Is stealth dead

[Persephone]

The USAF have spoken...stealth is alive and well.

Will stealth technology be able to keep up with advanced air defense systems? Even if yes, is it worth it?

Stealth technology is not going to be rendered obsolete anytime soon, a top US Air Force official says.

"Our adversaries are building capabilities to see stealth airplanes," says Gen Mike Hostage, commander of Air Combat Command, speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on 30 November. "But not at any faster rate than we're developing abilities to remain--not invisible, but able to deal with the relative visibility and invisibility."

Stealth, Hostage stresses, does not mean an aircraft is invisible. It just means the jet is much harder for an enemy to see. That enables the aircraft to get closer to the target it is trying to engage.

But while the US is making strides in making stealth aircraft even more difficult to detect and track, there are advances too in making low observable technology easier to maintain, Hostage says. A stealth aircraft inevitably takes more time and costs more to maintain than a non-stealthy aircraft, but the Lockheed Martin F-35 should be much easier to maintain than previous stealth aircraft. However, it will never be as easy to maintain as fourth-generation aircraft. "It will always be more expensive to maintain a stealthy airplane," Hostage says.

http://www.flightglobal.com/news/art...e-soon-379671/

[Pruitt]

Would the USAF lie? A lot of careers and retirements are staked on it. I won't come after long costly programs. It will come overnight when some other technology can find it.

Pruitt

[Glenn239]

Originally Posted by Pruitt

Would the USAF lie? A lot of careers and retirements are staked on it. I won't come after long costly programs. It will come overnight when some other technology can find it.

Pruitt

With the use of stealth not being 'obsolete' instead of not being 'obsolecent', they've covered their arse.

China and Russia seem to be investing a great deal of research and money in new stealthly birds. Can't imagine that's because both of them have written it off as done for.

[kek]

I think that this thing is more a political problem than operational. If you think F-35 and F-22 as a silver bullet to solve all possible problems in aerial warfare, then they are a failure. In dogfighting there are better aircraft. However if you think them as stealth bombers and in bvr combat as sort of extremely mobile sam-sites where they have someone else identify friend-or-foe, they excel

[PitchRate]

Originally Posted by kek

I think that this thing is more a political problem than operational. If you think F-35 and F-22 as a silver bullet to solve all possible problems in aerial warfare, then they are a failure. In dogfighting there are better aircraft. However if you think them as stealth bombers and in bvr combat as sort of extremely mobile sam-sites where they have someone else identify friend-or-foe, they excel

Actually there are several ways to do on-board beyond visual range (BVR) identification. One of the reasons the F-15s got a majority of the A-A kills in the Gulf war is because they had two forms of on-board ID. Two separate IDs were a requirement to launch BVR by the rules of engagement and many other fighters had to rely on AWACS or other means to get the required two IDs.

[GunzRX]

I've read about new tech that allows for most spectrums of light (except visible, for now) to be blocked but only in small dimensions so stealth is just starting.

[Mountain Man]

Once technology catches up with detecting stealthy aircraft, I predict a return to sophisticated jamming which will render detection systems useless once again.

Take a look at camouflage for a prime example. Camouflage reaches the point where armies could hide almost anything, so thermal imaging became the standard which negated optical camouflage...until "thermal jamming" became the norm - ordinance that creates heat blooms that render thermal sensors useless.

Meanwhile, the race for ever higher speeds and altitudes to defeat existing technology continues, but the day of the drone and the missile are upon us. The drone - growing ever smaller and now down to the size of a small bird/large insect - because they are almost invisible on the today's 4G battlefields, and the missiles because even though you can detect them, they travel too fast to do anything about, especially the long range ones.

The races will never stop because there will never be and end to conflict, but consider this:

Terrorists negate sophisticated systems by the oldest ploy in the book - they hide in place sight among innocent women and children. Even when we find them, we won't shoot them.

[GunzRX]

Originally Posted by Mountain Man

Once technology catches up with detecting stealthy aircraft, I predict a return to sophisticated jamming which will render detection systems useless once again.

Take a look at camouflage for a prime example. Camouflage reaches the point where armies could hide almost anything, so thermal imaging became the standard which negated optical camouflage...until "thermal jamming" became the norm - ordinance that creates heat blooms that render thermal sensors useless.

Meanwhile, the race for ever higher speeds and altitudes to defeat existing technology continues, but the day of the drone and the missile are upon us. The drone - growing ever smaller and now down to the size of a small bird/large insect - because they are almost invisible on the today's 4G battlefields, and the missiles because even though you can detect them, they travel too fast to do anything about, especially the long range ones.

The races will never stop because there will never be and end to conflict, but consider this:

Terrorists negate sophisticated systems by the oldest ploy in the book - they hide in place sight among innocent women and children. Even when we find them, we won't shoot them.

Doesn't mean you can't chase them down, and put them in a headlock.

[Anlushac11]

I had read that Russia had developed a airborne L-band radar system that could detect stealth aircraft. The problem is you need to be actively painting the target thus giving your position away.

The other drawback was the L-band system had horrible resolution, about all the radar operator could say was they are thata way.

[Pruitt]

Actually the older radar sets (around WW II and Korea era) can pick up stealth aircraft because they have different band widths. Stealth is only "invisible" to certain spectrum. Who has these older sets? The former Soviet Union!

Pruitt

[Nickuru]

With the GeoPositionalSatellite system concealment is a problem. You are not going to be under the radar systems like the Argentine airforce during the Falklands war of 1982. Whatever you do, it will be known. Now it is time to practice a campaign of deception

[PitchRate]

Originally Posted by Nickuru

With the GeoPositionalSatellite system concealment is a problem. You are not going to be under the radar systems like the Argentine airforce during the Falklands war of 1982. Whatever you do, it will be known. Now it is time to practice a campaign of deception

I’m not sure I understand your post. Are talking about geosynchronous orbit (GSO) satellites?