Should the Vulcan have been replaced

[Seawitch]

The B-52 would be great if you needed to indiscriminately carpet bomb large swathes of Iraq and Afghanistan but that isn't going to happen when you've got point targets and a need to avoid collateral damage.

What if your target is a couple of Russian/whatever divisions spread over an area of many square miles, and MUST be neutralised?
You don't need accurate weapons anymore, just devastating ones that can equal the odds for your own, without resorting to the nuclear option.
BTW...just because Russia isn't communist, it doesn't mean it's friendly and we don't know what the future holds.
I'm satisfied theres still a need to maintain heavy bombers, if in less numbers than the past.

 

[parsifal]

The only F-35's that are gonna be around fifty years from now will be in museums. The continuing advances in computer, pattern recognition, sensor, and missile propulsion technology will see to that.

BTW, anybody remember the economical, 'all things to all airmen' TFX?

Thought not...

JL

The F-111s are pushing 40 years of age, and show no signs of obsolesence really. Its the cost of maintenance and airframe fatigue that is forcing them out of service really.

If the F-35 is a success it will be around in the inventories of small nations for decades. Part of successful modern design is the ability to to upgrade and update progressively.

The days of an aircraft having a service life of 10 or even 20 years are dissapearing. Unit costs are forcing that issue

If the F-35 is unable to complete its assigned roles, it will get dropped early....and there are going to be a lot of p*ssed off foreign customers

 

[tomo pauk]

F-111 was a real asset for a huge country with a big sea around, like Australia; something like jet-age Mosquito. The proper replacement should have at least equal range, speed and payload, with low-observability and avionics of 21st century.
The F-22 could fill the F-111 shoes (eventually), but Aussies are going to get F-35 to cover a good part of globe.

 

[beaupower32]

What if your target is a couple of Russian/whatever divisions spread over an area of many square miles, and MUST be neutralised?
You don't need accurate weapons anymore, just devastating ones that can equal the odds for your own, without resorting to the nuclear option.

Sorry, but I think your wrong here. I would still take pin point accurcy over carpet bombing anyday. With carpet bombing, you dropping mass amounts of bombs, with no gaurentee that any will hit was your aiming at anyways. Now thats not to say it cant be done, especiall with the computers helping the aiming. But you take the Guided munitions, and you can take out the areas of the the biggest build up. If you carpet bomb a area (say 10 miles long by 5 miles wide) your not going to get everything. But using drones to pick out the most important targets, Send a heavy bomber in to drop GPS bombs, and take out the most important targets with the biggest threat to you. Once that is done send in your troops to clean up the rest, as it there would be most likely little resistance from the already confused and disordered enemy.

 

[parsifal]

Dont know too much about the B-52, but I think they dont actually "carpet bomb.....they can deliver huge amount of ordinance with a very high degree of precision.

I know the B-52s flattened North Vietnam with a massive bombing campaign, but that is not really the way B-52s are used today. They dont blind bomb....they know exactly what they are after, but just deliver big packages

 

[FLYBOYJ]

The F-111s are pushing 40 years of age, and show no signs of obsolesence really. Its the cost of maintenance and airframe fatigue that is forcing them out of service really.

If the F-35 is a success it will be around in the inventories of small nations for decades. Part of successful modern design is the ability to to upgrade and update progressively.

The days of an aircraft having a service life of 10 or even 20 years are dissapearing. Unit costs are forcing that issue

If the F-35 is unable to complete its assigned roles, it will get dropped early....and there are going to be a lot of p*ssed off foreign customers

100% correct, and if the F-35 doesn't perform, you'll never see Lockheed produce a combt aircraft again IMO.

F-111 was a real asset for a huge country with a big sea around, like Australia; something like jet-age Mosquito. The proper replacement should have at least equal range, speed and payload, with low-observability and avionics of 21st century.
The F-22 could fill the F-111 shoes (eventually), but Aussies are going to get F-35 to cover a good part of globe.

The F-111 and F-22 are two different aircraft designed for two different missions. Although the USAF has tried to place a strike capability into the F-22, its main purpose is air-to-air, and in that arena the F-111 doesn't come close.

 

[tomo pauk]

I know that those two are widely different designs, yet out of all modern Western designs, F-22 could best continue where F-111 left.

That F-111's abilities as an air-superiority interceptor fighter plane are completely as I stated in my previous post anyway, eg. non-existing

 

[Matt308]

That F-111's abilities as an air-superiority interceptor fighter plane are completely as I stated in my previous post anyway, eg. non-existing

No argument there.

 

[Matt308]

...and what has not entered into this discussion is if you have a Vulcan/B-52 asset, you must have lots of tanker assets. And if you have tanker assets... you must have control of the airspace (AWACS). And if you have AWACS... you must have uncontested airspace protection (SAMS /or fighters).

So in a nutshell, strategic bombers have a HUGE support infrastructure. And that = $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

 

[vikingBerserker]

A-fricken-men!

 

[pbfoot]

With the exception of the Falklands in the latter years they were simply a lo level strike weapon and in that role the Vulcan was surpassed by the Tornado ....it had speed was far more stealthy and didn't smoke

 

[parsifal]

...and what has not entered into this discussion is if you have a Vulcan/B-52 asset, you must have lots of tanker assets. And if you have tanker assets... you must have control of the airspace (AWACS). And if you have AWACS... you must have uncontested airspace protection (SAMS /or fighters).

So in a nutshell, strategic bombers have a HUGE support infrastructure. And that = $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Isnt that looking at the issue from a long range force projection point of view?

I agree about the AWACS and ADA requirements, but tankers are not entirely necessary if you simply projecting at a regional level.

I am thinking specifically of our own forces really. For most of the service life of our F-111 "heavies" (well, they were the heaviest bombers in the region for a long time....) they did not have proper tanker support, and very limited AWACS. Definately degraded their effectiveness, and we did eventually acquire some capability in both areas, but our force remained very potent nevertheless, able to strike out to a considerable distance from the home bases.

I will concede that our force was handicapped by these omissions, and even without themj the F-111 force soaked up a hell of a lot of money

 

[Matt308]

... and you guys are just now getting Wedgetails and A330 tankers to correct that liability.

 

[Seawitch]

Replacement to what end? In the confrontation they were primarily designed for, the V-bombers were an expensive method of getting aircrew to commit suicide - I'd have been shocked if any had made it to their Soviet targets.

Sorry, but I just could not resist this....
The Notorious Flight of Mathias Rust | History of Flight | Air Space Magazine

 

[beaupower32]

Thats a pretty intresting story, thanks for sharing. I could imagine the looks on the Soviet's faces when a West German Cessna landed right in the middle of their capital.

 

[Colin1]

Sorry, but I just could not resist this....

I remember it well
but you'll need to explain the parallels that I suspect you're trying to draw between V-bombers ingressing under a declaration of war and a light aircraft that buzzed in at light aircraft speeds under no such declaration.

 

[Matt308]

Yeah I too remember the flight. But I also don't understand the parallels that SeaWitch is attempting to make.

 

[beaupower32]

Glad im not the only one, I was curious how that tied in with the Vulcan.

 

[vikingBerserker]

Yea, I'm lost as well.

 

[krieghund]

Oh yes a B-52 can carpet bomb imagine a box of B-52s pickling their 500 pounders over an area target (this was done during Desert Storm) The Buff pilot telling me "The war's not over till the rubble bounces!!"