low level interception

[jaffo4011]

now, i realise that in our most recent conflicts involving air power seem to involve high to medium level ground attacks but i would presume that in any conflict with a more modern and effective air defence,low level attacks to avoid detection and destruction would again be the most effective....

my question is,if the above is true,why our new fighter aircraft and indeed new attack aircraft dont seem to be optimised for this attack mode?

surely fixed,large area winged aircraft such as the f35 and f22/typhoon etc would give their pilots a very uncomfortable and rough ride in comparison to the tornado or f111 when attacking at low level?..(reducing occupant endurance?)

conversly,in defence,a swing wing interceptor such as an f3 tornado(the fastest current fighter at sea level,i understand) would presumably be a effective interceptor of low level,high speed threats in its fully swept wing pursuit mode?

so,question 2, why arent we building swing wings any more,when they seem to be ideal for future conflicts esp as the weapon systems and high speed seem to be the assets most likely to be valuable in a modern war with a modern enemy?

 

[south]

Low Level doesnt have much utility at the moment, though it is still practiced. The swing wing aircraft do generally have a good gust response, providing a smooth ride. I have heard though that modern FBW aircraft are better than one might expect at riding turbulence. It has gone out of fashion due to the use of AWACS/look down shoot down radars.

The biggest killer of attack aircraft traditionally is AAA. Get rid of the SAM/fighter threat, and you arent forced down into the trashfire, where even a dude with a ballbearing and a catapult can bring you down. Current Doctrine calls for smacking down the enemy fighters and sam networks ASAP. This then allows for medium/high level attacks which themselves have a host of benefits (less fuel consumption - greater range, greater endurance, less workload on pilots leads to better SA, easier target aquisition etc). Besides, if you have a stealthy/reduced RCS aircraft, there is no real reason to go down low level.

Basically variable geometry was used as a way of getting acceptable performance in different flight regimes when we didnt have technology that allowed us to do this in other ways.

 

[jaffo4011]

thats my point,if you were not able to fully neautralise an enemies air defences,then wouldnt you be forced down to low level again to prevent loss?
im thinking in terms of a conflict with a modern enemy such as russia or china over a large area......
the wars we have fought recently were against countries such as iraq and afghanistan where we were able to totally dominate and over run them....but in a proper conflict this wouldnt be the case.......wouldnt low level tactics be necessary then??

 

[Abraham Gubler]

thats my point,if you were not able to fully neautralise an enemies air defences,then wouldnt you be forced down to low level again to prevent loss??

Combat experience from Vietnam to the Middle East indicates you are better off up high against a surface to air missile threat than down low. Simply because even the most powerful missiles need time to fly up from the ground to 30,000 feet and this gives the target time to respond and offer countermeasures. However if you are at 500 feet and a missile is shot at you: you're dead, before you know about it. Not to mention all the other problems that exist down low like trashfire. Another factor is terrain following radars (TFR) tend to have very powerful and distinctive signatures that give away the presence of an attacking low level strike aircraft even if threat radar doesn't have line of sight.

 

[jaffo4011]

i see,though i thought that it was experience in the sixties (such as gary powers,u2 shooting down at high altitude)that dictated the use of dedicated low level attack aircraft such as the tornado gr,jaguar and f111.
this is the part i struggle to understand,surely sam systems have become ever more sophisticated making a low level attack more important,not less?

also. emissions from a terrain following radar are,presumably,still harder to detect and give an enemy less time to react to them than medium to high level emissions,due to the height and speed of a low level attack?

 

[Gremlin29]

2 comments to make first that don't answer your question but I would like to make as I think there is some misconceptions about swing wings and turbulence.

The swing wing was brought into being to enable the respective aircraft to operate within a certain profile. Wings forward provides higher lift, higher AoA etc. Wings back reduces drag and allows the same wing, to perform at supersonic speeds. A Tornado or Aardvark isn't going to get off the ground with the wings swept back, and it's not going to be able to reach VNE with the wings forward. With wings back your also going to find a nasty tip stall at low speeds which you don't want to have happen, on short final. We are now able to design wings (they are very complex) that can perform in the desired envelope using typical airfoil changing devices like flaps, slats, spoilers etc. Also, the use of computer controlled flight surfaces allows these more complex wing designs to function. Swing wings are very complex and require a ton of maintenance over standard fixed wing designs. More moving parts is never a goal.

As for the effect of turbulance on aircraft, for the most part this is directly related to AC weight. Turbulance in aviation meteorlogical reports are based on medium weight aircraft, moderate turbulance for a 25,000 aircraft is severe for a 2500 pound aircraft, and light for a 250,000. When pilots make a PIREP due to unexpected turbulance ATC or Flight Service will tell you what type of aircraft made the report.

 

[jaffo4011]

gremlin,thankyou for that professional insight to vg wings.
would vg wings combined with todays advances in wing technology offer any advantages?

also,out of interest,what are your views on my questions re low level attack and interception?......id be interested in your perspective....and others.

 

[Gremlin29]

I don't see the benefit of VG now with the current state of the art in aircraft, all it does is add weight and more things to go wrong, fix etc. That's not to say the VG designs are bad, it's just that this particular design feature is no longer necessary to get the desired performance.

I think the low level strike missions for the most part are much less of a necessity than they were, particularly when operating aircraft like the F-22. Since the big ADA threats can be neutralized (even to simply create corridors ala Iraq part 1) with smart weapons, ECM, AMRAAM and other systems the necessity for low altitude strikes is greatly diminished. Now if you have 3rd world countries going at it this is out the window, but I assume we are talking about a modern battlefield.

Back when the F111's and F3's were fielded, NATO was still looking at making deep strikes in ADA rich environments ie the USSR. At that time, the current state of the art for ECM's, AMRAAM's etc made flying below engagable altitudes for the various SAM's preferable. Blasting out air corridors back then, just wasn't possible.

 

[KH-12]

As for the effect of turbulance on aircraft, for the most part this is directly related to AC weight. Turbulance in aviation meteorlogical reports are based on medium weight aircraft, moderate turbulance for a 25,000 aircraft is severe for a 2500 pound aircraft, and light for a 250,000. When pilots make a PIREP due to unexpected turbulance ATC or Flight Service will tell you what type of aircraft made the report.

I believe that gust response is more a factor of wing loading than aircraft weight per se, ie an aircraft with a smaller wing area at the same weight will experience a smoother ride, hence an aircraft such as the TSR2 which was designed for the lew level penetration role had a very small wing for the size of the aircraft, the compromise being turning performance.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

i see,though i thought that it was experience in the sixties (such as gary powers,u2 shooting down at high altitude)that dictated the use of dedicated low level attack aircraft such as the tornado gr,jaguar and f111.

No the U-2 shootdown did not have much effect on western aircraft developments. Far more SA-2s have been avoided by high altitude aircraft than have hit them, far more. The west was interested in moving from high altitude to low altitude from the mid 50s through to the early-mid 60s.

What brought about the western interest in low level strike from the mid 1950s that saw the development of TSR.2, F-111, Tornado, B-1 and the cancellation of the B-70, etc was the Soviet fielding of nuclear warheads for surface to air missiles. Nuclear warheads mean that SAMs don't have to hit and can be very lethal with simple guidance methods.

this is the part i struggle to understand,surely sam systems have become ever more sophisticated making a low level attack more important,not less?

The same level of sophistication applies to high altitude SAMs as it does to low level SAMs. In the case of the last Soviet systems the SA-15 is a pretty nifty system in the same way the SA-10 is. But as I mentioned before SAMs are not laser guns and require time to lift up from Earth and fly to 40,000 feet. Whereas an aircraft at 500 feet will be hit within seconds without an opportunity to respond.