I’m Baaaaack…

Oh what, you thought I forgot about my Weblargh?  Piffle!  I’ve just been busy packing, traveling across the country to get beat up, and then moving out to Oklahoma.  Fun.

And yet I’m bored out of my mind, which is usually the root cause of my contributions to my own page.  I just got all my stuff moved in from two states, and this place isn’t quite big enough to hold it all.  Waiting for the 26th when I get married and drag my new wife out here so we can find a house.

So loyal reader(s?) we’ll get back down to business soon, probably later today if this stupid computer keeps acting up.  I’m about ready to punt it out the window.  Stick around!  I’m going to stop being really lazy for a little while, but that usually doesn’t last long.

The Anniversary

On the first anniversary of the shootings at Virginia Tech, I thought it would be appropriate to re-publish the note I wrote at midnight that night in my dorm room on campus:

“It was just like any other Monday, minus the fact that it was in the 30’s, snowing, and windy in the middle of April. The Corps went out as usual for formation at about 0720, the flag went up, and we were inside by 0730. I sat around in the room for a while, played some video games or something, and then went off to Cinnabon (attached to Owens on the campus map) with two of my buds for some breakfast before our 0905 AFROTC class in the Military Building. We hadn’t heard anything about the first shooting that happened at 0715 in West Ambler Johnston, and we had no idea about the second shooting in Norris until after class ended and both the Air Force and Army staff were closing off the hallways.

My roommate and I decided to book it back to our room in Brodie, which actually overlooks the grassy area in front of Norris, Holden, and McBryde, where we watched crowds of people run out of Norris and McBryde into Torgerson, guided by a couple of our fellow cadets enlisted by the police officers on sight to help guide evacuated students in the right direction (and to light a fire under their asses too). We went back inside Brodie, and tried calling people to let them know we were ok, but phone lines were already jamming up. We tried for a while before we were able to contact everybody we felt necessary to talk to, and went down the hall to our friend’s room to look down on the situation.

There were cops everywhere. Not only campus police, but Montgomery County, Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Radford, Botetourt County, Virginia State Police, and the FBI all parked in between Torgerson and McBryde. We watched a few cars speed off as fast as they could, we were later told that they had done a “grab and go” where wounded people had simply been picked up and put in the car to go to the hospital, which was faster than waiting for an ambulance. The national guard and S.W.A.T. teams showed up, and a K-9 unit to top it off. They had an announcement playing every five minutes telling people to get inside and stay there. We had the perfect vantage point, one of my friends was snapping pictures of all the activity, and actually got on the phone with CNN.

Preliminary reports told us that there had been between one and five casualties, and only one of them was fatal. But the news just kept getting worse, next we heard there were seven or eight fatalities. Then 22. There had to be some mistake, maybe the police chief said 22 casualties and the news had spun it to mean deaths. But much to the dismay of everybody in the room, there had been no error, and we were suddenly very quiet. One young lady walked out of the room with her head in her hands, when not five minutes earlier had been joking with us about how she was so disappointed that her test was cancelled. The mood changed drastically after that first press conference.

We all went to Shultz for lunch/dinner, where we were greeted with between 15 and 20 state troopers armed with M4’s and a K-9 unit on the scene as well. They were there for security, so nobody felt unsafe, but it certainly added to the gravity of an already stressful situation.

Everybody in the Corps was trying to get accountability, trying to figure out who was where, and if they had checked in with their chain of command. It took about 30 minutes, but eventually all companies and ROTC’s had either checked in, or knew the whereabouts of their people.

Except for one.

Cadet Matt LaPorte was killed in Norris Hall. He lived one floor below me in Brodie, and although I didn’t know him very well, he was one of our brothers following in the same footsteps as many of us. He was in the Air Force ROTC, and was progressing through the ranks of the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets just like so many of us already have done. We’re all really shaken by the news, I mean some of us were bracing ourselves for the worst, but there’s nothing you can do to prepare yourself for when it’s actually confirmed. All our hearts and minds are with him and his family, as well as the families of the rest of the victims in this senseless tragedy.

People keep asking me if I have any news that’s not on TV, and honestly I can’t say that I do except for the stories from my friends that were there. One of them is currently in stable condition in the hospital after taking three bullets, one in his shoulder, one that broke his femur and lodged in his knee, and one that struck him in the hip and lodged in his pelvis. He’s going in for surgery soon, but he’s awake and in good spirits considering what he’s been through. We’re visiting him tomorrow. One of my other friends was in the room directly above the shooting, heard the noise and thought it was construction workers until he smelled the gunsmoke. After being held back from going down there himself, he and some other classmates locked themselves in an office and waited until the police busted the door down. I’ve heard other stories that shouldn’t be put on a public website, but basically the guy knew what he was doing, and had planned this out. He chained the doors to the building shut from the inside to keep people in, and the police out.

Other than that, what you see is what you get on TV, but don’t start buying into the media pointing fingers at people. They’re such assholes, attacking the police chief and President Steger when they’re just trying to get out any pertinent and appropriate information that wouldn’t interfere with investigations. I’ll go off on that tirade if you ask me personally, but really, think about it. If you had the information they had at the time (forget about what we know now) what would you have done differently? Do you really think it would have worked any better than what was done? Are you the one with years on a police force or are you just an uppity little shit that needs the ratings so you don’t have to go look for a new job with your useless English degree? I didn’t think so. Shut up.

Anyways. Thanks to everybody, I just wanted to put this out there so everybody knows I’m doing fine but things are still developing. Any specific questions I’m always glad to answer. You’re all awesome.

-Mike”

One year later, the media are still assholes, by the way.  And I still hate that nobody can say, “Virginia Tech,” without mentioning the shootings.  And one year later doesn’t help much with everyone missing their friends and family taken from us too soon.  Rest in piece, fellow Hokies, we all live for the memory of 32.

We are Virginia Tech.

Thrust Vectoring

This will be a quickie because there’s not really much to talk about. I keep looking around trying to find more information on thrust vectoring and how it really affects performance/maneuverability, etc. Here’s what I’ve found as well as what I think about it:

While we know that TV is a very interesting concept, what does it actually do? According to a lot of people, it makes seemingly impossible maneuvers possible and makes any fighter jet without it obsolete. Some speculate it is there for supersonic cruise purposes as well, which makes sense for reasons found here in a press conference with Col. Everest Riccioni. I’ve also read that it gives the advantage of maneuvering without moving the control surfaces, thereby avoiding the drag induced by doing so.

But one thing I’ve noticed that I wanted to comment on that nobody else has is the fact that today’s aircraft that use TV to gain high AOA maneuvering capabilities are using it as a crutch. Take a look at all those that have it, the F-22, Su-35, etc. All of them are flying dump trucks!!! The fact of the matter is that all of them are obscenely heavy and would be the most sluggish fighters if not for the magically redeeming qualities of vectored thrust. Even with it, it’s easy to see that fighter jets decades older are still much more agile. Have a look at the quickness that each plane does the Cobra maneuver in these two videos. Then try to guess which one has/needs TV to do it.

MiG-29 OVT

J-35 Draken

To elaborate on why slow speed maneuvering is pointless in my mind I leave you with a couple observations. First, all of it has to be done in full afterburner unless the plane is diving because of the weight of the plane and the amount of thrust needed to keep it up in the air. This does two things: put out a huge heat signature, and waste all your gas. So if enough of it is done, you’re either taking a heater up the tailpipe or running home because you need to refuel. Second, what many people still don’t understand is that it’s not how fast you can turn that wins dogfights, it’s the speed at which you can change the situation so that the enemy can’t cope with what you’re doing. It’s the rate of fast transients, how fast you can dump and regain energy, and from what I see, TV can only help you dump it. Post stall, you either have to dive or ride your afterburners to get your energy back which takes a painfully long time from what I’ve seen, giving a more agile opponent plenty of time to pop a heater right up in there. Anyways, enough of my ranting, I leave you with an afterthought:

Does anyone know what John Boyd meant by “flat-plating the bird”? I’m leaning towards the Cobra maneuver, but I’m not sure. I’ve heard that F-105’s could kind of pull a variant of it, if anyone knows send me a line.

That is, if anyone reads this.

X-Plane

I’ve often been harassed by claiming that I could design a better fighter jet than the F-22. Perhaps what I meant was I could design one that doesn’t completely ignore the history of air combat and exactly what it is that makes a fighter jet win. To that extent, I’ve scribbled down some criteria that I think would make the most badass fighter jet we’ve seen. This is solely for air-to-air and none of that fighter/bomber bullshit. All numbers are assumed to be with a full load on takeoff.

• First, the weight. Since we know that weight is a bad force when flying, let’s keep it low. Instead of an 80,000lb monstrosity (ehem, Raptor), I’m keeping this one under 30K. Lighter if at all possible.
• To give it the advantage in range, I’m putting the floor of the fuel fraction at .35. The lift/drag should be nice and high as well.
• As for the thrust/weight, I’m shooting for a 2.
• The sensors are where I’m a little unsure. While I would prefer it to have an emphasis on passive sensors, I know nobody would even touch it if it didn’t have a decent radar on it. That’s why I’m thinking AESA, just because they can get a decent amount of power into a smaller device. Hopefully that should save on weight.
• I’ve been really intrigued by the X-29 and the results of forward swept wings with vortex flow control. High angle of attack capabilities without thrust vectoring? I like it.
• Of course it’ll have a bubble canopy, and the agility will be incredible.

So for anyone who knows anything about fighter design, what do you think? I don’t really put any emphasis on stealth or top speed or service ceiling but all those are inherent in the design so long as it is kept small, quick, and isn’t aerodynamically sloppy. The Raptor is none of those things, so I’m already a step ahead. Plus, the cost of this fighter will be much less and therefore allow more of them, another key ingredient to winning in an air-to-air battle. So long as it’s not polluted by the current process of acquisition we have running, this would destroy anything flying today in an even cost analysis.

Real fighter pilots probably just had their wet dreams come true.

Air Tactics Pt. 2

I decided to wait until after we got through with our OCA sims to really have a good grasp on how we thought about conducting a full air war.  Turns out, there’s not much actual thinking involved.  It’s still the same 2nd generation attritionist mindset: destroy everything the enemy has and he’ll stop fighting you.  There’s little to no discussion at the tactical level as to what the best course of action may be, and if there is, it doesn’t really matter since the ATO comes out long before the mission takes place anyways.

Granted these were only sims, and designed to give us just an idea of what an actual OCA mission would be like, but I’m still irritated by the lack of consideration of the mental and moral aspects of war.  It’s all about getting bombs on target on time, hey diddle diddle straight up the middle.  The worst indication that our OODA loops are consumed by the ATO was on the last day, where in this particular scenario, our “intel report” declared our communications compromised and that the enemy was aware of our incoming strike.  In my head, this was a great opportunity to be unpredictable (heck, maybe we leaked the info to make the enemy think we were striking) and do exactly the opposite of what the enemy thought we were up to.  Hey, we could throw up all kinds of feints and deceptions to make them react inappropriately and then take advantage!  Unfortunately, I found myself once again correct about our mentality.  The word from above was basically, “deal with it, we’re not changing anything.”

…

I wanted to pull a Boyd and start poking people in the chest and yelling my lungs out about how stupid this was.  We had the knowledge of what the enemy was expecting, what they were planning to do about it, and we did nothing about it!  I calmed myself down for a short while thinking that this may have been a sim-ism and they were just using this as an excuse to challenge us until our instructor informed us that this sometimes happens in the real world.

I just don’t know what to say anymore.

Windows Vista - Pile of Crap

I’ve decided how I will choose which tech support personnel I will talk to.  Immediately upon introducing themselves, I’ll say, “QUICK!  Top five reasons Windows Vista sucks balls!!”  If they can’t answer, I’ll politely ask to be redirected to somebody that can respond to my inquiry.

You may be asking me, “but Mickey P, why so angry?”  Well if your computer locked up into an unrecoverable crash on average of 3 times a day (and keep in mind I’m at work all day during the week) you’d be a little irritated too.

You read right, my computer, the one I’m writing this on right now, completely locks up about 3 times a day.  Now, to give some background here, I’m not an idiot that can’t figure out which button turns the thing on, I built my last two computers from the motherboard up.  And while doing that assumes quite a good bit of risk with system problems (and believe me, I’ve seen some doozies) I’ve never put together a system that was as unreliable as this.  The last operating system I used before this was Windows 2000.  For whatever reason, I decided to be lazy and just buy a pre-built system by HP complete with Windows Vista.  Allow me to reiterate: BIG MISTAKE.

I’ve never heard of an operating system that turns every click into a gamble.  Basically, you try to open a program and hope that Vista is willing to cooperate.  A few rules though: never try to open anything shortly after login while the hard drive light is still flickering, and never try to open two things simultaneously.  Guaranteed lockup in both cases.  The other thing that confused me is the lack of an interrupt.  The old Ctrl-Alt-Del no longer breaks through system lockups like in the good old days of Windows 2000.  Apparently it’s just another function to Vista, in other words if your system locks up and you Ctrl-Alt-Del, NOTHING HAPPENS BECAUSE THE SYSTEM IS LOCKED UP.  What kind of stupid crap is that?

This is the epitome of an under-tested, rushed through quality control, resource-hogging, system locking steaming pile of dog crap operating system ever.  Maybe Microsoft should pull its head out of its ass next time it tries to design one of these, because I can confidently say that while I’ve never designed an operating system before, I could fuck up and do better than this.

F-22 Myths

There have been two big myths about the “mighty” Raptor that I just need to talk about or write down before they make my head explode. Two of the biggest things that the designers aimed for were not met. At all. Part of it being a misnomer of sorts (to fool the less educated?) and the other being a rather persistent misunderstanding of certain concepts behind what makes an airplane go.

I never got my degree in Aeronautical Engineering, but I’ve had the “crash course” in the theory of flight and even that level of understanding leaves one confused as to why the Raptor was designed the way it was. For example, it’s common knowledge that of the four forces in flight, two are quite undesirable. Those being weight and drag, in which the Raptor is unacceptably sloppy. Of the other two, the only category that I can see it doing well in is lift. Maybe. And while it has a seemingly impressive amount of thrust, when compared to its weight that amount becomes a lot less impressive. But I digress, on to the mythbusting.

Supercruise: First, I need to lay down two very basic definitions of two very basic words, because somehow they seemed to escape the head honchos in all this. Super - In this case, it refers to flying supersonically. Very simple. Cruise - The speed at which the vehicle (car/airplane/hummingbird) is the most efficient. You go the farthest when cruising, while using the least amount of gas.

Still with me? Good. So what’s the problem? Well, the Air Force for whatever reason defines “Supercruise” as the ability to go supersonic in dry thrust alone. Other than completely missing the point, apparently they forgot that every other supercruiser ever built has done it with some form of afterburner. Ask Col. Riccioni about it. As one pilot put it to me, if they want to stay up a bit longer, they’ll keep it around .8-.9 Mach. Wait, what? I thought it cruised supersonically? That’s what supercruise MEANS. You mean to tell me that the Raptor is a SUBcruiser??? So much for that.

Range: So for some reason, no one in the design department of this thing knows what it is that makes a plane go far. It’s no secret, lots of people know exactly what does it, and thankfully those people were on the job when the Air Force needed the F-16. The Air Force tends not to think in the realm of the relative, which is exactly the reason why they continue to miss the point. It’s not the amount of fuel that determines range, it’s the RELATIVE fuel. In other words, the weight of the fuel divided by the total weight of the aircraft including the fuel. It’s the fuel fraction. That and the relationship between lift and drag (you know, if the engines have to work against a buttload of drag to get the necessary speed for the wings to generate enough lift to get the plane off the ground, they’re not being very efficient).

So now back to the point. The examples are everywhere about why the two criteria above are the determining factors to aircraft range. The YF-16 upon its unveiling not only had longer range than the larger F-15, but it had longer range than any other fighter in the Air Force. Before the AF got their grubby paws on it and crammed as much heavy crap on it as possible, it had a takeoff fuel fraction of .30+. The F-15 is somewhere around .28. For better examples, the extremely long-legged MiG-31 runs at about a .45, and the aircraft that made it around the world in one try had a fuel fraction of .75! So where does our airplane in question lie? A meagre .275, give or take. More likely take, because with every new “upgrade,” it just gets heavier. Around here they’re proclaiming it to be 80,000lbs!

So there you go, the next time someone talks about the F-22 being the longest-legged supercruiser in the world, you can immediately let anything else they say just fall right on out the other side of your head. Then wonder why you hang out with these people.

Air Tactics

I’ve been thinking. Usually that’s a dangerous thing, mostly because my ideas are met with such sarcastic criticism from my classmates.  I still get ridiculed for liking the F-16 more than the F-22. But I’m hoping what I’ve been trying to piece together will make some sense. So instead of getting scoffed for having different views, I’ll put it in a blog that nobody reads. Thanks blogosphere!

So here’s the lead-in: the USAF’s doctrine department has been out to lunch since 1947 as far as I can tell. Despite the obvious leaps in technological advancement, the general construct of how we plan to win wars has changed little, if at all. It hinges around blowing up any enemy air assets and anything on the ground that isn’t ours as well. Quite 2nd Generation/Attritionist. Today’s doctrine is no different from that of decades ago, the only changes being the addition of radar, missiles, and other technological advancements. Same package, different wrapping.

The questions I’ve been trying to get help with are as follows: First, are there ways to incorporate 3rd Generation Maneuver Warfare thinking into a conventional air war scenario? Do we really need to destroy everything the enemy has in order to break their will to resist? What kinds of tactics can we employ that might break from the “hey-diddle-diddle-straight-up-the-middle” method? How can we better manage the air war from a bottom-up perspective, or is that even possible?

One scenario I’ve been rolling around in my head has to do with classic Sun Tzu cheng and ch’i setups. Despite the Air Force wanting to replace its F-15’s with F-22’s and its F-16’s and A-10’s with the F-35, it’s not going to happen. It’s a given that we’ll still rely on our trusty 4th-generation fighters for the reason of numbers alone. Couple that with their COMBAT PROVEN EFFECTIVENESS and it’s obvious they won’t be going anywhere. That said, we can still find a niche for the F-22’s and F-35’s, probably more in the ch’i section supposing we accept their stealth capabilities. The overall goal here would be to fix the enemy’s attention on our conventional fighters while slipping the smaller contingent of 5th-gens to their objectives. Or, if on the same counter-air mission, have the 5th-gens come around the back door, putting them outside the limits of the enemy aircraft’s radars and sensors. Makes more sense than flying straight at them and hoping they can’t see you.

Of course, this is a rough construct. Much like Sun Tzu’s observation that with only five colors one can produce all the hues that can be seen, same here. It’s an idea, work around it to fit your situation. I’m still learning about how we conduct the air war here at ABM school so I’ll be updating this as more things pop into my head.

To be continued when more ideas solidify…

Bored

So I was sitting at the computer this morning after gorging myself on two cans worth of Chef Boyardee when I realized I probably wasn’t going to do anything today. So I didn’t. Well, nothing productive anyways. I fiddled around with Windows Movie Maker to smash together a semi-power hour-like montage but only got up to minute 8 before I ran out of music video clips to distract the viewers. And, A.D.D. being the beast that it is, I grew tired of doing it too. Although I do like the timed out scenes indicating when you’re supposed to drink, for mine it’s a dogfight between an F-15 and my all-time favorite, the F-16. When you hear the 16 pilot say he’s going in for the kill, that’s your cue to do what you do. The rest of the day was well spent playing Battlefield 2142, and ended with my fiance calling me on her way home telling me that Virginia is on fire. That’s not good.

So now I’m sitting here still, only this time with an empty plate which used to contain what I like to call “Messy Eggs”. If anyone has the same cooking style as I do, i.e. throw a bunch of stuff into a pot/pan and cook the hell out of it, just about everything comes out as a messy something. It’s just those oh so few dishes that don’t turn out that way that make them special. This one is so special it should be wearing a helmet and taking the short bus.

And I’ve digressed once again. But then again, I should’ve had a topic to begin with to even be able to digress. It’s my weblargh, I’ll digress from nothing if I want to. Nobody reads this anyways.

So, the mighty F-16. Not what it was supposed to be, and that makes me sad. But I do think it ironic that it has performed so well and proven itself quite necessary despite how much the Air Force didn’t want it. But in the words of someone greater than I, “You can’t always get what you want…sometimes you’ll find you get what you need.” And now I’ve lost interest in talking about that too. I was toying with the idea of putting down my gripes about the F-22 but I wanted to go back and read some more of Col. Riccioni’s stuff as well as Pierre Sprey’s. Then coupled with what I’ve seen/heard by working with them, we’ll see what comes out. And I’m done.

OK, I thought of something to write.

Well, I decided to put this up and see if I get any response. This is straight out of my profile description:

“I’m a greenhorn 2LT in the Air Force, in the middle of Air Battle Management training. I started my own blog mainly to be able to comment on the DNI page, but I might contribute my own articles as well. I read Robert Coram’s book “Boyd” for the first time my freshman year of college (Virginia Tech, GO HOKIES!!!), and since then have re-read it two or three times. Then I started picking up anything relating to his ideas that I could get my hands on. I’ve read a number of Chet Richards’ books as well as Grant Hammond’s biography of Boyd. And for good measure I’ve started reading a series of books by H. John Poole about the current enemy we’re facing.

Basically, I want to educate myself in the best way to compete in a wartime environment, as opposed to my current AF education which puts Boyd’s trinity (people, ideas, hardware) in the REVERSE order. I’m hoping to be able to bounce ideas off of several people on a number of subjects ranging from war strategy and small unit tactics to aircraft design.

Ultimately, I want to get a better grasp on how Boyd’s ideas could be applied to the air. Any help is appreciated.

-MickeyPvX”

Now, pertaining to that last part of the info, it’s not like we haven’t seen/used those ideas in the air war, it’s just that we give it little to no credit as to how much good it did. In the most recent block of academic training I went through, we talked a lot about planning considerations for different parts of the air war. Deception was actually in there!!! If you couldn’t tell, I was surprised. But what irked me was how little time we spent discussing it. Blargh. I guess we don’t like learning from what worked. Hey at least I got a good callsign last week.