The (rigged?) ACEVAL/AIMEVAL air combat evaluations 1975 -1978

Scott Kenny said:
It means that you must have advanced warning of the war starting to get your full defensive loading.
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It's a reasonable supposition at the time that tensions will escalate before the Big One kicks off.

The real nightmare is a Pearl Harbour scenario in which the Soviet Union doesn't mobilize to roll west into Europe but kicks things off with a surprise attack on the fleet carriers everywhere around the world simultaneously. How quickly can your CV go from port-visit mode at zero tension to being able to defend itself?
 
pathology_doc said:
It's a reasonable supposition at the time that tensions will escalate before the Big One kicks off.
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Right, but you'd still need several hours warning to change your BARCAP birds from 4 Phoenix to 6.

Because I'm pretty sure most pilots don't want to try to trap with 6 Phoenix, trap the first time or hit the tanker or ditch.



pathology_doc said:
The real nightmare is a Pearl Harbour scenario in which the Soviet Union doesn't mobilize to roll west into Europe but kicks things off with a surprise attack on the fleet carriers everywhere around the world simultaneously. How quickly can your CV go from port-visit mode at zero tension to being able to defend itself?
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I don't think you'd get complete surprise like that, but yeah starting the war with strikes on all the carriers is the bad scenario.
 
Scott Kenny said:
I don't think you'd get complete surprise like that, but yeah starting the war with strikes on all the carriers is the bad scenario.
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Even if you only hit the nuclear carriers predominantly. That lays a heavier load on carriers which demand fuelling just like the rest of the fleet, and if you can sink some fleet oilers into the bargain then you're going to give the staff officers some major ulcers. Throw in a conventional strike on the fleet yards to make sure there are no Yorktown repair miracles and suddenly the USN is dangerously overstretched.
 
Bruno Anthony said:
Same here! They’re on YouTube?!
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Yep. Go, relive your childhood.

The point I was making with the vid was the shocked faces of our heroes when they realize that their seemingly bottomless missile magazines are empty, used up mostly on zero-threat targets (and Tom Clancy played that game too, in Red Storm Rising). For my own part, I have to admit that until now, I've given no thought as to the exact AAM load-out that a CV or CVN has on board. The US Navy's air war over Vietnam seems never to have been intense enough to seriously tax a carrier's AAM magazines (indeed, the number of launch-fly-trap cycles individual missiles went through without overhaul was a direct contributor to their unreliability), and the Air Force - operating from land, with no volume or weight restrictions on storage - can effectively be assumed to have had an inexhaustible supply.

Scott Kenny said:
Enough for 16 Tomcats at max loadout. (I'd actually expect more like 144x Phoenix, enough for 24x Tomcats with 6x Phoenix each)
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Would you rather have sixteen Tomcats with a full load-out, or 24 Tomcats with four each (and probably a pair of Sparrows for afters)?
 
pathology_doc said:
Would you rather have sixteen Tomcats with a full load-out, or 24 Tomcats with four each (and probably a pair of Sparrows for afters)?
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I mean, if that's the choice, I'll take 24 Tomcats with 4 each.

I'm just surprised that it wasn't enough for all Tomcats to have a full load.
 
Scott Kenny said:
I mean, if that's the choice, I'll take 24 Tomcats with 4 each.

I'm just surprised that it wasn't enough for all Tomcats to have a full load.
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I suspect there were analyses done which looked into things like the range and performance (in speed and climb) of a Tomcat with two, four or six Phoenixes (and their associated weight and drag penalties) versus various levels of threat to be met at the optimum distance for interception; and that these concluded that the best solution is for each F-14 on the carrier to take off with four Phoenixes.

Such analyses are touched on in Principles of Guided Missile Design: Airborne Radar by Povejsil, Raven and Waterman...

https://ia601307.us.archive.org/31/items/airborneradar00pove/airborneradar00pove.pdf

...beginning at pdf page 74 (text page 50). The discussion here is primarily pitched at the problem of designing the detection element of the entire system, but it does touch on the intercepting aircraft and their capabilities.
 
Scott Kenny said:
During the Cold War, two squadrons of 12 Tomcats, two squadrons of 12 Hornets, two squadrons of 12 A-6s.
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Typical late cold war air wing:
2 fighter squadrons with 2 x 12 F-14
2 light attack squadrons with 2 x 12 A-7 or later F/A-18
1 medium attack squadron with 10-12 A-6

A second A-6 squadron happened sometimes, but they would replace one of the light attack squadrons.
 

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