Posted on 09/29/2008 5:27:55 AM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
War game argues that USAF fleet could be outmatched by Chinese
By Stephen Trimble
Rand's 90-slide briefing presented in August argues that the US Air Force's fifth-generation fighter fleet could be outmatched by hordes of lesser-skilled Chinese Sukhoi Su-27 pilots in a 2020 battle over the Taiwan Straits. In the Rand war game, China launches an air attack on skies above Taiwan. Using advantages of proximity and sheer numbers, the assault force consists of 72 Su-27 Flankers, 24 in each of three regiments. Operating from Andersen AFB, Guam, the USAF can muster only six Lockheed F-22s in the Taiwan Straits at any time.
As the engagement starts, Chinese Flankers outnumber F-22s by 72 to six. The F-22s are also heavily outgunned in the battle. Three Su-27 regiments carry a total of 912 air-to-air missiles, compared with 48 by six F-22s.
In the end, the simulation optimistically assumes no F-22s are shot down in dogfights, but enough Su-27s break through to wipe out the USAF's tankers. Since the F-22s lack the range to return to a friendly base, they are lost anyway.
ping
Flight International? Any relation to the New York Times??
Sounds like a banzai attack. We better build about 5000 f-22’s. Quick. Oblahblah will leave us defenseless.
And we have no other assets in the battlespace? Like a carrier, for example?
This scenario, if it does not factor in those constraints, is wholly unrealistic.
What is to stop China or Russia/Iran if our economy tanks?
And all the F-16s and F-15s will have disappeared? Not to mention no F-35s available?
So, they start from the premise that outnumbered, out gunned and out fueled the USAF fighters will lose?...............
Too late. The “O” has already entered negoiation with Indonesia to sell the ones the AF now has to help pay for kindergarten lunches in inner city Chicago. After all, who needs airplanes when words and begging works just fine.
Then again, this is 2020, so probably that'd be 16 Joint Force Fighters, with 32 more up in 15, from Taiwan.
I must be missing a lot of things on this one.
We are about to succumb to our internal enemies, move into more spartan homes, eat day old bread, and wear pressed cardboard shoes.
The ChiCom's will be very busy developing Africa as a place to sell their cheap commodities, as we will no longer be able to afford them.
1. Ten guys with clubs will win out over one man with nine bullets.
2. If we are flying to defend Taiwan, why aren’t the Taiwanese airfields considered friendly to land at? Too many SRBM hits already? Perhaps.
3. The F-22s should fire their AMRAAMs well before they themselves can be engaged. Then with super-cruise, they should be able to RTB without being engaged.
4. You can’t defend Taiwanese airspace with six-aircraft, no matter how good they are. Getting back to #1, if the enemy brings more aircraft than you have missiles it is impossible to stop him.
5. When the first ten SU-27s explode and the rest still don’t have a lock on the F-22s, they may likely turn tail and head home. Unless of course we keep publishing that we will only send six F-22s.
1. Build more F-22s - this would be nice, but it just isn't going to happen under either administration. They're a great aircraft but too expensive. The Aussies and Israelis want to buy some, which would help lower our costs and keep the production line going, but for some reason they have been turned down.
2. Keep F-15s flying to supplement the F-22s. The F-15s are wearing out and disintigrating on their own and won't last much longer.
3. Supplement with F-16s - might be our only option.
If you've got any ideas, I'm sure the Air Force could use them. They've been pretty screwed up in recent years.
No Doubt. I read the book Obama Nation. Looks like the “O” is a communist. Can you believe we are putting one in the White House?
In WW2 we built “jeep” aircraft carriers, why not do the same now?
Have a fleet of cargo ships that are totally normal in appearance, do daily shipping in the area of a conflict but secretly have concealed Harriers, they need not be the expensive F35’s.
Quite frankly if its a situation of quantity vs quality then we need to counter on that level such as developing unmanned attack drones that are superfast and highly maneuverable that can be used to intercept massed formations.
One of my favorite authors Dale Brown has written many novels of such use of technology.
The US has refused to sell Taiwan new F-16s-what makes you think they will get F-35s???Besides, the current ROC government is too busy sucking up to Beijing-this wargame is hyperbole because there may not be a Taiwan in 2020-without a shot being fired.
If we go down hard then we take the rest of the world with us. No one there to buy Chinese junk and the petro dollars are greatly reduced for Iran and Russia. Plus, you can forget the investment available for China and Russia.
Seems to me that War Games are based on assumptions and, in this case, these assumptions are predicated on unknowns some 12 years in the future.
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