I hear the player base crying for a better radar missile for NATO countries. I’m going to suggest something that is actually reasonable instead of something absurd like asking for AIM 120 this update or AIM 9X.
SOURCES https://www.militarytoday.com/missiles/aim_7f_sparrow.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIM-7_Sparrow#Variants
https://weaponsystems.net/system/941-AIM-7%20Sparrow
https://www.f-16.net/f-16_armament_article10.html
As it stands right now the standard AIM 7 for NATO is the AIM 7M. This means it’s performance is still obviously classified. As it stands in War thunder it has a maximum G overload of 25g, and a top speed of mach 4. Let’s look back into the history of war thunder for a bit just to be able to realize how outdated this missile is in modern War Thunder.
The AIM 7M always has had the exact same stats as the AIM 7F. The AIM 7F has been in the game for a very long time, I think since when the F-4J was added in the update “Winged Lions”. The AIM 7F was a great missile back then when it only faced MiG 21s and MiG 23s with the best soviet counterpart being the R24.
The Apex Predators brought the AIM 7M but It is an exact copy of the AIM 7F, the only difference IRL is that it has integrated look down/shoot down capability which the F-4J already had with the AIM 7F. Here look at the stats.
So the top tier best radar missiles in the game haven’t been changed since the F-4J was added TWO YEARS AGO, the only difference now is that some aircraft have better radars. In my opinion this is completely absurd. One could argue that Gaijin is neglecting to give NATO a better SARH because in their fantasy world the US never got a better missile than the AIM 7F.
At the same time IR missiles in War Thunder have advanced massively. The best IR seeker in the game during the “Winged Lions” update was the AIM 9J, and now we have AIM 9Ms, R73s, Now AAM 3s.
To add to that the R27 ER and ET came originally as an after thought for the mig29 in the apex predators update now 1 full year ago, These missiles were something completely different to the R24 R/T and R27 R/T because of their speed. So the R27 ER/ETs are much much better than anything western aircraft can carry.
What I would be asking for is not a very big increase in the performance on the sparrow, just a small performance upgrade, but it would be a huge improvement.
Increase the max G overload on the AIM 7M by 10 gees to match the R27s turning capability, and although sources do say that the M has the same motor as the F it would only be fair to make it just a half-mach faster.
The other option is to add the AIM 7P. The AIM 7P is the most modern version of the AIM 7 sparrow.
After receiving comments people talked about the AIM 7MH. I don’t know much about it and didn’t find any sources so it’s up for debate, but still would be a very good improvement.
This missile on the F-15 with it’s proximity fuse, better avionics, and uplink would be able to be a competitive counter to the Su-27’s 6 R27s.
