War game argues that USAF fleet could be outmatched by Chinese

Flight International ^ | 29/09/08 | Stephen Trimble

[Yo-Yo]

In this scenario, the assumptions were that all F-22s BVR missile shots would be 100% effective, the Chinese BVR missile shots would be 0%, yet the US still lost, due entirely to a lack of F-22s.

We need more of these aircraft, and the Air Force Chief-of-Staff that was fired for saying so is, in my opinion, exonerated.

[AppyPappy]

What happened to the Taiwan air force and air defenses? Will Japan enter the fray?

[kingu]

I think the F-35’s will be online in Taiwan by 2020, assuming Taiwan still wants them. There’s just too much pressure in the Pentagon and a heck of a lot of pressure on congress-critters to keep aircraft plants humming to turn down Taiwan’s request a second time.

[Little Ray]

Sounds valid to me. Can’t expect six F-22s to take on three regiments of Flankers.

If’n it were me, however, I would put the F-22s forward to in the Straights and have something less advanced (F-16s, F-15s, or, if we’re really, really lucky, F-35s) orbiting the tankers as backstops...

[Little Ray]

Keep in mind, that the real object of this exercise is to defend or expand the USAF’s budget for acquiring more fighters.

[CodeToad]

German Tiger Tanks verus the US Sherman. We won. If you can’t win with superiority, go for volume.

[Yo-Yo]

Factor in a US Aircraft carrier with 40 SUperhornets and then see what the scenario tells you.

They did. See the complete slide show briefing here.

The point of the exercise was not to show that the US is inferior, but that it needs more secure bases in the area to operate from. This is just an ongoing consequence of being kicked out of Clark.

[mad_as_he$$]

Against those odds? The Superbug does not have the weapons payload to sustain AtoA combat in that environment. You have got to be kidding. One point that many seen to miss is that in the game the Chi-coms took out the the tankers. Oh and we would lose the carrier(s) to a Chi-com nuke. Read Fatal Terrain.

[LS]

Freeper Jeff Head wrote about this in “Dragon’s Fury.”

[Resolute Conservative]

Unless the guy with nine bullets is Chick Norris, then it does not matter how many they bring.

[Resolute Conservative]

We will never fall by military force, we will fall by an internal invasion of illegal aliens and an internal gutting of our economy all in the name of, “every one has a right to a house they cannot afford.”

[Pilsner]

I call BS. The degree to which the F-22 surpasses everything in history is absolutely mind-blowing.

I don't enought to know just how good the F-22 is, but I do know that just being technically superior is not enough, if you are on the short end of long odds for a long time. The Germans produced some very fine weapons in WWII. The Panzer VI (Tiger) totally outclassed the Sherman, and routiunely knocked them out at a 5 or 6 to 1 ratio. But the Sherman had been specifically designed to be easy to mass produce, and the US Army could afford to trade 6 Shermans for a Tiger, and replace their losses faster than the German Army.

The list goes on. German cruisers and battleships were state of the art, with perhaps the best armor, damage control, and gunnery control systems in the world, but the British Navy shrugged off their losses when they fought, and sank, or chased into port, the German surface fleet.

The ME-209 was a superior fighter to the Mustang and Spitfire, but it was swept from the skies.

I'm more than a little concerned that in any war with China, our small number of F-22s would prove to be too few, whether they are shot down in air-to-air combat, taken out on the ground by missle attacks, or saboatged by a fuel addative.

[Mashood]

Our satelite lasers and railguns will quickly obliterate the incoming forces.

[MCOAvalanche]

What we need is a low cost, easy to produce, easy to maintain, simple fighter in support of the F22s.

We have done it before - F-16, A-10 (I know, I know, not a fighter), F-20...

The USAF absolute infatuation with high tech is going to severely limit our defensive capabilities. Especially in light of the tightening of the budget.

[MCOAvalanche]

What we need is a low cost, easy to produce, easy to maintain, simple fighter in support of the F22s.

We have done it before - F-16, A-10 (I know, I know, not a fighter), F-20...

The USAF absolute infatuation with high tech is going to severely limit our defensive capabilities. Especially in light of the tightening of the budget.

[ThomasThomas]

Did the include Chinese pilots getting sick because of tainted food?

[mad_as_he$$]

With no way to reload them because the shuttle fleet had been mothballed??? Guess I missed when they put them up there in the first place.

[Mashood]

I believe the scenerio is situated in 2020.

[Yo-Yo]

What we need is a low cost, easy to produce, easy to maintain, simple fighter in support of the F22s.

That's what the F-35 was supposed to be.

The F-15, F-16, and F/A-18 production lines are still running. There is nothing stopping us from ordering new build F-16s with advanced AESA radars and HMCS to displace about half of the planned F-35 fleet. Or better yet, put the F-16XL into production. A protype was built in 1984 but lost out to the F-15E Strike Eagle.

There is nothing stopping us from ordering new build F-15Es with AESA radar and HMCS to supplement the small number of F-22s. Better yet, we could develop the F-15 MTD with vectored thrust and canards. NASA had a research prototype flying in 1989.

[impeachedrapist]

What? You don’t find a scenario where the opposition has a 12:1 advantage realistic?? :-p