This is true for the flight model and is especially true for the general scenario for a mission- why are these guys shooting at each other, and with what? This was always one thing that bothered me and thus dampened my enthusiasm for DID's F-22 ADF and TAW sims- the plausibility of the Sudan fielding cutting-edge fighters and equipment seemed more Dr. Seuss than Tom Clancy.

So, why in the hell are the available countries (Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, and the US) fighting over some obscure peninsula? It's obvious why SSI picked it- now it's up to you to figure out what everybody is tangling over. Here's the Briefing General Situation I came up with for my example mission.

As the brutal Russian crackdown in Chechnya grinds on and the economy stumbles aimlessly, anti-Russian sentiment has reached a fever pitch in the Ukraine. Even with this sentiment in the air, a swift, bloodless coup of the Ukrainian centrist government by a military-backed coalition has caught many off guard.

Russian nationals who have not already fled the country are being arrested by both Ministry of Internal Affairs militia troops and by self-proclaimed paramilitary squads. Caught on the ground and put under house arrest in his vacation dacha in the seaside town of Yevpatoria is Russian Admiral of the Fleet Grigori Velichko and his family.

A task force is assembled quickly and quietly to get him out. With Kunetsov carrier group (with AWACS support) off shore supporting a Marine Infantry unit that has taken and is holding the airfield at Saki, SPETSNAZ Special Forces enter Yevpatoria to free Velichko and his family. The plan calls for the SPETSNAZ to take down the small guard garrison and transport Velichko's entourage to a waiting transport at Saki Airport.

After the Illyushin is safely out of Ukrainian airspace, the SPETSNAZ will load up with the Marine Infantry unit on the waiting landing craft and retreat to the open sea- under the protective cover of the Kunetsov if necessary. Things seldom go as planned, however, and the SPETSNAZ team has been slowed down by stiffer than expected resistance. The sun is about to come up over the Crimean Peninsula as the team and entourage aboard confiscated IKARUS buses drive south down the narrow causeway, and the locals are getting restless...

Click to continue

OK, so Dale Brown has nothing to worry about, but you get the idea. My lust for realism could just be a personal problem. Nothing is stopping you if your scenario is a Turkish attack on Russia and the Ukraine, even if the end result would probably be the ability to clean Istanbul with a tanker of Windex and a squeegee the length of a football field. But it's a simulation, right?

The Mission Editor Interface

Firing up the ME, you see that the GUI is Windows-esque, very functional and businesslike, with nothing flashy. Pop-up windows and pull-down menus abound, and windows are available by hitting ctrl key modifiers. I love the clean design of the interface here. You can actually drag your cursor around easily, unlike the slow, stuttering, frustrating pointer movement of the Jane's USAF UME application. Another improvement over the USAF UME is the map view.

The theater map of the Crimea is full screen, and the windows are transparent. This allows the widest possible view of The Big Picture, while it is also possible to zoom all the way down to the unit level. Brewing up a good briefing is made a bit difficult, however, by the lack of place, city, and town names on the Crimean map in the Mission Editor. I like to know where I'm at, even if I don't have the slightest clue as to how to pronounce the name.

Good maps are available on several of the Flanker related web sites- I would suggest downloading one to help you navigate. Another feature that would be nice is a terrain elevation readout under the cursor like USAF has; this would make low-level flights through the mountains easier to plan.

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