Russian Air Campaign Observations:
The Georgian air campaign like all Russian administration and bureaucracy was incompetent but effective! They succeeded.
Aircraft were shot down by Manpads (man portable air defence systems). In one case a Tu-22M3-R was downed probably by a 9K37 Buk (SA-11), perhaps sourced from Ukraine.
From discussions with Israelis and others, in person, SA-11s are easily out manoeuvred by turning beyond the tracking parameters of the missile, particularly by crossing fighter pairs. One Israeli AD manufacturer said “I have seen it many times over the Golan.”
That the Russians were unable to out run their own missiles, which they designed, is somewhat of a poor reflection!
One of the main reasons for these losses is that Russian pilots are still forbidden tactical manoeuvre autonomy. Russian strictness was instituted during WWII to prevent pilots from avoiding anti-aircraft protected targets or dumping their bombs in lakes or elsewhere and turning back.
From my own point of view, from a doctrine perspective, the question arises what is the current interpretation of the Russian operational requirement for local air supremacy or dominance over the area of tactical manoeuvre and re-supply? With modern systems this protective area needs now to be hundreds rather than tens of kilometres across.
Although being deposited into Russian and benign South Ossetian territory and with pre-positioned stores, what we have seen in Georgia is the revisiting, written large, of the ‘OMG’, (1980s cutting-edge Operational Manoeuvre Group), in the form of 14,000 paratroopers airlifted 2,000 kilometres, within 36 hours.
This is the distance in the other direction from Leningrad or Moscow MDs to Southampton, Paris, Belfast, Rome, or anywhere in the Balkans or Scandinavia. If the threat arose; how specifically would it be stopped and by whom; especially collectively?
Bookmarks