Raaf Mirages

[Demon50]

It's a pretty gloomy and dull New Years Day in Perth so I've been musing over a few things as well as getting over a hangover !

With all the talk of the suitability or otherwise of the F/A18F and F35 for the RAAF doing the rounds, I've been wondering how suitable the Mirage was for the RAAF and whether it was the right choice ?

Ancient history, I know but was it the right aircraft for us ?

I presume that it was designed at the height of the Cold War and originally optimised as a high altitude interceptor of Russian bombers. Did we order it on the premise that we could be involved in a war with Indonesia and other Communist hordes so we would need an interceptor to shoot down their long range bombers, albeit when they were nearing the Australian coast ? But how would they have fared in dogfights against escorting fighters ?

When Confrontation ended in the mid 60s and with the war in Vietnam raging, it seems to me that Mirage had outlived its usefullness already. Had they been deployed to Vietnam, would they have had the legs to escort US bombers and would they have been agile enough in dogfights against the Mig 15s, 17s and 21s ?
Methinks not.

It's all theoretical anyway as I think the French slapped some sort oF ban on the RAAF deploying them to Vietnam and/or Thailand.

I know that the Mirage was used with great effect by the Pakistanis against India in 1965 and by the Israelis in the Six Day War in 1967 but were they cases of a nation's desperation to survive and fighting against inferior pilots, rather than a superiority of equipment ? I guess it doesn't really matter if you win.

So the Mirages soldiered on with the RAAF and assumed a ground to air role which was probably not ideal and it begs the question, should we have purchased another dedicated close support type - ie the Jaguar or Harrier etc as well as looking for a dedicated fighter such as the Tornado or F15 in the early 70s rather than waiting another 10 years for the F/A18 to arrive?

Is the multi role F35 the way to go or should we revert to specialized types? I understand the economies of one type but sometimes wonder if this is the correct policy as surely there must be trade offs in performance for each mission ?

The USAF has found out the hard way in Irag and Afghanistan with the C130s expected to do do everything. But often they have been too big for missions and have suffered many maintenance problems from overuse so now that's why they're buying C27s.

Forgive the ramblings - I'd be interested in any responses.

[mark]

I think it's a great holiday question! Here is my sixpence worth....with hind sight I think the F-4 Phantom would have been a great choice for the RAAF. In the early sixties and throughout the next several years they proved to be true multi role
aircraft that would have given the RAAF service in intercept,strike,recce and more. Sure F-4's had faults,what aircraft does'nt but history shows the F-4 to be a true classic.

I also think the F-15 should have been brought ahead of the F/A-18 but that's a discussion for next holidays....Regards Mark

[Rod Farquhar]

Well Demon, I have often mused over the same question as yourself re the Mirage.
Having worked on them for many years I do have a bit of an insight.
As you say they were designed to carry out a ground radar controlled intercept of incoming Russian Bombers, takeoff ,climb to altitude with rocket assistance, fire missile and return to base. The Matra missile with either ir or radar guidance (RAAF used radar) turned out to be pretty inefective and only one could be carried.
The guns had a fixed harmonisation with a pattern of an inclined figure eight, OK for a large target but not all that good against another fighter. The RAAF improved things by adding the AIM9B Sidewinder but it had severe limitations re aspect.
In the ground attack role only two bombs could be carried on the centre line station, usually with big drop tanks to get any range, if the RPK-10 supersonic tanks with 4x bombs each were carried the range was marginal.
Although it was very fast in a straight line it was not all that manouverable so up against an equally trained pilot it might have been outclassed.
Having said all that the Pakistan Air Force took our flogged out aircraft and refurbished them, they are still in front line service and some are undegoing their third major overhaul. Go figure!
Rod;)

[Luig]

It is astonishing to me today that airframes many decades old are expected to fly on in whatever role. This would have been unthinkable in the early Mirage era. In this light perhaps having a flexible airframe, 2 engines, great avionics to begin with that will inevitably be improved.... Am I describing a Super Hornet?

The RNZAF were able to achieve a remarkable upgrade to their Skyhawks with the KAHU update. An A4 that was in many ways an improvement on an F-16 (in those days) was something to behold by all accounts. I offer this example of the above concept. Have a good strong airframe with plenty of upgrade/carriage capacity and wait for the avionics/weapons upgrades. The Miracle never had this capacity I gather.

This post has been edited by Luig on Jan 2 2008, 02:26 PM

[Martin Edwards]

This post relates to that earlier regarding our purchase of JSFs. I was lucky enough to be at Fairford (UK) for the Royal International Air Tattoo in 1999. The theme for this event was the 50th anniversary of NATO. Having just finished the Bauklands campaign there was a lot of chest thumping going on and the end result I was very fortunate in being able to witness what was probably the ultimate demonstration of all current air assetts, new and old. The older warriors like F-104 star fighter, F-8 Crusader, F-4 Phantom and earlier generation Mirages would be no match for the later types such as F-16 Falcon, F-15 Eagle, Grippen and Hornet ( I believe used as F-18 by Swiss) in the air superiority role. However bring on the later generation aircraft such as SU-27 and Mirage 2000N then its a whole new ball game. The one that impressed me the most (and the flying display jugdes as it won the best display award) was the Mirage 2000N. This is one incredible dog fighter and I believe would be a match for any current adversary. It still has the beautiful Mirage lines but is awsome in its abilities. However as I mentioned in my other post I think political interferance from the French would compromise our use of this aircraft. On the subject of multi-role aircraft the Air Defence Version of the Tornado was a bit of a disappiontment. Based on the Tornado ground attack version it has a longer fuselage, extra fuel tanks etc with the end result the commonality percentage was greatly reduced and we end up with an aircraft that just does the job. Conversly the French versions of the Jaguar, whilst being strke aircraft, had a very impressive air display. I haven't seen Eurofighter or Rafiale but believe these would be in the same league as the 2000N. Then again would a hundred or so of any new fighters be a match for the swarms of old MiGs if things got really nasty? So the bottom line is lets talk the Israelies (or South Africans for that matter) into building and supplying us with Kfir 2000Ns :rolleyes:

[Demon50]

Thanks for the replies guys.

I guess with the benefit of hindsight, the F4C may have been the best option for the RAAF in the early 1960s. And I wonder how things would have transpired in later years ?

Perhaps we might have purchased a few of the recce RF4Cs then upgraded to F4Es and maybe some F4G "Wild Weasels" following the lessons learnt in Vietnam. A hundred or so Phantoms would have been a good deterrent in those days with the F111Cs to follow a few years later.

The Phantoms also had air to air refuelling capability which the Mirage did not so its range could have been extended considerably with the assistance of USAF KC135s.

I wonder what an F4C would have looked like in RAAF service ? I never liked the position of the fueslage roundel on the "E" and would have preferred to see it on the intake like the RAF Phantoms.

All ancient history now but thought provoking nevertheless.