Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!att!cbnews!military
From: shafer@drynix (Mary Shafer)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: infrared and interceptors
Message-ID: <8893@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 9 Aug 89 03:58:12 GMT
Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM
Lines: 36
Approved: military@att.att.com



From: Mary Shafer 
From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)

>(Oh, okay, a brief comment on why that happened...  Escort fighters are
>less necessary now that bombers attack individually rather than in
>formation -- a response to nuclear antiaircraft weapons, among other
                            ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>things -- and are less practical over intercontinental ranges.  Intruder
>missions classically involved going in at night and lurking around an
>enemy airfield waiting for targets; modern radar and other sensors have
>made this unhealthy.)

Are "nuclear anitaircraft weapons" antiaircraft weapons that use
nuclear devices or are they antiaircraft weapons used against aircraft
carrying nuclear devices?

Did I miss some strange and wonderful weapon system? 

Using a nuclear device to shoot down an aircraft sounds like a really
bad idea.  Consider the EMP effect on your own systems, for one thing.

Also, it's hard to be the first user of a nuclear device, even as a
preemptive event.  These would be tactical weapons and I can't imagine
that control would be surrendered to the field, which would be
necessary if such a weapons were to be successful.

Of course, practicality, feasibility, and useability are not
necessarily among the criteria used to select weapon systems.  :-)

--
M F Shafer                          shafer@elxsi.dfrf.nasa.gov
NASA Ames Research Center           arpa!elxsi.dfrf.nasa.gov!shafer
Dryden Flight Research Facility
                 Of course I don't speak for NASA