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Third Syrian plane shot down by Turkey so far if this news is to believe, the escalation can only go up from here. With both the Syrians and Russians operating the same types of aircrafts in the same area it is only a matter of time until Turkey hits a Russian jet either by accident or design.
 

Tirdent

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There is always a story to the story.

Burn-through range is an inescapable function of radar science. The aim of every attacking aircraft is to avoid the defending radar achieving burn-through. The more closely an aircraft approaches the victim radar source, the more likely is the radar signal to break through the jamming noise. The radar skin’s return power increases as the fourth power of reducing range while the received jammer power increases only as the square of reducing range.

It's pretty clear that the F-16 crew messed up in some way - as a fighter aircraft you don't otherwise get taken out by a missile almost the size of your own steed, with or without ECM! Even in absence of jamming, they should have been able to physically out turn this threat, especially if the ESM system correctly warned them of the lock and launch.

I'm not sure I buy the burn through hypothesis though. The S-200 missile not only has a long maximum range, due to the booster configuration that enables precisely this performance it also has a very significant minimum range (especially against an agile target, where it would be crucial to burn off some fuel before endgame). As a result, the F-16 can't really have been any closer than 10km, or the missile physically could not have engaged it successfully. Furthermore, how close do you think Syria is going to put a S-200 site to the Israeli border, because the wreckage actually came down in Israel IIRC...

A late-model F-16 with the Have Glass LO package should maintain a favourable ratio of jammer power to aircraft skin return signal down to pretty short range. If you do the math you'll find that burn-through is generally a very close-range phenomenon because another way of looking at the r^2 to r^4 relationship is that the jammer signal only has a one-way journey to the opposing radar receiver instead of a return trip. As a result, while burn-through is inevitable it doesn't take a whole lot of distance for the jammer to start winning the power contest - the cross-over point in the graph you posted is often in the single digit kilometres. It's frequently so close as to be tactically insignificant.
 

Tirdent

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“Russian-made S-300 and S-400 did not fire a single shot against Turkish and Israeli fighter jets and Drones”—Here’s Why:
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The answers are even simpler than that - Israel and Russia were the first parties in this conflict to agree to deconflict their operations, while Turkey's manned aircraft have stayed out of Syrian airspace at least in this recent skirmish. Shooting down a Turkish aircraft in Turkish airspace would have escalated things beyond control.
 

Brumby

Major
It's pretty clear that the F-16 crew messed up in some way - as a fighter aircraft you don't otherwise get taken out by a missile almost the size of your own steed, with or without ECM! Even in absence of jamming, they should have been able to physically out turn this threat, especially if the ESM system correctly warned them of the lock and launch.
I am afraid I disagree with what you are positing as they are not based on facts but pure speculation.

IADS threats are dangerous and the air losses from the Kosovo and Iraqi air campaigns are primarily from them. There is a wide body of published information on those air campaigns in terms of actual experiences - not theoretical. The Kosovo air campaign demonstrated that towed decoys were generally effective and the reason why currently all US and European platforms come with it as a standard protection feature - even the F-35. Standard defensive measures include the deployment of flares, chaffs and or towed decoy. Physically out turning as a defensive feature may be stuff of Hollywood.

1583458196660.png
Threat avoidance would be the primary goal through VLO/ECM but when that fails then the default is to activate disposable counter measures. There is no evidence from the report that the F-16 engaged in such measures when it was targeted. Modern ESM such as the Israeli ESM system would had classified the nature of the threat. Modern ESM are able to tell exactly what is the threat, what SAM system is in play and via their RF modulation whether the threat is in search, detection or tracking mode. The F-16 knew exactly how serious was the threat but is faulted for "professional judgement" by ignoring it.

I'm not sure I buy the burn through hypothesis though.
Frankly I am mystified by your view that burn through is some form of hypothesis. J/S is a very exact science in radar and EW. The simple formula is :

1583460419859.png
ELINT assets initially determines the electronic order of battle (EOB) in the area of operation (AOR). The type of threats and the nature of their RF signatures are collected and fed to the F-16 threat library before the mission. It is the basis on which the threat library within the ESM is able to classify and prioritize the nature of threats based on the J/S equation. The J/S enables a determination of range within which certain threats is able to achieve burn through. The aim is to stay out of "at risk" range depending on the threat. In this example, it did not work out. It could be the threat did not emit until the F-16 was well within the burn through range. The report did not say and so we do not know. What we do know (a fact) is the F-16 was hit and that means by default burn through was achieved.

The S-200 missile not only has a long maximum range, due to the booster configuration that enables precisely this performance it also has a very significant minimum range (especially against an agile target, where it would be crucial to burn off some fuel before endgame). As a result, the F-16 can't really have been any closer than 10km, or the missile physically could not have engaged it successfully. Furthermore, how close do you think Syria is going to put a S-200 site to the Israeli border, because the wreckage actually came down in Israel IIRC...
We don't know any of that except the threat successfully engaged the F-16. The rest is your speculation.

A late-model F-16 with the Have Glass LO package should maintain a favourable ratio of jammer power to aircraft skin return signal down to pretty short range. If you do the math you'll find that burn-through is generally a very close-range phenomenon because another way of looking at the r^2 to r^4 relationship is that the jammer signal only has a one-way journey to the opposing radar receiver instead of a return trip. As a result, while burn-through is inevitable it doesn't take a whole lot of distance for the jammer to start winning the power contest - the cross-over point in the graph you posted is often in the single digit kilometres. It's frequently so close as to be tactically insignificant.
Burn through is a function of J/S and their corresponding formula. RCS as you pointed out and from the J/S equation does include the RCS as a factor. There is not doubt that there is an advantage with a lower RCS as per chart.

1583461641644.png


That said, it depends on all those details in the J/S equation. Typically burn through is achieved via a gain of between 8-12 dB.

1583461774999.png

However that gain is variable and is subject to the type of threat.

1583461831100.png
 

Tirdent

Junior Member
Registered Member
I am afraid I disagree with what you are positing as they are not based on facts but pure speculation.

IADS threats are dangerous and the air losses from the Kosovo and Iraqi air campaigns are primarily from them. There is a wide body of published information on those air campaigns in terms of actual experiences - not theoretical. The Kosovo air campaign demonstrated that towed decoys were generally effective and the reason why currently all US and European platforms come with it as a standard protection feature - even the F-35. Standard defensive measures include the deployment of flares, chaffs and or towed decoy. Physically out turning as a defensive feature may be stuff of Hollywood.

Threat avoidance would be the primary goal through VLO/ECM but when that fails then the default is to activate disposable counter measures. There is no evidence from the report that the F-16 engaged in such measures when it was targeted. Modern ESM such as the Israeli ESM system would had classified the nature of the threat. Modern ESM are able to tell exactly what is the threat, what SAM system is in play and via their RF modulation whether the threat is in search, detection or tracking mode. The F-16 knew exactly how serious was the threat but is faulted for "professional judgement" by ignoring it.

So? Your own assumption (while we're on the subject of who's speculating and who isn't) was that jamming was out of the picture because the S-200 radar had achieved burn-though. At this point, if the missile is tracking true, your only option is to outmanoeuvre it. I was merely adopting your hypothesis for argument's sake and pointing out that even then, the F-16 should have stood a very decent chance due to the kinematics of the S-200, if the crew had not made an error of some kind.

Modern integrated ECM using deception techniques rather than noise activates automatically in response to detection of radar signals classified as threatening. Deception works by re-transmitting an appropriately modified copy of the waveform received from the threat, thus distorting the return seen by the radar - but it also means no received signal, no jamming signal. The pilot merely "arms" the system once he enters hostile air space, the rest of the jamming response is largely automated (though aural warnings and visual indications are given so the pilot can execute manoeuvres in support). Hence the notion that the pilot "forgot to turn on the jammer" is scarcely credible really - the EW system does that for him.

Frankly I am mystified by your view that burn through is some form of hypothesis. J/S is a very exact science in radar and EW.

Burn through in and of itself isn't a hypothesis, but your claim that it was the root cause of the F-16 shoot-down is. How you could read my message as dismissing the physics of it frankly mystifies *me*. I actually used the word "inevitable" in there!

What we do know (a fact) is the F-16 was hit and that means by default burn through was achieved.

It means no such thing. ECM can be defeated by other means, if the jammer signal is identified as such by whatever technique it can be filtered out, or (if it's a noise jammer that transmits constantly) you can try a HOJ shot.

We don't know any of that except the threat successfully engaged the F-16. The rest is your speculation.

I beg to differ.

First of all, the source you quote makes NO mention of burn-through, it merely states that the *passive* component of the EW system worked as advertised, that is to say it detected the threat and alerted the crew. So (on that count you're correct again) it wasn't for lack of situational awareness that the shoot-down occurred.

Second, that the S-200 has a very substantial minimum range because it can't engage targets with its four boosters still attached isn't speculation. Sources differ on how big exactly the minimum is, but the *lowest* figure I've seen is 7km, others state 17km. It's not speculation either that even after this the S-200, due to its *massive* size, will struggle to hit an agile target until it has burned off some more fuel, so against an F-16 the minimum range should effectively be longer still. It follows from these considerations alone that, whatever else happened, the F-16 must have been *at least* 10, probably more like 20km from the SAM site.

Third, that the wreckage came down inside Israeli territory is a confirmed fact too - the settlement in the vicinity is actually mentioned in the article you linked. Again, how close to the Israeli border do you expect the Syrians to put a S-200 site? Another indication that the aircraft can't have been all that close to the SAM site. In fact, on this point we don't really have to speculate at all, the following image is modified to show the precise location of the Syrian S-200 site closest to Israel from an original image created by respected analyst Sean O'Connor:

Syria_S-200.jpg

If you measure in Google Maps the distance from there to the approximate site of the F-16 wreckage you get ~140km, convincingly corroborating the above conclusion that (even allowing for distance covered after the hit) the aircraft must have been in the dozens of kilometres from the SAM site.

AP18041408790869.jpg

harduf-israel-10th-feb-2018-israeli-security-personnel-guard-the-remains-M3B2K3.jpg

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Geo_Harduf_dist.jpg

What it comes down to then, is whether several dozen kilometres is close enough to the S-200 for burn-through to occur, and I doubt that's the case. On the one hand, the Square Pair engagement radar is pretty powerful (100kW transmitter, no idea how much of that is lost before the antenna though), on the other hand the F-16 has a much lower RCS than the targets this fairly ancient system was designed to counter. At the site where you probably got your tables and diagrams from there is a quantitative example of the burn-through diagram, showing the cross-over between jammer and skin return at <5km. That's a fairly typical scenario and, since the low RCS of the F-16 likely offsets the high transmitter power of the Square Pair, it may not be too far from the truth for this specific engagement as well.

phased_array_illus2.jpg

On balance, it probably wasn't burn-through, as I've been saying.
 
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Brumby

Major
So? Your own assumption (while we're on the subject of who's speculating and who isn't) was that jamming was out of the picture because the S-200 radar had achieved burn-though.

I did not say that jamming was out of the picture. Burn through by default naturally involves jamming because that term if you understand the subject is when the radar power has sufficiently overcome jamming power (usually expressed in dB).

At this point, if the missile is tracking true, your only option is to outmanoeuvre it. I was merely adopting your hypothesis for argument's sake and pointing out that even then, the F-16 should have stood a very decent chance due to the kinematics of the S-200, if the crew had not made an error of some kind.
We know from the report that the F-16 even though was aware of the threat simply ignored it. The difference between our views is that your position is to outmanoeuver the incoming missile whereas I am saying that standard defensive measures employed would be the deployment of flares, chaffs and or towed decoy. According to the report, none of those defensive measures likely happened.

Modern integrated ECM using deception techniques rather than noise activates automatically in response to detection of radar signals classified as threatening. Deception works by re-transmitting an appropriately modified copy of the waveform received from the threat, thus distorting the return seen by the radar - but it also means no received signal, no jamming signal. The pilot merely "arms" the system once he enters hostile air space, the rest of the jamming response is largely automated (though aural warnings and visual indications are given so the pilot can execute manoeuvres in support).

Some or all of those self-protection jamming may well have occurred. That is irrelevant if at the end of it all the other side managed to track and engage you. That means your jamming ultimately failed.

Hence the notion that the pilot "forgot to turn on the jammer" is scarcely credible really - the EW system does that for him.

How did you end up with the idea that the pilot "forgot to turn on the jammer"?

Burn through in and of itself isn't a hypothesis, but your claim that it was the root cause of the F-16 shoot-down is.

You are creating a narrative of your own imagination which bears no resemblance to what I had said. Either you are ignoring what I said or you have a problem with comprehension.

I did not say that the root cause of the F-16 shoot down was due to burn through. Even the report did not say that. The report said the pilot made an error in professional judgement by not responding to the known threat. Since you don’t seem to understand the sequence I will walk you through it.

(1) The pilot has a mission tasked to prosecute a target
(2) During ingress it encountered IADS threats in that area.
(3) The typical ECM measures kicked in
(4) While pressing into the task, its system warning indicated a lock-on. This means its protection jamming has failed i.e. burn through was achieved by the IADS
(5) Standard protocol would suggest that defensive measures need to be employed. That did not happen and that was the error in professional judgement as mentioned in the report.

How you could read my message as dismissing the physics of it frankly mystifies *me*. I actually used the word "inevitable" in there!

Isn’t this what you said? “I'm not sure I buy the burn through hypothesis though.” Is the word “inevitable” in that sentence?

It means no such thing. ECM can be defeated by other means, if the jammer signal is identified as such by whatever technique it can be filtered out, or (if it's a noise jammer that transmits constantly) you can try a HOJ shot.

I need to remind you that we are not having a general discussion about ECM. We are discussing the F-16 shoot down. There is a lock-on and that means a missile is on its way. What the heck has a HOJ shot got to do with this conversation? The F-16 would be done with long before it can launch any HOJ and that is provided it is even armed with one.

First of all, the source you quote makes NO mention of burn-through, it merely states that the *passive* component of the EW system worked as advertised, that is to say it detected the threat and alerted the crew. So (on that count you're correct again) it wasn't for lack of situational awareness that the shoot-down occurred.

First of all I don’t even know what “passive” component of the EW system you are referring to nor such wording is made in the report. From memory the report said that there was warning given to the pilot.

The basis of my argument is a priori in nature based on what is self-evident of EW operations and the conclusion that can be reasonably drawn from it. So what are they?

The F-16 has onboard self-protection EW system. Even from the outset you admitted that Israel is advanced in this area. It would be foolishness to send a F-16 into an IADS area without self-protection.

The EW system works according to design by employing jamming when threats are detected

During the mission the report stated that a “warning” was made known to the pilot. The pilot failed to respond to it and was faulted for it.

The question is what type of warning since the report did not described the nature. The conclusion of the nature of the warning is based on what transpired subsequently and the logical sequence of how EW actually works.

We know as a fact that the F-16 was shot down. That means the incoming missile was likely guided. A guided missile means lock-on was achieved. Lock-on means burn through was achieved because the assumption is that jamming was taking place to prevent lock on.

We know as a fact that ESM system can tell you when a threat radar has achieved lock-on (based on RF modulation) and it is the reason why defensive measures need to be taken.

If burn through is not a natural and logical conclusion from the facts and on how EW intrinsically works, please point out some other feasible alternative.

Second, that the S-200 has a very substantial minimum range because it can't engage targets with its four boosters still attached isn't speculation. Sources differ on how big exactly the minimum is, but the *lowest* figure I've seen is 7km, others state 17km. It's not speculation either that even after this the S-200, due to its *massive* size, will struggle to hit an agile target until it has burned off some more fuel, so against an F-16 the minimum range should effectively be longer still. It follows from these considerations alone that, whatever else happened, the F-16 must have been *at least* 10, probably more like 20km from the SAM site.

Third, that the wreckage came down inside Israeli territory is a confirmed fact too - the settlement in the vicinity is actually mentioned in the article you linked. Again, how close to the Israeli border do you expect the Syrians to put a S-200 site? Another indication that the aircraft can't have been all that close to the SAM site. In fact, on this point we don't really have to speculate at all, the following image is modified to show the precise location of the Syrian S-200 site closest to Israel from an original image created by respected analyst Sean O'Connor:
If you measure in Google Maps the distance from there to the approximate site of the F-16 wreckage you get ~140km, convincingly corroborating the above conclusion that (even allowing for distance covered after the hit) the aircraft must have been in the dozens of kilometres from the SAM site.
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What it comes down to then, is whether several dozen kilometres is close enough to the S-200 for burn-through to occur, and I doubt that's the case. On the one hand, the Square Pair engagement radar is pretty powerful (100kW transmitter, no idea how much of that is lost before the antenna though), on the other hand the F-16 has a much lower RCS than the targets this fairly ancient system was designed to counter. At the site where you probably got your tables and diagrams from there is a quantitative example of the burn-through diagram, showing the cross-over between jammer and skin return at <5km. That's a fairly typical scenario and, since the low RCS of the F-16 likely offsets the high transmitter power of the Square Pair, it may not be too far from the truth for this specific engagement as well.
On balance, it probably wasn't burn-through, as I've been saying.
Unfortunately all the details that you are providing are irrelevant because the F-16 was shot down. I don’t know whether it was by a S200 but say it was. The only way you can argue that there was no burn through is either (i) the F-16 EW was not working (the report did not say that) or (ii) that it was taken out by an unguided missile which makes the whole point about the warning rather “moot” and therefore the conclusion about error in professional judgement.
In my view you are grasping at straws.
 
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Tirdent

Junior Member
Registered Member
We know from the report that the F-16 even though was aware of the threat simply ignored it. The difference between our views is that your position is to outmanoeuver the incoming missile whereas I am saying that standard defensive measures employed would be the deployment of flares, chaffs and or towed decoy.

That is not my view, I did not suggest this was the standard course of action in general, or even the preferable one. I was merely stating that if ECM has already failed to defeat the SAM (perhaps because of burn-through, although there are other scenarios), the only remaining response is to try and outmanoeuvre it. Further, I pointed out that in the particular case of a F-16 facing a S-200, the aircraft should stand a fairly good chance even in this contingency.

Or, to put it more bluntly, I don't disagree with the basic conclusion that the F-16 crew is guilty of a professional error by ignoring the threat. The appropriate response which they failed to make would have been to take evasive action.

Some or all of those self-protection jamming may well have occurred. That is irrelevant if at the end of it all the other side managed to track and engage you. That means your jamming ultimately failed.

... there you go. One way for jamming to fail would be if burn-through occurs, so if you assume that to be the case (which you did, not me) "jamming is out of the picture".

How did you end up with the idea that the pilot "forgot to turn on the jammer"?

You seemed to imply that was what was behind the statement that the pilot ignored the threat and failed to take appropriate action. If that's not the case, disregard - my bad.

I did not say that the root cause of the F-16 shoot down was due to burn through. Even the report did not say that. The report said the pilot made an error in professional judgement by not responding to the known threat.

Perhaps we can argue semantically whether you really said it was the "root cause", as I claimed you did. But the fact of the matter is that burn-through probably played no role in this shoot-down *at all*, contrary to your assertion, so I stand by the gist of my position.

Since you don’t seem to understand the sequence I will walk you through it.

(1) The pilot has a mission tasked to prosecute a target
(2) During ingress it encountered IADS threats in that area.
(3) The typical ECM measures kicked in

No argument from me up to here.

(4) While pressing into the task, its system warning indicated a lock-on. This means its protection jamming has failed i.e. burn through was achieved by the IADS

You are using the term burn-through in a much broader sense than its actual definition there. The phrase strictly means that the target's skin return signal power has increased to within a certain margin of the jamming signal power. It does NOT refer to any and all other mechanisms of defeating ECM! So your entire argument is founded on a flawed premise that "ECM defeated" = burn-through.

As one source puts it:

When there is sufficient "J-to-S" for effectiveness, increasing it will rarely increase the effectiveness at a given range. Because modern radars can have sophisticated signal processing and/or ECCM capabilities, in certain radars too much "J-to-S" could cause the signal processor to ignore the jamming, or activate special anti-jamming modes.

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So you can actually spoil the whole effect of your ECM by sending too powerful a jamming signal, even though that moves the threat further *away* from achieving burn-through (higher J/S). The reason is that you may end up tipping the radar off to the fact that it is being jammed and prompt it to filter the jamming signal out by signal processing techniques or switch to an entirely different mode or skip to a new frequency.

(5) Standard protocol would suggest that defensive measures need to be employed. That did not happen and that was the error in professional judgement as mentioned in the report.

We can call a spade a spade at this point: the only remaining option is to outmanoeuvre the threat, as I suggested.

Isn’t this what you said? “I'm not sure I buy the burn through hypothesis though.” Is the word “inevitable” in that sentence?

If you strip 280 words worth of context (including the phrase "As a result, while burn-through is inevitable..." further down) from a 290 word message, I guess I did. Kind of illustrates the dangers of quoting out of context - the word "hypothesis" did not mean to say burn-through in general was a mere hypothesis, but that its relevance to the F-16 shoot down is. While this is not clear-cut from that sentence alone, it is very obvious when considering the post in its entirety.

What the heck has a HOJ shot got to do with this conversation? The F-16 would be done with long before it can launch any HOJ and that is provided it is even armed with one.

Huh? Why would the F-16 want to use HOJ?! The acronym means "Home On Jam", the *SAM site* can use this technique to fire on a jamming source that it cannot otherwise get a firing solution on (if the jammer is of a type that transmits continuously, which the F-16I EW system probably isn't though).

First of all I don’t even know what “passive” component of the EW system you are referring to nor such wording is made in the report. From memory the report said that there was warning given to the pilot.

Very generally speaking, EW = (passive) ESM + (active) ECM. If that's the level of discourse here we'd better stop.

The basis of my argument is a priori in nature based on what is self-evident of EW operations and the conclusion that can be reasonably drawn from it. So what are they?

The F-16 has onboard self-protection EW system. Even from the outset you admitted that Israel is advanced in this area. It would be foolishness to send a F-16 into an IADS area without self-protection.

The EW system works according to design by employing jamming when threats are detected

During the mission the report stated that a “warning” was made known to the pilot. The pilot failed to respond to it and was faulted for it.

The question is what type of warning since the report did not described the nature. The conclusion of the nature of the warning is based on what transpired subsequently and the logical sequence of how EW actually works.

We know as a fact that the F-16 was shot down. That means the incoming missile was likely guided. A guided missile means lock-on was achieved. Lock-on means burn through was achieved because the assumption is that jamming was taking place to prevent lock on.

We know as a fact that ESM system can tell you when a threat radar has achieved lock-on (based on RF modulation) and it is the reason why defensive measures need to be taken.

If burn through is not a natural and logical conclusion from the facts and on how EW intrinsically works, please point out some other feasible alternative.

I won't address all of this in detail, because everything boils down to your flawed belief that if ECM has failed then by definition burn-through was achieved. It does not. Some alternative possibilities for defeating the F-16's jamming have been outlined above.

Unfortunately all the details that you are providing are irrelevant because the F-16 was shot down

They are in fact of elemental importance, because they prove pretty compellingly that the F-16 was almost certainly too far away from the S-200 site for burn-through (in the proper sense of this term) to be even physically possible.
 
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Brumby

Major
That is not my view, I did not suggest this was the standard course of action in general, or even the preferable one. I was merely stating that if ECM has already failed to defeat the SAM (perhaps because of burn-through, although there are other scenarios), the only remaining response is to try and outmanoeuvre it. Further, I pointed out that in the particular case of a F-16 facing a S-200, the aircraft should stand a fairly good chance even in this contingency.

Or, to put it more bluntly, I don't disagree with the basic conclusion that the F-16 crew is guilty of a professional error by ignoring the threat. The appropriate response which they failed to make would have been to take evasive action.
I think we both have made our points on this matter except the following news article did specify the nature of the failure.
"Despite this, the downed F-16's team failed to deploy countermeasures."
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... there you go. One way for jamming to fail would be if burn-through occurs, so if you assume that to be the case (which you did, not me) "jamming is out of the picture".
Failure does not equal to absence of effort. Failure is a result - effort is the action. If there was burn through it automatically means there was presence of effort. Out of the picture implies absence of effort.

Perhaps we can argue semantically whether you really said it was the "root cause", as I claimed you did. But the fact of the matter is that burn-through probably played no role in this shoot-down *at all*, contrary to your assertion, so I stand by the gist of my position.
I understand your argument. It is not one of semantics but fidelity as to the main reason for the shoot down. Say if I broaden the argument, I could say that the cause of the shoot down is due to the mission. If there is no mission there would be no shoot down. That would just be me playing word games - I do not engage in such matters.

Back to the point and in my view context is important. The report faulted the pilot for not making the right professional call i.e. threat avoidance. Consequently the plane was shot down. This is the most direct causative relationship we can establish based on the report. The burn through is incidental leading to the threat. My point was simply if expressed in reverse, if jamming was successful there would be no threat. Since there was a threat, jamming ultimately failed. Burn through is not the main cause but failure of the pilot to address the threat was - per the report.

You are using the term burn-through in a much broader sense than its actual definition there. The phrase strictly means that the target's skin return signal power has increased to within a certain margin of the jamming signal power. It does NOT refer to any and all other mechanisms of defeating ECM! So your entire argument is founded on a flawed premise that "ECM defeated" = burn-through.

As one source puts it:

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You are right that during ingress the F-16 SPJ might possibly have attempted other jamming techniques including deceptive jamming that does not involve burn through. I actually reply to this point previously but you may not have picked it up but I said at that time it was irrelevant. We are discussing a specific situation and not a general situation. We would never know what actually transpired but there is a fundamental fact that is known from the report. There was a known threat. I am now mentioning this a third time. ESM can determine exactly the direction, distance and the nature of the threat. Why is this fact important in the scheme of things? It means there was a lock-on and this was known to the pilot It is no longer a case of attempting deceptive jamming. Leading to the lock-on there is a logical sequence that would have technically happened. The threat radar was searching. The ESM would know and what ECM was initiated we do not know. The threat radar then secured a detection. This would likely mean, the scan box, the dwell time and the beam width and power would then concentrate in that sector (increasing signal strength). Correspondingly the F-16 SPJ knows that the threat radar mode has secured detection. The SPJ will automatically increase its power and narrow its beamwidth against that threat signal (increasing jamming strength). A power contest is now on in determining J/S outcome. The threat radar needs to achieve tracking mode to initiate missile launch. Tracking by definition means 3 or more consecutive detection. Burn through is achieved when there is a lock-on. I am happy to entertain any other alternative scenarios. You are suggesting that it may simply involve deceptive jamming and hence no burn through is involved. It is possible but not probable because once you are being detected (meaning deception has failed) you would invoke brute force to remedy the situation as there is nothing else to loose as a last resort.

So you can actually spoil the whole effect of your ECM by sending too powerful a jamming signal, even though that moves the threat further *away* from achieving burn-through (higher J/S). The reason is that you may end up tipping the radar off to the fact that it is being jammed and prompt it to filter the jamming signal out by signal processing techniques or switch to an entirely different mode or skip to a new frequency.
Filtering of signal is a in-build mechanism in every radar. It would be delusional on the part of the threat radar that jamming attempts would not be made against it. All the above are an expected part of the process.

Huh? Why would the F-16 want to use HOJ?! The acronym means "Home On Jam", the *SAM site* can use this technique to fire on a jamming source that it cannot otherwise get a firing solution on (if the jammer is of a type that transmits continuously, which the F-16I EW system probably isn't though).
If you are referring to the use of HOJ by the SAM threat radar then by account of the incident it was irrelevant because a lock-on was already achieved. HOJ would be a redundant effort. Against the F-16, HOJ is particularly vulnerable to the towed decoys.

I won't address all of this in detail, because everything boils down to your flawed belief that if ECM has failed then by definition burn-through was achieved. It does not. Some alternative possibilities for defeating the F-16's jamming have been outlined above.
Which I have addressed above

They are in fact of elemental importance, because they prove pretty compellingly that the F-16 was almost certainly too far away from the S-200 site for burn-through (in the proper sense of this term) to be even physically possible.
You don't have sufficient facts to make such determination. You are speculating since the details needed would be classified.
 
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