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From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Airborne Radar
Message-ID: <1991Mar4.211602.8745@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 4 Mar 91 21:16:02 GMT
References: <1991Feb28.052606.10693@cbnews.att.com> <1991Mar1.054007.1163@cbnews.att.com>
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Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
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From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
>From: edat!brian@uunet.UU.NET (brian douglass personal account)
>Rumor is that the radar on an F-15C is so good, it can actually
>count the number of blades on an oncoming jet's engines, and then
>determine what kind of plane it is based on this and profile.  This
>at 20 miles out!  Anyway, that is the rumor, but it comes from
>someone (not I) who should know.  Could anyone else elaborate?

I doubt that anyone can elaborate in an unclassified way.  Techniques
like this, which come under the general heading of "non-cooperative
target identification", are the deepest and darkest secrets in radar
technology today.  Even radars exported to supposedly-trusted allies
often omit any n-c-t-i provisions present in the original.
-- 
"But this *is* the simplified version   | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
for the general public."     -S. Harris |  henry@zoo.toronto.edu  utzoo!henry