Saving your six and lingua frantica

I know I distort but that is to convey the despair in saving one’s six. Call it lingua pilotica; a distortion again but emphasises the universality of the language between fighter pilots across the world. There are two sides to this proclivity: one is a duty — clearing your six — and the second is an instinct of self preservation — saving your six. The latter is defeatist and defensive and saves the day regardless of the cost. Respect, esteem, righteousness, all come later or not at all. Self preservation describes it best.

The clock has four sides to it: 12’O Clock is dead head-on or simply twelve — the nose; 6’O Clock is the behind, the tail, or the six; 3’O Clock is dead right or the right wing of an aircraft, or three; and 9’O Clock is the left wing or dead left, or simply nine. When pilots talk between them in the air they use such short syllables to express their long intended information to the formation. ‘One on the nose, 24, closing’ would mean I pick up someone, mostly through Radar from such distances, head-on at 24 miles, heading into me. And so on. However ‘one at six’ is the one which spells only trouble and becomes the urgency to save your six. He could geometrically soon launch his weapon on you and kill you.

But this isn’t universally true any longer, only the sentiment of saving your six is. Let me explain. In a typical fighter combat of the yore the gun and the rear-quarters missile were the only two weapons available to a pilot to shoot down the other guy. The gun typically always, while the missile was a luxury that came later. Rear quarters are the two quarters of the clock from 3’O Clock to 9’O Clock passing through the six. While the 3 to 9’O Clock through twelve will encompass the two front quarters. That should help us understand the clock and its role in a pilot’s life.

The missiles of the yore were rear-quarter weapons. They would fight with the background heat emanating from the ground and reflected up in the air to form the backdrop against which its seeker would need to discern the heat from the engine exhaust of the target aircraft which was always hotter. A locked missile on a target’s infra-red radiations would then give the pilot enough cues to suggest a weapon launch. Better the filters and the processors more effective would be the missile. Later missiles were much improved in frequency and processing and hence more reliable against the background clutter. In 1965 the very few missiles that we had were the first generation. The gun-kills hence were more common. Most missiles lost track after release and did not home on to the target in a competing environment.

The first step in missile or gun employment needed to first out-manoeuvre a combating adversary using pilot skills to position your craft in an adversary’s rear quarters. It was then that the next phase of the attack would begin. The distance needed to be right for either gun or the missile. The missile has its own little rocket motor which burns to propel the projectile a certain distance forward in the powered mode before it burns out, turns ballistic and loses energy and manoeuvrability. The gun was simpler to employ. It tested two things or three: a pilot had to out-manoeuvre the other guy — this was the part of the fabled fighter combat as told in the folklore — get in other persons rear quarters and closer to the tail, or the six, and track him with his gunsight. This needed exceptional skills because the gun-sights weren’t as steady and robust and oscillated with the slightest movement of the pursuing aircraft. But after an adversary had lost his energy in constant manoeuvring and hence his ability to escape, tracking became easier and the attacker would down his target. That happened at ranges between 2-4000 feet.

The missile kill would ideally be achieved from the rear quarters from a mile to a mile-and-a-half and did not need such close tracking except for keeping the aiming index on or near the victim aircraft’s engine exhaust. Infra-red missiles, the kind we are talking, initially sensed heat frequency between 2-3 microns only which were only sensed from the exhaust. Later versions slowly graduated to 3-5 microns and then 5-8 microns to enable cooler emissions to be detected. This obviated the need to only attack an adversary from the rear quarters. The relatively cooler emissions from a target aircraft emanated from the skin of the aircraft and the canopy. This made it possible to kill an adversary from the front quarters and missile employment envelope became more expansive, lethal and smart. This was the first minor step towards Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA).

The longer range, Beyond-Visual-Range, missiles were another category altogether. These initially rode the beam of the parent aircraft Radar which would have searched, sorted and locked an intended target. The missile is released as soon as the system indicates that parameters for its release are met based around its range, forward throw and enemy aircraft’s closing rate. As soon as the enemy aircraft is within the look angle and range of missile’s own radar it frees itself from the beam of the parent aircraft and begins autonomous tracking. This is when the launch aircraft is free to manoeuvre away and is not tied to the missile. More the thrust, stronger the on-board radar and more robust the aerodynamic characteristics of the missile, greatly more efficient is the missile capability against any counter-measures that the target may employ to escape a kill. Each missile has a specified and indicated ‘No Escape Zone’. Once launched within that there is no sparing the target.

And yet there is so much that the target aircraft can do to defeat the engagement and spoil an attacker’s kill-solution at each stage of the combat. In the former, simpler version an intended target would ‘Break’ — a desperate, maximum performance manoeuvre sharply turning away or breaking hard into the missile as it approaches — to beat him aerodynamically and push him into that part of the manoeuvring envelope which is impossible to negotiate forcing the pursuing aircraft or a missile to lose track and fizzle away. In the front-quarter short and longer range firings on-board assistance from jammers to deception to aerodynamic counter-measures come into play to defeat a missile. Saving six metaphorically remains paramount in a state of desperation with a little help.

Why this long rant on what may interest only a few? One, because it interests some, and two, there are too many loose ones (missiles and arrows) flying in the air these days. It helps to keep out of the way and not position your six before those. Preservation of what may have fallen your way as destiny must be secured. Only fools will barter it for pretentions.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 12^th, 2021.

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