Asagiri-class destroyer vs Mig-27/Su-17M4 1990

destiple

Banned
Asagiri is a modern destroyer of the 80s
its armed with decent AAW weapons the Sea sparrow ( I believe with 2 illuminators ) and CIWS x 2

year is 1990 and the ship is being attacked by 6 aircraft
3 x Mig-27 and 3 x Su-17
they are armed with a mix of AS-10,AS-12 and AS-14 missiles and some LGBs.The missiles are very short range and have no sea skimming capability obviously

Can the destroyer defend itself against 6 threats if they are detected at the same time?
Did the Mig-27 and Su-17 VVS versions carry any defensive gear to avoid the SAMs?

if you think it can easily dispatch the 6 threats then how many such strike planes ( fitter and flogger type) would be needed to overwhelm its defenses



thanks
 

SsgtC

Banned
No. Sea Sparrow is a short range, point defense weapon only. It cannot provide area defense. You need Standard Missiles for that. Against aircraft like the MiG-27 and SU-17, even SM-1s are adequate. But with only Sea Sparrow and Phalanx, that destroyer is Fucked, with a capital "F."

Edit: Also, with only two illuminators, it can only engage two targets at a time. Sea Sparrow is a beam rider. It needs a constant radar beam to ride from launch to intercept. So no cycling the beam between missiles like you can with the Standard family. And with at least 12 hostile inbound missiles, that's a recipe for disaster. You better pray that the Chaff dispensers work and that the missiles are easily fooled
 
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destiple

Banned
Thanks you are our resident naval expert I believe !
Is it true that only 2 illuminators were per ship ? I was making that assumption based on RN and soviet ships

How will this be different if this ship had SM-1 standard missile ?
 
Kh-25 (AS-10) has a range of about 10 kms which is about the same range as the Sea Sparrow - so some risk to the attacking aircraft

The Anti Radiation variant which is the AS-12 has a greater range upto 40 KMs according to some sources - zero risk to the attacking aircraft - generally used to attack SAM sites not sure how it would work vs a maneuvering DD?

The Kh-29 (SS-14) is a better weapon - with larger warhead and depending on the version between 10 - 30 KMs - zero risk to the attacking aircraft - and this warhead is likely to at minimum mission kill the DD with a single hit if it defeats the vessels ECM, Chaff and Phalanx CIWS

LGBs obviously would obliged the attacking AC to come in range of the ships weapons - high risk to the attacking AC
 

SsgtC

Banned
Oh I'm far from the expert. Lol. There are a lot of people here who know more about naval affairs than I do. Digging into the Sea Sparrow though, it likely only had a single illuminator. Either the Mk-115 manually aimed radar (shown below) which was basically useless at night or in bad weather. Or the Mk-95, which was an automated version of the Mk-115. There's one other issue. The Asagiri mounted only a single Sea Sparrow launcher with 8 missiles. So even with a 100% success rate, they can't shoot down every incoming missile.

Edit: With the SM-1, you have a far larger engagement window (it actually outranges the anti ship missiles the aircraft are carrying), a (slightly) more maneuverable missile, and I think it had a bigger warhead.

1280px-_Sea_Sparrow_Mark115_Fire_Control_Director.jpg
 
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IIRC Russian PGMs were not what one could call precision at first.

Perhaps not, but they were certainly good enough to hit a destroyer-sized ship. The crew of the Eilat would agree.

Edit: I agree there would be failures and misses, but out of 12-24 missiles (assuming each aircraft carries 2-4) I think enough would hit to render the point moot.
 

destiple

Banned
their hit probability for a modern warship like Asagiri employing countermeasures would likely be 1 in 8 I'm assuming
and approx 2 PGM are carried per mig-27/su-17 (the su-24 can carry 3 x AS-14s max)

I mean if we compare this to the attacks on Antelope and Coventry by A-4 and Mirages armed with essentially dumb bombs then I think that is the closest example in the modern era i.e after 1973
 

destiple

Banned
Kh-25 (AS-10) has a range of about 10 kms which is about the same range as the Sea Sparrow - so some risk to the attacking aircraft

The Anti Radiation variant which is the AS-12 has a greater range upto 40 KMs according to some sources - zero risk to the attacking aircraft - generally used to attack SAM sites not sure how it would work vs a maneuvering DD?

The Kh-29 (SS-14) is a better weapon - with larger warhead and depending on the version between 10 - 30 KMs - zero risk to the attacking aircraft - and this warhead is likely to at minimum mission kill the DD with a single hit if it defeats the vessels ECM, Chaff and Phalanx CIWS
I was under the impression that range for all AS-10/12/14 was approx 8-10 km

The Anti-radiation missile might home in on the ships radar if they are turned on ?
 
No. Sea Sparrow is a short range, point defense weapon only. It cannot provide area defense. You need Standard Missiles for that. Against aircraft like the MiG-27 and SU-17, even SM-1s are adequate. But with only Sea Sparrow and Phalanx, that destroyer is Fucked, with a capital "F."

Edit: Also, with only two illuminators, it can only engage two targets at a time. Sea Sparrow is a beam rider. It needs a constant radar beam to ride from launch to intercept. So no cycling the beam between missiles like you can with the Standard family. And with at least 12 hostile inbound missiles, that's a recipe for disaster. You better pray that the Chaff dispensers work and that the missiles are easily fooled

Emphasis mine; this isn't accurate, a true beam rider has to "capture" the in-flight missile within its path or it'll go ballistic (e.g. Talos). The Sea Chicken did start off guiding from a Mk 25 trainable radar, but it only had to be slewed in the general direction of an inbound for the missile to guide and hit, Doppler shift was visible to the bird even without centering the beam on target.

That being said, it's still a crappy, unreliable system that'd leave an Asagiri somewhat boned if faced with an air raid as described. Sea Sparrow (more accurately, BPDMS) was a kit-bash reaction to the Eilat sinking, not a comprehensive solution to the anti-ship missile problem.
 

SsgtC

Banned
Emphasis mine; this isn't accurate, a true beam rider has to "capture" the in-flight missile within its path or it'll go ballistic (e.g. Talos). The Sea Chicken did start off guiding from a Mk 25 trainable radar, but it only had to be slewed in the general direction of an inbound for the missile to guide and hit, Doppler shift was visible to the bird even without centering the beam on target.

That being said, it's still a crappy, unreliable system that'd leave an Asagiri somewhat boned if faced with an air raid as described. Sea Sparrow (more accurately, BPDMS) was a kit-bash reaction to the Eilat sinking, not a comprehensive solution to the anti-ship missile problem.
Yeah, I should have been a little more precise there in my terminology.
 
Asagiri is a modern destroyer of the 80s
its armed with decent AAW weapons the Sea sparrow ( I believe with 2 illuminators ) and CIWS x 2

year is 1990 and the ship is being attacked by 6 aircraft
3 x Mig-27 and 3 x Su-17
they are armed with a mix of AS-10,AS-12 and AS-14 missiles and some LGBs.The missiles are very short range and have no sea skimming capability obviously

Can the destroyer defend itself against 6 threats if they are detected at the same time?
Did the Mig-27 and Su-17 VVS versions carry any defensive gear to avoid the SAMs?

if you think it can easily dispatch the 6 threats then how many such strike planes ( fitter and flogger type) would be needed to overwhelm its defenses



thanks


Why don't you buy a copy of this and game it out.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/...r__Naval_Operations_WOTY/?snr=1_7_7_151_150_1
 
Even a modern defence system like the Aegis or the European PAAMS will make the crew sweat with 6 attacking aircraft at once. If a ship launches 6 missiles at once (PAAMS can launch up to 8 at once not sure about Aegis) you need 100% hit rate which might happen regulary in the simulator but I bet its less than 100% in real life.

If you miss one or two then you best hope the close in defence and Chaff is working and I am not sure how good they would be in 1990.
 
Even a modern defence system like the Aegis or the European PAAMS will make the crew sweat with 6 attacking aircraft at once. If a ship launches 6 missiles at once (PAAMS can launch up to 8 at once not sure about Aegis) you need 100% hit rate which might happen regulary in the simulator but I bet its less than 100% in real life.

If you miss one or two then you best hope the close in defence and Chaff is working and I am not sure how good they would be in 1990.
I’m not sure how many missiles AEGIS can launch at once, but the terminal targeting rate is limited to how many AN/SPG-62 guidance radars are on board; four on a Tico, three on a Burke.
 
I’m not sure how many missiles AEGIS can launch at once, but the terminal targeting rate is limited to how many AN/SPG-62 guidance radars are on board; four on a Tico, three on a Burke.

I thought AEGIS needed only to paint the target with its guidance RADAR give the missile initial target data then the missile did its own final targetting, the guidance RADAR switching rapidly between targets.

Thats from wiki so usual warnings apply
 
I thought AEGIS needed only to paint the target with its guidance RADAR give the missile initial target data then the missile did its own final targetting, the guidance RADAR switching rapidly between targets.

Thats from wiki so usual warnings apply
Er, no. All US SAMs at the time, and in fact most of its current inventory, were Semi-Active Radar Homing; they needed that terminal radar guidance. The big difference with the AEGIS/Standard-2 combo was that the AN/SPY-1 could direct the missiles in most phases of flight and also keep track of the targets, so that you could have many missiles in the air all accurately streaking towards the target, and only use the specific guidance radars for the terminal phase. Prior systems required a continuous lock-on from the guidance radars through the entire flight phase.
 
Er, no. All US SAMs at the time, and in fact most of its current inventory, were Semi-Active Radar Homing; they needed that terminal radar guidance. The big difference with the AEGIS/Standard-2 combo was that the AN/SPY-1 could direct the missiles in most phases of flight and also keep track of the targets, so that you could have many missiles in the air all accurately streaking towards the target, and only use the specific guidance radars for the terminal phase. Prior systems required a continuous lock-on from the guidance radars through the entire flight phase.

Emphasis mine; on top of all that, the time requirement for illuminating a target in the terminal phase is classified, but very VERY short even in supersonic missile terms. So you could have a limited number of illuminator radars, but not lose practical interception ability through a combination of tiny dwell time requirements and time-sharing available outbounds. You could also have one or two ships shooting "blind" with Standards, with a third ship entirely doing intercept guidance without launching themselves.

To be fair, AEGIS isn't the only system that can do that, the New Threat Upgrade and related variants can make those kinds of shots with SM-2s, and even one or two an AEGIS hull couldn't. Ditto the other way around. However, both combat systems are dedicated area defense set-ups, and can/could handle several times the number of inbounds that Sea Sparrow ever could, even in a damaged or degraded state. Don't even mention post SPY-1A AEGIS or SAMPSON, they're even handier.

EDIT: The in-fleet SM-6 ERAM doesn't need terminal guidance, it has a built-in guidance system like that on the AMRAAM, so there's at least one missile that can make a hit sans outside guidance (although that's just one, somewhat recent example).
 
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