It's the Zoomies versus the Squids, the United
States Air Force versus the US Navy, two of the most powerful- if not the most powerful
forces on earth, in a head-to-head matchup to determine just which branch is the best
at their primary purpose: killing bad guys and breaking their stuff. For the sake of this thought exercise, we're
going to ignore the normal realities of warfare and focus solely on firepower and assets. After all, in a realistic war scenario the
US Navy could do something the US Air Force could never do: blockade ports and stop the
shipments of supplies. So we're going to be pitting man and machine
in a straight up deathmatch, and find out which of the two services comes out on top. Despite their close partnership with the US
Navy, for this fight the Marines are out- sorry sailors, but you're fighting this one
on your own. Likewise, US Army forces which typically help
provide ground security for Air Force assets are also out, leaving the Zoomies to fend
for themselves. Most of this war will naturally happen in
the air, though without the support of their sister services, the US Air Force does have
one advantage that the Navy doesn't- the ability to deploy a moderate ground force against
Navy targets. The Navy after all isn't just about ships,
there's a long link of resupply, repair and resupply centers that are vital for keeping
America's fleets out at sea. US Air Force Security Forces personnel are
traditionally speaking, military police no different than their counterparts in the other
branches. However, during the Vietnam War, the Air Force
realized that it couldn't always rely on the other services for protection of its air fields
in hostile territory, and quickly established a training program to convert their military
police personnel into a small, but competent infantry force. Today, Security Forces personnel are all trained
in air base defense, and receive qualification training with heavy squad weapons such as
the .50 caliber machine gun and the Mark-19 automatic grenade launcher. Some of these personnel are even qualified
for air assault operations. Numbers are hard to pin down, but there's
an estimated 25,000 US Air Force Security Forces personnel currently on active duty,
giving the Air Force a sizable ground assault element that the Navy can't match. While US Navy Masters-at-Arms are trained
in protecting ships and shore installations, their focus and training isn't as exhaustive
in ground combat roles as Air Force Security Forces personnel. With the focus shifting from protecting air
fields from unsophisticated terror and insurgent threats, to a potential showdown against regular
Chinese or Russian infantry units, US Air Force Security Forces personnel have recently
begun a program to seriously upgrade their standards, training, and equipment to meet
these near-peer competitor threats. The stated goal of the US Air Force is to
produce a force comparable to US Army light infantry, powerful enough to repel a coordinated
attack from near-peer competitors. This means new tools such as anti-tank and
anti-air man portable weapon systems and fire support platforms such as mortars, as well
as a stronger emphasis on assault and defense operations. On the ground, it's clear that the Air Force
has a serious advantage, being able to deploy a sizable force to seize vital US Navy ground
installations and repel any assaults against its facilities, but the primary combatants
in this showdown are going to be aircraft and ships, so how do they measure up and what
can they add to this fight? The first step in this battle between the
services will be in establishing air superiority, as the primary armament of both services are
going to be its aircraft. In the Navy's corner we have the F/A-18 Superhornet,
an aircraft developed to counter advances in Soviet fighter design. Turns out, the Navy completely overcompensated
and created one of the most formidable fighter aircraft ever built. Responding to the Navy's Superhornet threat
is going to be the F-15 Strike Eagle, another development created in response to the advancements
made in Soviet fighter design. Both aircraft come from the same manufacturer,
meaning they share many of the same strengths, making this a difficult matchup to determine. The F-15 is an air superiority fighter, but
it is primarily geared for a ground-attack role. The Hornet is instead a jack-of-all-trades,
doing everything from air superiority to suppression of enemy air defenses, recon, and even aerial
refueling. That versatility gives the Navy greater flexibility,
and makes sense for a service which has limited space on its aircraft carriers- the better
buy for your money is the aircraft that can do multiple things well, rather than a single
specialized task. But, in this fight, which is better? The F-15 is powered by dual Pratt & Whitney
F100 turbofan engines producing twenty nine thousand pounds of thrust at full afterburner,
versus the Hornet's General Electric F414 engines putting out twenty two thousand pounds
of thrust at full afterburner. This gives the F15 a whopping speed advantage
of 700 miles an hour, with the F15 clocking in at 1,875 mph (3018 kph), versus the F18
at 1,190 mph (1915 kph). F-15s are going to get to the fight first,
every time, and if they get in trouble, they'll easily outrun any pursuing F18s, leaving them
in the dust. By comparison, F18s trying to flee from the
Air Force’s Strike Eagles, are going to wind up getting splashed. The Eagle also has a greater fuel and weapons
capacity than the Hornet, with the F15 carrying up to 23,000 pounds of fuel and weapons versus
the F18's 17,759. More fuel and more missiles means the Air
Force's fighter can stay in the fight longer, and shoot more- and gives the F15 nearly double
the range of the Navy's F18. However, the Navy's f18 can carry the AGM-88
High-speed Anti-radiation missile, giving it a robust capability in destroying enemy
ground and even airborne radar, while the F-15 cannot. Conversely, the F-15 can carry the GBU-28
bunker buster bomb, while the F-18 can't. The F-18 is slightly more agile than the F-15
however, which would give it the advantage in close-quarters dogfighting, although as
many enemy combatants around the world have found out, the F-15 is an absolutely terrifying
dogfighter itself. Targeting and tracking systems on both aircraft
are nearly identical, given that both aircraft operate for the same country. When it comes to long range detection, the
APG-82 radar has greater capabilities than the APG-79 radar used by the Hornet, though
just how much greater capabilities is a mystery as the data is a closely guarded secret. What's clear is that Air Force Strike Eagles
will get to the fight first, see their targets first, and fire first, putting the Navy's
Superhornet at a disadvantage. However, the F-18 is equipped with infrared
search and tracking capabilities, giving it a chance to take on stealth aircraft at close
range. With 769 Hornets versus the Air Force's 454
Eagles, the numbers advantage may seem to be in favor of the Navy- except the 769 Hornets
the Navy possesses represents the entirety of its air-attack and air superiority forces. By comparison, the US Air Force can call on
an additional 1,017 F-16 Fighting Falcons, and 229 operational F-35 Lightnings. The Navy's own F-35s only number at 21, and
are currently still only used for training. However, the absolute silver-bullet in the
sky for the Air Force, is its fleet of F-22 Raptors, numbering at 186. While low in number, the Raptor is without
comparison the world's most advanced air superiority fighter, featuring a radar cross section the
size of a marble. Its armament may be limited as it's forced
to carry its weapons internally, but its powerful radar allows it to detect enemy aircraft and
engage them at beyond visual range. While the Air Force initially wanted a fleet
of almost a thousand of these incredible aircraft, the extreme pricetag upwards of $220 million
dollars per aircraft, as well as a lack of a realistic threat to face off against by
any other nation, shelved the original production run and limited it to the number the Air Force
currently operates. Simply put, in an air battle the US Navy is
going to come out losing badly. Not only is it completely dwarfed by the numbers
of Air Force air superiority fighters, the Air Force's F-22 presents a threat that an
F-18 pilot is unlikely to survive. Luckily, the number of these airborne assassins
is relatively low. However, the Navy can call upon support from
its large fleet of warships, who thanks to modern battle networks, can add their firepower
to an air battle. While its fleet of dozens of attack submarines
may seem like an odd fish out on this fight, many of these are capable of taking on land-attack
roles thanks to the addition of cruise missiles to their magazines. With a range of 1,550 miles (2,500 km), Navy
subs could deliver crippling blows to US Air Force installations- with little if any warning. Likewise, its fleet of 91 destroyers and 19
corvettes could all strike at Air Force airfields. A vast inventory of anti-air missiles such
as the RIM-174 and the RIM-162 Evolved Sea Sparrow can project serious anti-aircraft
firepower into a fight, leaving US Air Force planes at risk in any air battle within range
of US Navy ships. The US Air Force is not the primary service
for neutralizing an enemy fleet, that task falls on the US Navy, but it is still very
well equipped to deal with hostile vessels. The AGM-158 JASSM (jassam) and the AGM-86
are both extremely long range stand-off attack air-launched cruise missiles, packing a thousand
pound warhead capable of sinking enemy ships. The AGM-158C is the latest iteration of these
anti-ship missiles, and features greatly improved technology allowing it to locate, track, and
target hostile vessels independently while ignoring civilian shipping. These missiles are all low-observable, making
them difficult to spot on radar, and are programmed to fly extremely close to the ocean's surface,
which makes them even more difficult to spot and target by a ship's anti-missile defense
systems. However, none of these weapons are supersonic,
as the US is currently coming far behind Russia and China in developing supersonic weapons. This means the individual success rate of
each missile is dramatically lowered when pitted up against the Navy's sophisticated
anti-missile defense systems, though the AGM-158C is capable of coordinating with other missiles
to conduct swarm attacks, approaching a target from multiple directions in overwhelming numbers. Increasingly, this fight is turning bad for
the US Navy. With an air superiority fleet that's less
than half the size of the US Air Force, and with aircraft outmatched technologically by
the Air Force, the Navy will never be able to establish air superiority. Even more importantly though, the Navy's Hornets
will never be able to establish air superiority at the stand-off attack distances required
to stop Air Force bomber aircraft from launching anti-ship attacks. While Navy fleet defenses are likely capable
of chewing up most of the Air Force's surface-attack aircraft, the Air Force's ability to attack
with long-range precision weapons means their vulnerable bomber aircraft can target and
fire from well outside of the air-defense envelope of the Navy. One way the Navy plans on protecting its surface
fleets from this threat against a near-peer competitor such as China or Russia, is to
simply establish Combat Air Patrols at greatly extended ranges, using F-18s in tanker mode,
or new tanker drones, to refuel F-18s assigned to long-range air patrols. However, no other nation can bring to bear
against the US Navy the sheer numbers and capabilities of the US Air Force, and in a
real-world situation, the Navy would always rely on Air Force help to protect its ships. Airpower will determine this battle, and the
Navy loses in that arena. While Navy ships would be able to launch attacks
against Air Force airfields and ground installations, they won't last long against coordinated Air
Force attacks by fleets of B1 Lancers and B52s equipped with stand-off long range munitions
and protected by fleets of F-16s, F-15s, F-35s, and F-22s. Air Force planes would always be able to redeploy
to civilian or even improvised air fields, but Navy fighters will find that their only
safe landing site- their aircraft carriers- will very quickly end up at the bottom of
the sea. With complete and total air superiority, the
US Air Force is without a doubt the victor of this conflict, though in reality, this
conclusion is no surprise. Air power has been the single most important
weapon in modern war since World War II, leaving any foe without suitable air power at the
absolute mercy of even an inferior army that is supported by a competent air force. However, it's also a matter of different mission
sets that sees the Air Force declared a winner. The US Navy is indeed tasked with air superiority,
but its vessels are also designed for a wide range of different responsibilities from surface
warfare to subsurface warfare, and the escort and deployment of ground combat troops to
beaches around the world. The Air Force however has a far more limited
scope of missions- air superiority, recon, and ground-attack- and its equipment is thus
far more capable in these arenas than the Navy's. In truth, neither service could win a war
without the other, and the two are equal and vital partners in ensuring the United States
military remains the most powerful on earth. Buuuutttt, squids would totally get their
butt kicked by zoomies any day of the week. Now for how the Navy would fare against a
competitor like China go watch “US Navy must do this to defeat China in a war.” Or if you're ready for a change of pace, click
this other video instead!
