Russian ABM system - 30 years in service

Originally posted by oxillini
reply to post by rogue1

 

What the article fails to mention is the sensitivity of vacuum tubes to vibration and shock.

What the article could mention is how caparatively easy it is to exchange vacuum tubes at remote airfields without the most experienced or intelligent of ground crew. I do not want to make the argument that the USSR employed vacuum tube technology just becuase of EMP effects but i would like to suggest that at the time such aircraft were built the massive gap in electrical system implemention had not yet opened.

For all their vulnerabilities vacuum tubes are in my knowledge at least as reliable as regular circuitry.

Stellar

Originally posted by rogue1
Fact is that no one knows how the Russian ABM sustems will perform.

I like it when you don't mix obvious truths with presumed truths.

They have only ever been tested under "test" conditions nit battle conditions and not with dozens of targets.

Like Aegis and the patriot and most of US air defenses? Who do you think could have and would have learned most from the other nations employing their air defenses in Korea, Vietnam, all the ME conflicts and Yugoslavia? Don't you think the USSR/Russia would have gained far more practical knowldege than the US? What do you think just the defense of Hanoi meant in terms of learning what can and can't be done?

ow well are they hardened against EMP for example ?

Vacuum technology are about a million times less vulnerable to EMP effects than regular circuitry so depending on how much their systems has been upgraded and in which ways it may be all but immune to EMP effects. We for instance know that the first US air defense systems were shown to be all but immune to EMP effects and i have seen little reason to think that the Russians could not or would not have emulated or reached similar implementation strategies.

They can't shootdown cruise missiles and the US is developing hyposonic delivery platforms like the HyStrike, Fast Hawk and JSSCM - which could easily carry a unclear payload.

But as far as the brochure's and western defense and intelligence specialist goes a whole host of Russian air defense systems ( as well as American) have anti cruise missile capabilities. The Foxhound and Flankers as well as Foxbat's all have anti cruise missile capabilties and as far as i recall the Foxbat was the first fighter to actually have such a capability anywhere.

If the Americans wanted to hit Moscow, they could simple as that.

Sure they could but how many warheads of the first strike would have to be allocated to ensure the destruction of Moscow and or deeply buried command bunkers? The sources i have given on many occasions use numbers as high as three to four hundred to "ensure" the penetration of both the Sa-10 and the 100 other launchers of the Moscow defenses. That was back in the 80's with a far more limited Sa-10 coupled with the even more limited Sa-5 so it's anyone's guess how much warheads may or may not be required today.

Stellar

Originally posted by StellarX
post by rogue1

 

For all their vulnerabilities vacuum tubes are in my knowledge at least as reliable as regular circuitry.

Stellar

By today's standards or at the time of Foxbat's development? I assume by "regular circuitry" you mean semiconductors?

Originally posted by oxillini
By today's standards or at the time of Foxbat's development? I assume by "regular circuitry" you mean semiconductors?

I couldn't mean something else but i suppose it would have been more obvious if i had included the word 'semiconductors'. Anything else i can help you with?

Stellar

reply to post by StellarX


I'm just curious to the context of your post. Vacuum tubes, while resilient to EMP's have their own attendant list of faults and drawbacks, one of which is susceptibility to shock and vibration. Semiconductors, by their nature, are relatively resilient to this while being susceptible to EMP discharges. They both have drawbacks to be dealt with. On the whole, the plusses of the semiconductors outweigh the plusses of vacuum tubes for most designers.

"Regular circuits" could imply any number of things besides semiconductors.