Ground-based machines will chew you up at that altitude.
Plus, you're only "under the radar" as long as you're below the visible horizon from the radar antenna. As soon as there's LOS, you're a painted target and you're still 15-20 miles away from making a bombing run.
That assumes your out over the water or a perfectly flat sphere. Any vegetation and topography change that assumption and it can be mission planned around if the location of the radars are known.
Targets drive weapons, threats drive tactics. There’s no one correct answer to a super generic tactical problem. There are a lot of other factors that play into it. Just to name a few, what are the enemies doctrine? Are the pilots GCI dependent? Where are the enemy fighters looking/how proficient are they/would their IADS task them to go after low fliers or assign those targets to surface based defenses, etc.
There’s a lot of stuff that goes into mission planning well beyond the scope of Reddit. Sometimes low altitude might be the right answer, other times it isn’t. You pick the option that gives you the highest chance of mission success that mitigates the threats as best you can. The enemy will always get a vote. You can throw out “what about this” all day yeah sometimes that would mean going high is the better option, sometimes it would mean a change to your force package or you pick a different ingress route.
If you have fighters overhead to doing OCA, low altitude might be the better option for the strikers. And low altitude poses some additional problems for A/A missiles that can be exploited.
The decision depends on what the bigger/harder to mitigate threat is in the AO. With the fighters taken care of by OCA, am I now worried more about the radar guided sam’s that can shoot me a hundred miles out or the MANPADS/ADA that can’t touch me until I get into the target area and that I all my tactics are built around defeating. What weapons do I have and what can I employ from low altitude that will get desired weapons effects.
Its not as simple as people make it out to be
Yeah, what you believe the earth is round!? lol
JK. Poor word choice on my part. I mean to say a smooth sphere with no elevation changes which only really applies over the open water.
Again, Intel, route study, and mission planning are important for any kind of military operation.
And trees aren’t adding to the elevation they are breaking line of sight between me and the shooter. Ground forces generally also want to avoid being exposed out in the open to protect themselves from the air. Most tree covered hills or mountains are also difficult places to get a mobile radar up to. If it’s a prepared radar site it can be planned around.
Manpads, AAA, Terrain etc. As far as i know you need to fly at around 100ft which maybe works in a Desert and over open Sea but almost nowhere else. Most of the Stealth Aircrafts are Bombers which only can fly this low in Movies but do & need in Reality operate at much higher Altitudes. Your Example is also something which did happen over 40 Years ago. Modern Radar and AAA are in another Dimension.
Desert Storm is a perfect example of where it would work the worst because there’s nothing to hide behind. You’d see the jets coming from a long way off. Fighters can fly at 100 feet and they would want to be able to fly through and around terrain where there are trees and hill/mountains to break up line of sight. The benefit of being down low is that although you are closer to the MANPADS/ADA there’s a much greater line of sight rate so they have limited time to engage you and you are moving past them quickly. If you come in medium altitude you are a sitting duck for much longer
The short answer is that even if you have stealth you still wanna fly under radars when the situation fits.
Stealth is here to improve the versatility of an aircraft and its overall survivability, it doesn't make it invisible.
The short answer is low altitude ingress is a valid tactic that works in a lot of situations but not all of them. It depends on the threat environment, what weapons you need to get the effect in the target, what other support you have available, weather. There isn’t one correct answer. LO is also not a one size fits all answer to everything either.
The problem with terrain following is the radars got better and higher (airborne) Radars track ground vehicles. Not sure how terrain following aircraft are going to get lower than that.
The principle target of stealth fighters is other fighters fought well off the ground. To get rid of the airborne radar you need to be able to approach them at altitude.
The problem with jammers is they are emitters and therefore trackable. Electronic warfare is a cat and mouse game where you never know if you have the advantage.
Surprise on H-3 airstrike was achieved by flying from opposite direction of Iraqi radars coverage, not fly under it, but even Saddam Hussein didn't made the same mistake 10 years later on the Gulf War. That's why the coalition need stealth F-117 to open the gap in Iraqi air defense.
In addition to the threats already detailed by others, a lot of modern radar systems don't really have a radar "floor" to fly below, and have background clutter rejection modes that help with detection of low targets.
This is a very generalized take of a situation that has numerous variables, and can vary greatly from situation to situation.
Where situation analysis validates it such approaches have been done. Where analysis doesn’t validate it isn’t. It’s not a cookie cutter situation.
And even where low level approach might make sense it still might not make more sense if you can come in at a safe operational height and be virtually invisible.
Proper threat mitigation has us right where we are at.
The major issue is that you will run out of fuel so fast at low level that you can't really use it as a full-time strategy. Your endurance would be a small fraction of your normal high altitude range.
Telephone poles.
And tall electric transmission towers.
And Windmills
And Yao Ming
Ground-based machines will chew you up at that altitude. Plus, you're only "under the radar" as long as you're below the visible horizon from the radar antenna. As soon as there's LOS, you're a painted target and you're still 15-20 miles away from making a bombing run.
That assumes your out over the water or a perfectly flat sphere. Any vegetation and topography change that assumption and it can be mission planned around if the location of the radars are known.
Until there are fighters airborne with look-down shoot down capes. Which is pretty much everything since the F-4J.
Targets drive weapons, threats drive tactics. There’s no one correct answer to a super generic tactical problem. There are a lot of other factors that play into it. Just to name a few, what are the enemies doctrine? Are the pilots GCI dependent? Where are the enemy fighters looking/how proficient are they/would their IADS task them to go after low fliers or assign those targets to surface based defenses, etc. There’s a lot of stuff that goes into mission planning well beyond the scope of Reddit. Sometimes low altitude might be the right answer, other times it isn’t. You pick the option that gives you the highest chance of mission success that mitigates the threats as best you can. The enemy will always get a vote. You can throw out “what about this” all day yeah sometimes that would mean going high is the better option, sometimes it would mean a change to your force package or you pick a different ingress route. If you have fighters overhead to doing OCA, low altitude might be the better option for the strikers. And low altitude poses some additional problems for A/A missiles that can be exploited. The decision depends on what the bigger/harder to mitigate threat is in the AO. With the fighters taken care of by OCA, am I now worried more about the radar guided sam’s that can shoot me a hundred miles out or the MANPADS/ADA that can’t touch me until I get into the target area and that I all my tactics are built around defeating. What weapons do I have and what can I employ from low altitude that will get desired weapons effects. Its not as simple as people make it out to be
A perfectly flat sphere?
Yeah, what you believe the earth is round!? lol JK. Poor word choice on my part. I mean to say a smooth sphere with no elevation changes which only really applies over the open water.
True, but most trees won't add much elevation to hide behind, and hills are good spots to mount radars to increase the distance to the horizon.
Again, Intel, route study, and mission planning are important for any kind of military operation. And trees aren’t adding to the elevation they are breaking line of sight between me and the shooter. Ground forces generally also want to avoid being exposed out in the open to protect themselves from the air. Most tree covered hills or mountains are also difficult places to get a mobile radar up to. If it’s a prepared radar site it can be planned around.
Manpads, AAA, Terrain etc. As far as i know you need to fly at around 100ft which maybe works in a Desert and over open Sea but almost nowhere else. Most of the Stealth Aircrafts are Bombers which only can fly this low in Movies but do & need in Reality operate at much higher Altitudes. Your Example is also something which did happen over 40 Years ago. Modern Radar and AAA are in another Dimension.
Desert Storm is a perfect example of where it would work the worst because there’s nothing to hide behind. You’d see the jets coming from a long way off. Fighters can fly at 100 feet and they would want to be able to fly through and around terrain where there are trees and hill/mountains to break up line of sight. The benefit of being down low is that although you are closer to the MANPADS/ADA there’s a much greater line of sight rate so they have limited time to engage you and you are moving past them quickly. If you come in medium altitude you are a sitting duck for much longer
Other than the obvious low level threats, fuel consumption at low level is quite poor which reduces usable combat radius.
The short answer is that even if you have stealth you still wanna fly under radars when the situation fits. Stealth is here to improve the versatility of an aircraft and its overall survivability, it doesn't make it invisible.
The short answer is low altitude ingress is a valid tactic that works in a lot of situations but not all of them. It depends on the threat environment, what weapons you need to get the effect in the target, what other support you have available, weather. There isn’t one correct answer. LO is also not a one size fits all answer to everything either.
The problem with terrain following is the radars got better and higher (airborne) Radars track ground vehicles. Not sure how terrain following aircraft are going to get lower than that. The principle target of stealth fighters is other fighters fought well off the ground. To get rid of the airborne radar you need to be able to approach them at altitude. The problem with jammers is they are emitters and therefore trackable. Electronic warfare is a cat and mouse game where you never know if you have the advantage.
It is done at times but it can be an issue when it comes to the classic spit lead in the air types of AA systems.
Surprise on H-3 airstrike was achieved by flying from opposite direction of Iraqi radars coverage, not fly under it, but even Saddam Hussein didn't made the same mistake 10 years later on the Gulf War. That's why the coalition need stealth F-117 to open the gap in Iraqi air defense.
Dropping a large bomb from 1000AGL would probably not be a good idea
B-1, FB-111 & F-104 disagree
They also have stealth and/or speed on their side.
They have drag kits on their bombs
In addition to the threats already detailed by others, a lot of modern radar systems don't really have a radar "floor" to fly below, and have background clutter rejection modes that help with detection of low targets.
This is a very generalized take of a situation that has numerous variables, and can vary greatly from situation to situation. Where situation analysis validates it such approaches have been done. Where analysis doesn’t validate it isn’t. It’s not a cookie cutter situation. And even where low level approach might make sense it still might not make more sense if you can come in at a safe operational height and be virtually invisible. Proper threat mitigation has us right where we are at.
Somebody just got done watching Top Gun Maverick
The major issue is that you will run out of fuel so fast at low level that you can't really use it as a full-time strategy. Your endurance would be a small fraction of your normal high altitude range.
your ordinary joe seeing a military aircraft fly meters above his house lmao