Arguably, the first few seconds of a fight are the most important.
With most dogfights lasting less than a minute, whoever grabs the advantage in the first few seconds usually wins. Ideally, you want to start the fight with an advantage, such as directly behind slightly low in his blind 6 o'clock position, usually that's not an option and you find yourself closing head-to-head with the bad guy.
At the merge you have a choice: enter a knife fight and rely on your turn performance to win the day (the angles fight), or use superior energy and hit-and-run tactics (the energy fight). Every fight is different, and an aircraft designed for angles fighting may find itself better suited for an energy fight. How do you decide which to use?
First, estimate your turn performance versus your opponent's. Being at and maintaining your corner speed means squat if the bandit can out-perform your best turn. Second, estimate your energy status. If you enter a fight 200 or 300 kts above your corner speed, don't merely waste all of that energy and decelerate to corner, initiate an energy fight and make use of that power. A well-flown energy fight is difficult to beat, as proven in Vietnam by F-4 pilots flying against MiG-17 and MiG-21 opponents.
Ask any combat pilot and he'll tell you the same thing: "If you get into a scissors fight, you screwed up."
A scissors is a series of reversing turns where each aircraft turn back towards each other, each trying to force the other out in front. A scissors usually begins when the attacker realizes he's going to overshoot. The defender sees the imminent overshoot and reverses his turn back toward the attacker too early, thus resulting in a fairly
neutral pass. If you're an attacker, the only way you can get into a scissors duel is by screwing up and overshooting. If you're offensive, scissoring should be the last thing on your mind. If you're defensive,
you already screwed up. Reversing into a scissors indicates the attacker also made a mistake, but you compounded your error by
reversing too soon and wasting the advantage.
Once in a scissors, there's nothing to do but keep the G high and keep turning into the bandit. Of course, this bleeds speed and energy horrendously. Ideally, the "winner" of a scissors match forces thebandit ahead of him while still having enough energy to bring his nose to bear. More often, one aircraft stalls out and plummets earthward. If the other aircraft has any semblance of energy left it rolls, dives on the bandit, and shoots it before it recovers.
Alternatively, the participants may begin a series of barrel rolls instead of break turns. This maintains some energy due to the
altitude/speed tradeoffs, but is far from an ideal solution. Each time the aircraft cross, they risk both collision and gunfire. Passing too far apart allows your opponent a guns snapshot while passing too close
usually results in a crash. In short, scissoring is not good.
If you find yourself in a scissors, how do you get out? In a guns only environment, executing a split-S immediately after crossing your opponent's tail usually does the trick. If you can rapidly increase and
maintain speed, you can extend beyond his gun range. Executing a split-S in a missile environment invites a heat seeker up your
exhaust. If you can't get outside the bandit's weapon range, then you have to win the scissors fight. If you can't win the fight by out-turning the bandit, you're dead.
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