F-22 Raptor fighter-bombers in Poland thumb nose at Tsar Vlad

The most advanced and deadly fighter-bombers, the F-22 Raptors, are taking part in exercises in Poland for the first time. They put all the antiquated Soviet-style scrap metal the Rooskies have to shame.The American warplanes are not only super-siwft but can create their own magnetic field making them virtually invisible to radar. Maybe its time to pay a courtesy call to Crimea and recover the illegally annexed peninsula for Ukraine?!

Except... it's not quite as clear cut as that. The F-22 against the SU-27 and especially the SU-30 might have problems - the jury is out, but no-one is convinced that the F-22 would win clearly against those two planes.

There is no true functional equivalent to the F22 in Russia's possession. The technological gap between the F22 and SU27 family (including 30 and 35) is not inconsiderable. More comparable Russian designs are either in concept or prototype stage (no serial production yet) and all such programs are problematic to say the least. Recently, the lack of certain parts from Ukrainian suppliers is putting entire projects on hold.

On the other hand, putting 4, 40 or even the entire American stock of 187 F22s in this region may change certain aspects of the game but won't be a game changer (my personal opinion) because Putin has strong potential to put his ego before logic.

and what if those Raptors really destroy Russia?

what would Poland then? to be more Polish, more Slavic? i don`t think so. There won`t be Slavic Poland.

Isn`t that ironic?

Is it really such a huge gap? I was reading about some war games conducted with India and the USA, and it seems that both sides manipulated the rules (on home territory) to suit their equipment. But - more surprisingly - Ukraine was supplying parts for Russian plane programmes?


I think it's also worth remembering that Russia has the capability of causing a lot of trouble without getting into aerial wars. A decent cyberattack effort against weaker NATO members (such as Latvia and Albania) for instance - we know the Russians have the capability.

That is correct. But still not a match for NATO or even the US alone for that matter. Remember, the US indirectly defeated the Soviet army (which was numerically stronger than current Russian army) in Afghanistan by providing light and medium weapons to ground based insurgents (and these insurgents eventually ended up attacking the US). In simplest of terms, the US has a lot more money to spend on proxies vs. Russia.


In terms of ultimate mechanical and aerodynamic performance not so much, but F22 was designed from concept to completion with stealth capabilities while the SU27-30-33-35 family was not, and the F22 has significantly better electronic warfare capabilities, and this is why (in my opinion) it would win in real world battles. It essentially thinks faster, therefore allowing the pilot to take action MUCH faster, often before its opponents have even achieved situational awareness.

4 x F22 practically means the Russians could lose entire small sorties of their most capable fighters with zero or near-zero loss to NATO.
If the Russians throw in 50 x MiG29 then they CAN create a lot of aerial trouble, but they are likely to lose planes at a ratio of 10:1 against NATO specifically because of the electronic warfare superiority mentioned earlier.