(Luft) McDonnell Douglas / Boeing F-15

[Quintus Fabius]

Unter Volker Rühe noch im vergangenen Jahrhundert wurde der Bundeswehr explizit die F-15 angeboten. Auch so eine vertaene Chance, den man hätte meiner Ansicht nach die F-15 leichter evolutionär weiter entwickeln können als den Eurofighter und stünde heute damit meiner Meinung nach deutlich kampfstärker dar.

https://warontherocks.com/2019/06/f-15ex...er-debate/

F-15EX: The Strategic Blind Spot in the Air Force’s Fighter Debate

The modern F-15E shows how neatly compartmentalizing fighters into “generations” can be misleading and subconsciously shape our perceptions. Consider the fifth-generation F-35’s much-lauded sensor fusion. This is enabled by computing power, software, sensors, and algorithms; all items with high potential to scale to other platforms — and they have. Despite the hype, the reality is that almost all current fighters have had some form of sensor fusion for the better part of a decade. In fact, the newest, largest, and most capable radar and the highest computing power on a U.S. aircraft aren’t on a fifth-generation fighter — they’re on the F-15E.

In the time I’ve flown the F-15E I’ve seen it progress through seven major operational software updates (called suites) and various hardware upgrades, each more integrated and potent than the last. When the next software upgrade arrives it will have even more sensors and hardware. In fact, the only limitation keeping it from achieving sensor fusion on par with the F-35 is its cockpit displays. As an example of how sequestration and funding instability drive incoherent budget choices, nearly $12 billion in aforementioned F-15E sensor upgrades are still stubbornly pushed through 1980s displays that use cathode-ray tubes to produce low-quality analog video that aren’t even all color, let alone digital, touchscreen, or high-resolution. The impressive F-35 cockpit has all of this, and that makes all the difference. The F-15EX enhanced cockpit displays mirror the newest displays coming to both F/A-18 Block III and F-35 Block 4, mostly because they are all made by the same company.

Adaption, not innovation, is the compelling variable in rapidly linking emergent strategies with deliberate strategies in strategic competition.

Though the F-15 airframe was designed to be solely an air superiority fighter, it has been used to shoot down satellites, fly to 100,000 feet, manually pilot rocket-powered precision bombs onto targets before GPS, employ stealth cruise missiles, shoot over-the-horizon anti-ship missiles, simultaneously employ multiple 5,000 lb. bunker busters, and fly 800 miles per hour just 100 feet above the ground, at night, in the weather — on autopilot. It’s even been turned into a thrust vectoring Mach 2 NASA flight test vehicle capable of taking off at just 42 mph and landing on less than 1,700 feet of runway. None of these uses were a product of the F-15’s original capabilities. Rather, they came from adaption, which was in turn built off knowledge gained from hundreds of thousands of flight hours and decades of flight science research with a platform with enabling attributes.

Earlier this year, Air Force officials caught the attention of defense media when they mentioned that the F-15EX could potentially be used as a hypersonics launch platform. Fighter-launched hypersonic weapons are an interesting example of creating a new disruptive effect via adaption. Similarly, the defense world took notice when Russia announced that MiG-31 fighters had already launched a dozen hypersonic weapons in testing. Using F-15s to launch hypersonic weapons is not hard, mostly because it’s not new. In 2002 DARPA’s HyFly program sought to launch a 400-mile Mach 6 hypersonic from an F-15E, and in 2007 NASA used an F-15B as a Mach 5 hypersonic research test bed.

Another ingenious example of adaption comes from the Israeli Air Force, which has used the F-15 to launch medium-range air-launched ballistic missiles as test targets for over a decade. The largest is the Silver Sparrow, a 27-foot long, 6,900 lb. missile that has an apogee 90 miles high (for perspective, space starts at 62 miles). Though it’s already proven on the F-15, there is nothing remotely comparable in the U.S. inventory today.

Regardless of how the Pentagon arrived at this juncture, there is an important choice ahead. While Congress appears to be at least somewhat supportive of F-15EX procurement, the global environment demands we think in a new way. The F-15EX has all the potential to be the disruptive force in strategic competition that the Air Force sorely needs, albeit in a dramatically different fashion than anyone has been discussing.

The urgency in war is often lost during times of peace. In a world of long-term, ever-shifting competition with our adversaries watching, are they likely to take notice if we pursue more of the same following the same predicable routine? Or will something genuinely disruptive — a novel, adaptive re-envisioning of an important platform’s capabilities — give them pause?