How useless were the Luftwaffe's Alpha Jets?

uk 75

uk 75

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One of the things that always puzzled me in the 70s was how the West German Air Force replaced its NATO light fighter bomber competition winning Fiat G91 with the Dornier Dassault Breguet Alpha Jet.
The Germans had the money to buy a raft of different planes for this role ranging from Jaguars and AV8s to A4 and A7s. Yet they chose this simple lightweight.
Was this inspired or dumb or something in between? I ask here because I have never read an account of how it was regarded in service
 
Interesting question uk 75

I'm thinking it could have had a lot to do with the economy of scale that the Alpha Jet (both purchase, maintance, running costs......) offered - after all as much as the West German's were unquestionably the most committed and serious NATO country when it came to its own active defence, their finances weren't endless.
I'm guessing the two-engine safety/ redundency the Alpha Jet offered was a good choice for a ground attack aircraft, as was its warload capability for a little aircraft.
I think I remember reading somewhere that the Luftwaffe's Alpha Jet's were earmarked for anti-helicopter Fighter's over the battlefield, if and when the balloon went up.....
The duel nature of a training aircraft which could be employed in a combat role has always puzzled me somewhat, because as much as it make face valued sense, the notion of using and losing your principle training aircraft in combat seems to risky.

Regards
Pioneer
 
It was a cost effective solution, the RAF looked at the doing the same with their Hawks before the secondary air defence role was implemented a decade later in the early 1980s.
Trainers needed to lug around gun pods and bombs to train budding fighter pilots anyway so why not make use of them.
In answer to Pioneer's point, if the Soviets had begun rumbling across the IGB then it was a life and death situation where everything had to be committed. No use planning for the next intake of recruits when a conventional war could only be fought for a matter of weeks and when an escalated nuclear war meant quite potentially the endgame.
 
Don't underestimated the pork barrel issue, too - Dornier build half of the Alphajet with Dassault, hence job program. Much like the Jaguar btw, Dassault and Dornier ended selling Alphajets separately, competing with each others.
 
Pioneer said:
...the notion of using and losing your principle training aircraft in combat seems to risky...
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The thing is, the Alpha Jets assigned to the Jagdbombergeschwader weren't the Luftwaffe's primary fast-jet training aircraft - the T-38 Talons at Sheppard AFB were. Alpha Jets were used as weapons trainers at Luftwaffenkommando Beja in Portugal but, in Germany, not so much.

Beyond pork-barrelling, also keep in mind shifts in policy. Some elements in the Luftwaffe wanted more domestic (or at least European) air training, others were content to continue fast-jet training in America. The latter faction won out and German Alpha Jets went primarily to the JaBoG.

As for those alternative aircraft types, were any offered to West Germany for co-production? The Harrier would seem a good fit for the JaBoG but, early on, it had German rivals in the form of the EWR VJ 101 and VFW-Fokker VAK 191 programmes. The former tanked in 1968, the latter in 1972. For the Luftwaffe, that mean going all-in on the Tornado and, for economy, padding with the JaBo Alpha Jets. A what-if scenario to continue Luftwaffe V/STOL ambitions might have been UK-West German joint production and purchases of both the Harrier ('Habicht'?) and the Dornier Do 31 V/STOL tactical transport.

OT: I'd be curious to know if the Luftwaffe ever looked at improved rough field capabilities for the Alpha Jet (akin to Soviet Frontal Aviation). AFAIK, the Germans were content with operating from the Autobahnen if the balloon went up.
 
Also, didn't West Germany picked the Alphajet as a poor's man A-10 Whartog 8an aircraft they badly wanted but could not afford in large enough numbers) - in the antitank role with a ventral 30 mm gun pod ?
 
The Alpha Jet primary role is pilot training
That was first objective of the Program, The Luftwaffe and Arme de Air needed new Training aircraft
Secondary objective was light support aircraft for Luftwaffe F-104G bombers
next to that is the Alpha very popular by Acrobatic Patrol

Studies
Luftwaffe look into use of Alpha as Anti Helicopter aircraft, a role the Aircraft could manage, but it's ground logistic not supported needed mobility on battlefield
Dassault look into Lancier a Alpha as fighter bomber / Anti Ship aircraft
 
coanda,

there were German plans for an operational single seat version of the Alpha Jet, but the only example that I'm aware of that actually flew was a DFVLR (now DLR) demonstrator for Direct Side Force Control (DSFC) and Transonischer Tragflügel (transonic wing, TST) efforts.

Martin
 
OT: I'd be curious to know if the Luftwaffe ever looked at improved rough field capabilities for the Alpha Jet (akin to Soviet Frontal Aviation). AFAIK, the Germans were content with operating from the Autobahnen if the balloon went up.
[/QUOTE]

During prototype testing the aircraft was extensively tested using grass runways.
 
Michel Van said:
Studies
Luftwaffe look into use of Alpha as Anti Helicopter aircraft, a role the Aircraft could manage, but it's ground logistic not supported needed mobility on battlefield
Dassault look into Lancier a Alpha as fighter bomber / Anti Ship aircraft
Click to expand...

The type was extensively tested as an anti-helicopter aircraft (target helicoters were mostly German CH-53s), but it became apparent that the agility of a very low flying helicopter was unbeatable in such scenarios.
 
martinbayer said:
coanda,

there were German plans for an operational single seat version of the Alpha Jet, but the only example that I'm aware of that actually flew was a DFVLR (now DLR) demonstrator for Direct Side Force Control (DSFC) and Transonischer Tragflügel (transonic wing, TST) efforts.

Martin
Click to expand...

Martin, do you have further infos regarding the transsonic wing? Would have it made the jet slightly supersonic in a dive?
 
Basil said:
Martin, do you have further infos regarding the transsonic wing?
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that project is better known as Alpha Jet KWS in this forum
sr-somalphajetmodel-jpg.690807

More Here:
https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/dornier-alpha-jet-kws.6406/
 
Basil said:
The type was extensively tested as an anti-helicopter aircraft (target helicoters were mostly German CH-53s), but it became apparent that the agility of a very low flying helicopter was unbeatable in such scenarios.
Click to expand...

Agility doesn't matter in the case of surprise.

Helicopters were shot down with 30 mm ADEN guns in Falklands War and it wasn't difficult. The 27 mm Bk 27 has a much higher muzzle velocity, making aiming easier. Its rate of fire is higher, overall one BK 27 is probably about as lethal as were two ADENs.


That being said, Fw 190 was pitched against Fl 282 back WW2 and the Fw 190 didn't score a hit according to the shot camera.
 
lastdingo said:
Agility doesn't matter in the case of surprise.

Helicopters were shot down with 30 mm ADEN guns in Falklands War and it wasn't difficult. The 27 mm Bk 27 has a much higher muzzle velocity, making aiming easier. Its rate of fire is higher, overall one BK 27 is probably about as lethal as were two ADENs.


That being said, Fw 190 was pitched against Fl 282 back WW2 and the Fw 190 didn't score a hit according to the shot camera.
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Well, according to Vetter "Der Alpha Jet" the Luftwaffe did not proceed to use the aircraft in this role because of lack of success in shooting down helicopters and because of the danger of getting shot down by the helicopter's air-air missiles.
 
Basil said:
Martin, do you have further infos regarding the transsonic wing? Would have it made the jet slightly supersonic in a dive?
Click to expand...
Hello Basil, unfortunately I have no further insights on the TST Transonischer Tragflügel (Supercritical Transonic Wing) effort.
 
Basil said:
Well, according to Vetter "Der Alpha Jet" the Luftwaffe did not proceed to use the aircraft in this role because of lack of success in shooting down helicopters and because of the danger of getting shot down by the helicopter's air-air missiles.
Click to expand...

Sometimes organisations pretend to have a reason not to do something they don't want to do.

Look up yourself how frequently Soviet helicopters were photographed with air/air missiles.
Mil Mi-24 were able to use R-60(M), but they had a short range and were easily shaken off in the hilly terrain of Southern Germany (breaking lock by breaking line of sight).

K-13 had such a long lock-on time that it was really only useful for bomber intercepts and surprise rear aspect attacks. It wasn't used by Mi-24, but equivalent AIM-9 were carried (later) by AH-1.

Soviet/WP helos with AAMs was a non-issue over Southern Germany and their lethality would be so bad over Northern Germany that the kill ratio would easily justify Alpha Jets attacking Soviet/WP helos.

So it made total sense to be opportunistic and attack any surprised red helo.
 
TomcatViP said:
Where would be that video now?
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You can read about the tests in publications on the Fl 282.

Very few German gun camera videos are extant. IIRC the most common gun camera wasn't even for video, but for very low framerate individual photos. Enough to tell whether the target burns, broke apart, pilot bailed and so on.
 
lastdingo said:
Soviet/WP helos with AAMs was a non-issue over Southern Germany and their lethality would be so bad over Northern Germany that the kill ratio would easily justify Alpha Jets attacking Soviet/WP helos.
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Operations up against the Ka-50 may have been a different story though.
 
Grey Havoc said:
Operations up against the Ka-50 may have been a different story though.
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NATO was having collective kittens about the possibility Ka-50 had an air-to-air role. And it's about the same time SABA was being pitched for the anti-helicopter role. So it was definitely being taken seriously about that time.
 
Grey Havoc said:
Operations up against the Ka-50 may have been a different story though.
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Not really, for Ka-50 would not have better situational awareness.

Such a small silhouette Jet arrives in seconds, pilot aims, shoots.
It's difficult to detect AND orientate the helo AND get a lock-on in a few seconds.

A helo pilot armed with R-60M might once in a while see a jet whose pilot didn't detect the helo and get a missile lock-on with the jet still in the no escape zone (lucky opportunity), BUT that's irrelevant for the question of intentionally going after helos.
 
lastdingo said:
Not really, for Ka-50 would not have better situational awareness.
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I'm not so sure about that, it was planned to be fitted with a pretty good sensor fit (including LLTV and FLIR) and EW suite, though thanks to the chaos of the late Gorbechov era and then of the post-Cold War era, it ended up not receiving most of those goodies, I believe.
 
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FLIR and LLTV don't matter if they don't look in the correct direction. Their field of view is a couple degrees only.
An Alpha jet would not use a radar, so even a radar warning receiver would not help.

The airborne all-round sensors (F-35's DAS or IIR / UV based missile approach sensors) only became much of a thing in the 2000's. Even the 1980's F-15, F-16 and F/A-18 had none. Even ATF (later F-22) wasn't required to have such a all-round threat detection and I have no memory of RAH-66 having been meant to feature one.

Today's Ka-52 has such all-round missile approach warners, but there was zero reason in the 80's to expect a Soviet/WP helo to have such a thing. And Ka-50 was probably not known in any detail to NATO during the 80's (prototype stage).
 

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