F-22 Fighter Loses $79 Billion Advantage in Dogfights: Report

F-22 Fighter Loses $79 Billion Advantage in Dogfights: Report

news.yahoo.com

The United States has spent nearly $80 billion to develop the most advanced stealth fighter jet in history, the F-22 Raptor, but the Air Force recently found out firsthand that while the planes own the skies at modern long-range air combat, it is "evenly matched" with cheaper, foreign jets when it comes to old-school dogfighting.

(visit the link for the full news article)

The Raptor's advantage has never been WVR dogfights, that's not what it was primarily designed to do and that's not how it is being used (Although it is still an extremely maneuverable jet that will give most, if not all 4th generation jets a run for their money in the WVR arena).

It's advantage is that it flies high and fast without being detected and if you combine that with the most advanced and powerful radar in it's class and a state-of-the-art avionics suite then you've got yourself a group of fighters that can see where you are, what you are doing and take a shot at you if they choose to do so before you even know they are out there. It's like being hunted down by invisible ghosts that are hundreds of kilometers away.

The only indication you will have that there are Raptors out there (If you are lucky) would be your RWR, warning you that you are being "painted" by a radar for a missile lock. If you are unlucky and the Raptor's radar "paints" your jet without you even knowing then you will only know when that AMRAAM activates its own radar when it is already at it's last stage of its flight which means it's already only seconds away.

This basically means that you won't know there are Raptors stalking you and your flight until you and your buddies all have an AMRAAM up your tailpipe, and even then, you won't know where they are and how many there are.

Surviving those missiles will require some very hard maneuvering... Maneuvering that will demand a lot from your aircraft and will test even the best pilot's skills.
Even if you and a few of your flight survives the first wave of AMRAAM's, you will have lost so much kinetic energy that the second wave of missiles will be nearly impossible to survive.
And you still don't know how many Raptors there are and from exactly where you are being engaged.
It is because of this that a flight of 2 to 3 Raptors can successfully engage and eliminate 2 to 6 times as many opponents than there are F-22's (4 Raptors vs 8-24 Tiffy's/Eagles/Vipers for example).


Furthermore, A Raptor "supercruiseing" at Mach 1.5+ at an altitude of around 60.000ft will dramatically increase it's missiles' flight envelope and thus deadliness. Combine that with the new AMRAAM-D that has a higher velocity and range and you will have a very, very bad day as the OpFor.

It is beyond me why they state that the Raptor has lost it's "advantage". No Raptor will ever get into the WVR arena if the pilot doesn't mess up badly and I really mean BADLY.

All of this and we haven't even touched upon the F-22's state of the art EW capabilities.

In my opinion, It is worth every single penny that you Americans spend on it. Why? Because I would rather put 3-4 pilots in much more survivable jets like the F-22 up against an overwhelming force of foes than to put 5 times as many of those pilots in much less survivable jets like the F-15 or 16.

WVR: Within Visual Range (Farther than 20nm/36km).
BVR: Beyond Visual Range (Within 20nm/36km).
RWR: Radar Warning Receiver (Constantly checks to see if anyone is focusing their radar emissions on your jet which is needed for radar guided missiles for example).
Supercruise: Flying faster than Mach 1 without the usage of afterburners (Faster than roughly 1200km/h).
EW: Electronic Warfare (Like ECM/ECCM/Jamming for example)
OpFor: Opposing Force (Enemy).
AMRAAM: Advanced Medium Range Air to Air Missile. (Mach 4+ Normal launch: 110+Km range, F-22 launched: 140+km range for the C variant. The D variant will increase this with around 40%).
Tiffy: Slang for Eurofighter "Typhoon".
Viper: F-16 Fighting Falcon.
Eagle: F-15 Eagle.

I'll end my post with a quote

I talked to an F-14D pilot a month or two ago about this (instructor in a Goshawk at the time). He was in the last squadron of F-14D's. He said "They (Langley)would call us on the phone (Oceana) since we were so close and ask if we wanted to fight, SURE we said. Well at first they only wanted to do BVR stuff, well, forget about it, two minutes after we start we're dead, but after a while they finally agreed to mix it up with us WVR" "How did you do I" asked? His only response, somewhat dejected, somewhat admiring in tone "the F-22 is an impressive plane"

IT--

My understanding was that if the F-22 is engaging in a dogfight it's already lost. I thought the point was that it had destroyed the target, before the target knew it was there?

How did they put it again, 'First look, first shot, first kill'.

Not a pilot, but I do have family that are. I believe, even with the best aircraft, it comes down to piloting skills.....

America has some great pilots and personally, if you are going to equip a aircraft, with "State of the Art", go all the way.....MHO

Originally posted by khimbar
My understanding was that if the F-22 is engaging in a dogfight it's already lost. I thought the point was that it had destroyed the target, before the target knew it was there?

How did they put it again, 'First look, first shot, first kill'.

Yes that is exactly what F-22's would "normallly" do but the ROE (Rules Of Engagement) prevented them from engaging the tiffy's before they were within visual range, giving the Typhoons an artificial advantage.
They probably wanted to test the BVR tactics being used by the Typhoon pilots to see the difference and to possibly develop/refine a counter-strategy but of course the MSM spins it (again) to make the Raptor look bad and unworthy.
If this was a real engagement between Raptors and Typhoons, those tiffy's would have been engaged and shot down long before they came even close to detecting any Raptors, let alone firing any missiles.


IT--

from my limited in the Know, this thing is a flying turd over 50,000 ft. it becomes slow and unresponsive, hence its vulnerability. I think the platform is designed for Mach 5 but doesnt have the engines.

Unmanned aircraft preform beyond the limits of human ability, welcome to the New Age

Originally posted by rebellender
from my limited in the Know, this thing is a flying turd over 50,000 ft. it becomes slow and unresponsive, hence its vulnerability. I think the platform is designed for Mach 5 but doesnt have the engines.

Unmanned aircraft preform beyond the limits of human ability, welcome to the New Age

"Limited" being the key word in your post.
This "thing" flies Mach 1.8 without the usage of afterburners at 60.000ft and does not become "slow and unresponsive" because "it is a turd". Put any plane at that altitude and velocity and it will not be as manoeuvrable as it would be at a lower altitude and velocity, it's physics. Also, it flies high and fast to increase the speed and range of it's ordinance which in turn increases the "kill-rate". It does not need to be manoeuvrable when it's flying high and fast while engaging its opponents 120+ miles out. Also, it is still one of the most manoeuvrable jets of all time, being matched by only the Eurofighter Typhoon and perhaps Su-37 "Terminator" but that one was a prototype.

Deny ignorance?


IT--

Imagine how much good that wasted $80 billion could do in this country right now... Imagine the shelter, food, and clothing that money could help or the good charities out there it could help out. But instead we have a wasted military fighter jet because its creators didnt do their due-diligence in planning and designing this aircraft...smh

reply to post by edog11


Deny Ignorance = commonly overused cliche' in troubled times of posting.

Failure of the F 22 was discovered upon flight (propaganda bird, HELLO!!!) and well known in 2002
its pointless to comment further

reply to post by rebellender


Mind backing that up with any facts?


IT--

Great now we can sell Isreal all our "old stock jets."....like strike eagles and such for a song.....
We wont see any raptors in close ground support roles then i take it?
The 80 BN $ sure could have allieviated a # pile of suffering.......now its just invested in death

reply to post by edog11


see the pointlessness? you dont believe your own thread OP.........yeah, who is being ignorant?

Originally posted by rebellender
reply to post by edog11

 

see the pointlessness? you dont believe your own thread OP.........yeah, who is being ignorant?

I ask you to back up your claims with facts and your response is to avoid it?
As long as you provide no PROOF of your claims you are and will stay a troll.
I won't waste any more time on you.


IT--

reply to post by edog11


the proof is in your OP source,,,,
another Cliche' disagreeing = troll!! again who is ignorant?
count the stars, let them judge the comment, thats how it works on ATS, swim champ!!!

reply to post by edog11


There are two problems that have come to light. One fairly significant, one possibly but not as much.

The fairly significant problem is that if you look at the long range missile kills by the US military, they're almost non-existent. Almost every kill made by the US has been medium or short range, mostly short range.

Add to that, this and you're looking at a potential serious issue with long range missiles in the US.

The second problem, which could potentially be a big problem is the Raptors WVR performance. When the bird was designed, it was chosen to go with 2-D TVR, instead of 3-D, to save weight. Now it's come out that with the 2-D, there is a massive evergy drop in the WVR field. The Raptor can do some amazing maneuvers, and get some wicked AOA angles, but that's not gonna do any good when you're slow and bleeding off energy fast.

A recent exercise involving the Germans shows that this can be a major issue, as there were days when the Raptor was eaten for lunch by the Luftwaffe pilots. BVR, there is not a better platform out there, as long as the missiles hold together, and work the way they're supposed to. When you get to WVR, there really is the potential for a problem however.

The Raptor is one of the best aircraft in the world, but all aircraft have weaknesses, just as all have strengths. The key is to stack the fight in favor of your strengths, and try to avoid your weaknesses as much as possible.

The F-22 is still by far and away the single most powerful long range air to air fighter in existence.

The one big flaw recently has been the oxygen system. Pilots have complained about sickness during and after flight, and these symptoms are consistant with oxygen deprivation or contamination. Tests have been done and nothing conclusive found, yet the entire F-22 fleet has been grounded time and time again.

Originally posted by rebellender
count the stars, let them judge the comment, thats how it works on ATS, swim champ!!!

If thats the case, your losing. Champ.

And we all know if all we want to do is get stars, all we have to do is bash Jews and Americans. Stars will come a-flowing.

reply to post by rebellender


I have NEVER heard a report about the F-22 having problems near the ceiling. In fact all the reports that I've heard have said how it has outperformed everything else that can even get near that altitude.

As for Mach 5 claims, the Raptor was never designed to go anywhere near Mach 5. Even the SR-71, which WAS designed for extremely high speeds couldn't get anywhere near Mach 5. The Raptor was designed from the start to cruise past Mach 1 without having to use afterburners.

If there's one thing I hate on forums, it's people who use abbreviations/acronyms only to explain what they mean by writing the thing out in full. It's time-consuming and makes even the most humble specialist/enthusiast look like they're trying to show off.

Originally posted by Zaphod58
The fairly significant problem is that if you look at the long range missile kills by the US military, they're almost non-existent. Almost every kill made by the US has been medium or short range, mostly short range.

Where did you get this information?

After perusing the Wikipedia entry on the Raptor, i dont see where it was deployed into an actual combat zone to test this. What kills?

If you are talking during war games, it would certainly appear that the huge majority of F-22 kills are at long range. Please post your information.