Man who shot down F-117 speaks about it for the first time

I am not against you, never have been.
I have always portrayed my comments to your topics and postings with respect, never intentionally seeking to incite you.
We are both patriotic, thus are inherently prideful, probably to a fault.

I can remember a time when I was one of but a very small minority on this board that backed this current war on Iraq. Can you imagine the amount of rhetoric filled hateful u2us I received over this?

Seekerof i couldnt agree with you more, you also have my respect and i always respond to your topics/posts with good solid manner, we both are adults and I think we all can work out our differences. I apologize for those words towards F-117 and have now changed them. I also know how it is getting so much u2u's people these days are filled with ignorance and no problem for the pictures it was my pleasure because last time i checked i overheard a member saying the plane came back safe only with bullet holes on its wings so i decided to post.

[edit on 30-10-2005 by NR]

Thank you!

I have omitted the quote I replied to.

Originally posted by Seekerof
Yeah, thats all well and good, but being the most important aspect of this whole incident is being left out and purposely disregarded, where skippytjc and COOL HAND made mention of:

The F-117 shot down had been running a flight path that had been previously run over and over on a number of previous F-117 missions.

That may be the case, yes, considering that the F117 appeared to be returning to base when the incident occurred.

I am not convinced that the F117's would have used the same corridor as regular fighters however, which would make it difficult to know this particular corridor (if they were using the same corridor then i think it is a failing in the mission planning...why would you let the enemy know where your aircraft are flying?).

What may have happened, is that spotters in Italy would have alerted crews to the fact that the F117(s) had been launched, and the ground crews would have been alert and on the lookout for the aircraft. When the aircraft dropped its payload, the crews would have had the chance to 'see' it on the radar and that enabled a close enough lock to down the plane, possibly with some optical guidance as well.

It does appear that the aircraft was downed by a SAM, which doesnt indicate random AAA fire brought it down. Witnesses stated a pair of SAM's were fired plus AAA when the F117 was downed.

Added to that, another F117 was damaged by a SAM (not a direct hit, exploded nearby) but managed to return to base in Italy. One other had light damage from AAA. So i think it is more likely that the aircraft were in fact tracked and targeted when flying at low altitude. I highly doubt that AAA would have been firing randomly where they believe a plane *might* have been...the tactics used were to fire on the enemy only when there was a reasonable chance of success and then move away the current position being occupied to try and minimise damage from targeted air strikes.

Your quite sure of this?
Is it because the US Air Force is worried about getting another taken down, or simply the application of adjustment, where lessons learned are re-applied and adapted? Note that air doctrines are not set in stone, and are subject to change via lessons learned from past mistakes.

seekerof

well i cant be sure, i dont have any inside information

But it seems apparent. The F117 has seen service in Iraq and maybe Afghanistan...neither country has as sophisticated an air defence as was (is) present in Serbia.

I am sure that a number of lessons were learned and applied.

[edit on 31-10-2005 by zvezdar]

zvezdar,
Bear in mind what you initially mentioned:

It hasnt happened since because the F117's havent been used against an enemy with the capability of shooting one down.

Question:
"Since" implys after the initial downing of the F-117?

At any rate, based on the assumption that "since" referred to the initial F-117 downing, I responded with "are you sure"?

Your reply:

But it seems apparent. The F117 has seen service in Iraq and maybe Afghanistan...neither country has as sophisticated an air defence as was (is) present in Serbia.

You are most certainly correct that the level of Iraqi and Afghanistani air defence was inferior to those utilized in Serbia, partly because of poor training,etc.

What I want to add to this, that you did not mention, was that even after the downing of the F-117 outside of Belgrade, just three days into the war [in a 78-day NATO campaign], the very next night, and subsequent nights, F-117s were sent on missions and completed their missions [fly in and fly out], all in the same mission/combat operational areas in the Belgrade and Serbian theatre. There were a total of 24 F-117s operating in the Bosnia/Kosovo theatre. NATO air missions involving F-117s continued, despite the downing of this one F-117. So my question would be: If the downing of this particular F-117 was not a matter of some luck, then how is that there were no further F-117s brought down in the subsequent F-117 missions in and around Belgrade and Serbia that followed the initial downing of the F-117?






seekerof

[edit on 31-10-2005 by Seekerof]

www.youtube.com...

In Serbian from the man that was in charge.He knows better than any of you.

I suppose when you make radar absorbing tech, from now on you have to be some guy who builds rockets, and radars on the fly. Don't use rocket scientists.

If I may doesn't current radar absorbing tech consist of an over the hull skin, if so can't we just intergrate an addative that works like that which is used to insulate magnetic equipt. in electronic magnets.

I mean those things have to be insulated or they would cause a feild outside the containment area screwing up the C & C system for the magnet.

Or the material the use to protect C & C system of a partical accelerator, they use a massive magnetic feild.

[edit on 22-9-2008 by Beelzabub]

[edit on 22-9-2008 by Beelzabub]

so what happened to all the wreckage ?? i mean its top secret and all so shouldnt it have been recovered or at least blow to bits ???? or maybe the russians have it now ?

Originally posted by ch1466

With the failures of the various Norden (APG-76 on A-6F)

ch1466

I love your posts, confusing as they are.

But as usual your technical information is sloppy. The A-6F would have used the AN/APQ-173 synthetic aperture radar, the APG-76 was (and is) used exclusively by the upgraded Israeli F-4Es.