No takers
Feb 20, 2009 Nuvo-Techno, Packing heat
Popehat on the F-15’s hoary origins:
Our air supremacy is built on the same tech level of the 8-track tape, and succeeds because no one will fly against it.
Not only won’t they fly against it — Saddam hid his MIG’s under the sand just at the thought of tangling with the F-15.
Worth remembering.
UPDATE:
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February 20th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Scary thought:
Apparently we do war games with the Indians every year. They also use the F15.
I’m told that, every year, the Indian pilots kick our asses.
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February 20th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
I wonder what inclination it is you have that makes you so credulous on this point, Punning…
Turns out it’s “not exactly” true.
February 20th, 2009 at 5:16 pm
Oh, I dunno. Reading the article, it looks like things were, at the very least, close enough for the Indians to _believe_ that they’d kicked ass.
But it doesn’t look like the Indians are using the F15, either. It’s a French plane…
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February 23rd, 2009 at 6:15 pm
[...] piece here, via a chain o’ links that starts here: When Rodriguez retired two years ago from the Air Force as a colonel, his three air-to-air kills [...]
February 23rd, 2009 at 6:42 pm
It was enough of a story about how well the Indians did that it made a nice news story. But that’s a long way from “every year, the Indian pilots kick our asses.”
March 11th, 2009 at 10:42 pm
I heard about that air war game with the Indians. The US forces intentionally did not use AWACS in the encounter because they wanted to gauge our pilots’ combat prowess when our technological advantage is diminished. It’s true pilots in other air forces, such as Israel’s, have a skill edge over American pilots but that does not necessarily default itself into significantly greater strategic and tactical superiority.
In reality, there is probably no other air superiority fighter in existence today with the same speed, radar stealth (even by comparison to our original stealth planes), agility, and power of the FA22. And we own the only ones. But, of course, technological edge is not the only reason why the USA has the best air force. Nor the main one.
In addition to being technologically superior in terms of the quality of our aircraft, the type of tactical intel we can gather, and possession of all the latest weaponry, our logistics and deployment capability is unrivaled and by any historical comparison, almost unparalleled. We can bring to bear scores of the finest combat aircraft to any theater in the world within days and, as engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan show, are very good at swiftly and successfully exploiting that capability. And we can almost just as quickly deploy ground forces which augment that capability.
Perhaps some nations, such as the Russians, have some fairly advanced aircraft but we can produce and field more and better of the equivalents to those craft than anyone. In terms of economic/logistical resources, strategic deployment capability, and our unique technology edge, no one currently rivals the U.S. air forces.
I doubt in a real conflict India’s air force–or anyone’s–would stand up to America’s for long, but it just goes to show, you have to stay on your toes if you want to win and keep winning. You can’t expect all that high-tech military technology to be there for you in every situation.
March 11th, 2009 at 11:47 pm
You sure sound like you know what you’re talking about!
March 12th, 2009 at 11:13 am
The Indian air force set up the ground rules to play to their strength, and we cut off our strengths to play. Interesting to see the facts taken out of context to construct a new whole.
One would be foolish to think that, given our level of superior technology, we wouldn’t become over-reliant on that technology in some areas — the F4 Phantom mentality. Thankfully, that lesson doesn’t seem to be lost on the Military which, from what I read, was an underlying reason for agreeing to the combat conditions the Indians set.
“No guns, only knives; tie an arm behind your back; now put one leg in a cast; ok, we’re good: let’s see who wins!” -> “Hey, we kicked their asses! They’re losing their edge, they’re in decline, we’re better.” I’m not seeing that conclusion.
March 16th, 2009 at 12:36 am
shite us air force never will be best in the world, and us aircrafts are not the best bullshit
March 18th, 2009 at 9:51 pm
It is true that the F-15 was built using 8-track technology…
However, so was the F-117, the B-2 Spirit, the F-16, and the Australians current mainstay fighter(forgot the name) was made during the 50’s.
The F-15 has gone through several upgrades, mostly in avionics and targeting systems. However, it is entirely possible, due to the design, to fly an F-15 missing one wing, limping back to base so to speak. The simple fact of the matter is, the only people that are better than us in Dogfighting and piloting are our allies, and would never combat us to begin with due to land and air superiority. Our ability to swat any aircraft out of the skies within range of any carrier group, or land based system, without the enemy being able to target us back is also a large deterant.
March 22nd, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Wait a minute, the European Airbus has missiles and radar systems that will kick the shit our of air superiority.
The French Rafale ain’t no chump and will have his radar system in 2012, Eurofighter is Ok nothing to brag about.
Iraq abs Afghanistan is nothing to brag about either, it’s kicking the shit out off undeveloped countries. Let’s see us thew U.S. take on Iran’s air defenses. Ooooooops! not that quick.
U.S. weakness! “the economy” stupid