Stealth planes are a contemporary weapon system that are less visible to the enemy by means of reduced radar and IR (infra red, heat) visibility. The IR image of a plane can be reduced by directing the hot exhaust gases to the top of the plane and mixing them with cold air. The B-2 uses this technique. The radar visibility can be reduced by deflecting the radar waves in such a direction that they don’t go back to the emitting radar, or making use of less radar-reflecting materials and/or radar absorbing coatings. The active substances in these coatings are mostly metal ions. To avoid being visually detected, stealth aircraft are typically painted black and flown at night. They also tend to have a slim silhouette, making them harder to spot.
Pyotr Ufimtsev, a Russian mathematician, laid the groundwork for modern stealth when his work was published in the 1960s describing a new method for calculating radar cross section across a large surface. Stealth technology has given the United States a previously unimagined dominance in modern warfare. The F-117 was the star of the 1991 Gulf War. It was able to destroy the most fiercely defended areas.
Similarly, during the 1999 Balkans war, the B-2 bomber, one generation of stealth beyond the F-117, stole the show in its combat debut by precisely hitting over a dozen targets per mission-against air defenses that had gone to school on the lessons of the Gulf War. It also returned without a scratch. Stealth has been a sign of victory for the United States every time a war takes place.
The Russian approach towards stealth is to make a plane invisible to radar by using a sort of plasma torch on the nose of the plane. The idea behind that is, this torch creates a ionized cloud around the plane which will absorb radar waves. But there are many difficulties making it work in real life.
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