Second, if the F-35 is not designed to be an air supremacy fighter and the F-22 has been capped at less than 200, there is a concern that the Russians, the Chinese, or who knows who else might be able to put up fighters in great numbers that will challenge our air supremacy in 10-20 years. Will we be able to knock down anything any potential adversary might put up?

But going by the past the Russians always get there, yes a bit late but they always do. The F 15/16/18 easily outclassed anything Russian when they entered service but with Su 30 they got on par and in some parameters exceeded the teen rivals.

It would be very Naive to think that the Russians won’t catch up with the F 22/35 eventually, the biger question is whether America would have a sixth generation fighter on the works or ready by then. Because when the Russians built better fourth generation figthers the Americans already had fifth gens in service.

Going by the current economic climate it may be very hard to field an F 22 replacement by the time the PAKFA matures into a worthy rival.

Bad Move on LMs part IMO, India is leaning towards more and more U.S platforms and Boeing already has a sizable presence.

As long as the U.S keeps spending substantially more money than others in defense R&D, there is not a chance of anyone catching the U.S

Yes and all of you know better than USAF. Or do you really think USAF only intent to use the 200 odd raptors for Air Superiority missions ?

AFAIK, our F16s (both the 52+ and the “Adv” of the 2nd batch) don’t have MAWS. But it could be that PAF ordered it… Usually LM allows a certain “customization” of the F16 in the sector of self protection suites (for example, none of the turkish and greek F16s have the same suite). So it depends on what you order.

EDIT : Found an article on the greek suite and mentions no MAWS in deed.

http://www.f-16.net/news_article889.html

Nice article so will we be seeing an enhanced version of you in the forum as well. Aspis II :diablo:

Now Some KICK Ass weapons. What Platforms will carry these ?

IAF Cleared For CBU-105 Sensor-Fused Weapon

The Indian Air Force has been cleared to receive 512 American-built CBU-105 sensor-fuzed munitions worth $257,737,338 more than two years after the Indian government first expressed it interest in procuring the system in September 2008. The IAF will also receive 44 training units. I’d reported on the system being in-principle cleared in March this year, with the final clearance coming in November. Total Buck Rogers weapon.

http://livefist.blogspot.com/2010/12/iaf-cleared-for-cbu-105-sensor-fused.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FUQMw+%28LiveFist+-+The+Best+of+Indian+Defence%29