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Not necessarily. An AAMRAAM derivative could have used passive radar homing. After all, if an AWACs is the target, it's emitting huge amounts of signal on well know frequencies.

In fact, the Soviets had AWAC hunter teams using exactly this type of missile. They figured (correctly), that sacrificing a squadron of planes to blind NATO would be a fair trade. The number of E-3s in NATO were limited, and extremely expensive. The R-27 had radar homing variants with a range around 70km. This would require the launching aircraft to get very close to the AWACs and it's protective escort.

The Russians have continued this with the R-37, which has a range of up to 400km. They plan on targeting AWACS, tankers, ECM aircraft (JSTARS) and other high value aircraft. All of these are slow, easy targets for a fighter.




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