Day of the Cheetah

Glossary

All terms in this Glossary are actual terms, weapons, or systems unless designated “fictional.”

AA-11 — NATO reporting name “Archer,” advanced Soviet close-range heat-seeking or radar-guided air-to-air missile. Carried by MiG-29 (can carry six), MiG-23 (cames two), and Su-27 fighters (carries four).

AAA — anti-aircraft artillery. Also called triple-A.

ADIZ — Air Defense Identification Zone. Specially marked areas around the United States where aircraft from outside the United States must receive permission from air traffic control before entering.

AEROFLOT — The national airline of the Soviet Union. Aeroflot has a major role in the Soviet Union’s military strategy and planning — all Aeroflot aircraft can be expected to serve under military command in wartime.

AFTERBURNER — A throttle setting in a high-performance jet engine where extra fuel is sprayed into an engine chamber to increase thrust. The use of afterburner increases the rate of fuel consumption by 500 % but can double or triple the engine’s thrust.

AGL — Above Ground Level. The actual distance between the aircraft’s belly and the ground. Usually measured by a radar altimeter.

AGM-88 HARM — HARM stands for High-speed Anti-Radiation Missile. The AGM-88 is an air-launched anti-radar missile built by Texas Instruments, Inc., that homes in on enemy ground or ship radars and destroys them from ranges as far as ten miles.

AGM-130 — An air-launched rocket-powered glide bomb built by Rockwell International. Guided by infrared or TV camera, by manual data-link guidance or automatic target lock-on, it has a two-thousand-pound high-explosive warhead and can glide for two to five miles, even when launched from very low altitude.

AGM-132C TACIT RAINBOW — An air-launched winged drone anti-radar missile built by Boeing Aircraft. The missile can be pre-programmed for certain enemy radars and launched from long distances. The missile will cruise to and then orbit the target area until an enemy radar comes up, then home in on it and destroy it.

AIM-9R SIDEWINDER — Primary U.S. heat-seeking air-to-air missile, built by Raytheon Company and Ford Aerospace. It has a speed of over Mach two (twice the speed of sound) and a range of more than ten miles.

AIM-120C AMRAAM — Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile, a radar-guided missile built by Hughes Aircraft and Raytheon. The AIM-120 has its own radar seeker in its nosecone — unlike other radar-guided missiles, the AIM-120 does not need guidance signals from the launch aircraft to home in on its target. It has a top speed of over Mach four.

AIM-132B ASRAAM — Advanced Short-Range Air-to-Air Missile — The proposed European-built successor to the MM-9 Sidewinder.

AIRWAY — Pre-planned routes to be followed by large or commercial aircraft entering, leaving or flying within the United States under positive control. Three kinds: “A” routes (from foreign or overwater points), “V” (for low altitude), or “J” (for higher-altitude aircraft).

ALPHA — Stands for “angle of attack,” the angle, measured in degrees, between the wind hitting an aircraft’s wing and the angle of the wing itself. A plane exceeding a certain angle of attack will stall (cease to fly). Most high-performance aircraft cannot fly at more than eighteen to twenty alpha, but advanced fighters will be designed to fly and attack at well over fifty alpha.

ANTARES (FICTIONAL) — Advanced Neural Transfer and Response System. A method for digitizing and transmitting neural impulses from the human body to a computer, and vice versa.

ATF — Advanced Tactical Fighter. A program developed to specify, design and build the next generation of fighter aircraft, beginning in the year 1992 and continue well into the twenty-first century. The ATF (X-22 or X-23) will use non-metallic materials in its construction, rely heavily on artificial intelligence and advanced computer graphics in the cockpit, fly in unconventional ways, fly at supersonic speeds without afterburner, and take off and land on a fifteen-hundred-foot-long runway.

AWACS — Airborne Warning And Control System. An aircraft-mounted radar that can scan for aircraft at any altitude out to two hundred miles and control air-to-air intercepts and engagements with enemy forces with a wide array of communications equipment.

BIG CHICKEN DINNER — BCD, or Bad Conduct Discharge.

BOGEY — Fighter pilot slang for unidentified aircraft.

BREAKAWAY — An emergency term used during air refueling when the two aircraft must separate quickly. The tanker aircraft will immediately accelerate and climb five hundred feet, and the receiver aircraft will immediately decelerate and descend five hundred feet.

BUS — In electronics, the point at which power is supplied to numerous other circuits.

C-21B — The military version of the Gates Learjet 35A, it is a ten-person fast airlift jet used by the U.S. Air Force. Can be used for up to eight passengers, three thousand pounds of cargo, or in aeromedical evacuation role.

CANARDS — Movable fins or stabilizers mounted on the front of an aircraft to provide additional lift, turning power, or supplement performance of the main wings.

CAP — Combat Air Patrol. Arranging fighters in a defensive or offensive role at various altitudes and configurations to counter an enemy threat.

CAYMAN ISLANDS — A small chain of islands southwest of Cuba in the Caribbean Sea, self-governed but administered by the British government.

CBU — Cluster Bomb Unit. A canister carried by a fighter or bomber that dispenses small bomblets over wide areas. Used against columns of troops, parked aircraft, or lightly armored vehicles.

CHAFF — small pieces of metal, like tinsel, that reflect radar energy and act as a decoy to enemy radars or radar-guided missiles.

COMPOSITE — A material made from metallic and non-metallic substances to increase the material’s strength without adding weight.

CONNECTICUT ACADEMY (FICTIONAL) — KGB training facility that teaches young Russian agents how to act like Americans.

“CRANKED ARROW” F-16 — A special version of the U.S. F-16 Fighting Falcon fighter built by General Dynamics, the “cranked arrow” resembles a large delta-winged fighter. The larger wing increases fuel load, weapons carriage, and stability.

CV-22 OSPREY — A special tilt-rotor aircraft built by Boeing and Bell Helicopter that uses two movable rotors to take off and land like a helicopter but flys like a regular airplane.

DIA — Defense Intelligence Agency. A special Pentagon unit that conducts investigations for personnel security clearances and coordinates intelligence gathering, analysis and dissemination for the Department of Defense.

DREAMLAND — Unclassified nickname for the restricted military airspace in south-central Nevada used by the Departments of Defense and Energy and the Central Intelligence Agency for special weapons research.

E-3B SENTRY — Modified Boeing 707-320B airliner with a thirty-foot diameter rotating saucer radome mounted atop the fuselage, plus extensive computer displays and communications systems. Primary U.S. and western reconnaissance, command and control system. Can track hundreds of aircraft and ships at any altitude. Can fly one thousand miles to and from a patrol area and then stay on patrol for six hours.

EEG — Electroencephalograph. Measures electrical activity in the brain and central nervous system.

EET — Eastern European Time.

F-15E — Modified McDonnell-Douglas F-15 air superiority fighter, with a weapons system officer and extensive air-to-ground attack systems added.

F-16F — FIGHTING FALCON — Lightweight single-engine, single pilot counter-air and attack fighter, built by General Dynamics. Designed for high maneuverability and flexibility and able to carry a wide variety of weapons.

F-20 TIGERSHARK — Modified Northrop F-5F fighter with single-engine and single pilot. Emphasis on simplicity and low-cost maintainability.

F/A-18 HORNET — U.S. Navy carrier-based interceptor and attack fighter, built by McDonnell-Douglas. Can change from air-to-air to air-to-ground attack role while in-flight.

FAST PACK — Fuel Armament Storage Tank Packs. Smoothly curved conformal tanks fitted to the upper side fuselages of F-15 fighters to allow them to carry extra fuel and equipment without a significant drag penalty.

FLARES — Pyrotechnic magnesium or phosphorous devices ejected from tactical aircraft to decoy heat-seeking missiles.

FOX ONE — Call made by an attacking fighter to friendly forces to warn of a radar-guided missile launch.

FOX TWO — Warning call for heat-seeking missile launch.

G — Measurement of gravitational forces imposed on something. One G is normal gravity (weight); two G’s is two times normal weight, etc. Zero G is weightlessness. Negative G’s cause reversal of normal fluid motion in blood vessels or aircraft fuel systems. A trained human being can withstand as much as six positive G’s before experiencing gray- or blackout, or as much as negative-three G’s before red-out. Excessive G’s (positive or negative) cause unconsciousness.

GCI — Ground Controlled Interception. Ground-based radars and controllers used to direct fighters to attack enemy aircraft.

GEOSTATIONARY ORBIT — An orbit of a satellite approximately 22,300 miles above Earth, where the time for the satellite to orbit the Earth is equal to the Earth’s rotation. If the satellite is placed above the equator, the satellite will seem to hang motionless in space over the same point on Earth.

GPS — Global Positioning System. A system of satellites around Earth that provide highly precise position, speed and time information to aircraft, ships, vehicles and ground troops. Position information precise to four feet, speed information precise to one-quarter-mile per hour, time precise to one-hundredth of a second.

GRAY-OUT — Condition during high-G maneuvering where blood is forced out of the brain, causing a gradual loss, darkening, or tunneling of vision. Excessive G’s cause complete gray-out (blackout) and unconsciousness.

GUARD — Internationally established and recognized emergency radio frequencies. VHF GUARD is 121.5; UHF GUARD is 243.0.

HF — High Frequency radio. Used for extreme long-distance communications (being replaced in USAF by SATCOM).

HH-3 JOLLY GREEN GIANT — Modified Sikorsky CH-3 Sea King helicopter, used for deep-penetration rescue missions into heavily defended areas.

HH-65A DOLPHIN — Aerospatiale SA-366G-1 Dauphin II utility helicopter, used for medium-range personnel and cargo transport and rescue operations.

HIGH-G YO-YO — An air combat maneuver where a less maneuverable but more powerful pursuer can attack a more maneuverable opponent by executing a dive, then a hard climb and descent to bring weapons in line for an attack instead of trying to outmaneuver the opponent.

HOTAS — Hands On Throttle And Stick. A carefully designed feature in many new high-performance fighters that logically arranges all necessary switches on the pilot’s control stick and throttle for easy activation in busy combat situations.

HUD — Heads-Up Display. Usually a large piece of glass mounted atop the instrument panel in a fighter aircraft, used to reflect projected information in front of the pilot’s line of sight. All necessary flight and weapons information is thereby presented to the pilot without having to look down inside the cockpit.

HYPERVELOCITY MISSILE — A simple, low-cost missile with no explosive warhead, designed to destroy targets by sheer force of impact. Speed of these missiles can exceed a mile a second. Warhead is usually a dense depleted uranium material that increases force on impact.

I.P. — Initial Point, the beginning of a bomb run. Usually the weapons officer or bombardier has control of the aircraft from the I.P. to the target.

ICU — Intensive Care Unit.

IFF — Identification Friend or Foe. A radio system that broadcasts specific bits of data “on demand” by compatible radar-radio systems that properly “interrogate” the system. The data are usually identification, altitude and airspeed data. Used by civilian and military agencies.

ILS — Instrument Landing System. Precise glide path (heading) and glideslope (altitude) radio beam system, widely used by civilian and military aircraft to line up with a runway for landing in bad weather. The bombing computers of military strike aircraft can sometimes simulate an ILS when no ground-based ILS is available.

ILYVsuIN-76 — NATO reporting name MAINSTAY. Soviet version of the American E-3 Airborne Warning And Control System (AWACS) radar plane.

IMMELMANN — Air combat maneuver where an aircraft can change or reverse direction rapidly without a wide, sweeping turn. Usually made by executing a steep climb, rolling inverted into the desired direction, then rolling upright.

INS — Inertial Navigation System. Precise navigation unit that uses accelerometers (precise electronic pendulums) to detect and quantify all aircraft motion and compute exact position and speed.

IR — Infrared (heat) energy.

IRSTS — Infrared Search and Track System. Used by the Soviet Union on fighter aircraft in conjunction with GCI search radar to collect attack information to launch air-to-air missiles from long range without transmitting radar information that can be detected.

JP-4 — Standard U.S. military jet fuel.

JUDY — Code word to ground or airborne controllers from fighter pilots that a designated target has been detected (either by radar or visually) and that the fighter pilot is continuing the attack alone.

KC-10 EXTENDER — McDonnell-Douglas DC-10 airliners modified for inflight refueling and heavy cargo transport. Able to carry all the men and equipment of an entire deployed fighter squadron for five thousand miles, including non-stop inflight refueling for the unit’s fighters.

KC-135 — Boeing 707 airliner modified for inflight refueling and light to medium cargo duties.

KGB — Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti (Committee for Internal Security). The intelligence-gathering unit and secret police of the Soviet Union.

KOLLEGIYA — The main military council of the Ministry of Defense of the Soviet Union, responsible for military implementation of the policies of the Politburo and the Communist Party.

LLUYKA TANKS — Specialized fuel tanks carried by non-air-refuelable aircraft that are fitted with retractable refueling probes to give these aircraft the ability to refuel inflight.

M-16/M203 — Standard U.S. infantry automatic rifle. The M-203 is a lightweight forty-millimeter grenade launcher fitted under the barrel of the M-16 rifle that can fire high-explosive rounds out to twelve hundred feet without impeding use of the rifle itself.

MAW — Mission-Adaptive Wings. Wings that can change the shape of their upper, leading and trailing edge surfaces to improve performance without the use of “hanging” devices such as flaps and slats.

MFD — Multi-Function Display. A series of computer monitors in an aircraft that replace or augment conventional aircraft instruments. Most MFDs can be programmed to display a wide variety of information in text or graphic form.

MIKOYAN-GUREYVICH — MiG. One of the many government aircraft design bureaus of the Soviet Union. Others are Sukhoi (Su), Ilyushin (Il), Yakovlev (Yak), Tupolev (TL), Beriev (Be), Antonov (An), and Mil (Mi).

MIL — Military power throttle setting. Usually one hundred percent or more of an engine’s rated thrust.

MODES AND CODES — An aircraft properly displaying coded IFF data that are being received by a ground or airborne surveillance controller able to scan for these signals.

NRTS — Near-Room-Temperature Superconductors. A specially designed composite material able to demonstrate unusually high rates of electrical conductivity at normal “room” or operational temperatures. Most materials exhibit superconducting capabilities only at super-cold temperature levels. NRTS devices can transmit high amounts of energy without relying on large or bulky power generators or large environmental units.

NSC — National Security Council. A group that advises the President of the United States on a wide range of national security matters.

POLITBURO — Politicheskoye Buro (Political Bureau). The key policy-making body of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, directing the work of the Party between plenums (biannual meetings) of the Central Committee. Composed of not more than fifteen persons, they are chosen by the 307 voting and 107 candidate (non-voting) members of the Central Committee.

PULSE-DOPPLER — Long-range radar tracking system that detects changes in relative motion of a target.

RAMENSKOYE — Chief aircraft design and test center of the Soviet Union, located in west-central Asia near Moscow.

RAPIER — British-built surface-to-air missile air-defense system, developed by British Aerospace Dynamics. Self-contained, mobile, low- and medium-altitude capable to a range of five miles.

ROE — Rules of Engagement. Set of rules established before an air-to-air engagement that spells out exactly when and how a fighter pilot can begin and carry out an attack.

SA-7 — NATO code name “Grail.” Soviet shoulder-launched heat-seeking missile used mainly against helicopters and slow, low-flying jets. Range eighty- to five-thousand-foot altitude, five to six miles, speed of missile Mach one point five.

SA-8 — NATO code name “Gecko.” Soviet short-range surface-to-air missile. Highly mobile, all-weather capability from one hundred to twenty thousand feet, out to eight miles range. Missile speed Mach two.

SA-10 — NATO code name “Grumble.” Strategic (fixed-base) high-performance Soviet surface-to-air missile. All-altitude, all-weather capability. Can intercept aircraft, cruise missiles, tactical ballistic missiles and some intercontinental strategic missile warheads.

SA-15 — Highly mobile improved version of the SA-8 surface-to-air missile.

SAC — Strategic Air Command. U.S. Air Force major command responsible for strategic nuclear, refueling, and reconnaissance forces (aircraft and land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles).

SATCOM — Satellite Communications. A radio data-link network that sends coded information to a time-sharing relay satellite for rebroadcast to Earth stations. High-speed, secure global communications capability.

SCISSORS — An air combat maneuver designed to prevent an unintentional overrun of a pursued aircraft. When an aircraft being pursued begins to slow or make sharp maneuvers to cause a pursuing aircraft to overshoot, the pursuer can begin several wide side-to-side turns to avoid overtaking the pursued aircraft without decreasing power.

SMG — Submachine Gun.

SMTD — STOL/Maneuverability Technology Demonstrator. A program developed to explore new technologies for advanced fighter aircraft to decrease takeoff and landing distances and increase maneuverability by the use of canards, mission-adaptive wings, vectored-thrust engines, computers and improved performance engines. The F-15 SMTD was one of the first high-tech fighter aircraft (precursor of the Cheetah). See STOL.

SR-71 — Extremely high-altitude (hundred thousand feet), highspeed (Mach three) strategic reconnaissance aircraft, the fastest air-breathing aircraft on Earth. Can photograph one hundred thousand square miles of the Earth’s surface an hour.

STALL — A condition when a wing can no longer produce lift. Usually occurs when airflow on top of an airfoil (wing) is disrupted or breaks free from the airfoil by slow speed, low power or high alpha (angle-of-attack) flight conditions.

STOL — Short Takeoff and Landing. A combination of high-lift wings and vectored-thrust engines to produce very short (less than one-thousand-foot) takeoff and landing distances, three hundred to five hundred percent shorter than normal.

SUPERCOCKPIT — A combination of computer graphics, multifunction displays, high-speed computers, voice-recognition and sight-pointing switch-activation systems that improve efficiency, integrate numerous battle management information sources and decrease pilot workload in a modern combat aircraft’s cockpit.

TACAN — Tactical Air Navigation. A ground or aircraft based radio used mainly by the military to provide distance and bearing information between two aircrafts or between an aircraft and a ground station.

TOW — Tube-launched Optically tracked Wire-guided. An antitank missile launched from ground or airborne vehicles.

TR-1 — Improved version of the U-2R high-altitude strategic reconnaissance jet. Subsonic but capable of reaching altitudes of eighty thousand feet. Mainly used for signals intelligence, electronic eavesdropping, and monitoring of data transmissions during Soviet space launches and missile tests.

VECTORED-THRUST NOZZLES — Nozzles and louvers on special fighter aircraft that can direct engine exhaust in many different directions, including side to side, downward, and forward. These nozzles improve takeoff and landing performance, enhance maneuverability, and can act as speedbrakes or drag devices.

X-29 — An experimental aircraft developed by Grumman Aircraft Corp. in the early 1980s, featuring forward-swept main wings, canards, strake flaps and aeroelastic computer-controlled wing surfaces in place of conventional flaps and ailerons. Used as a technology demonstration aircraft to explore the problems and advantages of forward-swept-wing aircraft. Airflow on a forward-swept-wing aircraft is channeled along the fuselage, increasing maneuverability and performance over conventional aircraft.

XF-15F (FICTIONAL) — Modified two-seat McDonnell-Douglas F-15E fighter, designed as test-bed aircraft for the U.S. Air Force’s Advanced Technology Fighter program. First fighter to combine SMTD, mission-adaptive wings and supercockpit technology in one operational aircraft. Capable of air-to-air and air-to-ground missions.

XF-34A (FICTIONAL) — The first fighter aircraft to combine forward-swept-wing technology, vectored-thrust engine systems, mission-adaptive wings, and artificial intelligence computer systems that allowed digital neural transfer of information from the aircraft’s systems to the pilot and back.

ZSU-23 — A highly mobile Soviet anti-aircraft artillery weapon system on a fast-tracked vehicle, composed of four radar-guided twenty-three-millimeter cannons. Range of one mile, capable of firing eight hundred total rounds per minute against all kinds of low-flying aircraft.