The Swiss plan to spend $8 billion on combined fighter and ground-based air defense purchase
The air force is stepping up its air policing efforts to 24-hr. coverage in 2020
And the neutral land-locked nation is taking its air defense more seriously than ever. At the beginning of this year, the Swiss Air Force increased its readiness levels, putting armed aircraft on standby for air policing duties for 16 hr. a day, 365 days a year. The next step is to provide round-the-clock coverage at 15-min. readiness by the end of 2020.
The changes are in response to criticism that the service was unable to respond to the 2014 hijacking of an Ethiopian airliner that landed in Geneva just before 6 a.m., 2 hr. before military personnel even arrived for work. The escort of the airliner was left to the French and Italian air forces, with which Switzerland has air defense accords.
The embarrassing wake-up call highlighted a dangerous gap in the country’s air defense security, and one that its air force was simply not funded to fulfill.
Such incidents have added credibility to the country’s 8 billion Swiss franc ($8 billion) Air 2030 plans to purchase up to 40 fighter aircraft and a new ground-based air defense system, all from the same pot of money.
How that will be split is yet to be determined, but OEMS have been requested to provide pricing for fleets of 30 and 40 aircraft.
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Raytheon’s Patriot and the Eurosam consortium’s SAMP-T system will be considered for the ground-based element.
Switzerland is one of a handful of nations that call for in-country evaluations of future combat aircraft. Finland is another, with Helsinki planning a winter test in 2021.
The Swiss need, say officials, is driven by the country’s unique topography. Although simulation is now capable of answering many of the questions asked by the Swiss customer and has enabled the number of evaluation flights to be reduced from around 20 in 2008 to just seven or eight this year, officials still need to understand how the aircraft’s sensors, notably the radar, will deal with the cluttered Alpine environment. Of the seven or eight flights, two will be technical, testing the sensors in the Alpine environment, says Kaj-Gunnar Sievert, spokesman for the Swiss defense materiel agency, Armasuisse. Five of the flights will be representative of operations performed by Swiss fighters such as quick-reaction alert—scramble and intercept.
Because some of the aircraft, notably, the F-35 and Gripen E, are only single-seat, data collection will be dependent on company test pilots and recordings of flight-test data. Swiss test pilots will monitor from the rear seat of two-seat aircraft where available.
Aircraft that do not show up for the evaluations are automatically disqualified from the competition.
Sweden’s Saab is optimistic about its prospects, particularly as the Gripen was selected previously, but the aircraft is arguably the least mature of the types taking part in the evaluation. The Gripen E’s appearance in June will be the first time the aircraft has left Sweden; it will be accompanied by C and D models.
For the F-35, the deployment marks the type’s first overseas evaluation because most national evaluations have been performed in the U.S. Four U.S. Air Force F-35As will make the transatlantic crossing, heading to a U.S. air base in Europe, probably Ramstein, Germany, before making the short hop into Switzerland. The company is hoping to build on its recent European successes; Lockheed notes that Switzerland already makes use of U.S.-built platforms, which means some equipment and weaponry could be reused. Questions remain, however, whether a nation that only uses its fighters for air defense duties really needs the low-observable capabilities offered by the fifth-generation fighter.
Being the incumbent could be valuable for the Super Hornet’s chances in Switzerland. This year’s evaluations will also mark the F/A-18E/F’s debut, as Boeing pulled the aircraft from competition prior to the trials in 2008.
Airbus, working with the German government is using British Royal Air Force (RAF) aircraft for the tests because the configuration of RAF Typhoons with the Phase 3 Enhancements package is the closest operational configuration to what Switzerland is being offered. If selected, Swiss Eurofighters would be in the same configuration as the aircraft soon to be ordered by Germany as Tranche 1 replacements, fitted with the new active, electronically scanned array radar.
Dassault is expected to offer its F4 upgraded version of the Rafale, with Paris leaning on its recent purchase of Pilatus PC-21 trainers and its close relationship with the Swiss government to get an edge.
Armasuisse will initially use the data from the trials to confirm the answers provided by the manufacturers in the first request for proposals (RFP) issued last July. Later, it will be used to make direct comparisons in support of a second RFP planned for 2020. A possible hurdle to this schedule is another referendum, also planned for 2020. Rather than ask whether the government should buy a particular platform, the referendum will likely be more fundamental, officials say, such as asking if the country should modernize its air defenses.
With a green light, contracts would be signed after parliamentary approvals in 2022, and deliveries would begin in 2025-30.
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