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From: eachus@aries.mitre.org (Robert I. Eachus)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: How effective was the Stealth fighter?
Message-ID: <1991Apr18.032647.22171@amd.com>
Date: 18 Apr 91 00:40:49 GMT
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From: eachus@aries.mitre.org (Robert I. Eachus)


stevenp@decwrl.pa.dec.com (Steven Philipson) writes:
>prentice%triton.unm.edu@ariel.unm.edu (John Prentice) writes;
>> [...] However, the statistics from this war would
>> appear to not tell us anything, simply because the losses of Stealth
>> versus non-Stealth are statistically insignificant.
>
>The loss rates of all aircraft were low, but I haven't seen any
>official statement that the *difference* in loss rates between were
>statistically insignificant.  A large number of sorties and flight
>hours were recorded.  Reported losses as I've seen them seem to indicate
>that the rates *are* significantly different.  Could you please tell us
>why you conclude that they are not?...

   There are some significant differences in loss rates, and actually
the most important significant difference (the loss rate for Tornado
GCR aircraft) was apparently due to a tactical problem.  When the
tactics were changed the losses changed.

   All that said, the loss rate (and effectiveness) of the F-117A were
very significant, and made the air war look easy.  If you have a plane
you can send on missions where ANY OTHER aircraft will have an
unacceptably high loss rate, and they all come home, that tells you a
lot.  (I had nothing to do with the air war planning, but I've played
a lot of war games--err strategic simulations?--with some of those
that did...)

   Some of the targets that the F117A hit in the opening salvos of the
air war, were the type of strategic target where if intell tells you:
"Expect to lose 40% of the attacking aircraft, and you have about a
10% chance of mission success per sortie...", you figure out whether
to allocate one squadron or two.  I would guess that "opening night"
there were on the order of twenty strategic targets where getting them
all would make everything else a (relative) cakewalk.  Some were
allocated to F117As, some to Tomahawks, and the rest is history.

   A similar thing applies to the ground war.  It has been widely
reported that there were no M1A1s lost.  True, (actually, I think a
couple were banged up bad enough to require depot maintenance, but
anyway...) but this doesn't mean that the M1A1s weren't hit.  I'd be
surprised if there was a single M1A1 that saw action and didn't have
some scratches.  (And don't say, yeah but most of it was from rifles
and machine guns.  As a former TC, I can tell you just how much of me
was usually sticking out of a tank.  The fact that my crew would
probably do a very good job on any sniper that hit me would be VERY
cold cumfort.)

    It's just that the crews were trained well enough, and the weapons
were accurate enough and capable enough to do the job beyond the
effective range of the Iraqi weapons.  (And the Iraqis were dumb
enough to light those oil fires.) Tell a TC who has say five tanks
kills at an average range of two miles, and dents from T-72 sabot
rounds in his front slope, that he had it easy.  He probably won't
take your head off and put it back on the right way round, but I
assure you that he and his crew know just how "easy" the war was.

--
Robert I. Eachus