Re: F-117 Air-to-Air Capabilities


Message posted by Birch on June 09, 2020 at 3:09:25 PST:

Thanks Duke,

If I recall correctly (Mind you, 30 years ago almost), the deal was that the Mainstay in hose days were using a rather obsolete "Schmel-1" radar using both VHF and HF frequencies, and at a rather hefty power too. Since the Mainstays had to circlate in a pattern of "8" in the Baltics, it was a rather slow object especially since it couldn't bank that much without losing radar cover.

It had significant portions of the radar cirle that was shadowed by the fuselage (tail portion for the most) and could be approached by the missile sniffing the side lobe from behind. When getting closer the tracking radar of the defensive weapon in the rear could automatically turn on, thus giving an almost 100% hit propability.

There was rumorwise an instance of a B-52 in 1991 over mid-east that accidently was hit by an AGM-88 missile in air by an EF-4G mistakenly identifying the B-52 as Iraqi AA artillery, kinda proving the AGM-88's Air to Air capacity by accident.

That was the theory as far as I can recall, but if this is feasible.. Don't know. Been to many years.

Regards.


In Reply to: Re: F-117 Air-to-Air Capabilities posted by Duke on June 07, 2020 at 16:15:30 PST:

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