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From: igor!rutabaga!wab@uunet.UU.NET (Bill Baker)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Air Superiority B-52? (AWACS)
Message-ID: <1991May31.061326.13426@amd.com>
Date: 30 May 91 03:10:32 GMT
References: <1991May22.034943.27949@amd.com> <1991May23.062740.17080@amd.com> <1991May29.010650.5556@amd.com>
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From: igor!rutabaga!wab@uunet.UU.NET (Bill Baker)


The AWACS platform is a 707.  The lifetime Boeing has squeezed out of
the '07 airframe boggles the mind, what with the KC-135 and AWACS (and
Looking Glass?).  Actually, my dad was at Boeing during the design
cycle of AWACS and I remember asking why they weren't using a '47.  It
turns out the system just doesn't need that much of a platform.  It was
also much cheaper considering both the unit cost and maintenance
start-up costs (the AF was already set-up for '07's).

Those are good reasons, but the AF has been historically wary of the
747.  First, although those were ostensibly the reasons why the '07 was
the platform of choice, the scuttlebutt around the company was that the
AF didn't want to be accused of subsidizing another commercial airframe
(like the '07).  There was also the general "contract balancing"
sentiment of the AF:  The quiet word from the AF was that Boeing had
Minuteman and the B-52 and that was enough (this is also supposedly why
Boeing hasn't bid on a fighter contract for many, many years prior to
the ATF).  However, there were, at one point, some senators agitating
for the AF to buy '47's instead of C-5's and the AF wanted their C-5's
no matter what.  This was happening at the same time that AWACS was in
the early design stages, if I remember correctly.  Then, during the
debate over funding the B-1, there was a school of thought that what we
really needed was a B-52 follow-on that could just stand-off from
Soviet airspace and salvo cruise missiles during a war.  I think there
were some comparisons along the lines that you could have six 747's for
the price of one B-1 and each one could carry twice the number of
cruise missiles, etc.  That didn't make the AF very happy.  Finally, I
think the AF contest for the KC-135 follow-on was between the DC-10 and
the '47 (not sure about this).  Anyway, the AF took the DC-10, which
has led me to wonder what the effect of a Sioux City-type uncontained
engine failure in a fully-loaded DC-10 tanker would be.

Anyway, I think the AWACS system can track a lot more targets than the
AEGIS system, plus having look-down capability.  AWACS can also
download targeting information directly to fighters, and I think it
would be a semi-trivial task to do some post-processing on the same
data and use it for missile targeting.  You'd need an airframe capable
of carrying the system and dozens of BVR air-to-air missiles, but a '47
could probably do it.  A squadron of such planes might make a hell of a
backbone for theatre air superiority.  It couldn't function as a
stand-alone system for various reasons, but in conjunction with
fighters it might be effective.

One consideration is that the AF hasn't wanted to arm their radar
tracking planes, mostly because it wants them to have a somewhat
non-combatant status.  This has actually worked as the AF have deployed
AWACS to bolster other air forces without raising the political
considerations of "sending in the troops."  But really, the reason the
AF would never implement such a system is that 747's aren't sexy and
the AF fighter mafia would never stand for a single fighter buy being
displaced by a non-fighter system.