Post by ngatimozart on Jun 6, 2013 21:30:55 GMT 12
This story is on Flightglobal about the French Air Force Rafales operating over Northern Malin against militants.
Striking success
The Dassault Rafale proved its capabilities during a wide range of operations as part of the French campaign this year against militant groups in Mali, northern Africa
By: Craig Hoyle
The Normandie-Niemen unit is tasked with being able to perform multiple duties
When France ended its combat involvement in Afghanistan at the end of 2012, few could have expected its armed forces to be almost immediately required to launch a major intervention in northern Africa.
Dubbed operation Serval and initiated in Mali on 11 January, the campaign was intended to halt and reverse the territorial advances being made by al-Qaeda and other Islamic militant groups towards the capital city, Bamako.
France's combat involvement started when military assets already based in N'Djamena in Chad as part of a long-term presence were sent forward to engage rebel forces. These included Dassault Mirage F1 reconnaissance and strike aircraft and Mirage 2000D bombers, supported by air force Boeing C-135FR tankers from the same base.
Within 48h, the intense activity was also to involve assets deployed from the French mainland, with the air force's Dassault Rafale community receiving little time to prepare for the complex and long-range sorties that would be asked of it.
Late on a Friday afternoon, as the hostilities started, a telephone call made to the office of Col Guillaume Letalenet, commander of the French air force's Mont-de-Marsan air base near Bordeaux, prompted a flurry of preparations among the personnel at the Rafale-equipped 2/30 "Normandie-Niemen" Sqn.
At 8am the following day, two aircraft departed the base to join a formation that was preparing to fly a long-range strike mission from Saint-Dizier. On the morning of 13 January, the pilots tasked with performing operation Montezuma took off, at the start of what was to be a campaign-longest 9h 45min strike mission covering 2,970nm (5,500km), before joining the fixed-wing assets already in N'Djamena.
"This is a quick reaction capability: we were not on alert," notes Lt Col François Tricot, officer commanding 2/30 Sqn, which had only been stood-up at Mont-de-Marsan in June 2012 and has so far received 18 of its full complement of 20 single-seat Rafale Cs. Almost 60 personnel are currently assigned to the unit, including pilots, maintainers and an intelligence cell to support reconnaissance activities.
DIPLOMATIC CLEARANCE
With diplomatic clearances not yet in place to transit Algerian airspace, the Rafales were required to route to their destination in Chad over Morocco, Mauritania and Mali, with six air-to-air refuellings performed per aircraft from accompanying C-135FR tankers.
The four strike aircraft were carrying a potent mix of weapons, with one pair armed with six Raytheon GBU-12 Paveway II 230kg (500lb) laser-guided bombs each, and the others each carrying six of Sagem's AASM "Hammer" INS/GPS-guided bombs. The latter weighs around 340kg per round, with its propulsion system enabling a stand-off range performance of up to 32.4nm.
Once over Mali, the crews struck 21 ground targets, before flying on to their new operating location for the rest of the campaign. A second wave of Rafales performed a similar journey one week later, this time from Mont-de-Marsan.
Paris has set an upper limit of 225 combat aircraft for its air force and navy
Use of this mixed formation model continued throughout the conflict, as the Rafale has not yet been cleared for operations carrying a mixed load of the two weapon types. This capability will, however, be enabled soon, via the next batch of F3-standard software for the type, which is currently undergoing flight test.
"Rafale is very, very impressive over Mali," says Tricot, who goes on to describe one mission flown involving two aircraft in each configuration against a rebel installation later in the intervention. Intended to "destroy the will of the enemy", this involved deploying all 24 weapons carried by the formation within a very short period of time.
"They were very surprised. They did not expect any attacks on their bases," he says. "With the AASM, it was six bombs together, then six more, then the GBU-12s." In a later raid, two Rafales again released their combined load of 12 "Hammers" against rebel targets, destroying all of them within less than 1min.
Other activities performed by Rafale pilots beyond flying such air interdiction bombing missions included convoy escort and dissuasion. "A show of presence or a show of force was very important for the forces on the ground," Tricot says, as the sound of combat aircraft would encourage rebels to disperse. "They [the militants] discovered the GBU-12 and AASM at the start of the campaign, and they didn't like it," he notes.
Rafale missions also included providing close air support cover for a major land forces offensive on Timbuktu, which did not require the fighters to deploy weapons.
"For a normal close air support mission, AASM was not necessary, as you had the GBU-12," Tricot says, with the former weapon being used against pre-planned targets.
All sorties launched from N'Djamena were of long duration, because of the distances involved in reaching the combat area. Flying a 5h-plus reconnaissance mission would require three visits to a tanker, while longer-duration close air support missions would double this.
"We always had to fly around 1,500km to be on station above northern Mali," says Tricot. "The key part for us was fuel, fuel and fuel." Because of the demands of French ground forces, who preferred to move at night, many of the Rafale missions were performed during the hours of darkness. "You could do a couple of weeks of flying and not see the country," he notes.
The process of in-flight refuelling was smooth, he says, regardless of the service providing the tanker. Such assets included C-135FRs flown from Chad, US Air Force KC-135s from Morón air base in Spain and a German air force Airbus A310 multi-role tanker transport. "Formating with a US tanker at night - it was no big deal; it was just like training in France. It seems normal, but it wasn't always this way," he says, referring to the interoperability demonstrated with France's NATO allies through past experience in conflicts in Afghanistan and Libya.
RECONNAISSANCE POD
Some ground refuellings were also performed in Niamey, Niger, during the campaign, a location also used as a data relay site for some reconnaissance missions. Rafale pilots were able to select around 10 target images from the Thales Reco NG reconnaissance pod during a sortie and send them to the ground via the Link 16 data link within a roughly 10-15min period while passing the location. "For reconnaissance, there is nothing better than the Rafale right now," Tricot claims.
Operational tasking over Mali was managed by a command centre in Lyon, France, and also from a combined air operations centre, which was deployed to N'Djamena in December 2012. "All these operations from day one were 24/7," Tricot says. Busy airspace saw Rafales typically being flown above Mirages, transports, unmanned air vehicles and combat helicopters.
Surveillance assets including a French air force Boeing E-3F airborne warning and control system aircraft were flown out of Dakar, Senegal, with the UK Royal Air Force also assigning one of its radar-equipped Raytheon Systems Sentinel R1 battlefield reconnaissance aircraft to the campaign until late May.
Despite the high intensity and long-endurance nature of the almost 800 sorties flown with Rafales by late May, the Snecma M88-engined type demonstrated extremely high reliability. "Out of all the operations, we had more than 90% availability, plus spare aircraft on the ground," Tricot says.
Individual pilots would typically fly every other day, to allow adequate rest periods, as some reconnaissance missions could take 2-4h to plan and complex strikes as long as 3-5h to debrief, including conducting battle damage assessment work with intelligence staff.
The Normandie-Niemen unit is tasked with being able to perform multiple duties, including air interdiction, close air support and reconnaissance: everything except the nuclear deterrent mission assigned to the air force's two-seat Rafale B squadron, based in Saint-Dizier.
"One day you fly recce; two days after, you fly night close air support; two days after, you fly a pre-planned attack with AASM; and the day after, close air support," says Tricot. "All of the crews are trained to perform all of these missions - the same aircraft, technicians and pilots, and the same intel, whatever the squadron."
Tricot also notes that with six air-to-surface weapons, one Rafale is capable of striking the same number of targets in a single sortie as three Mirage 2000Ds. Also, "it's more reliable, much more comfortable and has more power", he adds.
Despite their involvement in the NATO-led campaign in Libya in 2011, for many European air forces the prospect of staging a major intervention in Africa would plunge their pilots into unfamiliar territory, but this is not the case for French crews, thanks to decades of training performed in the region.
"For any French pilot, Africa is something known," Tricot says. "All our pilots had been to Chad" prior to operational Serval. "For us, there was nothing brand new over Mali - it was all done before over Libya. Montezuma was like Benghazi two years before."
With extensive combat experience having been gained via the Rafale's involvement in Afghanistan, Libya and now Mali, the French air force is very satisfied with its so-called "omnirole" strike asset. "It's not a show aircraft: it's a war machine," Tricot says.
"We appreciate to fly this aircraft, because of its reliability, because it is easy to use and easy to fly, and because it can do so many things. We trust our aircraft. This one is well above any other that we met before."
RAFALE ENHANCEMENTS CONTINUE, AS ORDERS TOTAL FACES PRESSURE
The French air force received its first operational Rafale in 2006, from an expected total order for 234 units, plus 60 M-version strike aircraft for the nation's navy.
With combat experience now accumulated in Afghanistan, Libya and Mali, the air force's growing fleet of single-seat Rafale Cs and nuclear strike-roled Bs continue to receive operational enhancements that will underscore the type's claimed status as an "omnirole" asset.
Deliveries of a new, laser-guided version of the Sagem AASM precision-guided bomb began recently, after the weapon was qualified as ready for service in April 2013.
Already operational in INS/GPS and infrared seeker-equipped versions, the roughly 90kg (198lb) "Hammer" kit adds precision guidance equipment and a booster rocket to "dumb" bomb bodies, to provide a precision-attack capability.
Performed at the DGA defence procurement agency's Cazaux flight test centre during December 2012, the last of three qualification firings involving the laser-guided version saw a weapon dropped from a medium altitude and a range of around 8.1nm (15km). Following its release, the weapon executed a 90˚ turn to the right, before the host Rafale designated a moving ground vehicle target using its Thales Damocles targeting pod, scoring a direct hit. An initial order for 380 laser-guided 340kg weapons is now being executed by Sagem, but the type has yet to be used operationally.
In the longer term, air force and navy Rafales will gain the ability to fire MBDA's Meteor beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile in squadron service from 2018. The weapon will enable them to use the full potential of the active electronically scanned array for the type's Thales RBE2 radar, which is now being flown during test and evaluation-phase activities from Mont-de-Marsan air base near Bordeaux.
But while such weapons and sensor enhancement work continues, budgetary pressures in France mean that Dassault's domestic production of the type is unlikely to reach the level previously expected. In its defence White Paper published in April 2013, Paris set a future upper limit of a combined 225 combat aircraft for its air force and navy, with further details likely to emerge when its new military planning law is passed in September.
Dassault, which according to Flightglobal's MiliCAS database delivered a combined 10 Rafales to the French air force and navy in 2012, has still yet to finalise its first export contract for the type. The company continues to work towards agreeing a 126-aircraft deal for the Indian air force, and is also eyeing opportunities in nations including Brazil and the United Arab Emirates.
Striking success
The Dassault Rafale proved its capabilities during a wide range of operations as part of the French campaign this year against militant groups in Mali, northern Africa
By: Craig Hoyle
The Normandie-Niemen unit is tasked with being able to perform multiple duties
When France ended its combat involvement in Afghanistan at the end of 2012, few could have expected its armed forces to be almost immediately required to launch a major intervention in northern Africa.
Dubbed operation Serval and initiated in Mali on 11 January, the campaign was intended to halt and reverse the territorial advances being made by al-Qaeda and other Islamic militant groups towards the capital city, Bamako.
France's combat involvement started when military assets already based in N'Djamena in Chad as part of a long-term presence were sent forward to engage rebel forces. These included Dassault Mirage F1 reconnaissance and strike aircraft and Mirage 2000D bombers, supported by air force Boeing C-135FR tankers from the same base.
Within 48h, the intense activity was also to involve assets deployed from the French mainland, with the air force's Dassault Rafale community receiving little time to prepare for the complex and long-range sorties that would be asked of it.
Late on a Friday afternoon, as the hostilities started, a telephone call made to the office of Col Guillaume Letalenet, commander of the French air force's Mont-de-Marsan air base near Bordeaux, prompted a flurry of preparations among the personnel at the Rafale-equipped 2/30 "Normandie-Niemen" Sqn.
At 8am the following day, two aircraft departed the base to join a formation that was preparing to fly a long-range strike mission from Saint-Dizier. On the morning of 13 January, the pilots tasked with performing operation Montezuma took off, at the start of what was to be a campaign-longest 9h 45min strike mission covering 2,970nm (5,500km), before joining the fixed-wing assets already in N'Djamena.
"This is a quick reaction capability: we were not on alert," notes Lt Col François Tricot, officer commanding 2/30 Sqn, which had only been stood-up at Mont-de-Marsan in June 2012 and has so far received 18 of its full complement of 20 single-seat Rafale Cs. Almost 60 personnel are currently assigned to the unit, including pilots, maintainers and an intelligence cell to support reconnaissance activities.
DIPLOMATIC CLEARANCE
With diplomatic clearances not yet in place to transit Algerian airspace, the Rafales were required to route to their destination in Chad over Morocco, Mauritania and Mali, with six air-to-air refuellings performed per aircraft from accompanying C-135FR tankers.
The four strike aircraft were carrying a potent mix of weapons, with one pair armed with six Raytheon GBU-12 Paveway II 230kg (500lb) laser-guided bombs each, and the others each carrying six of Sagem's AASM "Hammer" INS/GPS-guided bombs. The latter weighs around 340kg per round, with its propulsion system enabling a stand-off range performance of up to 32.4nm.
Once over Mali, the crews struck 21 ground targets, before flying on to their new operating location for the rest of the campaign. A second wave of Rafales performed a similar journey one week later, this time from Mont-de-Marsan.
Paris has set an upper limit of 225 combat aircraft for its air force and navy
Use of this mixed formation model continued throughout the conflict, as the Rafale has not yet been cleared for operations carrying a mixed load of the two weapon types. This capability will, however, be enabled soon, via the next batch of F3-standard software for the type, which is currently undergoing flight test.
"Rafale is very, very impressive over Mali," says Tricot, who goes on to describe one mission flown involving two aircraft in each configuration against a rebel installation later in the intervention. Intended to "destroy the will of the enemy", this involved deploying all 24 weapons carried by the formation within a very short period of time.
"They were very surprised. They did not expect any attacks on their bases," he says. "With the AASM, it was six bombs together, then six more, then the GBU-12s." In a later raid, two Rafales again released their combined load of 12 "Hammers" against rebel targets, destroying all of them within less than 1min.
Other activities performed by Rafale pilots beyond flying such air interdiction bombing missions included convoy escort and dissuasion. "A show of presence or a show of force was very important for the forces on the ground," Tricot says, as the sound of combat aircraft would encourage rebels to disperse. "They [the militants] discovered the GBU-12 and AASM at the start of the campaign, and they didn't like it," he notes.
Rafale missions also included providing close air support cover for a major land forces offensive on Timbuktu, which did not require the fighters to deploy weapons.
"For a normal close air support mission, AASM was not necessary, as you had the GBU-12," Tricot says, with the former weapon being used against pre-planned targets.
All sorties launched from N'Djamena were of long duration, because of the distances involved in reaching the combat area. Flying a 5h-plus reconnaissance mission would require three visits to a tanker, while longer-duration close air support missions would double this.
"We always had to fly around 1,500km to be on station above northern Mali," says Tricot. "The key part for us was fuel, fuel and fuel." Because of the demands of French ground forces, who preferred to move at night, many of the Rafale missions were performed during the hours of darkness. "You could do a couple of weeks of flying and not see the country," he notes.
The process of in-flight refuelling was smooth, he says, regardless of the service providing the tanker. Such assets included C-135FRs flown from Chad, US Air Force KC-135s from Morón air base in Spain and a German air force Airbus A310 multi-role tanker transport. "Formating with a US tanker at night - it was no big deal; it was just like training in France. It seems normal, but it wasn't always this way," he says, referring to the interoperability demonstrated with France's NATO allies through past experience in conflicts in Afghanistan and Libya.
RECONNAISSANCE POD
Some ground refuellings were also performed in Niamey, Niger, during the campaign, a location also used as a data relay site for some reconnaissance missions. Rafale pilots were able to select around 10 target images from the Thales Reco NG reconnaissance pod during a sortie and send them to the ground via the Link 16 data link within a roughly 10-15min period while passing the location. "For reconnaissance, there is nothing better than the Rafale right now," Tricot claims.
Operational tasking over Mali was managed by a command centre in Lyon, France, and also from a combined air operations centre, which was deployed to N'Djamena in December 2012. "All these operations from day one were 24/7," Tricot says. Busy airspace saw Rafales typically being flown above Mirages, transports, unmanned air vehicles and combat helicopters.
Surveillance assets including a French air force Boeing E-3F airborne warning and control system aircraft were flown out of Dakar, Senegal, with the UK Royal Air Force also assigning one of its radar-equipped Raytheon Systems Sentinel R1 battlefield reconnaissance aircraft to the campaign until late May.
Despite the high intensity and long-endurance nature of the almost 800 sorties flown with Rafales by late May, the Snecma M88-engined type demonstrated extremely high reliability. "Out of all the operations, we had more than 90% availability, plus spare aircraft on the ground," Tricot says.
Individual pilots would typically fly every other day, to allow adequate rest periods, as some reconnaissance missions could take 2-4h to plan and complex strikes as long as 3-5h to debrief, including conducting battle damage assessment work with intelligence staff.
The Normandie-Niemen unit is tasked with being able to perform multiple duties, including air interdiction, close air support and reconnaissance: everything except the nuclear deterrent mission assigned to the air force's two-seat Rafale B squadron, based in Saint-Dizier.
"One day you fly recce; two days after, you fly night close air support; two days after, you fly a pre-planned attack with AASM; and the day after, close air support," says Tricot. "All of the crews are trained to perform all of these missions - the same aircraft, technicians and pilots, and the same intel, whatever the squadron."
Tricot also notes that with six air-to-surface weapons, one Rafale is capable of striking the same number of targets in a single sortie as three Mirage 2000Ds. Also, "it's more reliable, much more comfortable and has more power", he adds.
Despite their involvement in the NATO-led campaign in Libya in 2011, for many European air forces the prospect of staging a major intervention in Africa would plunge their pilots into unfamiliar territory, but this is not the case for French crews, thanks to decades of training performed in the region.
"For any French pilot, Africa is something known," Tricot says. "All our pilots had been to Chad" prior to operational Serval. "For us, there was nothing brand new over Mali - it was all done before over Libya. Montezuma was like Benghazi two years before."
With extensive combat experience having been gained via the Rafale's involvement in Afghanistan, Libya and now Mali, the French air force is very satisfied with its so-called "omnirole" strike asset. "It's not a show aircraft: it's a war machine," Tricot says.
"We appreciate to fly this aircraft, because of its reliability, because it is easy to use and easy to fly, and because it can do so many things. We trust our aircraft. This one is well above any other that we met before."
RAFALE ENHANCEMENTS CONTINUE, AS ORDERS TOTAL FACES PRESSURE
The French air force received its first operational Rafale in 2006, from an expected total order for 234 units, plus 60 M-version strike aircraft for the nation's navy.
With combat experience now accumulated in Afghanistan, Libya and Mali, the air force's growing fleet of single-seat Rafale Cs and nuclear strike-roled Bs continue to receive operational enhancements that will underscore the type's claimed status as an "omnirole" asset.
Deliveries of a new, laser-guided version of the Sagem AASM precision-guided bomb began recently, after the weapon was qualified as ready for service in April 2013.
Already operational in INS/GPS and infrared seeker-equipped versions, the roughly 90kg (198lb) "Hammer" kit adds precision guidance equipment and a booster rocket to "dumb" bomb bodies, to provide a precision-attack capability.
Performed at the DGA defence procurement agency's Cazaux flight test centre during December 2012, the last of three qualification firings involving the laser-guided version saw a weapon dropped from a medium altitude and a range of around 8.1nm (15km). Following its release, the weapon executed a 90˚ turn to the right, before the host Rafale designated a moving ground vehicle target using its Thales Damocles targeting pod, scoring a direct hit. An initial order for 380 laser-guided 340kg weapons is now being executed by Sagem, but the type has yet to be used operationally.
In the longer term, air force and navy Rafales will gain the ability to fire MBDA's Meteor beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile in squadron service from 2018. The weapon will enable them to use the full potential of the active electronically scanned array for the type's Thales RBE2 radar, which is now being flown during test and evaluation-phase activities from Mont-de-Marsan air base near Bordeaux.
But while such weapons and sensor enhancement work continues, budgetary pressures in France mean that Dassault's domestic production of the type is unlikely to reach the level previously expected. In its defence White Paper published in April 2013, Paris set a future upper limit of a combined 225 combat aircraft for its air force and navy, with further details likely to emerge when its new military planning law is passed in September.
Dassault, which according to Flightglobal's MiliCAS database delivered a combined 10 Rafales to the French air force and navy in 2012, has still yet to finalise its first export contract for the type. The company continues to work towards agreeing a 126-aircraft deal for the Indian air force, and is also eyeing opportunities in nations including Brazil and the United Arab Emirates.