Aircraft before the 1993 tech explosion for DCS

Baaz, it's almost like a different world. It's maybe a bit like the difference between a Ford GT-40 racecar of the 1960's... compared to driving a Tesla today. Both are at the front of auto tech for their times, they both have 4 wheels and a steering wheel... but the experience, the skills needed to make full use of that GT-40's full potential... is VASTLY different from negotiating a highway in the Tesla today (not even accounting for it's "self driving" under development!). Or maybe the difference between a B-737-700, and a DeHavilland DHC-3 Beaver...  both are planes, both are at the height of their categories, but it's quite a different feel and experience!

One thing I noticed is that without a datalink, the mission commander needs to formulate a much more complex mission plan, full of timings, reference points, and a very experienced and disciplined squadron, to accomplish a significant ground strike over enemy territory. Lessons learned from WW2 become just as relevant with the fast jets of the 60's and 70's, albeit with the occasional SAM or heatseeker... 

16 minutes ago, Baaz said:

Not to speak for Harlikwin,

Nah that summed it up pretty well from my perspective. I mean I'm not gonna be down on people that want to fly the modern stuff, but I do find it a bit boring. 

On 6/9/2021 at 3:19 PM, Tippis said:

…I guess it's worth pointing out that LGBs were around in the 1960s.

On 6/9/2021 at 3:27 PM, Harlikwin said:

 

Yeah, but employing them then was harder too. old school TGP's were not "Good". But they were better than nothing. 

Truth to both statements.  Back in the 60's LGBs improved precision from 5% for unguided to 50% for a guided.  Nowadays, unless someone screws up (pilot or intelligence gatherers), it's pretty much a guaranteed hit.

In those days, LGB's were almost more field testing technical experiments conducted in warzones, than true operational weapons that the Pentagon could count on to win wars.

I recently read a book by Stephen Coonts (he of "Flight of the Intruder"), called "The Minotaur" published in 1989, about USN pilots testing out stealth replacements for the A-6 Intruder. Now... consider it was written in the late 1980's... in it, there is a description of the debate between precision guided munitions, Vs unguided dumb bombs... which is the better strategy? Spend a LOT on a few precision weapons, or have a LOT more dumb iron dropped from aircraft that can bring some precision themselves, and do so with some survivability using stealth tech. As I remember it, the author suggested that neither was truly a slam dunk, because numbers matter but so does precision, but precision means far fewer booms and sooner than later you run out of fancy bombs to drop, which pushes the service to revert back to dumb iron earlier than most would expect. 

Now, you might think "heh, who cares what some dumb fiction writer thinks?".  Well... turns out he wrote "Flight of the Intruder" based partly on his own experience flying A-6's over Vietnam for two cruises on the USS Enterprise! It's not often a fiction writer has a very real  Distinguished Flying Cross. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Coonts

The Minotaur    1989    0-440-20742-8    

Great. So now I have to track down the "Flight of Intruder" book...damnit!

Well, in DS1 it was a bit of both. But literally the US/NATO dropped like less than ~10% PGM's over the course of the war, and in doing so absolutely depleted their stocks of PGMs, they even heavily dipped into strategic wartime reserves of PGM's in the 1 month air war.  But they still overwhelmingly dropped dumb bombs. Now that was a certain time and place, but the argument that you want a precision platform that can drop dumb bombs came out on top there. Planes like the harrier with the ARBS/DMT combo were highly effective even without PGM's. The russians more or less have gone this way with the systems on the SU-33 more recently. Then again, these days JDAM's are pretty darn cheap and give you a lot of capability unless you are fighting a peer opponent that can jam them.

2 hours ago, Harlikwin said:

(I'm purposefully leaving out the M2k, and the other "teen" fighters, as really they are too modern).

What timeframe represents DCS Mirage 2000? IIRC Mirage 2000 is from 1983, but we have 1987 upgrade with Thales RDI doppler radar and 530D missiles, digital radio and SNECMA M53-5 P2 engine, but before 1999 -5F upgrade

F-15C from FC3 is from 1979 but we have MSIP II upgrade used from 1985 to 1998 with new computer, NCTR and TWS, but before 1998- 2000s upgrade with Link16, AESA, JHMCS.

1 hour ago, Rick50 said:

Spend a LOT on a few precision weapons, or have a LOT more dumb iron dropped from aircraft that can bring some precision themselves

Rick50, have you seen this analysis by Binkov's Battlegrounds? It sounds like you would be interested in this. Back-of-the-napking calculations, but give some perspective.

4 hours ago, bies said:

 

What timeframe represents DCS Mirage 2000? IIRC Mirage 2000 is from 1983, but we have 1987 upgrade with Thales RDI doppler radar and 530D missiles, digital radio and SNECMA M53-5 P2 engine, but before 1999 -5F upgrade

 

F-15C from FC3 is from 1979 but we have MSIP II upgrade used from 1985 to 1998 with new computer, NCTR and TWS, but before 1998- 2000s upgrade with Link16, AESA, JHMCS.

The m2k variant we have didn't really fly in the cold war IMO, esp not with NVG's etc. 

The FC3 F15 fits tho. I'm mainly talking about the upcoming F15E which wont. 

It's worth noting that the Israeli Air Force strike on Iraq's nuclear facility in 1981...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Opera

...featured F-15's as air to air escort, and F-16A's as the bombers. A precision attack, almost "commando" style, on a single critical target. No smart bombs, no precision munitions. Each F-16A dropped two dumb iron Mk.84 2000lb bombs, using only the CCIP for accurate delivery of the weapons.  And it was effective!

Now, read the whole page though, because it's quite interesting and has several other interesting items, like the radio deception, long range strike considerations, timing of AAA crews (I don't think that was a happy accident, it was probably known ahead of time by ground spies, and mission plan created to maximise this vulnerability)

I'm not saying such a mission could be done that way today... air defense has come a VERY long way since 1981, but it's interesting just the same!

SFJackBauer, I will check out that video when I have the time tomorrow, I do like his videos, but have not seen this particular one!

Edit:

I Just watched the Binkov video, very interesting, I was unaware that 'Murica had such a huge stockpile of PGM's these days!  

On 6/9/2021 at 3:27 PM, Harlikwin said:

 

Yeah, but employing them then was harder too. old school TGP's were not "Good". But they were better than nothing. 

Pick your year and system...  Of course, Pre-1970 ALD was a science lab experiment, no self laze, easy for the dropper, WSO in the back with funky kit, hard for the designator.  Next round, Pave Knife, works through the weapons system, somewhat stabilized, completely daylight cameras, something like only 6 kits available for Linebacker I/II with only 4-5 working at any time.  Could self laze, didn't though to allow multiple strike packages to lob lot of bombs into a funnel to be designated by the very few functional systems.  

Fast forward to just after Vietnam 73-76, Pave Spike, pretty well stabilized, daylight only, self designate yes, pop up dive toss yes , totally on the capabilities of your WSO.

Pave Tack, now we're talking some different stuff...

9 hours ago, mkellytx said:

Pick your year and system...  Of course, Pre-1970 ALD was a science lab experiment, no self laze, easy for the dropper, WSO in the back with funky kit, hard for the designator.  Next round, Pave Knife, works through the weapons system, somewhat stabilized, completely daylight cameras, something like only 6 kits available for Linebacker I/II with only 4-5 working at any time.  Could self laze, didn't though to allow multiple strike packages to lob lot of bombs into a funnel to be designated by the very few functional systems.  

 

Fast forward to just after Vietnam 73-76, Pave Spike, pretty well stabilized, daylight only, self designate yes, pop up dive toss yes , totally on the capabilities of your WSO.

 

Pave Tack, now we're talking some different stuff...

I agree, and the history of those systems is interesting, I wish we could actually have some of them in DCS, but even stuff like lantrin which we have and is better than those systems doesn't really address the various  limitations of those systems. 

On 6/8/2021 at 12:44 PM, Harlikwin said:

 

They just think it will sell better thats why. But they also shoot themselves in the foot, since selling an "upgrade" is alot easier than a "downgrade".

 

I don't actually believe this is there motivation. If it was why did they have Belsimtek, and WWII aircraft. ED exists because of military, and commercial contracts. I believe they do the most complicated, and modern things they can as a way to show off. 

On 7/9/2021 at 4:13 PM, Harlikwin said:

Well, in DS1 it was a bit of both. But literally the US/NATO dropped like less than ~10% PGM's over the course of the war, and in doing so absolutely depleted their stocks of PGMs, they even heavily dipped into strategic wartime reserves of PGM's in the 1 month air war.  But they still overwhelmingly dropped dumb bombs. Now that was a certain time and place, but the argument that you want a precision platform that can drop dumb bombs came out on top there. Planes like the harrier with the ARBS/DMT combo were highly effective even without PGM's. The russians more or less have gone this way with the systems on the SU-33 more recently. Then again, these days JDAM's are pretty darn cheap and give you a lot of capability unless you are fighting a peer opponent that can jam them.

 

Umm, off topic but how exactly do you "JAM" and INS guided weapon? I mean you could kick off a Kesler event and deny space assets. But i doubt you could jam the GPS system, or secure data link. And these things have an INS capability too. Its less accurate, but not by that much. 

53 minutes ago, FlankerKiller said:

Umm, off topic but how exactly do you "JAM" and INS guided weapon? I mean you could kick off a Kesler event and deny space assets. But i doubt you could jam the GPS system, or secure data link. And these things have an INS capability too. Its less accurate, but not by that much. 

Um yeah, you can absolutely jam GPS, its happened same for any "datalink". In fact thats why the US has spent serious money upgrading those so it was harder to jam them. And yeah thats precisely why JDAM's have INS guidance, and its not great unless you have an aspirin factory to bomb.

1 hour ago, FlankerKiller said:

I don't actually believe this is there motivation. If it was why did they have Belsimtek, and WWII aircraft. ED exists because of military, and commercial contracts. I believe they do the most complicated, and modern things they can as a way to show off. 

Nah, I figure the real reason for WW2 its what nick grey likes/wants. Plus its easy enough to do in really high fidelity. But yeah, you're right, they probably do the high end stuff to be "relevant". 

11 hours ago, Harlikwin said:

 

I agree, and the history of those systems is interesting, I wish we could actually have some of them in DCS, but even stuff like lantrin which we have and is better than those systems doesn't really address the various  limitations of those systems. 

Indeed, it is fascinating bits of history.  Highly recommend reading Sierra Hotel, it's a n Air University book about the F-4 weapons school right after Vietnam.  One of the chapters delves into dive toss and use of Pave Spike, pretty good stuff.

LANTRIN was before my time, but I did get to flight test Sniper and Litening on the Bone and BUFF.   The comparison between EVS and Litening was really stark.

Even in 2003 op Iraqi Freedom, I believe there was at least one location in Baghdad where Russian made radio signal jammers were used, units specifically designed to degrade and even eliminate a clear GPS signal. From that point on, a strong effort was started to be able to neutralise that kind of threat. These wouldn't ruin any satellites... but the GPS satellites put out a relatively weak signal, compared to some radio signals for other purposes. I'm guessing because it's all "line of sight" work. Theoretically, if you had a powerful enough jamming emitter, you might be able to overpower such a weaker signal, and cause the user GPS unit (in this case a JDAM or similar PGM) to "go blind". In reality it probably only increases the chances of an unintended weapon path that will quite possibly result in unintended civilian deaths, but such considerations aren't always at the forefront of combatant purchase decisions. Especially when such an event might be viewed as a propaganda win for the "weaker" side: "hey look those evil rich dudes in fast jets just bombed the hospital!!" or something.

I never looked into what the countermeasures consisted of, but one might look to advanced military/security radio comms for some clues. Also, repeaters have likely been implemented, though I'm not real sure how they could maintain point security until after that ground has been secured...  I'm also guessing that countering such jammers is likely a moderately easy task, as long as it's planned for: jammers are active by their nature. Friendly ELINT would pick up those signals, and likely be able to triangulate quite precisely. Then send the coordinates to a unit carrying Paveways, lase the GPS jammer...and it's gone! Now let the JDAMs and JSOWs fly.

I don't imagine there's any kind of real world ability to jam or ruin an INS... but as I understand it, INS needs to start with an accurate starting point, and the further you go, the more turns and issues, the more the accuracy will "degrade", until it can be given a precise fix again. But if you jam for dozens of miles, at least theoretically the JDAM might not have a real good accurate starting point to give it's INS. But I don't really know. I do believe the INS was added for exactly the issue of GPS signal disruptions... not sure the very first JDAM test units had INS, I doubt they were added during the earliest "proof of concept" test drops. 

As for WW2 stuff, I believe Nick Grey has a fair bit of stick time in several warbirds (I believe he's flown the P-47, Spitfire, and might have time in other planes too), and has a deep love of all things military aviation, in all eras. It's not AT ALL a surprise to me that he wishes to see these warbirds replicated in intense detail. From what I gather, ED is kind of his hobby, a costly passion project. It doesn't seem to me like he's owning ED to make money, he made lots of money in some other businesses AFAIK, and he wants ED to make quality experiences for himself and everyone else with an interest, and wants ED to be financially healthy to keep going, keep expanding and bringing the awesome. At least that's what I got from his interview from... a year ago? (the Grim Reapers's Cap interviewed Nick) I mean, if he just wanted ED to make big money and not care too much about the project, they woudn't be making modules that take 2 to 5 years to complete... they'd make some insanely popular smartphone game/app like Angrybirds or Candy Crush. Clearly that's not ED or any of it's 3rd party devs either!

The thing with GPS jammers as I understand it is that for anything on a strategic scale your going to need a rather large antenna which also considering its putting out EM would be trackable and as such engageable by standoff stuff.  Wouldn't this limit their potential long term utility?

2 hours ago, Rick50 said:

 

Even in 2003 op Iraqi Freedom, I believe there was at least one location in Baghdad where Russian made radio signal jammers were used, units specifically designed to degrade and even eliminate a clear GPS signal. From that point on, a strong effort was started to be able to neutralise that kind of threat. These wouldn't ruin any satellites... but the GPS satellites put out a relatively weak signal, compared to some radio signals for other purposes. I'm guessing because it's all "line of sight" work. Theoretically, if you had a powerful enough jamming emitter, you might be able to overpower such a weaker signal, and cause the user GPS unit (in this case a JDAM or similar PGM) to "go blind". In reality it probably only increases the chances of an unintended weapon path that will quite possibly result in unintended civilian deaths, but such considerations aren't always at the forefront of combatant purchase decisions. Especially when such an event might be viewed as a propaganda win for the "weaker" side: "hey look those evil rich dudes in fast jets just bombed the hospital!!" or something.

 

I never looked into what the countermeasures consisted of, but one might look to advanced military/security radio comms for some clues. Also, repeaters have likely been implemented, though I'm not real sure how they could maintain point security until after that ground has been secured...  I'm also guessing that countering such jammers is likely a moderately easy task, as long as it's planned for: jammers are active by their nature. Friendly ELINT would pick up those signals, and likely be able to triangulate quite precisely. Then send the coordinates to a unit carrying Paveways, lase the GPS jammer...and it's gone! Now let the JDAMs and JSOWs fly.

 

I don't imagine there's any kind of real world ability to jam or ruin an INS... but as I understand it, INS needs to start with an accurate starting point, and the further you go, the more turns and issues, the more the accuracy will "degrade", until it can be given a precise fix again. But if you jam for dozens of miles, at least theoretically the JDAM might not have a real good accurate starting point to give it's INS. But I don't really know. I do believe the INS was added for exactly the issue of GPS signal disruptions... not sure the very first JDAM test units had INS, I doubt they were added during the earliest "proof of concept" test drops. 

 

As for WW2 stuff, I believe Nick Grey has a fair bit of stick time in several warbirds (I believe he's flown the P-47, Spitfire, and might have time in other planes too), and has a deep love of all things military aviation, in all eras. It's not AT ALL a surprise to me that he wishes to see these warbirds replicated in intense detail. From what I gather, ED is kind of his hobby, a costly passion project. It doesn't seem to me like he's owning ED to make money, he made lots of money in some other businesses AFAIK, and he wants ED to make quality experiences for himself and everyone else with an interest, and wants ED to be financially healthy to keep going, keep expanding and bringing the awesome. At least that's what I got from his interview from... a year ago? (the Grim Reapers's Cap interviewed Nick) I mean, if he just wanted ED to make big money and not care too much about the project, they woudn't be making modules that take 2 to 5 years to complete... they'd make some insanely popular smartphone game/app like Angrybirds or Candy Crush. Clearly that's not ED or any of it's 3rd party devs either!

 

 

 

 

I mean just as with the pre GPS days you could do a nav fix on the system to get accurate coordinates again.  And with modern TGP's with laser ranging I'd imagine it would be as simple as fixing on a landmark near the target a minute or two before drop.  Yeah you may not get sub 10ft accuracy but well I can't imagine that the drift on the INS would build up to a point bad enough to cause such a large miss that JDAM's would be unusable.  And as you point out, GPS jammers are traceable by ELINT and would almost certainly be priority targets air picture permitting.  Also a lot of modern weapons have dual guidance modes now such as the GBU-54 or SDBII

GPS improvements have been in anti-jam and anti-spoof. Anti-jam I don't know, frequency hopping or narrow band or narrow azimuth or whatever. Anti-spoof has got to be mostly cryptographic keys. Spoofing isn't just drowning out useful signal in noise but purposeful deception to misinform. The importance of key integrity is understood seeing how often it comes up in manuals. Back in the 90s with selective availability casual users were given only so much precision with the clock data. Only privileged members had the secret code to unscramble the fine time values for full precision. Currently SA is off allowing everyone high precision but my understanding is that this could be turned on at any time again.

INSs can't be jammed per se only denied external updates. Between their invention and the tight integration of GPS to the system about the 1960-1980 time span (although V-2 1940s counts to a degree). The technology and techniques of INSs being updated from various sources is well exemplified by many DCS modules of that era. Visual landmark overflight, TACAN, stellar fixes, radar offset, terrain profile matching, and so on are still relevant because tactical air recognizes that GPS is vulnerable. Denying US tactical aircraft GPS would be a minor hindrance but would degrade things, especially some precision strike.

JDAMs despite their common presentation are not "GPS bombs". They are INS bombs which may or may not be aided by supplementary GPS information. I doubt that any JDAM has flown without INS operating. Moment-to-moment understanding of the dynamics of motion is dependent on such a rapid and smooth system such as INS. JDAM works suitably well without GPS and all sort of INS weapons operate without GPS at all. A JDAM drop of a short time of flight for example doesn't have time to go through the GPS process before impact. Accuracy of JDAM attacks have an optimum at several tens of seconds flight time with shorter or longer being lesser.

8 hours ago, nighthawk2174 said:

The thing with GPS jammers as I understand it is that for anything on a strategic scale your going to need a rather large antenna which also considering its putting out EM would be trackable and as such engageable by standoff stuff.  Wouldn't this limit their potential long term utility?

Such jammers would be for tactical local use, not strategic or theatre-wide use. Whether the antenna was large or tiny, the EM signal would be easily strong enough to be found and targeted, which would IMO strongly limit it's practical use even as a tiny deterent.  I'd say it does more than limit it's utility in the short term, it's likely a wasted effort even for the first hour of use!  This may be why we haven't heard very much about such systems since the 2000's. These days I'd think it's little more than a novelty item that some un-technical groups (say like ISIS) might suddenly do a panic-purchase... and some electronics supplier might only be too happy to oblige, knowing it won't have any effect on the battlefield, won't result in heavy pushback from the Americans, and might make some nice profits! But that's just a guess on my part.

It is very likely that in a peer scenario the GPS satellites of both sides would be taken out in the first stages of the conflict.

11 minutes ago, ViFF said:

It is very likely that in a peer scenario the GPS satellites of both sides would be taken out in the first stages of the conflict.

 

I don't think there are any ASAT weapons that can reach up to the GPS cluster yet.

@Pikey hi pikey, i'm wondering how you did come up with the thread description. was there anything particular about the year 1993 in military aviation? anything related to procurment maybe? i did a quick google search but nothing came up.

Taking out GPS sats would be a goal some would consider... but it would ruin so much for so many. 

It's very likely that there are multiple secret ASAT weapons in various org service.  And they would likely be effective at crippling some or a few of America's sats.  But wiping out the majority of mil sats, in a coordinated "first strike" situation, seems unlikely to be successful. So very many things would have to go just perfectly, that Murphy's Law would wake up, look over and think "huh, whats going on here now? And how can I mess it up?

5 hours ago, twistking said:

@Pikey hi pikey, i'm wondering how you did come up with the thread description. was there anything particular about the year 1993 in military aviation? anything related to procurment maybe? i did a quick google search but nothing came up.

I honestly cannot remember, it might have been a nod to NAVSTAR's fully operational system. 1991 would have been just as good - GW1, Soviet Union fading out and the AIM-120, but I opted for a few years later until GPS was more widely used.

Maybe it was the release of the first PDA/phone combo, or Jurassic park hitting the cinema, but if you throw at dart at the wall in this era, you will hit something big - Tactical Datalink maybe?

No idea what I was googling

Thanks for getting this pack on topic.