never used, nobody knows how good (or poor) it really is.

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A counter-argument I saw is that India doesn't want everyone to realize their MKI's radar really isn't that good, little better than a basic Flanker B. If it's never used, nobody knows how good (or poor) it really is.

I can understand the need to keep certain things secret, but what is the point of coming if not to test the capabilities of the aircraft and crew in the first place? If they get legitimately beaten by the opposition, then they'll never know if the fault is with the pilots or with the equipment. Which makes the exercise moot.

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Yeah, and deny us all our fun comparing the two. Of course, they can't really "risk" even one "shoot down" of any plane by a Flanker, or congress will cut all funding. "Why are we paying for this when INDIA can shoot down our billion-dollar planes?"

I'm willing to bet that the Indian Air Force is just as unwilling to risk their relatively expensive MKIs against foreign air forces, lest their parliament start wondering why they're buying MKIs instead of more Mig-21 Bisons or upgraded Mig-23s or something.

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A counter-argument I saw is that India doesn't want everyone to realize their MKI's radar really isn't that good, little better than a basic Flanker B. If it's never used, nobody knows how good (or poor) it really is.

Radar? What is this radar you speak of? Everybody knows it's just a guy in the nosecone with a pair of binoculars! :p

Graham

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A counter-argument I saw is that India doesn't want everyone to realize their MKI's radar really isn't that good, little better than a basic Flanker B. If it's never used, nobody knows how good (or poor) it really is.

I don't want to sound like a flag waving jingoist but I have a much easier time buying your counter argument rather than india's "our radar is so advanced we're keeping it turned off so that you americans don't crap your pants in a jealous rage" statement.

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I don't want to sound like a flag waving jingoist but I have a much easier time buying your counter argument rather than india's "our radar is so advanced we're keeping it turned off so that you americans don't crap your pants in a jealous rage" statement.

:lol::lol: Im glad I wasn't drinking anything when I read your post or it would be all over my keyboard.

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I'm not entirely certain what you mean, David, but in the UK, train-spotters are a well known lack-of-social-skills subgroup. :) (in popular perception, anyway - as always, the ones I actually know through my job are all nice people... )

In the US, the act of watching planes (often through binoculars) and likely recording registry numbers, is "planespotting". The same thing, but involving trains, is not called trainspotting, though the public thinks it is. Watching trains and recording locomotive road numbers is "railfanning". "Trainspotting" is not a term/verb here, but it was the name of a movie. The word is well-known here due to said movie, but it does not actually describe anything--but the public thinks it does (they think it means railfanning, since "planespotting" is fairly well known).

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