Guess who's coming to Red Flag?

Ok, who wants to go to Las Vegas, for Red Flag 13-01? They're going to have some VERY interesting guests for the first exercise of FY13. It was announced that the Russian Federation is coming to play, most likely with SU-27SM, SU-30M2, and MiG-29SM. This opportunity is too good for Russia to pass up, since the only aircraft to truly be tested against western aircraft is the MiG-29.

Red Flag 13-01 will run from October 8th, through the 19th. No word on if they're going to be on the Red or Blue force.

Despite a cooling off in relations between Russia and NATO countries, neither party has refused taking part in joint military programs.

One such program is the regular aerial combat training exercise of the US Air Force and its allies, called “Red Flag”. The next exercise is scheduled for October 2012.

US Military command came up with the idea of conducting Red Flag exercises during the Vietnam War, when the USAF and naval aviation primarily used heavy multi-functional bombers such as the F-4 Phantom-II and F-105 Thunderchief. These bombers demonstrated their inability to engage in close combat with Vietnam’s light MIG aircraft. The reason for such failings was the strong reliance placed on powerful radars and medium-range missiles on the new American fighters. However, in practice the engagements very often did not go the way the pre-war theoretical schemes designed them to and the ratio of losses did not benefit the American side.

english.ruvr.ru...

The Russian Federation Air Force will be coming to Nellis AFB, Nevada, to participate in the US Air Force's Red Flag (13-1) exercise. How the world has changed... This would have been absolutely unthinkable even a few years ago. It's actually kinda bizarre now... But at the same time, kinda awesome.

The questions I have are: Will the Russians play the part of Red Air? It will certainly be interesting to see how the Russians react to the US interpretation of their tactics and doctrine... Also, I have to wonder how the Russian play-acting/dress-up the 64th and 65th Aggressors do will go over...

www.flightglobal.com...

It's a classic Trojan Horse ploy! Noooooooo!

Seriously though, this is pretty interesting and surprising as of late. Aren't the Russians also joining the big Pacific Rim naval war games we've got upcoming, too?

reply to post by LifeInDeath


RIMPAC is already going on, and yes they have three ships involved. I believe a destroyer, a resupply ship, and a tug or something similar. One of the things that I find interesting is that even as bad as relations have gotten, neither side passes up on the chance to be involved in joint exercises.

Russian forces on the hallowed US soil?

You do realise, Zaphod, you have opened up a whole can of worms around here...

OT, sounds cool! It isn't often when you run wargames you actually get to go up against a force which, if they are honest, the entire US defence establishment has been geared up to fight for 50+ years...

It will definitely be interesting to see the outcomes of such games...

I would LOVE to see the results of this Red Flag. I'm a closet aviation enthusiast and was pretty much stark raving mad about fighter planes my entire life (hell I still play flight sims). I have seen all kinds of smack talk from fans of both sides but cold hard data doesn't lie.

I'm a huge fan of both countries aviation history and current fighter planes so I really hope the results are available somewhere.

Any predictions?

reply to post by stumason


Yeah, I know, but I've got my flame proof underwear on.

I really can't wait to read the results on this one. It'll be interesting to see what they're going to throw in the mix this time, considering they're usually using Aggressors based on Russian doctrine as the Red Force. I agree with some of the comments in the Dew Line article. Will they be the Red Force? How will they react to the pretend Russian forces, and our interpretation of their doctrine.

I've got a really stupid question, I know very little about this.

Would Russia intentionally play at only, say, 80% effort? That way they would see what we have without giving away their capabilities, and that might cause us to underestimate them.

reply to post by Zaphod58


So what are the USAF bringing to the table? It'd be interesting to see if they break out the F22s to go up against the Russian aircraft, but I don't know if the USAF would be publicly announcing if their most advanced aircraft were to be beaten by Russian MiG29s and Su27s.

It is amazing to see though, even 20 years ago the actual east vs. west that was such a big deal in the 80s has become the latest in war games.

darn I thought you'd say aliens, since its being done at Nellis

Originally posted by charles1952
I've got a really stupid question, I know very little about this.

Would Russia intentionally play at only, say, 80% effort? That way they would see what we have without giving away their capabilities, and that might cause us to underestimate them.

imo, there is too much pride on the line. I can't see any service man or woman deciding to only give 80%. Especially fighter pilots. Their egos are huge, and they will give 150%, balls to the wall, 24/7.

reply to post by charles1952


Neither side will play at 100% systems wise. American aircraft are prohibited from using all their systems if a foreign aircraft is involved. In fact for years, the USAF pilots weren't allowed to use all of their threat warning systems even with only US aircraft involved.

When the Indian Air Force brought their SU-30MKIs in 2008 they didn't use their radar systems to prevent giving anything away. The Indian Air Force said that the frequencies of the radar can be used to block certain functions of the aircraft so they were forbidden to use it.

reply to post by 74Templar


I don't believe they have announced which US units will be involved yet. They'll probably be announcing it soon. I'm not sure they'll bring the Raptor, but it would make things REALLY exciting if they did.

Originally posted by Zaphod58
reply to post by 74Templar

 

I don't believe they have announced which US units will be involved yet. They'll probably be announcing it soon. I'm not sure they'll bring the Raptor, but it would make things REALLY exciting if they did.

Isn't the Raptor on the verge of being grounded?

reply to post by DeadSeraph


No. They're limited to 44,000ft and have to stay near enough to a base that they can land safely if there's a problem. The head of Air Combat Command, General Mike Hostage has just qualified in the F-22, and is planning on flying the aircraft with different units around the Air Force. He has said that he's asking pilots to do something that he himself isn't doing, so he's going to fly it as much as possible until they fix the problem.

Pilots currently are flying without the upper pressure suit that they have been using, that is believed to be a leading cause of the problem pilots have experienced. That means they're limited to 44,000 feet or lower, which is the upper limit they can fly without a pressure suit on.

Originally posted by Zaphod58
reply to post by DeadSeraph

 

No. They're limited to 44,000ft and have to stay near enough to a base that they can land safely if there's a problem. The head of Air Combat Command, General Mike Hostage has just qualified in the F-22, and is planning on flying the aircraft with different units around the Air Force. He has said that he's asking pilots to do something that he himself isn't doing, so he's going to fly it as much as possible until they fix the problem.

Pilots currently are flying without the upper pressure suit that they have been using, that is believed to be a leading cause of the problem pilots have experienced. That means they're limited to 44,000 feet or lower, which is the upper limit they can fly without a pressure suit on.

Kind of puts the F-22's usefulness in a red flag exercise in question then. Thanks for the info, I hadn't heard much about the situation since I saw an interview (on 60 minutes I think?) with some raptor pilots that were claiming many of them felt unsafe flying it, and talking about how there were issues with the oxygen system (pilots coughing up black stuff after logging a lot of high altitude hours, etc).

reply to post by DeadSeraph


There has been once incident since they removed the upper pressure suit from the equation. The leading theory is that it's a combination of the pressure of the oxygen going into their lungs, as well as a condition known as acceleration atelectasis. The pilots of U-2s have been observed suffering from atelectasis, but they go several days between flights, where F-22 pilots go twice a day.

The OBOGS system forces air into the pilots lungs at high pressure, then when they pull high G maneuvers the alveoli in their lungs collapse. The first flight, or even the second, they're ok, but with constant flying, eventually they're going to get a hypoxia type reaction.

That's the theory being put forth by the physiological guys that have been studying the problem anyway.

reply to post by Zaphod58


It's almost a pity the F35 isn't in operational service, I certainly would like to see whether it stands up to the Russian aircraft or falls in a heap like most of the reports are leaning toward.

I think the F22 has air supply problems for the pilot doesn't it? That the pilots are suffocating above a certain height? ETA: Sorry, just read your post.

Are there any reports of the Russian T50 making an appearance? Now that vs. the F22 would be something worth seeing, although I doubt either nation would be bringing their big guns into the public eye, or making that information public knowledge sadly.

reply to post by 74Templar


There are only two T-50s currently flying, and both are in early testing. It's way too early for them to be there.

reply to post by Zaphod58


Carp! That is really weird news considering all I am reading about the possibility of Russian troops here in the US already. I do not know, this sounds like playing with danger to me. Are we invited there as well to show our muscle?

reply to post by antar


Technically there are Russian troops in the US. There are three Russian Federation Navy ships in Hawaii exercising with the US, Australian, Korean, Japanese and I'm not sure who else for RIMPAC 2012.