by Gecko 6, 57th VFS Grave Dancers

2. Low altitude threats

The DPRK finds the nastiest, cheating, low life scum of the earth and issues them SA-7s. The not so bad mojos get a ZSU position. In my past article I advised pilots to avoid certain areas on your ingress and egress for this reason. The DPRK place the units anywhere that might be a possible flight path.

One mission I flew took me around a good-sized mountain. I looked right to see my clearance from terra firma and saw a smoke trail heading at me almost perpendicular to my AC. The impact was enough to close my 20' distance between my AC and the mountain turning me into a dirt dart on the side of the mountain.

3. Unknown capabilities

Not much to explain here, always plug this into your formula.

TARCAP Patrols

The enemy is not stupid; they know what targets we are interested in. When I say TARCAPS I mean any aircraft that is in the target area meaning to do you harm. If you see several flights of enemy Migs and you have no escort then maybe you should pass on that mission.

Threat Analysis Formula

I have a simple formula that I use to rate the threat level for the target.

• S = 4 pts
• L = 3 pts
• U = ?
• T = 2 pts

Every instance of enemy batteries I assign the point value. Add up the total and divide by 4. This will give you the average threat level. Use the Unknown to decide if you can handle it or need to pass.

• 1 Battery of SA-2s= 4
• 2 Battalions of ZSU-57-2= 6
• Unknown number of IR = ?
• 1 Nearby Airbase = 2

Total: 12 / 4 = 3

• Level 4 = VERY HIGH
• Level 3 = HIGH
• Level 2 = LOW

Any target that has a rating of HIGH or above is almost guaranteed to have SA-7s in the area. Now that I have a clearer picture of the Threat I can make educated guesses on my attack profiles, routes, and load-outs. This is a tool and not gospel so use it as you see fit.

Click to continue

Emissions: Enemy

Not everything that the enemy will throw at you emits a signal alerting you of their presence. Your RWR is nice to have but do not trust it with your life.

Search radars, Tracking radars, and ATC radars are all your enemy. Just because you are picking up a search radar signal don't think you are safe from SAMs. SAM launchers are networked via a ground control radar system. Any radar can guide a missile as far as you are concerned. This is tough due to F4 not representing to you the signatures of search radars.

Emissions: Friendly

It is nice to fly low and fast in CCRP mode, but you might as well fly with your landing lights on! It will only take one EWR or EW rig to vector fighters to your area. Get into the habit of flying with radar snuffed. This is nerve racking and it is like going to school and forgetting to wear pants. Let your escort do the TWS scans and draw the attention to themselves. You are there to get steel on target, not to become an ACE.

Counter Measures

Chaff and flares are your best friends. Now that that has been said, realize that they are also worthless and sometimes worse than worthless.

Chaff is used to create a bigger more inviting target for the guidance radar to home in on. Most of the time it only works to limited effect.

Flares on the outer hand are more effective in their role. IR guided missiles are more susceptible to this type of decoy.

I am not going into different types of evasion methods and practices, but I will share my SOP for reference. I drop three in succession at a 2-second interval: one during my pop-up, another as I turn to my egress heading after release, and then again just before I duck down behind the nearest terrain feature.

Reaction

There is a simple yet very true statement I used a lot in the Army: "Stay Alert! Stay Alive!"

You can take the information I have given and use what you wish to better plan your attacks. Remember it takes a better pilot to pass on a target and live, then to die trying.

Join a discussion forum on this article by clicking   HERE.