I guess that immitation is the sweetest compliment received by US from its competitors… :diablo:

Nope. Cheap nationalism is the Europeans department… 😀

A great many of the technologies you listed were developed independantly of America and are in no way knock offs of American designs rather developments to keep up with the state of the art, also in the case of some the technologies you mention they were not developed in America first and it could be argued America is immitating others.

Whilst every country can be guilty of cheap nationalism to have it suggested that its only the preserve of the Europeans is comedic considering America is one of the most blindly nationalistic countries I know of(not that I have anything against America for this).

Whilst the F22 is amazing and obviously at the state of the art it doesn’t mean other late generation aircraft are not very capable. It can be very frustrating for none American posters to have the capabilities of their latest equipment dissmissed if it doesn’t have made in America stamped on it. Actually in quite a few areas America operates equipment which is behind the state of the art and inferior to products from other nations – the HARM anti radiation missile is a good example, whilst is cheap it is also less capable then the MBDA ALARM. Of course whilst ALARM has excellent performance it is a failure on the international arms market due to its cost.

NO BODY in the USAF calls the F-16 the “Fighting Falcon”…..or even “Falcon”……..its a “Viper”. BTW………didnt the USAAC originialy call the P-51 the Apache (A-36)? Was it the Brits that dubbed it “Mustang”? If so, we owe the Brits a HUGE debt!

Indeed Mustang was the British assigned name as was Dakota for the C47.

Was the English Electric Lightning mentioned in the presentation?

Nice idea about a formation with the P38, English Electric and the F-35, the only thing is I wonder if the English Electric Lightning would have problems keeping in formation with the P-38. I bet it doesn’t like flying slow! :diablo:

Well I for one am happy especially as I guessed the correct name long ago. 😀

If you go to the official site there is a montage picture of the P-38, English Electric Lightning and the F-35 Lightning II.

http://www.jsf.mil/

Now I just need to find a video of todays naming.

Oh well here comes the final stab in the back of Britains shipbuilding industry! I bet it will be announced as meeting the needs of the modern world and the war against terror yada yada yada!

I find it ironic that in stuffing Britains own shipbuilding industry Labour is also shafting their own core vote. A great deal of British shipyards are in Labour seats, heck the yard which was going to build the final CVF is Gordon Browns old seat! Talk about being taken for granted! It shocks me that the people in these seats still vote for people who are so happy to hang them out to dry…

BAe have even managed to mount the XM777 on the Supacat thus making it self propelled if thats what the MoD want.

I believe they were showing that combination at he DSEi exhibition.

The thing is they do get their chequebook out, they just write the cheques for endless feasibility and finance studies which usually conclude that the idea they are studying is inapropriate and therefore they need to do another study.
For this deployment Apaches and Merlins should have been sent in force and some of the new 155mm lightweight howitzers that BAe offers should have been procured of the shelf, instead an ill-equiped force with too few troops has been sent to do a job which the MoD claims is one thing but is in effect something completely different.

Amen to that!

The XM777 is utterly perfect for the UK armed forces, considering the MOD is doing a comparative study of this weapon against the French truck mounted 155mm weapon is crazy.

Yes but if we go with A310’s we are back to second hand airframes again, not that i’m says the A310 is not the answer in fact the RAF should have gone for the A310 at the start when new build were available.

Paul

True, but I would prefer second hand a310 to a vc-10 refit.