Category Archives: Aviation/Space Tech

Memorial Day 2013 Warbirds

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The Memorial Day airshow at the American Airpower Museum at Republic Airport in Farmingdale, New York is always spectacular. This year was no different. There was a wide variety of aircraft on display, including a number that were Second World War warbirds. Here are two – a B-17 Flying Fortress and a P-40 Warhawk done up in Flying Tigers colors. Take a good look at the all-metal scheme on the B-17. That was to save weight by not applying paint, and also to entice the Luftwaffe to find them and come up and duel.  Luftwaffe combat losses were so heavy, and the requirement of keeping so many fighters back in Germany on defense so onerous, that the USAAF had almost total air superiority by D-Day.

 

Marc DeSantis

All images copyright MGD Research Company, LLC.

Next Up: Skynet!

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Okay, perhaps Skynet is not just around the corner. That will take some doing. But the infamous, artificially-intelligent mastermind behind the Terminators just got one step closer with the launch of the naval UCAV X-47B from the deck of the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush on May 14, 2013.  Eventually, major weapon systems will be autonomous, uninhabited machines, whether aerial, naval, or ground combat units. Right now, the major advantage of a human-crewed machine is the brain of the person inside it. Human warriors are much more adaptable and creative than machines, and can react faster and more appropriately to changing situations.
The future will be different. In time, the technical challenges posed by genuine artificial intelligence will be overcome, and an uncrewed vehicle will be as capable, or perhaps more capable, than a crewed craft. A significant portion of a modern fighter aircraft’s weight, for example, is taken up by the systems needed to allow the pilot to fly the warplane and to keep the pilot alive. If you can remove the human from inside the cockpit, you won’t even need a cockpit anymore, and can save a huge amount of weight, such as the ejection seat, which can be devoted to extra ordnance or fuel. That will be an enormous advantage over a piloted machine, assuming that all else, such as outright combat capability, are equal.

Marc DeSantis

F-35 Specifics

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Although the troubled F-35 program has been reported on extensively in the past, it is not often that the mainstream press reports specific problems with the actual aircraft under development.  That is why the April 2013 issue of Popular Mechanics is noteworthy.  Joe Pappalardo has penned a short article about several development problems of the F-35B (that’s the Marine Corps version that can land vertically) and potential fixes for them.  Interestingly, and perhaps most worrisome, the maneuverability of the F-35B has been reduced from a sustained 5 g’s turn to 4.5.  There are other issues too, and I recommend that you check out this issue for them.  It seems that the decision to buy the aircraft while it is still in development has not proved to be a happy one.

Marc DeSantis

F-35 Lightning II Program Troubles

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Time’s always awesome Battleland has just run a fantastic article by Mark Thompson about the endlessly troubled F-35 program. As you will recall, the F-35 Lighting II is intended to be a stealthy, multirole fighter for the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy, and U.S Marine Corps. It is this attempt to be all things to (almost) all services that has held back the program, and perhaps even prevented the F-35 from ever becoming a useful fighter airplane.

Among other interesting tidbits of information in the article: The design blueprints for the aircraft are changed ten times every day of the week; the plane has a short range and the carriers it flies from will thus have to move dangerously close to enemy territory before they launch them; the 133,000 jobs currently tied to the F-35 program exist in no fewer forty-five of America’s states; the F-35 may not even outperform earlier aircraft in the U.S. arsenal, such as the F-15, F-16, or F-18, even though those planes are several decades older and less expensive; the bill for the projected 2,457 F-35’s to be procured by the U.S. will cost an eye-popping $396 billion, which is double the initial assessment when the program began; the three models of the F-35 now under development will be slower and less maneuverable than originally planned; the stealthy characteristics of the F-35, which have increased its costs and development problems, may not be of much use in evading air defenses after all in a world with better sensors and better computers; and the lifetime cost of maintaining the fleet of F-35’s is estimated be an astonishing $1.5 trillion.

After reading this article, which should be required reading for all American policymakers, I wonder if the United States has just spent a fortune developing the most advanced dirigible airship or sail-powered ship-of-the-line when the weapon type itself itself fading rapidly into obsolescence.

Marc DeSantis

F-35 Fighter Program Still in Trouble

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The F-35 Lightning II program has been beset by a number of problems that were not anticipated when it was first proposed. It is astounding, even when considering the technological advancements that the F-35 represents, for a military aircraft program to require more than eleven years of development and not a single operational squadron yet exists.

If you have been reading this blog, you are well aware that one of the underlying reasons that America pays so much for its weapons is because the Pentagon seeks to push the tech envelope in every direction. Sometimes, this results in a remarkable weapon system, such as the M1 tank, while in others, the result is dubious (the V-22 Osprey) or both (the F-22).The F-35, which is shaping up to be the costliest weapon buy in American history, may never be the cost-effective, multi-service jet that was promised. It was meant to be a fighter usable by the US Air Force, the Navy, and the Marines, as well as a number of other countries. The problem is that Lockheed had to design a fighter that was stealthy, like the F-22, could dogfight, drop bombs, carry its weapons internally to keep it stealthy, and, oh yeah, land on a carrier by hovering, just like the old Harrier jump jet.

Getting all of these opposing design requirements to work in a single package, at a reasonable cost, no less, has proven far more difficult than expected. The F-35, which appears to have a distressingly short unrefueled range, reminds me of a latter-day F-111 Aardvark, a swing-wing jet of the 1960’s that, as a cost-saving measure, was supposed to be used by both the Navy and the Air Force. As it turned out the F-111 proved to be too heavy to land on carriers (oops!) and the Air Force was stuck with it. Irony of ironies, this big and heavy “fighter” was actually used in the light bomber role by the Air Force, which demonstrates that trying to be all things to all people usually means that you are nothing to everyone.

At this stage, it seems likely that the F-35 will never live up to the hopes expressed upon the inception of its plan, but it is too far along to give up, both politically and economically. Something will have to be salvaged from this otherwise unhappy fighter program. Look for far fewer purchases than anticipated, as newer and better Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV’s) emerge from the drawing boards of aerospace companies.  UAV’s are not yet the Dreadnought battleship that renders all previous designs obsolete, but they are getting close. Read about the sorry details of the F-35 here.

China’s Carrier Fighter – First Landing

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The naval situation in East Asia has just gotten more interesting.  China has just achieved its first carrier jet landing on the recently-commissioned Liaoning.  Take a look at a photograph of the Shenyang J-15 here.

The Pentagon has not been impressed, but I think that it is watching China’s single aircraft carrier (for now) very closely. Something tells me that China’s growing naval power will be used to justify big American defense budgets for many years to come.

In the meanwhile, Japan is eyeing China’s build-up nervously.  It is responding with some moves of its own.

Marc DeSantis

Chinese Stealth Fighter Photos

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Anyone interested in aviation will want to read this article in The Atlantic.   Without a doubt, the Chinese  J-31 stealth fighter bears more than a passing resemblance to the American F-22.  While espionage is always a possibility, the more reasonable interpretation for the outward similarity of the two aircraft is that the Chinese have studied the contours of the F-22 very closely, and since they are seeking to solve the same problem that the U.S. Air Force is – evade radar – the Chinese designers have applied a ready-made solution to the problem.

It is also likely that the F-22 is still more advanced because of a variety of special coatings and other onboard technologies that can’t be copied so easily.

Marc De Santis

The Weapons We Need

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Check out this article by Robert Haddick in Foreign Policy. Stealth technology may now be in doubt because of more advanced radars and computers, and so the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert, favors larger ships and aircraft that can be adapted more easily because of their size. There is historical precedent for bigger weapons being easier to upgrade. The Royal Navy’s large Queen Elizabeth-class dreadnoughts were modernized between the world wars and remained first-class warships in the Second World War, but the smaller Royal Sovereign-class could not be refitted so easily, and were not as useful.

Make sure to take a look at the article itself by Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert mentioned in the Foreign Policy piece. Greenert makes some interesting points. He is also a supporter of the Littoral Combat Ship (LCS), which has been discussed at some length in previous posts on this site. I think that the idea of modularity is a very good one, but it is not a panacea. A weapon system, such as an aircraft, that can be employed in a wide variety of roles is fantastic, as long as it does well in all of those roles. A good example is the de Havilland Mosquito from the Second World War. The Mosquito turned out to be one of the best aircraft ever made, and was superb in all the missions given to it by the Royal Air Force.

A mediocre machine, by contrast, one that performed its multiple missions in only an acceptable fashion, would not be of much use, since what you really want is a warplane that is great in at least one area, such as dogfighting or dive bombing or reconnaissance. I think that the LCS, while fine in concept, may prove to be an all-around mediocre ship that does not stand out in any area. That is not a true cost-saving, since the Navy would have, in effect, purchased a sub-standard vessel that does not compare well with other, more narrowly-focused warships. The point made by Admiral Greenert is, however, well-taken. With the pace of technological change, every warplane, ship, or tank deployed by the U.S. armed forces must be capable of being upgraded over an extended period of time to keep it competitive.

 

Marc De Santis

Naval Warfare: Outer Space Edition

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At long last, someone has addressed the urgent question of naval warfare in space! I am not joking when I say this. Check out this article. I am a fan of science fiction, especially naval science fiction such as the Honor Harrington series by David Weber. Most SF novels use a known historical analogue of water naval combat as the basis for how they depict space-based warfare. Typically, this involves super-humongous ships engaged in battle over thousands of kilometers behaving as if they were duking it out at some far future Trafalgar. This analogy is dubious, on the grounds that modern water naval combat is itself far removed from Nelson’s day, or even from the Jutland battle of 1916. Read about the Battle of Midway for just how different things were in the 1940’s! The American and Japanese fleets never sighted each other. Damage was inflicted, almost totally, by aircraft-delivered weapons.

The nature of space battles of the future can’t truly be predicted, because we don’t know what kinds of weaponry will exist or what it will do. My money is on missiles, because they can change direction to strike at targets after they have been fired. Presumably, a laser or plasma gun will only be able to fire in a single direction. If an enemy vessel is far enough away, it will likely evade. So direct fire weapons will probably only be useful at comparatively shorter ranges, unlike a missile.

The major trend of almost all weapons since the invention of gunpowder firearms several hundred years ago is for higher lethality at greater range. Even lower lethality at greater range is still a good bet because it allows the firer to stay outside the range of an opponent’s weapons. Therefore, I think that the longest range weapons that provide the best chance of hitting the target will be the primary weaponry deployed on a spacegoing warship. I don’t envision battleships like the Yamato (yeah, Starblazers!) or the Galactica. No Star Destroyers either. For that matter, I don’t foresee even the USS Enterprise. Instead, I think most space warships will be akin to missile boats or corvettes of some kind or another – fast, inexpensive, and relatively small.

For a much more near-future examination of the potential for war in space, more science fact than science fiction, read this Time magazine piece.

China’s New Aircraft Carrier

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Very few ships at sea are as impressive as an aircraft carrier. The battleships of a bygone era – USS Missouri, HMS Warspite, or Bismarck, were extraordinary vessels, but they are now vanished from the world’s oceans. Carriers also grant the navy that employs them an extraordinary ability to strike at targets well inland and out of the range of even the largest guns. To put this in perspective, the most powerful naval guns emplaced upon a battleship could strike at targets some 26,000 yards away. A carrier plane can fly to ranges over a thousand miles – more if it is refueled in the air. This is called power projection.

But a carrier is arguably the most difficult of all warships to operate. It is both a ship and an airport squeezed into a hull that, no matter how large, is going to be very cramped. Landing on a carrier requires the finest pilots and highly skilled deck crewmen. Further, even conventionally-powered carriers will have prodigious fuel needs, and nuclear carriers, while not dependent on fossil fuels, will demand expensively-trained nuclear technicians to keep their reactors running.

China has just now, with the launching of the Liaoning, entered into the exclusive club of navies that operate genuine carriers – ships that can launch and recover fixed-wing aircraft, not just helicopters. The Chinese are taking things slowly. They purchased the unfinished hull of the Varyag, a Soviet-era vessel that was marooned in the newly-independent Ukraine when the USSR collapsed. It took a long time for China then to complete the ship, a sign of both the aircraft carrier’s complexity, which is true of all carriers, as well as the need to develop the requisite technical base to fabricate the parts to make the ship more than a floating hulk.

It is interesting that China is getting into the carrier game now. While China’s maritime ambitions are nothing new, it does not appear that seagoing airpower is necessary for it to achieve its goals in the waters nearest to it, especially in the East and South China Seas. The Chinese seem to realize that the Liaoning is a learning vessel, and that it will be a while before it is truly ready for sustained combat operations.

The U.S. Navy, which is the current master of such things, did not leap into carrier warfare all at once either. The ability of U.S. carrier strike groups to operate for long periods far from base was developed during the crucible of its Second World War battles with the Imperial Japanese Navy. Getting airplanes off the deck is no small feat. Coordinating their attacks, and mastering the time and space dimensions of carrier warfare, which are so different from that of old-fashioned, gun-equipped warships which can see their targets when they fire, was not something that came naturally to the Americans. At both Midway and Santa Cruz, the U.S. naval aviators had trouble synchronizing their attacks on the Japanese.

Since the end of the war, the U.S. has retained its carriers to enhance its overseas diplomatic and military efforts. Is that what China is looking to do with its own carrier, or carriers, one day? Perhaps China feels that the only way to safeguard its interests in the Middle East and Africa is to have the ability to deploy military aircraft at sea. But Chinese carriers would be vulnerable to the same antiship missiles and other weapons that make the survivability of American carriers during a “hot” war so dubious. Carriers will be the first targets in any shooting war. China itself has deployed long range antiship ballistic missiles to strike at U.S. carriers. The Liaoning will face very similar threats when it is at sea. Apparently, China is willing to run that risk, that is, deploying a costly warship that will be the biggest target in its fleet, for the benefit of the diplomatic and power projection capability that it provides.

Without doubt, the introduction of the Liaoning will probably cause more psychological distress among China’s neighbors than it will actually affect the balance of power there. The Liaoning is not so much a game changer in itself, but a harbinger, most likely, of things to come. A carrier is not a half-measure when it comes to things naval. It is too big, complex, and costly to be just a showpiece. Barring some complete reassessment of its strategic posture, China’s navy will likely deploy other carriers in the future, to enable it to influence affairs far from Chinese shores.

Among other ominous developments, here is an article about the current situation in East Asia.  According to the author, for many of the people of China and Japan, the Second World War never really ended.   The resolution has been just been delayed a while.