What has replaced the SR71?
- Thread starter Kevin123
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It's been replaced by dragonladys and satellites in the main. however, the ISR role has also been taken up by UAV's such as Global Hawks, Predators,. various smaller UAV's even submarines have some of the roles. The US for example also has access to other assets which provide a system view on a point of interest. eg Compass, Rivet, Guardians, ASW aircraft also perform more ISR roles as tech has improved.
sateliites didn't replace them, satellites were prefered because they were benign, and the fact that no pilots would be put at risk.
The US stopped ferrets over the soviet union as russian SAMs improved, but they didn't stop overflights over the soviet union until the late 70's.
they stopped overflights over china in the early 80's. IIRC their last overflight over a foreign "hostile" country was 82
satellites can only do so much, unless you have sympathetic conditions, unless the satellites are tailgating (for overlap and redundancy) then they are limited.
aircraft (manned and unmanned) provide control and immediacy, satellites don't and can't. you just can't reprogram them to change course and harvest over a new area at short notice.
in short, the SR-71 was replaced by a system, - not by a platform
There's always the talk of the black "Aurora" project, wich has been linked with Pulse-Detonation-Engines and chemtrails. You need to have you BS filter on when you research that stuff however.
A PDE is essentially a hypersonic pulsejet, probably with an aerospike nozzle as on the X-33. It think it's kept secret so Russia dosen't respond in kind by reviving the Tu-2000 program and the militarisation of space. Wich they might already be doing, we don't know.
Expect hypersonic suborbital aircraft to be secret for a long time, then some day they will unclassify them and we will all be like "Hmm, ill be damned."
A PDE is essentially a hypersonic pulsejet, probably with an aerospike nozzle as on the X-33. It think it's kept secret so Russia dosen't respond in kind by reviving the Tu-2000 program and the militarisation of space. Wich they might already be doing, we don't know.
Expect hypersonic suborbital aircraft to be secret for a long time, then some day they will unclassify them and we will all be like "Hmm, ill be damned."
PAK-DA. Do you think it will be similar to the Northrop B-2? Or a heavier, stealthy super/hypersonic design?
Or is it exactly what i always though it was, the T-4MS revived? I knew it, that design was too good to let it go. A quick glance at google image shows me loads of images of T-4MS derivated design.
http://www.testpilot.ru/russia/sukhoi/t/4/ms/t4ms_e.htm
Or is it exactly what i always though it was, the T-4MS revived? I knew it, that design was too good to let it go. A quick glance at google image shows me loads of images of T-4MS derivated design.
http://www.testpilot.ru/russia/sukhoi/t/4/ms/t4ms_e.htm
What relevance does a manned supersonic bomber have against russian requirements now? It's a 40-50 yo design that was considered against the threat construct of the time.
It has zero relevance today
lets keep the debate realistic and not chuck pretty pictures into the argument as evidence of tactical merit.
T4
What would be the point in recreating a mach 3 bomber? No way would the Russians want to drop a quick 150 million on a bomber with no use in modern warfare (no pun intended) I'd bet they are trying to create something that has stealth capabilities but is small and hard to detect.
What would be the point in recreating a mach 3 bomber? No way would the Russians want to drop a quick 150 million on a bomber with no use in modern warfare (no pun intended) I'd bet they are trying to create something that has stealth capabilities but is small and hard to detect.
$150 million? I find it hard to believe the individual fly-away cost would be that low, especially once you figure in the billions of rubles in R&D and the years time delays the creation of a hypersonic intercontinental bomber would create.
gf0012-aust, Feanor, or one of the other Russia-watchers here could probably give you a more complete answer on this; but I'd imagine Russia's more likely to keep the Blackjack in service and invest in stand-off missiles.
The Blackjack is more than able to fight in contested modern battlespace, I see no reason for the Russians to move beyond that for another manned concept.
they can do the business more than adequately with what they have.
one has to ask the question... what is it that would compel them to develop an expensive replacement when they have redundancy with multiple other delivery solutions.?
woftam IMO
the rhetorical question still stands...
why would the russians need a B2 replacement.
their western borders lie next to the most heavily saturated air traffic managed environment on the planet. their eastern borders sit astride a neighbour who is investing in LR strike and has made it clear that weapons management investment is going to be heavily linked into space placed capability.
so what threat do they face where they warrant developing a B2 solution when so many air management systems can see what they do on a day to day basis (and I'm just talking about civil overlap - not just military systems which include OTHR, SWR etc...
it makes no sense. their capacity to react and strike hard in the opening stages is still wrapped around an artillery concept where missiles and rockets take the role of artillery. manned bomber developments are just not that useful in light of likely threat matrix etc...
they don't need a B2 equiv. there is minimal tactical benefit in it.