home » Equipment » Bringing death. The best attack aircraft in the history of aviation. The best attack aircraft in the world Modern attack aircraft

Bringing death. The best attack aircraft in the history of aviation. The best attack aircraft in the world Modern attack aircraft

In combined-arms offensive combat, you can do without air support: the howitzer artillery division of the Soviet army could bring down on the head of the enemy five hundred shells of 152 mm caliber! Artillery beats in fog, thunder and blizzard, and the work of aviation is often limited by adverse weather conditions and the dark.

Of course, aviation has its own strengths. Bombers can use ammunition of enormous power - an elderly Su-24 booms up with two KAB-1500 bombs under the wing. The ammunition index speaks for itself. It is difficult to imagine an artillery gun capable of firing the same heavy shells. The monstrous sea gun “Type 94” (Japan) had a caliber of 460 mm and a mass of guns of 165 tons! At the same time, its firing range barely reached 40 km. Unlike the Japanese artillery system, the Su-24 can "abandon" a couple of its 1.5-ton bombs five hundred kilometers.

But for the direct fire support of ground troops, such powerful ammunition is not required, as well as super-long range firing! The legendary D-20 howitzer gun hits 17 kilometers - more than enough to hit any targets in the frontline. And the power of her shells weighing 45-50 kilograms is enough to destroy most of the objects on the front line of the enemy’s defense. It is no coincidence that during the Second World War the Luftwaffe abandoned the “hundredths” - 50 bombs weighing 50 kg were enough to directly support the ground forces.

As a result, we are faced with an amazing paradox - in terms of logic, effective fire support at the forefront can be provided only by the use of artillery. There is no need to use attack aircraft and other “battlefield aircraft” - expensive and unreliable “toys” with excessive capabilities.
On the other hand, any modern combined-arms offensive battle without quality air support is doomed to an early and inevitable defeat.

Attack aircraft have their own secret to success. And this secret has nothing to do with the flight characteristics of the “battlefield aircraft” themselves, the thickness of their armor and the power of their on-board weapons.
To solve the puzzle, I invite readers to get acquainted with the seven best attack aircraft and aircraft for direct support of troops in aviation, to trace the military route of these legendary vehicles and answer the main question: why is attack aircraft needed?

Anti-tank attack aircraft A-10 Thunderbolt II (Thunderbolt)

Norm take-off weight: 14 tons. Small arms and cannon armament: GAU-8 seven-barreled gun with 1350 rounds of ammunition. Combat load: 11 suspension points, up to 7.5 tons of bombs, NURS units and high-precision. Crew: 1 pilot. Max. ground speed 720 km / h

Thunderbolt is not a plane. This is a real flying gun! The main structural element around which the Thunderbolt attack aircraft is built is the incredible GAU-8 gun with a rotating block of seven barrels. The most powerful of the 30 mm caliber guns ever mounted on airplanes — its recoil exceeds the thrust of two Thunderbolt jet engines! Rate of fire 1800 - 3900 rds / min. The velocity of the projectile at the cut of the barrel reaches 1 km / s.

The story of the fantastic GAU-8 cannon would be incomplete without mention of its ammunition. Particularly popular is the armor-piercing PGU-14 / B with a depleted uranium core, piercing at a distance of 500 meters at a right angle of 69 mm of armor. For comparison: the roof thickness of the first-generation Soviet infantry fighting vehicle is 6 mm, the hull side is 14 mm. The phenomenal accuracy of the gun allows from a distance of 1200 meters to lay 80% of the shells in a circle with a diameter of about six meters. In other words, a one-second salvo at a maximum rate of fire gives 50 hits in an enemy tank!

A worthy representative of his class, created at the height of the Cold War to exterminate Soviet armored tanks. "Flying Cross" does not suffer from the lack of modern sighting and navigation systems and precision weapons, and the high survivability of its design has been repeatedly confirmed in local wars of recent years.

Aircraft fire support AS-130 "Spectrum"

Norm take-off weight: 60 tons. Small arms: 105 mm howitzer, 40 mm automatic cannon, two 6-barrel “Volcanoes” of 20 mm caliber. Crew: 13 people. Max. speed of 480 km / h.

At the sight of the attacking Spectrum, Jung and Freud would embrace as brothers and cry with happiness. National American fun - shooting Papuans from cannons from a flying airplane (the so-called "ganship" - cannon ship). The sleep of reason gives rise to monsters.
The idea of \u200b\u200b"ganship" is not new - attempts to install heavy weapons on an airplane were made during the Second World War. But only the Yankees guessed to mount a battery of several guns on board the S-130 Hercules military transport aircraft (an analogue of the Soviet An-12). At the same time, the trajectories of the fired shells are perpendicular to the course of the flying plane - the guns fire through the embrasures in the port side.

Alas, fun to shoot from a howitzer on cities and towns floating under the wing will not work. The work of the AC-130 is much more prosaic: goals (fortified points, accumulations of equipment, rebel villages) are selected in advance. When approaching the target, the ganship makes a turn and starts circling over the target with a constant roll to the port side, so that the projectile paths converge exactly at the “aiming point” on the ground. Automation helps in complex ballistic calculations. Ganship is equipped with the most modern sighting systems, thermal imagers and laser range finders.

Despite the apparent idiocy, the AS-130 Spectrum is a simple and ingenious solution for local conflicts of low intensity. The main thing is that the enemy’s air defense should have nothing more serious than MANPADS and heavy machine guns - otherwise, no heat traps and optoelectronic protection systems will save the ganship from fire from the ground.

Gunner's Workplace

Workplace charging

Henschel-129 twin-engine attack aircraft

Norm take-off weight: 4.3 tons. Small arms and cannon armament: 2 rifle machine guns, two 20 mm automatic guns with 125 rounds per barrel. Combat load: up to 200 kg of bombs, hanging cannon containers or other weapons. Crew: 1 pilot. Max. speed of 320 km / h.

The plane is so ugly that there is no way to show its real b / w image. Hs.129, artist's fantasy.

The disgusting heavenly low-speed boat Hs.129 was the loudest failure of the Third Reich aviation industry. Bad plane in every sense. Textbooks for cadets of flying schools of the Red Army speak of its insignificance: where whole chapters are devoted to “Messers” and “Junkers”, Hs.129 was awarded only a few general phrases: you can attack with impunity from all directions, except for an attack on the forehead. In short, knock it down as you want. Slow, clumsy, weak, and still blind, the German pilot saw nothing from his cockpit except a narrow section of the front hemisphere.

Serial production of an unsuccessful aircraft might have been curtailed before it could begin, but a meeting with tens of thousands of Soviet tanks forced the German command to take any possible measures to stop the T-34 and its countless "colleagues." As a result, the wretched attack aircraft, released in the amount of only 878 copies, went through the whole war. Marked on the Western Front, in Africa, on the Kursk Bulge ...

The Germans repeatedly tried to modernize the “flying coffin”, put an ejection seat on it (otherwise the pilot couldn’t escape from a cramped and uncomfortable cockpit), armed Henschel with 50 mm and 75 mm anti-tank guns - after such a “modernization” the aircraft could hardly stay in the air and somehow developed a speed of 250 km / h.
But the Forsterzond system was the most unusual - a plane equipped with a metal detector flew, almost clinging to the tops of trees. When the sensor was triggered, six shells of 45 mm caliber were fired into the lower hemisphere, capable of breaking through the roof of any tank.

The story of Hs.129 is a story of flying prowess. The Germans never complained about the poor quality of equipment and fought even on such wretched machines. At the same time, from time to time, they achieved some successes, on the account of the damned Henschel a lot of blood of Soviet soldiers

Armored attack aircraft Su-25 "Rook"

Norm take-off weight: 14.6 tons. Small arms and cannon armament: GSh-2-30 double-barreled cannon with ammunition of 250 shells. Combat load: 10 suspension points, up to 4 tons of bombs, unguided missiles, cannon containers and precision weapons. Crew: 1 pilot. Max. speed 950 km / h.

A symbol of the hot sky of Afghanistan, the Soviet subsonic attack aircraft with titanium armor (the total mass of armor plates reaches 600 kg).
The idea of \u200b\u200ba subsonic high-security strike machine was born as a result of the analysis of the combat use of aircraft on ground targets at the Dnepr exercises in September 1967: each time, the best results were demonstrated by the subsonic MiG-17. An outdated aircraft, in contrast to the supersonic fighter-bombers Su-7 and Su-17, confidently found and aimedly hit point-based ground targets.

As a result, the Rook was born, a specialized Su-25 attack aircraft with an extremely simple and tenacious design. An unpretentious “soldier aircraft” capable of operating on operational challenges of the ground forces in the face of strong opposition from the enemy’s front-line air defense.

A significant role in the design of the Su-25 was played by the “captured” F-5 Tiger and A-37 Dragonfly, who arrived in the Soviet Union from Vietnam. By that time, the Americans had already "tasted" all the charms of a counterguerrilla war in the absence of a clear front line. In the design of the light dragonfly, the Dragonfly, all the accumulated combat experience was embodied, fortunately bought not by our blood.

As a result, by the beginning of the Afghan war, the Su-25 was the only aircraft of the Soviet Air Force, maximally adapted to such "non-standard" conflicts. In addition to Afghanistan, due to its cheapness and ease of operation, the Grach attack aircraft was noted in a couple of dozens of armed conflicts and civil wars around the world.

The best confirmation of the effectiveness of the Su-25 - the Rook has not been off the assembly line for thirty years, in addition to the basic, export and combat training versions, a number of new modifications have appeared: the Su-39 anti-tank attack aircraft, the Su-25UTG carrier-based aircraft, and the modernized Su-25SM with glass cabin ”and even the Georgian modification“ Scorpio ”with foreign avionics and sighting and navigation systems of Israeli production.

The assembly of the Su-25 "Scorpion" at the Georgian aircraft plant "Tbilaviamsheni"

Multipurpose fighter P-47 Thunderbolt

Norm take-off weight: 6 tons. Small arms: eight 50-caliber machine guns with 425 rounds of ammunition per barrel. Combat load: 10 suspension points for 127 mm unguided rockets, up to 1000 kg of bombs. Crew: 1 pilot. Max. speed of 700 km / h.

The legendary predecessor of the modern A-10 attack aircraft, designed by Georgian aircraft designer Alexander Kartvelishvili. It is considered one of the best fighters of World War II. The luxurious equipment of the cockpit, exceptional survivability and security, powerful weapons, a flight range of 3,700 km (from Moscow to Berlin and vice versa!), A turbocharger that allowed a heavy aircraft to fight at sky-high heights.
All this is achieved thanks to the appearance of the Pratt & Whitney R2800 engine - an incredible 18-cylinder “star” air-cooled 2400 hp engine.

But what does an escort high-altitude fighter do on our list of top attack aircraft? The answer is simple - the combat load of the Thunderbolt was comparable to the combat load of two Il-2 attack aircraft. Plus eight large-caliber "Browning" with a total ammunition of 3400 rounds - any unarmored target will turn into a sieve! And for the destruction of heavy armored vehicles under the wing of the Thunderbolt, 10 unguided missiles with cumulative warheads could be suspended.

As a result, the P-47 fighter was successfully used on the Western Front as an attack aircraft. The last thing many German tankers saw in their lives was a silvery blunt log diving at them, spewing out streams of deadly fire.

P-47D Thunderbolt. In the background B-29 Enola Gay, US National Air and Space Museum

Armored Il-2 attack aircraft vs Junkers-87 dive bomber

An attempt to compare Ju.87 with an IL-2 attack aircraft meets with fierce objections every time: how dare you! these are different planes: one attacks the target in a steep dive, the second attacks the target from a low-level flight.
But these are just technical details. In fact, both machines are “battlefield planes” designed to directly support the ground forces. They have common tasks and ONE mission. But which of the attack methods is more effective is to find out.

Junkers-87 "Piece". Norm take-off weight: 4.5 tons. Small arms and cannon armament: 3 machine guns of 7.92 mm caliber. Bomb load: could reach 1 ton, but usually did not exceed 250 kg. Crew: 2 people. Max. speed 390 km / h (in horizontal flight, of course).

In September 1941, 12 Ju. 87 were released. By November 1941, the production of the “lappeter” was practically discontinued - a total of 2 aircraft were produced. By the beginning of 1942, the production of dive bombers again resumed - in just the next six months, the Germans built about 700 Ju.87. It is simply amazing how the “lapper”, produced in such insignificant quantities, was able to do so many troubles!

The tabular characteristics of Ju.87 are also surprising - the plane is morally obsolete 10 years before its appearance, what kind of combat use can we talk about ?! But, the tables do not indicate the main thing - a very strong, rigid structure and brake aerodynamic grilles, which allowed the “lappethnik” to dive almost steeply at the target. At the same time, Ju.87 could GUARANTEED “put” the bomb in a circle with a radius of 30 meters! At the exit from the steep peak, the Ju.87's speed exceeded 600 km / h - it was extremely difficult for Soviet anti-aircraft gunners to get into such a fast target, constantly changing its speed and altitude. Barrage anti-aircraft fire was also ineffective - a diving “raptor” could at any time change the slope of its trajectory and leave the affected area.
However, despite all its unique qualities, Ju.87's high efficiency was due to completely different, much deeper reasons.

IL-2 attack aircraft: normal. take-off weight of 6 tons. Small arms and cannon armament: 2 VYA-23 automatic cannons of 23 mm caliber with 150 rounds of ammunition per barrel; 2 ShKAS machine guns with ammunition 750 rounds per barrel; 1 Berezin heavy machine gun for protecting the rear hemisphere, 150 rounds of ammunition. The combat load is up to 600 kg of bombs or 8 unguided rockets of the RS-82, in reality the bomb load usually did not exceed 400 kg. Crew 2 people. Max. speed 414 km / h

“He doesn’t break into a corkscrew, flies steadily in a straight line, even with the control abandoned, sits himself. Simple as a stool "

- opinion of pilots IL-2

The most massive aircraft in the history of military aviation, “flying tank”, “concrete plane” or simply “Schwarzer Tod” (incorrect, literal translation - “black death”, correct translation - “plague”). A revolutionary car for its time: stamped armor panels of double curvature, fully integrated into the design of the attack aircraft; rockets; powerful cannon weapons ...

In total, during the war years, 36 thousand IL-2 aircraft were produced (plus about another thousand modernized IL-10 attack aircraft in the first half of 1945). The number of issued Ilov exceeded the number of all German tanks and self-propelled guns available on the Eastern Front - if each Il-2 destroyed at least one unit of enemy armored vehicles, the Panzerwaffe steel wedges would simply cease to exist!

Many questions are related to the attacker's invulnerability. The harsh reality confirms: heavy booking and aviation are incompatible things. Shells of the German automatic gun MG 151/20 pierced the IL-2 armored car through and through. The wing consoles and the tail of the Sturmovik's fuselage were generally made of plywood and had no reservation - the anti-aircraft machine gun queue simply “chopped off” the wing or tail from the armored car with pilots.

The meaning of the “reservation” of the Sturmovik was different - at extremely low altitudes, the likelihood of German infantry shooting with small arms increased sharply. This is where the IL-2 armored cab came in handy - it perfectly “held” rifle-sized bullets, and as for the plywood wing consoles, small-caliber bullets could not harm them - Ily safely returned to the airfield, having several hundred bullet holes.

And yet, the statistics of the combat use of IL-2 are bleak: 10,759 aircraft of this type were lost in combat sorties (excluding non-combat accidents, catastrophes, and decommissioning for technical reasons). With Sturmovik’s weapons, everything was not so simple either:

When firing from a VYA-23 cannon with a total consumption of 435 rounds in 6 sorties, pilots of the 245th ShAP received 46 hits in the tank convoy (10.6%), of which only 16 hit the aiming point tank (3.7%).

- Report on the tests of IL-2 at the Air Force Research Institute of Arms

Without any opposition from the enemy, in ideal training conditions for a predetermined target! Moreover, shooting from a gentle dive had a bad effect on armor penetration: the shells simply ricocheted off the armor - in no case was it possible to break through the armor of enemy medium tanks.

The bomb attack left even less chances: when 4 bombs were dropped from a horizontal flight from a height of 50 meters, the probability of at least one bomb falling into a 20 × 100 m strip (a section of a wide highway or the position of an artillery battery) was only 8%! Approximately the same figure expressed the accuracy of firing rockets.

White phosphorus proved to be not bad, however, the high requirements for its storage made it impossible for its mass use in combat conditions. But the most interesting story is related to the cumulative anti-tank bombs (PTAB), weighing 1.5-2.5 kg - the attack aircraft could take on board up to 196 of such ammunition in each sortie. In the early days of the Kursk Bulge, the effect was overwhelming: the attack aircraft "carried out" by the PTABs 6-8 fascist tanks in one run, in order to avoid complete defeat, the Germans had to urgently change the order of construction of the tanks. Nevertheless, the real effectiveness of these weapons is often questioned: during the war years 12 million PTABs were manufactured: if at least 10% of this amount would have been used in battle, and of which 3% of the bombs hit the target, nothing would have come from the Wehrmacht’s armored forces not left.

As practice shows, the main objectives of the Sturmoviks were not tanks, but German infantry, firing points and artillery batteries, accumulations of equipment, railway stations and warehouses in the front-line zone. The contribution of the Sturmoviks to the victory over fascism is invaluable.

So, before us are the seven best aircraft for direct support of ground forces. Each "superhero" has its own unique story and its own unique "secret of success." As you may have noticed, they all do not have high flight characteristics, rather, on the contrary, they are all as one clumsy, slow-moving “irons” with imperfect aerodynamics, given to the mercy of increased survivability and armament. So what is the meaning of these aircraft?

A 152 mm D-20 howitzer gun is towed by a ZIL-375 truck at a maximum speed of 60 km / h. The attack aircraft "Rook" flies in the sky at a speed of 15 times faster. This circumstance allows the plane to arrive in a matter of minutes on the desired section of the front line and pour a hail of powerful ammunition on the enemy’s head. Artillery, alas, does not have such capabilities for operational maneuver.

From this follows a straightforward conclusion: the effectiveness of the “battlefield aviation” primarily depends on the competent interaction between the ground forces and the Air Force. Quality, communication, organization, proper tactics, competent actions of commanders, air traffic controllers, spotters. If everything is done correctly, aviation will bring victory on its wings. Violation of these conditions will inevitably cause a "friendly fire".

The merits of Soviet attack aircraft in World War II were so great that, it seemed, this type of aircraft should have been prescribed in the domestic armed forces for decades. However, interest in him disappeared almost immediately after the end of hostilities.

Alexander Grek

The defeat of attack aircraft

Short-term interest in attack aircraft reappeared at the very beginning of the 1950s, under the impression of the successful use of IL-10 by Chinese and North Korean pilots in Southeast Asia. In October 1950, the Air Force Commander-in-Chief Marshal Zhigarev even turned to Ilyushin with a letter in which he proposed to consider the issue of resuming the serial production of the Il-10M attack aircraft as a combat aircraft of direct support to troops that "have not yet lost their combat capabilities." The request did not go unnoticed - the issue was resumed, and during 1952−1954, plant number 168 produced 136 copies of the Il-10M (which were decommissioned only two years later!).

Despite the cool attitude of the military towards attack aircraft, Ilyushin himself remained faithful to them until the end, without stopping developing new machines. For example, in 1950 his design bureau began developing the world's first jet twin-engine twin-seat armored attack aircraft Il-40 with powerful artillery, missile and bomb weapons. The first IL-40 took off in March 1953. True, the further fate of this aircraft is sad.

The absence of a light attack aircraft in the Vietnam War (1961−1973) led the Americans to the forced conversion of 39 Cessna T-37B civilians to the A-37A Dragonfly with a significantly strengthened structure, protection for the crew, increased internal fuel supply provided by the built-in tanks.

In April 1956, Defense Minister Marshal Georgy Zhukov presented to the country's leadership a report prepared by the General Staff and the General Staff of the Air Force on the status and development prospects of attack aircraft. The report concluded that attack aircraft on the battlefield were not very effective in modern warfare, and in fact it was proposed to liquidate assault aircraft, providing a solution to combat missions of direct aviation support for ground troops in offensive and defense by bomber and fighter aircraft. As a result, an order was issued by the Minister of Defense, according to which attack aircraft were abolished, and all available IL-10 and IL-10M (no less than 1,700 aircraft!) Were written off. In parallel with the acceleration of ground attack aircraft, the serial production of the IL-40 rocket armored ground attack aircraft was stopped and all pilot work on promising ground attack aircraft was stopped.

Why was this needed? The fact is that with the advent of nuclear weapons the concept of “remote” wars triumphed. It was believed that ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads could win a future war. Moreover, seriously considered options for the complete elimination of combat aircraft.

The only attack aircraft in the world comparable to the Su-25. He entered the U.S. Army in the mid-1970s. Strong emphasis on the famous heavy-duty 30-mm gun GAU-8 / A has not justified itself - uncontrolled bombs and missiles became the main weapons of the attack aircraft. This is one of the most popular attack aircraft of our time - more than 715 pieces were produced.

Vietnam

Note that attack aircraft as a class disappeared not only in the USSR, but throughout the world. The Americans were the first to realize the mistake - Vietnam helped. The multi-purpose supersonic F-4 Phantom II and F-105 Thunderchief could not cope with the task of directly supporting the ground forces, as, however, the light attack aircraft A-1, A-4 and A-6, whose low survivability did not allow them to work at low heights. As a result, the specialists of the Navy and the US Air Force in the field themselves modified the planes as best they could, protecting them. The most interesting “home-made” was the legendary Vietnamese attack aircraft A-37 Dragonfly, remade from the Cessna T-37 training aircraft. The cabin was covered with Kevlar mats from the inside, and soft fuel tanks filled with polyurethane foam and suspension components for weapons under the wings were installed. The most amazing thing is that the unit of these "homemade" attack aircraft, having made several thousand sorties, did not lose a single aircraft!

In March 1967, the US Air Force sent out demands for a promising aircraft to directly support troops on the battlefield of 21 aircraft manufacturing companies. Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II, the winning attack aircraft, was one of the most amazing aircraft of the second half of the 20th century. Built around the specially created heavy-duty 30-mm seven-barreled gun GAU-8 / A, resembling a huge flying cross, with two barrels of turbojet engines on short pylons on the sides of the rear of the fuselage, with fancy spaced vertical plumage, with rough, “chopped” shapes, the plane It turned out to be extremely technological and ideal for its only task - the direct support of troops over the battlefield. And since February 1975, the US Air Force began to receive serial attack aircraft, which have no analogues in any country in the world. On that moment.

The IL-102 pilot aircraft built in 1982 was a further development of the IL-40 attack aircraft. In fact, this is the IL-42, the loser of the Su-25 contest. In 1984, the plane flew to the airfield LII MAP in Zhukovsky, where it was put on conservation. IL-102 could lift up to 7 tons of bomb load at 8 nodes of the suspension.

Illegal plane

The successes (or failures) of American aviation in Vietnam were closely monitored in the USSR. And if the leadership of the country's air force still continued to believe that each new aircraft should fly “faster, higher and further,” some aircraft designers were of a different opinion. After analyzing the experience of post-war conflicts, Oleg Samoilovich, deputy head of the general types brigade of the Kulon Design Bureau (now the Sukhoi Design Bureau), at his own risk, began to work out a promising battlefield aircraft designed to destroy targets when they were visually detected. The development of the aerodynamic scheme and layout of the future aircraft was entrusted to the leading designer of the general brigade Yuri Ivashechkin.

It was decided to create a small aircraft (smaller - harder to get) of a fairly simple design using non-deficient materials, easy to pilot, with the ability to base on unpaved airfields and protect the crew from armor-piercing bullets up to 12.7 mm and rocket fragments up to 3 g. The difference between the future Su-25 and the American A-10 was that the main weapon of the American attack aircraft was to be a unique gun, and the Su-25 was designed with emphasis on the use of primarily unguided weapons - OMB and missiles, as told to our magazine Yuri Ivashechkin. The choice, by the way, is very logical: almost all the tanks destroyed in WWII by IL-2 attack aircraft were hit either by small cumulative bombs or rockets. Disabling German tanks from an aircraft gun are isolated cases.

Su-25 is equipped with 10 external suspension units located under the wing. Two wings closest to the wingtips are designed for air-to-air guided missiles, and on the remaining eight nodes, with a load of 500 kg each, various offensive weapons can be mounted: bomber (8 bombs of various purposes of 500, 250 or 100 kg calibres, or 32 100 kg caliber bombs on MBD2−67U beam holders, 8 KMGU-2 containers for mining, 8 RBK-250 or RBK-500 bomb cartridges), unguided missile (256 unguided missile (NAR) S-5 caliber 57 mm, 160 NAR type S-8 caliber 80 mm, 40 NAR type S-13 caliber 122 mm, 8 ON S-25 type caliber 266 mm or 8 NAR type S-25 caliber 240 mm), guided missile (2 air-to-air missiles R-60 or R-60M on external pylons, "air-to-surface" - 4 X- missiles 25ML, 4 S-25L missiles, 2 X-29L missiles with semi-active laser guidance heads or 4 X-25MTP missiles with a thermal homing head).

After numerous sketches, the scheme of a single-seat monoplane with a highly located wing of low sweep and large elongation was chosen. The engines were located in individual gondolas on the sides of the fuselage, which served as fire and splinter baffles, which excluded the possibility of their simultaneous defeat. The aircraft was designed as simple and easy to maintain as possible, such as a flying Kalashnikov assault rifle, recalls Yuri Ivashechkin. The suspension level of air bombs and missiles was just at the chest level of the average person, which made it possible to manually suspend weapons if necessary. Engine hoods easily opened from the ground, allowing instant access to them (try getting to the engines on the A-10!). Even a folding stepladder was built-in for the pilot to independently exit the cockpit - an unprecedented luxury in modern combat aviation. The protruding cockpit formed a characteristic “hunchback” profile of the aircraft - thanks to its location, the pilot received a forward, downward and sideways view, similar to that not found in any of the existing Soviet aircraft.

Competition

In May 1968, the project reached a certain degree of readiness and Samoilovich with Ivashechkin reported it to General Designer Pavel Sukhoi. Sukhoi liked the plane, and he gave the green light to the continuation of development, which received the T-8 factory index. Application documents for the new aircraft were sent to the Ministry of Aviation Industry, the Air Force Civil Code, the Scientific and Technical Committee of the General Staff, the Navy Commander-in-Chief and TsAGI. Designers began to wait for a reaction.

The NTK of the General Staff was the first to respond: a concise answer fit on one page of typewritten text - we do not need such an aircraft. The Air Force Research Institute sent a cautious conclusion, while the rest ignored the project. Nevertheless, Sukhoi, at his own peril and risk, instructed to continue the development of the T-8.

The results of the Dnepr large-scale maneuvers in Belarus in the autumn of 1967 gave hope, when the supersonic Su-7B and MiG-21 aircraft with the support of the ground forces proved to be much worse than the obsolete transonic MiG-17, the only aircraft that managed to reach the first approach target, recognize and destroy it.

Meanwhile, an analysis of the Vietnamese events, albeit belatedly, reached the military leadership of the USSR. In early 1969, USSR Minister of Defense Andrei Grechko ordered the Minister of Aviation Industry to hold a light attack aircraft (LSS) competition, and in March four design bureaus - Ilyushin, Mikoyan, Sukhoi and Yakovlev - received requirements for a new aircraft. By the appointed date, Sukhoi Design Bureau had not only an advance project, but also a full-size model of the aircraft, which immediately brought the company to the lead. Mikoyan’s design bureau presented the MiG-21LSh project, created on the basis of the MiG-21, Yakovlev’s design bureau - the Yak-28LSH, and Ilyushin’s design bureau - the Il-42, based on the already experienced IL-40 attack aircraft. The Air Force rejected the proposals of Yakovlev and Ilyushin, suggesting that Sukhoi and Mikoyan build flying models.

Over time, the military's appetites began to grow. By mid-1971, they demanded to increase ground speed to 1,200 km / h (initially 800 km / h) and a combat load of up to 1.5 tons (1 ton). All this led to a complication of the aircraft and an increase in its size. Sukhoi especially resisted an increase in maximum speed - 1200 km / h was still not allowed to escape from fighters, but greatly complicated the design of the entire aircraft. As a result, a compromise of 1000 km / h was reached, and by November 1971 Sukhoi Design Bureau was declared the winner.

Train departure

Most American and Soviet aircraft that solve the same problems are quite similar in appearance: F-15 and MiG-25, B-1 and Ty-160, etc. However, there is almost nothing in common between the A-10 and Su-25 . The thing is that they were created in complete isolation from each other - American and Soviet aircraft designers did not know anything about the work of competitors. The first materials on the American A-10 became available to Sukhoi designers only in 1971. Immediately after this, Yuri Ivashechkin sketched out several layout options that resembled an American attack aircraft. He explained to us that they did not give any fundamental advantages, moreover, it was too late to change anything. Samoilovich, who looked at the sketches, snapped: “Late. Train has already left!"

Despite the preservation of the original layout, the designed Su-25 was very different from the original T-8: the contours and layout were completely changed, the combat load was increased (from 1000 to 1660 kg) and the fuel supply. All this led to an increase in take-off weight (from 8340 to 10 530 kg) and the physical size of the aircraft (length from 12.54 to 13.7 m, wing area from 21 to 28 m 2).

Special problems arose with the reservation. The contours of the head were formed by straight planes, so most of the armored plates of the cockpit could be made flat, which simplified the production technology. As a reservation, a “sandwich” of KVK-37D steel alloy plates was originally planned, which held the explosive charge of the warhead well, but poorly - bullets and fragments, and a layer of ABO-70 alloy, resistant to bullets and fragments, but not to HEs. Between the plates, a rubber cushioning layer was provided. However, such a “sandwich” was not amenable to welding, and the assembly on bolts significantly weighted and increased the design of the cabin. The way out was the use of a special titanium alloy ABVT-20, specially designed for the Su-25. In addition to the possibility of creating a monolithic welded cockpit, titanium armor allowed to reduce the total weight of armor protection. By the way, as it turned out later, American designers of the A-10 came to titanium armor.

In general, the aircraft was very technological. Petr Dementyev, Minister of Aviation Industry, who visited the pilot production in 1972, praised the technological simplicity of an almost finished machine on a slipway: “Such‘ humpbacked horses ”, in which case ten pieces a day can be riveted!”

Into the sky!

For the first time, the T-8−1, the future Su-25, took off on February 22, 1975. He was piloted by the chief pilot of the Sukhoi Hero Design Bureau of the Soviet Union Vladimir Ilyushin, the son of the legendary aircraft designer. The whole year he spent on working out the aircraft. Like the Americans, the designers were faced with the problem of engine surging when firing large-caliber unguided rockets and simultaneously firing from the built-in cannon and four suspended cannon containers SPPU-22. Like the Americans, they coped with the problems.

In November 1975, the aircraft was shown to the Minister of Defense Andrei Grechko, who for the first time directly asked the question: “Will the Su-25 be able to hit the new American tank M1A1 Abrams?” - to which he received an honest answer: "Maybe, but with a very low probability." To perform this task, a specialized set of powerful guided weapons was required. After analyzing the problem, it was decided to create a specialized aircraft for fighting tanks, which subsequently led to the appearance of the Su-25T, armed with supersonic Vortex missiles.

Another problem of the future Su-25 was serial plants. Nobody wanted to take into production a prestigious attack aircraft. These are strategic bombers or, at worst, strike fighters - yes! A stormtrooper - a lot of trouble, but little money. And only in 1977 it was possible to "register" the plane at the Tbilisi Aviation Plant named after Dimitrova. Moreover, there was a chance to completely lose this aircraft: at the same time, the first secretary of the Communist Party of Poland Edward Gierek turned to Brezhnev to transfer the license to produce the aircraft at the Polish aircraft factory in the city of Mielec.

Rhombus

Little by little, the Tbilisi plant began to develop Su-25 production, releasing a couple a year. The aircraft entered the protracted state tests. In March 1980, on the personal instructions of the Minister of Defense Dmitry Ustinov, it was decided to conduct tests in "special conditions" - in the real combat zone in the Republic of Afghanistan. For this trip, Sukhoi Design Bureau was promised to set off all the remaining tests. Together with two T-8s (future Su-25s), six Yak-38M vertical take-off and landing planes were sent to Afghanistan, which were supposed to test the concept of creating airmobile troops. The test program was called "Rhombus". Post-war history did not know anything like this before.

The aircraft’s artillery armament is one integrated VPU-17A cannon mount with a 30 mm caliber GSh-30 cannon. The ammunition of the installation is 250 shells, rate of fire - 3000 rounds per minute.

The test base was the Shindand airdrome, where in April 1980 the planes were relocated. At first, firing and bombing were carried out at an improvised training ground 9 km from the airfield. But at the very beginning of May, the 9th motorized rifle division began the Farakh operation, during which it came across a fortified area in a narrow mountain gorge. Even at the entrance to the gorge, two infantry fighting vehicles exploded on mines, and the infantry was met by heavy fire. At each fracture of the gorge there were powerful bunkers armed with heavy machine guns, which made it almost impossible to use attack helicopters. It was decided to use a pair of Su-25, which worked in the gorge for three days, making 3-4 combat sorties a day, using unguided rockets, high-explosive and concrete-piercing shells. But the main weapon was the “hundredths” - AB-100 hundred-kilogram bombs; 32 "sotochki" were located on eight underwing nodes of the suspension. Airplanes entered the gorge from the rear, “dived” from the top of the mountain and moved towards our units, not giving the Mujahideen time to deploy large-caliber machine guns. After the work of the attack aircraft, the infantry entered the gorge without a single shot and losses.

As Ivashechkin recalled, after the operation, the gunsmiths decided to simulate the operation of the AB-100, blowing up an equivalent explosive charge in the gorge. After the explosion, the participants in the test for three days could not recover - the acoustic impact alone was shocking. But what the Dushmans felt in the gorge, on which these bombs continuously fell for three days, causing, among other things, severe screes, no one could imagine. After the Farah operation, the Su-25s began to be actively involved in other military operations. Soon they won the affectionate nickname "scallops" from the infantry. In early June 1980, Operation Rhombus was successfully completed, the test program was completed, and the Su-25 pair returned safely to the Union. And in May 1981, the first batch of 12 serial Su-25s entered service with the 200th Separate Attack Aviation Squadron (200th OSHAE). Exactly a quarter of a century later, attack aircraft revived in Russia.

The aircraft can carry four additional cannon mounts SPPU-22−1 with a GSh-23 gun or SPPU-687 with a GSh-301 gun on external sling.

Work with a spark

Almost immediately after receiving new aircraft, the 200th OSHAE was urgently relocated to Afghanistan at the already familiar Shindand airfield - the military really liked the resulting aircraft. On July 19, 1981, the first Su-25 landed on the airfield, and on July 25, the assault squadron began to take an active part in the large-scale operation in the Luarcoch mountain range. After many days of treating the massif with "scallops", the enemy completely left the area, having suffered heavy losses. A little later, the Su-25 appeared in the area of \u200b\u200bHerat, and by autumn - in the south of Afghanistan in the region of the country's second largest city - Kandahar. The attack aircraft by this time had a second nickname - “rooks”.

In just a year, the 200th Squadron completed more than 2,000 sorties without losing a single vehicle. The most effective weapons were the 80-mm S-8 missiles, especially in the S-8D variant with a volume-detonating warhead. Cluster bombs and incendiary tanks were also used. The most powerful effect was possessed by volume detonating bombs ODAB-500, which have terrifying power. They were used for serious purposes.

By 1983, the tactics of using new aircraft also developed. As a rule, the Su-25 began firing, performing the first approach to the target, after which the Mi-24 appeared, pinpointing the remaining centers of resistance. The Su-25s learned to work even at night - the first attack aircraft dropped the luminous aviation bombs of the SAB, in the light of which, as in a football stadium, the next link of the "rooks" began its terrible work. They mastered the Su-25 and the profession of miners by mining caravan routes from a height of 300-500 m at a speed of 700 km / h from KMG containers; in 1984-1985 they completed 80% of all mine installations. Due to the efficiency and versatility of the Su-25, they quickly became the most popular aircraft in Afghanistan, their pilots had the largest flying time compared to pilots of other types of aircraft. Not a single operation was complete without attack aircraft, and the geography of basing was constantly expanding: Bagram, Kandahar, Kabul, Kunduz, Mazar-e-Sharif.

Wingspan: 14.36 m // Length: 15.53 m Wing area: 30.1 m 2 // Maximum take-off weight: 17600 kg // Normal take-off weight: 14600 kg // Combat load: maximum 4400 kg, normal 1400 kg // Mass of fuel in internal tanks: 3000 kg // Maximum speed with normal combat load: 950 km / h // Ceiling: 7000 m (cabin is leaky) // Flight range with normal combat load without PTB: 495 km (near the ground ), 640 km (at altitude) // Engines: two Р95Ш with a thrust of 4100 kgf each.

By the fall of 1985, dushmans began to actively use portable anti-aircraft systems, and the number of losses among aircraft began to grow. The most damage was done by the American Red Eye MANPADS. To counter them on airplanes, the number of infrared traps being shot was sharply increased, bringing their shooting to the military trigger. Now, after exiting the attack, the traps automatically shot off the aircraft for 16 seconds - this was enough to go to a safe 5 km.

At the end of 1986, the Dushmans had more advanced Stinger MANPADS with a dual-band homing head, from which the Su-25 suffered the greatest losses. They could not find an effective "antidote" against the "Stingers", but they managed to reduce the losses by fundamentally improving the fire extinguishing system - after the hit, a significant number of aircraft began to get to the airfields. In 1989, the Su-25s left Afghanistan last, covering up the withdrawal of Soviet troops. For the entire time of the Afghan war, 23 attack aircraft were lost in the air. On average, one lost plane accounted for 2600 sorties. These are very good indicators.

Subsequently, the Su-25 took part in almost all conflicts involving Soviet weapons: in the Iran-Iraq war of 1987-1989, where they performed up to 1100 (!) Sorties per day, in Angola, in the conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea, in the Karabakh conflict, in the Georgian-Abkhaz war, in Tajikistan and, of course, in Chechnya. And everywhere these planes deserve only excellent reviews.

Modifications

There was (and is) a huge number of modifications of the legendary aircraft. Let us dwell only on the most important ones. Since 1986, the production of the “twin” Su-25UB, a combat training two-seater aircraft, began at the plant in Ulan-Ude. Apart from the addition of a second pilot's seat, the aircraft is almost completely identical to the classic attack aircraft and can be used both for training and for military operations. The most modern modification of the Su-25SM serial attack aircraft differs from the “primary source” in a more modern complex of avionics. The project of the carrier-based attack aircraft with a catapult take-off Su-25K did not go beyond the project stage (due to the absence of Russian aircraft carriers with catapults), but several carrier-based training aircraft Su-25UTG designed to be based on the aircraft carrier cruiser Admiral of the Kuznetsov fleet were released with a springboard take-off. The plane turned out to be so successful that it serves as the main training aircraft for training pilots on deck aviation.

Su-25 is very versatile and can carry various types of bomb weapons: high-explosive, high-explosive, concrete-breaking, lighting, photographic, incendiary bombs and tanks. Normal combat load of the aircraft is 1400 kg, maximum - 4400 kg.

But the most interesting and complex modification is the Su-25T anti-tank aircraft, the decision to create which was made back in 1975. The main problem in the development of this aircraft was the creation of airborne electronic equipment (avionics) for the detection, tracking and guidance of missiles at armored targets. The aircraft was based on the glider of a two-seat training aircraft Su-25UB, all the space reserved for the second pilot, took a new avionics. I also had to take the cannon into the cockpit compartment, expand and extend the bow, where the Flurry daytime optical sighting system was located to control the firing of the Whirlwind supersonic missiles. Despite a significant increase in internal volume, there was no place for a thermal imaging system in the new machine. Therefore, the Mercury night vision system was mounted in a hanging container under the fuselage at the sixth point of the suspension (by the way, the problem was similarly solved with the A-10). The anti-tank attack aircraft did not manage to win the laurels of his older brother Su-25 - he did not participate in anti-tank battles in Russia, and was not exported. Nevertheless, the extraordinary aircraft was emphasized by the name Su-34 (in honor of the legendary T-34 tank), which the car wore for some time. Later it was given to another plane. The most advanced modification of the Su-25 is now called the Su-25TM (sometimes the Su-39, under this name the aircraft can be exported). It is characterized by perfect on-board electronics, which allows you to effectively hit point targets in any weather.

In full bloom

As Yuri Ivashechkin told us goodbye, the Su-25 can remain in service for a long time - it’s far from obsolescence. The only thing that needs to be replaced periodically is the on-board electronics: the equipment is rapidly becoming obsolete, as technological progress in this area is developing by leaps and bounds. And on our own, we note that, despite the plain appearance and small size, the Su-25 is indeed the greatest modern Russian combat aircraft. And this will be confirmed to you by everyone who fought and who had occasion to see this hard worker at work, and not just at the demonstration fields of aviation exhibitions.

In preparing the article, Ildar Bedretdinov’s book, Su-25 Attack Aircraft and Its Modifications, was actively used, M., 2002

Anti-tank attack aircraft A-10 Thunderbolt II (Thunderbolt)

Aircraft fire support AS-130 "Spectrum"

Norm take-off weight: 60 tons. Small arms: 105 mm howitzer, 40 mm automatic cannon, two 6-barrel “Volcanoes” of 20 mm caliber. Crew: 13 people. Max. speed of 480 km / h.

Gunner's Workplace

Workplace charging

Henschel-129 twin-engine attack aircraft

The plane is so ugly that there is no way to show its real b / w image. Hs.129, artist's fantasy.

Armored attack aircraft Su-25 "Rook"

The assembly of the Su-25 "Scorpion" at the Georgian aircraft plant "Tbilaviamsheni"

Multipurpose fighter P-47 Thunderbolt

P-47D Thunderbolt. In the background B-29 Enola Gay, US National Air and Space Museum

Armored Il-2 attack aircraft vs Junkers-87 dive bomber

“He doesn’t break into a corkscrew, flies steadily in a straight line, even with the control abandoned, sits himself. Simple as a stool "

- opinion of pilots IL-2

- Report on the tests of IL-2 at the Air Force Research Institute of Arms

Even in the current times of the general infatuation with helicopters of fire support for troops, ground commanders from all over the world dream with dreary hopelessness of a battlefield airplane. Although the helicopter element, like a jet from a rotor of a helicopter, enchantingly twisted the concepts of military theorists about the participation of aviation in combat clashes of ordinary infantry, airborne paratroopers and marines with the enemy, but the thoughts about battlefield planes, which should be at the immediate disposal of the commander on the battlefield - battalion commander, brigade commander or commander - periodically arise at various meetings of ground commanders of all degrees. Peter Khomutovsky discusses all this.

The idea of \u200b\u200ba battlefield aircraft or an aircraft of direct combat aviation support of ground forces on the battlefield, capable of inflicting fire damage to enemy personnel and military equipment to effectively carry out combat missions by their forces, began to interest infantry and cavalry commanders with the advent of aviation.

In the First and Second World Wars, aviation was widely used not only for confrontation with the enemy in the air, but also for the destruction of enemy manpower and military equipment on the ground. Numerous types of aircraft appeared, which were used with varying success both for air battles and for fire support of troops.

Moreover, already in the first period of World War I, Russian armies suffered significant losses not from machine-gun fire from German airplanes, but from ordinary iron arrows, which drove German pilots from high altitude to an accumulation of infantry or cavalry.

In World War II, aviation became not only the main means of struggle for gaining dominance over the battlefield in the tactical depth of defense, but also an effective means of intimidating the population, destroying industry and disrupting communications in the operational and strategic depths of the enemy’s country.

The few war veterans who have survived to this day remember the sky of June 1941, when enemy aircraft dominated in it - Junkers Ju-87 aircraft and other German aircraft were especially effective then.

In that terrible summer of 1941, the Red Army had one question: where is our aircraft? Probably, the soldiers of Saddam Hussein felt the same in two Iraqi campaigns, when all types of US aircraft hung from them, from deck aircraft to fire support helicopters, since then the situation was characterized by the almost complete absence of Iraqi aircraft in the air.

To achieve superiority of infantry over the enemy in ground battles, a type of combat aircraft such as attack aircraft was established. The appearance of the Soviet attack aircraft over the battlefield took the German command by surprise and showed the terrifying combat effectiveness of the Il-2 attack aircraft, which was nicknamed the Wehrmacht soldiers - "black death".

This aircraft fire support of the troops was armed with the whole range of then available in aviation weapons - machine gun and cannon, bomb and even missile shells. Destruction of tanks and motorized infantry was carried out with all the on-board weapons of the Il-2 attack aircraft, the composition and power of which turned out to be extremely well-chosen.

Enemy tanks had little chance of surviving an aerial attack with missile shells, cannon fire and bombing. The tactics of sorties for attacking ground troops of the enemy from the first days of the war showed that pilots of the IL-2 attack aircraft, when successfully reaching the target on a low-level flight, hit all types of tanks and manpower with an on-board set of missile shells.

According to the reports of the pilots, it was possible to conclude that the effect of missile shells is effective not only with a direct hit in the tank, but also has a demoralizing effect on the enemy. The IL-2 attack aircraft was one of the most popular aircraft, the release of which was one of the main tasks of the Soviet aircraft industry during the war years.

However, although the achievements of Soviet attack aircraft in the Great Patriotic War were huge, they did not develop in the post-war period, since in April 1956 the Minister of Defense, Marshal Zhukov, presented to the then leadership of the country, prepared by the General Staff and the General Staff of the Air Force, a report on the low the effectiveness of attack aircraft on the battlefield in modern warfare, and it was suggested that attack aircraft be eliminated.

As a result of this order of the Minister of Defense, the attack aircraft was abolished, and all the Il-2, Il-10 and Il-10Ms in service - about 1700 attack aircraft in total - were scrapped. Soviet attack aircraft ceased to exist; Incidentally, at that time the question of the elimination of bomber and part of fighter aircraft and the abolition of the Air Force as a type of Armed Forces was seriously raised.

The solution of combat missions for direct air support of ground troops in the offensive and defense was supposed to provide the forces of the developed fighter-bomber.

After the resignation of Zhukov and the change of priorities of the military confrontation in the Cold War, the high command of the Soviet armed forces came to the conclusion that the accuracy of hitting ground targets with missile and bomb weapons from supersonic fighter-bombers is not high enough.

The high speeds of such aircraft gave the pilot too little time to aim, and poor maneuverability left no opportunity to correct the inaccuracy of aiming, especially for inconspicuous targets, even with the use of precision weapons.

So the concept of field basing appeared near the front line of the Su-25 attack aircraft at the initial stage of its creation. Most importantly, this aircraft was to become an operational and tactical means of supporting the ground forces, like the Il-2 attack aircraft.

Understanding this, the command of the ground forces fully supported the creation of a new attack aircraft, while the command of the air forces for a long time showed absolute indifference towards it. Only when the "combined arms" voiced the required number of staff of the Su-25 attack aircraft did the Air Force command appear reluctant to give ground commanders with the aircraft a huge amount of personnel and airfields with infrastructure.

This led to the fact that the aviators took up the project of creating this attack aircraft with all responsibility, naturally, in the understanding of aviation commanders. As a result of repeated demands to increase combat load and speed, the Su-25 transformed from a battlefield plane to a multi-purpose aircraft, but at the same time it lost the ability to base itself on small, minimally prepared sites near the front line and instantly fulfill targets on the battlefield according to the current situation.

This came around during the war in Afghanistan, because in order to reduce the response time to the calls of motorized riflemen and paratroopers, it was necessary to organize constant duty of attack aircraft in the air, and this led to a huge overspending of scarce jet fuel, which had to be delivered first from the USSR to the airfields of Afghanistan under constant fire of mujahideen , or to overcome huge distances from airfields in Central Asia.

Even more fatal was the problem of a light anti-helicopter attack aircraft. Its appearance in Soviet times did not take place, although several promising projects were proposed for consideration by the military. One of them is the light attack aircraft "Photon", whose unofficial nickname was "Pull-push."

The main feature of the Photon attack aircraft scheme was a redundant spaced power plant, consisting of a TVD-20 turboprop engine located in the nose of the fuselage, and an AI-25TL dual-circuit turbojet behind the cockpit.

Such an arrangement of the engines made their simultaneous defeat from enemy fire unlikely, and in addition, provided additional protection to the pilot, who, like the Su-25, was in a welded titanium cockpit.

The project of this attack aircraft, together with the developed model, was presented in the ordering departments of the Air Force armament service, but somehow it did not appeal to the aviators who repeated - any device that raises less than five tons of bombs is not of interest to the Air Force.

Meanwhile, during the transition to the formation of military units on the basis of the “battalion-brigade” principle, there was a clear imbalance in the availability of aviation, which was directly at the disposal of the battalion commander and brigade commander, more precisely, the complete absence of both combat aircraft and vehicles at the level of the battalion brigade.

In Soviet times, they tried to solve this issue by creating airborne assault airborne brigades with giving them squadrons of Mi-8T transport and combat helicopters and Mi-24 fire support helicopters, but this idea also did not receive wide development, since helicopter convoys were too cumbersome .

The fact is that usually regiments and individual squadrons of helicopter pilots are based on their habitable airfields, which are part of the army aviation structure, and are located at a fairly substantial tactical distance from the main forces of the air assault brigade.

In addition, the army aviation itself, with its location under the sun there is no way to decide - it is either thrown into the Ground Forces, then transferred to the Air Force, or, according to rumors, can soon be subordinated to the Airborne Troops.

If we take into account that the Russian army’s armament is mainly armed with materiel from the Soviet era, the capabilities of regiments and individual squadrons of fire support helicopters look pale, despite sworn assurances that the latest helicopters will arrive in the army aviation firms Mil and Kamov.

But the point is not only in what structure the army aviation will organizationally enter, but in the fact that army aviators do not quite represent the essence of modern combined arms combat, which, with the advent of modern tanks and armored personnel carriers, has changed from positional to maneuverable and which requires continuous air covering both from the impact of enemy combat helicopters and ground fire weapons.

In addition, there is an urgent need for the supply of ammunition and food for troops on the march and in the defense. A typical case of clashes between the FAPLA Angolan army and the troops of the UNITA group in the mid-80s in Angola. Carrying out a swift attack on UNITA troops, the units of the FAPLA operated in the jungle.

The troops were supplied with pairs of Mi-8T helicopters and Mi-24 fire support helicopters. Since aviation support for UNITA troops was provided by South African aviation, which revealed helicopter communication of the FAPLA supply. At the request of UNITA leader Savimbi, it was decided to secretly intercept the FAPLA supply helicopters with the help of light Impalas attack aircraft, which had only cannon weapons.

As a result of several unexpected attacks on a group of Angolan helicopters that were not previously warned by FAPLA reconnaissance, about 10 helicopters were shot down by Impalas light attack aircraft, and the attack on the UNITA group was failed due to a lack of timely supply of ammunition and food supplies.

As a result of the failure of the FAPLA offensive, more than 40 tanks and about 50 armored personnel carriers were lost, and the loss of FAPLA personnel amounted to over 2500 soldiers and officers. As a result of this, the war in Angola dragged on for more than 10 years.

Thus, the example of this episode of armed struggle shows that in the troops on the battlefield, in the tactical depth and on the lines of communications, a situation arises of obvious insecurity from unexpected enemy air strikes, since fourth-fifth generation fighters not only took off too high and ended up completely divorced from the battlefield, but they act only at the request of the command with a predominance of the “free hunt” method to search for enemy aircraft and attractive targets on the ground.

The "big attack aircraft", for understandable reasons, can not "hang" over the battlefield for a long time, working on the principle: - dropped bombs, shot and - flew away. As a result of this, the need arises for the emergence of new battlefield aircraft — light non-aerodrome-based ground attack aircraft, which should be under the direct command of the battalion commander and brigade commander.

Such aircraft should have one quality - be in the tactical reachability of the company, battalion or brigade location and be used for timely air cover and escort of military units during a break, march or combat collision with the enemy, both on the defensive and on the offensive.

Ideally, light non-aerodrome-based ground attack aircraft should be directly tied to a specific platoon, company and battalion, ensuring the transfer of reconnaissance groups in the tactical depth of the offensive or defense, providing transportation of the wounded to the rear, during the so-called “golden hour”, to be involved in reconnaissance and observation on the battlefield and perform local tasks to suppress enemy firing points.

It is logical, in this case, to learn the technique of piloting aircraft of the battlefield of sergeants-contractors, suitable for flight work due to health reasons. Over time, it is possible to certify them for production as officers. Thus, in the Ground Forces there will appear commanders of air groups in the battalion and brigade, understanding the essence of the use of aviation at the level of the battalion and brigade on the battlefield.

This will be of tremendous importance, especially for mountain brigades, air assault brigades and Arctic special forces brigades. Attempts to use various types of helicopters for these purposes were not very successful. In the best case, using the G8 or the Twenty-Four it was possible to evacuate the wounded, toss up ammunition or food, and also to suppress enemy firing points.

Although helicopter pilots in Afghanistan showed massive heroism in the air, the advent of Stinger-type mobile short-range air defense systems reduced the effect of the presence of fire support helicopters on the battlefield to a minimum, and transport helicopters did not have a chance to survive when using stingers. Local conflicts of recent decades also show that the use of "large" military aircraft is limited.

In fact, in many African conflicts, especially in Angola, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, etc., as well as in battles in Abkhazia and Nagorno-Karabakh, light aircraft of various types, as well as converted ones, from sports aircraft were used as attack aircraft (Yak-18, Yak-52), training (L-29, L-39) and even agricultural (An-2) aircraft and hang-gliders.

The need for a battlefield aircraft also arises sharply during anti-terrorist operations, when the use of a fire support helicopter completely unmasks the intentions of the attacker to clean the area from gangs, and besides, the use of a “turntable-turntable” is not always possible, especially in the mountains.

Meanwhile, in the United States and NATO countries, based on the information available to me, there are also ongoing processes of rethinking the use of aviation in numerous local conflicts of recent times. The Marine Corps and the United States Air Force recently received $ 2 billion in initial funding for the purchase of 100 Light Attack Armed Reconnaissance (LAAR) aircraft, which are expected to be used in local conflicts such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya.

At the same time, the first aircraft should enter the troops in 2013. Also, the British company British Aerospace recently presented information on the development of the project of the light aircraft “SABA”, designed to deal with helicopters and cruise missiles. Three versions of the machine were presented - R.1233-1, R.1234-1 and R.1234-2. The R.1233-1 option showed a great advantage.

Customers from the British Department of Defense considered it the most optimal layout scheme for such a duck with a small reverse sweep wing, front destabilizers and a rear arrangement of a twin-propeller turbofan engine with a double thrust propeller. Destabilizers are the horizontal front feathers that are installed in front of the wing and are intended to provide or improve the longitudinal controllability of the aircraft.

According to the representative of the company, the main advantages of this light aircraft are its high maneuverability in all flight modes, the ability to base on unpaved airfields with runway lengths of up to 300 m, a very impressive duration (up to 4 hours) of autonomous flight, and powerful small arms and missile weapons.

The performance characteristics of the aircraft:

aircraft length: 9.5 m
wing span: 11.0 m
Maximum take-off weight: 5.0 tons, including weapons weight: 1.8 tons
average speed: 740 km / h
landing speed - 148 km / h
minimum turning radius - 150 m
180 degree turn time - about 5 seconds

Based on the main purpose of this aircraft - to intercept enemy combat helicopters appearing directly on the battlefield, the aircraft is armed with 6 short-range air-to-air missiles of the Sidewinder or Asraam type and an integrated 25 mm cannon with 150 rounds of ammunition .

A heat direction finder is installed on board the aircraft as a survey and sighting system and a laser range finder as a target indicator. The aircraft designers of this aircraft argue that such a powerful weapon with high maneuverability will allow the SABA pilot to conduct equal air combat at low altitude even with supersonic fighters.

However, critics of this aircraft believe that this aircraft can become easy prey not only for enemy fighters and attack aircraft, but also for fire support helicopters, due to the fact that it is not outside the aerodrome.

A real find and a pleasant surprise for the Russian Ground Forces could be the use of a light attack aircraft, a normal category amphibious aircraft with an air cushion landing gear, which is designed to perform air transportation tasks with a payload of up to 1000 kg in unprepared sites and flying at a minimum height .

This amphibious aircraft, in addition, can be used to perform various combat missions, to patrol military columns in the tactical depths of defense and attack, for search and rescue operations, conduct reconnaissance aerial surveys, detect enemy tank columns, land and land on water surface and be the headquarters command post for the leadership of drones, which will make it possible to determine the employment of defensive lines by the enemy and their preparedness in engineering In the course of development, the presence of enemy troops in the forest, determine the advancement of enemy reserves along highways, dirt roads and their concentration at railway stations.

One of its modifications can be an effective means of combating transport helicopters and fire support helicopters of enemy troops, as well as enemy tanks and armored personnel carriers.

Modifications:

The basic platform of an amphibious aircraft can be easily converted into various modifications of the sanitary, assault, transport, patrol, etc., depending on the type of fuselage security, which will be manufactured in two versions:

based on the use of aluminum alloys
based on the use of titanium alloys with the creation of a welded titanium cockpit in combination with the use of Kevlar fiber

Dimensions:

amphibian length - 12.5 m
height - 3,5 m
wing span - 14.5 m

The size of the fuselage allows you to place 8 soldiers with full-time weapons and a supply of food.

Engines:

The power plant consists of:

marching turboprop Pratt & Whitney PT6A-65V power - 1100 hp
a lifting engine for creating an airbag PGD-TVA-200 with a capacity of 250 liters. from

Masses and loads:

take-off weight - 3600 kg

Flight data:

maximum flight speed up to 400 km / h
cruising speed up to 300 km / h
range with a maximum payload of 1000 kg - up to 800 km
range - maximum distillation - up to 1500 km

The program for the creation and serial production of amphibious aircraft involves:

NPP AeroRIC - project developer
Nizhniy Novgorod Sokol Aviation Plant OJSC - aircraft manufacturer
Kaluga Engine OJSC - manufacturer of a turbofan unit (TVA-200) for creating an air cushion

The initial version of the amphibious aircraft was equipped with a marching engine of the Canadian company Pratt & Wittney - RT6A-65V with a rear location on the fuselage. In the future, in mass production, it is planned to install aircraft engines of Russian or Ukrainian production.

Estimated armament:

one 23-mm double-barreled gun GSh-23L with 250 rounds
2 UR air-air R-3 (AA-2) or R-60 (AA-8) with laser homing heads in difficult meteorological conditions
4 PU 130 mm
NURS C-130
PU UV-16-57 16x57 mm
NUR Reconnaissance Equipment Container

It is planned to install an ASP-17BTs-8 on-board sight on this aircraft, which will automatically take into account the ballistics of all weapons and ammunition used. Also on board will be installed a warning system for radar irradiation SPO-15, with devices for ejecting dipole reflectors and over 250 IR cartridges.

Although discussions in Russia and in the world about the possibility of using a light attack aircraft in ground forces are not abating, due to the fact that the life of a battlefield aircraft in modern combat is very short, such statements also apply to tanks and armored personnel carriers and even drones.

Therefore, despite the increased risk to the life of the attack aircraft crew in modern combat, the role of direct support aircraft for ground forces will only increase and, over time, such infantry vehicles will appear at the disposal of infantry that form a new class of combat aircraft - battlefield aircraft.

And also for aiming destruction of land and sea targets.

Attack - defeat of ground and sea targets with the help of small arms and cannons (cannons and machine guns), as well as missiles. This method of defeat is more suitable for striking at stretched targets, such as clusters and especially marching columns of infantry and equipment. The most effective attacks on openly located manpower and unarmored vehicles (cars, unarmored tractors and towed vehicles, rail). To accomplish this task, the aircraft must operate at low altitude without diving (“shaving flight”) or with a gentle dive (at an angle of no more than 30 degrees).

History

As attack aircraft, non-specialized types of aircraft, such as conventional fighters, as well as light and dive bombers, can be used. However, in the 1930s, a specialized class of aircraft for assault operations was allocated. The reason for this is that, unlike an attack aircraft, a dive bomber only hits point targets; a heavy bomber acts from a great height over areas and large fixed targets - it is not suitable for hitting a target directly on the battlefield, since there is a great risk of missing and hitting your own; the fighter (as well as the dive bomber) does not have a strong reservation, while at low altitudes the aircraft undergoes targeted fire from all types of weapons, as well as the effects of stray fragments, stones and other dangerous objects flying over the battlefield.

The most massive attack aircraft of World War II (as well as the most massive combat aircraft in the history of aviation) was the Il-2 KB Ilyushin. The next machine of this type, created by Ilyushin, was the IL-10, which was used only at the very end of World War II.

The role of attack aircraft decreased after the appearance of cluster bombs (with which elongated targets are hit more effectively than from small arms), as well as due to the development of air-to-surface missiles (increased accuracy and range, guided missiles appeared). The speed of combat aircraft increased and hit targets, while at low altitude, it became problematic for them. On the other hand, attack helicopters appeared, almost completely displacing the aircraft from low altitudes.

In this regard, in the post-war period, the Air Force grew resistance to the development of attack aircraft as highly specialized aircraft. Although the direct air support of ground troops by aviation remained and remains an extremely important factor in modern combat, the main emphasis was on the design of universal aircraft that combine the functions of an attack aircraft.

An example of post-war attack aircraft are the Blackburn Buccaneer, A-6 Intruder, A-7 Corsair II. In other cases, an attack on ground targets has become the field of activity of converted training aircraft, such as the BAC Strikemaster, BAE Hawk and Cessna A-37.

In the 1960s, both the Soviet and the American military returned to the concept of a specialized aircraft for direct support of troops. Scientists of both countries settled on similar characteristics of such aircraft - a well-armored, highly maneuverable subsonic aircraft with powerful artillery and missile-bomb weapons. Soviet military settled on a brisk Su-25, the Americans relied on a heavier [ ] Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II. A characteristic feature of both aircraft was the complete absence of air combat means (although later they began to install short-range air-to-air missiles on both aircraft for self-defense). The military-political situation (a significant superiority of Soviet tanks in Europe) determined the main purpose of the A-10 as an anti-tank aircraft, while the Su-25 was largely intended to support troops on the battlefield (destruction of firing points, all types of vehicles, manpower , important objects and enemy fortifications), although one of the modifications of the aircraft also stood out in a specialized "anti-tank" aircraft.

The role of attack aircraft remains well defined and in demand. In the Russian Air Force, Su-25 attack aircraft will remain in service until at least 2020. In NATO, modified serial fighter jets are increasingly being offered the role of attack aircraft, as a result of which double designations are used, such as the F / A-18 Hornet, due to the growing role of high-precision weapons, which rendered the previous rapprochement unnecessary. Recently, in the West, to designate such aircraft, the term "strike fighter" has become widespread.

In many countries, the concept of “attack aircraft” does not exist at all, and planes belonging to the classes “dive bomber”, “front-line fighter”, “tactical fighter”, etc. are used for attack.

Attack aircraft now also called and attack helicopters.

In NATO countries, aircraft of this class are designated with the prefix “A-” (from the English Attack) followed by a numerical designation (it should be noted that until 1946 the prefix “A-” was also assigned