Quote Originally Posted by Fuchs View Post
Aircraft maneuverability is largely irrelevant for today's fighters because the most advanced air-air missiles can already be launched to hit a target behind the launching platform. They simply turn on the first few hundred meters by 180° and lock on after launch - guess why the Russians installed rear radars in their last fighter series. The F-35 has the DAS for the same purpose (and other purposes).

I suspect that active defences (jamming or shooting down incoming missiles, known from ships and now also from tanks and transport aircraft - bound to happen in fighters) will become relevant in the near future.
This will add even more per unit cost and require additional installation volume and surface.
Fuchs, I strongly disagree...

The death of Basic Fighter Maneuvers (BFM) is often greatly exaggerated...

No missile is perfect. OBTW the jammers you refer to exist... see my last post for details on what the threat has. These can affect missiles...

Until missiles become hittiles and have 100% Pk (never going to happen in my opinion) there is always the possibility of having to close with the enemy, maneuver to a position of advantage, and kill him with WVR weapons - BFM.

OBTW, to use your BVR missiles you have to be able to ID the threat- again this is not a perfect science, and if it fails you may have to visually ID (VID) the threat. Getting a VID requires the same maneuverability mentioned above.

At some point we may get to where a computer can match the human system in terms of air-to-air situational awareness... but we're not there yet.

We learned this lesson in Vietnam, hopefully we don't need to re-learn it anytime soon.

V/R,

Cliff