Why The F-35 Can't Shoot at Long Range | The key air combat technology nobody talks of.
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 14 ส.ค. 2021
- The F-35 and other modern aircraft can't necessarily use their long range weapons, like the AMRAAM, at the best of their possibility. In this video we explain why and discuss how WVR and
dogfight are not dead. Short range, intense, combat is not dead. Despite the air combat doctrines emphasize Long Range and BVR combat, WVR, short range and dogfight may well still happen.
There is a reason nobody is talking about: NCTR (Non Cooperative Target Recognition).
#Dogfight #BVR #WVR
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Man, watching your videos I start to realize how much of what I have been told about aviation and fighter aircraft technology is totally bogus. Everyone under the sun has an opinion on which fighter is the best, what technologies are best, etc. But the more you explain the more I realize the subject is quite complex and nuanced. I guess it's a large scale example of the Dunning Kruger effect, people are just prone to assuming they know what they're talking about due to a combination of ignorance and vanity. It just goes to show no one should be so naïve as to take a so called expert's opinions at face value.
The discord server still has trouble with kicking people randomly. From what I've been looking at it may be because the invite is set to temporary. Trying it with the current link.
And no I have never sent anything there other than a couple messages asking why I got kicked before sending anything
Excellent video. Can you make an episode about the Rafael Python-5 missile ?
Can you explain the guidance laws for the latest GPS equipped AMRAAMs? My understanding is GPS effectively increased range through more efficient laws, but I don't see how this works; I thought all the missle would care about is range and bearing of the target.
@@JenkemSuperfan Sorry, I can't pin down the problem yet.
Damn, if I can apply what I've learned from this illuminating video to my own air force I'll be unstoppable! I just need an air force.
😆😆😆
-Thank God that only adult and responsible men has an airforce....!!!
@@easer777 : Branson?
@@easer777 The only adult and responsible air force that I've seen flies Gripens. LOL
As an electronic engineer I can only say, WOW great explanation on energy and frecuency Concepts. PS: I can see that the wooden like kitchen furniture is omnipresent in the UK... I have the same ones hahaha
As an Electronic Engineer I was thinking it was lacking, like no mention phased array beam steering and spoofing the targets. Because I imagine steering the beam and the F35 hunting in packs could give much better radar returns and identification. As for him talking about amplifying system the new generation of even commercial chips can pick out a signal from basically 99.9999999% noise can only imagine what boeing/lockleed get custom made.
Are they still using SAW devices to do FFT now? Is modern electronic processor chips fast enough?
Can encoding auto-corelating function in the sent radar signal prevent spoofing?
@@ntal5859 He is talking about NCTR (Non Cooperative Target Recognition) as stated in description.
This was the stuff I was doing in the Navy 15-20 years ago. Great video, I appreciate the nerding out on topics like this.
This is really a key here 15-20 years ago...
There have been some developments in computers and electronics since...
@@RogerJL also this assumes only 1 guy is doing NCTR. reality now is you have tons of other assets doing the same thing and processed with sensor fusion AI/machine learning. thats a significant ID confidence boost.
NCTR as described in this video made its first combat appearance permitting many BVR kills without VID in Desert Storm... thirty years ago. That was pre-datalink, too. I think the contemporary state-of-the-art is probably significantly more complex and advanced than what's discussed in the video... By a lot.
how old are ya sir?
@@Jester-uh9xg Anything public about electronic warfare is usually at least 25 years old.
This target recognition tech, backed by a database should be familiar to anyone in the submariner field. Excellent and exceptional show as always.
Wow! Excellent! Really, is frustrating read below every posted picture of a non US plane something like "the f35 can shoot it down from xxx miles". Your videos are amazing, teaching and explaining complicated topics in a way that everyone can understand. English is not my first language so I hope you could understand. Regards!
I consider the f35 a hidden information gathering node that sends information back to c and c systems than then determine the best course of action; engage, kill, evade, etc. In this scenario, a f35 can find a target and then the best weapon within the area takes the kill (whether it's that f35, a different plane, a hidden sub, a local ship, etc.). Makes sense that they're building the f-15ex that can carry many missiles and the US is currently in the process of building longer range stealthy missiles (AA, ASW, AsUW, etc.) that can be carried by many platforms.
Those who write such comments usually can't comprehend videos like this.
Your English is perfect dude.
Another brilliant video, thank you.
When I served in the RAN as a radar plot, seemingly back in the dark ages, we still had some ships with no computerisation, having to interpret every little thing on our screens and tables like clouds and rain and sea clutter, and perform manual calculations for the simplest things like the course, speed and closest point of approach for all contacts. Even the idea of identifying a contact with radar(although we did have an IFF transponder on our air search radar antenna with mode 4, that’s a different thing altogether) seems like the stuff of science fiction from that perspective, yet so intuitive at the same time!
how old are you sir?
@@sidv4615 “only” 51.
I did the same thing in the US Navy in the 80’s and 90’s. One of the systems I worked on was a powerful raw data radar system. I would take raw radar data and give it symbology that was then sent over a system for the officers who made both tactical and strategic decisions based on the data from raw radar and OS’s who gave symbology to the returns. For example if we had and unidentified airborne return, we could tell a lot about the unidentified aircraft based on speed, altitude and the strength of the return. We could then send an F-14 or other airborne asset to visually identify. Once that infmrwas sent back to us we would attach an electronic symbol for type of aircraft. Same occurred for surface contacts.
@@bret9741 late 80s-early 90s for me too. We used the same symbols as the USN too. And codewords, and voice procedure, etc. That class of ship, the River class DEs, was the end of the manual ships, and indeed one had already been decommissioned before I joined up.
Another great video by Millennium 7. Keep it up, I keep sharing your videos on every relevant media.
Super-interesting, and a great presentation! It helped me understand why the AWACS is so important. It can acquire targets at great distances, and also likely has much better resolution, so it can do a much better job of IFF.
Previously, I’d just thought of AWACS as keeping track of where everything was, but this vid made me realize that it’s much more important to know WHAT everything is!
One of the purposes of AWACS, as I understand it, is to allow stealth aircraft to be stealthy.
For the most part a stealth aircraft is not stealthy WHILE an active radar is operating. However if the search/track radar functions are performed by the AWACS, then a jet such as F-35 may not need to turn on its own radar
@@julianbrelsford This is utterly untrue. The radar of both the F-22 and F-35 is designed to search and track while having a low probability of interception
I'm not going to go into details because many systems are classified but the reason why the F-15C was chosen to fly CAP and fighter roles even when Carriers were in the area was because the F-14 lacked the ability to identify targets at range the same way the F-15 can using some of the principles explained in this video.
Honestly the best way to tell what returns are enemies is to keep careful track of all non-enemies.
Which works until someone in a Boeing or an Airbus with a few hundred civilians on board looses the plot and wanders into your theater of operations unannounced...
You make a somewhat correct point but there is so much more that goes into combat PiD. Its not about NCTR. its never been. NCTR techniques like print and JEM are only secondary. The main tools of PiD are: AWACS (point of origin criteria), RWR bearing-to radar azimuth correlation (assuming positive signal ID), Trespass criteria and long range visual ID (through TGP/EOTS radar slaving). The above form what is know as the "ID Matrix". In order to force a WVR engagement (which is not a dogfight) ALL the above elements of the matrix must fail for BOTH sides at the SAME time, otherwise one is slaughtering the other in BVR. Not happening. Not even with effective jamming. The only expected WVR scenarios are those of high saturation COMAO's and again only if both combatants pursue AND survive the WVR approach, will they end up in a real dogfight. Because its prohibited to launch active weapons against merged aircraft, they will have to sort it out with pure BFM/ACM. Assuming they wasted their HOBS weapons during the WVR approach. So then, will dogfights happen? Perhaps, but if yes, only to a very small extent. The outcome of air operations throughout a campaign will be decided in BVR.
What he said.
Edit: I love how the only counterargument in the comments gets ignored while all the yesmen gets the seal of approval hahahaha what a guy, not coming back to this clickbait channel, good riddance.
Why can’t you launch at merge?
So dogfights or turning fights is just a small portion of the overall air to air combat in this era, right? What would comprise large part of overall air to air combat are BVR & within visual range air engagements involving no dogfights or turning fights, right?
"ALL the above elements of the matrix must fail for BOTH sides at the SAME time, otherwise one is slaughtering the other in BVR." ...But BVR makes "slaughter" more difficult. As distance goes up, the likelihood of hitting your target goes down.
@@jamclancy9335 at a USAF Red Flag exercises out of 152 Air to Air engagements, 7 ended up WRV and 145 were BVR. The F35 won 145 out of 145 BVR engagements. It lost 7 out of 7 WVR engagements.
Thank you. Certainly a complex task. Reminds me of the written and verbal claims about main gun stabilisation (and the advantages thereof) in tanks from WW2 onward. Ian V. Hogg, a former gunner who was a celebrated and prolific author on artillery, fortifications and small arms; asserted in his book about anti-tank weapons that main gun stabilisation was not properly sorted until the mid-1960s. Given his status as a highly respected expert technical writer (in books and magazines) on artillery and small arms, I would take his word over that of every tank enthusiast who lacks such credentials.
I am possibly addicted to Millennium 7 * History Tech at this stage. 🙂
Great video but I think you overstate how much of a problem it is for BVR, back in the 1991 Gulf War F-15Cs with JEM NCTR capable radars and AWACS support were authorised to take BVR shots in a very dense and complicated theatre with hundreds of coalition aircraft present, since then technology has moved on massively with new AESA radars, datalinks etc. Some F-35 pilots have said that their situational awareness is so good now that sometimes they don't even need an AWACS, especially if they're in a networked 4-ship flight, because the quality of the information they have is so much better.
@mandellorian Sure, it's always good to be sceptical of pilots' claims. That said there's red flag for realistic combat scenarios and if that's too high profile they do a lot of work with in simulators. I think the jamming training issue probably applies to a lot of aircraft, particularly the Growlers, those jamming pods they carry emit a huge amount of RF energy.
Awesome video!
Thanks for explaining this! :)
One more thing to add, as new aircrafts become available, this means that stealth will be even more common. Problem is that these aircrafts wont be able to see eachother until they are on top of eachother. Well, this means dog fight! I can see the F35 being in a disadvantage here...
And even when they can see eachother, they’ll have low confidence returns because stealth aircraft share a lot of the same geometry. Especially the F35/FC-31/Su-75.
_Simple can be harder than complex._
True, the more time passes, the stealthier aircraft will become, inevitably. That will force them to move closer, and closer.
WVR won't die out for a while.
It's a myth to say that the F-35 is bad at dogfighting. The F-35 has a sustained turn rate comparable to the F-16 (F35: 12 degrees/sec | F-16: 12.5 degrees/sec) in a clean configuration. In realistic configurations with missiles equipped, the F-35 has superior sustained turn rate compared to the F-16 due to being able to store more internally. Even in the clean configuration, the F-35 has dramatically superior instantaneous turn rate (nose authority) compared to the F-16 (F-35: 20 degrees/sec | F-16: 17.4 degrees/sec). Again, in realistic combat loadouts, the F-35 will have an even larger advantage. Think of the F-35 as a plane with slightly better sustained turn rate than the F-16 and a slightly better instantaneous turn rate (nose authority) than the Superhornet in realistic combat loadouts. By all means, the F-35 is a dangerous dogfighter. It's just not marketed as a dogfighter because it has other more impressive attributes.
Source(s):
www.f-16.net/forum/download/file.php?id=27757 (Primary Source)
www.reddit.com/r/F35Lightning/comments/8z2b3c/f35_in_a_dogfighting_scenario_would_the_internal/ (Secondary Source, Discussion).
"these aircrafts wont be able to see eachother until they are on top of eachother" - But they can be datalinked each other's positions by larger early warning systems, and use methods like IRST to locate and identify each other.
"Well, this means dog fight!" - No, it doesn't.
@@ChucksSEADnDEAD that is an ideal cenario. On a contested air space, that wont be the case, specially against the most modern air forces and ground batteries.
Very thorough and interesting! Good work!
I always appreciated this guy since I found him.
same
I really think he needs a new microphone, his accent and bassy voice makes him hard to understand at times.
Really great video. 👏👏👏
Nice simple explanation sir. Good work.
Very informative thank you 🙏🏿
Very informative. Gracci
Very thorough and interesting. Thank you.
A typical 4 gen fighter uses about 7 parameters to identify a BVR target.
The F-22 uses about 200 parameters to identify a BVR target.
The F-35 uses about 600 parameters to identify a BVR target.
F-35 pilots have said they don't need E-2s, and always identify a BVR target before the AWACS aircraft.during exercises In fact the F-35 often acts as an AWACS aircraft for other fighters.The F-35 has been identifying BVR aircraft in in heavy jamming environments too.
".......in my cockpit, I saw this in Raptor and I saw this in F-35 when I went on operational missions in Nellis Test range or anywhere else, we routinely and almost never utilized an off-board system like an AWACS and when we did, we never relied on the information they pass because we had so much high fidelity information.
Four-ship Raptor/F-35 does not need an AWACS to conduct missions.” "
- Lt. Col. David "Chip" Berke. Over 2,800 hours in F/A-18, F-22 and F-35. Served 3 Years as Top Gun Instructor pilot and former CO of First operational F-35B Squadron."
In Red Flag 17-1, the F-35 often entered into a visual fight, but it did so on its own terms. It had such a superior view of the air battle that, when it chose to enter the visual fight, it entered in an advantageous position. That’s what the F-35 gives you with it’s sensors, sensor fusion, and stealth. It gives you a “gods-eye” view of the air battle, and despite being outnumbered by Red Air in Red Flag 17-1, the F-35 still kicked derriere in the visual fight. Like German Ace Erich Hartmann said, ‘He who sees first has already half the victory.’
So many F-35 shills and Washington bots around these days.......🥱
@@Miesepete So many clueless F-35 haters around these days. Ask the Israelis what they think of the F-35. And I'm a former USAF pilot and retired airline pilot, not a bot.
a passive receiver could receive radar signals from a distant set,
and be able to identify that aircraft by the characteristics of the received signals,
hence the make and model of the radar deduced the aircraft based upon what it was fitted to
Outstanding. Thank you.
Stealth planes have one big advantage - they can get to the enemy from direction they dont expect.. thats how F22 for example usually identified planes over Syria, where sometimes other plane had no idea F22 was that near.. and even if they were spotted, there was always another F22 covering the one that had to get into visual contact with potential enemy.
Exploiting the blindspot
@mandellorian Huh?
One of your best shows! Details matter.
You are targeting an intelligent audience who knows about the Fourier Transformation already, so you should freely talk about these concepts.
Don't overestimate us man, it's a good thing he explains it so clearly.
... Yeah! Right guys ? We all totally know what that is! Ppfft obviously!!
Fourier what....??? ;- )
@@unknownuser069 thank you!
I don’t. But I watch a lot of his videos. So yeah. World doesn’t revolve around ya pal. I’m sure he’s trying to expand his audience and reach people who aren’t quite as educated as you. It would be foolish to not dumb them down a little bit to reach a larger audience.
Broke down and explained a very complex topic such that even a smooth brain like me could follow along and understand. An excellent video good sir on a topic so overlooked yet of vital importance.
Great analysis as usual. In a general war there are also lots of other things that will be operated such as air space management setting out safe fly zones at specific altitudes and times. With data networking these can be changed on the go (which wouldn't have been possible historically). As you suggest, the other networked approach is advantage will be multiple radar systems on multiple bands in the theatre.
On more modern systems, either the aircraft or the supporting control centre may well be combining data together electronically (ie multiple F-35 radar signals being combined giving a wider range of aspects and a much cleaner data return one one F-35 in the flight). I dont think the technology is there yet, but the same thing could be done in real time as electronic processing systems get more powerful , would be to combine data from multiple aircraft of different types in real time. The USAF is working on such systems for electronic warfare purposes at the the current time.
(1) Most of these are peace time issues and even then IFF solves much of the problem.
(2) In war time, it is not unreasonable to assume that anything out there not known to you is the enemy and should be shot at with or without identification.
(3) While it is possible for aircraft to wind up in visual range before the shooting starts -- especially when there isn't a hot war going on -- DOGFIGHTING IS DEAD. There is no reason to design an aircraft to be highly agile in terms of the ability to point it's nose. Why? Because if you are close enough for that to matter, high off boresight missiles like the AIM-9X can be shot backwards and still hit the target. If you are far away enough to worry about the missile's motor burn time, you are also far away enough that even a 747 can turn fast enough to put the enemy in the forward 45 degree cone of the nose.
On your second point, during Desert Storm, the coalition had literally hundreds of planes in the air over Iraq at the same time, and massively outnumbered the Iraqi Air Force. There is no way a single pilot could have kept track of every aircraft in the sky when planes keep coming and going, and there are more planes than in the sky than you could shake a stick at.
If they detected an unknown aircraft on radar there was actually a good chance it was a friendly, which is why they had to get conformation from AWACS every time they wanted to engage an aircraft and shoot it down. Some Iraqi aircraft did get away because of this, but it was needed to limit friendly fire.
I love the charts you showed. This reminds me of a Sonar Technician on a Submarine. They listen like radar does and he learns and matches known sounds to unknown to identify using experience to know what the target is. Does this make sense to you?
My "go to guy" does it again, bravo bro. The most knowledgeable channel for military info on TH-cam.
Within Visual Range combat has been declared dead several times, but it will always come back.
Meanwhile F-14 crews ;
"Haha, Phoenix goes wooosh"
I am gasping for air from awe with your intelect.
Excellent !
Originally discovered in the 1970s on the old "raw" fighter pulse doppler radar returns head on with the bogey. What was seen was something like ||||||| I believe, behind the nose return, reflecting the blades at the front of the bogey's compressor section. It was speculated that it might work to permit BVR (beyond visual range) identification. Glad to see progress on this. Realistically, in the furball that combat becomes after the first sweep, the Admiral will still require a visual ID, just to be sure. Add Link 16, though, and it's just another tool.
interesting, something I had zero understanding of, explained very well I thought thanks
Brilliant!!
Could you do a video explaining Coded Pulse Anti Clutter System (CPACS) used in the F-15 and TPS-43E radar?
I love this channel, it goes a little bit deeper than many of the other military avation channels (voiced by fvcking bots). After watching many of your videos I am confident I'm now ready to build my own delta wing/full wing body stealth aircraft at home. The enemy can't fire on me since they would have no record of my radar cross section 😂
Retrieving the signature of enemy aircraft is difficult. However east/west should have a very detailed database of signatures of their own types of aircraft, thus be able to identify that an an aircraft is not friendly I.e. not of our types. Unless of course enemy aircraft resemble the own types and the is not enough information to make the distinction. But given that even mission configurations make a difference, I think the chance that enemy and own can be confused is very small.
@17.47 camera panning onto him is the very embodiment of what he wants to say.. Enter in a dogfight to know your enemy correctly and then you can decide if or not you want to kill him(if he is a semi active radar emitter..kill him ie the source) or don't kill him if u know his weapons bay is just IR and you can make your other secondary targets as primary..
17:47
Well, my stereo amplifier may not be good enough but my knowlede of (digital) audio at least helps me to uderstand most of this! Visual radar recognition? Never thought of that untill now so thta is a real eye opener in itself. You do however surely describe all the pitfalls perfectly. Be sure the industry will claim it is only a matter of time before this conondrum will be soved. Maybe that was the centre of the argument that made you so angry? Stay cool, my friend! :-)
I wonder how well virtual radars built out of multiple transceivers on multiple platforms and connected with a theatre datanet works?
So, you encode and encrypt a serial number, location, time and metadata into your radar pulses.
Then, say it gets received by multiple receivers, yours and an AWACS.
You now have even more useful information for identifying that aircraft, especially if it's a low observable platform which is redirecting your radar energy away but happens to hit an AWACS.
This is undoubtedly already implemented on F-35
If I am not wrong, upcoming 6th. Generation aircraft in future have extreme maneuverability feature ( unmanned). This tells us, close air combat is still alive. 🙏🙏
Page 5:00+ although we can utilize multiple return wave front (time difference echo as signature) to catalog air born shape. It is not as simple beyond a principle level. We may be dealing with a large (or even overwhelming) catalog of signatures pointing to the same aircraft model. Since the wave incidence angle at a target plane varies by the yaw pitch and roll. That create a demand for AI on board the plane.
In the first gulf war we saw this a lot. Where fights got into short ranges because of difficulty identifying enemy aircraft and the fear of friendly fire incidents.
That said, in the first gulf war they didn't have modern datalinks sharing real-time information on the aircraft around them, friendly and enemy. I can't help but think a lot of what you said is less relevant now than even twenty or thirty years ago. There are a lot more options for identifying aircraft now than there were even relatively recently. This information can, and is, compiled from multiple sources now in a way that didn't really exist until relatively recently.
P.S. You argued that because radar signal scales with the fourth power of distance, aircraft have to be relatively close to get a better return, but that's LITERALLY the exact opposite of the conclusion to be drawn from that fact.. Inverse fourth power scaling means even a relatively small decrease in distance results in a dramatically stronger return signal. Halve the distance to the target, and you get a 2^4 or sixteenfold increase in the strength of the return signal.
In order to double the signal strength, an aircraft only has to get about 16% closer. Aircraft don't need to get much closer than their maximum range to get a significantly better signal.
That part, in particular, was the wrong conclusion.
I think the instances where you find one f-35 relying on only its radar to identify a long-range target are going to be slim to none . I really think you need to look at a system as a whole and not just the individual components. Especially now with the introduction of More drones into the battle field.
Excellent explanations, Just one piece of a intricate puzzle. I would prefer the F-35 fire zero missiles dependent on other assets in theatre. Good day sir!
well done ..
Another reason why within visual range, maneuvering fighting capabilities will always be important : air policing and interceptions. You can't just shoot at a contact from 50+ nm away and hope for the best, even if you're sure it's an "enemy". Unless you're engaged in open warfare that would create a diplomatic incident.
You have to get close and visually confirm the identity of the trespassing aircraft, establish contact and escort it. And at that point it doesn't matter how stealthy your aircraft is or how much range your missiles have. You've firmly entered the visual arena, and BFM is the only line of defense you've got left if the target suddenly decides it doesn't actually want to cooperate.
Plus I always hear this argument of "oh our stealth fighters will detect and shoot down their conventional fighters before they ever get close enough to engage anyway". And sure, that sounds reasonable enough. But... what about THEIR stealth fighters ? Are you sure they can't get close either ? Overconfidence is an insidious killer.
Well tbh peacetime air policing and interception really doesn't require much maneuverability. Theres basically no civillian aircraft that can compete with military aircraft used for airpolicing(F-16). Interceptions usually have a relatively signifcant degree of seperation between aircraft(even more so if the target is likely hostile), meaning that heatseakers and even radar missiles would be of use.
Identity of aircraft can generally be obtained based on the actions of the target. This has been used in the Iraq and Lybia.
Stealth is almost never conclusive, radar capabilities can be limited but not nullified.
These aircraft are designed for open warfare against a peer adversary. It's no longer the middle east shooting Ahmed in his mountain cave, where you have coalition forces operating in close vicinity trying to ID that unknown.
The world is moving away from asymmetrical warfare and towards open hostilities in the Pacific theatre.
When these aircraft go in, they'll be hot on the heels of a nuclear/cruise missile first strike. It'll be what's left of say the PLAAF against the remainder of the US' carrier force in the Pacific in that scenario. ASATS will have gone out crippling C3 on both sides, and there'll be massive 4-4.5 gen strike packages rolling in vs the surviving air defense network/battlegroup ships. There won't be any friendlies ahead of you, only hostiles carrying HARMs or antiship.
You mean all two of their stealth fighters?
For air forces which employ stealth/5gen-data-centric-inter-operable-highly-redundant aircraft, it "simply" gives them the upper hand, increasing hit probability. Dominance.
It comes at a cost, however. That cost is not entirely carried by the host nation but also the enemy, in an effort to counteract such an advantage. An arm's race.
I'm sure Russia n China have all sorts of technical n tactical defeats to varying degrees, all of which are taxing, too. America spends ten times its closest competitor n is well-versed at war. Alot could go wrong but that's balanced against what goes right.
Manned aircraft have all but reached the limit of manoeuvrability, especially in a tactical, high energy scenario. I don't really care if the Su-27 can do a cobra, n triple back-flip, coz the F-35 can point n shoot from any direction/angle with its highly integrated passive target acquisition, better missiles.. n designate other targets for others to shoot at, be that land, air or sea, in real-time. F-35s in (high) numbers, allow for swarms with ever more focus yet distributed processing/situational awareness. Hive mind. It's a credible threat. Why do you think Russia n China say it's useless while building their very own?
What people forget is that stealth has two components. Low visibility, but also good detection ability. If you only have one of these, then you are in trouble. It does not help if the enemy can not see you if you can not see them. Some have invested more in the ability to see targets. Some have invested more in not being seen. But you should have a mix of both. And if you can not have both, then great ability to detect is more important than the ability to avoid getting detected. Because that can be used both offensively and defensively.
(There is a reason why when USA engages an enemy they try to take out detection systems first despite having stealth aircraft. There not invisible. They're just harder to see. And that lets your other not so stealthy weapons fly more safely, too.)
The more stealth there is, maybe the less radar and beyond visual range will work, so the more dogfighting will be important.
Exactly, as technology progresses forward some tech will get outclassed bringing back old ways needing modernization.
It's not hard to imagine beyond visual range becoming outdated in many situations because of stealth.
@@ned418 Paradox n
can you do a detailed video on synthetic aperture radar? how it works from satelites and now from sensor-fused fighter clusters and wingman drones?
Another thoughtful and authoritative treatment of some complex topics, ending with a really clear reason why dogfighting will be thing for some time to come.
One emerging subject that was not covered is the use of machine learning technology for classification.
Excellent as usual.
the closing speed of these aircraft also increase the odds of close-range engagements
There's also other technologies called IFF and FLIR, both of which can be used for BVR engagements.
Thank you for everything you teach.
And thank you for finally giving us a tour of your house :)
sign:
One of the "experts" lol
It's wild that exportmodel Iranian f-14s were quite capable of BVR interdictions against Saddam's airforce, and then later, American F-16s repeated the same feat in the Gulf War, but the F-35 with its AESA is incapable of the same thing. Huh. (To say nothing of the fact that the Russians are more than capable of BVR engagements and have been doing so against Ukraine)
And to think that Iranian f-14 Tomcats didn't have AWACS support. Or did they? 🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔
My point here is, why jump to the conclusion that F-35 couldn't shoot from long range when it wasn't proven in real combat or even in simulation/training exercise that it couldn't really shoot something from long range?
I like how you can take a subject as complicated as Boolean algebra or running a differential equation through a food processor and not wind up being just alphabet soup.
And now that this MASINT thing has been implemented in C for COTS on the F-35, the next sensor suite to use it can just have the code recompiled for itself rather than having to be ported in FORTRAN.
BVR combat existed before NCTR. So saying that F-35 can't do long range engagement is simply funny.
Regardless the not bad tech. explanation of the NCTR.
most planes use support aircraft (AWACS) and ground installations, too increase the radar effectiveness.
Also most likly in a "real war", you fire even if you are not fully able to identify the target based on mapping of friendly troops in the area, this is one of the reason why you have FF incidents and they are bad but most people rather take the chance than die.
Nope. US all the time need a visual confirm before they fire.
ps. Which really surprised me when I first learned about it
@@mikexhotmail no they don’t lol. ROEs are made up for each specific area of each specific conflict, and they can vary wildly from “must visually confirm” to “fire on any non-friendly targets”. Given the range of systems available to confirm friendlies and classify targets (spoiler alert: the video’s conclusions are based on a 20-30 year old understanding of the topic), the former ROE will almost never be used now.
sword and the shield, someone makes a new better sword, then someone makes a new shield that can stop it, then someone makes a "new" new sword that can defeat the new shield...over and over
Shields/defensive systems are inherently reactive, this ebb and flow will continue seemingly forever.
Of course, Bvr combat has sense, with platforms (Aesa radar systems as apg-81 and Captor E) as f35 or Eurofighter and weapons as meteor misiles... Target engagement and destroy options, would be very high from ranges of 50 -70 km.
merci de vos infos de combattt
Great analysis, but I think that another useful NCTR technique was not mentioned, which is to compare the rcs at different frequencies, let's say that in L band it gives a much higher return than in X band is because the target is of the stealth type
Yeah but Lband can be countered by the jamming of d band signals (electronic attack) which the f35 has electronic attack capability!
@@zacharyjones1285 what is d band
This is great - keep telling the enemy the F35 cant do BVR.
Very informative, and very clearly explained, thanks! I've just subscribed and I look forward to more. :)
1986's Top Gun, 1 dot was actually 2 dots.
But the military should have great overall picture of the battlefield where all the own units are? So if one is not own then most likely in war it is enemy.
One issue with this analysis. There’s an assumption that the underlying technology is one of the solutions discussed. If technology already in the hands of others is what’s on the F-35, why the absolute control over its systems by the US? I highly suspect there are undisclosed technologies on the F-35 that put it way ahead of anything the Russians or Chinese have available. To support this argument, I want to jump to a seemingly unrelated topic. You know all those UFOs off the coast of the US? I highly suspect those are just super advanced American technology. That they show up in American training grounds during training isn’t likely an accident. The more likely explanation is they were there to see how effective current military tech is against them. So why does this matter? Well, the US puts hundreds of billions of dollars more into its defence development than any other counties, and has been consistently doing so for decades. I find it extremely hard to believe that a country like Russia that’s been crumbling economically for several decades or China, which is has only become a near-peer in the last 10-20 years have the same technological capabilities as the US. This analysis more or less argues that this is the case and that new technology not available to others isn’t on the F-35. From a development, economics and behavioural perspective (the absolute control over F-35 production and support), this is very likely not the case.
VERY GOOD EPISODE AGAIN LOVE FROM PAKISTAN
I really love this channel, wish we get F22 series
The F-35 can infact shoot at long range if a hostile can be confirmed from another location that is better positioned to do so. Eg AWACS, ground/sea radar or another F35 that is out of weapons but flying closer to the hostile. The F-35 was designed with this in mind. In fact one F35 could do identification while another F35 maintains weapons lock.
Great analyze, I learned a lot. And that is exactly why in planes is transponder with code that will send signal to all other transponders nearby that its friendly. That is crucial element to all planes, so in combination with RADAR and DATA LINK you have 3 way IFF. I agree that short range combat is relevant like solder that must have gun/knife in engagement.
Depends on the kind & profile of your mision (IMAO) no my bussiness & not an expert
Reminds of the time a Russian Mig 31 shoot down another one during training essentially because the Zaslon komplex isnt / wasnt working correctly and iff did not work correctly therefore so the target drone lived to see another day lol
I really enjoy this very straightforward approach to the information delivery. This makes understanding easier and thus the information is more useful.
Based on principle angle of incidence is the same as angle of return use stratosphere to bounce return hence NVR is limited by energy steength
Riiight 😉🍻
Target recognition databases make for an exquisite target of cyberwarfare - especially if RADAR operators are inexperienced and have no interest in memorizing reflection profiles...
LOOK ! TIC-TACs !!!
Pilots train for BFM and AFM but they are warned not to get into a turning dog fight and rely on BVR when engaging in a high intensity conflict with Russia or China. There is plenty of interviews from pilots who have said the same thing. Someone posted that the F-35 has 638 NCTR parameters in 2016 compared to the 2 NCTR parameters in 1991 on an F18. I've been looking for material on the internet that confirms or denies. Given that the F35 is less maneuverable than the F16 and the F35B/C models, does not carry an internal cannon and none of the F35s carried a sidewinder till recently, I think that there is tech none of us privy to that gives the USA an NCTR at range advantage. So to me given the evidence I've read from military pilots the turning dogfight is as one of these pilots said "a metric of a bygone era".
So DRFM "ECM" by definition - can delineate "regular" radar scan/tracking waveforms from the engineered waveform shapes used by NCTR? Otherwise, how would DRFM cause problems for NCTR? I just wanted clarification on this point. Would not DRFM need to have the capacity to characterize a radar waveform it receives - by definition? Even LPI.
If we knew a bit more how DRFM is working we could answer. I expect so, but I don't know.
@@Millennium7HistoryTech Yes ok. I am thinking this must be the case otherwise DRFM could not mimic anything convincingly. Perhaps all attackers' pulses are really NCTR pulses for simplicity's sake. I can also see problems porting direct NCTR readings from ISR and RC-135 platforms to say AN/APG-77, APG-81, and APG-82. You really need the actual APG unit itself pointing at the target to build a characterization file. Say APG-77 and an APG-82 looking at the exact same Flanker - would generate different NCTR waveform echo shapes - for the exact same target - is my thought.
sir how use of diff materials can confuse Nctr? also cant cyber warfare cause errors in the data base and cause false info?
Great stuff. I grew up in the era of raw pulse radar and early PD. All signal processing happened between the ears of the RIO. Saw the early EID in Hornets. Obviously dazzled me. Your presentation has reaffirmed what we always suspected: VID to an engagement should accompany every practice intercept.
Radar operator : "i get strange signals, looks like a Su-30".-" Indian or Russian?"- " Well, i don't have visuals". Dilemma. Or "hey, we are lucky, i think we found an F-35", But in reality is a j-31. instead. The many flavours of the same Airframe like F-16 also pose a problem.
The sniper may kill his target from further further and even further away. but he still has to see it. even through his spotter. dogfights are relevant. If all else fails, you need to be capable of it. And there will never be a "clean" war.
Educational, as always. Thanks lot. I think, some politicians should watch your series, so they don't get so easily "convinced" by lobbyists.
Russian Su-30SM2s don't just pop up from an Indian airfield when Pakistani AWACS is scanning their theater for IAF activity, and the RF signatures are different between Russian and Indian Su-30s.
Same with Taiwanese F-16A MLU. The Chinese would never mistake it for a Royal Thai Air Force Viper because.....look at a map for starters.
If you take the map of the world, then overlay each fighter's combat radius from any of its airfields, 90% of the PID problem is solved.
Then look at altitude band and speed, which narrows it down further. Opposing regional intercept squadrons know each other well based on theater-specific ELINT and SIGINT, as well as HUMINT and political intelligence.
If any radar/IADS net operators don't have a clue what they're looking at, they're amateurs...unless 5th Gen is involved. That's not their fault.
@@unknownuser069 Israelis have been doing that type of thing for decades even when things were more analog, like the Osirak strike mission.
But to the point, with 5th Gen platforms, especially JSF, they don’t care if you’re trying to use RF deception measures because they’re looking at you with so many sensors in so many spectra, that your RF waveform manipulation techniques are only helping them as they observe you with high resolution IR sensors across multiple vantage points on an interleaved LPI data link net.
Even the F-106A and F-101B used IRST to slave the radar to filter out ECM from Soviet bombers in the 1960s, and also solved their lack of look-down/shoot-down radar ground clutter discrimination by relying on the IRST to track and slave the radar to the TGT.
The EOTS and DAS are far more capable sensors than what we had in the 1960s.
Just the other day (Aug 5), an F-15C+ used a Legion 1.5 pod IRST to detect, track, and guide an AIM-120 to intercept a live QF-16C target drone without painting the drone with RF from the APG-63(V)3 AESA. The Legion pod and AESA still worked together.
So while the ground-based IADS operators won’t have PID in many cases, when they vector fighters towards incoming contacts, depending on the level of technology possessed by those fighters, they may or may not be able to gain long range PID with modern sensor nodes.
A 4.5 Gen fighter formation equipped with more up-to-date Digital waveform manipulation ECM can press the skirmish close to the edge of visual range before defenders can PID via IRST from different angles, whereas 5th Gen will get NCTR much farther out and maintain a healthy BVR intercept solution if they want.
5th Gen also reverse this as attackers because the IR signatures are so reduced, effectively making fighter IRSTs limited to Edge of Visual Range, which is several minutes too late.
@@unknownuser069 Imagine if you had someone trying to school you on things you've been involved with for almost 5 decades, from when the programs were in initial development, all the way through operational deployment, but that person wasn't even alive at the time and talks to you like you're some kid playing DCS, while condescending to you with corrective modifiers. That's how it is for me reading a lot of the comments.
@@LRRPFco52 Millennium 7 knows way more than you, and everyone here in this comment section. The SU-57 is almost entirely classified, you don't _really_ know anything about it, only the Russians do. Either way, Russia and China alone (excluding their other allies) have made the US and NATO shit their pants. Anyway, I love the fact that Americans are always so angry about Russia, they come across as little children.
@@LRRPFco52 What if the map shows Aircraft carriers? What if pilots "use" radio silence? and what if Taiwanese allow Royal airforce to land and start from their airfields?
There is much more than technical abilities involved in a fight. or war, for that matter. Tactical and strategical circumstances/decisions influence the outcome as much as the technical aspect.
this is an excellent and very insightful video, despite the terrible title..
the F35 has recently been upgraded to be able to carry sm4 long range missiles
In times of peace everyone thinks their own technology is flawless
Do peacetime makes one forget how to fight?
Given that NCTR algorithms are highly classified it's impossible to analyse their effectiveness. And AESAs can, of course, emit multiple waveforms simultaneously. Plus the radar return isn't the only way of identifying a target. The battlespace picture will include data such as target origin (sometimes, at least), IR and/or EO signature and target radio, IFF and radar emissions to allow identification as well. You also need to bear in mind that a process of elimination will be applied, since friendly aircraft signatures will be known in great detail. As usual, a good, informative video.
@@Biden_is_demented That was one of the earliest exercises the F-35 had participated in, when the pilots had yet to develop a tactical doctrine for the aircraft, and they went up against one of the most mature fighters around. More recently, the F35 has been outperforming legacy fighters in thos same exercises.
If you believe that, I got some oceanfront property for sale...
Another outstanding and truthfull analysis, embarrassing, bur patently obvious to those who see without bias. For years we get ridiculed by the fan boyz.
And the ability to snoop on AWAC correspondence would add an extra strength to an enemy. Since a Piper Cub is unlikely to elicit a defensive response. An FA 18 or F35 is definitely a recognised threat. Modern warfare is more about digestible data than bore sighting an enemy.
I really don't get why was the title presented as a dig at the F-35? NCTR is not a golden bullet, but it works. And to pick the F-35 as the poster boy here, the plane that has an order of magnitude more target recognition parameters compared to the F-22 is just ludicrous. If any aircraft can succesfully recognize a target, F-35 is it.
What is the benefit of an a/c firing a long range weapon at another (closer) a/c's target, over that closer a/c firing a short range weapon at the target?
It would just have the fuel to burn all the way to impact. Long vs Short is basically just a fuel issue
I would love a 2-5 minute version of this 20-minute video. Otherwise, it's too in-depth for me. I think theres a larger audience for shorter-form videos in this field. Maybe give it a go and see how it's received?
They generally do bad, on this channel.
Good attempt to describe the frequency domain to those who don't have that background. I'll just remark that if there is something specific you are looking for, cross-correlation can be more sensitive.
But I have a question about how you claim that this bvr combat technique will not work because it is difficult to identify the target. When is this most likely to be used? It would be in a direct conflict with China. Wouldn't we know that any aircraft coming from China is not friendly? And if some of ours were in the area we would know that too. So I don't see the big problem there in the most likely encounter. Certainly there are more complicated tactics, but this idea that a perfect identification is required does not appear to be a deal breaker.
No, this is the wrong assumption. A friendly damaged or a poorly maintained aircraft can easily be flying from China and be silent, no radio, no IFF, no datalink. Only if you follow an aircraft taking off from a known enemy base where it is certain that there are no civilians, can be a reasonably safe target, but even in that case there may be doubts.
Hollywood and video games assume the "god's view" to be available with modern technology, but it works way less reliably than is shown on TV or discussed by the vendors..
@@Millennium7HistoryTech I don't play video games so I can't relate to your comment. My remark has more to do with the beginning of a large scale conflict where it isn't as likely to to have a mix of friend and foe in the same space moving toward you. Your point applies to the general case, and there it does make sense.
Well, the Israeli air-force seemed to think they didn't want the electronic parts, and wanted to put their own components. They did call they own version ""awesome", apparently. Also, just some thought, not only the F35 has some sort of antenna that is reminiscent of the old TV antennas at the front, and that's never shown on 3D models, and also, it has some sort of "perch" (don't even know if that word means anything in that context), a sensor, on a stick near the front, exactly like the rafale, for example, but it's just hidden, inside, and can be deployed, I didn't know that, lol.
Are you familiar with Desert Storm? US coalition flew hundreds of sorties very successfully. I believe there may have been one friendly fire incident. They do practice combine arms; relying on other aircrafts but isn't that a strength?