Soviets Develop Formidable Air Warfare Capability

More encouraging statistics have come to light subsequently; but while Western efforts have been concentrated mainly on improving the equipment and reliability of existing aircraft like the F-15 (which has been flying for twelve years and is likely to stay in production for another ten), the Soviet air forces have begun reequipping with new, and very different, aircraft from top to bottom. Unless the West rethinks its whole attitude to defence procurement, which is unlikely under its present political and economic systems, the balance must swing progressively in favour of the East. This will compel an increasing reliance on nuclear weapons, which is the most dangerous of all available options.

Today’s situation was entirely predictable. Anyone who has made a study of Soviet military power in the years since World War II must have discovered the basic difference between East/West procurement policies. The Soviet Union will always build the best that its industry is capable of producing; the West will build only what its monetarists say it can afford. Sadly, there is no second best when only the winner survives.

For years the West has maintained a significant lead in major aviation technologies. Yet many of the key combat aircraft equipping NATO air forces in Europe, starting with the A-10, Jaguar, Harrier and F-16, are unable to operate by day and night in all weathers. Vast sums have to be spent retrospectively to improve the capability of the F-16, which was promoted as a money-saving alternative to the F-15. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union’s new counterpart of the F-16 has, from the start, a pulse-Doppler lookdown/shootdown radar with which to seek its prey, control its weapons and find its way home, regardless of conditions.

At the risk of being annoyingly repetitive, it must be said that this was utterly predictable, as were so-called ‘shock revelations’ in the new edition of the US Department of Defense’s publication on Soviet Military Power, published in April of this year.

Back in December, newspapers throughout the world had drawn attention to references in the latest Jane’s All The World’s Aircraft to a new Soviet heavy transport aircraft of Antonov design known to NATO as Condor. Conceived as a tank carrier to replace the disappointing turboprop An-22, Jane suggested that it might also airlift SS-20 mobile nuclear missile systems to where they would be deployed most effectively- a thought-provoking possibility at a time when President Andropov had offered to withdraw some European-based SS-20s east of the Urals.

One US newspaper interviewer, asking Jane’s Editor the right questions, was able to publish that the Russians might also produce soon a small and agile combat helicopter to deal with slow, low-flying NATO helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft in the first hours of any future confrontation in Europe.

Four months after these stories appeared, Soviet Military Power revealed the first picture of an SS-20 emerging on its launcher from the cabin of a Condor transport. Another, less detailed, drawing depicted a hitherto secret Soviet combat helicopter that will be known to NA TO as Ha-voe – for once an apt reporting name to convey the aircraft’s likely effect on Western front-line air cover if the shooting ever started.

Such early confirmation of Jane’s predictions generated the customary queries about a private spy network, infringement of security and official leaks. In fact, no Jane’s editor would ever prejudice the national and international relationships that are his lifeblood by accepting clandestine information. In the case of Soviet military aircraft, it requires no crystal ball, or skulduggery to assess future developments accurately. The student of Soviet air power need to remember only one cardinal fact. If the Soviet government or aerospace industry becomes aware of any gap in the nation’s air power, that gap will be plugged as rapidly and effectively as Soviet technology permits, regardless of cost. This explains all the advances in aircraft capability and operation that have been made in recent years, and are still being made.

As a start, the whole pattern of air defence has changed. The days when victory went to the fastest, highest climbing interceptor had passed by the early 1960 s. President Kennedy cancelled further work on America’s mighty Mach 3 B-70 Valkyrie bomber, and the main requirement for the Mikoyan design bureau’s Mach 3 MiG-25Foxbat fighter went out of the window with it. The MiG was transformed into a reconnaissance aircraft that eluded every enemy interceptor sent against it for years. Western combat aircraft began flying at ever lower altitudes, where the Soviet defences had difficulty in detecting them, let alone destroying them,

The first requirement was for a Soviet counterpart to America’s airborne early warning (AEW) aircraft, equipped with a large radar able to locate incoming attack aircraft, flying at low level, long before they would appear on ground radar. If the new aircraft could also direct fighters towards any pinpointed target, so much the better. A prototype was flying by 1968, developed from Tupolev’s huge Tu-114 four-turboprop transport. It looked better than it was. Those who claimed to know said that the aircraft (Tu-126 to the Russians and Moss to NATO) might pick up raiders approaching over water but was useless over land, where objects on the modified to carry supersonic Kitchen air-to-surface missiles instead of subsonic Kangaroos.

Furthermore, the resulting Bear-Gs will not represent the final variant of this 30-year-old propeller-driven giant, with the surprising 575 mph maximum speed. Production of attack models has been resumed after a fifteen-year interval to provide the Soviet bomber force with the entirely new Bear-H, carrying long-range cruise missiles. Will it introduce other long-expected Soviet innovations like propfans instead of propellers to increase its very long range even further? We can only wait and see.

Blackjack is the world’s biggest bomber. Condor was described initially by the Department of Defense as the biggest transport, five per cent larger than the C-5Galaxy, although there now seems to be some doubt of this. Giantism has always been popular with Russian designers since the late, great Igor Sikorsky built and flew the world’s first four-engined aeroplane at St Petersburg in 1913 . The Tu-28P/Tu-128 Fiddler, the world’s largest ever purpose-designed interceptor, also lingers on with the Voyska PVO after some 20 years of service. The reason must be its unrivalled 3 100 mile range, which gives it some chance of engaging an enemy attack force before the latter reaches its missile launch point.

Does the age of the small Tu-28P/Tu-128 force suggest another gap that the Soviet leadership might wish to fill? A large aircraft able to carry 30 or 40 AA-9 missiles in supersonic cruising flight, over a long range, might be able to deal very effectively with a wave of cruise missiles. It might also be able, with flight refuelling, to venture out over the Atlantic for long periods to play havoc with the stream of slow, unarmed NATO transports operating a resupply service between the US and the UK.

As always, it requires no crystal ball, or private spy network, to imagine such an aircraft. Something which the Russians 1dent1fy only as ‘Aircraft 10 1 ‘, with tour 44,100 lb thrust ‘Type57’ engines and a shape that sounds very like that of the now-abandoned Tu-144 supersonic airliners has set no fewer than 1 4 officially recognised world records since July 1983. They include four speed with payload records which involved carrying a 30 tonne7oad around a 1000 km (621 mile) circuit at Mach 1. 91 (1 262 mph). It could, of course, be no more than a ‘Concordski’ working out its time as a testbed; but the thought of30 tonnes of AA-9s on a Mach 1. 91 fighter is something to keep Western Air Force leaders awake at night.