When were F-4E's first equipped with the ALR-46 RWR?

[303_Kermit]

50 minutes ago, MBot said:

I think it it is interesting how strongly many associate the F-4E with Vietnam. From the Heatblur F-4E manual:

In detail, the USAF confirmed 21 kills.

That is the number of kills made by F-4E only. Peter Davies writes, that during Vietnam War F-4 killed 17 MiG-17 at a cost of one F-4 lost to them. In the case of MiG-21 VPAF claim 74 F-4 downed. Estimated 197 MiGs (all types) were shot down during the Vietnam War, with 150.5 claimed by Phantoms.

Anyway... I don't think that you understood the point. And IMO the point is, that people want to recreate Aerial combats over North Vietnam since MiG-21bis came to DCS. It was in the end, the last great Air Battle in history. Every conflict later was affected, by new doctrine of aerial warfare. Those doctrine was successfully tested during 6 Day war. There was no more classical struggle for domination in the air, but sudden total destruction of enemy air forces. Development of modern doctrine of Aerial warfare culminates IMO during Yom -Kippur War. Where SAM's reduced the mobility of Air units of both sides, and where battlefield shrinked to a small space outer range of heavy SAM sites. Aerial combat since then goes slowly but steadily into second plan. No more long intensive Air battles. Just the series of rapid interceptions, Head on clashes, with Full aspect missiles playing a main role.

That is why, the "senior part of community" want Vietnam. Because they know and love Air Dogfight. ACM, BFM, Tactics, Doctrines, and they sleep with a Fighter Pilot Bible under the pillow...

With my best regards
Green Ugly Fellow

Edited January 30 by 303_Kermit

[Gunfreak]

3 hours ago, 303_Kermit said:

That is the number of kills made by F-4E only. Peter Davies writes, that during Vietnam War F-4 killed 17 MiG-17 at a cost of one F-4 lost to them. In the case of MiG-21 VPAF claim 74 F-4 downed. Estimated 197 MiGs (all types) were shot down during the Vietnam War, with 150.5 claimed by Phantoms.

Anyway... I don't think that you understood the point. And IMO the point is, that people want to recreate Aerial combats over North Vietnam since MiG-21bis came to DCS. It was in the end, the last great Air Battle in history. Every conflict later was affected, by new doctrine of aerial warfare. Those doctrine was successfully tested during 6 Day war. There was no more classical struggle for domination in the air, but sudden total destruction of enemy air forces. Development of modern doctrine of Aerial warfare culminates IMO during Yom -Kippur War. Where SAM's reduced the mobility of Air units of both sides, and where battlefield shrinked to a small space outer range of heavy SAM sites. Aerial combat since then goes slowly but steadily into second plan. No more long intensive Air battles. Just the series of rapid interceptions, Head on clashes, with Full aspect missiles playing a main role.

That is why, the "senior part of community" want Vietnam. Because they know and love Air Dogfight. ACM, BFM, Tactics, Doctrines, and they sleep with a Fighter Pilot Bible under the pillow...

With my best regards
Green Ugly Fellow

 

I say the last great air war was Iran-Iraq war. 

And while I personally find the Air War in Vietnam interesting. Its not the air to air war that makes me wish for Vietnam aircraft or Vietnam map. It's the ability to fly my Huey down the actual valleys they flew. Fly over the jungle canopy and set down in a small clearing.

It's the ability to drop bombs from my F4,A4, F100, A1 etc to give close air support to troops in contact.

Running in on a SAM site with Shrikes and CBUs 

It's the ability to run in on a Vietnamese bridge guarded by a billion AAA pices. Coming low over the jungle clad hills.

[Bozon]

4 hours ago, 303_Kermit said:

Phantom Started his career in Kheil HaAvir in war of Attrition I believe. Mainly as Fighter. A Ground Attack role was covered those times mainly (but not only) by A-4 and survived Mystere's

The dedicated strike types were the A-4 and Sa’ar (Super Mystere upgraded by Israel with license built J-52, the A-4’s engine). Phantoms were immediately recognized as the best fighter-bombers in the roster and were used mostly for deep strikes.

The Mirage III & Nesher were considered better dogfighters and significantly inferior fighter-bombers, so during 1973 war they were tasked with air defense freeing the phantoms to focus on strikes.

Iftach Spector, 107 sq. commander in 1973 said he had to “suppress the Mirage pilot” within his pilots (most of which transitioned from Mirages) so they stop chasing Migs and focus on their primary mission, which was to strike and get out. Of course he was unable to suppress his own inner Mirage pilot and went after Migs - including one incident where he sent his 7 formation members to RTB and he stayed to duel a Mig 21 in a crazy 0 altitude stall competition.

[303_Kermit]

9 hours ago, Bozon said:

The Mirage III & Nesher were considered better dogfighters and significantly inferior fighter-bombers, so during 1973 war they were tasked with air defense freeing the phantoms to focus on strikes.

Nonsense! I hear sometimes such opinions, but there's no confirmations about it in any sources. Mirage III played a secondary fighter role ever since Phantom came into service.
I am during a lecture of a book written by David Nicolle, and Tom Cooper. Phantom seem to be far more superior to anything what Kheil HaAvir had before. Especially in war of attrition when Mirage III and Nesher losts started to built up. 
Egipt become new russian fighters - MiG-21MF and (never used during that period) MiG-25. Together with new R-13M missiles. All of it together, made Mirage a bit "out of time" since he possessed no flare dispenser, useless radar, and insufficient thrust to weight ratio (compared to MiG-21 MF). Phantoms were tasked not just with A2G strikes as you want to see them - that role they took only after Israel become their F-15A/B and later on also F-16. Before that, during war of attrition, and Yom Kippur Phantoms were tasked with most difficult tasks. Deep strikes inside enemy territory, ands usually Phantoms performing such task were escorted by... Other Phantoms. If Phantom would be purely A2G plane he would never score a kill ratio of ~85 aerial victories vs 5 lost. Phantom was a greatest threat and biggest problem of Egypt, and Syria. It was also one of the reasons, why Egypt after a war of attrition and Yom Kippur... Broke cooperation with CCCP, signed a peace treaty with Israel. Because all that allowed Egyptian pilots to came to Miramar California to TOP GUN to... learn how to pilot a Phantom (they become excellent notes from their US Instructors). And that is also why, Egypt right after that bought Phantoms
 

Before somebody argue - Mirage was still commonly used fighter, and played significant role, but "Elite" IDF/AF squadrons were equipped with F-4E Phantom. And yes, they were tasked with most risky tasks, but Mirage played secondary role in them.

One more thing: you wrote:
 

Quote

Iftach Spector, 107 sq. commander in 1973 said he had to “suppress the Mirage pilot” within his pilots (most of which transitioned from Mirages) so they stop chasing Migs and focus on their primary mission

The reason was not to force Phantom pilots focus on their secondary A2G role - as you want to see them. The true reason was a new ambush tactics used by EAF during war of attrition. Most IDF/AF lost in them were... Mirages. They lacked situation awareness of Phantoms.

Edited January 30 by 303_Kermit

[Bozon]

2 hours ago, 303_Kermit said:

…

The reason was not to force Phantom pilots focus on their secondary A2G role - as you want to see them. …

 

Why do you think that this is how I want to see them? I didn’t say they were bad fighters. They had a more important role to fill that no other plane could perform nearly as well and that was not holding defensive patrols - Mirages were more than adequate for that. Phantoms did shoot down Migs over enemy territory during deep strike operations. They were also used in a few aerial ambushes operations because… they were considered very good fighters as well! Plus their radar was actually useful as opposed to the Mirage’s.

In 1973 Mirages and Neshers already got their Shafrir II missiles and were still considered top dogfighters. There was still little faith in radar missiles and much faith in the cannons. Mirages performed most of the combat patrols and got more kills than the Phantoms (Mosty the Neshers did IIRC).

When IAF’s chief test pilot Dani Shapira first tested the Phantom in the US (probably a B), after they got out of the plane the American instructor asked what he thought of the Phantom. According to his autobiography Dani tactlessly replied: “in a dogfight, I’d rather be in a Mirage”…

I can’t blame Dani - he also said that after his wife his loves were his Mirage III and his Spitfire IX that he couldn’t choose between.

[Kalasnkova74]

4 hours ago, 303_Kermit said:

Nonsense!….
 …Phantoms were tasked not just with A2G strikes as you want to see them - that role they took only after Israel become their F-15A/B and later on also F-16. 

 

I quote directly from Shlomo Aloni’s book, “Israeli F-4 Phantom II Aces” :

”Among Israeli fighters, the F-4 is ranked second only to the Dassault Mirage III and Israeli Aircraft Industries (IAI) Nesher family of deltas for the number of air to air kills it achieved. Yet it must be stressed that most of the operational sorties flown by IDF/AF delta fighters were pure air to air missions, while the versatile F-4 usually earned its living attacking ground targets, rather than chasing hostile fighters across the sky. Therefore, the achievement of IDF/AF Phantom II aircrews, officially credited with 116.5 aerial kills between September 1969 and June 1982, is all the more outstanding.”

Aloni’s follow-on book “Ghosts of Atonement”  also lists Kurnass sorties in the Yom Kippur war by aircraft number (where available) call sign, and mission type. Very few Kurnass missions in that war were air to air orders: the majority were SEAD , airfield or interdiction operations. The F-4E was the safest of all the IDF/AF inventory for these missions, being equipped with then-latest U.S. ECM and radar altimeters for low altitude ingress and egress.  During these missions the Kurnass flights often encountered Arab coalition MiGs vectored to intercept (or flying CAP above the targets). Usually, the F-4’s won these one-on-one duels- thus the high MiG kills. A similar dynamic is why USAF F-105s shot down 27 MiGs in Southeast Asia despite flying only strike and SEAD missions. 

If there’s a source stating the F-4E was primarily an air to air asset for the IDF/AF, I’d be curious to see you share that info. 

[303_Kermit]

4 hours ago, Bozon said:

When IAF’s chief test pilot Dani Shapira first tested the Phantom in the US (probably a B), after they got out of the plane the American instructor asked what he thought of the Phantom. According to his autobiography Dani tactlessly replied: “in a dogfight, I’d rather be in a Mirage”…

Yes... It's very surprising that IAI test pilot liked home made plane better. Statistics are not supporting that. Nor is the poor performance of Mirage III. The plane has worst thrust to weight ratio of all time ( I am not kidding here, check yourself. It's very hard to find a plane with worse T/W ratio). The only superior parameter of Mirage III were their excellent pilots. Plane simply lacked proper engine. Check me out. IIIC is the lightest version of MIII but IAF/DF used the heavier one, and Nesher - yes you guessed right - was even heavier. 

3 hours ago, Kalasnkova74 said:

”Among Israeli fighters, the F-4 is ranked second only to the Dassault Mirage III and Israeli Aircraft Industries (IAI) Nesher family of deltas for the number of air to air kills it achieved. Yet it must be stressed that most of the operational sorties flown by IDF/AF delta fighters were pure air to air missions, while the versatile F-4 usually earned its living attacking ground targets, rather than chasing hostile fighters across the sky. Therefore, the achievement of IDF/AF Phantom II aircrews, officially credited with 116.5 aerial kills between September 1969 and June 1982, is all the more outstanding.”

The statement is not supported by any declassified mission reports we're know of. And any opinions shall be of secondary importance to dry facts. During attrition Mirages killed more MiG's - 124, but IAF/DF lost 19 of them. And that all considering easier tasks - not involving such great risk as the one taken by Phantoms.
In the end Mirage (according to IAF/DF data) archived K/D ratio of 6,5, and Phantom 17:1 - numbers varied heavily (Wiki says that during war of Attrition Phantoms took down 116,5 MiGs, the book I just finished to read gives a number of ~85 MiG's).

During Yom Kippur it was even worse, since lack of proper RWR equipment made Mirages fragile for Egyptian combined Fighter - SAM ambush tactics. Most pilot opinions are very sentimental and they are very interesting, but they're only that - opinions. Facts are facts.

Numbers changes heavily if we compare Egyptian /Syrian data with Israelis, but the main picture stays. Mirages started to suffer significant losses. On the 3-rd day of Yom Kippur war Mirages and Skyhawks were forbidden to cross Suez Canal. Only Phantom survived clash against SA-2/3/6 and MiG-21MF, and proved being capable to perform strike (and perform extremely dangerous SEAD and DEAD) missions till the end of war. In most critical time only Phantoms could intercept MiGs over their own territory, in hostile environment of SAM sites ,and win for a short period "Domination in the air". At the end of the war of attrition Suez canal over the length of 50 miles was covered by 120 SAM sites (only the Egypt ones. I roughly quote after a book mentioned couple posts above, similar number gives declassified USMC analysis of Yom Kippur war). In 1973 Appearance of Phantom over Israel, marked the end of II gen fighters. MiG-19 almost totally extinct (even according to Egyptian data) and Mirages (never a proper multirole fighter) went to secondary role. In 1976 IAF/DF become F-15A and they pushed Phantom into Fighter - Bomber, and F-15A took a role of "Air superiority" fighter. They also marked an end to aerial dogfight as we knew since 1916. That is also were fighter pilot bible ends. 

Sad but true

With my best regards
Green Ugly Fellow

Edited January 31 by 303_Kermit

[SgtPappy]

4 hours ago, 303_Kermit said:

Yes... It's very surprising that IAI test pilot liked home made plane better. Statistics are not supporting that. Nor is the poor performance of Mirage III. The plane has worst thrust to weight ratio of all time ( I am not kidding here, check yourself. It's very hard to find a plane with worse T/W ratio). The only superior parameter of Mirage III were their excellent pilots. Plane simply lacked proper engine. Check me out. IIIC is the lightest version of MIII but IAF/DF used the heavier one, and Nesher - yes you guessed right - was even heavier. 

I'm assuming maybe the Israelis just flew the Mirage for so long and were so successful in 1967 that they fell in love with it and it's instantaneous turn rate. You're right, there's not too much out there to support that it was a better jet than the F-4. And the F-4 was such a versatile jet that it had to do so much, under very difficult circumstances, I would imagine that those missions were not as "romantic" and classically epic as just the dogfight missions that the Mirage/Nesher had in October 1973. It would not surprise me therefore if pilots associated the Mirage with these missions and had high morale flying them. This is just my wild speculation.

 

4 hours ago, 303_Kermit said:

The statement is not supported by any declassified mission reports we're know of. And any opinions shall be of secondary importance to dry facts. During attrition Mirages killed more MiG's - 124, but IAF/DF lost 19 of them. And that all considering easier tasks - not involving such great risk as the one taken by Phantoms.
In the end Mirage (according to IAF/DF data) archived K/D ratio of 6,5, and Phantom 17:1 - numbers varied heavily (Wiki says that during war of Attrition Phantoms took down 116,5 MiGs, the book I just finished to read gives a number of ~85 MiG's).

Yes, though it's hard to confirm them all, lots of them are indeed confirmed. I believe the Israeli claimed total between 1969 and the end of the 1982 Lebanon War is 116.5. The 85 was all Yom Kippur War. Honestly if even half of those kills are confirmed, that's still an incredible amount in just 2.5 weeks of terrible, bloody combat.

 

[9thHunt]

Considering that the last good Vietnam-era combat flight simulator was Jane's USAF, I'm okay with a close approximation for now.

[Bozon]

6 hours ago, SgtPappy said:

I'm assuming maybe the Israelis just flew the Mirage for so long and were so successful in 1967 that they fell in love with it and it's instantaneous turn rate. You're right, there's not too much out there to support that it was a better jet than the F-4. And the F-4 was such a versatile jet that it had to do so much, under very difficult circumstances, I would imagine that those missions were not as "romantic" and classically epic as just the dogfight missions that the Mirage/Nesher had in October 1973. It would not surprise me therefore if pilots associated the Mirage with these missions and had high morale flying them. This is just my wild speculation.

Israeli pilots talk about their Mirages much like RAF pilots talk about their Spitfires - they say it was a joy to fly. They praise it for being very responsive and intuitive. It just “felt right” and leading ace Giora Epstein repeatedly stated that it was much more fun to fly than his F-16A (in spite of the latter being far more capable). He actually stated that the F-16A was not fun enough for him…

I can relate to that because the F-4E will most likely be the most modern module I will ever buy in DCS (except Kfir which is about equal). I don’t like modern jets that are more of a flying systems package held together by an aircraft.

F-4E was far more capable than the Mirage in every aspect except close dogfights, where they were about equal or a slight advantage to the Mirage. This is the opinion of many ace pilots who flew both into combat, and flew dissimilar dogfights in training using both against each other. I have never heard any one of them who claimed the opposite that the F-4E was a better dogfighter.

[SgtPappy]

4 hours ago, Bozon said:

F-4E was far more capable than the Mirage in every aspect except close dogfights, where they were about equal or a slight advantage to the Mirage. This is the opinion of many ace pilots who flew both into combat, and flew dissimilar dogfights in training using both against each other. I have never heard any one of them who claimed the opposite that the F-4E was a better dogfighter.

Modern aircraft are amazing in their own right, but I'm absolutely in the same boat as you. These older jets are more interesting to me.

I have noticed there isn't much out there on the slatted F-4 vs Mirage III in terms of Israeli pilot opinion, but lots of raw data and comparison with similar platforms infer it has better 2-circle performance than the Mirage III. There's a lot of anecdotal evidence of the Mirage being a better dogfighter but then again, the majority of F-4s by October 1973 were hard/BLC winged.

 

Trends from anecdotes may very well be at least partly a result of human psychology and physiological responses and not just solely aircraft performance. If you'll entertain this idea:

Mathematically, the Mirage III's only advantage vs the slatted F-4E would be instantaneous turn rate (and maybe max AoA?) when both planes are in a fully air-to-air configuration and maybe Israeli doctrine for air to air combat prioritized that. After all, they were flying the Mirage for a longer time and adapted themselves well to the its advantages. The F-4 also required lots of force on the stick, per anecdotes with the Blue Angels, so it also wouldn't be surprising if the Mirage simply felt lighter which would make it easier to handle in a dogfight for longer periods - a pilot could reasonably conclude this with better max turn rate would infer a better "dogfighter".

 

To your point, Epstein preferred his Mirage III over the F-16 (great fun factor!) and I've also heard F-4/F-15 pilot Moshe Melnik comment on a similar thing saying that the "F-16 flies itself" so anecdotes are good for pilot opinion but don't always get us very far if we're trying to determine certain aspects of aircraft DACT. They need to be combined with context and data for a conclusion. 

Edited January 31 by SgtPappy

[ponys123]

On 1/30/2024 at 4:01 PM, Gunfreak said:

it's the ability to run in on a Vietnamese bridge guarded by a billion AAA pices. Coming low over the jungle clad hills.

having a digital RWR kinda spoils the proper experience when you've got guidelines to contend with

Edited January 31 by ponys123

[Temetre]

Am 30.1.2024 um 11:04 schrieb MBot:

I think it it is interesting how strongly many associate the F-4E with Vietnam. From the Heatblur F-4E manual:

In detail, the USAF confirmed 21 kills.

In combat, the Israeli Air Force downed 116 jets.

The IRIAF shot down 83 aircraft.

Tbh I think a lot of people here got a quite america- or at least vietnam-centric view.  

vor 1 Stunde schrieb ponys123:

having a digital RWR kinda spoils the proper experience when you've got guidelines to contend with

That is DCS though. The plane variants are so exact, you almost never get a perfect matchup for anything. Thats just not possible.

The F-4E well get is imo a good choice because its quite versatile, especially if you limit equipment.

Edited January 31 by Temetre