Ready for China: RAF joins US & Australia for largest Allied air exercise ever

the bright lights and bling of Las Vegas but as revelers risked their dollars on the edge of town War Fighters are taking to the skies [Music] by night and by day American Australian and British crews set out on sorties in the biggest air combat training exercise anywhere in the world this is red flag my job is to train the Coalition Air Forces to the most advanced adversary that we possibly can it's probably the most demanding and challenging exercise from an air crew perspective very very stressful and that's the whole point this huge exercise happens every year but 2023 has been different so we're going to find out why and today's missions are just beginning [Music] red flag began almost half a century ago when the U.S military realized from Vietnam that if Pilots survived their first 10 missions the chances were they'd survived the war red flag was born to simulate those first 10 perilous Ortiz red flag the most realistic combat training exercise ever developed [Music] today the exercise is bigger than ever there's now three a year this is red flag one and it's huge so this is the British flight line we've got all our typhoons nicely lined up next to us are the Australians they've brought their four Growlers with them and Beyond them are the US now there's around a hundred Jets here and this stretches for over a mile although the goal Remains the Same after years of looking Eastward now attention turns to a new threat the red flag scenarios during red flag 23 1 are 100 focused on the pacing challenge in China we present the blue participants with both offensive and defensive counter problems that's every training period that they're participating in the Big Challenge now is what the Americans call the tyranny of distance the miles at task force would need to cover just to reach the fight they could also be operating over water not land and potentially fighting a well-equipped enemy to tackle the tyranny of distance they've almost tripled the airspace they're training in it now stretches from Utah across Nevada into California and for the first time over the Pacific Ocean all the nations involved bring their own expertise to the party and this problem of distance means what the British bring is key yesterday before yesterday at seven in the morning fixing hard the Voyager is the raf's air-to-air refueling tanker is basically a civilian airliner with a few handy military adaptations it has two underwing pods for refueling bus jets with an additional Center hose for larger aircraft it can refuel two Jets at a time delivering half a ton of fuel a minute with each jet taking around five minutes to refuel it complements the U.S tanker the kc-135 which uses a single rigid boom and is better for refueling bombers in larger aircraft hose is about 99 feet long and you'll just see the basket tucked up in there and it'll come out behind the aircraft and just sit in the airflow here and then the receivers come up with their probes and then their job is to produce their probes into the basket at about 400 miles an hour Voyager is effectively a force multiplier enabling aircraft to stay airborne for longer she's therefore critical to this year's red flag so although this to all intents and purposes looks exactly like a civilian airliner we are essentially an international Airborne fuel station we hang out on the edge of the training area ready waiting to refuel the British typhoons the U.S Marine Corps f-35bs and the Royal Australian Air Force and the U.S Navy's Growlers okay so what are we expecting um okay so we're going to expect a couple of typhoons in the next two minutes and then the second way we've got some f-35s coming busy it is very busy I mean these guys are just so busy so I just try not to talk to them they need to concentrate yes they do it's not long before the first customers arrive up front the mission systems operator controls the refueling today the Voyager has 50 tons of fuel to deliver to 18 aircraft in around 90 minutes meanwhile the job of the pilots is to fly straight and level very still very steady very predictable we don't want them to be disoriented while they're around the aircraft we want to provide a nice steady platform for them to come and get their fuel as you can imagine it's like a big flexible hose it bounces around if there's any bumps or turbulence so it's hard enough as it is so anything we can do to make it easy for them we will the Jets come and formate on the left-hand wing and that's kind of like the holding area and then two at a time they'll come one behind each hose they'll then connect when they get the green light so they can take their fuel when they're finished they'll disconnect and then they move off to the right hand Wing which is kind of the holding area before they leave then they'll climb up above us and head back to their fight the Voyager is a very critical enabling asset what we call a high value Asset so what we tend to do is make sure that the Voyager is protected we don't want the Voyager near the enemy forces and we always want to have blue forces fighters in between the Voyager and the enemy so we would have Fighters protecting the Voyager we'd have Fighters up front fighting the enemy and we'd also probably have fighters on the Voyager refueling as well whilst we brought our typhoons and tanker the Australians came with their Growlers The ea-18g Growler is an electronic attack aircraft designed to scramble enemy Communications it's a pretty important exercise for Australia for us it really includes incorporating into packages of up to 60 or 70 aircraft to achieve various Mission sets our task or our mission set is really to enhance survivability mentality of the joint and Coalition force and we do that by denying or degrading or deceiving intermittent Communications or our equipment to make sure that the typhoons for example can achieve their mission set it's not just a scenario putting the visitors to the test the cold winter desert also has its challenges well it's used to being in such warm climate and now it's like freezing and we're just like oh what is it going to do now we always figure it out it's great they may look simple but they're really not there is so much design that's gone into them and so much information that you've got to learn about it to be able to fix it or troubleshoot it as the Allies evolve so too does the enemy to keep Coalition forces on their toes Nellis Air Base has a unit of Resident baddies their job is to provide red air in other words to get amongst the blue friendly forces and do all they can to disrupt them last year they became even more lethal when they were joined by a new Squadron of f-35s headed up by Commander norto this is their first International red flag it's a challenge to a certain degree I think the Baseline you start that started your best fighter pilot that you can be is the is the absolute Baseline whether from the enemy or from the good side but then now you have to pick yourself from the mindset of the enemy that you're you're hitting the the missile launch the simulated missile launch button against your friends right there and you you can't be afraid to do that because any hesitation in doing that means that your friend is not getting the best training that they could possibly get another day another mission they need to be snug so that um when you're pulling G in the aircraft the uh these pants inflate and squeeze squeeze the blood back up to your torso and into your into your brain so you you don't lose Consciousness under high G they need to be tightly fitted um after a few weeks in America there's a challenge to get on in a hurry do you have to psych yourself up for going out for SRT uh you certainly need to put yourself in a in a in the right frame of mind um also they have rock music in here which which helps as well get into the mood clear the mind yeah out here you get a uh kind of a big match mindset so um there's so many people watching as well um but you don't want to let each other down and we want to give the best best performance you can so absolutely uh I definitely still get nervous the Rivalry with the Americans and Australians as well too no no Black Hawks provide cover as the B-52 strategic bombers depart first then the tankers and the fast Jets follow there seems little doubt amongst the 3000 or so deployed that red flag is working you said you'd only died once hey yes so uh it was my first mission I was taken aback by the the aggressiveness of our adversary I haven't died since so I learned my lesson I like think I was the last guy to get gas from my flight and I look over to my left and I see four typhoons there to my left it was just you know it was a surreal moment I like couldn't believe that I like whatever choices in my life brought me to that moment it was it was beautiful to see I feel exactly where I want to be you know just feels right being here as red flag draws to a close Coalition forces prepare for the long journey home and Nevada looks to Future red flags which may be conducted entirely at Sea panicking forces news Nellis Air Base Nevada if you enjoyed this video don't forget to like And subscribe to our Channel

Channel: Forces News

Views: 2,130,472

Keywords: Forces News, Forces TV, British Armed Forces, British, Forces, military, serving, military personnel, Ministry of Defence, British defence, British military, Royal Air Force, Exercise Red Flag, Nellis Air Base, Nevada, RAF, Ex Red Flag, USAF, US Air Force, Royal Australian Air Force, defence, exercise, training, military news, China

Id: LO5YiBTTNW4

Length: 10min 27sec (627 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 10 2023