Stealth isn't a universal military panacea

A recent article highlights the very important fact that stealth in military aircraft isn't the be-all and end-all of existence.

The commander of Sweden’s air force, Mats Helgesson, recently made the bold statement that his country’s Saab Gripen E fighter could beat Russia’s formidable fleet of Sukhoi jets with none of the expensive stealth technology the US relies on.

Saab Gripen (image courtesy of Wikipedia - click it for a larger view)

“Gripen, especially the E-model, is designed to kill Sukhois. There we have a black belt,” Helgesson told Yle at a presentation in Finland, where Sweden is trying to export the jets.

. . .

The Gripen can’t carry the most weapons and has no real stealth. And it isn’t the longest-range, the fastest, or even the cheapest jet. But it has a singular focus that makes it a nightmare for Russia’s fighter jets.

Justin Bronk, an aerial-combat expert at the Royal United Services Institute, told Business Insider that like the A-10 Warthog was built around a massive cannon, the Gripen was built around electronic warfare.

Virtually all modern jets conduct some degree of electronic warfare, but the Gripen E stands above the rest, according to Bronk.

. . .

To defeat Russia’s fearsome fighters and surface-to-air missiles, the US has largely turned to stealth aircraft. Stealth costs a fortune and must be built into the shape of the plane.

If Russia somehow cracks the code of detecting stealth-shaped fighters, the US’s F-35, the most expensive weapons system in history, is cooked.

But Saab took a different, and cheaper, approach to combating Russia’s fighters and missiles by focusing on electronic attack, which gives them an advantage over stealth because they can evolve the software without a ground-up rebuild, according to Bronk.

There's more at the link.

I'd have to agree to a large extent with the article's arguments.  Back in the 1980's, South Africa was faced with what many considered to be the most comprehensive air defense system outside the Warsaw Pact, during its war with Angola.  It was able to penetrate it routinely, and carry out raids on enemy positions without major difficulty (even though it had lost air superiority to the later-generation MiG and other fighter aircraft, and modern anti-aircraft missiles, operated by Communist forces).  Similarly, Israel has been able to operate over Syria almost with impunity, despite the latter's relatively modern air defense systems.  This capability was publicly displayed in the famous 2007 raid on a nuclear reactor complex being built in that country:  "The attack pioneered the use of the Israel’s electronic warfare capabilities,as IAF electronic warfare (EW) systems took over Syria’s air defense systems, feeding them a false sky-picture for the entire period of time that the Israeli fighter jets needed to cross Syria, bomb their target and return".  Over the past couple of years, it's been evident in Israeli air strikes against Iranian and terrorist positions in Syria.

Stealth is very useful, but it has limitations.  It's another arrow in the quiver, but not the only one.  I think the Swedish approach (and that of Israel and other powers) is equally viable.  I also note that Israel insisted on the right to modify the stealthy F-35 with its own software and electronic systems before it agreed to buy it for its Air Force (a concession granted to no other foreign purchaser).  I suspect Israeli F-35's will combine stealth and electronic warfare to create a truly formidable adversary.

Peter