What is the best fighter jet sans missiles?

In My Humble Opinion
1

If you were to pit the world’s various fighter jets against each other, but remove their air-to-air missiles, who would come out on top?

It seems as though present-day fighter jets effectiveness relies on the ability to knock out the other guy from farther away than he can knock you out. Thus, it almost seems to be very similar to submarine combat- whoever sees the other guy first, and pulls the trigger first, wins.

Most of the modern-day jetfighter dogfights have seemed rather one-sided. Missiles have become so sophisticated that it seems like in 99% of cases, once a missile is in the air the battle is pretty much over. I once asked why pilots don’t eject BEFORE the missile hits their jet- from my prespective the situation seemed pretty hopless and personally I’m not about to wait for a missile to hit and possibly get burned to a cinder/exploded/etc before I could eject.

Anyway, if we took away the missiles, would it change the standings? I know the Russians have built some pretty amazing aircraft that are insanely maneuverable; I was very impressed with air show footage of planes like super flankers doing backflips and other bizarre maneuvers I wouldn’t assume an airplane to be capable of. On the Military channel they were talking about US vs Germany war games, and it seemed like guns still played a pretty good part of the battle.

2

Hard to say really as guns are not the favored dogfight weapon in modern fighters. I was told in weapons school that at least for the US the short range, infrared seeking, AIM-9 Sidewinder missle has gotten more kills than guns and all other missles combined. Part of the reason it is so effective is that having a totally passive tracking system there is no signal to tip off the target that it’s coming as with radar guided missles. That and being launched from closer range mean little or no time to evade or eject. US pilots certainly train with guns but 'winders are what work.

Guns dominated in US vs Germany as effective AA missles were virtually nonexistant.

3

What, in WW2? Too darn right. All you had back then in terms of missiles were fire-and-forget rockets that you lobbed into bomber streams in the hope that they would go Bang near enough to something to damage it. Hitting a single plane, especially a fighter, would have been a pipe-dream.

Excuse me if my opening question is inane, but over here we rather resist the notion of a uniquely “US vs Germany” armed conflict ever having existed. :slight_smile:

4
      • Most air-to-air combat is fought with missiles now, from beyond visual range.
        …
  • But ignoring missiles, as of a few years back the Russian air-superiority jets had more thrust, higher top speeds and could turn harder than the US planes, or anyone else’s–but–the Russian planes also had significantly less operating range, because they were not as fuel-efficient. They were designed to be operated locally (to Russia or occupied areas) and so be well-supplied, and fuel economy was not considered to be as important an aspect of the designs.
  • In WWII, the German Me 262 Messerschmitt was the first turbine aircraft, and at the time, also the fastest–it was so much faster than the other propeller-driven fighter aircraft at the time that even in a full power-dive, they could not catch up to it. In spite of that, a bunch of ME-262’s still got shot down, and back then nobody had missiles.
    ~
5

I might be way off base here, but if we’re talking no missiles at all, I think the old A10 Thunderbolt tankbuster might be a contender. It’s slow as hell but it turns very tightly and it can take a beating, unlike just about anything else in the sky. Try and stay on its tail and it’ll out-turn you, wind up on yours instead and treat you to burst of 30mm shells designed to take out tanks. Try and keep your distance and it’ll survive your cannon long enough to turn to face, and again you’re facing a bloody big gatling gun.

6

Having seen the Thunderbirds perform a low-speed low-altitude show, I would expect that an F-16 would make short… well, long and excruciating work out of an A-10. The F-16 controls all the variables that matter, and I think “keeping your distance” is exactly the tactic that is likely to work. An F-16 could essentially make strafing runs on an A-10, dropping speed to engage and then sprinting up and out of range after each run. You’re right that it would likely take several passes… but the F-16 would probably win.

You could also argue that the SR-71 would “win” any engagement because it could push other planes around with its shockwaves.

7

I don’t think today’s modern fighters can stay on it’s tail. All it has to do it go it’s minimum speed, and the other fighters won’t be able to stay behind. Once they pass it, it lets loose with the 30mm.

8

I love how these discussions take on the dynamic of “could a werewolf beat up a vampire.” :rolleyes: Really guys, it would be insteresting to pit an A-10 and an F-16 against each other but I expect the vast speed disparity would make it pretty boring to watch as it probably makes it much harder for each plane to engage the other. Add to that the A-10’s fire control isn’t setup for air to air targets but ground targets that move much slower if at all.

You can’t easily compare modern planes with those in WWII when it comes to gunfighting. Back then pilots used a rudimentary gunsight and tracers to help them zero in on a target. The M-61 gun found in most modern fighters holds about 600 rounds but because of the way it cyles it’s only good for about six - 50 round bursts. The unspent rounds are fed back into the drum but they can’t be used. That works well for A-G where you can line up with a real time gunsight that tells you where your bullets are going to hit before you pull the trigger but considerably more difficult with A-A targets when you can only touch the trigger six times. I know all the BS about lerning to fight with guns from Top Gun. I was working at Miramar on F-14s when it was being made and knew some of the pilots listed in the credits. I also saw how difficult it was for them to hit A-A targets in gunnery practice and that is towed banner moving in a straight line in front of them.

Skill is going to be a bigger factor than having the best plane IMHO and that skill is hard to come by. Lots of pilots in WWII built up enough experience but they were just the opposite end of the bell curve from the guys who became a statistic their first time out.

9

I think that Padeye has it, that the fight is going to come down to pilot skill probably more than what airplane you’re flying, but as an airplane nut, I’ve got to throw out some contenders.

A-4 Skyhawk - Nimble, fast, twin 20mm cannons in the wing root. To the best of my knowledge, no US Skyhawk ever scored a gun kill, one did score a MiG kill in Vietnam using a 3" unguided Zuni rocket.

F-8 Crusader - Very maneuverable, lots of power, high top speeds, 4 20mm guns in the nose. Nicknamed “the last of the gunfighters”, was one of the last US fighters to be designed with guns before the “missiles only” design phase of the 1950’s took over. I think only a couple of Crusader MiG kills in Vietnam were actually guns only, the rest were AIM-9 Sidewinder kills.

F-86 Sabre - Nimble, had design charecteristics that were more forgiving of pilot error than the MiG-15, 6 .50 caliber machine guns in the nose. Best remembered dueling it out in “MiG Alley” over North Korea, last US airplane to have a lot of its’ pilots as multiple aces.

F-5 series - In a similar class to the A-4 Skyhawk, these were used, along with the A-4’s, as adversary aircraft at Top Gun and other places that taught air combat. Also used as the black “MiG’s” in the movie Top Gun.

A-1 Skyraider - 4 20mm cannons in the wings. While not a jet, it was designed at the end of WWII as a Naval attack plane, the Skyraider served in Korea and Vietnam doing what it did best, ground attack and close air support. 2 Naval Skyraiders were MiG killers as well.

If I had to pick a jet to do guns only combat in, I’d pick the F-86 first, followed by the A-4 Skyhawk.

D. Pirahna

10

Well, yeah. It pretty much has to, given the artificial nature of the situation posed by the OP. It’s kinda fun though! I freely admit that on this subject I’m speculating my ass off, and to some degree talking through it. The input of posters like yourself who have an informed opinion and can cut through the bullshit is appreciated.

Now, let’s say the werewolf has a stake and the vampire has a silver dagger…

11

Oh, I didn’t say it wasn’t fun. Howzabout a vampire who was trained at navy fighter weapons school (call sign “Chocula”) in an F-8 vs. a werewolf from Red Flag in an F-106?

12

If the fight takes place at low-level, and the F-106 has the “Six-Shooter” mode with the gatling gun in the weapons bay (for this discussion, it has to), then I’ll take the F-106.

D. Pirahna

13

In that case you might want to consider the Folland Gnat , AKA the “Sabre Killer”.

14

This seems to be more a matter of opinion than fact, so I’ll move this thread to the IMHO forum.

bibliophage
moderator GQ

15

Former F-16 pilot here …

We could slaughter Viet Nam-era and before jet fighters with kill ratios of 20 to 1 using just the gun & our radar. Any idea that an F-4 or F-8 or F-86 would last for more than a minute or so is crazy. There is NOTHING about those aircraft that is even 50% as good as an F-16 or F-18 for gun-to-gun one-on-one combat. If you go for a more realistic guns only scenario but with 2 of us vs 2 of them, it gets even more lopsided. Ditto 4 vs 4.

As to F-16 vs F-18, I’d give the edge to the F-18, but it’s not so one-sided that a better F-16 driver couldn’t win over a lesser F-18 driver.

I’ve been out of the service long enough that I don’t have first-hand experieince in dealing with Mig-29 / Su-27 / Eurofighter Typhoon / Rafale type aircraft. My understanding is the Russians have awesome low-speed manueverability but are a little weaker in fire control & definitely weaker in range/endurance. I’d suggest that they’d be a good match for F-16/-18 class jets, with the winner determined more by skill and/or tactics than the jet itself.

The Typhoon and Rafale, if gun equipped, would be comparable to the F18, maybe slightly better.
As to A-10s… My unit did a lot of wrasslin with them. We called it “Hog poppin’; the sport of Kings”. They are quite hard to kill because they operate comfortably at speeds and alitiudes we don’t. OTOH, they almost couldn’t hurt us, PROVIDED we used good tactics that minimized our vulnerabilities.

You cannot avoid squirting out in front of them on each pass, which exposes you to their gun. Their gun is one hell of a weapon, but without a radar and air-to-air computing gunsight, they’re hard pressed to aim it well. If you sit still out in front of them at close range, they’ll hammer you. If you keep moving, they’ll spend a lot of ammo shooting where you aren’t.

IF they are armed with AIM-9s, which was a new program when I was leaving the USAF, they are VERY dangerous to fast fighters. Absent the AIM-9s, they’re more like a snappig turtle. Much stronger on defense than on offense, but if you put your hand in front of their face, they’ll bite the shit outta you.

Bottom line on A-10s. You can evenutally kill most of them most of the time, but it takes a lot of time and fuel and ammo. Inconclusive engagements were common, where somebody had to leave the fight due to fuel/ammo before either side got a kill. We could withdraw at will, but they couldn’t run away fast eenough to get away. if we encountered them low on fuel or ammo, it was just a matter of waiting until they had to run and then swatting them.

During the protracted engagement which more-or-less anchors you in one spot over the ground, you’re exposed to their support fighters, if any. Circling on one area for very long is dangerous when their reinforcements can close on a fixed spot at 10 miles per minute. Long engagements also contain an ever-increasing risk of hitting the ground.
As to the idea that most combat is now beyond visual range with missiles, not true AFAIK. To avoid shooting down your own folks or innocents, most ROE still require the pilots to see the enemy, confirm his aircraft type, then start shooting. In the real world with multi-aircraft formations, you can send 2 guys out front to ID the enemy and have the other 8 guys well behind hose off a volley of missiles once the ID is made. In the artificial one-on-one scenario of the OP, that won’t work.
Finally, as to bailing out when a missile approaches, three thoughts:

  1. Often you have no idea it’s coming until it hits. You may or may not have warning that some radar is targetting you, but a radar doesn’t guarantee there’s a missile behind it. Unless you can see it, you have no way of judging the closure rate or whether it’s after you or somebody else nearby. They’re small, fast, and usually aren’t smoking by the time they get near where you are. Spotting one is very, very hard.

  2. Despite Hollywood & some carefully edited Pentagon PR footage, missiles aren’t perfect death rays. Figure 80% success at best in combat conditions. If I know it’s coming, there are a lot of things I can do to drive that percentage down to more like 30%. Jumping out instead of evading gives the enemy a 100% effective weapon.

  3. It’s cowardly to run in the face of the enemy. I’d shoot a man who did that. So would most of the rest of the combat military officers.

16

lol! That was certainly the case in Strike Commander (when I was pretty rubbish at video games) I remember it took out all my missiles with countermeasures or started blasting at me from long range :stuck_out_tongue:

How’s about the Hawker Harrier for extra manoeuverbility?

17

Does an X-Wing count?

18

We feel the same way just north of the US.

19

Bah! The best plane EVAR!!!11oneone is the Avro Arrow. Ask any Canadian. They’ll tell you.

20

For pure guns, I’d go with the Harrier for the low-speed manoeuverability. However, since it’s not particularly fast, it’s not a plane that can successfully flee an engagement without help - either you win or you die. That Raptor will just boom and zoom, but the Harrier will turn on a dime and take the killer snapshot.

BTW the issue of the Typhoon’s gun is interesting.