…And anyway, what need does Israel have of the capabilities the F-117 provides?

How about decapitation attacks and hits on targets deep inside countries like Syria? Israel hasn’t been afraid to mount such attacks in the past and stealth should open up a whole new world of possibilites. It would be a lot harder to track down an F-117 or F-35 than an F-15 or F-16. To intercept and track such aircraft you would need MiG-29s or Flankers with state-of-the-art missles, radars and IRTS as well as a combination of very modern AWACS and some system that locates stealth aircraft by their airframe radiation and communications/active-sensor signature (although that would be minimal). Having 24/7 satellite surveillance of all possilbe stealthfighter bases and of their approach routes to the various targets wouldn’t hurt either. Now from what I know none of the Arab nations have unrestricted access to spy satellites, the USA deliberately keeps Egypt’s air force a step behind that of Israel in terms of technology, Syria doesn’t appear to be able to afford to keep it’s fighter fleet or air defense network modernized at the same rate as Israel can and Iran’s air defences are also getting old. Basically the Israelis should be able to strike pretty much whatever they want if they acquire state-of-the-art stealth aircraft as long as the political fallout isn’t to great.

Cthornburg,

Nice finds! Any idea on the camo scheme of the Nigerian MiG 15 UTI ?

I have better pictures of this particular aircraft as well as other early NAF MiGs in print. It was either natural metal or silver. Some of the MiG-15/17 fighters and trainers that I have seen in museums and that still seem to be wearing original camouflage seem to have been painted in a protective coating containing what looks like aluminum pigment. After the embarrassingly successful rocket attacks against their airfields by Biafran MFI-9s and T-6s had cost them a few MiG’s and at least one Il-28, the NAF camouflaged it’s aircraft and the MIG-17 fighters in particular. The scheme was an all over medium or dark green color.

Hunter

According to my Hawker Hunter bible India retired the last Hunters in 2000, AFAIK they were the last operator. Some of the Swiss ones are still flying but with private owners (I wish I was that rich 😀 ). Chile has some ‘nominally’ operational Canberras, whatever that means. Argentina also had a few Canberras still flying as late as the Falklands war, don’t know their status though.

VPAF Officials checking out upgraded MiG.

Which subgenus of MiG would that be, what did they upgrade and who did the work?

Well it probably does has some form of advantage, it is scaled up from the F-5
making it similar to the Northrop F-17 which in itself is a scaled up F-5. If we ever do get a good structural and size drawing I would love to compare it to the Northrop F-17.

Judging from the photographs at the top of this thread the Saeqeh isn’t all that much bigger than the F-5F chase plane. I’d say it looks more like a testbed than a production prototype.

Now the WS-10A is a funny old project :rolleyes:

The core of the CFM56 was used as the template for WS-10A development, the core of the CFM56 is based on the F101-GE-102 which was developed for the B1-B. The GE F110 fighter engine is based on the F101 making it a sister engine to the WS-10A.

The main problem for China has been getting the metals right and the program was stalled until the Russians helped.

What a mess 😀 But will any Russian involvement with the WS-10A affect export? I know Chinese made Flankers can’t be exported due to clauses in the license agreement.

Sticking a second vertical tail surface on an F-5 does not count as a serious upgrade. :rolleyes:

😀 True, the Saeqeh isn’t very impressive. But I was thinking more along the lines of the various electronics upgrades, new RWR systems, IR and Radar countermeasures, improved radar performance, integration of Chinese IR missiles and other upgrades applied to the unshaven masses of IrAF frontline F-5E fighters. Mind you, these are ‘unconfirmed reports’ from the military press, but considering the Iranians kept the F-14 flying all this time (which is a major technological achievement without manufacturer support) the reports about major F-5E upgrades seem quite plausable.

Until WS-10A is deployed in large numbers, there is no point to sell J-10.

In the near future the only real candidate for J-10 is Pakistan. Most traditional Chinese customers are lucky if they could afford FC-1. I’m not sure J-10 passes Iranian standard, they really want F-14 replacement, not another light weight fighter. Egypt is an interesting case, but even that won’t happen any time soon.

While I will agree that the Iranian Tomcats are in need of replacement they are not they only ones and although they are important assets they definitely don’t form the backbone of the IrAF. According to Scramble the Iranians have 6-7 squadrons of F-5E/Fs and at least another 7 squadrons of F-4D/Es of various marks needing replacement plus a motley collection of Mirages, Migs and Chengdu F-7s making up another 5 or so squadrons. Now, I don’t know how accurate those figures are, but if even if the Iranians have only 4-5 squadrons of F-5s and F-4s left it still sounds like the J-10 should suit them just fine to replace these types. Especially if they can license produce the J-10.