Mihir wrote:The initial debate was about CAS aircraft, not just subsonic and armoured CAS aircraft.
The initial debate started with: '
CAS performed in the manner of the A-10 or Su-25 is fast becoming obsolete'.
The MiG-27 fills this niche role in the IAF, and not just as an afterthought. This is a platform designed for low-level attack missions including CAS. Before the introduction of the Su-25, it fulfilled this role even with Frontal Aviation. The big gun, cockpit armour, laser ranger and nav/attack suite all point to that.
One one hand you say I'm arguing for the sake of it and on the other you go ahead and claim that the MiG-27 was built for CAS. Single engine. Single rudder. No control redundancies. It has big gun indeed and ammunition enough to last for about... 5 seconds.
The fact that it was employed for CAS doesn't imply that it was suitable for CAS (which is why the Su-25 was developed in the first place).
Are you even reading my posts? If low-flying aircraft are vulnerable to short-range SAMS and AAA, then those flying at higher altitudes are more vulnerable to medium range SAMs. The USAF and Israeli AF paid a heavy price in lives to learn that lesson. It is why low-flying tactics were adopted in the first place.
The whole point behind flying at higher altitudes is to attack from stand-off ranges. Mobile army units are usually equipped only with AAA and SR-SAMs, and infantry with MANPADS.
USAF and IsAF paid a heavy price?
The same Israeli Air Force that lost some 40 fighters in 1973 to ZSU-23s, including six lost in one day?
As for the US, of the 25 fighter aircraft lost after Vietnam, 18 were downed by AAA, VSHORADS or MANPADS. Having paid as you put it, 'a heavy price', its little wonder that they're opting to attack from safer altitudes and retiring the A-10 altogether.
In the UK's case, 9 out of 9 losses sustained after the Suez War have been to AAA & VSHORADS. In Iraq '91 losses totally 6 Tornados all flying low level strike. In Iraq '03, the same Tornados flew mid altitude and engaged almost exclusively with PGMs.
Now you're just nitpicking. Please point to an IAF or at least a reputed Indian publication that calls the Longewala operation "battlefield air interdiction". As for the "most casualties" argument, are you denying that low-flying IAF aircraft did indeed turn the tide of the battle? Are you denying that they engaged Pakistani forces while they were fighting the Indian Army? In fact, were it not for Wingco Bawa's Hunters, the Pakistani forces wouldn't have broken contact with Indian defences in teh first place.
The Pakistani formation had been routed by the time the second sortie returned to Jaisalmer. Air operations continued for another two days. Also I did not, at any point, belittle the importance or contribution of the IAF to the battle.
-You think the pilot can see what's happening in a confused melee on the ground from more than 30k feet and accurately hit enemy targets?
-If the ground units are locked in melee, there's little that an aircraft can do resolve the situation, save perhaps for attacking the enemy's rear echelon to affect a loss of morale.
That's your assumption, and not borne out by facts. In a close battle, aircraft can pick out and attack enemy targets, and have done so in the past.
Melee implies close quarters combat. And the armies don't wear olives or khakis in the field anymore. Even with support from FACs and some degree of separation on ground, pilots are usually loath to employ weapons, in NATO parlance, 'danger close'. There's no question of doing so based on minimal visual cues.
Yes, as blobs on a screen. Do tell us what modern technology short of IFF transponders is going to help IAF pilots distinguish a T-72 from an Al Zarrar or a T-90 from a T-80UD from 30,000 feet. Let us also know how they are going to id infantry formations with certainty without someone on the ground doing the designating.
Do you think a pilot zipping along in a MiG-27, an aircraft with poor cockpit visibility and designed to deliver its payload in a supersonic dash at low level (
not for low speed loiter over the battle area), trying to keep his aircraft from being shot down, can distinguish between a T-72 & Al Zarrar, or T-80UD & T-90?
A pilot of an aircraft operating at range, can survey a far larger swathe of the battlefield, accept a feed from UAVs on scene, have targeting information passed on from an FAC on ground, use SAR imagery with
sub-metre resolution and/or employ CCD-TV. And do it all in a calm measure manner, without his feet in the fire,
and while keeping an eye out for enemy aircraft.
It is an "appalling risk" only if you force a Rafale of F-35 into a role ill suited to its basic design. It isn't an "appalling risk" for dedicated CAS birds.
Aside from the fact that we don't operate dedicated CAS birds,
even modern CAS birds are at far greater risk today given the proliferation of SHORADS and MANPADS.
You're confusing two very different things again. "designed in an era when precision guidance was in its infancy" is not the same as "was conceived for an era when precision guidance would no longer be a novelty".
The statements have nearly
opposite implications. No scope for confusion. To whit - '[they] were conceived for an era when precision guidance was a novelty'.
In any case, the Maverick was operational before the A-10 first flew. And by the late seventies, it's fire control systems had been upgraded to greatly increase the accuracy of the gun and rocket pods.
The A-10 is designed to fly slow, be highly maneuverable and can employ Hellfires and Mavericks. It ability to do the job when on scene is not in doubt, its ability to survive on the other hand, is.
First, while the requirement for the A-10 was identified in late 60s, it wasn't until the mid-80s, that the Igla and Stinger (more reliable than the Strela-2 and Redeye) were in wide service becoming potent threats to low level aircraft.
Secondly, until the later 90s, low level rocket and missile attacks were the
only means of carrying out CAS missions. Its only recently that long range LDPs and PGMs capable of hitting moving targets from altitude, have become common.
Those aircraft were phased out because (a) the dissolution of the Red Army made them unnecessary in Europe and (b) the downward pressure on budgets at the end of the Cold War necessitated the consolidation of platform types, so specialist fighter aircraft of all kinds were replaced with more types (and fewer numbers) of multi-role fighters. There is some merit in your argument that it wasn't cost effective for NATO to maintain a huge fleet of single-purpose aircraft. But that is only true for Western Europe. For India, it makes very little sense to blindly follow what the world is doing without taking the capabilities of its potential adversaries into account.
While I do agree that there's been an understandable and deliberate shift away from single purpose aircraft, it wasn't
cost effectiveness that I was referring to. All those aircraft were designed long before the proliferation of PGMs and long range cruise missiles. And it wasn't until they entered their last leg of service that long range EO sensors were being widely fielded. Coupled with the advent of net-centric warfare, both events vastly reduced the utility of such aircraft.
extra 40 yeras?? 
