I agree with am, leo is full of crap. All I have to say is standoff. So while the atacms and others or going after "bogus tgts" the wild weasels will standoff and just wait for them to supidly turn on their radar and just take them out from long range. And any SU or Mig that tries to take off will just be shot down. Plus all the new missiles that are coming out now, that are umanned and track radar, we'll just sit out over the pacific and launch them and wait for a radar spike. Maybe Leo should go back and do some research.

gentlemen, we have to remember that no AD system can be truly effective on its own. the S-400 is a VERY formidable long range SAM but it would be relatively naked to a terrain-following Su-7 with a few cluster or fuel-air bombs bent on ruining the SAM site's day. however, if you are talking about an INTEGRATED air defense system, well then it's a totally different ball game. an effective AWACS coupled with interceptors flying CAP, extra aircraft on QRA and S-400 coupled with medium ranged SAMs and 2S6s would result in much better protection of the nation's airspace, and as part of a layered system, the S-400 is without peer

meant to say "the S-400 is without peers.."

AWACS and modern fighters flying DEFPATs would be a wonderful luxury, but to be effective they must be operated/flown by trained aircrews. This aspect of air defense is too expensive/intensive for most countries to maintain superiority v. their likely threats. Yet, that still seems to be the way most countries go. I suspect it's due to the tinpot dictator mentality most of the rest of the world has ruling over them: they like big flashy jets sitting on the ramps (collecting dust/rust)at their airbases. What would make us sh*t bricks would be if each of these pathetic Arab nations (for example) would sink their money into an SA-20 group command post and a half-dozen SA-20 battalions, with a BIG BIRD, and a half-dozen FLAP LID, TOMB STONE, and CLAM SHELL radars, supported by a few SA-11 brigades with a half-dozen SA-11 batteries each, and with an SA-15 battery for point defense at each SA-20 site, all tied together with some modern C2 equipment like UNIVERSAL or FUNDAMENT. Sure it would cost a billion dollars (or maybe two), but it would cover something like a 500km diameter with instant death. We would have to plan hard and long, and use a very sizable force, to crack that nut open. Displacedjim

Actually no, thats the weird part about air defense systems. Anytime you plunk down a permanent or semi-permanent or even mobile AD site that has radar connections or C4 sytems involved you can usually pinpoint it via satellites and by monitoring transmissions. As long as the radars dont transmit they are relatively safe..the moment they do, well they're so much as beacons. And it isn't necessarily from fighters. Stuff like Tomahawks and JSSOW can be made to take out everything from the periphary to the the inner core systems of the network. Worst case you have ATACMS coming in to destroy your network. You're all looking at it from the aspect of the Air Force having to take the network out. But that isn't the way it works. The AF will be involved, but so could the Navy or the Army/Marines. Think about it..how do you stop a HIMARS/MLRS launcher thats within kill range of your FLAP LID or BIG BIRD radar systems? Air Defense works best when you have an integrated system of Air Networks (yes thats planes) but also an integrated or at least semi-capable ground component to hold off the any enemy ground movement. All this boils down to Joint Force Tasking. If you don't have any of that, well what it ends up being is that you have a distributed group of AD sites that isn't in full connection with the rest of the network, thereby reducing their capability.

Mind you, you'd be correct in saying that we'd hafta plan for a bit to taking it apart ;) Doesn't mean that we wouldn't be able to though.

"No" what? We wouldn't sh*t bricks? You are wrong. Could we overcome the little mini-IADS I described? Of course, and that's exactly what I said at the end of my last post. My point was that if some third world nation wants to defend its airspace, then basically any given amount of money is much better spent on a modern air surveillance network tied in to a modern SAM network, all controlled by a modern C2 network, than it is spent on a modern air surveillance network, tied into some modern fighters, all controlled by a modern C2 network, and maintaining well-trained fighter pilots to fly them. And the more they spend on equipment and training, the better their defense will be. By the time we've committed enough ground force to roll up close enough to drop MLRS rockets on their SAMs, we'd be close enough to drop them on their airfields if they had fighters instead, and either way if the Army is that deep into their territory it's just about all over for them anyway. Air defenses are for stopping airpower, and it's much easier for second-rate powers to man SAM batteries than to man fighter squadrons, and much more effective. For example, regarding air defense over China, fighter pilots might not admit it in the barroom, but intel officers back in their SCIFs are way more worried about several SA-10/20 battalions in China than they are about several Su-30 squadrons in China. Similarly, reports of a SLOT BACK intercept over some target nation are of interest because it indicates the likely presence of a MiG-29, but reports of a TIN SHIELD intercept from that nation will get immediate high-level attention because it indicates the possibile presence of an SA-10 battery. Finally, we were waaaaaaay more interested in any report of possible sales of SA-10/20s to Iraq than of MiG-29s or Su-27s. Displacedjim

The toughest decision for an American commander to make in such a SAM infested area is which foolproof method to choose to destroy the SAMs. There are so many choices it's unreal. Most people already mentioned the good ones like: ATACMS launched from Army HIMARS and MLRS systems, these guided rockets have a range of up to 300 km depending on the version. HARMs which would annhilate any radar a few minutes after it turns on... ALCM or SLCM would destroy a SAM site quite thoroughly from hundreds of kilometers away... JASSM and JSOW are fun little missile that would make quite a mess of a SAM site before anyone knew what was happening... There's always the good ole low level iron bomb/cluster bomb/fuel air bomb method.... Just to name a few

If it were quite that "simple" we wouldn't have hundreds/thousands of personnel (including me) employed full time analyzing IADS-associated signals, equipment, systems, and networks. A scenario could be dreamed up where any weapon could suffice, e.g., the SAM is emplaced next to the trap range and one guy with a shotgun could shoot them down in between breaking clays. However, more reasonable scenarios make taking on a modern IADS far more difficult and potentially dangerous. First of all, virtually any realistic scenario of America v. Joe Third World ends quite predictably, thank God--but only because we work hard and spend hard to make sure it will. However, if Joe Third World wants to protect himself from anyone else or at least try to make the political cost potentially too high for us depending on the reason for conflict, then a layered SAM defense would be more cost effective than a fighter defense. Regarding your examples, the SA-20s could probably shootdown whatever (non-stealth) aircraft was delivering the HARMs, JASSMs, JSOWs, and bombs before weapons release (it certainly outranges those weapons), while the SA-15s could possibly take out the cruise missiles. On top of that, essentially all those weapons require accurate targeting data which can be made quite a bit more difficult given these SAMs are much more mobile than relocatable SAMs like SA-2s and SA-3s. The alternative is to buy fighters. Yeah, that'll work against the USAF--NOT! Every weapon you cited (except HARMs) would work against them, too. That, and airfields aren't mobile so targeting them is much simpler. Name a reasonable near-term scenario (within, say, two years) were we would likely loose more aircraft to enemy fighters than to enemy SAMs, and I'll name two the other way. I think we'd have to go to war against NATO before our airpower would seriously be in danger more from the air than the ground. Displacedjim