“Crap, what do I do now?” I thought to myself. I couldn’t kill the trail F-15 as planned. My game plan unraveled, causing the clear mind of one of America’s killer elite to turn to mush. This clear, calculating mind was quickly replaced by the bane of all fighter pilots — the “random thought generator.” A stupid idea that sprung unbidden in the confusion was “gun the trailer.” That was all I could think of. “Gun the trailer — yeah, it might work.” In response to this neural spasm, I laid 8 Gs on the jet and squared a corner that was practically unsquarable. When I started the turn, I was at 90° of aspect, at a range of 4,000 feet from the F-15E. I ended up right in the heart of the gun envelope and quickly tracked the trailing Mud Hen. The guy reacted like he was struck on the head with a board. While my turn surprised me, it must have mesmerized the target because he never even jinked out of plane. He just kept pulling into me and gave me an easy shot.
I called, “Tracking kill on the F-15E at 17,000 feet, nose low, passing through west.” It was now a 2V1 fight. “Now, where the hell are those other Mud Hens?” I rolled to do a belly check and picked up a tally at 8 o’clock level. The two Mud Hens were nose on at 6,000 feet. Not too bad — I could do a high G bat turn, pass them head-on and separate. I rolled to put my lift vector on them and started to pull. Nothing. The nose would not move. My mind started to clear as I realized that I had just taken a 450 knot fighting machine and turned it into a 150 knot grape that was about to get eaten. I had two options — both of them lethal. Extend to get energy and soak up a missile, or try to turn the jet with no airspeed and get gunned. Neither choice was good, but fighter pilot instinct took over, and I turned into the closest Mud Hen. The fight ended (but not until I performed a feeble jink out[10]).
What went wrong? I did everything correctly up until the moment I committed to a 3V1 turning fight. The F-15E is the best air-to-ground fighter in the world. It is also a very respectable air-to-air jet and is very similar in performance to a Turkey.[11] It is no match, however, for an F-16 in a maneuvering fight. I got shot because of pure buffoonery. Many fights come down to the ability of the pilot to maneuver his jet in a 1V1 situation. In this fight with the Mud Hens, I should have realized the position of my escape window and separated (a concept we will discuss in Chapter 4). In addition, I used up far more energy than necessary turning on the trailing bandit. BFM is the first critical set of skills that a fighter pilot must learn. In this case, I flew my BFM like a plumber, not a fighter pilot, and paid the price.
Introduction to the Geometry of Air Combat
When I was a pimply-faced Cadet at the Air Force Academy, I had an Aeronautical Engineering professor that we all called Captain Sominex. Captain Sominex could take the most motivated and dedicated student and within minutes turn him into a slobbering, head-bobbing imbecile, fighting a losing battle to stay coherent. You can imagine his effect on a student like myself with a somewhat more casual approach to academic life at the Zoo (that’s what the cadets called the Air Force Academy). In fact, I still have the scars on my forehead (now covered by wrinkles) from my head banging off the desk. All of this did not faze the Captain, however; he just continued to drone on about Bernoulli’s Equations and the Law of Continuity as waves of heads bobbed and drooled, almost marking time to his writing on the board. The funny thing about old Captain Sominex’s Aero class, though, is that it is one of the few subjects that I had at the Zoo that I still use today. I obviously don’t have to solve aero problems, but it does help to understand how jets fly and how engines push air out the back.
Well, the same thing can be said for this chapter on geometry. It may not be the most exciting section in Art of the Kill; however, it isn’t possible to discuss air combat if we don’t know the terms and definitions used to describe the spatial relationship between two aircraft. Further, just like my Aero courses, you’ll find you’ll use the information in this section long after you finish reading the book.
Now, in order to perform BFM, a fighter pilot must understand his spatial relationship to the target from three perspectives: positional geometry, attack geometry and the weapons envelope. Like any profession, air combat has several unique terms that are a necessary part of the language.
Positional Geometry
Angle-off, range and aspect angle are terms used in BFM discussions to describe the relative advantage or disadvantage that one aircraft has in relation to another.
Angle-off
Angle-off is the difference, measured in degrees, between your heading and the bandit’s. This angle provides information about the relative fuselage alignment between the pilot’s jet and the bandit’s. For example, if the angle-off between you and a bandit were 0°, you would be on a parallel heading with the bandit, and the two fuselages would be aligned. If the angle-off were 90°, your fuselage would be perpendicular to the bandit. Angle-off is also called Heading Crossing Angle or HCA. Figure 1-1 shows angle-off.
Range
Range is the distance between your jet and the bandit. In most HUDs, range is measured in feet, out to one nautical mile (6,000 feet). Outside one nautical mile, range is measured in miles and tenths of miles. For example, a range to the target of 9,000 feet would be displayed as 1.5 nautical miles. Figure 1-2 shows range.
Aspect angle
Aspect angle is the number of degrees measured from the tail of a target to your aircraft. Aspect angle is important because it indicates how far away your aircraft is from the target’s 6 o’clock position. Aspect angle has nothing to do with your heading, as is shown in Figure 1-3. Note that the aspect angle stays the same, regardless of which way your aircraft is heading. Along with a measure in degrees from the target’s tail, Figure 1-3 describes aspect angle as either right or left. In order to determine if the angle is left or right aspect, start at the target’s 6 o’clock facing the target. If your aircraft is in the right hemisphere, you have right aspect; in the left hemisphere, you have left target aspect. Aspect angle is important because, if you know the aspect angle and range to the target, you then know his lateral displacement or turning room from the target — and lateral displacement is very important in BFM.
Attack Geometry
Attack geometry describes the path that the offensive fighter takes as he converges on the bandit. When you start an attack on the bandit, there are three distinct paths or pursuit courses you can follow. These pursuit courses are lag pursuit, pure pursuit and lead pursuit. If you are pointing your aircraft behind the bandit, you are in lag pursuit. If you are pointing directly at the bandit, you are in pure pursuit. If you are pointing in front of the bandit, you are in lead pursuit. Figure 1-4 shows the pursuit options that can be taken by the attacking fighter.