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LearningTranscript
00:00So, here's the thing, I made 6 videos about the Su-57, I covered the aircraft in a great
00:06detail because a lot of the western public is not familiar with the Russian technology.
00:12I explained times and again how the Russians do things differently.
00:17And this is what I get.
00:30So, let's address some of these comments and let's address the last big subject
00:35that has remained unexplored.
00:37Stealth.
00:38So, stay till the end.
00:50The Su-57 has 5 antennas, 2 of which are L-band arrays.
00:56L-band, which is a longer wavelength band than the X-band, is a radar frequency,
01:04is a radar band where the stealth is way less effective.
01:09Some say that the Su-57 arrays are too small to be really effective.
01:15And maybe it's true, but actually knowing that a stealth aircraft is there,
01:22even though you cannot locate it precisely, is already a big technical advantage.
01:28There's also the possibility that at the tip of the wing of the Su-57,
01:33there are going to be more antennas that have not been disclosed publicly.
01:41So, maybe the L-band arrays are not that small.
01:45So, if there is a fighter that has little probability of being surprised by an F-22
01:50or an F-35, that fighter is the Su-57.
01:54No other fighter in the world has the same onboard capability of detecting stealth.
02:06It is surprising how many people actually take this as a fact and not for what it is.
02:14It is actually the United States Air Force doctrine.
02:17So, this is the way the Air Force is going to fight the next war.
02:21And it may well work, but we are not guaranteed.
02:25Until there is a confrontation with a near-peer opponent,
02:28we don't know if this doctrine is actually working or not.
02:32And please don't tell me that in the last 30 years,
02:35all the engagements have been beyond visual range.
02:38Basically, the United States and the Western Alliance never fought a competent opponent
02:42during these years.
02:43And they were always, always with a large advantage in technology and numbers.
02:49As I said in a different video, the first victim of high-tech warfare is high-tech warfare itself.
03:01Yes, it's true, exposed rivets and large seams have been seen.
03:06But this is a superficial analysis.
03:08Wait till the end when we speak about stealth.
03:12Yes, it is underpowered if you compare with the original plans,
03:19but it's still very capable with the AL-41.
03:22And by the way, apologies for getting the MTBF of the AL-41 wrong in the first video of the series.
03:30It is about 4,000 hours.
03:32And then the Izdeliye 30 is pretty much right behind the corner.
03:36It has flown already, it has been tested, and it shouldn't be that far away.
03:42So it is not underpowered as in an aircraft that has insufficient performance.
03:47It is underpowered because the development took too long.
03:58Yes, of course, this is true.
04:00But you have to consider that the F-22 was developed when Russia was during the impasse
04:06of the 90s.
04:07It was a terrible time for them where development pretty much arrested.
04:12They had famine, they had death.
04:15That was a terrible time for Russia.
04:17And when finally full-scale development actually resumed, they accumulated some delays.
04:22And to be honest, there were also other priorities,
04:26some asymmetric priorities to the precedence on the Su-57.
04:30For the Russian airspace, the Su-57 is a quantum leap that they're trying to do.
04:36And these projects take 20-25 years, give or take.
04:46Yes, there are a few because, as we said, they started later.
04:49The last time a reporter has been in the Sukhoi factory and has visited the assembly line,
04:55they have counted about a dozen units at different levels of completion.
05:00So the production is actually going.
05:02It's not in large numbers.
05:04It's not like the F-35 today.
05:07But it is coming along.
05:09And by the way, I don't think that they do a press release every time they deliver one.
05:14So we don't know exactly how many are in service now.
05:35Sorry guys, you totally missed the point.
05:43The key word in all of this is asymmetry.
05:46I know that some think that being better means being superior in a few numeric parameters.
05:53Some of them are really meaningless, like for example the missile range.
05:58Some people think that the missile range or the radar range are a thing.
06:02So a missile that has a range of 50 km is better than a missile that has a range of 45 km.
06:10That's... come on, that's not the point, guys.
06:13It's not black or white.
06:16Well, sorry, but this is an oversimplified version.
06:19I know it is reassuring if you see the world in a logic of us against them.
06:26But definitely that's not the case.
06:29The Russians do not plan to respond with the same means,
06:33tactics and doctrines of the Americans in case of confrontation.
06:38Doing the same thing as your opponent when you are in a condition of material inferiority
06:44is simply suicidal.
06:46Nobody competent would do that.
06:48And this was stated times and again in all the Russian doctrinal publications.
06:55We want good relations with all participants of the international dialogue.
07:00And really, we don't want to burn bridges.
07:02But if someone mistakes our good intentions for indifference or weakness
07:06and intends to burn or even blow up these bridges themselves,
07:09they should know that Russia's response will be asymmetrical, swift and harsh.
07:13Asymmetrical, asymmetrical, asymmetrical.
07:16What they plan to do is something different,
07:19to cripple the capabilities of whatever enemy they are up against.
07:23It seems that many believe that if they don't do the same stuff that we do in the West
07:29is because there are stupid simpletons.
07:32Well, I don't know what you think,
07:34but I always thought that underestimating your opponent is the first step to defeat.
07:39An aircraft like the Sukhoi 57 will be employed differently from its Western counterparts.
07:47That's the reason why it is different.
07:49On to stealth.
07:54So when you speak about stealth, there is a number that is thrown around freely,
08:01that is the radar cross section.
08:03The radar cross section is defined like this.
08:06The RCS of a radar target is the hypothetical area required
08:10to intercept the transmitted power density at the target
08:13that if the total intercepted power were re-radiated isotropically,
08:16the power density actually observed at the receiver is produced.
08:20In practice, the larger the cross section, the more visible is an aircraft on radars.
08:26However, an aircraft doesn't have one radar cross section value.
08:31The radar cross section varies with a lot of parameters
08:34and the most important being the attitude of the aircraft,
08:38so the angle and the richer view in the aircraft
08:41actually determines the radar cross section of the aircraft more than everything.
08:46And also the radar cross section depends from the radar.
08:50As we said before, in the X band, which is the band used by fighter jets' radars,
08:57stealth is extremely effective.
08:59In the L band, at a longer wavelength and a lower frequency,
09:04it is not as effective.
09:05The RC, the radar cross section, is higher.
09:08Radar cross sections values are available in the press for every aircraft,
09:14but they are all estimates.
09:17I've never seen any official statement about the radar cross section of an aircraft.
09:24Never.
09:24They are all estimates.
09:26I personally find this discussion about who has the biggest radar cross section
09:32quite curiously similar to another discussion about size
09:37and pretty much it has the same finality.
09:40Coming to the Su-57, the aircraft has clearly been designed to be low observable.
09:45All the classic features of geometric stealth are present.
09:49There are no right angles, the platform is aligned,
09:53the vertical surfaces are counted outwards and all the panels are serrated.
09:58It is not 100% clear what is the solution for the engines,
10:03but fans and turbine blockers seem to be present.
10:06And the canopy is coated with metal oxide to keep the impinging radiation out of the cockpit.
10:12When the first close-ups of the aircraft became available,
10:16it was clear that there were a lot of exposed rivets and very large gaps.
10:21And the obvious explanation is that those Russian simpletons
10:25do not have the sophisticated technology required
10:29for the small tolerances that we see on the American aircraft.
10:32The misunderstanding derives from the fact that the Su-57 prototypes are all different.
10:39Many of them have just been built for testing the flight systems,
10:43testing the aerodynamics, testing the engines, but not the combat systems.
10:49Many of them do not have any form of coating or rather absorbing materials.
10:55And no prototype was ever brought to the production standard.
11:00The production aircraft looks much smoother
11:03and many of the exposed rivets and many of the gaps have been covered.
11:08There are way fewer metallic parts exposed.
11:12About 70% of the external surface of the aircraft is actually composites
11:18and those composites have been designed to be radar absorbing
11:22and in fact they have been made with a relatively unusual variety
11:27of electrically conductive carbon fiber.
11:30The tolerances are reduced albeit they are not as tight as we see on for example the F-35.
11:37Making those small tolerances is not anything particularly difficult
11:41but I believe that in this case we are in the presence of the usual Russian compromise
11:47to make the aircraft more resilient to damage and wear and tears.
11:52And mind that the gaps between the panels now are filled with conductive material
11:56and most of the exposed rivets are gone.
11:59We also know that the Russians use a radar absorbing paint
12:04and the aircraft is painted and all the metallic parts are painted.
12:08Some analysts have reason to believe that the Russian radar absorbing materials
12:13are still not as effective as the American ones
12:18but there is no doubt that the aircraft is reasonably low observable in its final configuration.
12:25It is pretty much impossible to say how stealth an aircraft is
12:28just by studying it from the outside
12:31but definitely the proposition that the aircraft is not stealth doesn't seem to be justified.
12:39And to be honest a lot of the statements that you read on the internet about the Suhoi 57
12:43are not justified and if you want to learn why
12:48well just watch the videos that are going to appear beside me.
12:51So thank you very much for watching and see you there!