JA 37 Viggen: Sweden built this plan to fight Russia during the Third World War
Clearly, Sweden is not a military superpower, although Stockholm will most likely soon join the largest military alliance ever – AKA NATO. And yet Sweden has a proud tradition of building fine fighter jets. JA 37 is part of that tradition: Sweden tried to maintain absolute neutrality during the Cold War, but made sure that if the war with Russia came, it was ready. That priority promoted a tradition of aircraft 100 percent designed and manufactured in Sweden. The country’s System 37 program achieved this goal and the result was the Saab JA 37 Viggen.
The development of System 37 began in the early 1960s, at the same time as the US Air Force TFX program. In almost every respect, the Viggen, or Thunderbolt, came as an outstanding aircraft – one with versatile air combat capabilities that significantly surpassed the Soviet and Western European fighter jets of the era.
Much like the previous generation of the fighter, the Saab 35 Draken, Viggen used one double delta design but with two separate surfaces. The front surface was a flapped front plane that generated powerful vortices, which helped to scrub the wind during tight maneuvers and during slow landing approaches. The range’s range, field length and low speed characteristics were as good as any other fighter in the world, and better than most. Fighter’s only real shortcoming was its high fuel consumption, especially in afterburners.
No other conventional, non-vector-controlled fighter aircraft matched Viggen’s ability to use short, tight airports. It can also be serviced, refueled and refurbished in less than ten minutes by untrained staff. During a time of war, it can define the difference between elimination and survival.
Saab JA 37 Viggen – A flying combat computer
Although the aircraft is remembered for its unique design and advanced capabilities, its avionics were also considered laceand far superior to the Soviet fighters during the late Cold War.
Saab 37’s LM Ericsson UAP-1023 (PS-46 / A) radar was the world’s first multimode pulse Doppler to come into production. It worked on I-Band and provided reasonable impact, as well as high resistance to electronic countermeasures. It offered multi-target capability, with views on the head-up display or head-down display, all while allowing track-while scanning and continuous wave lighting for Sky Flash RB71 missiles.
Continuous improvements
One of the other significant advances with the aircraft was its electronic head-up display and its digital automatic flight control systems – the latter is among the very first such systems to enter production.
Saab 37 Viggen received continuous upgrades throughout its life. In 1985, it included the addition of a so-called fighter link that enabled encrypted communication between four fighters and a ground-based fighter jet. Using that link, a fighter aircraft could paint an airborne enemy with control radar for the Skyflash missiles from the other three fighter jets, while these friendly aircraft kept their search and guidance radar systems off.
The Swedish Air Force operated this system for a whole decade before other nations began to use similar technology. In addition, the autopilot was enslaved to radar control for better precision while firing the aircraft’s main cannon.
Between 1992 and 1997, there were several major avionics upgrades manufactured for the aircraft, which was now referred to as the YES 37D variant. The craft now boasts an Ericsson CD207 mission computer and an ANP-37 store management computer, linked via dual MIL-STD-1553B databases that allow the use of the guided Rb 99 AMRAAM weapon. TI 327 color screen for tactical moving map and a Synthetic Attitude Heading Reference System were installed in the cockpit.
Saab JA 37 has the award to be the only aircraft that has been confirmed to have achieved radar lock on SR71 Blackbird, overcome the disturbance measures of that reconnaissance plane. In January 1986, the Swedish pilot Per-Olof Eldh managed to catch an SR-71. The key to the JA-37’s successful radar lock of the US Air Force’s high-flying spy plane was the integration of Sweden’s very sophisticated data link.
Now the senior editor of 1945, Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based author who has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers and websites. He writes regularly about military hardware and is the author of several books on military headgear, including A gallery of military headdresses, available at Amazon.com. Peter is also one Contributing author for Forbes.