Arms race: Greece & Turkey

[s3kiz]

I'm sorry but i will indulge into some copy-pasting JackGr and eliaslar asked some questions/made statements that i think have been answered very well by Ozzy Blizzards insight into the F35 capabilities. So instead of rephrasing Ozzys words ill simply highlight them once again:



Quote: Originally Posted by eliaslar
In my humble eyes F-35 doesn't look like a fighter that will make the difference over the Aegean sea in the next years...especially from what i hear in Greece if we buy the Eurofighter or Rafale, or even better a combination of them , air supperiority will be a matter of fact. Not to mention the time that will take for F-35's to become fully operational.



Quote: Originally Posted by Ozzy Blizzard
The F-35A will be a a far more capable air superiority asset than anything in the next 20 years bar the F-22A, so what are you worried about? What upgrades do you want?
More missiles in the internal bays? Allready being worked on by LM.
An new engine? Why? the F135 is the single most powerfull fighter sized engine on the plannet, and will alow that little fighter to hawl a huge ammount of fuel & payload and have an impresive T/W ratio (better than rafale with similar internal fuel).
Why does it need TVC? Sensor missile combinations are far more improtant in WVR combat than instentanious turn rates. The Distributed Apature System on the F-35 will provide 360 dgeree's of IR coverage, coupled with the 360 degree engagement envilope of the ASRAAM (or 270 of the AIM 9X) means an F-35 can egnage a threat at any bearing without maneuvering, even directly behind. Therfore why is trust vectoring important when you dont even need to turn to employ wour weapons systems? that sensor missile combination is not employed on any other fighter, meaning the F-35 will be a devistateing WVR fighter.
The F-35A~C was designed from the ground up to be a multirole fighter, which means neither its strike or A2A capability have been compromised becasue of the other. (apart from the F-22) What other platforms are there out there that bring VLO, 3rd gen AESA and 5th gen EW/EWSP suite? These things alone make the F-35 a devistateing BVR fighter.



Quote: Originally Posted by JackGr
Well if what they say about S-400 is true,F-35s are going to fall like flies no matter their kinematical performance (Personal opinion).



Quote: Originally Posted by Ozzy Blizzard
1. If what they say is true, which is doubtfull considering the S400 is basically an upgraded S300PMU, which couldnt do any of the magical things the russians claim S400 can do (neither can the more sophistocated and with a higher power output SPY-1D for that matter, funny about that huh?). Considering the need for some magical counter to VLO and the russian's lax attitude to truthfull marketing i doubt it.

2. Your looking at things in a way too simplistic manner if you think its F-35 vs S400. Its an IADS equiped in part with S400 vs a whole air combat system equiped in part by F-35. Those S400 units are going to have to deal with 21st century EW capability and 500nm standoff weapons launched by F-35's supported by E-X, Rivet XX, KC XX ect ect. If for arguments sake the russians claims are true, your relying on a single weapons system as your whole IADS. Its the only thing that can see or shoot. How many ARM's/JASSM-ER's/JSOW-ER's do you think will be saturating said single system before a single F-35 peeks its head above the radar horizon? I woudlnt want to be a maning an S-400 battery at that point.

No, somehow i dont think the F-35's will be "droping like flies" even if the mythical, magical S-400 turns out to live up to the colosal expectations. Single weapons systems dont achieve decicive results alone, its intergrated combat systems that count.



Quote: Originally Posted by JackGr
Also I was misunderstood,I said about "falling like flies" in a manner of speech,like a joke,S-400 won't do that alone,but imagine having S-400 with Su-XX,Mig-XX etc etc


....well JackGr we are not discussing fantasy futbol here, hypothetically adding Su-xx and Mig-xx into the equation is doing just that, turning it into fantasy scenario isnt it?

Cheers.

 

[JackGr]

First of all things here concerning F-35s are a scenario , Turkey doesn't own it and Greece doesn't have S-400.I used Su-XX and Mig-XX(since Russia owns both S-400 and Mig/Su) as an answer to Ozzy about the questioning from him that a single system doesn't do all the work.Of course not.It needs the full co-operation of a lot of systems,including planes,if you have a problem about Su-XX,Mig-XX put instead Rafale or Eurofighters that probably Greece will buy.I'm not talking about fantasy football,I'm talking about scenarios.We can't be always practical,can't we?

 

[eliaslar]

Turkey will buy the STOVL or the CTOVL version of F-35? it doesn't make any difference but i'm just curious. I have read that Israel will buy the F-35Β which is STOVL.

 

[JackGr]

They will only have F-35A.According to what beleg previously said around 120 planes approximately

 

[s3kiz]

Quote: Originally Posted by JackGr
"First of all things here concerning F-35s are a scenario , Turkey doesn't own it and Greece doesn't have S-400."

1) The mentioned and known capabilities of F35 are not a scenario, they are fact.

2) Turkiye does “own” F35s, she is part of the consortium developing, building AND buying it, the time wait needed to see it in hangars does not make it a fantasy.



Quote: Originally Posted by JackGr
"I used Su-XX and Mig-XX(since Russia owns both S-400 and Mig/Su) as an answer to Ozzy about the questioning from him that a single system doesn't do all the work.Of course not.It needs the full co-operation of a lot of systems,including planes,if you have a problem about Su-XX,Mig-XX put instead Rafale or Eurofighters that probably Greece will buy."

1) In your previous post you merely mentioned the performance of S400 alone will result in F35s “dropping from the skies like flies” and I believe Ozzys comprehensive answer to that was for that.

2)You consider Turkiye with its comprehensive dedication in the F35 as researcher, investor, builder and buyer of it as a scenario and claim it does not own it, but draw conclusive scenarios upon the Rafale/Eurofighter “Greece will probably buy”? Lets be reasonable and acknowledge that Turkish F35s are underway, Greece is stil in need to decide if they will buy Rafale/Eurofighter, even so Eurofighter is doing all it can to sell the same planes to Turkiye so the same options exist for both AFs.

3) Even with Su/Mig-xx or Rafale/Eurofighters in the equation the mathematics still do not allow for F35s to “drop from the skies like flies”, but as you later explained you were joking and i accept it as that.



Quote: Originally Posted by JackGr
"I'm not talking about fantasy football,I'm talking about scenarios.We can't be always practical,can't we?"

1)Considering that the platforms we are talking about are to be used (hopefully not) in war scenarios, we need to remember that war scenarios do not relly much on jokes or fantasy situations like “if we had this if we had that” instead it DOES call for practicality.

2)But i do admit we cant all always be practical when discussing such matters on forums.

Cheers.

 

[JackGr]

We have never seen F-35 doing sth(meaning of proving itself,not just flying),secondly Turkey doesn't own,Turkey will own,it's huge difference,producing and integrating takes time.If you check your inventory says 0 next to F-35s.I never talked about fantasy,it's not D&D,I talked about scenarios different thing.Well each scenario is different,concerning of how many hypothesis you make.Also pls state what "underway" mean,how many years?Because if you have them near 2012 and Greece has new A2A plane near that time then there's no difference.I never said it's not a good plane(We might buy it as well),I'm just questioning if it so great as it was said quite a lot of times here.

 

[eliaslar]

I agree to JackGr at some point. F-35 have proven nothing till now, it's just an airplane under development, no aircrafts operational and i think it's future is still a bit blur. We don't know what USAF is going to do about how many of them they will buy.
Don't forget that the numbers they will buy depend on the F-22's, and they need lots of them, and the F-15's, which i think they are upgrading and promoting for export.
On the other hand Eurofighter and Rafale are operational and have also taken part in exercises and India have a first hand impression of their capabilities, comparing them to Sukhoi's.

Fantasy is needed to make reality someday (not war!!)

 

[s3kiz]

Dear JackGr,

You might personally not be aware of "F35 doing something besides flying" to prove its mentioned performances but it doesnt negate its performance.

You say Turkiye doesnt own it and on our inventory it says 0 next to F35, so true, however you are discussing performance matters of S400 as if its carved into stone and the usage of S400/Su/Mig/Rafale/Eurofighter by Greek AF.

You ask for the meaning of "underway" in relation to Turkish F35, well just follow up on the development of the plane and you'll have the most upto date underway information you want.

You make varity of hypothesis, firstly S400 been alone adequate to drop F35s from the skies like flies, which was proven to be false, then add into the equation Su/Mig and later Rafale/Eurofighters.

On one hand we have a force layout of Turkish and Greek AF with existing and projected force multipliers and on the other hand we have your hypothesis regarding the two and your conclusions from it.

Hypothesis can only result logical outcomes if its clear of symantics and wishfull thinking.

Please detail to us kindly the Greek AFs projected force layout for the next decade, what are the purchasing/upgrade plans and/or development projects Greece is undertaking to be able to better compare apples with apples instead of comparing apples with pears.

Cheers.

 

[Atilla [TR]]

why dosnt turkiye just invest there money and work with the south koreans KFX program instead

You are right Yasin! Korea and Turkey are really good allies, but I was thinking that or the ATD-X then we can provide some of the funding needed for the development of the ATD-X the Japanese government desperately needs. Both Korea and Japan are really good allies with Turkey (it is the Altaic decent ), and both need external money for development of there airplanes. And to the people who said the F-35 is nothing after the S-400 is up and going, imagine your non stealth planes, and have you tried to squat a fly with a flysquatter? Very difficult however big the fly squatter is , but imagine if the fly was shaped differently, and he was harder to see? I would hate to have flies like that flying above my head good for me they are on my side.

 

[Ozzy Blizzard]

It is said that S-400 have 2 times the Patriot's range according to Wiki which if you check has very good references about it so I don't think it's so mythical.Also nowadays weapons HARMs(~60nm),AGM154 JSOW(~70nm) are shot inside its lethal range.JSOW-ER and JASSM-ER are very capable I must admit that but if,(I know again if but "If" are important since we are just speculating) it can shoot down Cruise missiles why not shoot down those advanced weapons?I know it's just a hypothesis but to be right you have to count every possibility.Also I was misunderstood,I said about "falling like flies" in a manner of speech,like a joke,S-400 won't do that alone,but imagine having S-400 with Su-XX,Mig-XX etc etc

1) Wiki is hardly a quotable source.

2) If you look at the sources behind the claim the S-400 can engage stealth aircraft and they are no better than Wiki. One is APA's site (Carlo Kopp's Australian lobby group, we've had some history with Carlo, he's not a reliable source because he has a vested interest in influencing the Australian government’s decision to buy the F-35A. He put forward a different proposal consisting of F-22A's which aren’t for sale anyway, and rebuilding our F-111 fleet, which he stood to make significant personal financial gains on. I have been accused of actually being Carlo Kopp on this site before, I bogged on him if you want to have a look), another is an internet article which in turn sites a news article/press release (again hardly compelling) and the third is a press release. So a lobby group and two vague claims by the people who build and are trying to sell the system. I wouldn’t call that gospel.

3) Those vague claims of being able to engage stealth aircraft are made with no explanation, even in principle as to how this is possible or at what range. Remember technically anything can engage a stealth aircraft if it gets close enough. Now somewhere I read detection of .01M RCS at 250km (F-35A's RCS is stated to be ~.001). If that was indeed correct, then the radar should be able to detect a fighter sized target (3m2) at 75 000km (!). That’s 1/5th the way to the moon if VLO aircraft are detected by power output. Remember this is a truck mounted PESA antenna. How does the 64N6 Big Bird search and track radar, which is common to the S-300PMU and S-400, somehow now do something radically different then it could before? It’s the same system, with a software overhaul. Maybe it’s the wavelength? Big Bird operates in L/S band which is centi-decimetric wavelength. F-35's VLO is optimized to X band centimetric radars. Well L/S band is close enough with only a difference of a few centimeters in wavelength, so I doubt it’s the radar band. HF radars like JORN can in some cases detect current gen stealth aircraft but it operates in the 10-100m wavelength. So how does it do it even in principle? Until someone explains that too me this magical counter to VLO will remain in the realms of excessive Russian marketing claims IMO.

I have no doubt it’s an excellent area defense SAM system, providing more capability than even PAC3. But a magical counter to stealth, no I don’t think so.

4) Your not accounting for the most important part, Electronic Warfare. EW is an area in which the west excels and has a healthy lead over the Russians. Even at the platform level, the F-35's integrated EW suite which uses the APG-81 as its antenna can interrupt datalinks and severely degrade radar performance at 150km+. At ~5kw power output focused at an incoming missile a few dozen km's away could effectively fry the delicate radar seeker, if not blinding it. Now imagine what dedicated EW aircraft can do. Any S-400 system will have its acquisition, search and track radar performance severely limited by precise Electronic Attack, its wireless data links with battery/battalion HQ and its own various radars interrupted. If the radars can’t talk to each other then the battery is useless. Of course this can be countered by using hard-line links, but that also limits the placement of your various radars, missile launchers and battery HQ.

5) These systems will be highly susceptible to next gen ASM's like JASSM-ER. JASSM is a VLO platform itself, with various RCS reducing measures. That noisy Big Bird search radar will be illustrating its presence to elint assets of the likes of Rivet Joint or even Wedgetail (I’m not sure what the Turks are going to call it), meaning that as soon as it radiates (or as soon as it communicates over wireless datalinks in Rivet Joint's case) its precise position will be triangulated. Now (for arguments sake) maybe the S-400 can detect & engage a JASSM, in spite of its VLO at decent range, lets say 100km detection and 80km track & engagement. JASSM-ER will have a range of ~500nm, that’s over 900km's which is outside of the S-400's claimed engagement envelope vs. legacy platforms and massively outside its VLO engagement envelope so it cant get the shooter. Remember the S-400 is line of sight limited, therefore the launch platform can sit below the radar horizon and remain undetected by the S-400. The Big-Bird won’t be able to be supplemented by other radar sources when facing western EW capability; all datalinks would be practically inoperable. Therefore the JASSM-ER would have a target (thanks to Rivet XX) would have a secure launch platform (thanks to LOS+EW) and would be able to fly a nap of the earth ingress profile. Therefore, depending on the terrain the JASSM may not pop up over the radar horizon until as late as 10-15km. Maybe the S-400 can get a missile off in the time it takes a JASSM to travel 15Km and shoot one down, but what about 4 or 5 or 10. Said system would have to deal with saturation attacks. Even if the S-400 can engage and destroy the incoming threats in time (which I seriously doubt considering its not a point defense weapons system) each launcher only has 3 missiles so maybe 6 per battery, any more than that (assuming they all hit in time) and the battery is useless until it is reloaded, which is a relatively long and complex process. Even if the battery is protected by a point defense weapons system like Tunguska M1, they would not be able to communicate due to western EW capability, so the M1 could not be guided by the magical Big Bird radar, therefore it will have to rely upon its own radar vs. VLO missiles coming from unexpected bearings. Basically the lack of co-ordination will be the mort telling in this scenario.

6) MiG XX and Su XX won’t have a major impact because their primary missile sensor combination is severely handicapped by VLO techniques. They’re not going to be very useful in BVR vs. VLO, therefore they'll have to get in close to do anything and they'll most likely be eating AMRAAM's well before that point.

 

[s3kiz]

Ozzy that was one of the best articles i have read on this forum, very thorough, detailed, precise and objective, just wanted to say thank you for the explanation.

Let me know when you going on holidays and coming to Turkiye, would like to meet and have you as my guest

PS: regarding your link to Kopp, it doesnt open.

Cheers.

 

[Ozzy Blizzard]

Ozzy that was one of the best articles i have read on this forum, very thorough, detailed, precise and objective, just wanted to say thank you for the explanation.

No worries, just my opinion.

Let me know when you going on holidays and coming to Turkiye, would like to meet and have you as my guest

Thankyou, i'm honored! I would love to go to Turkey but alas its a long long way from melbourne Australia...

PS: regarding your link to Kopp, it doesnt open.

Cheers.

Try it now.

 

[F-15 Eagle]

I agree to JackGr at some point. F-35 have proven nothing till now, it's just an airplane under development, no aircrafts operational and i think it's future is still a bit blur. We don't know what USAF is going to do about how many of them they will buy.
Don't forget that the numbers they will buy depend on the F-22's, and they need lots of them, and the F-15's, which i think they are upgrading and promoting for export.
On the other hand Eurofighter and Rafale are operational and have also taken part in exercises and India have a first hand impression of their capabilities, comparing them to Sukhoi's.

Fantasy is needed to make reality someday (not war!!)

I would be surprised of the USAF got less than the 1800 or so F-35s, when you take into account that they are only getting less than half of the F-22s they need, and that the F-15s are really braking apart in mid-air. And new Russian and Chinese fighters are under developement. I don't see the F-35 order being cut no matter how much the cost increases.

Cheers.

 

[s3kiz]

@Ozzy:

Did a fast read on the link and i admire your logic there. As you say:

"I was once addicted to Carlo Kopp's sweet intellectual smoke, however I have seen the light so to speak.."

Light does seem to penetrate smoke, no matter how thick the smoke cloud might seem.

Thanks again Tim "Ozzy"

Cheers.

 

[JackGr]

@Sekiz I can say to you how our AF is going to evolve cause I'm no military man so I have no sources about it,except magazines etc.Secondly I never praised so much S-400,it's a good system but we don't know yet its full capabilities.Well I think right now we are playing with "words".You made a good choice,congratulations but let me have my thoughts about it.

@Ozzy
1)It's not always a very good source I agree,I just said about its references
2)Ok then who knows if F-35s can really do what they and it's not an advertisment from the consortium to sell more?I'm not saying that they are 100% true references,but you don't know if they are 100% wrong either.
3)Never said it's a mythical system,but let me think that there is a possibility it can do what they say(all guys here accuse me of that )
4)Yes you might be right about that
5)Each one can shoot 16 missiles without reloading.Approximately 8-10 vehs per unit.Take that also into consideration.A good analysis thought,congrats
6)And how do you know that?You saw a kind of test somewhere?
Sorry for not speaking so "technical" like you,but I'm just an economist not an defence analyst.

 

[eliaslar]

Ozzy where did you find all those stuff? They are very interesting and some of them very detailed and optimistic i think, especially that about the RCS of the F-35 and the capabilities of it's RADAR i think you know that to blind an incoming missile you don't need only power from your ECM's but also the correct....frequency and missiles today are a bit smarter than RADAR's, not to mention that a passive missile can't be jammed.

 

[eliaslar]

Something doesn't look so nice to me, every country in the consortium thinks that they will have the same capabilities with the USAF's F-35's? This will never happen,at least in the early stages of the program. USAF will keep the best for herself, as always happens. They will not let another country have the same systems as they have, till they have something better.
I don't blame F-35, it's a very nice aircraft, with a futuristic aerodynamic that reminds me star wars, but it sounds very good to be true, especially under the shadow of F-22.

 

[Lostfleet]

There was a lot of discussion about future a2a and air defence capabilities of the both air forces in this forum. However if Turkey and Greece go into war, it will be both air and naval warfare ( at least at the beginning).

So how is the capabilites of both air forces in detection, identification and destruction of enemy naval forces. I know Greece has Exocet missile carrying aircraft but I dont know if Turkey is considering anti-ship missiles for their aircraft?

 

[JackGr]

Sorry for being off-topic.But you should know there's no way for such a war,both are NATO member's,Greece is in EU,there's no way sth like that could happen,and I wish it remains like that,cause just imagine the domino effect of a situation like that.

 

[Atilla [TR]]

Something doesn't look so nice to me, every country in the consortium thinks that they will have the same capabilities with the USAF's F-35's? This will never happen,at least in the early stages of the program. USAF will keep the best for herself, as always happens. They will not let another country have the same systems as they have, till they have something better.
I don't blame F-35, it's a very nice aircraft, with a futuristic aerodynamic that reminds me star wars, but it sounds very good to be true, especially under the shadow of F-22.

I dunno but the Turkish one will be either equal or better then the U.S one after the first batch we are putting our own avionics, maybe the upgrades i stated and the stealth paint. And the only thing the export F-35`s don`t have that the USAF versions do have is the stealth paint.