Fighter Combat

FIGHTER WEAPONS 19Guns are like alcohol: valuable, useful, popular, and fun—but, withoutdiscretion, self-destructive to the user.UnknownIn making his guns approach, the shooter must also plan for the possibilityof a missed shot. Approaching with high closure is conducive to overshootingthe target, which may give the opponent an opportunity toreverse his turn and assume an offensive position. The shooter should alsobreak off a gun attack whenever he is unable to maintain proper lead for theshot. Further turning in the target's plane of maneuver usually results inexcessive loss of speed and often leads to an overshoot. Instead, the shootercan reposition for a second attack or disengage.Suddenly you go into a steep turn. Your Mach drops off. The MiG turns withyou, and you let him gradually creep up and outturn you. At the criticalmoment you reverse your turn. The hydraulic controls [F-86] work beautifully.The MiG [-15] cannot turn as readily as you and is slung out to theside. When you pop your speed brakes, the MiG flashes by you. Quicklyclosing the brakes, you slide onto his tail and hammer him with your "50's."Colonel Harrison R. "Harry" Thyng, USAF10 Victories, WW-II and Korean ConflictAnother typical error is not allowing sufficient excess lead in the saddleposition. At long range, target LOS rate is relatively slow, making it easy tomaintain excess lead. As the range closes, however, AOT, LOS rate, andrequired shooter G build steadily. In a rear-quarter attack on a turningtarget, AOT will usually increase to a maximum, stabilize, and thendecrease again as minimum range is approached. Maximum G required bythe shooter generally occurs soon after AOT begins to decrease. Thismaximum G is often greater than that of the target, particularly when theshooter has the usual speed advantage, and easily can exceed the shooter'sturn-performance capabilities before he reaches minimum firing range. Itis much more effective to allow, by stabilizing or slowing the rate of Gincrease, the target to fly up to the pipper as firing range is approached; thisallows the target motion to take out the excess lead and is preferable totrying to "pull" the pipper up to the target from behind. Also, the excess Grequired to pull the pipper to the proper aim point can exceed the shooter'scapabilities. Shooter G, particularly with a real-time gunsight, should bestable or constantly increasing during the attack for best pipper control.Pulling up into his blind spot I watched his plane grow larger and larger in myring sight. But this German pilot was not content to fly straight and level.Before I could open fire, his plane slewed to the right, and seeing me on his tailhe jerked back on the stick into the only defensive maneuver his plane couldmake. I banked my 47 over to the right and pulled back on the stick, strivingto get him once more into my ring sight. This violent maneuver appliedterrific G's to my body, and I started to black out as the blood rushed from myhead. Fighting every second to overcome this blackness about me, I pulledback the stick, further and further, so that the enemy plane would just showat the bottom of my ring sight to allow for the correct deflection.