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Old 09-14-12, 10:26 AM   #1
Skybird
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Default The end of stealth aircraft era?

If this is real, then yes.

http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/t...-a-855711.html

This video was recorded at the ILA in Berlin this year. It shows radar tracking of a Zeppelin via passive radar - no active radar beams, only radio transmissions from civilian infratructure around.

The article claims the demonstration of socalled passive radar shows that it has reached a technical developement state that now it is able to track stealth aircraft without even sending own radar beams.

Passive radar uses the reflections of radio waves and comparable electromagnetic emissions and thus does not give its presence and activity away to the enemy. Since these signals come from a myriad of different directions and just any source and origin, the special geometry of stealth aircraft does not offer protection anymore.

The Cassidian system is expected to be ready for production in 2015. Demonstration and evaluation systems already have been delivered to the Bundeswehr. The equipment, depending heavily on latest algorithms and super brute force calculation power, has just recently become affordable for mass production and is not more than what can be packed onto a pickup van or a small transporter.

The article also refers to an essay by a marine corps Ltn-Col, Arend Westra, written in 2009. He wanred that the progress made in passoive radars threatens to erode Americxa'S superiority in stealth tchnology, and that one should not rely to conduct military operaiton in the fguture under cover of stealöth-basded air siperiroity. He recommended back then that instead of pumping giant ammounts of money into new stealth platforms, the focus should shift towards research to understand passive radar better, becasue the next egneratiuon of Russian and Chinese stealth aircraft easily could be of American standards of today and then it would be good to have a passiove radar system oneself. For offensive operations, his advise was: "Let's prepare to conduct ground combat operations without cover provided by air superiority."

In the light of all this, the already hilariously expensive stealth fighters like F-22 and F-35, appear to be even more a giant waste of money.
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Last edited by Skybird; 09-14-12 at 10:47 AM.
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