Cool new / rumored Military technology

[spikerS]

I have been reading and watching different documentaries about old USA / Russian / Euro technology, and I remember fondly as a kid in the late 80's and early 90's about all the new and rumored fighter jets that were coming out like the B-117A, the SR-71, the B2 (and all the unconfirmed UFO sightings that are now attributed to them) , and being awestruck by the (then) current fighter jets, like the F-18, F-15, Mig-27, Mig-29 etc...

Now, I know I am out of the loop on this stuff, but I was wondering, what is out there now? What cool is new tech rumored to be out there? I know drones are all the rage...But have we figured out how to use ramjet? scramjet? low/high earth orbit?

[revelations]

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I have been reading and watching different documentaries about old USA / Russian / Euro technology, and I remember fondly as a kid in the late 80's and early 90's about all the new and rumored fighter jets that were coming out like the B-117A, the SR-71, the B2 (and all the unconfirmed UFO sightings that are now attributed to them) , and being awestruck by the (then) current fighter jets, like the F-18, F-15, Mig-27, Mig-29 etc...

Now, I know I am out of the loop on this stuff, but I was wondering, what is out there now? What cool is new tech rumored to be out there? I know drones are all the rage...But have we figured out how to use ramjet? scramjet? low/high earth orbit?

The short answer is, yes. If you can imagine it, chances are it was developed 40 years ago. Electrostatic propulsion for eg. is 60 year old technology. We have essentially reached the end of the archaic, smash through the air, brute force military aircraft.

Jet engines will improve with new materials but there hasn't been a revolution in propulsive technology in the white world for over 70 years.

On a side note, its rumored that the F22 and the F35 use artificial intelligence with their pilot interface. Rudimentary thought control was tested back in the 90s where the pilots wore a head-mounted sensor that picked up certain brainwaves for certain actions (eg. fire missile), this was in a tech mag - Popular Mechanics I think.

[speedog]

Enuf said.

[Gman.45]

SpikerS, PM me, I can send you my list of defense related sites I read daily, and a few forums where xpilots post quite a bit. I have 2 US friends, one a former F14 pilot (TG instructor, flew the last black Vandy F14s in the test squadron), and an F15E Strike Eagle pilot that is retiring soon (currently teaching pilots in trainers before he gets out). I also have a friend from high school that is a high time (like close to 3000 hours) pilot in fighters, from the CF18, Super Hornet, F16, Eurofighter, and the Gripen. He was CO of the RCAF test establishment squadron, and did the F35 training down in the USA as he is the lead pilot on whatever we were going to choose back when they were deciding on the F35 or another fighter. RCAF is still muddling through that, slowly, as ever.

Good article came out today from one of the defense sites I read, guy who runs it is a great military aviation photo journalist, been around for 10 years online. Directly relates to your question in the OP. Some interesting stuff on the podded airborne defensive laser project in the works right now, and what an offensive system like that would mean for air combat (bottomless magazine, just electric power generated by fuel use, pew pew pew pew pew, and the pew pew some more).

http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone...k-like-in-2030

Regarding the F35 - interesting tidbit, one flight when they were doing flight tests a short while ago, the distributed ap system (DAS) on the F35 detected a 2 stage missile launch about a province away in distance, 800 miles, and tracked it as well - very classified stuff on the capability of that thing, there is a reason every pilot that flies it raves about what it can do, and what it will do as the code and systems are written and wrung out. It's not even as big a dog as many had worried, last air show demo limited to 7g was impressive, next updated when they get the 9g updated, and full thrust from that smoking engine, it'll be just fine in the WVR arena IMO. Still some issues, such as the helmet making it harder to look over the shoulder and keep bandits in sight, but they are working that, and with the DAS and that AESA radar, WVR isn't going to happen all that much other than brutal ambushes on enemy fighters that'll never know the F35 was there anyway.

Again, PM me if you want, I have about 50 great, and 15 excellent defense journals and sites I read daily that cover advanced and upcoming fighter tech, and a couple good forums. Generation 6 fighter tech is going to be something else - airborne high kw lasers are coming, maybe megawatt class pew pew lasers in airborne fighters in our lifetime perhaps as well, and that alone is very interesting stuff. The new blended engine tech, ie 2 or 3 types of propulsion in a single fighter allowing very high sustained mach numbers...again, all kinds of interesting info.

I remember growing up in the 80s, playing all the flight sims, especially F19 Stealth Fighter, and being in awe when they declassified the F117 and then the B2 when I was in high school. I did a science project on the ATF competition between the YF22 and YF23, and made my case as to why the 23 should have won instead of the 22, and got a nice propeller head prize for the Province science fair. I saw the Mig29s at Abbotsford's Int Air Show the first year the x-Soviets came over and flew them, the 29 being my favorite fighter back then. Still have some great pics of the static display and airborne demos they did. So I can relate SpikerS.

Regarding what Revelations is alluding too, IMO he's correct. Think about this for a moment - the SR71 was designed in the very early 60s, and operational before the 70s even came along. It could fly faster than any missile system of the day, faster than a very high powered 30cal rifle bullet, and sustain that speed for entire nations distances, at incredibly high altitudes, like 2x or higher than airliners cruise in the 30k+ range. It also had recon capability that could read numbers off trucks and plates from that 60k altitude moving at high mach 2 and even mach 3 at times when needed. Just let that bake your noodle for a minute - before nearly all of us were born, in the early 70s, the USAF had a plane that was very low observable on radar (for the time), could fly faster than any threat and any threat's weapons could fly themselves, and take pictures from 2x airliner altitiudes of crap on the ground with good enough resolution to recognize a face.

So, whatever they have now 50 years later, that is classified, must be pretty crazy (ie gravity manipulating craft etc, aren't that much beyond imagination now, and more IMO).

[Go4Long]

Stuff in the near future for the US military includes a rumoured new hypersonic spy aircraft being dubbed the SR-72 by media types which is somewhere in the flight test phase (it was spotted but not confirmed at Lockheed's facility in California, is believed to be the cause of some very interesting contrails over the California test area, and believed to be the cause of some very "different" sonic booms around the California coast) with "Combined-Cycle" engine tech and speeds in excess of Mach 5 somewhere. Pretty cool stuff .

The new B-21 Raider Bomber is supposedly well into its flight testing phase but I've yet to see anyone even claiming to have spotted it.

Both the big US air defense contractors are probably well in to the design phase of "6th generation" fighters...keeping in mind that the F-22 project actually began in earnest in 1981 and the F-35 in 1992, to assume that the next fighter isn't already in the works would be silly, but who knows what kind of tech might be included in them.

[Sentry]

I was going to bring up the SR71 as well. The more you learn about it, the more in awe you will be. There have been books written hand over fist about that plane alone. And it's over 50 years old.

Strike fighters seem to have seen the most action the last 20 years and is kind of the way US man-piloted air doctrine has been headed. Need something that can bomb shit heads in caves without being a full blown bomber, while also having fighter capabilities. Development cycles are so long for these things, I wouldn't be surprised if something to surpass the F35 was on the drawing board right now.

Surveillance is going to be completely drones, although they aren't opposed to dusting off some of the U2s once in a while. Drones will be smaller, faster, quieter than they are now.

[Go4Long]

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although they aren't opposed to dusting off some of the U2s once in a while.

Once in a while? lol. They change out aircraft once a week at RAF Fairford...the one the had on static at the airshow last year had been thoroughly sandblasted...they're in flight pretty much every day.

[ZenOps]

Mach 15 hypersonic nuke. Also: Railgun that can sink an aircraft carrier at 100 miles.

When anyone says "with pinpoint accuracy" - they are obviously talking conventional explosives - because as long as you are within a hundred miles of your target, a nuke is not really going to miss unless you want a ground nuke.

[ZenOps]

BTW: All the new tech has no real human control. Leaders of governments and kings tend to not take chances in war. There is always a chance that a human bomber pilot will decide to go rogue and drop the bomb wherever they want to instead of where they are supposed to, or maybe even not drop the bomb at all. The most destructive and powerful weapons have no human eyes or hands behind them anymore.

Imagine if the guy who dropped the nukes on Japan got cold feet. It is understandable considering he knew full well that he was killing off a few hundred thousand people, and whatever punishment in hell comes with that.

Way more cool than that: Somali pirates! Talking about shooting people you don't know at 1,000 yards.

[revelations]

You can also assume that the latest attack aircraft in use have some kind of optical-range cloak as well. Thats also been hammered out the last 30 years, so not really new.

Also, warfare in the modern era has become network-based. The Israelis, when they bombed/deposed of a Syrian nuclear facility in the desert back in 2007, disabled the, very well equipped & Russian-made, anti-aircraft systems with a network/electronic attack - to such a level that the scopes on the Syrian radar installations were hacked and showed no aircraft approaching and no SAM was ever launched.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operat...tronic_warfare

[95EagleAWD]

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Mach 15 hypersonic nuke. Also: Railgun that can sink an aircraft carrier at 100 miles.

When anyone says "with pinpoint accuracy" - they are obviously talking conventional explosives - because as long as you are within a hundred miles of your target, a nuke is not really going to miss unless you want a ground nuke.

Not really. Nukes still need to be reasonably accurate. You sure can't miss a target by 100 miles and do damage to it, even with a nuke.

[ExtraSlow]

Iron beam system the Israelis have is neat. Apparently up and operating now.

[BerserkerCatSplat]

Hot time for tank news this week for some reason, wonder if there's a trade show coming up. Rheinmetall with the new Panther KF51 MBT and General Dynamics teasing a next-gen Abrams and Stryker.

[ZenOps]

Petabit over optical fibre. 70 bit quantum computing. Mind control for changing channels on 8K HDTV.

Things that explode better pretty much stopped decades ago when the Tsar nuke was set off. With the puny size of the earth, there is no need to make a bigger bomb than that.

As to why fighter jets in the USA have regressed? Intentional?

[ZenOps]

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Not really. Nukes still need to be reasonably accurate. You sure can't miss a target by 100 miles and do damage to it, even with a nuke.

https://science.howstuffworks.com/tsar-bomba.htm

They could make a singular nuke bigger but there is almost no point. Using it over land basically means that you have forsaken it as no one in their right mind would ever set foot on it for a hundred years. Its heavy and pudgy, but arguably quite small, only eight meters long.

3,800 times the explosive power of Hiroshima. But you would need two to take out Finland. You would never use it to take out an aircraft carrier, using much smaller nukes with multiple redundancies would be used in that scenario.

In the ocean, just like throwing a grenade in the water, its the compression wave that you have to worry about more than the fireball. There is a certain stupidly long range that will instantly cause eardrums to pop, as well as lungs and internal organs. Even with an 18 inch steel thick hull - you have to worry about the whole ship microcompressing for the blast and instantly killing everyone on board just by air pressure shudder. In fact, they seem to be practicing the idea to "steal" an aircraft carrier intact. Arguably there may be a way to "steal" an aircraft carrier with tactical nukes. If the nuke is "too close" then it simply gets nuked.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davy_C...uclear_device) But detonate about 1/2 mile before hitting the carrier would be optimal

What destroys submarines in war is the compression wave of the explosion which weakens the structure, not shrapnel or fire of the explosion itself.

The one way to make an aircraft carrier nuke resistant would be to remove all humans off of it, and make it "compression explosion" proof by only using robots. I do wonder if the USA is considering moving to completely manless for any of its carriers.