07-11-2022, 08:48 AM
https://www.yahoo.com/news/russian-fight...05106.html This is an element that has been startlingly absent from the Russian ORBAT in the Ukraine conflict. The article discusses the use of the Mainstay in the context of pinpointing ground targets. While it can do this, it isn't it's typical job (and maybe that's why they are practicing). Normally, it is used solely as a fighter direction asset for air defense. It has the capability to target basically everything that flies in Ukraine. Two such units can do this country-wide without needing to overfly Ukrainian territory anywhere. The Russians can do this, we have seen them do it. It should make the Ukrainian air force basically untenable.
To be clear, from what we have seen these aircraft do not directly task S-400 units and have limited (if any) interface to the Russian IAD. Obviously, from the Western point of view restricting the function in this way doesn't make sense and it is tacitly assumed that the Mainstay can indeed transfer targets to the IAD. AFAIK, we haven't seen this happen. It should be noted that administratively these two groups are totally disjoint. This may have more effects than one would think. What we have seen happen is very effective fighter direction that makes life very difficult (and often short) for opposing air forces, at least in exercises. That is what makes the absence of this aircraft from the news up until now very hard to understand.
My conjecture is that the Russians fear that if they use their AEW operating out of Russian (or Belarus, same thing in their view) airspace to direct fighters in the Ukraine, NATO would be justified in using our AEW to do the same operating out of NATO airspace. They may now believe it is appropriate to take such a step, or they may believe we are already doing it so there is nothing to lose. Possibly this is a one-off exercise and we won't see it again. In any case, it could make things much more "interesting" and get us all closer to a wider war. Not Good.
To be clear, from what we have seen these aircraft do not directly task S-400 units and have limited (if any) interface to the Russian IAD. Obviously, from the Western point of view restricting the function in this way doesn't make sense and it is tacitly assumed that the Mainstay can indeed transfer targets to the IAD. AFAIK, we haven't seen this happen. It should be noted that administratively these two groups are totally disjoint. This may have more effects than one would think. What we have seen happen is very effective fighter direction that makes life very difficult (and often short) for opposing air forces, at least in exercises. That is what makes the absence of this aircraft from the news up until now very hard to understand.
My conjecture is that the Russians fear that if they use their AEW operating out of Russian (or Belarus, same thing in their view) airspace to direct fighters in the Ukraine, NATO would be justified in using our AEW to do the same operating out of NATO airspace. They may now believe it is appropriate to take such a step, or they may believe we are already doing it so there is nothing to lose. Possibly this is a one-off exercise and we won't see it again. In any case, it could make things much more "interesting" and get us all closer to a wider war. Not Good.