IAF Exercise Gagan
Shakti 2018 - Simple Attrition Estimates
The
Indian Air Force Conducted its recent Exercise Gagan Shakti 2018 in April 2018.
It was an exercise to learn meaningful lessons in a short and intense battle
scenario. According to the press release, “lAF exercised its entire war fighting machinery to
validate its concept of operations and war waging capability”. It is also
claimed that, “During the exercise, more than 11000 sorties were flown, which
include approx 9000 sorties by fighter aircraft”.
This short article analyses the
possible distribution of these combat sorties within the constraints of each
type of aircraft available to Indian Air Force and it also tries to give estimates
on possible attrition or aircraft losses in such war scenarios. By no means,
the author claims this to be an authentic estimate and it’s not from any
official source. However, within the range of different constraints, historical
attrition rates, potential capabilities of adversaries and characteristic of
such an air war scenario, we present an estimate of likely losses IAF will
suffer in its combat aircraft.
Combat
Sorties Distribution
Using the modified Sortie Rate Generation Model described
earlier, we estimate the daily sortie rate for each of the IAF
aircraft in Strike role and Air Defence (AD)/Combat Air Patrol (CAP) role. The
numbers, sortie rates and number of sorties generated in 3 days of intense
operations are given in the following Tables. We assume that IAF will deploy
365 aircraft for Strike/Attack roles and 298 for AD/CAP roles. Further the
number of sorties as per our assumptions will be 4800 in Strike and 4089 in
Defence/CAP roles.
Estimating
Attrition of Combat Aircraft
The war envisaged in Gagan Shakti
2018 has two phases. In Phase I, the focus was on western side and in Phase II,
the war operations had to be shifted to eastern side. Potential scenario
envisaged in that the war starts with Pakistan and then China joins in and
starts an intense air operation. India must quickly respond by shifting part of
its assets from western flanks to Eastern flanks.
Our aim in this article, however,
is to estimate the potential loss of aircraft (attrition) that may emerge. Typically, aircraft attrition rates are used
based on sorties. For example, if you have 20 aircraft and each does 3 sorties
per day, potentially you will have 60 sorties in a day. The attrition rate
defines the probability of loss in each sortie, given in percentages. In
intense air wars, an attrition rate of 2% to 3% has been utilized based on
historical data from 20th century wars. Air wars, after 1991
Gulf-War and especially in the 21st century have been one sided as
the air assets of the adversaries have been asymmetric. In an India-Pakistan
and India-China war, it will be symmetric in the sense that all the three
countries will have much more evolved air assets, doctrines, capabilities and
technologies.
We estimate these attrition rates per sortie may vary from 1% to 5%.
Envisaging these ranges we 
calculate the potential losses on the base of number
of sorties estimated above for each type of aircraft in strike and air defence
roles. It can be seen, that at 5% attrition rate, we will lose half of our
aircraft in the scenario envisaged. However, we estimate such extreme loss may
not be likely. In fact, at 2% loss per sortie, 88 strike aircraft and 75 Air
Defence aircraft will be lost, making the total loss to 163. This means a loss
of about 25% of the total 663 aircraft estimated above.
calculate the potential losses on the base of number
of sorties estimated above for each type of aircraft in strike and air defence
roles. It can be seen, that at 5% attrition rate, we will lose half of our
aircraft in the scenario envisaged. However, we estimate such extreme loss may
not be likely. In fact, at 2% loss per sortie, 88 strike aircraft and 75 Air
Defence aircraft will be lost, making the total loss to 163. This means a loss
of about 25% of the total 663 aircraft estimated above.
Given the role, capabilities and technology we estimate, a likely
scenario for each type of aircraft in specific role. For example, Jaguar being
a strike a aircraft will most likely have to bear the brunt with 3% attrition
rate and Mig-27 may be even higher or 4% per sortie. Mirage 2000 and Su30MKI
will go as strike packages with Jaguars and Mig-27s and also as Escorts.
Potentially, there much better stand-off capability and technology will keep
their attrition rates at the low of 2% and 1% respectively, in the strike role.
In the AD/CAP roles, we believe the attrition rates of all will be at 1%.
However, we envisage Mig21s being older and limited in different aspects, may
face higher attrition rates of 2%.
Thus, in the Most likely
scenario, the picture emerges as below. IAF will lose a total of 99 aircraft in
strike role and a total of 54 aircraft in defence role. This results in a loss
of 153 aircraft that is slightly less than 163 that we calculated at uniform 2%
attrition rate. 23% loss of aircraft is substantial.
The
Overall Picture
One aspect that emerges from the above analysis is that the 3 days
air war envisaged in Gagan Shakti 2018 will be intense and unprecedented
because of the scale and symmetrical capabilities of both sides. It will result
is heavy losses on both sides. It also
gives us a clear indication of the role of stand-off weapons and modern
aircraft to minimize the attrition and increase the rate of sorties. Further,
we need to look at the key changes from the last century air war that need to
be incorporated in the type of force structure and assets IAF should have.
Last
century air combat especially when both sides have almost equivalent strengths
including air defences and air superiority assets along with C4ISR capabilities
will result in these sort of attrition rates. Last two decades with new type of
systems and warfare in place with extensive Beyond Visual Range, stand -off
attack weapons and comprehensive navigation and stealth components these
numbers and attrition rates need to be worked out. Various simulations may give
some indications. However, given the increasing density and tempo of warfare -
everyone need to solve this equation of minimization of attrition with
maximization of concentration of effective lethality. One can see how US/Allies
achieved it in 1991 gulf war.
IAF
still seems to be playing the old game of traditional air warfare going by the
response of 9000 sorties in 3 days. There are much better alternatives now of
contact-less combat, unmanned, robotic and stand-off options where the less
number of combat sorties will need to be backed up by more number of non-combat
sorties. Just to clarify though, even Pakistan and China will also have the
same attrition rates if they haven't evolved their air war doctrine with newer
technologies used effectively in an innovative manner.
Key Message
Exercise Gagan Shakti 2018, while
demonstrating a commendable and massive ability of Indian Air Force to generate
11000 sorties in 3 days, gives an indication of how much the IAF doctrine is
manned aircraft based. It may be prudent
to create a force structure with stand-off, more “effective and precision
lethality” assets and estimate and plan the minimum number of aircraft sorties.
The optimization problem in mathematical terms can be articulated as - Minimize
the number of manned combat sorties and inflict effective lethality at the
least cost. Investing in simpler platforms with longer ranges, precision,
automated and hypersonic weapons with the added assets in C4ISR may be the
key.
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