I know I’m a week late, but it was stated last Friday that the Ukrainian Air Force successfully shot down a second Beriev A-50 ‘Mainstay’ Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS), the latest in a long string of aircraft losses in their 3-day special military operation in Ukraine.
Disclaimer: I’ve been working on this post for a week, but Ukraine won’t stop shooting down Russian fighter jets long enough for me to post it. As a matter of fact, they shot down another Su-34 as I was finishing up this post.
What is an AWACS?
In short, an Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) is a special plane with a big a** radar dome stuck on the top. They’re mounted on big airplanes like the Boeing E-3 Sentry (based on the old Boeing 707). Their radar monitors the airspace in a large area (hundreds of miles) for friendly and enemy aircraft, cruise missiles, and pretty much anything else in the sky (including birds).
How Did Ukraine Shoot It Down?
At first, I figured this shootdown was the work of the mysterious roaming Patriot battery near the front lines that keeps downing Russian jets, but it is reported that it was actually an ancient Soviet S200 SAM system. I’m totally speculating here, but here’s what I think happened:
Ukraine strikes air defense radar installations along and near the frontlines. In order to try to maintain their aviation operations, the Russians call their A-50 forward to augment the radar coverage. Ukraine then takes the opportunity to take out the A-50.
If this is actually accurate, it poses the question: what will Russia do next? Will they bring another A-50 to the front lines and risk losing another one? I guess only time will tell.
Why Is This Shootdown So Important?
In short, this is a really special airplane. Russia had 9 in pre-war service. Now they have 7, assuming all 9 were originally operational. To put that in perspective, the US Air Force has 31 E-3 Sentry AWACS in its fleet (with NATO having an additional 17), and the Navy has 55 of the smaller carrier-based E-2 Hawkeye AWACS. (Not to mention the incoming E-7 Wedgetails).
The A-50 is based on the Ilyushin Il-96 strategic airlifter. The Il-96 is still being manufactured, but it is unclear if the A-50 is still being made. If not, it’s unlikely that production lines could be started in time to replace these losses. So unless India will sell them one of theirs, they might just be out of luck.
Nuclear War
I’m working on a post about the risks of Russia using nuclear weapons in Ukraine, and why they won’t. Hopefully I’ll have that done soon.