Air attack effectiveness

[stww2]

All fair points. I was mainly referring to the Allied conventional campaigns since it was those campaigns whose effectiveness was being mentioned, but I should have clarified. Of course, even with those you can justifiably argue given the tactics used in many cases it becomes a distinction without a difference, at least for human rights purposes (not that such law existed at the time, AFAIK). But I think the original point that using the number of people killed as a metric for measuring the effectiveness of air attacks is a poor one still stands, at least in most cases (though as the OP clarified, he was referring to infantry losses specifically, so it's a moot point as far as strategic bombing is concerned).

[mustang191]

There's a lot to comment on here, but I'll make one observation about strategic bombing in Vietnam and World War II and the air campaign in the First Gulf War. At no point was the goal of bomber forces in those conflicts to mass-murder the civilian population (though that such casualties would occur was certainly accepted). The goal was primarily to destroy strategic and manufacturing infrastructure (such as factories) in WW2 to degrade the capability and will the enemy to continue to fight.

Regarding World War II that is a little incorrect. Japan conducted long range air raids against Chinese cities (most famously Chongqing) with the express purpose of killing civilians and breaking their enemy’s will to fight.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki did have military targets near them but the bombs themselves were dropped directly over the cities, and the purpose was intended to be psychological rather than destroying some military target (although the military target justification was given in the press releases of the time). Nuclear weapons were so experimental though that it could be argued that those attacks didn’t constitute strategic bombing.

In regards to the OP’s comments, I think he is missing the point. This is not a simulation, it is a game. While having the ability to conduct bearing only launches with dumb bombs and having individual infantrymen/tank/APC etc. units would make the effectiveness of ground attacks more realistic, it is not feasible because of limitations to the number of units one can have in a scenario and not fry their computer, and problems with managing so many units for the AI side and the player.

That's how I think the game should be seen, as in "we showed up, dropped the bomb, job done", not as in saying you could actually kill 30 infantry with 1 bomb.

[mustang191]

I think that question is answered, the game does not similar infantry. Fine.

The other problem is air defense. I take a rifle and shoot a plane a mile away. The plane is a acre. My shooting area is a square mile.

If I fire completely randomly, with a clip, I have a 1% chance of hit.

A rifle platoon, firing completely randomly, no attempt to aim, has a 50% chance of hitting a plane.

In real life low level attacks are completely impossible and even rifle fire, let alone computer targeted AA, will kill anything.

[maverick3320]

I think that question is answered, the game does not similar infantry. Fine.

The other problem is air defense. I take a rifle and shoot a plane a mile away. The plane is a acre. My shooting area is a square mile.

If I fire completely randomly, with a clip, I have a 1% chance of hit.

A rifle platoon, firing completely randomly, no attempt to aim, has a 50% chance of hitting a plane.

In real life low level attacks are completely impossible and even rifle fire, let alone computer targeted AA, will kill anything.

What?

[BobTank63]

I think that question is answered, the game does not similar infantry. Fine.

The other problem is air defense. I take a rifle and shoot a plane a mile away. The plane is a acre. My shooting area is a square mile.

If I fire completely randomly, with a clip, I have a 1% chance of hit.

A rifle platoon, firing completely randomly, no attempt to aim, has a 50% chance of hitting a plane.

In real life low level attacks are completely impossible and even rifle fire, let alone computer targeted AA, will kill anything.

That's a vast overestimation of AA capability.

[mustang191]

I think that question is answered, the game does not similar infantry. Fine.

The other problem is air defense. I take a rifle and shoot a plane a mile away. The plane is a acre. My shooting area is a square mile.

If I fire completely randomly, with a clip, I have a 1% chance of hit.

A rifle platoon, firing completely randomly, no attempt to aim, has a 50% chance of hitting a plane.

In real life low level attacks are completely impossible and even rifle fire, let alone computer targeted AA, will kill anything.

That's a vast overestimation of AA capability.

It's just simple math. If it doesn't match reality it means they weren't trying.

[BobTank63]

I think that question is answered, the game does not similar infantry. Fine.

The other problem is air defense. I take a rifle and shoot a plane a mile away. The plane is a acre. My shooting area is a square mile.

If I fire completely randomly, with a clip, I have a 1% chance of hit.

A rifle platoon, firing completely randomly, no attempt to aim, has a 50% chance of hitting a plane.

In real life low level attacks are completely impossible and even rifle fire, let alone computer targeted AA, will kill anything.

That's a vast overestimation of AA capability.

It's just simple math. If it doesn't match reality it means they weren't trying.

Do you have a source for those statistics?

[thewood1]

I think that question is answered, the game does not similar infantry. Fine.

The other problem is air defense. I take a rifle and shoot a plane a mile away. The plane is a acre. My shooting area is a square mile.

If I fire completely randomly, with a clip, I have a 1% chance of hit.

A rifle platoon, firing completely randomly, no attempt to aim, has a 50% chance of hitting a plane.

In real life low level attacks are completely impossible and even rifle fire, let alone computer targeted AA, will kill anything.

That's a vast overestimation of AA capability.

It's just simple math. If it doesn't match reality it means they weren't trying.

Can you show your work and sources on this? They didn't call it a magic BB for nothing.

[mustang191]

That's a vast overestimation of AA capability.

It's just simple math. If it doesn't match reality it means they weren't trying.

Do you have a source for those statistics?

Which statistics are you asking for, the loss rate for planes I assume.

In the gulf war most of the sorties planned never happened. Furthermore 9% used PGM. We can consider the 3% of sorties which used PGM, and actually happened, the real sorties.

So if the loss rate was 1 per thousand sorties, there were actually 30 sorties, some aborted, some were against easy targets, three real sorties. So the "one per thousand" loss rate, is in fact all the real planes being lost, or about one in three sorties resulting in loss or damage to aircraft.

Of course this isn't recorded anywhere, so there is no way to cite it.

If that's not what you're asking then be more specific.

[elenian]

Why did you assume a target area of an acre? That's, like, eight times the total planform (which is unlikely to be the shooter-facing cross-sectional area) of a B-2 or 747, and more like three hundred times the planform of a plausible CAS aircraft. Your shooting area also seems wrong by a factor of 2pi, assuming you fire truly at random across a hemisphere of mile radius. With plausible (though very generous) assumptions for the cross-section of a CAS plane, I give the per-shot odds as around one in a hundred and thirty thousand.

[mustang191]

Why did you assume a target area of an acre? That's, like, eight times the total planform (which is unlikely to be the shooter-facing cross-sectional area) of a B-2 or 747, and more like three hundred times the planform of a plausible CAS aircraft. Your shooting area also seems wrong by a factor of 2pi, assuming you fire truly at random across a hemisphere of mile radius. With plausible (though very generous) assumptions for the cross-section of a CAS plane, I give the per-shot odds as around one in a hundred and thirty thousand.

Thanks for the corrected math. So even if it's aimed, say, 1% then a battalion has a 50% hit chance, with a single mag. If the mags are reloaded every few seconds and the sortie is five minutes it's basically guaranteed death.

[elenian]

Loitering for any considerable length of time in an area where many tens of thousands of rounds are being fired into the sky is not especially recommended, sure (though of course even if you get hit, very likely in the wing, by a rifle-calibre round having lost the vast majority of its energy, it is hardly instant death!). This is... not quite the same as saying that it is suicidal for aircraft to approach within a mile of infantry in platoon strength, though :p.

[mustang191]

Loitering for any considerable length of time in an area where many tens of thousands of rounds are being fired into the sky is not especially recommended, sure (though of course even if you get hit, very likely in the wing, by a rifle-calibre round having lost the vast majority of its energy, it is hardly instant death!). This is... not quite the same as saying that it is suicidal for aircraft to approach within a mile of infantry in platoon strength, though :p.

In reality aircraft have a hard deck of ten thousand feet, loitering below that is truly instant death.

But as for long range sams, advanced high altitude systems and so forth I'm fine with the game modeling them. Any effective use of unguided weapons is mostly impossible given the altitude required. This is why there are no statistics on tanks bombed in Ww2 or anything, it isn't possible.

[BobTank63]

It's just simple math. If it doesn't match reality it means they weren't trying.

Do you have a source for those statistics?

Which statistics are you asking for, the loss rate for planes I assume.

In the gulf war most of the sorties planned never happened. Furthermore 9% used PGM. We can consider the 3% of sorties which used PGM, and actually happened, the real sorties.

So if the loss rate was 1 per thousand sorties, there were actually 30 sorties, some aborted, some were against easy targets, three real sorties. So the "one per thousand" loss rate, is in fact all the real planes being lost, or about one in three sorties resulting in loss or damage to aircraft.

Of course this isn't recorded anywhere, so there is no way to cite it.

If that's not what you're asking then be more specific.

The statistics I was asking about were the percent chance to hit an aircraft by firing randomly into the air with an assault rifle that you cited. Please provide a source.

[mustang191]

Do you have a source for those statistics?

Which statistics are you asking for, the loss rate for planes I assume.

In the gulf war most of the sorties planned never happened. Furthermore 9% used PGM. We can consider the 3% of sorties which used PGM, and actually happened, the real sorties.

So if the loss rate was 1 per thousand sorties, there were actually 30 sorties, some aborted, some were against easy targets, three real sorties. So the "one per thousand" loss rate, is in fact all the real planes being lost, or about one in three sorties resulting in loss or damage to aircraft.

Of course this isn't recorded anywhere, so there is no way to cite it.

If that's not what you're asking then be more specific.

The statistics I was asking about were the percent chance to hit an aircraft by firing randomly into the air with an assault rifle that you cited. Please provide a source.

I doubt anyone records that. In any case the overall loss rate of aircraft is pretty high, as I said almost as many planes as tanks were lost in the gulf war.

[BobTank63]

Which statistics are you asking for, the loss rate for planes I assume.

In the gulf war most of the sorties planned never happened. Furthermore 9% used PGM. We can consider the 3% of sorties which used PGM, and actually happened, the real sorties.

So if the loss rate was 1 per thousand sorties, there were actually 30 sorties, some aborted, some were against easy targets, three real sorties. So the "one per thousand" loss rate, is in fact all the real planes being lost, or about one in three sorties resulting in loss or damage to aircraft.

Of course this isn't recorded anywhere, so there is no way to cite it.

If that's not what you're asking then be more specific.

The statistics I was asking about were the percent chance to hit an aircraft by firing randomly into the air with an assault rifle that you cited. Please provide a source.

I doubt anyone records that. In any case the overall loss rate of aircraft is pretty high, as I said almost as many planes as tanks were lost in the gulf war.

So what you are saying is that a group of soldiers, armed with assault rifles, can fire randomly in the air for 5 minutes, and are practically guaranteed to hit and down any aircraft flying below 10,000 ft. And you have no sources to back this up.

OP, this is the Command Modern Operations forums, not r/NonCredibleDefense.

[mustang191]

The statistics I was asking about were the percent chance to hit an aircraft by firing randomly into the air with an assault rifle that you cited. Please provide a source.

I doubt anyone records that. In any case the overall loss rate of aircraft is pretty high, as I said almost as many planes as tanks were lost in the gulf war.

So what you are saying is that a group of soldiers, armed with assault rifles, can fire randomly in the air for 5 minutes, and are practically guaranteed to hit and down any aircraft flying below 10,000 ft. And you have no sources to back this up.

OP, this is the Command Modern Operations forums, not r/NonCredibleDefense.

I gave the math, I don't see you objecting. Even if a few soldiers fire completely randomly with a single mag they will hit the plane. Believe it or not, I proved it with math.

[BobTank63]

I doubt anyone records that. In any case the overall loss rate of aircraft is pretty high, as I said almost as many planes as tanks were lost in the gulf war.

So what you are saying is that a group of soldiers, armed with assault rifles, can fire randomly in the air for 5 minutes, and are practically guaranteed to hit and down any aircraft flying below 10,000 ft. And you have no sources to back this up.

OP, this is the Command Modern Operations forums, not r/NonCredibleDefense.

I gave the math, I don't see you objecting. Even if a few soldiers fire completely randomly with a single mag they will hit the plane. Believe it or not, I proved it with math.

You're trolling right?

[thewood1]

I'd like to see the historical case for 10k soldiers shooting into the air at once.

[mustang191]

I'd like to see the historical case for 10k soldiers shooting into the air at once.

It doesn't need that many. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MUgluYZRsPU