Interesting

CDP · Post by **CDP** » Wed Nov 18, 2015 3:48 pm

Interesting reading on current Russian aviation tactics.

May be more useful knowledge for the Micronauts / navel wargamers that Microarmour but even the comparison between Russian to US availability is worth knowing.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... cades.html

av8rmongo · Post by **av8rmongo** » Wed Nov 18, 2015 8:50 pm

An interesting article to be sure. But... Here are a few things to consider. A 25 bomber raid is an impressive event and after a 20 year career in naval aviation I was reminded of the aphorism 'never count the bear out'. One question that has to be asked is can the Russians sustain that level? And a related question is what effect did the attack have? Kudos to the Russians for mounting and filming the raid, but maybe that was the real intent of the mission anyway. If the West starts to believe, as this reporter clearly does, that Russia is now on par with NATO then maybe that will give Russia a freer hand in other endeavors. What we've seen though is a higher than expected failure rate in everything from aircraft engines to ship launched cruise missiles. If Russia truly wants to impress they'll have to turn a one-and-done show of force into a sustained campaign.

The author compares this 25 plane raid to the B-52 strikes at the opening of Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom and if one only has a soda straw to look through his conclusion would be reasonable. If one opens the aperture a little however it becomes obvious that Coalition air forces sending waves of aircraft around the clock is a distant fantasy for Russia. I'll wager (I haven't done the research) a GHQ box set that U.S. bombers flew more sorties, more hours, and more miles in the first week of Iraqi Freedom than Russian bombers have flown in the last three years. Hell, I'd like to see them pull off a mission like the B-2 strikes in Iraq flown from Holloman AFB and back. Then they could talk about global reach.

I'm not saying the Russians aren't any good, they are, but they are not back to their Cold War levels yet. I think that from their perspective it is vitally important that the West thinks they are. Which brings me to my last point about readiness and availability rates. The author quotes availability numbers but offers no insight beyond that. Are the bombers broken? Are they being modernized or upgraded? Are the availability rates below what the Combatant Commander (COCOM) needs to fulfill his mission set? Bottom line here is availability rates without the lower level detail can be misleading.

It was a good show now lets see if they can sustain it.

av8rmongo · Post by **av8rmongo** » Wed Nov 18, 2015 11:09 pm

Oops, I misspoke. I meant Whiteman AFB not Holloman AFB.

Mk 1 · Post by **Mk 1** » Thu Nov 19, 2015 2:56 pm

I think it is a misinterpretation to suggest this was done largely for western consumption.

Rather, I think it was done largely for internal consumption.

Putin is a showman. He is a walking propaganda machine. The whole Socchi Winter Olympics show was very clearly orchestrated to impress his own domestic audience, without much concern over whether anyone else cared.

This is little different. Making the Russian people believe that he has restored their pride-of-place as an impressive world power is his first priority. Making them believe he is doing something decisive about the bombing of the Russian airliner in Sinai is the second priority. Providing some real-world training to Russian forces is probably a distant third priority. Impressing ISIS, their current or potential supporters, is probably also on the list. Impressing anyone else outside of Russia is probably far distant behind those issues.

Just my reading on the way Russian politics have tended to run for years, and for Putin's way in particular ...

av8rmongo · Post by **av8rmongo** » Thu Nov 19, 2015 8:35 pm

I had a really long, cogent, rebuttal argument but before I could post it my computer crapped out and I lost it. Maybe it is trying to save me from myself. Anyway, I'm too tired to try again. You win.

piersyf · Post by **piersyf** » Fri Nov 20, 2015 10:14 am

It's also worth considering another intended audience. Note that Putin has also instructed his forces to treat the French as 'allies' and to integrate with them. Note he singled out France and not NATO or the US forces. He even specifically had Australia barred from discussions on Syria despite the involvement of RAAF assets (because we blamed him openly for downing a passenger jet). Putin may well be leveraging the incident in Paris as a way to convince France to sell him the ships they commissioned rather than sell them to someone else.

TAMMY · Post by **TAMMY** » Sat Nov 21, 2015 3:45 am

The delivery of the French ships wassuspended by Hollande directly. Sanctions imposed against Russia did not prohibit the final delivery of the two Mistral ships, but the French president decided that the deal should go ahead only if Russia meets two criteria: one, genuinely observing the ceasefire between the Ukrainian government and Russian-backed rebels that was signed in September; and, two, agreeing to formally resolve the conflict in Ukraine.

It seems there are no change on this side..