Since the Russian-Ukrainian war lasted for more than 2 years, the Russian Aerospace Forces have gradually entered a state on the battlefield.
On the one hand, the efficiency of ground strikes has been greatly improved by popularizing FAB aerial bombs equipped with UMPK simple guidance kits, and on the other hand, they have continuously shot down the only remaining fighters of the Ukrainian army in the air.
The combat strength displayed by the Russian Aerospace Forces also directly woke up the United States, and the American military media WDMMA once said:
The Aerospace Forces are getting better
Compared with the Aerospace Forces at the beginning of the war, the current Aerospace Forces have finally done some things that the Air Force should do, and the Aerospace Forces have begun to use the Su-34NVO fighter-bombers that they have just received to drop FAB aerial bombs equipped with UMPK guidance kits.
【FAB Guided Bomb】
This very simple package not only gives Russia's astronomical reserves of FAB bombs the ability to strike accurately, but also gives this traditional free-fall bomb the ability to glide and strike.
According to the pilots of the Aerospace Forces, the maximum gliding range of the FAB-500 aerial bomb equipped with the UMPK kit is close to 70 kilometers, which allows the Russian fighters to drop bombs outside the effective range of the Ukrainian army's individual air defense missiles and field air defense systems, greatly reducing the possibility of Russian fighters being shot down.
The Aerospace Forces are currently frequently using such gliding guided bombs to launch air strikes on the entire front.
【FAB Guided Bomb】
Previously, the Russian army also installed the same guidance kit on the powerful FAB-3000 aerial bomb, which directly razed several Ukrainian strongholds detected by drones.
In addition to the gains in ground strikes, the Aerospace Forces recently won a long-lost victory in air combat, when Russian Su-35S fighters used R-37M ultra-long-range air-to-air missiles to shoot down a Su-27 fighter piloted by a Ukrainian ace pilot hundreds of kilometers away.
This once again confirms the technological crushing of fourth-and-a-half-generation fighters such as the Su-35S compared with the early fourth-generation aircraft.
[Su-35]
Although the Russian standard fourth-and-a-half-generation fighters have long been considered inferior to the fourth-and-a-half-generation fighters of the West and China, considering that the F-16A/B MLU that Ukraine is about to obtain is also a relatively early fourth-generation aircraft model, it is difficult for Western fighters to threaten the existing air superiority of the Russian army.
There is a high probability that the picture of the F-16 beating the Su-35S in the fantasy of many Ukrainian supporters will not appear, and it is difficult for the F-16 to break into the hinterland of the battlefield to launch a strike.
At present, the biggest role of the F-16 in Ukraine is the same as the Su-24 in the hands of the current Ukrainian army, acting as an air launch platform for long-range cruise missiles to hit targets in Russia.
The effect of the attack is definitely there, but if you want to rely on the F-16 to turn the tide of the battle, you should wash and sleep first.
[Ukraine accepts F-16]
Summarizing the performance of the Russian Aerospace Forces on the battlefield, the US military media WDMMA has warned that in the face of the Chinese Air Force, the combat capability and equipment level displayed by the Russian Aerospace Forces are still not worth mentioning.
The world's first air force changed hands
For a long time, the U.S. Air Force was considered the undisputed No. 1 Air Force in the world, but just 30 years later, the U.S. Air Force, the No. 1 Air Force, is no longer in a precarious position.
【U.S. Air Force】
While the Chinese Air Force has never boasted of its air power, the WDMMA believes that China is stronger than it seems, and its comprehensive capabilities have far surpassed those of the Russian Aerospace Forces, approaching or even reaching the same level as the U.S. Air Force.
For example, in the active fighter fleets of China and the United States, fourth-generation aircraft and four-and-a-half-generation fighters occupy the absolute main force, and the US Air Force has 864 F-16C/D fighters.
The oldest of these is the BLOCK40/42 batch, which was delivered in 1988, and the latest is the BLOCK70/72, the so-called F-16V, which will only start deliveries in 2024.
【F-16】
With an average age of 32 years, the entire F-16 fleet is no longer considered a new aircraft, and even the new F-16V was upgraded from the F-16C/D.
The U.S. Air Force pursues the principle of high and low matching, and as a high-end model, the F-15 currently has a total of 4 models in service, with a fleet size of 335 aircraft, including 117 F-15C/D MSIP II, 218 F-15E, and 2 F-15EX just delivered, which is also the latest model in the series.
Although it is true that there are quite a few in numbers, the F-15 and F-16 have the same problems, and the average age of the F-15C/D fleet has reached 37 years.
【F-15】
In the entire fourth-generation/fourth-generation half-generation fleet, there are only 218 F-15E and 2 F-15EX aircraft that are relatively young, and the Chinese Air Force, whether it is the J-10 or J-11 series, basically began to equip the troops on a large scale after 07 years, and the average age of the aircraft is less than 20 years.
Moreover, the Chinese Air Force is upgrading its fourth-generation fleet on a large scale, such as the J-10A, which has reached the standard of a fourth-and-a-half-generation fighter by replacing it with the JKL-24 active phased array radar.
[J-10 upgrade JKL-24 radar]
In the next few years, all fourth-generation aircraft of the Chinese Air Force will be upgraded to the four-and-a-half-generation standard, not to mention that the J-10C and J-16, which are in mass production, are originally four-and-a-half-generation fighters.
China has actually surpassed the U.S. Air Force in the quantity and quality of non-stealth fighters, not to mention that the Americans did not expect it, and the Chinese themselves did not expect that it would be possible to reverse the trend of Chinese and American air power in just a few years.
The Chinese Air Force is also not lagging behind in terms of fifth-generation aircraft, which are expected to be high-hoped, with the US Air Force equipped with a total of 535 fifth-generation aircraft, including two models, F-22A and F-35A.
【F-22】
However, 152 of the F-22s are far inferior to the PLA J-20 in terms of informatization and kill chain combat capability because of their early production and development time, and the F-22 cannot even complete the data link sharing with the F-35.
Moreover, some US Air Force insiders have disclosed that the proper rate of the F-22A fleet is only about half, which means that only more than 70 fighters in the 152 F-22A may be able to take to the air at any time, and the PLA has more than 300 J-20 aircraft.
[J-20 Fleet]
Although the F-35 is on par with the J-20 in terms of technical level, and has a certain advantage in terms of quantity because of the earlier equipment time, the F-35 is not an air superiority fighter, but emphasizes multi-purpose attributes.
In addition, the size of its mid-sized aircraft is very disadvantageous to compete with the J-20 for air supremacy, for example, the F-35A does not have a side bomb bay and cannot carry infrared combat missiles in a stealth configuration.
And considering China's exaggerated industrial production capacity, it is almost a sure thing that the number of equipment of the J-20 will surpass that of the F-35A in the future.
[J-20 production]
Once the U.S. Air Force is crushed in both quantity and quality of its advanced fighter fleet, how can it gain air superiority on the battlefield?
Sources:
[1] The formation and development of the Air Force of the Chinese People's Liberation Army. People's Daily Online [Quote date: 2021-09-06]
[2] No repairs: the U.S. Air Force B-2 fleet will drop to 19 aircraft. Observer.com.2024-05-11 [cited 2024-05-11]