Saturday, November 22, 2008

Forum :: Equipment :: Commanche

Page 1 of 1 Commanche
Author	Oldest to Newest

Sickle1001 Joined: 06 June 2005 Posts in this thread: 1	Posted on 12 September 2005 11:07 PM I was wondering if anyone could tell me why the Commanche was cancelled when now the army has to rely on the 20year old Apache. Which is a nice helicopter but is unstealthy and is a cold war relic, (which Rumsfield said about the Commanche.) If it a budget thing I'm sure that the current armed services budget of 420 billion dollars could have accomendated it. Post Reply
Ghauri1003 Joined: 29 June 2005 Posts in this thread: 2	Posted on 13 September 2005 1:27 AM I wondered this myself. About a year ago I was looking this baby up on the internet and reading a few books in the library etc about its development. From what I can gather the Comanche lost its appeal because of the expense of the program. Mainly the cost of making the helicopter 'stealthy' was to much. I believe the US decided that it had no need for a stealth helicopter in the new conflicts it would be fighting in. Now days, especially in Iraq, helicopters are the new call-up precision artillery. They need to be able to withstand heavy ground fire and be able to deliver their ordanance with pin piont accuracy mostly in urban enviroments. Basically, they are a support weapon, an airborne mop if you will. By the time they come into action most radar and S.A.M. sights would be deemed to have been destroyed by missile and airstrikes. So the need for stealth is not there. A large percentage of the development program's budget was spent on making the comanche stealth, and the increased production costs were to high to maintain. Bit sad really as she has the looks of a kick arse chopper, and would no doubt prove very useful but not cost effective. On the other hand you have the Apache which is a proven weapons platform, can take alot of punishment and looks tough to boot. To be honest I aways thought they should follow the turbine hoverers depicted in the 'Terminator' movies. And just for added effect have loud speakers playing the Terminator theme tune. Those things would really freak out the enemy. Post Reply
Nimrod1001 Joined: 04 February 2005 Posts in this thread: 1	Posted on 13 September 2005 7:25 AM Commanche was never a replacement for the Apache. Rather it was supposed to replace the Kiowa scout helicopters, and with the enhanced capabilities that it would have provided, allowed helicopter groups to be faster and more capable. What really killed Commanche was the UAV. For the primary mission of this helicopter, scouting, a UAV is superior. You don't risk a pilot, you can have several UAV for the same cost, and UAV provide longer times on station and superior stealth to any helicopter, no matter how sexy looking. Commanche could also perform air to ground roles, but I think the death knell for this program was spelt the first time they dropped a hellfire onto a terrorist from a Predator . The UCAV concept was proven to work. A Commanche could not have done what UAV's did that day. Locating and killing from long range without the enemy knowing they were under attack. You can hear a Commanche, but a predator at 5km is almost invisible and silent. I think the Commanche was a very sexy machine, but far, far too expensive as just a scout machine. Sure, it had cannon and hellfire, but Longbow already has the strike role covered, and usually struck targets located by other assets (I.E. NOT located first by the Kiowa scouts the commanche was going to replace). If Commanche had a reasonable pricetag, and had been ready before reliable UAV and UCAV, it would have gone into service. Post Reply
Ghauri1003 Joined: 29 June 2005 Posts in this thread: 2	Posted on 14 September 2005 2:03 AM Well that makes sense. I was right about the expensive part, but looks like I made 1 + 1 = 4563.5643. I could have sworn I read that Apache was going out to make room for the Comanche. I tell ya, if the U.S. can work out a way of fighting wars without losing any human lives they will have the fight won. Absolute dominance, and they will be able to do anything. Post Reply
Wotan1002 Joined: 02 October 2005 Posts in this thread: 1	Posted on 31 October 2005 12:03 PM Comanche was a very expensive project and obsolete in terms of crew survivability, weapon systems and heavily influenced by the cold war. If something can be done by unmanned platforms it has no sense to put someone in danger. Post Reply
1

Copyright © 2003 - 2008 deagel.com. All Rights Reserved.