Which aircraft is best suited for SEAD?

[Alkaline]

Hi,

 

Quick question. If I want to go SEAD and take out some SAM's in multiplayer, should I go with the Su-25 or A-10C?

[Exorcet]

The Su-25T by far. It is the only FC3 plane with Anti Radiation Missiles and a pod for detecting SAM radar emissions.

 

The A-10 can destroy anti aircraft units with Mavericks, but at a much, much shorter range. You cannot takeout any medium or long range SAM's with the A-10 unless you basically drive it along the ground up to the SAM site, disable the ground lock for the gun, and spray with 30 mm.

[escaner]

Yep, the Su-25T is currently the only true SEAD aircraft available.

[DarkFire]

Definitely the Su-25T. Some tips for you when flying SEAD missions.

 

1. Don't be tempted to load up the aircraft with a pile of other weapons in addition to your anti-radiation missiles. When fully loaded the Su-25T is a real bomb truck with severely restricted manoeuvrability.

 

2. Against long-range SAM systems such as the Sa-10 (S-300) and Patriot your Kh-58 ARMs will not have sufficient range to keep you outside the WEZ of the SAM system. Practice doing lots and lots of NOE flying and pop-up attacks from suitable distances.

 

3. Higher-skill SAM systems will happily shoot down your ARMs. To help increase your Pk against medium & long range SAM systems practice pop-up attacks from shorter distances and consider firing at least 2 x ARMs against each target. The latter is particularly true when facing the SA-10. Patriot and SA-11 systems. The 2S19 Tunguska system is also distressingly good at shooting down guided missiles.

 

4. Don't use ARMs against the ZSU-23-4 Shilka. That AA gun system doesn't have a search radar, only a tracking radar so at the point at which you're able to lock on to the the shilka tracking radar you're within 1-2Km of the maximum engagement range of the gun. Using things like the Kh-25ML against the shilka will be much more effective.

 

Good luck! The Su-25T can be a formidable SEAD aircraft as long as you're careful.

[WinterH]

A tiny caveat, Su-25T is indeed currently only anti radar missile carrying flyable, and is most effective against radar dependent SAM systems.

 

But if your definition of SEAD also include IR SAMS that guard convoys or other targets, than A-10C can be better against those due to Litening pod, missle warning system, and apparently lower heat signature.

 

I would also add TOR (SA-15) to list off missile killers DarkFire provided above. It seems one of the best missile defences of a SAM site in DCS and will sometimes happily shoot down more than one missile on it's way :). I've read on forum OSA (SA-8 ) do it too but I didn't encounter them pulling that off (amy be due to skill level of that particular unit).

 

Another thing to keep in mind, if targeted radar is shut off or is destroyed, any anti radar missiles launched at it will self destruct. Also, some radars will appear on HUD by Phantasmagoria but your missiles can't track them so you can't shoot them with Kh-58 or Kh-25MPU (EWR radars for example).

[SDsc0rch]

how long does it take to re-load SA-10s?

 

if you fire more (or equal) ARM missiles at an SA-10 site as it has in ready-to-launch status, and it fires all its missiles in self-defense at the inbound ARMs...... haven't you therefore effectively "suppressed" that site??

[SDsc0rch]

...

 

Another thing to keep in mind, if targeted radar is shut off or is destroyed, any anti radar missiles launched at it will self destruct.

 

ok, that is a serious discrepancy that simply must be addressed

 

 

Also, some radars will appear on HUD by Phantasmagoria but your missiles can't track them so you can't shoot them with Kh-58 or Kh-25MPU (EWR radars for example).

 

that too

 

 

possibly related (possibly not - ?).. i've noticed that if i am down in the weeds in a mountain range, and i lock up a jamming contact, i'll look in the HUD to get a line-of-sight to the strobing contact.. and the TD box will be in the mountain!

 

in other words, the jamming signal is penetrating through the mountain (or, said another way, the RADAR code doesn't do LOS calculations on jamming signals)

 

i wonder if these issues could be related

[WinterH]

Well just ran a test.

 

Regarding saturating the missile site, I thought if I was the one who build the mission, that air defence site would be a layered approach. S-300 would be the "phalanx", but should the spear tips gets breached, closer range defence systems would lie in wait at second line, and if even that gets past, close quarters fighters (i.e. AAA and MANPADS) would form the final line. So, short / mid range systems like Tunguska or TOR would ideally tackle incoming missiles, leaving S-300 free for more shots. But I wondered how will ground units in DCS behave here, so I hit the mission builder.

 

Placed a site of 4 x S-300 launchers (4 missiles each) with associated search, track and command center units, but also placed 1 TOR and 2 Tunguska in front. I would put AAA and MANPADS to final line as well, but since this is a test only for seeing how will a missile site respond against missiles lobbed at them, they would be irrelevant. Also in a real life integrated air defence, ideally medium range systems like Hawk, BUK or KUB would also form another layer, but I've left them out as well. I think 4 launch vehicles would be a typical minimum, but that is just a guess.

 

I start in a Su-25T armed with 2 x Kh-58 and 4 x Kh-25MPU. Mission start in the air, in a mountain range, heading directly towards the SAM site which is about 80 kms away.

 

I've had two sorties, and they both resulted roughly similar. I emerge from end of mountain range, and release the missiles from about 60 km distance. I release the 58s first, and then the 25s. But before I release them, first S-300 is well underway towards me.

 

In first attempt I fired all 6 missiles in quick succesion on same target. Kh-58s did not get anywhere near, sniped by S-300s. TOR killed two of the Kh-25s, other two got past and hit the search radar. Tunguskas never fired. As soon as I released the missiles, I reversed course, dove, dumped chaff and ran, did not get hit.

 

In second attempt, I took some time to switch targets after firing first 3 missiles, so there was a few seconds of seperation between first and second 3. Again, turned and ran as soon as I dumped all ordnance as an S-300 was already coming on to me before I fired. Faster and bigger Kh-58s again got sniped when they got close. But this time TOR also did not let anything pass due to a few seconds seperation between 2 waves of ARMs. Although I had, as in first attempt, at least 3 S-300 fired at me, I was able to run away back into mountain range. Again, Tunguskas did not fire.

 

In both cases S-300 battery fired about 5-6 missiles out of their 16 and still had ample more ready to fire.

 

Without the mountains I guess it would be pretty hard to approach Kh-25MPU range. So only Kh-58 could have been launched, and since Su-25T can carry only two of them, it would take a huge SEAD package to saturate the relatively small air defence site.

 

Regarding self destruction of missiles that lose target. Well I don't know whether that really is realistic with these missiles but I think that used to be pretty common with older missiles. I know later blocks of AGM-88 HARM for example, do not do this and keep flying for the last known location using GPS / INS. Other ARMs like ALARM could even fly to target area, deploy a parachute and loiter for a SAM radar to light up. But Kh-58 is pretty old so I wouldn't think it would have satellite / inertial equipment to do such and I guess it have seen as better for it to destroy itself rather than to go ballistically to unknown.

 

As for missiles not being able to track all radar kinds that the pod sees, older ARMs had a passive seeker that is able to only seek a few preset known enemy radar frequencies. Which meant they could only engage those few radars. So it is possible that newer tech pod can see emitter, but the missile can't.

seadTest.miz

[DarkFire]

Well just ran a test.

I start in a Su-25T armed with 2 x Kh-58 and 4 x Kh-25MPU. Mission start in the air, in a mountain range, heading directly towards the SAM site which is about 80 kms away.

 

I've had two sorties, and they both resulted roughly similar. I emerge from end of mountain range, and release the missiles from about 60 km distance. I release the 58s first, and then the 25s. But before I release them, first S-300 is well underway towards me.

 

From experience I'd say that firing at 60km is much too far. Against high-end SAM systems something in the region of 20km provides much better Pk for your ARMs, though of course it's not always possible to approach to anything like that close.

 

Regarding ARM self-destruction on loss of lock, it'd be interesting to see if the Kh-58 and Kh-25MPu behave the same way as the AGM-88 and ALARM in that they try to hit the last known geographic position of the locked emitter...

[WinterH]

Yeah, I was surprised Kh-25MPU even reached that far since I fired them with release authorization override :).

 

My intention was rather to see reaction of SAM site, rather than to do actually meaningful damage. I was more trying to test the scenario of baiting S-300 launchers to expend missiles in self defence, and whether shorter range SAMs in group will relieve some of that from them or not.

[tob.s]

when i comes to sam, the ka50 still is the best option im my opinion. Of course one has to advance very carefull and scan the terrain, but then you can stay out of range or below trouble.

 

Im curiuos about the f18 ( ground radar + HARMs ). Will the mirage have some guided ag weapons ?

[Arcto10]

Question: Tunguska. Are the Tung's missiles not manually guided by the operator?

 

I only ask as that is what you have to do in Combined Arms. I would imagine trying to shoot down an incoming missile with a manual paint would be nearly impossible...

[Frostie]

Su25t when used correctly will dessimate any normal SAM set up in DCS. It's important to give your missiles legs so shooting well after max is best. Plus firing against multiple mobile units must be timed for sync impacts or attack one at a time because once one hits the other units will move location causing following ARMs to miss.

[xaoslaad]

ok, that is a serious discrepancy that simply must be addressed

 

 

 

 

that too

 

 

possibly related (possibly not - ?).. i've noticed that if i am down in the weeds in a mountain range, and i lock up a jamming contact, i'll look in the HUD to get a line-of-sight to the strobing contact.. and the TD box will be in the mountain!

 

in other words, the jamming signal is penetrating through the mountain (or, said another way, the RADAR code doesn't do LOS calculations on jamming signals)

 

i wonder if these issues could be related

Im not sure if youre saying the missile not locking onto EWR etc is something that needs to be addressed, but my understanding is that the discrepancy as to what the pod can see and missiles can lock is 'accurate', and therefore there is nothing to be adressed.

[whitehot]

Question: Tunguska. Are the Tung's missiles not manually guided by the operator?

 

I only ask as that is what you have to do in Combined Arms. I would imagine trying to shoot down an incoming missile with a manual paint would be nearly impossible...

 

 

I think that the system has an automatic tracking mode which would guide the missiles onto the target.

Basically, something like the auto-track on the Shkval device found on KA-50 and SU-25t.

 

In fact the Sa-19 sams which the Tunguska packs are SACLOS guided, but with an auto-tracking sensor they become what it's defined as pseudo-fire and forget.

 

Something like that has been also developed for the Kornet anti-tank missiles in its EM version.

Imho it isn't a very complex technological feature - mostly a matter of developing a dedicated software for the EO/IR tracking cameras.

 

edit: noticed that the question was only about the DCS CA vehicle - I elaborated on the real vehicle so disregard

[Arcto10]

Still a very good comment :)

[Alkaline]

Thanks for all answers!

 

I gotta say, the Su-25T is a MONSTER on SEAD! It's so fun to gather up so we are like 2 SEAD's and 2-3 escort fighters, and then we'll just head on towards enemy base and take out the SAM's.

 

Just one thing I really hate, hehe. When im over-excited that I just launched a KH-58U towards a Patriot-SAM, and then a IR-SAM takes out my missile... -.-