Are conventional Anti-Aircraft guns obsolete in modern warfare?

what's up [Music] [Music] wow [Music] [Music] hello everyone it's me matt appreciate you stopping by on today's video we're discussing anti-aircraft artillery and the threats to us as militaries around the world are ever changing as both the conventional and technological advances but one thing that stayed true anti-aircraft artillery has been around for a very long time and it's still being utilized heavily today the root cause of this video is basically a rhetorical question as many of you are aware we still need conventional anti-aircraft weapons but on what context do we still need projectiles that are sent through the sky blasting shrapnel all over targets or do we need the more advanced capabilities of anti-aircraft artillery such as lasers which really opens up the realm of total new technology advances and the way in which anti-aircraft artillery works a lot of people have spoken to me in the past telling me of how you know missiles are the way forward but are they there is so much advancement now in terms of anti-aircraft conventional artillery that it's something i really want to try and discuss and see if it does still have added value on the modern battlefield first of all let's take a look at ryan mattel's version of a new upgrade they put on their anti-aircraft artillery now unfortunately due to youtube's awesome copyright laws and this video having music on it that's copyrighted i have to go through this myself so basically the projectile is now being scanned and programmed from time to flight as it leaves the barrel magnetically so as it leaves it is calculating exactly where it needs to hit on the target and the radar from the gun system is seeing where the target is and programming the round as it comes through the barrel now this isn't a huge change in technology there's a lot of these kind of weapon systems out there but it's the way in which each round is programmable as it comes through the barrel to make almost a wave of shrapnel very similar to flac you could pretty much say this is the modern day flak capability and the way in which these rounds are programmable at such high speeds and for such small targets is a huge advancement in the way in which conventional munitions work so there you have it there is some pretty cool developments going on with the conventional side of anti-aircraft artillery and clearly it's not something that has been neglected from militaries around the world from the high-tech advanced highly funded militaries to some of the militaries that have almost near zero funding anti-aircraft artillery is also something that can be utilized on two spectrums not only engaging aircraft or helicopters or whatever else is in the sky including that of drones which we'll talk a little bit more about in a second but that of a ground capability we've all seen many times footage of these guns being turned into absolute meat churners on the battlefield when putting thousands upon thousands of rounds down onto enemy positions in the context of ground attack and it kind of opens up the door of saying well if these things can be used in a ground attack role and an anti-aircraft role why would you ever get rid of them there is discussion about this however the problem with anti-aircraft weaponry is it requires a lot of ammunition ammunition is heavy it is also very logistically burdening it can cause huge amounts of time effort and logistics to get these kind of weapon systems on the battlefield effectively and to continue feeding them something is just as much complicated though in the antsky aircraft world is missiles missiles are extremely complicated and sensitive bits of equipment an artillery piece like an anti-aircraft gun however not so much you keep feeding it bullets and for the most part if you've maintained it and looked after it it will keep churning out the lead all day long if you accidentally bump a missile on route or one of the tubes is you know male aligned or the sighting system is not quite working you have a lot of problems and on top of that radar is an extremely complex piece of equipment but we could say we're kind of comparing apples to oranges here when you're looking at a weapon system can gain up to about 5000 meters to something that can engage up to 50 kilometers there's obviously gonna be a huge deterrent factor anti-aircraft guns are really utilized for the short-range engagements whether it be helicopters low-flying close-air sport aircraft or drones which is where i also want to then speak upon why there is a massive positive need for anti-aircraft guns drones are here to stay they're advancing across the globe and an extraordinary rate and they will do for some time of course we're looking at the standardized drone that we think of nowadays or these smaller sort of dji gopro mounted drones the reaper is quite the extreme of drone capability here long engagement counter insurgency kind of weapon system but the drones that i'm more concerned about and something that is more applicable to anti-aircraft artillery is the smaller type drones the drones that can mass in swarms we've all seen the latest olympus's fallen movie where thousands of them storm across a lake to kill the president and you kind of giggle at it but the reality is folks is that is something that many militaries around the world are trying to develop swarm technology anti-aircraft artillery can keep up with that threat missile technology not so much you're not going to spend 180 000 launching two missiles to try and take out what could potentially be up to a hundred of these small micro or miniature type drones working in a swarm type fashion it's scary to know that these kind of drones could be you know amassed and engage a battle group whether it be with you know ieds or small arms on these things but they are a massive risk in the future and something i would love to do a dedicated video on the future but anti-aircraft artillery is definitely very poised to take out these kind of systems because if you have a hundred of these things flying through the sky you could use two anti-aircraft weapon systems with the conventional munitions to create a huge plethora of shrapnel to try and prevent this swarm coming towards you which is why i really do think anti-aircraft artillery is going nowhere many people have told me and it's really interesting to hear their argument behind why it should be gotten rid of is that it is just not able to engage at longer ranges you have to think about this from a broader perspective if you're being engaged by aircraft for the most part you're going to be engaged at a high altitude whether it be with joint direct attack munitions you know j dams things like that or you know strike capability that is way beyond visual range you don't even know it's coming and that is to a very very technologically advanced nation or military that is engaging with those kind of weapons however we all know the reality is that helicopters low-flying close esport aircraft such as you know the super tucano which a lot of militaries are looking at sort of these propeller based aircraft that can come in swoop engage and pull out again instead of spending you know upwards of two million dollars just to get an f-35 or an a10 on the runway a small little prop plane could cause a huge amount of damage using missiles against 10 to 15 of those things may be effective on the short term say using stinger missiles but eventually you will run out of those missiles missiles also have a high malfunction risk okay depending on the weather or the environment that they've been worked on you also have the jamming capability of certain weapon systems that can prevent missiles from engaging its target of course missiles are getting hugely advanced too but nothing stops the beautiful timed charge of a high-explosive warhead exploding mid-air there's not really much you can do about that when an aircraft is flying in the sky other than you know trying to outmaneuver the fire that's been placed upon you and normally by that time it's too late anyway and anti-aircraft weapon systems don't normally work in pairs or ones or twos they work in a whole host of a battery and that's how they just create a swarm of fire into the air these smaller propeller type planes or smaller close export planes and helicopters are really what we're looking at with anti-aircraft artillery and even then when i have the discussion and the debate with these individuals saying but we still need anti-aircraft guns for those kind of threats nope nope nope missiles can take it we've got stingers we've got all these you know the missiles getting cheaper they're getting faster they're getting more capable of knocking out aircraft even with the jamming capabilities and i have to smile because it makes me wonder who's paying for all this which military if they went into a conventional warfare situation is going to spend a billion dollars on an anti-aircraft battery that uses purely missiles to engage low-flying threats it's just totally out to lunch and which is why i always find it very interesting having a debate with someone about why anti-aircraft artillery is useless a lot of people have also said to me that the older school weapon systems are completely redundant you know as you saw in the previous video there from ryan mattel they've got some pretty cool tech coming out they've got you know charges that can be and fuses that can be primed through the barrel which is nothing really new but that kind of technology is just as much of expensive cost than it is for the missiles can be you know i'm sure a box of a thousand of that kind of projectile ammunition going through that rime metal gun and the gun itself is extremely expensive and it adds up with an older school weapon system you've got old-school weapons and old-school munitions which can be used all day long but as i said before it just adds that complexity of having to find and carry all this ammunition onto the battlefield another interesting concept that i've heard people talk about is what about if the weapon system is totally out to lunch when it comes to effectiveness what if the rounds aren't able to penetrate or create such a dash of shrapnel in the sky that's not even able to stop the aircraft a couple of people have told me that they've seen footage and i've never been proven of this fact of hindi helicopters having a spray of shrapnel from forty millimeter bofors and continue flying now i work in the aviation industry and i can safely say that if a 40 millimeter both around one two three or however many rounds being shot into the sky come anywhere near the rotor blades or the engine or behind d it's coming out the sky i'm not saying that a hindi can't take that kind of beating but to say that 40 millimeter bofor rounds is not going to stop behind d i'm very very shocked by that conventional munitions although not huge in size nowadays we're not looking at you know 105 millimeter guns firing into the sky like world war two and you know world war one of these big old guns blasting it's not quite the case now now we're looking at smaller faster more high volume projectiles trust me when i say this there is just as deadly as any other larger caliber flat gun flak as known in world war ii was really the concept of projecting a weapon system at a predetermined time ahead of the bombers flying into it in world war ii of course this was perfected by the germans and of course the allied nations at the time to basically preemptively set a huge amount of shrapnel ahead of a bomber group this took a huge amount of planning timing mathematics and gunnery skill to actually put the amount of flack on target as needed we don't need that anymore anti-aircraft artillery in its conventional form uses radar very effective radar of course it still uses the standard signing system but for the most part the predictory kind of weapon engagements aren't needed because the radar does it all for you you're basically just pressing a button the rounds are going to be predetermined to engage and explode at a certain time period in the sky and the shrapnel or flak will be made in effect a more modern day system like that again adds to the fact of effectiveness people say well if it's not going to be able to aim correctly then it's not going to be able to actually engage the target technology has got to the point where it's not adding a huge amount of added cost to the munitions but a little bit more to the weapon system itself of course when you put radar of things on anti-aircraft weapons it's going to add a lot of cost but not an extraordinary amount of cost the same radar would have to be placed upon a missile system so for those of you who do feel that anti-aircraft artillery is not really capable anymore it's time to get old we should just give it all up and go straight to missiles and advance our technology and reducing cost of missiles or larger volumes of missiles or different kinds of missiles that can produce flack in the sky i would have to disagree i think anti-aircraft artillery is here to stay for the long haul i really hope it does it deserves to it's been here since the dawn of artillery time and aircraft being flying in the sky and it needs to be consistently updated right mattel has gone to town with it we see a lot of it actually on naval ships too the way in which they have provided a weapon system that only engages aircraft but also surface ships missiles normally for the most part other than things like javelin don't really focus on two different concepts of fighting ground and air if you have a ground target for the most part a lot of the modern-day anti-aircraft missiles don't have the capability of knocking down that ground target guess what the anti-aircraft gun does if it's mounted in the certain way that it should be on the platform that it's moving around on for ships that is perfect you want something that can do two jobs engage surface vessels and aircraft in the common battle space of the battlefield today that is even more important can engage infantry engage small armed vehicles it can engage heavy armored vehicles maybe not take them out but definitely dilapidate them to the point they can't be used so if you have a debate about why anti-aircraft artillery isn't needed anymore i would love to hear your opinion in the comments section below you can also come chat with me on discord message me on facebook i would love to hear your debate i don't want to argue of course i'd love to debate and talk to people about these kind of things but let me know your opinion it's an interesting topic to discuss a lot of people do challenge me on it and you know as much as i have respect for anti-aircraft missiles and how effective they are at doing what they do i don't think we're going to see them consistently replace the entire plethora of anti-aircraft weapons systems out there today if you did enjoy today's video please leave me a like and as i mentioned before leave a comment in the comment section below thank you to everyone who is subscribed as a member to my channel i really appreciate you all and thank you also to those who have supported my patreon funding in the description box below uh where that link is found to get to my webpage for patreon thank you so much it really does mean a lot to financially support me and my channel and for those of you just stopped by today thank you also you can go check me out and all my other social media links etc in the description box below too and if you do want to be notified of any upcoming videos please click the little bell by the subscribe button so you can be notified for videos next time have a wonderful day everyone all the best [Music] bye [Music] you

Channel: Matsimus

Views: 478,402

Rating: 4.9211259 out of 5

Keywords: Anti-aircraft, counter-air defence, anti-aircraft warfare, Missile defence, weapon system, flak gun, CIWS, close in weapons system, air defence, military technology, MANPADS, SPAAG, Pantsir-S1, Air supremacy, anti-aircraft weapons, ZU-23-2, ZSU-57-2, Bofors 40 mm, Oerlikon 20 mm

Id: RxsDOIqTZ9Y

Length: 15min 37sec (937 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 06 2020