Why Building Aircraft Shelters Should be a Priority
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- Опубликовано: 19 май 2024
- Ever since the Cold War, NATO Air Forces have centralized around a smaller number of Airbases. After two decades of asymmetric warfare, the question is now whether NATO airbases have not become too vulnerable. Joining Chris is Prof. Justin Bronk from RUSI, to explain how NATO could improve their airbase protection - and for a budget price.
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Read Prof. Bronk's paper: "Regenerating Warfighting Credibility for European NATO Air Forces" rusi.org/explore-our-research...
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- Timecodes -
00:00 - NATO Airbases
00:10 - Improving Protection of Airbases
01:35 - Hardened Aircraft Shelters (HAS)
04:00 - Legacy of Gulf War
05:05 - Cruise & Ballistic Missile Threat
06:50 - Benefits from Shelters
- Audio -
Music and Sfx from Epidemic Sound
Given the threat of low cost drones, all major air forces should use at least some hardening for their air bases.
Exactly. That would radically shrink the vulnerability of aircraft on the ground to them. There's still some risk the drone could get launched while a plane was taxiing, or while the shelter doors were open, but its easier to be on high alert against drones during short windows of vulnerability than to keep that level of alert up 24/7.
Excellent point! The Desert Rats WISHed they had drones.
Weren't likely-Russian drones caught flying around NATO airbases lately? We don't need another invasion of Poland, or another Pearl Harbor. We knew about 9/11 and did nothing.
Hardened shelters not only protect against submunitions and drone attacks but also against the weather. The stealth coatings of 5th generation aircraft are notoriously fickle. Even without an external threat, having such bunkers to protect aircraft makes economic sense.
For protection against weather the shelter doesn't have to be hardened. Normal shelter are much cheaper.
Protecting the aircraft is one aspect. Maintaince crews work much better, if they are protected from rain and low temperatures.
Just had a 200km wind storm hit an airbase in Brittany, France.
also great for denying intelligence. Awnings help but they don't help against local informants.
@@MrChickennugget360 In terms of intelligence Idk If synthetic radar aperture technology synchronisation isn't,sophisticated enough to bypass,such shelters
even soft shelters protect from weather. look at american bases in the US and everything is under cover. russians seem to just park their junk in the open, not only leaving them vulnerable to weather but also cheap ukrainian drones
Simple common sense. Time for various European politicians to drop their ridiculous excuses and actually use those existing Cold War assets-hardened aircraft shelters-instead of wasting the money on obvious taxpayer funded re-election advertising AND build any new structures that may be required. Justin’s comment about building more shelters than are needed at a particular location also makes sense in another way: additional shelters could be used as workshops, warehouses and accommodation whilst disused/derelict structures are being refurbished/replaced.
Nothing you are saying is wrong, and I see people making similar arguments all over Ukraine War related videos over the last 15 months or so. However, the problem is that policy agendas of governments tend to only include a limited number of items at once (unless you are the United States, who just prints money to spend, hoping that demand for Dollars will never drop so much that inevitable hyperinflation ensues). Countries like Russia and China can have their policy agendas set entirely by elites. Elites of course try to set policy agendas in the West, but they can't control them as thoroughly, especially in Europe, where there are many political parties in each country, and the bar to a new party gaining seats is not insurmountable (see that pro-farmer party in the Netherlands for a recent example).
My point here is that Europeans can be at a place where they in theory want more money and serious attention for defense matters, but that vague endorsement doesn't mean that they actually will stand for it if defense spending is going up at the same time that the retirement age is being raised and the economy is in decline. I think that military history/news channels have a lot of people commenting who make really good points in a vacuum. Unfortunately, the real world of politics and government budgets is not a vacuum where you only have to worry about one variable.
@@mensch1066 True. As someone who will be turning 61 in a little over four months, I have absolutely no problem with the retirement age increasing to 67 before I become eligible for a pension. I was only a public servant for the first two years out of school. Many of the people who publicly whinge about increased retirement ages are either on government salaries OR are trade union officials who continue to be paid their full salaries whilst the members whom they supposedly serve, are on strike for more pay.
Civil servants shouldn’t have to pay income tax. Bc their wages are derived from tax revenue.
I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.” ― Smedley D. Butler, War is a Racket" a short book from 1935.
@Col.DouglasMacgregor53 come on now you hypocrite, you as US mil know zionists did 911
I agree. It might sound ridiculous, but an interim solution might be basically using barrage balloons with netting and/or just basically a scaffold with netting would be a quick, cheap easy way to secure fixed and rotary assets not in hardened hangars.
Hellenic Airforce Bases are a great example. One HAS for each fighter jet, in an not straight line placement and one runway with two parallel taxiways that can be also be used as runways. Tanagra Airforce Base is an example but most bases do it.
Well, if you fear your allies (at least one of them) more than your enemy...
@@thekinginyellow1744 What the 💩are you on about now?
@@Farweasel If you knew anything about the history of Greece, you wouldn't be asking.
oh yeah turkey lol@@thekinginyellow1744
@@Farweasel
Turkey... bit obvious...
Also maintenance costs on aircraft shelters are fairly low (not zero don't neglect them but it's not a lot of effort/cost) so it's a really good investment, I support this idea whole heatedly.
Try working in one that hasn't got the resources of a government to maintain it. I'm part of a museum restoration team that operates out of one. On more than one occasion it has only been the fact that one of the outfits that operate on the ex-base we are based on has massive John Deere tractors that has allowed us to open and close the doors!!
Every airbase should have air defence systems really. We have too little of that in general and it is mostly focused on defending military assets. Ukraine shows we need to protect civilians as well.
Sweden closed F9 F8 F13 and F18 all bases with underground hangars.
F8 and F18 are residential areas and F13 has those close by.
F9 was Gothenburg City airport but is a museum.
Only F16 remains but that wing has no fighter squadrons.
There are also the central aircraft workshops in Arboga which are underground.
SAAB also has the option to assemble its jets underground in Linköping.
Other than that hardened shelters are very rare in Sweden
I hope that it would not be too hard to "remobilze" those shelters again in a relatively short notice.
When talking protecting your planes on the ground there are two basic options.(the extremes)
A - If you are Operating from one single airfield then the enemy will know where to hit your.
But you then hardened that with air defense, EW and bunkers so the enemy need to spend a lot of resources to be sure to kill even a few planes.
B- operating from so many dispersed airfields that the enemy really don't know where your planes are and even if he with his satellites learn where your planes are on the ground, by the time he got that info to the relevant command and they launch cruise missiles, then the planes are gone.
And the Gripen is famously designed to operate dispersed from highways across the country. And to be serviced by just a few conscripts.
I fully agree that sweden should also have their main bases hardened. Because all planes need extensive service from time to time.
But Sweden can, disperse its Gripen fighters to make them a lot less vulnerable.
This is very much unlike here in Denmark where we only operate our new F35s from one base.
The F16s that are slowing starting to be retired do also operate from Bornholm as a forward base, but still need to go back to the main base for most maintenance.
(And the other "real" airports ca obviously also be used. Some like Aalborg did have F16s stationed there 20+ years ago and still do have some hardned Hangars from the cold war)
Reminded me of the underground hangars at the old Säve airforce base in Sweden, damn roof there is near 30 meters thick and hangar is 22,000 square meters large.
Early-ish in the RUclips Ukraine commentary, Lt Gen (Ret) Ben Hodges mentioned more than once that Ramstein Air Base (in particular) had a glaring shortage of anti-aircraft/missile capability. That may have changed, but might be another piece of the "hardening" equation. Great videos, Chris!
Professor Bronk speaks sense.
Again.
I love this guy.
Half of this guys predictions have been wrong so I don't see what you mean.
These kinds of "unpreparedness" videos are a great service, since you have credibility, and hopefully some decision maker will actually listen.
It's the difference between losing a majority of your fleet to a few cheap cluster munitions or losing a few aircraft to an all out air attack that may cost the enemy just as dearly. Pretty simple economics.
Another excellent interview with Dr. Bronk! Thanks for posting.
Love your interviews with Justin. Always so interesting and full of high level information.
Mothballed NATO / Naval Air Station (NAS) Keflavik has 12 hardened shelters for the entire F-15 squadron plus dispersion areas away from the airport runways for AWACS, C 130 air rescue and deployed P-3 assets. Ammunition storage areas and fuel tanks had revetments to protect this infrastructure
PS - Think USN deploys Seabees annually to inspect structures and complete basic maintenance
PS - Given winter weather, you need the ability to shelter aircraft from routine gales and other conditions
I can not speak for other NATO air forces, but the USAF is currently (or at least was) in a position of having a surplus of HAS in some places. When the mission of Ramstein AB changed in the recent past from a fighter mission to airlift there were three squadrons worth of HAS (we called them Tab Vs) left unused and unoccupied. If they have been maintained even at minimum levels they would provide protected cover for aircraft deployed there. The same could be said of the now mostly deactivated Bitburg AB. A couple of things I remember from my time stationed in Germany is that we never practiced with air defense units units when we had exercises. Unlike some NATO air forces the USAF has no organic air defense units. They have to rely on Army units to provide that function and none were ever moved in areas around the vicinity so we could practice coordination. The other thing is that when visiting other NATO bases is the almost complete lack of HAS or inadequate types. Mostly it was open topped revetment style separation or just a plain open parking ramps. Not the standard that I saw at any US base.
One thing not mentioned is the biggest vulnerabilities of NATO air forces is their runways. All the HAS protection in the world will not help if some runway cratering munitions get through and force the aircraft to stay on the ground.
Runways can be repaired pretty fast and NATO believed in it's repair capabilities during cold war.
@@orbiradio2465Not to mention that modern fighter jets don't require that much runway anymore compared to what they once did.
@JohnMckeown-dl2cl With the exception of the stuff at Lakenheath, all of the USAF HAS's in the UK are no longer owned by the UK MoD. Upper Heyford and Bentwaters were sold off completely and the airfield part of Alconbury is also gone. USAF got the RAF Regiment to defend their UK airfields with 3 1/2 squadrons of Rapier SAM (equipment and running costs paid for by the US until 1994, when the funding was cut and the RAF (USAF) SAM squadrons were disbanded). The 1/2 squadron being an operational role for the RAF's Rapier (operators) Training Unit. The NATO policy for airfield hardening was that NATO common funding would pay for the Shelters to protect 70% of the aircraft, support equipment and personnel on the base and the user nation would provide the funding for the other 30%, plus Rapid Runway Repair and Active GBAD. For Rapid Runway Repair, there was the RED HORSE squadron at Wethersfield for the USAF.
For the RAF in Germany, when the HAS Complex's were first built, two 8 launcher Bloodhound Mk 2 SAM sections were deployed to the Clutch Airfileds at Wildenrath, Buggen and Laarbruch, plus 12 L40/70 40mm Bofors guns and Ammo were placed in storage at each station, to be manned by RAF Regiment personnel sent over from the UK in time of tension (they did deploy for exercises). For RAF Gütersloh, A UK based RAF Regiment "Tigercat" SAM squadron would be deployed in time of tension. By 1976-77, the Guns had been replaced by Raiper Field Standard A (daylight only) and the Harriers had gone to Gütersloh, where they were going to fight from deployed sites. Rapier FSB with the all weather blindfire radars were deployed between 1981 and 1983, which allowed the Bloodhounds to be withdrawn to the UK (to allow the UK to provide low level cover for their own airfields with NATO funded HAS sites).
The USAF requested that 312 HAS be built in the UK at Upper Heyford. Alconbury, Bentwaters, Greenham Common and Woodbridge. By the time the first were batch were finished. the shelters planned for Greenham Common went to Lakenheath instead as the later base was getting GLCM. The RAF couldn't afford to put a Squadron of Rapier on every base that needed it to meet NATO requirements, so they put forward a plan to use Bloodhound 2 to provide cover down to 500 feet where possible and 1000 feet maximum covering all of the USAF bases and RAF bases in the same area. NATO were happy for the RAF to defend their own bases that way, but they had the view that the USA could afford to defend their own bases. RAF bases outside of the Bloodhound Coverage got a Squadron of Rapier SAM's and every RAF base with a HAS site got a squadron of Royal Engineers off the Army to repair the runways. A lot of the piles of Runway repair matting and gravel were still kicking around the last airfield I was based on 10 years ago.
The primary reason all of the HAS complex's were built between 1975 and 1990 were 1500 odd soviet fighter bombers and bombers based in the central region of the Warsaw pact. Regimental sized attacks were expected on each airfield and use of precision guided munitions were not expected in large numbers before 1980. To get to the airfields, the Soviet aircraft had to get past the low level HAWK belt first (and any Field Force GBAD assets they flew over) and then the fighters milling around at low altitude behind the HAWK belt under the control of NATO and USAF E-3's. No point attacking at medium level as the whole of West Germany above 10,000 feet was a Nike Hercules / Patriot Missile Engagement Zone.
For attacks on the UK, the only weapons were stand off missiles off the Badger and Backfires, plus a very low threat from Su-24's on the bases in eastern England (if the flew direct from captured bases).
Justin's comments about how the money gets funneled back into the economy by hiring skilled tradespeople raises a cost he didn't touch on, at least in Canada. Canada is in the midst of a massive housing crisis and one of the major obstacles in solving it that we literally don't have enough people who know how to build homes to be able to build housing fast enough to keep up. (That skills shortage is the result of decades of bad policy from both sides of the house, but it's also very real right now.) Now, I don't know how big the overlap between "knows how to build an apartment building" and "knows how to build a hardened aircraft shelter" actually *is*, but I can't imagine it's zero, either.
Which doesn't change the utility of the shelter, but it *does* substantially increase the social *cost* of those shelters, and makes the decision less straightforward than it seems from Justin's lens.
Rusbots do always tries to hide their real goals: demilitarize the west.
And this is done in various ways like enviromentalism that says the military should not have any places to train their troops because of the sensitive unique biodiversity in an area... or fake concerns about too much money being spent on the military and too little on the homeless... or talk like that you have now.
I am not saying you are a Putin troll. I am just saying that one should be much critical of such statements, and observant of a hidden agenda. And yes, military spending is competing with other resource uses in a country. And sometimes money and Manpower/brainpower will go to the military instead of the civilian sector because there is a strong national security interest for doing so. And if we did not do that we would not have an effective military, and without an effective military there is no point in paying for any military at all in the first place.
Those who knows about economics related to the housing sector also knows that more housing construction is no quick fix to give everyone affordable housing. At best could you maybe increase the national housing stock with only 5% even after you have pumped in many hundreds of billions into it.
So what is the solution then? The solution to the housing crisis is to kickstart the housing chain and encourage people to start exchanging homes with each other. Getting the elderly couple with a large house in the city to move to a smaller residence in the countryside. This would allow a young couple who are starting a family and need more space to move out of their cramped student apartment and into something larger for their growing family. And in turn, a student apartment becomes available for a student in need of an affordable place to live."
I would think of HAS as being civil engineering work, with a services component.
There is definitely overlap with other sectors in construction, but I think housing, not so much, there are numerous trades in doing housing that wouldn't be involved in a HAS project.
From those I have been in, it is just leveling ground, pouring concrete, setting up a ribbed steel prefabricated shelter, then setting up forms and pouring more concrete.
The only plumbing was for drainage, and there was no electricity at all.
On the other hand, lack of plumbing and electrical, heating or cooling aside . . . I still preferred to sleep outside on the path to the runway with nothing but a mosquito net for a blanket, and a water bottle as a pillow. Most of the year.
@@davidgoodnow269 Given what cold does to most high-performance equipment, I would assume a hardened shelter in Canada would have at least some form of heating. Of course that could be portable of some sort, but I don't imagine an F-35 would like -25C very much.
@@davydatwood3158 The obvious solution to the (now obvious to me, but I live in Texas and though I did work heavy industrial construction in South Dakota was transferred to Texas ahead of winter) would be to build with a geothermal solution. That probably would not only compete with the civilian construction market, but probably be as foreign to the thinking of Canadian parliament as the thought was to my own mind!
As a former German Soldier (231. Gebirgsjägerbattalion) as well as a year with KFOR i never thought about this Topic at all, i guess because i wasn't in the Luftwaffe but like with a lot of Problems that need fixing regarding our Military (which of course use NATO Airbases) it definitely needs more Support, especially in the current climate and after basically downstripping the Bundeswehr since the Wiedervereinigung.
But in the End, Politicians have to makese these Decisions and as usual, you can't really trust them to follow up with their Promises until they did indeed deliver.
Dispersal will also be key. Not something that has been practiced much by most forces since the Cold War
Apart from making more HASs', it would make sense to construct 'dummy ' HAS's at less cost to stretch the opposition resources.
Perhaps, but I think thermal imaging would be able to classify them as fake, even from a satellite. A fake shelter, even if built with a thin layer of concrete, would have less thermal inertia and change in temperature faster during a clear and cold night. Once the enemy has determined that, and it wouldn't take more than a few months to a year at the worst, then the fake shelters are worthless.
@@mytube001 Doubt it, not if they're covered with a metre of soil and grass and 15cm of concrete. TBH even a good layer of soil would be vastly better than the aircraft out in the open like we're seeing from both sides in Ukraine.
@@blackcatdungeonmastersfami5311 Covered in soil and grass? I thought we were talking about hardened shelters. They look like concrete tents. Plain old boring concrete. But even if you cover them with several tens of tons of soil, they would still cool at a different rate.
@@mytube001 I don't think so, not unless that layer of soil is very thin. Consider the heat equation - the rate of heat transfer is inversely proportional to the thickness of the layer between the two air spaces . The difference in temperature between inside and outside is pretty small, The difference in temperature on the outside surface is going to be minute. Yes I would agree with you if you had something like 2cm of earth over say a plastic cover. Once you get to more like 50cm of earth and 10cm of concrete, there's no way you'd be able to tell the difference between that and 50cm of earth and 80cm of concrete. But if you were worried about that you could easily compensate by painting the inside different colours.
@@blackcatdungeonmastersfami5311 At that point though isn't it just worth spending a little bit more to harden it completely? No idea of the cost differences however, even semi hardened structures might be enough to stop cluster munitions or UAS (or blast damage from a non direct strike). Hard to know the cost / benefits without having a good idea of the costs.
Your friend in Seattle Thanks!
Thanks very much, Guy!
Using prefab techniques + producing in volume (and avoiding absurd EU red tape), constructing individual shelters, should cost no more than a new car. Concrete with rebar is the most basic stuff in the world.
I have designed some systems for rapid base deployment with armored shelters. I always wonder why we don't protect assets more.
It seemed like the Ukraine invasion woke Europe up from their dream of a living in an era of no further wars (and certainly no possible existential threats to their sovereignty), and the EU/NATO is having to play catch-up militarily with the rest of the world who never had the opportunity to sleep away those years. I'm talking mainly of the NATO members who weren't spending the recommended 2% minimum of their budget on defense...one would think that the Trump years, where the lesson should have gotten through that relying on the US to be an automatic backer in any conflict wasn't a sure thing anymore, would have woken up many of those nations to the need, but it took an actual war to do that.
Also need a lot of empty decoy shelters to disguise where the planes actually are at any given moment, since anti-bunker weapons can still destroy those planes if they're located. It's just that those weapons are very expensive. So wasting them is usually an efficient use of resources.
I know where Germany might find some hardened aircraft shelters that could be refurbished. In the 1960s, my father commanded the 5th Missile Detachment just outside Dunsen, not far from Delmenhorst. We lived in WWII Luftwaffe housing and across the road, a little way into the woods, was the bunkers of the Luftwaffe base. We weren't supposed to play war there because of the possibility of live bombs and ammo, but we did.
They could just re-activate Bruggen, Laarbuch and Gutersloh...plenty of HAS there
Thanks for this video.
Australia needs to do the same, we have shelters but not that many bunker sort of shelters, we also have no ground based air defenses protecting our airbases and limited ship based air defense that is not certain to be operating near our air bases
Exactly. Next war, the Emus may well have drone assets. 😉
Yep. Bases like RAAF Amberley could be wiped out in minutes by drones launched from the surrounding area, much of which is still bushland, or residential. No extensive defensive perimeter.
Hardened Aircraft Shelters are rather cheap and rather permanent, as are most airport facilities.
Bunkering fuel and munitions is much more serious and expensive to do right, but most airbases manage to do that. (Not so much with the fuel bunkers, those inevitably leak and no one bothers to fix them!)
Airbase (and airport) defenses against drones are critically important. The only thing remotely safe and economical is [mobile-capable] laser defenses.
To defend against a serious attack, the obvious first defense is an Air Force. If a Wing of TU-122 achieve launch range with a dozen cruise missiles each, most SAM/ADA batteries are not nearly enough defense, figuring three or four missiles on each of eight to twelve vehicles, versus twelve times twelve times six inbound missiles.
Those aircraft shelters better be pretty good.
If you figure any offensive aimed at Australia would likely begin with nuclear missiles from just offshore from either submarines or converted freighters, targeting every military base, then a follow-on exactly as I described but targeted on every air-defense frigate, destroyer, and cruiser, before returning to closer-than-home forward air bases to refuel and rearm, that represents your opportunity for counter-strike (targeting the withdrawing bombers) and dispersal on return. Re-arm and prepare to defend.
If the military is *gone,* then the civilians have no other options than submit to being enslaved, or die. There is no more-valid path of resistance available to them than introducing their new government's representatives to the local biota, when entire cities can be, and probably have been, depopulated by enhanced radiation warheads, or prior introduction of a biological agent, or simply cratering roads and ringing the cities with VX.
Compare that scenario with what the People's Republic of China has done; it bought an A.E.G.I.S. Arleigh Burke-class destroyer from Australia in 2002, took delivery, and stripped it and began a crash conversion of all existing destroyers and cruisers to A.E.G.I.S., and armed them with Standard Mark-4 missiles. It then began construction of new, purpose-built, vessels in 2003/4, and dispersed the destroyers up its two major rivers while keeping the cruisers formed as Task Forces to shelter the heavily-populated coast. That program and policy created an ABM shield that can intercept every nuclear missile warhead in the arsenal of the United States of America, without reloading.
Australian population patterns offer a similar ease of defense, but Australia is very, very, far from having any slightest similar capacity.
The only countries not using HAS’s are the UK and Belgium for the F-35s. All other European F-16, F-35, EF-2000 and Tornado users are using HAS’s.
RAF do operate out of HAS's. Marham has 24 of them and the F-35's could go in them if required. Coningsby's two operational squadrons do operate out of them (29 squadron is a Training unit). Lossimouth could do with a few more being built though.
Very interesting, thanks for the video. Seems like a no-brainer to do.
Have you heard of the missing Australian C-47 call sign VH-CIZ? A descendant of one of the passengers wrote a book recently, but I think it could benefit from a more professional examination.
Reducing dependency on airbases, ala Swedish practice, or aircraft types that can operate effectively away from them, would also be public money well spent
having grown up on 2 front line air bases during the cold war, a good topic for the channel, would be to document the air power that existed. for example, one these bases had 48 HAS, providing approximately 240(48 * 5) hours of routine flying per week. multiply this by the total bases within western europe and you have a rather noisy and busy airspace. should they have all launched at the same, which occasionally did happen by intent or false alarm(maybe...?), it would of painted a rather foreboding SIGINT/RADAR image for our adversaries. i think this needs to be covered as the differences in scale are a little under appreciated in respect of todays capabilities
Hardened aircraft shelters also help against small commercial drones.
I've always thought this, it's not alot of expense compared to losing an aircraft
I'd also add to that reactivating the capability of launching jets from the autobahn.
Yes so medians would have to be redesigned, but would be invaluable incase shit really hits the fan
There are many roads in Sweden that have that capability.
Spreading out your targets is also one way to solve some of the issues, but that's only when the crisis has arisen since you can't just close public roads without side effects.
So it makes sense to have shelters, even if the shelters aren't that strong the effect of a shelter is also that it's hard to know if there's something in that shelter or not. Add a number of mock-up shelters as well and it's harder to know which ones that are important.
@@ehsnils of course. But at the end of the day it doesn't matter how many aircraft stayed safe in the shelter when there is nowwhere to launch them.
There are actually old Bundeswehr educational Films of them landing two Transalls on the autobahn at once. Search for "Ersatzpiste 1988"
It is refreshing to get a problem and solution in the same video.
Gone is the ability from the cold war of Harriers Hiding in the woods and using Roads as runways Also , as the modern replacement seems rather Bug laden
You don't need a VTOL aircraft to use highway bases necessarily.
Holy Crap Chris! !!! I have said this since at least the early 90s!
I am so glad someone else starts to say it too! 🙏
Very intersting talk.
The NATO airfield hardening program dates from 1968 after the move from the all out nuclear war from the git go Tripwire Policy was changed to Flexible Response where NATO was going to fight a Conventional war for an extended period until the war went nuclear. This mean that unlike the Tripwire war plan that had aircraft flying a one mission war from dispersed airfields with a nuclear payload, they were going to have to fly multiple missions which would require operations from a main operating base (The operations by Harrier Squadrons deployed in the field required a huge logistical tail in the shape of Motor Transport). The NATO programme, known as "Programme for the Physical Protection of Airfields" required three major parts.
1. Building of Hardened Aircraft Shelters, plus Hardened Operations Rooms, Personnel and Equipment Shelters.
2. Rapid Runway Repair Facilities.
3. Active Airfield All Weather Ground Based Air Defence (Radar controlled AA Guns or SAM)
NATO agreed to pay for enough Shelters to house 70% of the aircraft based on any airfield, the other 30% had to be funded by the nation operating the base. As for the Runway Repair and Active Airfield Defence, the user nation had to provide that. This actually caused a few problems for the USAF in the UK and Türkiye, as the USAF were not allowed to operate short range GBAD and the US Army wouldn't provide it for them. Thus they paid the British and Turks to use Rapier SAM's to do it for them.
Simple common sense and affordable.
All airbases are vulnerable - unless you have excellent SAM coverage. A standoff attack from runway denial weapons leaves everyone grounded - for a time, if not permanently.
One reason the RAF survived the Battle of Britain is that they could use dispersal airfields to launch & service fighters. Main air bases were attacked, but plenty of aircraft weren't even there.
Despite slower speed, the Harrier could at least survive away from a runway etc. I think we've forgotten just how vulnerable air bases are.
Investing in the military is important.
But I take issue with the argument of "money going back into your own economy" being used to argue in a way that it's cheaper to build the aircraft shelters than politicians think it is.
No matter where the money goes, the important part is that resources (labour and concrete) are spent on that project that have alternative uses.
And then they're gone. So it is a net loss of wealth to do this, and that loss is just as big if you use your own country's workers or another country's workers. Either you spend your resources or you spend your money to buy those resources, but in the end your country's society is poorer for it whatever you do.
The only thing that is different is that a politician can appeal to some people for giving them jobs.
That being said, I'm not against spending money on the military.
It's an insurance, and insurances cost money, but if shit hits the fan, you're very happy you have one.
It might sound ridiculous, but basically using barrage balloons with netting and/or just basically a scaffold with netting would be a quick, cheap easy way to secure fixed and rotary assets not in hardened hangars.
Basically just more of Justin Bronk, bitte und danke.
An important point is that the shelter will last through multiple generations of aircraft
Not always. I remember when Switzerland choose the F-18 over the F-16 one mayor point was, that the underground hangars needed less adaption. The F-16 was too high.
7:43 asymetric threats. Thats kinda reminds me of the early days of the SAS in north africa.
HAS have been built on most NATO airbases during the cold war
At a pinch, you can two-stack smaller (F-16 sized) fighters in a typical NATO HAS
Iraq had better built HAS than most of NATO - it didn't help them much.
What is an issue, is that supporting infrastructure, often is not protected at all
Rather than turning airbases into permanent industrial estates or even nature parks, they should be reactivated as reserve airbases as much and as quickly as possible
Oh, and improve air defence drastically
Belgium has NO land based air defence assets whatsoever (and only 2 x 16 ESSM at sea)
A Reserve Air Base certainly can be certain types of industrial park, and most could also be nature parks, as well. I have been to a couple of mostly-retired airbases that function as both civilian airports, industrial parks, and still serve as training and repair fields for military aircraft. Those simply have their own shelters and dedicated maintenance.
They don't serve as nature parks, but they do provide facilities for museums and technical schools, while the base housing was long-since sold as residential surrounded by large open fields good for sending the kids "camping."
I don't think that the Russians are likely to lose a bomber if they employ long ranged missiles against aircraft on the ground (e.g. Kh-101). They don't need to leave Russian airspace to fire them. There's also more defeat mechanisms for a HAS than just penetrating it and detonating inside. HASes might protect aircraft, or they might just force a change in munitions in which case they might not. This is the kind of question that's best looked at on a campaign level.
Correct. Protecting the weapon system, while the fuel stores, barracks, radar systems, offices, maintenance facilities and stores, bomb and missile dumps remain exposed...
@@JohnSmith-gd2fg Most of those systems on RAF bases were also hardened. Most of the RAF accommodation blocks from Pre WWII had bomb shelters in them.
I am pretty sure a thermobaric bomb carried in to an open HAS (I have rarely seen one closed, even in old photos) by a converted drone will cause substantial damage to most aircraft. But I might be wrong, it might take a mason jar full of bolts and nuts to disable a modern jet fighter for months, individually, or years if it happens a lot.
The *only* economical defense is a mobile pattern of lasers, as Russia used in Syria, and the U.S. has retrofitted to its ships as port defense.
When I heard about Russia using theirs to defend their air bases in Syria from drones and found they already had that system on the open market for more than a year, I checked the price and it was about US$1,100,000 for delivery, three-year service contract US$400,000 with supplied Russian crew and all parts and service and salaries included; so I figure that is the going rate.
I think the weak spot isnt so much the front line aircraft that an enemy would need to destroy or render inoperable with attacks on runways etc. Its the "enabler/Force multipliers", the Tankers, the AWAC, Rivert Joint etc. These are big planes, difficult to build a viable hardened shelter for and without them the frontline squadrons are deprived of range, they would be very hard to replace in a viable timeframe. Amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics.
Also missile defences might (and I stress) MIGHT not be as effective against hypersonic missiles and without AWACs, this would be even harder.
Lastly there is always special forces/sabotage attacks on airbases with long/vulnerable perimeters, this was remarkably effective at Bagram airbase in 2012 and less so at Bagram airbase in 2019.
Being based on civilian airframes, these typically have longer mission times and require less maintenance - so less time on the ground. Given the difficulty of hardening a shelter so large, decoy/spare hangars are probably a more cost effective approach.
FiAF has been reinforcing its air bases. Like go take a look at newest aerial photos of Luonetjärvi air base. Note that if the road map is marked differently then its a old picture.
Brilliant
You can even have more benefits of building and upgrading your HAS. Unemployed can be utilised and paid to do it. Some may even find it's something they can transition into. As long as it's done properly and graft and corruption can be kept out it could benefit the country on a whole especially if there is a massive economic downturn it can be used to stimulate the local economy. Contrary to what many consider the popular belief, most people want to work and will do it treated properly/correctly and paid for their labours and not exploited. This could be a WIN /WIN / WIN / WIN situation. Yeah I know there's four of them but work it out. Hell there may even be more than just four.
Seeing as HAS are not going to stop any serious attack it would make far more sense to disperse the equipment and move it around in times of tension.
Base comanders have never liked that though.
Does it really need a hardend shelter? A revetment with some kind of roof and maybe a door, which makes it impossible to detect from a satellite, which revetments are currently in use could be enough, if you have several per aircraft. Of course you would have to constantly rotate the aircrafts between the positions.
Yeah it's bizarre how cheap opaque shelters are not being used in Ukraine already. Both sides are leaving aircraft out in the open in full view were even the cheapest drones can hit them.
Thanks Christoph and Justin. Good video. Simple common sense. So … a bit hard for the majority of politicians to understand. The other issue that would obstruct central government approval is that:
there is minimal opportunity for potential election donors to corruptly inflate construction/repair costs.
The relative low cost, on the other hand, makes this option an easy way for parliamentary opposition parties to apply pressure to government ministers and cabinet as a whole🙂!
Imagine you were a major European NATO economy that only had one, medium range SAM battalion and parked all that battalion's non forward deployed equipment in a couple of hangars on a completely unhardened coastal airfield. Further imagine that you had gapped your fixed wing AEW capability with the intention of buying only three plstforms which would then be parked adjacent to a public road flanked by woodland. Furthermore your entire nuclear arsenal was stored at one base and its deployment platforms were likewise stationed at one base. You had spent lots of money on HAS and point defence SAMs only to dusband the latter completely. Of the bases equipped with HAS, you had completely abandoned many and repurposed others in ways that would impede or completely prevent flying. If that was not stupid enough, two.of your air bases were on.large grey steel floaty things usually located at a completely undefended base. This country is purely hypothetical, of course.
My first idea when reading this post was about Britain, but then on rereading I saw you mentioned it had to be a “European” country, so surely that can’t be it. After all, ever since the 2016 referendum, they made clear they feel that their island is just of the coast of the USA, not Europe.
So, who are you writing about?
@@JABN97Political idiocy doesn't trump geographical reality.
@@JABN97 The UK is still part of Europe geographically.
Until of course they tow it outside the 5-mile limit, like the Goodies did.
@@JABN97 He is totally talking about the UK!!!! One minor error, however, the HAS complex's were paid for by NATO!, including the ones on the USAF bases.
This is the kind of unsexy video which is almost certainly true and almost certainly absolutely critical
Runway denial is easier than hitting HAS. Saab Grippen, formerly Harriers are designed to mitigate this. I assumed F-35B could act in a similar way.
The Bronk has spoken!
He’s very persuasive and well spoken, I’m considering investing in a hardened structure for my car now
Sorry for my ignorance but I was just wondering, looking back at history, is the threat not as much against the runway as it is against the jet? Or are most modern jets short take off? I used to be much more informed with this sort of stuff, but my knowledge is both amateur and thirty years out of date!
Runways can be patched in a couple of hours. Replacing a jet - a lot longer.
This seems obvious. I would not have thought there was any question HAS’s need to be built.
Did you change the title?
Even besides hardened shelters, could you not have row upon row of tentlike simple covered shelters made of just cloth. If you have lets say 25 planes, and you have lets say 50 tents, with each plaje in a tent, then each strike would be a gamble possibly wasting the munition on just a tent. Shuffle the planes around every few nights, and striking them would be a big gamble and waste if the enemy does not have 24/7 surveillance.
I'm a bit dubious about the assertion that an FPV drone could not penetrate a HAS as currently extant on NATO airfields. One equipped with a PG-7 HEAT warhead would definitely penetrate the doors and could damage or even destroy the aircraft inside. It would not be difficult ti screen the doors. More problematically, it could certainly also penetrate the concrete shell of the kind of structures you see in the UK. I am not sure whatvthe answer to this is when FPV drones are so powerful and are accurate enough to enter bunker apertures etc.
A RGP-7 can punch through many hangar doors. But how much damage does a HEAT round do behind the door?
Not much, but quite possibly enough to render an aircraft inoperable for some time or possibly even destroy it.
Lokking at US Army evaluation data from 1976, presumsbly for the original grenade it mentions penetration of just over an inch of RHA at 9ft standoff from a 270m launch range (so angled significantly downward). Also that it would go through both sides of an APC and had significant behind armour effects.
So, you are saying a small warhead RPG round could penetrant a structure designed to protect against weapons weighing 500kg? This does not seem logical. Could you explain please?
@@kitbag9033 Each Door on a TAC-V HAS weighs 80 tons!!! The blast panel of the door is about a foot thick and is not tank armour. It is made up of two 5 to 10 mm thick steel plates with reinforced concrete core in-between. A HEAT round would most likely not penetrate it., however, if it could, the structure that supports the door could easily be covered with an anti RPG mesh, as could the other weak points.
Why not build 5x decoy covers and decoy planes?
Perhaps those countries buying the F-35 should include a number of Bs in their order, so they can go into the field, as RAFG's Harrier force routinely did during the Cold War.
Surplus airfields with HASs? Keep them and move the army in.
The MOD haven't left any major RAF bases with HAS on them in the UK, bar St Mawgan (who had 8 of them). Lossiemouth, Leeming, Coningsby, Marham and Honnington are still RAF Stations. Wattisham is used by the Army Air Corps, Leuchars, though an army base is still an active RAF airfield and Boscombe Down is still MOD owned. Of the USAF Bases, only Lakenheath still has them.
Kinzhal cost US10 million. F35 cost is now running at US80 million. Kinzhal can penetrate very robust hardened shelters. Range is at least 1000km from launch.
Maybe F-35 is at home, when Kinzhal arrives. Maybe it can avoid airdefence. Maybe it hits.
How hard do the airbases need to be? The other strategy is to keep relocating the airplanes like the Australian "Bare Base" concept
That works if you have a country the size of a continent, indeed.
@@pjotrtje0NL if workers can work anywhere in the Eurozone, so can fighter jets. All it would take is a treaty.
I think Professor Bronk makes some good points. However, I'm shocked by how spartan his home is. I'm assuming this is his home because of the pictures on the wall, unless he stays in airforce-themed hotels, but the tight space and mirrored wall (to give the impression of space) remind me of inner-city student slums. I pray this is the spare bedroom. My apartment is much nicer and I only have a BSc! Must be in London.
I presume he well knows how to present the space he is speaking from, he's far from being clueless.
@@JohnSmith-gd2fg What, you think it's like a cry for help? Like POWs blinking morse code during their confessions?
Seriously though, anyone at Professor Bronk's level should be better compensated.
Spartan room with nothing but a rudimentary bed and two pictures of fighter jets on the wall. Military Aviation Monk.
If tanks can have active defense, I don’t see any reason aircraft shelters can’t.
Korean construction would be a lot cheaper than German. PPP makes a large difference.
Well do we really need expensive military jets anymore if everything can be done with cheap drones.
If Nato need hardened shelters against Russia, we lost allready.
There is like zero chance Russia could ever get true a Nato countries airdefence.
But then again most Nato countries have total shitt preparation.
Russian strategists: 🤔 Noted
Привет Стратегу диванного легиона.
Had we now learn the same lessons that the troops and powers had to learn at the end of WW2?
NASAMS & IRIS-T performed miserably against cheap Geran 2 ( Shahid 136 ) let alone kh-101
a small drone can go through the air vents though can't they
Consider me a HAS-head now.
Good Idea, but it's way to common sense for our politicians to actualy do it.
Something about a "one eyed monkey hanging from a ten cent balloon".🤔
A drone swarm attack, with each drone holding a hand grenade sized explosive, could wipe out an airbase pretty simply.
No they can not!
nahh is this bismark from TBLF??
Yep
Bis18marck himself
Ukraine should be building hardened shelters now to prepare for aircraft deliveries next year.
NATO are you listening to Justin? He knows his copro..
@3:52 That's a lousy economic argument. There is no practical difference between spending on ammunition, fuel, and other expendables, and spending on hardened airfields. Both employ just as many civilians for the same amount of money, and both waste that money on unproductive diversions from the civilian economy.
yeah lets be defensless, time to wake up from the hippie dream world
Finland is bying F-35 s. that money must be think like protection money to U.S. in real Russian invaison I dont think that jets that need 2 kilometer runway could be putten into air. Too big possibility that runways are Missiled in worthles condition. Air superriority can be cained with Anti Aircraft defence and next comes Anti Tank weapons after that a Infantry.
Why waste so much money on defense I do not get it since we will always be safe as long as we got double the number of troops and a large nuclear arsenal that is larger then china if we combine the UK and France(550 nuclear warheads). The smartest decision we can do is create a single EU army so we can streamline our clusterfuck of a system.
Mass standardization and mass production then have a single stockpile of ammunition that we use. That way we can really scale up our own capability.
Our main weakness is a lack of standardization and a extremely small stockpile of smart munitions. The only way to fix those issues is with economies of scale(doing it on the EU level). 14 trillion dollars and 450 million people can do a lot more then 60 million people and 2 trillion dollars. Everything cost resources and more you got the more you can do, its a simple concept that we are incapable of understanding.
At 0:28 you mentioned that a long term Russian threat is inevitable at this stage. I would argue the opposite.
The Ukraine war has shows how weak Russia really is and only a few scraps from NATO members is enough to completely stop Russia for years. IF a NATO member was invaded then Russia would have to contend with the full support of a nuclear NATO which would immediately push Russia back to its own boarders even if a first strike was delivered on every major air base in Europe. This isnt the 1960s Warsaw pact anymore and Russia is showing us that it is somewhat of a regional power but not a global one or global super power like a lot of people like to believe for some reason.
Population density of most European countries is 100-500 per Sq km. Russia - 9 per Sq km. You'll die just faster than Russians.
Hmm the point about substituting the budget for 1-2 aircraft for cover for a whole base, Lockheed Martin is not gonna like that. This might sound absurd but wouldn't it sound like a dream to Lockmart if they get another massive contract for a whole bases worth of fighters in the case one gets attacked?
I'm not entirely sure the need is that big though because at the end of the day NATO airpower in Europe is basically Ramstein which is seriously built up with bunkers and munitions stores and heavily defended perimeter. I don't think NATO would base that close to the front so early days and they'd just do air to air refuelling over Germany if range was a problem. Some dispersal would take place but most the frontline CAS is going to get done by helicopters anyway and they don't operate from hardened aircraft hangers
no they should not fix it
Algorithm.
Dear Professor isn't the air war really about smart missiles now? .. its a brave pilot who takes to the sky these days .. fighter jets no longer rule the skies . Ukrainian pilots revealed that early on it was he who locked on first lived and the other pilot died .. guess who mostly died ? Ukrainians . And these hardened shelters .. how hard are the hangar doors? 2 feet of concrete or just plain old sheet steel ? Also a jet inside a HAS is of little use an asset . It has to be out there fighting .The Swedes are on the money .. the Grippen jet is the way to go ..operate from anywhere . Also versions of the Harrier like the F35B might also be useful . Sitting in a hardened bunker and hoping the Russians don't penetrate the HAS is fanciful . When did castle walls ever stop invaders ? As an Englishman you should know the answer .We are in a different world now . Russia is showing what a MODERN WAR looks like ...attrition like WW1 .. economics, supply lines,large population , industrial capacity away from the front .. friends with productive capacity . This is not Iraq or Vietnam or Afghanistan . where you can bomb the peasants ....this is RUSSIA (+CCP CHINA and NK ) all nuclear armed to the teeth. Ukraine is getting NOWHERE against defence lines in eastern Ukraine ..folks aren't fooled ..its a war of military and economic attrition and you know what? ..Russia going to win ..like they always do ..well sans Afghanistan ...because they pay the price ...The backbone of support is really just the USA and they will tire of support n 2024 . Putin knows this .. no I don't like it either . God help Ukraine if Trump gets in .. its game over for Ukraine .
Does Justin work for a construction company?