Evan Brennan wrote:

Guy Alcala wrote in message ...
Evan Brennan wrote:
The Argentine pilots used an early version of the Matra 530 that
suffered from a narrow field of vision (30-40 degrees) and a
smaller range of sensitivity to heat.

The British Sea Harrier pilots carried the US-made AIM-9L which
had a 90-120 degree field of vision,

Probably more like 54-80 degrees: +-27 degrees off boresight for
acquisition, +-40 deg. OB for tracking, according to one fairly
authoritative source (snip)

I won't argue with all the technobabble, but the specs I mentioned are
found in 'Argentine Airpower in the Falklands War: An Operational
View', Dr. James S. Corum. As of this writing, it's online at:

http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/a...l02/corum.html

I read it (well, as much as I could stand to, but grinding my teeth is bad for me). Aside from the numerous minor errors,
there are several real howlers in it. I don't have the energy to point them all out, but anyone who wants to take a look
can have a good chuckle. Start with the paragraph entitled "Argentine Air Force/Naval Air Arm", where the following
statement is to be found:

"Fuerza Aerea Argentina (FAA) was the country’s large, relatively modern, and capable air force, particularly when compared
to the militaries of most midsized powers. The FAA possessed some frontline aircraft equal to any in the world—including
Mirage III interceptors."

Re the R.530EM (SARH) seeker, I've got the following: 40 deg. off boresight, but has to be within 25 deg. OB at launch. I've
also got fairly specific performance data but I'm not going to post it, just a summary that was given to me along with the
performance data. I'm not sure the data was/is in the public domain, even though the missile is, AFAIK, long gone:

-------------------------------------------------

Notes : the first French production AAM was not really a success. The missile
was notably unreliable at launch and had a very limited intercept envelope due
to its long arming time (4 s.), bad fusing and low delta-v. It was estimated
that with the combined performance of the Cyrano Ibis radar and the missile,
probability of success of a forward sector shot with a Mirage IIIC was nil.
OTOH, its long-lasting motor gave it a fair snap-up capability (a feature common
to all French RHMs).Another unwanted characteristic of the missile was its long
flame and very thick smoke plume, which made the weapon not only very visible
but also potentially dangerous for the launcher. The missile became increasingly
unreliable after the first 5 years of service, and was definitively abandoned in
1991. At that time, it had an officially estimated kill probability of 0.35.

R530 IR (1963)
--------------------

The R530 had a modular design and could be fitted either with a homing or an IR
seekerhead. I haven't got physical characteristics of the R530 IR, but from
pictures it looks close to the SARH version (the latter having, in an unusual
way for a radar-guided missile, a blunted nose). The IR seekerhead was very
rarely mounted as it produced no significative gain in performance over the
smaller Sidewinder. The SAT-3501 nitrogen-cooled seekerhead [Guy: I've deleted the specific wavelength range, but mid-IR]
was credited with an all-aspect capability in certain circumstances (high
altitude), but the missile was very poor in this regard. Seeker could be slaved
to the radar (40 deg. off-boresight).
--------------------------------------------


The chance of an R.530FE being able to pick up a subsonic SHAR from the
FQ falls into the 'slim and none' category, and even if it could, its
maneuverability is so poor that a SHAR that saw it should be able to
outmaneuver it with some ease.

If that was true, it meant Argentine pilots were saddled with another
serious disadvantage.

Sure would have been, which is why it would have made far more sense for them to use the radar-homing version, assuming that
they actually had any IR versions. Besides, they had the Magic (now Magic 1, after the introduction of the all-aspect Magic
2 a couple of years after the war).

Another issue was reliability of the equipment
-- and their ability to repair and maintain it.

British Sea Harrier pilots who did not have the luxury of the AIM-9L
were known to get their butts kicked real good by French Mirage pilots
in training combats. I don't recall which missile the Frenchies were
using, but I'm sure you'll probably tell us about that and Sharkey
Ward's excuses for their victories. : )

Matra Magic and/or R.530, and Sharkey says that the pilots who flew the trials were anything but "Aces of the Base." He
also points out that his squadron had flown against and beaten the 527th TFTAS F-5Es, F-15s from Bitburg and F-16s at
Decimomannu, and both the latter a/c in particular were a couple of decades ahead of the Mirage III in 1982, in performance,
weapons and avionics. The Mirage is much overrated as a dogfighter, having the lowest t/w ratio of any Mach 2 fighter and
the usual characteristics of a naturally stable conventional delta without LE flaps. It can do two things really well: go
fast in a straight line owing to low drag, and bleed energy in a turn like nobody's business. In fact, there's probably
only one a/c that can decelerate faster than a delta, and that's the Harrier, using full braking stop.

The Magic seems to have been a fairly typical 2nd generation IRM, although its public specs indicate it had some advantages
over most of its contemporaries. I've been told privately that the reality was rather different, but it certainly should
have been better than the R.530, which may have been marginally okay when used against unmaneuverable bombers at medium or
high altitude, but was essentially useless against maneuvering fighters at medium/low levels. Indeed the R.530's sole known
kill was an Egyptian MiG-19 which never knew it was coming and was flying along fat, dumb and happy, and the Israeli pilot
who fired the shot, Micha Haber, could hardly believe that he'd actually managed to score a hit with the thing. He kept
expecting the radar to break lock or overheat, or the missile to malfunction, the usual results. The AAF, at least,
wouldn't be operating in such hot conditions as the Israelis, which should improve the radar's cooling and thus its
reliability.

More to the point -- it would have been very interesting to see the
results of combat if the Sea Harrier pilots in the Falklands were
forced to use the infrared Matra 530.

Well, let's give them their own missiles, and assume that they'd somehow managed to shoehorn the Lightning's Firestreak or
more likely Red Top onto the SHAR. Lower reliability and performance than the AIM-9L (or AIM-9G, for that matter), but
warheads of triple the size, and in the case of Red Top a mid-IR cooled seeker like the R.530. Probably better performance,
though. Given roughly equal 2nd gen. IRMs, i.e. the Brits with AIM-9G and the AAF with Magic/Shafrir 2, the Brits still win
with their better training and tactics, and the combat results would have been about the same (given that all the shots were
taken in the rear hemisphere), albeit a few more a/c would get away owing to the lower reliability and maneuverability of
the AIM-9G compared to the L. Argentine tactics would have varied somewhat if they didn't have to worry about head-on AIM-9
shots, but not enough to make a significant difference in the outcome.

Now, if you want to postulate some major change in the results, give the Argentine Mirage/Daggers AAR capability plus the
Cyrano IV from the Mirage F1 (or better yet, the entire a/c) and Super 530F RHMs, plus an additional two and preferably four
more KC-130s. A roughly Sparrow-level FQ capability would give the Brits similar problems as the AAF faced, although SARH
shots can certainly be avoided. But the AAF could then take long range FQ shots and wait to get lucky while disrupting the
British CAPs, without needing to close into AIM-9L range. Oh, and they'd want some Matra AS.37 Martel ARMs as well, to
remove the British GCI capability.

Guy