jspec

After completing the Seven Days Campaign for CMCW, which is part of a 3 part trilogy following the legacy of Captain Charles Stevens  (In the Fields Where the Poppies Grow CMBN and Fields of Tears CMFB) (and his son Charlie Stevens in Seven Days CMCW), I decided to go and revise In the Fields Where the Poppies Grow. 
It was my first campaign for CM and I made a lot of mistakes along the way. I had did an earlier revision but I still left issues unsolved. So this is an attempt to get the campaign up to the standards of the other two hopefully. Below is the information.
In the Fields Where the Poppies Grow
(Revised)

This campaign is a complete revision of my first ever campaign that I created. Being a novice, I made a lot of mistakes, despite the campaign being well received by the community.

So I have gone back and reworked the entire campaign, making what I hope, are some noticeable improvements.

In the Fields Where the Poppies Grow is a semi-historical campaign following the 31st Tank Battalion, part of the 7th Armored Division, through the Battle of Normandy during August of 1944. It is an interactive campaign, the first part of a trilogy that continues with Fields of Tears in CMFB and Seven Days in CMCW.

It follows the legacy of Captain Charles Stevens (In the Fields Where the Poppies Grow and Fields of Tears) and later his son Lieutenant Charlie Stevens (Seven Days) through the trials of war.

In this campaign Captain C. Stevens is in command of A Company, 31st Tank Battalion and he must lead it through the later stages of the Battle of Normandy. Your job is to keep Stevens alive as his loss (2500 points) will effectively end the campaign, and still complete the missions.

About the Campaign:

It is a 10 mission campaign.

In the original you had a command decision to make which was confusing to some players so I eliminated it.

A draw will advance you in all missions.

Mission Tree:
1. The Crossroads
2. When Angels Weep
3. Tiger Tiger
4. The Road
5. The Bridge Over the Eure
6. A View to a Kill
7. Dance with the Devil
8. Bunker Hill
9. Encounter at Loire
10. Chartres

All the missions are from the original campaign, but have been heavily reworked and one renamed due to script issues.
Improvements:

1. All maps have been reworked, especially the annoying roads, and much more micro terrain has been added as well as flavor objects reworked.
2. All mission dates and times are in correct sequence
3. The command structure for all units is now correct as well unit names. The core unit commanders are all named from friends or actual participants.
4. Mission objectives have been updated and expanded and the point system modified for better balance.
5. Mission briefings have been reworked for better detail and there are now tactical maps for each mission as well. To follow the narrative of Captain Stevens, read the designer notes for each mission as I have updated these as well. They give you insight into his experiences.
6. Artwork has been updated for all the missions.
7. I have added a number of additional mods to the mods in the original campaign for better immersion. One not included in the download  but needed for the immersion of this campaign, is Lucky Strikes Hedgerow Hell mod, a must have for CMBN. All the other mods used are included in the download. Just drop into your z folder. All credit goes to the authors of the mods.
8. AI has been reworked as well for hopefully a better challenge.

My goals was to bring this campaign up to the standards of the other campaigns in the trilogy and I hope I have succeeded. In the download you will find the .cam file and the mod folder.
 
As always let me know of any issues and I hope you will find the campaign enjoyable.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/n8exclchbhzupfiokoqg2/h?rlkey=v5t7xumw8235ay0v1084jfztd&dl=0
 

I see this situation has been resolved. Sorry, I've been very busy with both work  and AoW4 this past week.
Hope you enjoy the campaign. I've yet to hear from anyone who has completed it or at least any feedback on the final three missions.

Are you patched up?
Not sure which patch @Paper Tiger is on but I have the latest & see the new Gung-Ho! campaign fine.

That was it! Could swear I was patched, but turns out somehow I had managed to patch the patch to it's own game folder inside the actual game folder (as in ..\Combat Mission Shock Force 2\Combat Mission Shock Force 2).
Thanks a lot, thought it was user error just needed a little help figuring out what it was.
 

Do you have the NATO module installed?  Paging @Paper Tiger

Thanks, yes I have it installed (just checked and can start playing one of the NATO single battles).

One of my ongoing side projects (aimed, mostly, at the new influx of Steam Players) is to host an 'All in One' for every CM game here.
This is my initial effort for RT & its primary feature is a large collection of weathered vehicle mods (by @kohlenklau, @umlaut  & @Aristoteles ) renamed & tagged so that they now work with F&R. It also features terrain mods by @SeinfeldRules, UI mods by @rocketman, @Marco Bergman & @Volksgrenadier, Infantry mods by @EZ, @Tashtego & @Ithikial_AU, loading screens by @umlaut, building mods by @Kieme(ITA) & @Tanks a Lot as well as the ME effects package, ME soundscape & (subdued & fixed) superpack voices by @ironsturm plus many more others.
I know a lot of people had issues with their old RT mods & the new Fire & Rubble module so hopefully this modpack will be of some interest to them.
Here's a taster of some of what you can expect...
 
 
Here's the modpack link...
https://www.mediafire.com/file/rwd0d774itq1omg/CMRT_Initial_%27All_in_One%27.7z/file

Ha be careful about mentioning a certain software distribution company here friend, lest the scabrous backward has-beens come down on you like a ton of bricks.

I've been curious for a while about this idea in general, what would it feel like inside a modern tank that took a hit that didn't penetrate? From another tank let's say. 
 
Like a knock on the door? A little push? A car crash? I just don't have any concept as to what it would be like.  I wonder if any of our real-life tankers have heard stories they could share?
 
Edit - obviously hope they haven't been in a tank that got hit! Just meant stories they might have heard, or what they understand it would be like based on their knowledge.

+1
 
 I gotta say I'm begining to wish the moderation here was a little more 'active'.  This guys posts have been consistently arrogant, condescending, and most of all insulting - what value is he adding to any of the discussions?
 
 There are plenty of posters here who can disagree, even argue without basically calling the other person an idiot. Is it an attempt at humor or something? It doesn't come off that way.

But again, if I have A TRP 1-1 CAV screening the flank of the Brigade, the mechanics sufficient to support the day to day stuff are already part of the formation.  If one of the vehicles goes down hard it can then be pushed higher until the vehicle receives the level of repairs it needs.  Fires is a little different but given the advances in joint type fires, it's less important that all batteries exist under one formation, controlled by higher, as much as the assets may be flexed to where they are needed.  This flexiability is essential on the modern battlefield, and especially essential once you try to leverage technology over quantity, which at least nominally is what the Russians are trying to do with this modernization thing (and really have to do if they're serious about Armata and associated equipment).
 
 
Nah brah.  I just think you're whiny and immature, and the 'murican thing, combined with basically flapping around the American bias flag any time something that reasonably was inferior to US equipment performed inferior basically validated that position.
 
And needless to say you're well on your way to showing I did not jump to conclusions, so carry on!

Haha, excellent! U mad that glorious rossiya tankists will receive new Abrams beating toy?

I was wondering how long it would take for his inner-Adolf to pull out the poms-poms. This guy just can't help giving himself away. It's like retarded clock work, the same exact MO every...single...time. You'd think after being banned in triplicate he'd figure out a way to suppress it all...but in record time we are graced with yet another one man circle jerk...which I predict will once again end in tears...and blisters. It's downright pathological.
 
 
 
Mord.

Re: Destroyed
 
See my car example.  If you still need a blinky orange light, and the cupholder isn't too mangled to accept a cup, then those elements may function on just fine, but the car is still destroyed.  So if in a less sarcastic example, if the 1st Infantry Division of Panzersaurkrautwerfertopia loses five of its six infantry regiments, the division HQ, 60% of the artillery regiment, and the last band member died playing a defiant tune on his tuba in the face of the enemy, the one remaining infantry regiment will still be in the fight, and Panzersaurkrautwerfertopia's high command will still employ it as needed, and might even still call it the 1st Infantry Division in official documents, but in reality we're giving orders to the 3rd infantry regiment+1st ID PzKwfr Divisional Laundry Platoon and it is incapable of carrying out division type missions (just as the car can still do blinky orange light and cup retention missions, but is incapable of carrying out car level missions like driving down the highway).
 
Re: Bees
 
Those are serious posts.  Combat Mission's Bee behavior is going to be second to none, and the bee tank rider script is pretty much the Sistine chapel of coding for AI.  
 
Re: Reading books instead of burning them
 
 
I said I did not care.  I'm more interested in this mythology of germans being somehow better than they were, and this whole "german divisions were never destroyed!" mentality that goes with it.  Plenty of Nazi soldiers became good Nazi soldiers face down in the snow, many units participating in the Bulge simply stopped existing outside of desperate bands of men fleeing after burning their vehicles.  
 
I really do not care to look into what happened to one particular band of scum.  I'm just sad any of them escaped to fight another day, because surely both the world and Germany would have been better off had they not.
 
 
I'm of largely German ancestry.  My beloved fatherland was turned into a perverse mockery of what it had been before.  All the cultural achievements, all the art, all the beauty, and the good, honorable reputation of the German people was cast down by morons marching with stiff legs and singing "horst wessel lied."  Even today being "proud" of what Germany once was, and has become today requires a denunciation of the 1936-1945 criminal regime and its puppets.  I hate Nazis and their puppets and it makes me sad to think I'll never get to see them pop beneath tank tracks and become best Nazis.
 
 
 
This is why, frankly why I think you're an idiot;
 
a. The majority of US and British losses happened when:
   1. Vastly outnumbered and outgunned US units were destroyed in the center of the Bulge.  The US units on hand to receive the original attack were at the lowest level of readiness, either entirely new or virtually depleted, and even then they took a heavy toll of their attackers.  As the Germans forced much larger numbers of armor and artillery into the breach, these units crumbled, being already understrength and overextended.  This is where many of the losses come from, not successful deutchbag combat abilities 1:1 on the battlefield, but after the lines crumbled, US losses spiked as units were overrun, cut off etc.  In places on the shoulders, like St Vith or the approaches to Bastogne where the resistance was better organized it remained fairly lopsided in favor of the defender.
   2. US and British calculations usually include the cost of digging the Deutchbags out of what they had occupied.  To that end an offensive unit will generally take heavier losses.
 
So in "tactical" terms the German performance was at best, nothing special.  They were held up by nearly any resistance for time they did not have, and despite a successful initial attack, were totally unable (to almost incompetent levels!) to exploit this attack in a meaningful way, which allowed the allies to mass on the Nazis, and make them into best Nazis.  
 
 
Again, look at the places were the Germans and the Americans went force on force, Americans who are not on the run after their unit fell apart under superior numbers/was cut off because of how overextended the US Army was in the opening stages.  It tells a far different tactical story, and shows the myth of German combat performance (just like Mortain, and the autumn fighting in Lorraine showed quite effectively).
 
Re: "Not a module"
 
I'd actually be sort of upset if it was a module vs a separate game.  Winter 1944-Spring 1945 was very much its own set of battles, markedly different from the Summer-Fall fighting in equipment, men and locations.  Bulge was more than just Normandy in white.  

This I genuinely don't get - Steve already posted that this is a guy who was already banned, so what's the benefit of letting him post under a different name?
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118902-we-need-another-the-road-ahead-from-bf/

Haha, it demonstrates the bug clearly. Is that not enough? So does my picture set. I went and provided evidence that was asked for. Does it make me any less wrong when the evidence is clearly there because I have an opinion?
 
Im surprised you took the time to find all the threads I have posted in. Well done. You missed my one about the BTR spotting though.
 
I can complain and argue all I want, someone has to on here. I also couldn't give a f about what people think about my opinion, I will voice it anyway, I think that should be obvious.
 
Also, wood, I feel as though you are directing most of your angst against me here, when Antares has similar conclusions. Is that some sort of personal vendetta I see developing there?
 
 
 
 
I say this because of what was said to Vladimir about the accuracy of GLATGM on page one of this thread, if that isn't someone glossing over something and underestimating a piece of kit, then I don't know what is :
 

Here are only a few of your posts that seem to contribute mightily in reinforcing the opinion you have some kind of bias...does the word "murican" in the context you used it at least three times mean anything?
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118050-how-to-use-the-khrizantema/?p=1593068
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118050-how-to-use-the-khrizantema/?p=1593869
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118891-in-game-spotting-system-are-you-kidding-me/?p=1595890
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118891-in-game-spotting-system-are-you-kidding-me/?p=1595959
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118713-ainet-as-trophy-killer-sensor-wrecker-paving-the-way-for-abrams-kill/?p=1593071
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118648-russian-optics-and-spotting-in-general/?p=1591366
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118648-russian-optics-and-spotting-in-general/?p=1591756
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118648-russian-optics-and-spotting-in-general/?p=1591898
 
http://community.battlefront.com/topic/118682-bmp-3m-mech-inf-vs-m2-mech-inf-tactics/?p=1591900
 
I am pretty sure there is more out there...I just stopped after a few threads.  So you have pointed out one possible error on a UKR plane.  Compared to the above.  It sure does look like bias.  Especially when you have accused insinuated a few times that the developers are biased.  You'd make it a lot easier for people to look at issues a lot more seriously if you stopped presenting the way you do and bring some tangible evidence to back up claims of bias.

Haha. The 90s called, they asked if they could get any tips on game design from the future. I told them not to call here again it was a waste of time.

I'm not really trying to be antagonistic, but I would qualify that with "it does what it says on the tin if you hold it right, and it's not a day ending in "y" or "in the strictest technical sense that labeling a day optic with a decal that says "night sight" does make it technically a night sight, but it doesn't make it a very good one"
 
All the Russian hardware I saw generally did what it was supposed to, just with appalling quality and shoddy worksmanship. Maybe it's better now, but it is the same companies doing it since the stuff I handled was cranked out, so perhaps not. 
 
Granted it was mostly infantry gear, but I expected "rugged and simple" not "did something just fall off?  I think something just fell off"
 
Also
 
 
then
 
 
RUSSIA IS SUPERIOR BUT I AM NOT GOING TO BE POLITICAL SO I WILL NOT TALK ABOUT THE FACT THEY ARE SUPERIOR.  ALLOW ME TO INSERT SOMETHING ABOUT HOW SMART RUSSIANS ARE INTO A TOPIC ABOUT PUFF THE MAGIC RUSSIAN TANK THAT IS TOTALLY REAL AND MY BEST FRIEND YOU JUST CANT SEE HIM.
 
I like the UN's education index.  They're not trying to sell me something
 
Additionally can we just have one Armata thread?  It seems to be the pattern that RT publishes how Aramatatata will eat all the American babies from 10 KM while jumping a ditch and someone sees fit to post another thread because we cannot possibly have heard of this tank that is the promised one instead of simply adding to the existing half dozen Armata threads.

I have to say I feel the opposite - I'm glad they stand up for themselves, and they are certainly never rude to people unless people are rude to them first.
 
He's explained the reasons why lots of the things people want won't be forthcoming in a totally clear, logical way, many times; and there are a small number people who just refuse to accept the answer and basically think they know better, and a (very) few number of those people can end up getting pretty nasty - so why not defend themselves?
 
I'm sure it'd be easier in a big company to let the forum manager, or whoever, deal with these kinds of things but Battlefront has, what; 4 and a half people working for them? There's really no one else who works there to do it, I don't think.
 
So, with that being said.... will the briefing text ever get any bigger?

I have to say I feel the opposite - I'm glad they stand up for themselves, and they are certainly never rude to people unless people are rude to them first.
 
He's explained the reasons why lots of the things people want won't be forthcoming in a totally clear, logical way, many times; and there are a small number people who just refuse to accept the answer and basically think they know better, and a (very) few number of those people can end up getting pretty nasty - so why not defend themselves?
 
I'm sure it'd be easier in a big company to let the forum manager, or whoever, deal with these kinds of things but Battlefront has, what; 4 and a half people working for them? There's really no one else who works there to do it, I don't think.
 
So, with that being said.... will the briefing text ever get any bigger?

This thread, methinks, very much needs to be put back on the track. Am not going to attempt to respond by individuals, so am going to address this by specific issues.

Yom Kippur War IADs effectiveness
 
IAF CAS losses were so severe vs Egypt for days that Israel terminated them altogether. They didn't resume until IDF tanks, which had crossed the Suez Canal, drove into the SAM zones and systematically shot up the SA-2/3/6 SAMs and dense AAA, of which the most notable AAA was the "airplane eater" ZSU-23/4. DEAD Israeli style. Against Syria, the story was much the same, but in both cases, Israeli CAS was effectively out of the war until the SAM problem was addressed, of which the pacing element (and eye waterer to defense types in the US and) was the lethality of the highly agile, mobile SA-6, a weapon against which the IAF had no ECM capability whatsoever. None. The SAMs were sufficiently deadly to force IAF planes to fly low, placing them in the deadly embrace of radar directed AAA, not to mention a plethora of SA-7s. The US provided Israel with as many as 40 F-4s and definitely 46 A-4s as replacements for terrible air losses. What's not generally known is that the US provided Israel with numerous complete tail end assemblies for A-4s. Why? The planes were eating SA-7s, but barely getting back home. Spare part planners never envisioned such a situation, so the IAF suffered major virtual attrition as a result. The IAF started the war with 440 combat planes and lost, depending on which numbers are used, 107-387, but I don't know offhand whether the US supplied additional planes over attrition during the resupply effort.
 
Given the above, I'm having real problems signing up for the "lessons of the Yom Kippur War." Likewise, I'm having similar problems with GW I. There were other factors at work other than those enumerated including: precision destruction of a key Iraqi air surveillance radar, the removal of which allowed the entry of the Stealth fighters and more visible friends. Inter alia, this resulted in the pinpoint destruction of the key Syrian AD HQ, spectacularly shown time and again on strike vid broadcast worldwide. Even in unbroken state, the IADS had very little capability vs Tomahawks which are, many don't realize, pretty stealthy in their own right, let alone when whizzing down the boulevard so low details on the weapons were clearly visible. This isn't the famous footage, but it gets the idea across.


 
The US went into GW I with not merely with superlative intel on Iraq's IADS, it went into battle with a direct conduit right into the IADS situation center, thanks to a physical hack into the fiber optic trunk line from the front, a hack put into place by a brilliant US SpecOps mission. Reportedly, the US was able to show, or not show, IADS HQ whatever it desired, but the hack is believed to have been used as a generator of enormous numbers of false targets. I firmly believe it's dangerous to draw sweeping conclusions without a fundamental understanding of what was going on to begin with. I recall the mighty MOD himself came out from Russia with his experts to figure exactly this out. One such insight was a demand for a weapon capable of downing a HARM attacking a defending SAM site. Pantsir, anyone? Tunguska itself has substantial capabilities vs things like GBU-15, LGBs, JDAM, JSOW and Tomahawks.
 
Now, let's look at the Vietnam War, shall we? It's fashionable to deride NVN's IADS as ineffective. This is based on another faulty premise. That premise is that the aggregate performance figures reflect how the national IADS performed historically throughout. Not the case. What you're seeing are the effects of a lot of really bad outcomes late in an otherwise impressive career.  When the US first ran into the SA-2, the SA-2 was killing 0.5 planes per engagement. 0.5! Indeed, there were several cases of two planes downed in one shot. What broke the back of the NVN IADS was a masterful CIA op called HA/BRINK or HABRINK. What was that? The CIA slipped people into Indonesia's SA-2 warehouses and obtained the relevant guidance link frequencies, allowing the US to pretty effectively jam the SA-2. Why Indonesia? The Indonesian SA-2s were identical to the NVN's SA-2s! Sure, evasive maneuvering, Wild Weasel, Iron Hand played their part, but HA/BRINK was what undid the IADs as far as SAM coverage. By late in the war, Linebacker II, jamming, better tactics, SEAD and other means had so degraded and cowed the SAMs that they were blind launching (no radar at all, optical direction only)  dozens of SAMs at once, and that's why the overall numbers look so bleak. That wasn't the case through much of the air war over NVN and the DMZ. We lost a family friend and his WSO to an SA-2 over the DMZ. It came out of the clouds below, so they had no chance to see the launch and evade. Boom!  Two wall entries on the Vietnam Memorial.
 
For a more informed view of Russian SAM operational effectiveness than what I've seen in this thread, please see Carlo Kopp's analysis here. Kopp has some scathing things to say about how the Arabs not only fundamentally disregarded a throughly thought out Russian doctrine, but did some things which would've been comedic had they not been so hurtful to the using force! Suggest interested parties also look at what specific threats the newer generation SAMs were designed to defeat, what their tactical-technical characteristics are and how that applies to the ability to detect, localize, engage and kill them. Makes rather sobering reading. A Serbian captain with his ancient SA-6 unit not only survived a major SEAD/DEAD campaign, but also cost the US the stunning loss of an F-117, damage to a second one and an F-16.
 
As a longtime student of military history and a former defense professional, I deem it folly to expect the USAF to be able to so thoroughly control the skies that Russian CAS and similar can't operate. US AAA threat is risible, so there's no real dense AAG penalty for operating in the weeds to make it really hard vs both fighters and Patriot to engage it, and SU-25s have survived hits by things much worse than MANPADS. Russia's not going to sit idly by and let the US/NATO gin up its air power before striking, so the force ratios, for a time, at least, are not going to be pretty. Contrary to popular opinion, the AWACS supply is quite limited, and people need to remember that these vital birds can stay aloft only so long before they have to be replaced to keep a given area in coverage. The harder they're flown, the less reliable they become, and the worse the even more critical highly trained control crews perform. Tired radar operators miss things. That. of course, presumes the plane ever gets airborne to begin with, A single Russian sniper armed with, say, an OSV 12.7 mm rifle, could ruin NATO's day at places like Geilenkirchen, which when last seen, had a whole 5 E-3As. It's even worse with JSTARS, where there are but a handful of planes in total.
 
And this discussion is without taking into account Russian missile hard kill systems or jamming. Put it this way, for every long range sensor we deployed, the Russians deployed countermeasures. Jammers vs the E-3A, the TR-1's SAR, JSTARs. I used to have some SECRET diagrams of the E-3A radar display under jamming. Thanks to steerable antenna nulls, the system performed very well in the face of one or two jammers, but after that things progressively fell apart. It was entirely possible to jam the E-3A so effectively that entire (pizza slice wide) sectors were blind. Additionally, the more jamming energy received, the shorter detection range becomes, totally compromising the vast volumetric region a Sentry ordinarily controls. This allows even crude Stealth weapons a veritable free ride through the defenses.
 
If memory serves, the wartime scenario over West Germany envisioned only two E-3As up, covering the entire region. What happens if one doesn't show up, is shot down or is jammed so effectively it can't do its job? How many would likely be available to support ops in Ukraine, and how much coverage, even best case, would be lost just to keep things like S-300PMU and S-400 from simply devouring them? The Russians also have the Il-76 MAINSTAY, their Gen 2 AWACS. Nor, as a look at page 3, #46 in that thread will show, is that by any means the limits of what's going to be faced. The Russians are building a combined function aircraft able to handle everything but undersea warfare from an AWACS perspective. I'd argue that Russian force effectiveness will be greatly enhanced by even the vanilla MAINSTAY of the Cold War period, never mind what it's evolved into since. Patriot will assuredly be a key Spetsnaz target, and if it goes down, there's no way the Air Force can handle the flood which would ensue. SAMs are 24/7 systems, but planes, even with in-flight refueling, have to go home sooner or later. There is no in-flight replenishment of munitions, LRUs or crews. And who's to say that the planes keeping the Russians away in one place won't suddenly be retasked elsewhere, leaving the poor ground force commander in the denuded zone in a Heinz factory sized pickle?!
 
What are the MCRs (Mission Capable Rates) for the F-22A under high sortie conditions?  We already know the F-35 is compromised practically across the board when it comes to just about every combat metric, so why should MCR  or sortie generation rate be any better? It'll probably break a lot, not least because it'll be anything but a mature system. We know how those tend to be. As a mature system, the F-14 Tomcat was running ~65% MCR. This meant a two-carrier CVBG could use only one CVN on a given day for strike--because the other could do nothing but conduct FAD to keep both alive! Doubtless the numbers these days are better, bit I think they nicely illustrate the main issue. Complex things, and the F-35 is super complex and broken to start, are iffy at best to depend upon. The more you stress a complicated system, the faster it breaks, not necessarily in ways anticipated, either. Given this incredibly important issue, does it really make sense to make campaign success dependent on breaking the Russian Air Force via aerial combat, as seems to be the general expectation?
 
I don't have the latest numbers and all the tech specs for what I fervently hope are upgrades from what I knew of US capabilities, but I do know the overall situation should give serious pause to US/NATO planners, operations and combat personnel. There is a strong case to be made for a real integrated US tactical air defense a la Russe or similar. I close with a cautionary tale from my Hughes AIM-54 Phoenix days.
 
The FAD (Fleet Air Defense) Section Head vs His Boss, the Operations Analysis Department Manager.
 
My section head, Bill Knight, ran OPFOR--Tu-22M BACKFIRE & SOJs (Stand Off Jammers); his boss, Dave Spencer, had the FAD for a BLUFOR CVBG (carrier battle group). Site of battle? Navy tactical simulator in Monterey, California. Each side had its own war room, and there was a separate Control room where all was known. The stakes? A good bottle of wine and gloating rights on Monday. Event was part of a threat conference the weekend immediately before Monday.
 
OPFOR objective:
 
Penetrate FAD screen and launch long range Mach 3+ AS-4 KITCHEN ASCMs to hit and destroy CVNs (in the days before AEGIS was deployed)
 
BLUFOR objective
 
Use CAP and DLI (Deck Launched Interceptors) to destroy OPFOR before it can reach the missile release line.
 
Execution: BLUFOR
 
BLUFOR radar detects jam strobes on expected threat axis and gleefully commits both CAP and available DLI to attack OPFOR. Once in range, and operating in HOJ (Home ON Jam) mode, salvos of Tomcat launched Phoenix missiles kill the jammers, clearing the radar scopes. Dave Spencer exults, thinking he has destroyed the attackers and won a crushing victory.
 
Execution: OPFOR
 
Bill Knight fully anticipates BLUFOR commander's battle plan and uses it to destroy him. OPFOR demonstrates with SOJs, getting exactly the response he anticipated, but sends the actual striking force, without SOJs, around to the back door, conducting completely unhindered AS-4 missile attacks. The SOJs and crews blown to bits? Regrettable losses necessary to fulfill OPFOR commander, Bill Knight's, operational intent.
 
Battle Resolution 
 
About the time Dave Spencer was celebrating his great victory, Control informed him  his triumphant Tomcats would begin ditching shortly. Seems both of his carriers had been sunk by Bill Knight, and no fixed airfield, or even another carrier, was anywhere to be had. This was the end. I have no idea what the wine was, how expensive and delectable, but the wine of victory was thoroughly savored by my section head, for he had wiped the floor with Dave, who possessed an awe inspiring Ph.D. in Military Operations Research, from Harvard, no less. Come Monday, though, his customary arrogance and aura of superiority were gone. He walked about head down, visibly depressed and like a man in a daze. He couldn't believe what had happened to him; so catastrophically at the (perceived) moment of victory.
 
Summing up, I believe the expectation that the US would almost immediately own the skies over Ukraine to be on the scale somewhere from delusional clear up to clinically insane. Such expectations seem to be predicated on a largely incompetent opponent who hasn't a prayer of prevailing vs western military might and training. Additionally, this seems to be predicated on the notion that Russian pilots are no better than Arab pilots and would be flying planes just about as capable relative to US combat aircraft. Does the US have some nice toys? Absolutely. But how many will actually be usable--and stay usable--over the course of the envisioned campaign? Is it reasonable to assume that other US foes are going to lie doggo so the US/NATO can fight Russia absent other military crises? I think not. And has anyone here bothered to look at the Russian approach to BVR aerial warfare in a very heavy jamming and rapidly maneuvering target environment? Once you have, consider this notional engagement, but with as many as 4 x AAMs targeted on each Raptor. This engagement presumes, too, that AWACS isn't attacked and downed or badly crippled. Nor does it recognize the existence of a technology called forward pass, in which missile shooters simply salvo missiles on command of aircraft whose far superior sensors allows guidance of those weapons even though the shooters can't see the target. All of a sudden those numerous not Stealth planes become a real threat, making the already enormous missile loads of Russian Stealth fighters many times larger than can be carried. 


 
Regards,
 
John Kettler

You did compare the ability of the Soviet military in 1980's to conduct anti-shipping warfare to the ability of the Russian Federation to conduct CAS over hostile airspace in 2017.  You also announced it was your duty to bring a thread that was pleasantly derailed back to quite honestly a line of discussion that was pretty well tapped out.
 
So yeah, apples and monkeys, thread-Stalin.
 
Anyway, so now I'm bored, annoyed, and I AM FILLED WITH THE ANGER AND FURY OF A'TOMIC POM*
 
 
Re: SOF
 
There's practical limitations on just what they can do.  Russian SOF is not some sort of collection of ubermench able to accomplish any mission, any time without raising an eyebrow.  In a practical sense given the overt, and high intensity nature of the conflict we can assume the level of force protection is to put it mildly, "harsh and draconian."  Preventing observation of these high value assets will be a priority, let alone keeping folks back and away from the launchers.  Counting on a SOF campaign to do anything but knock off the odd launcher is fool hardy and the Russians are not at all that stupid.  
 
This isn't 1988 man.  There's no ultra deep cover Spetnaz company waiting by Ramstein to conduct a suicide attack with the Red Army Faction to knock out as many fighters as possible.  In talking about conducting SOF missions outside of the Ukraine, it's a game Russia will be hard pressed to play, simply put if it starts running craziness in NATO countries, it's inviting effectively like escalation into Russia, which is damage it cannot afford to absorb (Again, how hard would it be to send a few dozen Chechen fighters via funding through Saudi Arabia with Iglas in hand to camp out below any airport/air base?).
 
There's also a practical limit on how many special forces units can be deployed against targets (just in terms of teams available, and able to effectively blend in), mobility (likely restricted to foot movement, full scale war will doubtlessly bring a curfew and civilian traffic will be restricted.
 
Which really gets to the point of we can expect an effect, but again, an effect to the point where it strongly influences the ability of NATO to the degree it negates a nearly three to one advantage in airframes, literally dozens of AWACs and other radar platforms, the 1,000+NATO available PATRIOT missile launchers (again, they're not all going to the Ukraine, but it provides a number to draw from, and PATRIOT can be air transported pretty easily compared to other hardware) is just daft.  
 
But it does.  The loss of one AWACS would hurt, but it's not going to remove the capability.  The number of AWACS available also means you could afford to have more than two E3s in the air at once, say some sort of two forward one back setup.  It also handily negates your earlier statement about airframe/crew fatigue, they're not going to run into the ground with that many available platforms.  Two AWACS over West Germany reflects the 80's availability of those platforms.  It's not 1988 anymore, and the capability has increased to the degree where your point is moot.
 
 
A-10 has a role, but its after the Russian Air Force has been put to bed, and SEAD/DEAD has done its job.  Same deal with the SU-25, but there's no reasonable observer who believes the Russian Air Force can take on the NATO air element, to the degree it prevents the NATO CAP from being able to operate freely above friendly forces.
 
Additionally how many sorties did that  damaged SU-25 go on to fly the next day?  I rather imagine it was difficult with significant parts of the airplane missing.  A plane that badly damaged is effectively a self-conducting downed pilot rescue and little more.  Even if hundreds of SU-25s are limping home (this is doubtful.  The Georgian example made it home because once it left the target area it was safe from enemy fire, over the Ukraine the SU-25 would have to dodge the pursuing fighters), holed by various hits, they're effectively "killed" for the purposes of follow on operations and likely the remainder of the campaign.
 
 
We aren't talking about just superior technology dude.  We're talking about better planes, we're talking about better pilots, we're talking about three times as many airframes, cutting edge sensors, advanced command and control, all conducted above highly advanced friendly air defense.  If it was just one for one each side had 200 planes, but the US had 200 F-22s and the Russians 200 MIG-29s, it'd be a rough go, but certainly some CAS would leak through just by saturation.
 
But to the degree the Russians are outnumbered, to the degree they are behind technologically and training wise....god.  It'd be a bad day to be a Russian pilot.
 
Which goes to the REDFOR planning cycle. They're not going to commit horribly outnumbered, out gunned, and out-manned platforms to knock out a few tanks here and there.  Giving up a few Bears or Backfires to kill a carrier is an effective trade, carriers are important.  Giving up a four strike fighter element for a chance at a tank or two, the math just doesn't work.  The Russians only have so many planes, and they cannot afford to fritter them away by hoping THIS SU-24 isn't going to be picked up by AWACS while somewhere over Russia before catching an AIM-120 after crossing the border.  Further any fighters expended trying to make a hole through CAP is one less fighter to keep the few thousand NATO strike capable fighters away from bombing the tar out of Russian forces.
 
The actual value of the Russian Air Force would likely be closer to the whole "fleet in being" because that's the only way it survives the war without getting its heart ripped out over the Ukraine.
 
All well and good, but how fast do you think it'd take follow on NATO CAP to arrive?  Given the number of AWACS, and NATO interceptors, any hole will last for a few minutes, and only be created at major losses.  This was viable when the air forces were basically 1:1 in number, or Russian superiority, as losing some number of planes to secure a local advantage was sensible.  But in a fight where NATO has vast superiority of numbers and systems  it's just feeding the NATO kill count.  Make a hole, AWACS sends more fighters to fill the hole.  They have more fighters and more capable systems, Ivan's skeletal remains are collected up by a MIA recovery team in 2034 that's working with permission from Kiev.  His MIG-29 is in pieces, not over the Russian Army, A-10s have party funtime in late August because there's no Russian fighters left to challenge them.
 
Third and fourth order effects.  
 
 
Which gets to the point that building a new SHORAD system is moronic now.
 
Simply put Russian CAS may get some hits in.  But it will also almost certainly die in the process.  And Russians are not stupid enough to throw away their platforms and pilots to bag a couple of tanks.
 
 
*I discovered the PX sells rip-its.  My Grandfather picked up a strange affection for spam after his years in the Marines, it appears I've acquired at least an occasional nostalgia for terrible energy drinks after my years in the army.

It's been requested already!

Cool thanks Steve, I figured it was a good guess
 
I got why you left it up and put those sites as a rebutal, just figured might be better to get rid of it in the long run.
 
Majority of the thread is super interesting, enjoy reading.