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#3934000 - 04/03/14 05:53 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: piston79]  
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Excellent reading! Can't wait to read that book. Thanks for sharing Piston! thumbsup

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#3934138 - 04/03/14 09:03 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: piston79]  
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Originally Posted By: piston79


Of all the remarkable achievements
of the B-2 at war, four stood out:
opening the air campaign, flying
alone, destroying an SA-3, and
taking down the Novi Sad bridge.


Great reading!
Recommended to all.
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Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

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#3934323 - 04/04/14 05:04 AM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: piston79]  
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[quote]...Written by political analyst and bomber warfare expert Rebecca Grant...[quote]


I'm already worry of any books written by "analysts" and "warfare experts".... is it good?

#3934640 - 04/04/14 05:53 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: GrayGhost]  
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Originally Posted By: GrayGhost
I tend to use -30dbsm for the F-117, but I have no idea if that's truly correct.


Could you be more specific? Where you use this -30 value?

#3934678 - 04/04/14 06:57 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Sim]  
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Originally Posted By: Sim


I'm already worry of any books written by "analysts" and "warfare experts".... is it good?


I admit that I haven't real the entire book, so far I read something like half of it and a quick "diagonal" reading of the other remaining half and so far it's IMO very good, specially because it's a compilation of historical facts and not a personal opinion of someone (such as an "analyst" or "warfare expert").

Basically that book covers the history of the B-2 development.

#4321019 - 12/18/16 06:26 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
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To Hpasp and all others... (note the date!)


#4333433 - 01/31/17 05:40 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
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I start a series, about aerial victories during OAF.



Here is the first debrief...

Lt Col Cesar “Rico” Rodriguez (USAF)

493rd EFS “Grim Reapers,” F-15C
Operation ALLIED FORCE
MiG-29
24 March 1999
Call-sign: KNIFE 13

Lt Col Rodriguez’s ALLIED FORCE kill marked the first of the conflict and the third in his career. It also made him one of only two pilots to shoot down two MiG-29 Fulcrums. The following account is from a taped interview with Col Rodriquez.

In January 1999 I was assigned to the 493rd Fighter Squadron, known as the “Grim Reapers,” stationed at RAF Lakenheath in the United Kingdom. We were the only F-15C squadron left in Europe: Spangdahlem had recently closed its Eagle squadron, and sent some of their jets to us. This enabled us to “plus-up” from an 18-jet squadron to a 24-jet unit. Several squadrons in the states were also to plus-up at this time. This made us the “pro’s from Dover, the only unit dedicated to providing air supremacy in the European area of operations (AOR).

Whereas my unit in DESERT STORM (58 TFS) had wingmen with over a thousand hours in the Eagle, the 493rd Fighter Squadron had wingmen showing up straight from the training course at Tyndall as recently as a month prior to the deployment. Some were finishing their Mission Ready (MR) check rides the week before we left for Italy. We had some very, very young aviators with us, and that’s not to say they didn’t perform admirably. On the contrary, they did incredibly great work. In particular was one of these young troops, “Wild Bill” Denim, my wingman on the night of 24 March.

We left Lakenheath and deployed un-refueled, but full loaded, to Cervia, Italy. Cervia is an Italian base 80 miles south of Aviano, on the east coast of Italy. This gave us the capabilin to take off in full afterburner, turn due east, and within eight and a half minutes be on station to monitor Yugoslavia, or provide support to anyone that needed it. We were the only U.S. presence at Cervia, which was a huge advantage over being deployed to the “USS Aviano.” We did not have to compete for runway, ramp, or weapons storage space, so we had a pretty good deal set up for us. The Italians were phenomenal hosts, not only on base, but also downtown, in the restaurants and hotels we frequented. They were equally determined to see this conflict ended as rapidly as possible with as minimal impact on the communities involved.

On 24 March we prepared for the first mission of this conflict. There were two missions on this first night, both spearheaded by F- 15s of the 493rd Fighter Squadron. The first was a U S -only mission that went north through Hungary to act as the northern arm of the assault. They focused on Belgrade and the SAM threat employing F-117s and EA-6Bs. Our mission, on the other hand was a coalition-centric mission, with a strike package made up of most of the coalition members. We refueled with the package over the “boot" of Italy, and then pushed north up the eastern shore of the Adriatic. The targets were primarily in Montenegro; radar sites and SAMs positioned to deny access to Pristina. The strike was designed to break a hole in this SAM belt, and to open access for the close air support (CAS) assets that needed to get into Kosovo from the west.

Our four-ship of F-15s proceeded north, consisting of the flight lead "Cricket” Renner, and his wingman “K-Bob” Sweeny I was number three, with my wingman, “Wild Bill” Denim. We were positioned with "K-Bob” on the far left to the west, then to the right was “Cricket,” then myself, and “Wild Bill” was on the far right. As I mentioned, "Wild Bill” was one of our youngest members in the squadron, having just completed his MR check and barely had 100 hours in the jet. In fact, he would finish the war with more combat time than peacetime flying in the F-15 and, like all our young aviators, he did just phenomenal work.

As we did our pre-strike sweep heading north, we got an initial radar contact about 25 miles north of Montenegro's airfield. At first it appeared to be a CAP, as the contact was orbiting; however the slow speed and lack ot any jamming led me to believe this might not be a fighter CAP. We were now thinking our element of surprise had been compromised. Lead and two focused on this contact as we closed the range, while "Wild Bill" and I kept our focus on Pristina’s airfield. We knew this was their primary MiG base, with extensive underground shelters. This was our briefed primary threat axis, and our main task was to insure that nothing took off from Pristina heading towards Montenegro that might attempt to intercept our strike.

I got an intermittent contact out of Pristina, moving at high speed through the mountains. As the contact climbed above the mountains (about 10,000 feet) I was able to maintain a solid track, and I called him out as being on a bearing from our noses of 030 degrees for 70 miles. I started my ID matrix, and asked AWACS to do the same so that we would all be on the same sheet of music when the time came. Once I had determined my contact met hostile criteria, I handed him off to my number four to monitor, and I began monitoring the original contact, which was slightly west of our nose, to assist the lead element as needed. Lead then advised me that it appeared that this contact was landing, so I switched back to the eastern contact and asked four what its status was. Number four came back with a bearing, range, and altitude (BRA) on the contact that allowed me to put my radar right there. Four also had gotten a positive ID on the contact as a MiG-29, and it was pointed right at us.

I directed my element to start a climb, jettison tanks, and push it up. This would give our AMRAAMs greater range and, since we were on the front edge of the strike package, I wanted to shoot as soon as possible, to start the shooting match on our terms, not the MiG’s. I asked AWACS if they had an ID on the contact, but they were unable to provide any information. Since both jets in my element had a positive hostile ID, I took it upon myself to declare “Hostile,” and I shot one AIM-120 at about 25 miles. I didn’t realize we had accelerated to about 1.3 Mach, so as I shot the missile I looked to my left, and it appeared to be flying alongside of me. The missile took a couple of seconds to build up momentum and accelerate out in front of me, and during that time I thought I might have a bad missile. As it pulled away from me towards the location of the MiG the motor appeared to be a small glow, about the size of a dime.

I had a good radar track and did not see any jamming, so I opted to fire only one missile. I also was concerned with managing my missiles, as we had a long way to go, and a long time period to cover, so I didn’t want to waste any. I also checked my element a little more to the east to avoid some of the SAMs that were starting to become active. My RWR was indicating that the SAM radars were starting to acquire us, so I wanted to stay away from them.

At about 15 miles to the MiG. I directed the element to come left and go pure, or point at the target. I did this for a couple of reasons. First, I had gotten a little too far east to be able to meet my contract of holding the east-west, counter-rotating CAP after this engagement was complete. Our four ship had briefed the strike package that we would hold our CAP between Montenegro and Pristina, and I needed to be in a position to uphold my responsibility. Second, I wanted to get an eyeball check on the missile and the threat. As I looked through the TD box in the HUD, I could not see the MiG, as it was pitch black out, but I was counting down the seconds left for the missile to impact.

As the counter reached zero, a fireball erupted in my HUD. Because the western mountains were still covered in snow, the fireball literally lit up the sky as it reflected off of the snow-covered mountains. The only thing I had ever seen like this was when they turn on all the lights at an NFL stadium, except this was like five times that bright; it really lit up the whole sky. In fact, an F-15E WSO about 85 miles to the southwest of the fireball heard my "Splash" call and simultaneously saw the bright glow. He became suspicious of what might have detonated up there, since the glow was so bright! As it turned out it was just that MiG-29 exploding.

There were a total of six aerial victories during ALLIED FORCE, and four of these were credited to the “Reapers,” so we were very proud of our squadron’s performance. One of the other kills was accomplished by a Dutch F-16, and the Shaw F-16s also got one.

Operation ALLIED FORCE represented a turning point in the understanding of warfare by the average fighter pilot. As one of a few DESERT STORM veterans in our squadron, I kind of felt it was my responsibility to help the guys understand their role in actual combat, and the impact of combat on our squadron, our base, and our families back home. I also made a point to help the young guys understand the political ramifications of being armed with an air-to-air machine, and that you are sending a political statement anytime you hit that pickle button.

ALLIED FORCE represented a political tightrope, where U.S. forces and NATO forces were coming together for a political objective. We realized at that point that NATO had fallen behind in its training and technological investment. As a result, some of the tactics that were employed had to be "watered-down” significantly so that other partners could play completely in the entire operation. We also had the unique scenario where, as the U.S. leadership from SHAPE was directing airpower, they were not always airmen, and hence sometimes that direction was poor. It was common to go after targets that had already been struck, or going after targets that had no impact on forcing Yugoslavia to surrender. Even the youngest Lt in the squadron could tell that we were not doing things as well as we could have.

I say it was a turning point because, unlike DESERT STORM, where we had no idea what was going on, and we were just the execution element, we were actively involved in planning the air campaign over Yugoslavia. Unfortunately, when these recommendations got to SHAPE, they were often changed, and airman were put into harm’s way striking targets that had no significance, and in some cases had already been destroyed. But that’s a whole other aspect of this battle space. The actions of the 493rd were significant in developing tactics for both day and night employment that are still used by the F-15 community, and also by the F-22 as it becomes operational.

The investment in technology also paid off, as we were finally equipped with a missile that had the range to kill the enemy well beyond visual range, and was lethal enough to insure a kill. The investment made after DESERT STORM was made on the recommendations of the Captains, Majors and Lieutenants that fought in STORM, and much of the credit for the success in employing these new systems in ALLIED FORCE goes to them.

So to wrap it up, I ended up with three MiG kills. Three kills by a fighter pilot who I consider to be average; I was by no means the golden boy, and never had golden hands. What I had were great instructors and commanders who forced me to achieve higher levels of performance through dedication and hard work. They allowed me to experience failure, but they were also there, 100% of the time, to get me back on my feet, and help me to achieve new standards. Those three MiG kills are also a reflection of the dedication of the men and women who fix the F-15, and all those that supported the combat operations we were in. The men and women in today's maintenance world make success possible in the battle space. When it comes right down to it, every time you enter an engagement, the enemy has an equal opportunity to employ his weapons against you, so your aircraft and your weapons are the tiebreaker. In both STORM and ALLIED FORCE the troops that worked the jets, loaded them, fueled them - you name it, they were phenomenal. As were the support folks that take the creature comforts of home and deliver them to the forward edge of the battle space. They knew the mission, and supported it in every detail.

Also, a large part of this true success story is the family members, the spouses and the children left behind. I’ve been blessed to have my wife, who has endured three full-up combat deployments with what I would call the heart of the envelope; being involved each time in the night one operations, which are always the most challenging in combat. She has had to endure three of them, and she's been a true trooper. The same goes for my two great kids, who supported me and my wife during these deployments, and allowed me to do my job. When you look at the total amount of sacrifice it takes to accomplish the mission, even though my name appears on these kills, it should appear at the bottom of a very long list!





Major Iljo Arizanov in MiG-29 number 18112 launched from Nis.
He was hit North West of Pristina at 20:20
Ejected, and parachuted to Suva Reka.

Last edited by Hpasp; 01/31/17 06:26 PM.

Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

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#4333439 - 01/31/17 05:52 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
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Captain Michael “Dozer” Shower (USAF)

493rd EFS “Grim Reapers,” F-15C
Operation ALLIED FORCE
MiG-29
24 March 1999
Call-sign: EDGE 61

Mike Shower graduated the United States Air Force Academy in 1990, and attended UPT at Vance AFB, Oklahoma. In 1993 he completed F-15C training, and was assigned to the 43rd Fighter Squadron, Elmendorf AFB, Alaska. Following this tour he was selected to attend the F-15C Fighter Weapons Instructor Course at Nellis. Upon graduation, "Dozer” was assigned to the 493rd Fighter Squadron, RAF Lakenheath, United Kingdom, in the summer of 1997.

Besides the multiple deployments to Incirlik to support Operation NORTHERN WATCH, I had also been on the ADVON (Advance Team) to Cervia AB, Italy, for one false alarm. On that trip in October 1998 I went with an out-going weapons officer, Maj Stu “Razor” Johnson. The entire squadron deployed; we had no idea if a war would kick off. In fact, the Serbians backed down, partially due to winter conditions in theater. The deployment only lasted a little over a month, and when they backed down everyone redeployed to their home bases. On February 19, 1999, I had just completed a BFM hop with another IP, Capt Ken “Heater” Griffin, when the Operations Officer (Ops O) met me at the door and told me to get my bags packed; we're going back to Cervia. Four hours later I was on an airplane for Italy, ADVON for the 2nd round.

A couple of days later the first 12 jets arrived from Lakenheath (we still had six jets deployed to Incirlik performing Operation NORTHERN WATCH; they would show up to Cervia a week before the war), and I assumed my flight commander duties; I was still helping our brand new weapons officer get up to speed, so I was fairly busy. The experience level in the squadron was very low, and there weren't many IPs; in fact, we had several brand new wingman, and even worse, several of our most experienced instructor pilots, including “Razor,” “Heater," “Tonto,” and a few others, had just PCS'd (Permanent Change of Station), leaving a big hole in our experience level. In one unusual aspect we were lucky; since we had just deployed to Cervia for the same drill, there weren’t many unknowns to deal with. As the weeks wore on I shuttled back and forth between Cervia, the CAOC at Vincenza, and the planning cell at Aviano doing the mission planning for F-15Cs. It was obvious that things were getting more serious, and the prospect of actually going to war was looming near. As we stood-down from training sorties a few days prior to the start of hostilities everyone knew that the time was close. Still, it was difficult to come back to the squadron and have to pretend that nothing was going on, or at least that I didn't have any “gouge."

One of the more interesting things from my perspective as the weapons officer was how much more attention the squadron was paying to academics during the last couple of days. Instead of the usual “oh well” attitude, guys were on the edge of their seats to learn more about SAM breaks, the survival radios, you name it; everyone knew their lives depended on this information, so it was a great time to be a weapons officer. Another very important factor was the great leadership we had in “BillyMac,” our Squadron Commander, who was also a Weapons School Graduate; he too had been there for the first deployment. He was a superb pilot, and incredibly calm throughout the entire deployment, and I was able to share details, ideas, and thoughts with him as we made plans, prepared, and flew missions—that was a great benefit, and made things much easier.

The day of 24 March was very surreal. Most of us tried to sleep until about noon, most couldn’t. Since it was March, and still pretty cold and not yet tourist season, our little resort town of Cesanatico on the beach was empty. The guys were bummed, since it’s a nude beach in the season! The pilots were in a four star hotel with a four star restaurant with outstanding per diem; all I can say is, if you’ve got to go to war, this was the way to do it! Everyone was restless, so about 20 of us head down and play beach football. In hindsight, this was pretty stupid, as any one of us could have broken something and been oil the schedule, but it was a blast, and was all about relieving the stress that we were all feeling. We played for a good hour and a half, got cleaned up and in uniform, got in our cars, and went to war. Strange how that stays so vivid in my memory.

The flight line was completely still and quiet when we stepped to the jets—it was a somber moment. I’ll always remember handing my nametag to Sgt Donald Green, aircraft 159’s crew chief; I really don’t remember much of what was said-it was pretty emotional—but I think it included, “bring my jet back and you with it!” I taxied and took off first, since I was leading the first four-ship out; our package had a greater distance to travel before our push time. We took off at sunset, one at a time (it was a tiny runway), and I’ll never forget it, because there must have been 100 personnel lined up along the infield down the runway standing at attention when we took off—it sent chills down your spine. The line-up was myself as EDGE 61 and “Man-O” Steele as my number two. The second element consisted of “BillyMac" as number three, with “Dirk" Driggers on his wing. We used most of the squadron during the first 24 hours, including our newest wingmen. “Dirk" was one of these, with only a few hours of night flying in the Eagle, not long out of RTU, and here he was in the first four-ship, at night, and at war over hostile territory—it was great! While they were nervous, they did a fantastic job hangin' in there. In fact, I was most impressed throughout the entire conflict by how well our young pilots performed. They followed their training to a “T,” and in many ways performed better than 'us" more experienced pilots did.

"Cricket" Renner was leading the 2nd four-ship to takeoff. My four-ship was tasked to protect a "U.S.-Only" package consisting often F-117s, two B-2s on their combat debut, four F-l6CJs, and two EA-6Bs over northern Serbia. “Cricket" had a coalition package of aluminum (non-stealthy) aircraft pushing first into the Kosovo province and southern Serbia. In his flight were “K-Bob” Sweeney as number two and “Rico" Rodriguez as number three, with "Wild Bill" Denham on his wing. Both "K-Bob" and “Wild Bill" were also very inexperienced in the Eagle.

The northern push w as considered the “low-observable stealth” package, and since it was U.S.-Only, the NATO AWACS was not well informed of its presence, purpose, or composition. This was not great planning or coordination on the coalition leadership's part. Out of many painful lessons learned, a few were that you might not want to plan that the war will only last a few days, and it might be wise to bring in everything you need to fight—like a U.S. AWACS to control your U.S.-only packages! In fact, when I checked in with the AWACS. they said in effect “Who are you?,” so we were off to a rough start, and this had a significant impact on our mission. The package marshaled over Hungary, and then was to push south through Serbia towards Belgrade. The B-2s were moving from south to north throughout the country, so they were really under everyone’s protection during the mission. The F-117s were doing their “spider routes,” going all over to their various targets in north Serbia. Our plan was to sweep the area as two two-ships separated by about 25 miles, then set up two CAPs just north of Belgrade facing south. This would keep us out of the SAM rings, but give us good coverage of their known MiG bases. I was holding down the western CAP with two, while three and four held the east CAP. With all this going on, and NATO AWACS not being in the loop, it made for a real mess.

Since we didn't have night vision goggles (NVGs) yet, our formation within the elements was about a five mile trail for the wingmen. They maintained this using the radar, air-to-air TACAN, and the IFF (Identify Friend or Foe) interrogator, as well as having built in altitude deconfliction between aircraft. Since we were a little short of AIM-120s, some of the aircraft had six AIM-120s, and some had four -120s and two AIM-7MHs. All had two AIM-9Ms, three bags of gas, and full chaff and flare. My aircraft had the two AIM-7 configuration, along with the AMRAAMs.The heavier AIM-7s were on the front stations, with the AMRAAMs behind them and on the inboard wing stations.

We pushed first, about two minutes in front of the CJs as planned. This gave us room to pump cold once, and not run over the CJs. It was a crystal clear night; we could see all the way to the southern end of Serbia. The lights of Belgrade were right there to the south. Since we knew the timeline, as the Time On Target (TOT) for the initial wave of cruise missiles came close, I had the whole flight look south at Belgrade. We could see the orange glow of the explosions as they hit various targets. Then it was our trun, and we pushed south.

We were in the mid- to high 30s, and the CJs were in the 20s. The F-117s were below them, and the B-2s came through WAY above everyone. This gave us some concern, having JDAMs (GPS-guided bombs) coming down through us, but it was “big sky theory” in such a tight airspace. We were really stuck; we didn't know where they would be, we had no way to see or avoid them, and we had to stay close to the MiG bases. I had briefed the F-117 weapons officer that if we engaged low targets we would shoot and dive through their block. He said he was fine with this, after all, it's a Big Sky Theory-you'll hear more about this later!

We had just gotten to the southern end of the CAP point and were getting ready to set up our counter-rotating CAPs when I hear the call “Splash one MiG in the south" relayed via AWACS. This was the luckiest guy in the world. “Rico," who now had his third MiG kill (two in DESERT STORM); he had just killed a MiG-29 that drove right at him—single AIM-120 to a fireball about 10 miles from Kosovo's capitol, Pristina. So we were pretty tired up now, as we knew they were flying. We had questioned whether they would fly or not, and now we knew the MiGs were up. We were running 10 mile legs in the CAP, and we had been in country for roughly 6.9 minutes. I turned south again for the first time and, just like that, at 35 nm, there's a blip on the radar. I lock him up, and he’s doing 150 knots at 1,500 feet, climbing out from their airfield in Belgrade, Batajinica. I call everyone, “Heads up, contact out of Batijinica." There’s no ID or AWACS calls yet, and I break lock and go back to search. A short time later the radar shows him northbound, so I lock him again at 25 miles, our briefed lock range. Now he's at 10,000 feet going 400 knots.

Unknown to me until after the sortie, most of my radio calls on my main radio were unreadable. The radio was jamming itself, but I didn't know it; there was no feedback in the headset, and all we heard when playing the tapes together after the sortie was silence on everyone else's tapes, while I was jabbering away on the radio on my tape. So almost all of my contact calls, IDs, shots, etc. were not heard by anyone but me. This will turn out to be a huge factor in the chaos that ensues.

By 17 miles I have an ID that this is a bad guy, and I call it out. I talk first and shoot second, just what you're not supposed to do. So I call, "Hostile, Hostile, FOX 3" and take my first AIM-120 shot at 14 miles. I made sure the AIM-120 was active, and then thumbed to and shot an AIM-7. No kidding. I've always wanted to shoot an AIM-7, and that big ol' Sparrow comes off, WHOOSH! I'm looking down into the lights of Belgrade so I can’t see anything, but I was able to follow the missile motor for awhile. I’m ramping down from 37,000 feet the whole time. At about six miles, and just after the AMRAAM times out, the target turns right, directly into the beam. This could have been triggered by several things. He could have gotten indications of my radar lock. The AMRAAM could have exploded near him but not damaged him, who knows, but he does maneuver into the beam. So now he’s maneuvering when the AIM-7 gets there, and it apparently misses also.

Now I’m at 5.5 nm, look-down, when I shoot another AIM 120 and call, “FOX 3 again." I’m at about 20,000 feet, and he’s at about 10,000 feet and I’m diving. This missile comes off and goes about straight down, and I'm diving and turning left, looking down and trying to follow it. The MiG then comes out of the beam in a climbing left turn towards me, kind of breaking up and into me. Maybe he got spiked, got a call from his GCI, or just looked up into a dark sky and saw the missile, but we end up about eight or nine thousand feet apart, and he’s almost directly under me, head to head aspect. I pick up a spike (I have no idea where it came from—I never looked), and at the same time I’m glued to the missile motor when it turns into a fireball. Of course, I’m supposed to be in AUTOGUNS and clearing for other bad guys. Instead, I’m in a steep left turn staring at the fireball, thinking, cool! I don’t see an ejection, but there was a lot of stuff coming off the aircraft, and I watched it impact the ground. We found out later that the pilot actually survived, which I was really glad about. My goal was to shoot down the aircraft, to eliminate a threat to our aircraft; you really don't think about killing the other guy. In hindsight I was glad to have only shot down the aircraft—he had a wife and kids too.

The Yugoslavian press claimed that the only MiG pilot to be killed was shot down by their own air defense SAMs. There are a lot of conflicting reports, though. The pilot flying my MiG wrote a long article about his short flight, and it even had his picture. It’s been “edited" by a very sarcastic U.S. fighter pilot, and it’s hilarious. He claims to have had three missiles shot at him; how he figured that out I’ll never know—maybe he guessed, but he was spot-on.

Remember what I said about the F-117s and the big sky theory? This is exactly where this proved false—as always, Murphy’s is alive and well. Because we had spun once in the CAP prior to the commit, one of the F-117s was now in front of us, directly between us and the MiG during the engagement. He’s flying along, looking through his NVGs when, WHOOSH-WHOOSH, two missiles go right over the top of his canopy. He looks back and forward and realizes he is sandwiched, smack in the middle of an air-to-air engagement. I'm 20 degrees nose-low. and about a thousand feet away from the F-117, pointed right in front of him, when I fire my third missile. I find out by talking to him on the phone later that he sees all this as the missile motor illuminates my F-15, and the missile, followed closely by me, flying right across his nose. I almost hit him. He turns and follows the missile's path, and sees the MiG turning left towards him. also! Then the MiG explodes, and he watches it crash, too. Another F-117, about 35 miles away, sees the explosion. With his NVGs he clearly saw the MiG. the Eagle, and the F-117 all together. So much for the "Big Sky Theory," and of course, I have NO IDEA this just happened!

While all this is going on, my wingman and other flight members are only getting bits and pieces of my radio calls. My wingman knew something was going on, but not the whole picture. Because of this, when he sees the fireball "Man-O's” first thought is, "Dozer just got shot down!” I then transmit on the other radio "Let's come off north,” and he thinks, "Thank God it’s not Dozer!" He did have an ID by then, and was ready to shoot, but held off on his shot trying to figure out what was going on—outstanding patience for a young fighter pilot at night, on his first combat sortie! The other element didn’t realize what had happened until later (radio again). So that’s the end of the first engagement.

We had just reset in the CAP when we turn south and see an exact repeat of the first radar contact, except at 20 miles this guy turns into the beam. I can’t get an ID on him and AWACS is no help; not once did they call an ID on a real airborne contact that night in the north. I can’t blame them entirely, because first, NATO AWACS did not train as focused on tactical engagements as U.S. AWACS controllers did, and second, they were not given our U.S. Only Air Tasking Order (ATO), so they didn’t know who was where, at what altitude, times, etc. In addition, since they couldn't hear my ID and shot calls, either, there was no way for them to hold onto a contact and pass the ID back to us if we lost track or had to turn cold (again, a factor later on). At this point I end up right over the top of the contact-I'm at 30,000 feet, and he's at 10,000. I call my element out north, since I don't have an ID and no NVGs so we're not comfortable running on him. In my heart-of-hearts AND based on information I had in front of me, I KNEW this was a hostile, I knew where everyone else was (Eagles and CJs, and I knew he wasn't a F-117 or B-2), but without the technical and “legal" ID I couldn't shoot. After the shoot-down of the Black Hawks, the F-15 community was so conservative and worried about doing something wrong that we missed an opportunity to do something right. While being conservative is a good thing, we completely removed the ability of a pilot to use common sense and situational awareness. I had no doubt who this guy was, I had tracked him off his airfield. So while I did the right thing, what if the MiG had gotten a lucky contact and shot one of us? I fully believe I would have been questioned for not shooting. In retrospect, and I teach this all the time now, under the same circumstances—SHOOT! If there's ANY doubt you don't hit the pickle button, but if there isn’t, don't be a lawyer—do what's right!

Meanwhile, "Billy Mac" and his element are running on this guy, who is now northeast of Belgrade, turning back to the north. "BillyMac” runs on him for 30 miles with a lock, and he can't get an ID. One of the problems is while I was directly over the top of the MiG. “BillyMac” gets a “Friendly” indication from our merged plot. I didn’t think to call out that I was directly over the MiG, and he doesn't know to break lock and reacquire to clean up the picture — in those days we didn't have data link yet, so we didn’t have great S.A. on where other people were. They go in to 10 to 15 miles and abort out for lack of ID. Meanwhile “Dog” Kennel, an F-16CJ pilot (CLUB 73), has a solid radar lock on the MiG but no ID. He asks me seven times to confirm “Hostile” on the target, but once again, because of my radio he can’t hear me (I respond five times to his calls!). In the heat of the battle he forgets to then get an electronic ID, so he holds his shot and comes off north with “BillyMac’s” flight.

With no one able to get an ID we now have EIGHT fighters all running north away from ONE MiG-29 because we couldn’t ID him, nor use situational awareness to shoot him. While we are bravely running away to the north, my two-ship is in a position to start a turn back to the south to look at Belgrade again. Right then AWACS calls out “MiG-29 CAPs airborne near Belgrade,” so I’m thinking where did all these MiGs come from? We found out just before takeoff they had moved six MiGs well to the south (the ones “Rico” engaged), but what AWACS was calling was ground traffic. We flew south all the way to Belgrade looking for these MiGs that weren’t there (they became somewhat infamous for this—and worse were those in charge at the CAOC that several times attempted to commit us through SAM rings throughout the conflict to attack MiGs that weren’t there because they were ground tracks). Operation ALLIED FORCE took a big step (backwards!) towards centralized control AND execution.

A few minutes later the lone MiG-29 had turned south, so the other six U.S. fighters turn and start chasing this guy south. “Dog” calls me and recommends that I turn north. As soon as I do, I get an immediate radar contact with hostile ID at 16 miles, beak-to-beak. “Man-O” is with me and locked also. At exactly the same time that I call the bullseye position of the hostile contact at 10,000 feet, AWACS comes back with “Friendly there, 27,000 feet.” So I start a steep dive from 37,000 feet trying to get below 27, all the while screaming for the position of the other Eagle element and CLUB flight, the CJs. Of course they can't hear me because of the radio issue, so I get no answers from anyone!

By the time I'm diving through 19,000 feet the MiG is now five miles off my nose, and I know I'm looking at a guy WELL below 270. I call "Hostile, FOX-3” and shoot one AIM-120. I make a cardinal mistake here, and it's something I always hammer guys on doing —take two shots! They are called “miss”iles, not “hit"tiles. So I hold the second shot, since I only have one 120 left and an old AIM-7. I should have cranked, which would have given me room to complete the intercept and be in a position to shoot again (another mistake), but I don't, so I'm in a right turn looking straight down when near time-out I see a small “pop." This could have been a proximity detonation of the missile, or it could have been the missile hitting the ground. Either way, it didn't down the MiG and there's no fireball, so my “one” shot didn't do the job. Now I'm too close to keep him on the radar, so he gimbals off my radar low; I’m looking all the way down, and he’s got to be right under me, and I'm thinking this isn’t a very good situation. So I've got to spin to get spacing, and hope he ends up in front of me again. I call for a 360 turn, or “spin,” and around I go. I say “I” go because of the radio again, as two doesn’t hear the call.

"Man-O” has been locked to this guy the whole time, but he doesn't hear my hostile call, my shot, nor the spin call; he also doesn’t have his own ID, so he’s not sure who this contact is. While I'm in my 360 turn I see the air-to-air TACAN range getting bigger, so I ask him for his heading in the other radio, and he says “south.” I direct him to come north and spin to get back in formation, and being a good wingman, he drops the contact and turns north. Had I known he was tracking the same contact, and was in a position to kill this guy, I would have shouted, “Shoot him. he’s hostile!” In fact, when we listened to his tape later there was broken but audible radio calls from "Man-O” about being locked to something—had I been able to process that and figure out what was happening, we might have been able to get this MiG.

Once I roll out southbound and “Man-O” is back behind me, we get more locks on a contact that we “KNOW” is the same guy; he's heading south towards Belgrade, same place we left him, same airspeed and altitude, but I can’t get an ID, and AWACS keeps saying “friendly there,” so I can't shoot. No kidding, this is the only radar contact in the area; everyone else we can see with radar and IFF is behind us (ie, it was only stealth aircraft in front of us and the MiG). He starts to slow and descend, so I secretly hope he has battle damage and is going to crash, but he was probably on approach to his field. We are coming up on the SAM threat rings around Belgrade, and I don’t want to go from hero to zero by getting us shot down, so I drop the contact and call us out north. We missed killing this guy not once, but twice, for a variety of reasons. My radio problems, ID issues, not shooting two missiles, AWACS not hearing the hostile calls, and the reasons mentioned before all compounded in the “fog of war" to cost us this opportunity. And many of the issues were solvable at the time, had I just been able to process the information and act upon it.

However, at this point we just return to our CAP; the B-2s are nearly overhead based on timing, and it’s time to egress and Return To Base (RTB). All said and done, it was still a pretty cool start for Eagle drivers on the first night of a war!

The Yugoslavian press later reported that the first MiG-29 to launch from Batajnica Air Base was Maj Nebojsa Nikolic in MiG-29 18111, followed shortly by Maj Ljuhisa Kulacin. Nikolic was reported to have been shot down almost immediately, while Kulacin claimed to have evaded three missiles fired at him. Since Batajnica AB was under attack by NATO forces, he chose to land at Belgrade International Airport. Both pilots reported that the radars and SPO-15 radar detectors were inoperative on their aircraft. These reports match amazingly close to the NATO claims.

Capt (now-Lt Col) Shower went back to the F-15C Fighter Weapons School, this time as an instructor. Following this tour, he was selected in the initial cadre of F-22 Raptor pilots for the initial operational test and evaluation, and currently is stationed at Elmendorf AFB Alaska, commanding an operational F-22 Raptor squadron.



Major Nebojsa Nikolic launched from Batajnica at 20:37, in the MiG-29 number 18111.
A nearby missile explosion caused no harm of the plane.
Soon a 2nd missile passed close by.
He initiated evasive action, but the 3rd missile hit the plane.
At 20:47 he ejected, and parachuted down to Knicanin.

Major Ljubisa Kulacin launched from Batajnica at 20:40, in the MiG-29 number 18105.
Heading north of 3km from Batajnica, he was alerted to radar lock.
He beamed in, broken the radar lock and continued north, by evading a missile.
After 20min of flight, he landed back at Tesla international.


Last edited by Hpasp; 01/31/17 06:27 PM.

Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

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#4333446 - 01/31/17 06:02 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Dec 2009
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Hpasp Offline
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Hpasp  Offline
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Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 2,665
Hungary, Europe
Captain Jeff “Claw” Hwang (USAF)
493rd EFS “Grim Reapers,” F-15C
Operation ALLIED FORCE
2 x MiG-29s
26 March 1999
Call-sign: DIRK 21

Capt Hwang Graduated UPT at Laughlin AFR in 1990. Upon completing F-15C training at Tyndall AFB, he spent six years flying the Eagle and T-37 prior to being assigned to the 493rd Fighter Squadron of the 48th Fighter Wing, RAF Lakenheath. "Claw" had been in the squadron for two years, and had flown one Operation ALLIED FORCE mission prior to this engagement. The following account is from an email he sent just days after the event to fellow Eagle Drivers.

Well, I'm finally back in England after being Temporary Duty (TDY) since the end of January — at least for two weeks anyway. Got sent direct to Cervia AB, Italy, from Operation NORTHERN WATCH in Turkey after being at Incirlik AB for over seven weeks ("Luv the 'Lik" no 'mo!). My house and yard are a total mess!

There doesn't seem to be an end in sight in the Kosovo situation, but the war is over for me, at least for a while. Some of you have probably already heard through the grapevine about what happened to "Boomer” and me. Here's the proverbial "Rest of the Story."

“Boomer" and I were tasked as Bosnia-Herzegovina DCA on 26 March 1999, Vul time (Vulnerability Time, or “station Time”) from 1500Z to 1900Z. We were established on CAP over Tuzla for about an hour after the initial refueling. At 1602Z, while eastbound approaching the Bosnia/Yugoslavia border, I got a radar contact 37 nm to the east, 6K' (Altitude 6000’ feet), beaming south at over 600 knots.

Of course AWACS had no clue, and did not have any inkling someone was flying on the other side of the border (although he was real good at calling out every single friendly WEST of us!)

I called out the contact, and “Boomer” was locked same. Without an ID, and not being tactically sound to cross the border at the time, I elected to pump our formation in a right hand turn through south and called, "PUSH IT UP, BURNER, TAPES ON!" (We were initially flying .85 Mach at 28,000 feet, and rolled out heading west/southwest.) At that time I didn’t think anything much would happen. I figured the contact would probably continue south or turn east, and remain well on the eastern side of the border.

Nevertheless, I called the flight lead of the south CAP over Sarajevo and gave him a craniums-up on the position of the contact, altitude, and the heading. This entire time AWACS still had no radar contact, even after I called it out on the radio. Man, running away with the contact at our six o’clock with AWACS not having any clue was NOT comfortable!

“Boomer” and I continued west for a total of 60 seconds (about 10 nm) before I directed the formation to turn back hot, again turning through south in an attempt to get some cut-off. “Boomer” was on the north side of the formation (left side, as we rolled out heading east). We both got contact BRA 070 degrees for 37 nm, 23,000 feet, target now heading west (hot towards us). AWACS finally woke up and starting seeing the same thing. Now, I’m starting to think Sh!T IS GONNA HAPPEN (evident with the increase of about two octaves in my voice!).

It was fairly obvious this guy originated from FRY (Former Republic of Yugoslavia), and there were no OCA missions on at the time. We still needed to get clearance from AWACS to engage, so I requested (codeword) and got no reply from the controller (pretty sure he had no freakin' clue what that codeword meant!). About this time both “Boomer” and I got good ID on the target in our own cockpits, and with threat hot towards us inside 30 nm I decided to blow off the AWACS/clearance to engage restriction and go for it!

Target was now inside 30 nm, and I directed “Boomer" to target the single group. I broke lock, and went back to search in 40 nm scope and 120 degree sweep. The target then check-turned to the right towards the northwest (about 14L aspect) and descended to high teens. “Boomer” and I checked about 30 degrees left to the northeast for cutoff. This check-turn slung me aft in the formation so I stroke it up to full afterburner to get more line abreast. I called “COMBAT 1, ARM HOT,” and saw “Boomer’s” wing tanks come off with bright flames under the wing. Pretty impressive!

I was well over the Mach when I punched my tanks off, and the jet jumped up abruptly (you can see it in the HUD). I took a quick look back to check and see if my stabs were still intact... I rolled my radar elevation coverage down, looking from about 5,000 to 21,000 feet, and no kidding, stayed in search for at least one full frame (believe me, I wanted to go back to single target track SO DAMN BAD!). AWACS started calling out two contacts, lead - trail. Sure enough, I was starting to see the break out on my scope!

At about 20 nm “Boomer” called "FOX 3, 18K!” 1 saw the cons/smoke from his jet and thought “SONOFABITCH! I gotta get me some!”

I commanded miniraster on the leader, and as soon as the radar locked, I immediately thumbed forward to HD TWS. My first shot came off inside 16 nm from the leader. When I pressed the pickle button, it seemed like an ETERNITY before the missile actually launched, but when it did...WOW!!!! I have never shot an AMRAAM or AIM-7 before at WSEP (and I don’t think I have a chance in hell of shooting more missiles at WSEP after this!). The missile came off with such a loud roar/whoosh, I not only heard it clearly in the cockpit above the wind noise, radio comm, ear plugs, and helmet, I actually FELT the rocket motor roar!

In the HUD, you can see the flames shooting out from the tail end of the missile, and the smoke and cons following it! I stepped immediately to the trailer in HD TWS, and pressed and held the pickle button for at least three seconds. Again, thinking “COME ON, DAMN IT! LAUNCH!”

The second missile came off just as impressively as the first after the same painful delay. I yelled, "Dirk 1, Fox six, lead trail!” (I was later critiqued on my comm as incorrect 3-1 terminology... WHATEVER!)

Since “Boomer" was the primary shooter I assumed he was locked to the leader, so I kept the trailer as the PDT. Didn't want to screw with a good thing, so I stayed in HD TWS inside 10 nm (our Weapons Officer promptly criticized me for NOT going STT inside 10 nm upon reviewing my VSD tape; thus, I still have to pass my IPUG Tactical Intercept check ride!). Both targets started a left check-turn to the southwest (14L to H to 16R aspect) and continued to descend to low teens. Approaching 10 nm, checking RWR to make sure we weren’t targeted: "DIRK 1 naked !" “DIRK 2 naked !" "DIRK (flight), let's go pure!"

From 30K, both of us rolled our jets inverted, pointed nose low directly at the TD box on the HUD, and pulled throttles to idle. I think my heart rate at this time was reaching my aerobic limit for my age (you know, that formula: 220 minus age...)! Against a broken cloud background, I saw a tiny dot in the TD box about seven to eight nm out. I called, “DIRK 1, tally ho, nose seven nm, low!"

Realizing I saw the trailer, I was praying “Boomer" would soon follow up with a tally call on the leader. Approaching five nm, I'm scanning in front of the trailer for the leader, but no joy. Sh!t! The trailer continued his left turn to southwest, and I was looking at approx 14R aspect. Inside of five nm I thumb aft to AIM-9, and tried twice to un-cage, but the tone was not there.

Just then, between the HUD and the canopy bow (about right 12:30 to 1 o'clock position), I saw the leader explode! The best visual description I can think of is if you held a torch from one of those Hawaiian Luau parties and swing it through the air. The flame, with an extended tail trailing the torch, is exactly what I saw! Turning my attention back to the trailer, the trailer exploded into a streaking flame seconds later just as I tried to un-cage the missile the third time! Never mind!

"DIRK 1, SPASH TWO MlG-29s, B/E035!!!" I'm ashamed... I was screaming like a woman! I didn't really bother to keep an eye on the fireballs, so I didn't see any chutes. Later reports confirmed both pilots ejected safely.

Anyway, I called for "Boomer" and me to reference 080 heading and short range radar. Thumbed aft to AUTOGUNS, plugged in full afterburner, and accelerated to 460 knots at 20K (20.000 feet). My cranium was on a swivel, and I was breathing like I just ran a full sprint!

“DIRK 2, blind!” Crap!!!! I looked north, and it took me a few seconds to find "Boomer" (about 3.5 nm left and stacked high). I tried to talk his eyes back to me, but "Boomer" called out to west in a right turn. I waited a few seconds to sanitize and turned west as well. During the turn I immediately pulled into double beeper due to airspeed and Gs (looking back, I should've over-G’d so the mission would’ve been more impressive...).

Rolling out. I was three nm in trail of "Boomer," so I had him shackled to the south to pick up line abreast. The fun wasn’t over yet, "Boomer" got an AUTOGUN snap lock less than 10 nm south of us, low altitude, with no ID. I told him to press for VID while I followed him three nm in trail. We were diving back down to the low teens, and I saw ABSOLUTELY NOTHING on my radar!

"Boomer" all of a sudden pulls up and yells, "DIRK 2, unable ID!" That's BAD!!! I just about sh!t in my pants! I saw nothing, and after a few seconds I asked "Boomer" if he saw ANYTHING at all. "Boomer" said he didn’t see anything, so we just stroked it up and separated to the northwest for a while, then came back for a second look. Nobody home! "Boomer" thought it may have been a bad radar lock. I sure hope so!

The rest of the sortie was one excitement after another. While on the boom, AWACS controller started calling out every single ground traffic as possible contacts crossing the border into Bosnia. For a while it sounded like a mass attack on Tuzla! By now it was night, and "Boomer" (in an offset 3-5 nm trail) and I were still running around with our hair on fire!

One time AWACS called out contacts very low alt moving towards Tuzla westbound. I didn't see squat on my tube, and neither did "Boomer." As the position of group started getting closer to Tuzla, I expected to see a burst of explosion from the airfield underneath! "Boomer" and I were gonna go from "heroes to zeroes" real soon!

AWACS later called out MiG CAPs just 15 nm northeast of the border! “Boomer” and I were ready to "Pop a cap in their ass" across the border as soon as we got contact and ID! Again, nothing on the radar. We even did two iterations of a grinder with a two ship of Vipers, and no one got a solid radar hit.

That night we committed and armed hot THREE MORE TIMES after the MiG kills based on ridiculous AWACS calls! No kidding, by the time our replacement showed up (four hours of vul time later), I was totally exhausted and drained!

The flight across the Adriatic was uneventful, and "Boomer" and I finally had a moment to think about what happened. After I landed and pulled into de-arm, I saw a freak in a flight suit wearing a reflective belt, jumping up and down. Sure enough, it was "Freak" welcoming us back!

Taxi back to the chocks was like having a bunch of kids following an ice cream truck! Everyone came running out, and waited at the parking spot for "Boomer" and me. "Boomer" taxied in front of me as I pulled into my spot. Losing all professionalism and radio discipline (yada yada...), I called out on Ops freq: "'Boomer,' You're the Sh!T!!!" Getting out of the jet and greeting all the bros and maintainers was THE GREATEST MOMENT OF MY CAREER!!! Our Ops Group Commander was first to shake my hand, followed by the mob!

We were laughing, shouting, hooting, high-fiving, and hugging! It was awesome! Couldn't wait to review the tapes, so we all piled into the "Turtle" (a deployable secure debrief facility, aka a small trailer) and watched my HUD tapes. Thank God it recorded everything clearly, including the fireball from the trailer.

More of the squadron bros almost knocked me over when they came storming into the Turtle! We were all screaming and jumping so hard in the Turtle I thought it was going to fall over! Too bad "Boomer's" VSD tape did not run, and his HUD tape was washed out due to a high aperture setting. "Boomer" and I were laughing and high-fiving the entire car ride home! We weren't even supposed to fly that day!

Some afterthoughts... No kidding, it took over a day for this to finally sink in. It felt almost surreal that day/night. Our Maintenance Officer said it best when he saw me hours after I shut down engines, "So ‘Claw,’ have you landed yet?" Only a few words can describe this event: F***ING unbelievably LUCKY! Not the fact we shot them down, but that they were airborne during our watch. Any Eagle driver could've easily done what "Boomer" and I did, but as one person said, "You guys won the lottery!"

The sequence of events happened in our favor like the planets lining up. The jets, missiles, and radar (well, at least mine) performed marvelously! Our Maintenance dudes deserve the bulk of the credit. We had no spares that day. The crew chiefs and the Pro Super absolutely BUSTED THEIR ASSES working red balls and launched us on time! "Boomer," my wingman - what can I say? Regardless of whose missile hit which MiG, WE shot down two Fulcrums that afternoon. We succeed as a team, and fail as a team (good thing it was the former)!

"Boomer" did an OUTSTANDING job of finding the group, working the ID matrix, and targeting according to plan. If I didn't have faith in him, I would not have broken lock and broken out the lead trail formation. Of course, I'm proud of what we did, but there's one thing I'll really stick out my chest for: to everyone who taught me and influenced me on my tactical flying and gave me long briefs (though painful at times), especially (names omitted), I DID NOT LET YOU GUYS DOWN!!! It doesn’t get much better than this, guys! Well, maybe two more kills would be pretty cool... That's all I have to say.

Later analysis showed that even though "Boomer" shot first, it was "Claw's" two AIM-120s that destroyed both MiG-29s. Serb sources later stated that Major Peric and Captain 1st Class Radosavljevic were scrambled from Batajnica Air Base to intercept other NATO aircraft. After multiple malfunctions, to include both of the MiGs' radars, and some poor GCI directions, both MiGs were dispatched. While it appears that both pilots ejected, it is reported that Radosavljevic did not survive. Capt Hwang was awarded the 1999 Hughes Trophy for this double-kill.



Major Slobodan Peric in MiG-29 number 18114, and Captain Zoran Radosavljevic in MiG-29 number 18113 was launched from Batajnica at 17:00.
Their target was flying 16,7km from Hungary, 20degree and at 15km altitude.
Passing Zrenjanin turned south, climbing to pass Fruska Gora Hills.
Their new target was a Mirage-4P over Valjevo heading West.
Peric RWR alerted, so he pulled 7G evading the first missile.
The second missile hit the plane, so he ejected over Bosnia.
Cpt Zoran Radosavljevic was killed, and his plane was fallen into Bosnia.


Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

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#4333647 - 02/01/17 10:41 AM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 4,840
ricnunes Offline
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Portugal
Excellent posts/reports Hpasp and again thanks for sharing them thumbsup

#4333661 - 02/01/17 12:26 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: ricnunes]  
Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 2,665
Hpasp Offline
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Hpasp  Offline
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Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 2,665
Hungary, Europe
Still two to go. (two F-16 engagements)
biggrin


Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

thumbsup
#4333673 - 02/01/17 01:15 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 4,840
ricnunes Offline
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ricnunes  Offline
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Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 4,840
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Eagerly waiting for them smile

#4333754 - 02/01/17 05:19 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
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Hpasp Offline
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Hungary, Europe
Lt Col Michael “Dog” Geczy (USAF)
78th EFS “Bushmasters,” F-16CJ
Operation ALLIED FORCE
MiG-29
4 May 1999
Call-sign: PUMA 11

Lt Col Geczy graduated from Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training (ENJJPT) at Sheppard AFB in 1983. Upon completing F-4E training in 1984 he flew the Phantom II for two years, converting to the F-16C in 1986 while on his first operational assignment at Ramstein AB, Germany. He later graduated from the USAF Fighter Weapons School F-16 Division in 1992. Lt Col Geczy had approximately 2,300 flight hours (including previous combat experience in Iraq and Bosnia) in the F-16C (Blocks 15, 30, 42, and 50) before deploying to Aviano AB for Operation ALLIED FORCE (OAF). This MiG-29 kill occurred on his 115th career combat mission, and his seventh mission supporting OAF. The following excerpts were taken from a briefing that Lt Col Geczy gave about a year following the event.

We were tasked for what we call a "force protection" mission... loaded up with two High Speed Anti-Radiation Missiles (HARMs), two AIM-120A AMRAAMs, two AIM-9M Sidewinders, a full load of 20mm, and self protection assets (external jamming pod on the centerline, chaff and flares, and towed decoys). As there were no Eagles tasked as part of this daylight strike mission, our job was to protect the strikers from both the surface and air threats.

The jets were Block 50 F-16CJs. F-16CJs are configured with the HARM Targeting System pod on the side of the intake. The HARMs are those large white missiles closest to the external fuel tanks that home in on radar emissions from SAMs, AAA, or early warning radars. The other key part to our force protection mission was air-to-air, of course. On the wingtip missile stations are the AIM-120 AMRAAMs; we also carried the shorter range AIM-9M infrared missiles on the inboard stations, and the trusty internal, 20 mm Gatling gun for shorter range air-to-air engagements.

My flight included myself as number one (on my 12th contingency deployment), my wingman, who was a 1 Lt (“DBAL" Austin, with about 350 hours in the jet) on his third contingency deployment; the number three and element lead (“Hajii” Julazadeh) was an instructor pilot with about 1,200 hours (and on his eighth contingency deployment). The number four man, “Nut” Peterson, was absolutely critical to our success that day. Although “Nut” was flying as a wingman and number four, he was then a four-ship flight lead, and upgrading to instructor pilot with about 800 hours in the F-16. Operation ALLIED FORCE was “Nut’s” second contingency deployment. This combat sortie was the seventh or eighth Operation ALLIED FORCE sortie for all of us, since Shaw AFB deployed our squadron into the theater about three weeks into the war as part of a NATO force structure plus-up.

I have to admit, my opinion is that the Serbian surface-to-air missile (SAM) battery crews were pretty darn good...well trained and coordinated during Operation ALLIED FORCE, and with some pretty creative and unpredictable tactics. They fired over 700 SAMs at NATO aircraft during the war! Of course, the Serbian military had been watching NATO’s operations over Bosnia for more than six years, and had been quick to modify their tactics during this operation to increase the probability of a successful kill against NATO aircraft. So frankly, since the Serbian MiG-29s had not faced NATO pilots for almost seven weeks at this point of the war — and we had just lost our second NATO jet a couple nights prior to a SAM — my biggest concern that day was the SAM operators. I was dead wrong, as the biggest threat that day would end up being one MiG-29 driver who would attempt to intercept “tail-end Charlie" during the egress phase of the strike.

On that day, NATO was conducting some of its first daylight strikes in central Serbia, near Belgrade. There were two flights of four f-16CJs, each dedicated to the force protection of these midday strikes. My flight, call-sign PUMA 11, was tasked to launch out of Aviano, pre-strike refuel, enter Serbia, protect Strike "Alpha,” egress, refuel again, re-enter Serbia again, and then protect Strike "Charlie.” Strike package “Alpha" that day included Dutch, British, and French strikers. Another flight of four F-16CJs (PANTHER 21) were from Spangdahlem AB (but also launched out of Aviano), and were protecting strikes “Bravo” and "Delta” in the same manner.

Keep in mind that, since the F-l5Cs were dedicated to protecting the tankers and AWACS that day, they only had CAPs up in Bosnia and Hungary. The other players that day included EA-6Bs, a French AWACS that controlled all of the activity in Bosnia, and a British AWACS that controlled the strikes in Serbia.

Let's get on to the details of that day. First of all, the weather was poor. The clouds were layered to broken up to almost 30,000 feet. Our flight had some difficulty finding good, clear airspace to CAP to do the best job protecting against the air and surface threats during the strike period. In fact, the British and Dutch strikers ended up weather aborting their attacks completely. On the other hand, the French strikers, or KNIFE 61, were working overtime trying to deliver their bombs between holes in the weather in their target area.

Near the end of the strike period, KNIFE 61's flight lead requested that we stay on station another eight minutes or so until they finished their attacks. I agreed, but of course, was concerned that we might end up stretching the flight's fuel before we could get back to the tanker. Since my fuel state was actually the lowest in the flight, I made a mental planning note that I was the most “skosh” on gas.

Later, I heard the next set of F-16CJs for Strike Bravo, PANTHER 21, check in on the strike frequency. Well, the French finished their attacks after about 12 minutes of "overtime," and we started to escort them out of Serbia. Keep in mind, it had been a very quiet mission up to this point. Although we had done some preemptive SAM targeting, we had not fired any HARMs at active sites during this first strike period. I was probably a bit too casual finishing up this "walk in the park" strike package, and too anxious to get air refueled and back on station for the next one.

It is near the end of this “ho-hum” egress that the AWACS controller calls out that a "bogey" is airborne in Serbia. I completely missed this call! Fortunately, our trusty number four man, "Nut," saved the day, and piped up on our discrete, intra-flight frequency with a "head's up" call and the bogey's position. We immediately turned the four F-16s around, and we faced the bogey in a wall formation. During our turn to face down track, NATO AWACS called out the track as hostile for the first of what would be a total of seven times during the intercept.

We simultaneously pushed it up to supersonic, climbed up into the high 30s (forgot to jettison our tanks!), and pressed right on into the SAM threat rings. Shortly thereafter, “DBAL" called out that he was bingo fuel...since I knew that I actually had the lowest fuel in the flight, I "copied" his call, and decided that all of us would most likely need to recover into Sarajevo after the engagement.

About this same time, the AWACS controller made some calls that made the NATO-required beyond-visual-range (BVR) rules of engagement (ROE) matrix damned confusing, and uncertain in my mind. As I was working through this dilemma, both in my head and with some calls back to AWACS, I tried to get PANTHER 21 flight’s radars looking for the target (who were actually trailing us by quite a bit). I frankly started to have my doubts that we were going to finish this intercept with the little fuel remaining. Also during this final period of the intercept, the MiG-29 driver illuminated me with his radar a couple times, which definitely got my attention.

Fortunately, yet uncomfortably late in the intercept, and at range much less than we all wanted. I finally worked through all the ROE rules with AWACS... I got a chance to put my thumb on the weapons release, or pickle button—one of my last thoughts as I was mashing down on the pickle button was, “if it’s important enough to shoot, shoot two. So, ‘Dog,’ fire these two off as rapidly as possible!"

Well, it seemed to take FOREVER for that first missile to come off—must have been time compression! I actually had second thoughts about whether I had properly armed-up or not. I just started to glance in the HUD to confirm the arm status, and then I saw the first missile come off from the left wingtip. I mashed the second AMRAAM off as quickly as I could after that first one launched. It didn't seem to take nearly as long for the second AMRAAM to blast off the right wingtip!

Although I had already fired an AIM-9 in training and HARMs in Bosnia during Operation DELIBERATE FORCE, and earlier in Operation ALLIED FORCE, I had not YET had a firsthand appreciation for what an AMRAAM live-fire looked like. Those two AMRAAM launches were EXTREMELY impressive, and continue to amaze me even today!

Since the MiG was at short range and maneuvering at this point, the line-of-sight of the target was changing rapidly across my nose and well below me—those missile fins obviously dug-in immediately after launch and dove with rapid, arcing attacks through the HUD field-of-view with breakneck speed (kind of like a pitcher throwing a curve ball)! It was a true testament to American technology that the AMRAAM performed so well at close range, and with a fantastically high line-of-sight! I am not sure any other radar missile out there could have hacked the square-corner that the AMRAAMs made that day!

Descending quite a bit after the launches, I noted on my radar that the missiles were preparing to impact, and made a mental note that in order to get credit for the kill, “I had better see this, as I may be the only one who witnesses it!” I rolled up in about 90 degrees of left bank, and then saw the aircraft exploding about six thousand feet below, and between scattered cloud layers (basically underneath my left knee). I made two, “Splash one with a fireball!” radio calls to AWACS—guess I knew that my chances of making that call again in my flying career were essentially nil!

“DBAL,” on the other hand, reported after the mission that he watched both missiles all the way into impact. Fortunately, the weather had scattered out somewhat at the point of intercept, so today "DBAL" has a "nanosecond by nanosecond" recollection of how the aircraft defensively maneuvered to a near perfect beam, the missiles' impacts, how the MiG started to burn, and what parts came off first!

Following the engagement, as we were all “skosh" on fuel, we immediately started our climb and egress to the west, towards the tanker tracks in Bosnia. I requested that the AWACS controller sector our tanker due east and directly back to us.

Now the real difficult part of the mission began! As it turned out, and as was frequently true during Operation ALLIED FORCE, the hairiest part of the mission was just beginning: getting rejoined on a tanker that has been directed to retrograde to a safer area, in the weather, while other F-16 and F-15 flights are rejoining on it simultaneously to do their refueling, in the weather. When we crossed into Bosnia, we discovered that our tanker was over 120 miles away and going further away!

I then set a divert bingo for the flight for Sarajevo, and had to call the tanker crew directly to get them to turn around for an in-the-weather tanker rejoin. In the end, we were able to refuel and get back on station for Strike Charlie. Shortly thereafter Strike Charlie was weather cancelled. With a full load of fuel, we flew back to Aviano “as the crow flies” — supersonic in the low 40s across the whole length of Bosnia, and across the Adriatic Sea — breaking all kinds of rules, I am sure!

It was raining like cats and dogs when we finally got back to Aviano; of course, I insisted upon bringing the four-ship up a combat, tactical initial after the mission (pretty dumb decision, as the rain storm was almost directly over the air base) — the guys did a marvelous job getting the jets on the deck, despite my stupid act!

We all lined up in the de-arm area, and a crew chief hooked up on the head-set communications cord during the aircraft de-arming. Since my HARMs were still loaded. I guess he thought that we had a “ho-hum" mission; he asked me in a real low key
voice, and obviously not really pleased to be in the pouring rain.

“Well, Sir, how did your mission go?"

I replied, “Pretty good...Shot a MiG down."

He yelled back, “You got to be sh!ting me...Sir!”

I yelled back at him, “Look at the missile rails!!!”

I looked at the rails too, at that point, and saw the other guys in the de-arm crew doing pull-ups on the missile rails in the rain! They were really psyched up, and came up later after shutdown to give me the AMRAAM umbilical cables that remained—perfect mementos for that mission!

“Nut” showed exemplary flight discipline that day. First, by succinctly and promptly advising the flight about the AWACS call that a “bogey” was approaching during our egress. And second, by employing his radar as directed to confirm that no other threats were airborne. Also, unlike other “yahoo-cowboy radio calls" that you hear sometimes during MiG kills these days, my flight members did not say ONE word after the MiG-29 was splashed. They maintained the strictest discipline throughout the egress, on to the next AWACS controller in Bosnia, to the tanker, and on the boom taking fuel. Only after the air refueling was complete, and when we were preparing to return for the next strike period, did “Nut” say on the discrete frequency

“PUMA 1, PUMA 4. request?”

“Go ahead with your request, PUMA 4”

“Sir, can we go back there and do that again?”

By the way, last month "Nut" Peterson was selected to go to F-16 Fighter Weapons School for the class starting this summer.

There were some internet claims immediately after the war that this MiG-29 was mistakenly shot down by a Serbian SAM battery. That is absolute, complete, and pure BS! You can actually see the aircraft break up on my radar tape after the missile’s impact!

I cannot speculate upon the Serbian Air Force single ship tactics that day, or why someone would make such a claim, other than to perhaps save face for the Serbian MiG-29s that performed so poorly during the war against NATO pilots (for lots of reasons, I am sure: weak equipment, poor aircraft serviceability, lousy Soviet-style training and flying currency, etc). Lately, more and more of the Serbian internet sites acknowledge that this MiG-29 was downed by an F-16CJ.

But what I can say is that the four of us that day were employing fully mission capable F-16CJs with 100% of our jets and avionics operational (thanks to our maintenance technicians), fully armed with a variety of operational weapons ready to handle all kinds of threats (thanks to our munitions, armament, and weapons technicians), and were fully trained to handle the events of that day (thanks to the USAF training and readiness model).

You bet, there are decisions and tactics that I would do differently if I had a chance to do that mission again. But any of my flight members could have ended up firing those two AMRAAMs and getting a MiG-29 kill that day. I was fortunate to have been the leader and targeted the group, and thankfully supported by a great flight of Viper drivers, particularly “Nut” Peterson, who really got the “light bulb turned on” during our egress.

Although Lt Col Geczy deployed to Operation ALLIED FORCE as part of the 78th Fighter Squadron, the deployment included jets from other squadrons at Shaw AFB. The aircraft during Lt Col Geczy’s MiG-29 engagement (91-0353) was actually from the 77th FS “Gamblers.” Lt Col Geczy went on to command the 77th Fighter Squadron, and made F-16 91-0353 the squadron flagship during his two year command.



MiG-29 number 18109 was launched from Batajnica, Lt Col Milenko Pavlovic jet was hit by AMRAAM and crashed at Petnica. He was killed.


Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

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#4333780 - 02/01/17 06:08 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 4,840
ricnunes Offline
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ricnunes  Offline
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Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 4,840
Portugal
One down, another to go smile

BTW, the other one was from a Dutch F-16, right?

#4334053 - 02/02/17 05:00 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 2,665
Hpasp Offline
Senior Member
Hpasp  Offline
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Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 2,665
Hungary, Europe
Maj Peter "Wobble" Tankink (Royal Netherlands Air Force - RNLAF)

No. 322 Squadron “niet praten maar doen” (don't talk but do), F-16AM
Operation ALLIED FORCE
MiG-29
24 March 1999

The pilot has given two interviews about this event, however he doesn't wish to spend any more time talking about it, he takes the opinion that he was just doing his job and the RNLAF fully supports this typical Dutch no-nonsense attitude.

We had been in several tense situations since the autumn of 1998. A early as October 1998 we had flown eight upgraded F-16s from Leeuwarden to Amendola, Italy as reinforcements to the Dutch F-16s already there. Then the negotiations were able to come to an agreement with Milosevic, but not this time. When we heard that we were going to fly, we started making preparations by establishing which countries and aircraft would be taking part int the attack formation, checking arrangements for getting everyone to the destination, which means working out, routes and altitudes, and, of course what kind of support there would be from tanker aircraft. The preparations were no different from those for a normal practice flight. During exercises such as Red Flag it's just the same.

We knew one day before the mission, that we had been assigned to the second attack formation of the second NATO formation. A package like this consists of different kinds of aircraft. Apart from the aircraft whose mission was to deliver the bombs, there were air defence fighters, suppression of enemy air defence fighters, and other support aircraft at a distance, such as flying radar stations, command aircraft and tankers. Our task was to fly ahead of the attack formation in our four modernized Midlife Update F-16s to look out for enemy aircraft that might attack the formation. This is called a fighter sweep, and it means that you are the first aircraft to enter enemy territory...!

That day I went to the air base at about 14:00. I worked through the whole preparation cycle discussing the situation with intelligence and the Met (meterology) people, discussing the mission with the three other pilots, getting equipment issued and lastly, handing in my personal possessions. When you talk about the mission you discuss things like the kind of formation the four of you are going to fly in, and what rules of engagement are - that is when force should be used and when not.

At 17:45 I went to my assigned aircraft J-063, equipped with four AIM-120B AMRAAMs, two fuel tanks and an ALQ-131 jamming pod, aside from the built-in 20mm gun.

The fact that this was a real mission did not change anything. Even the idea that we were going to be flying in the dark was not unusual. We practise night flying regurarly, and we often flew at night during the operations we had been carrying out for years over Bosnia.

After taking off at 20:45, we flew to the rendezvous with a tanker above the Adriatic Sea. I was number three in the formation. First there was the lead, that is, our formation leader, with his wingman, then me with my wingman. After fueling up we flew to the marshaling area. In the meantime it had become pitch dark. We knew that some 20 or 30 of our mates were flying in the area, but we could not see them. We also heard that the first formation to carry out an attack during Allied Force had returned safely from Yugoslavia.

We set course for Kosovo at the predetermined time, everyone in his place in the formation at the altitude assigned. The moment we crossed the Yugoslav border we heard from Magic, NATO's AWACS aircraft that three MiGs of the Yugoslav Air Force were in the air. That was all we heard for a while. A few minutes later the lead of our group of four saw a MiG on his radar. The radar contact put it more or less on our flight path and we were directed to it by the AWACS.

I had no radar contact flying some 6 miles (10km) behind the lead pair, but with the F-16MLU's improved datalink capability, leader datalinked his picture so that I could see where the target was. We still did not know what kind of target it was but because of its high speed (400 knots) we knew it was fast. Asked the AWACS permission to engage but the AWACS crew could not see it as it was flying at 5,000ft (1,500m) behind a ridge.

Through a range of other planes and assets, the AWACS tried to identify the nature of the contact and finally it was agreed that it was hostile. However, only one target was visible and the AWACS personnel understood that there should be three - they did not know that the other two had already been shot down by a pair of USAF F-15Cs of the 493rd FS flying from Cervia AB in Italy.

Suddenly the contact disappeared from the radar. Following our rules the leader banked off, followed by his wingman. We were also going to bank off when I saw the target again on my radar. My wingman and I were directed to it. In such a short time, say 4 to 5 minutes, you are regurarly in contact with the AWACS aircraft. In our formation we had not exchanged a word with each other, everything we had to know about each other's movements was transmitted by the datalinks aboard the MLU F-16s. Eventually I got the order from the AWACS to intercept the target.

At 20:30.08 at a distance of 11 miles (18km) flying at an altitude of 34,000ft (10,363m) I fired one AMRAAM from the port underwing station. After you press the firing button you actually have to wait for about a second before the missile leaves. That time seemed to last forever. I rememberred that I looked at my wing to see whether the missile had become stuck. But as I watched, the rocket motor fired - the fierce light blinding me a little.

After about five seconds I lost the missile in the pitch black sky as its engine had spent its fuel and burnt out. Approximately ten seconds from impact the missile acquired the MiG with its own radar, allowing me to turn away sharply. I knew where the target was flying and looked in that direction over my left shoulder. I saw a dim flash of light and a second or so after that, burning pieces of wreckage falling. Than I knew I had hit him.

Until the impact I had not thought at all that the four of us were actually carrying out a 'real' interception. I was just too busy looking at the instruments, talking to the AWACS, and of course flying the aircraft. Moreover, the other aircraft of the NATO formation were at that time also carrying on with their mission, and quite a lot of bombs and missiles were being fired at the enemy air defenses. When I saw that my missile had hit the target I was very pleased. An aircraft like that is always a threat at such a time, and if your missile misses, for whatever reason, you are going to have to do something about it - either attack again, or begin evasive manoeuvers. But in my case it was unnecessary.

The MiG-29 came down west of Kusevac. The kill was immediately confirmed by the fighter controller in the AWACS who had seen his radar contact disappear. The engagement took approximately five minutes. I later learned that the pilot had escaped using his ejection seat.

We had to patrol above that area for another 20 minutes, and in that time, plenty of SAMs were fired at the NATO formation. We were flying quite high and could see that three SAMs were fired at our F-16s. It is very strange to see the warning in the cockpit and then the missile itself, coming at you like a fiery arrow. Then you really have to do something, like evasive manoeuvers and throwing out chaff. It was our job as fighter sweep to stay in the area until the last aircraft of the attack formation had left - first in, last out. After the last one had left, we took the shortest route back to Amendola. In total, the flight lasted two and a half hours.

When we landed at Amendola, they already knew we had brought down a jet but they just did not know which one of the four of us had fired the missile. When you land you have to put your weapons on safe mode at the end of the runway before you are allowed to taxi the aircraft to the platform. This is done by weapons personnel which is to say the same people who had earlier mounted the missiles under the aircraft. When they saw that I had fired one they got quite excited. The fact that a missile had been fired meant they had done their job well. If they had not, I could have squeezed the firing button as much as I liked without anything happening. So it was only right they were pleased that everything worked as well as it was supposed to.

In Amendola they asked if I wanted to phone my wife. I said that I never phoned my wife at 00:30, so why should I start now? They told me that she had phoned from Leeuwarden already and that she expected a call, so I telephoned her right away.

I flew eleven missions above and around Yugoslavia, including air defence assignments and attack missions, until the Leeuwarden detachment was releved.

Looking back at that first night, I still does not experience feelings of triumph. That night, the four of us did what we are paid to do, a fighter sweep to make sure that the attack formation could do its work safely. No more, no less. Its satisfying to know that we carried out all the tasks assigned to us as required, but then I am talking about the deployment of the Dutch F-16s as a whole, not just about that one night. That means that you have been well trained and that your equipment works.

Take the F-16... during that first mission we used all the advantages of the latest Midlife Update version. The improved radar enabled us to see the MiG earlier, and with the help of our new IFF we knew quickly that it was an enemy aircraft. Using AMRAAM missile, we were able to put aircraft out of action from a considerable distance. Also we did not have to talk to each other during the entire air combat phase because we could exchange information by means of datalink.

In short, these were all things that increased our chances of being able to make an effective contribution. I thought it interesting that we were assigned the fighter sweep function in the formation because we had the MLU version. With standard F-16 you have fewer options, and we would not have been given that assignment.

In fact, the Dutch F-16AMs were the only non-American fighters that were flying escort missions in enemy territory, a clear indication that the Americans, who effectively ran the show despite it being under NATO banner, were confident about the Dutch equipment and training standards.

This was the climax of an historical mission for the Royal Netherlands Air Force. It marked the first air-to-air kill for the service since World War Two and put the RNLAF in the modern air combat spotlight. But more importantly it was the ultimate reward for a progressive and professional organisation that had put a lot of effort into modernizing its equipment and maintaining an extremely high level of training in the turbulent 1990s.




Maj Predrag Milutinovic was launched from Ponikve in MiG-29 number 18106.
His RWR alerted him 3Km from Kosovo.
He took evasive action to break lock.
Over Ribarska Banja RWR alerted him again and 10s after, he was hit.
Successfully ejected.


Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

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#4334094 - 02/02/17 08:37 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 13,199
DBond Offline
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DBond  Offline
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 13,199
NooJoyzee
Originally Posted By: Hpasp
I start a series, about aerial victories during OAF.


Thanks for posting these. Good stuff thumbsup


No, now go away or I shall taunt you a second time!
#4334135 - 02/02/17 11:02 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 4,840
ricnunes Offline
Senior Member
ricnunes  Offline
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Joined: Dec 2001
Posts: 4,840
Portugal
Great show thumbsup

#4334693 - 02/04/17 07:39 PM Re: B-2 over Belgrade....an extraordinary technical achievement [Re: Hpasp]  
Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 2,665
Hpasp Offline
Senior Member
Hpasp  Offline
Senior Member

Joined: Dec 2009
Posts: 2,665
Hungary, Europe
Nice badge of the NATO AWACS crew, although some fighter pilots might disagree...



Hpasp
Free SAM Simulator, "Realistic to the Switch"

(U-2 over Sverdlovsk, B-52's over Hanoi, F-4 Phantoms over the Sinai, F-16's and the F-117A Stealth bomber over the Balkans.)
http://sites.google.com/site/samsimulator1972/home

Book from the author - Soviet Nuclear Weapons in Hungary 1961-1991
https://sites.google.com/view/nuclear-weapons-in-hungary/

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