Dont forget the Storm Shadow/SCALP.

An idea that might deserve a bit of joint work (and money) would be a new bi-mode seeker for the Meteor. Combining active radar and passive anti radiation guidance would be something (IMO) to pursue. The Alarm II operational life will expire soon, the “Hammer” family while great for going “DEAD” doesnt have quite the range to deal wih a top tier SAM defense, and even the Germans might go along, they have an operational requirement that went orphan since the Armiger was killed.
Well, just an idea.

Cheers

Eurofighter goes with the same swashplate radar as seen with SELEX Galileo’s RAVEN AESA
http://www.eurofighter.com/fileadmin/web_data/downloads/efworld/ef_world_3-2010web.pdf

As the company making Gripens radar and leading the eurofihter AESA radar are the same, will the performance of these two radars be similar? (same Tx/Rx modules in the radar along with other electronics backend)?

The Phoon AESA antenna should be +-50% bigger. That brings more power, range, etc.

A new Eurofighter World issue is available at the official website. Nothing really new or ground breaking included. But once again a cheap shot at the US 5th generation.
http://www.eurofighter.com/fileadmin/web_data/downloads/efworld/ef_world_3-2010web.pdf

The only real highlight in that magazine is that the internal fuel of the Typhoon is finally disclosed on an official public document. Five tons.

As for threatening a nuclear power – do you think any democratically elected government would survive threatening the innocent civillians of even a hostile state with nuclear annihilation if they themselves were not threatening us in the same way?!. Perhaps you forget the furore that the idiot politicians in this country stoked up over the Belgrano!.

Was it not Maggie Tatcher that seriously considered sending a Polaris (minus the warhead) into Argentina if the Fleet was forced to turn back?

While i agree that no elected British government would survive if they used the Bomb, i am quite sure that any Argentinian government is aware that no elected British government would survive if it looses the Falklands…
I know that by principle no British PM would really consider droping a bomb over inocent civilians, you know that, everybody knows that, but… If you are on the possible receiving end and are not completely mad/fanatic/whatever i can only imagine that the perspective might be a bit diferent! Maybe scarier enough to make you think twice about threatning the wellbeing of hundreds of British citizens.

Cheers

In a 2015 time frame? would the Falklands be up for the taking?
To be honest even now all they would needs are 2nd hand Chinese knock off s-300s and the Chinese knock off Su-30.

NO and NO.

Argentina capability for retaking the Falklands in less than ten years time is an absolute ZERO.

That’s an interim solution at best, side arrays will take care of that during the next Rafale/EF/SH/F35 MLU in a much cleaner way. Those will also be used for ECM at the same time in all likelyhood.

Of course that’s if you don’t guide your missile by an IRST because your target is stealth, or by your ESM suite, or by another platform.

Swashplate is a dead end mate.

Nic

Sidearrays?

Let me guess, one thousand plus sidearrays?!
Unless, there´s enough room (and electrical power, cooling, etc) there´s no way in hell that a handfull of sidearrays will have the range to guide something like a Meteor.
Swashplate is, actually, a very, very good idea.

Wrong 2: it is not 1 year but 7 at best: if Harrier goes next year (and almost certainly the two remaining Invincibles will be decommissioned immediately after, once their reason d’etrè is killed, this being the “hidden part” of the cut), the UK will be TOTALLY AND DEFINITIVELY INCAPABLE TO MOUNT ANY AIRCRAFT OPERATION AT SEA AT THE VERY BEST UNTIL 2018. 7 YEARS OF EVIDENT VULNERABILITY, ONE OF THE GREATEST GAMBLES EVER.

And?

Right now the offensive capability that the Harrier brings is a token at best, get a map, make a circle with the actual range of an Harrier put an aircraft carrier in the center and try to use that same carrier in any meaningfull way near a coast in wich there´s something similar to an air force, or god forbides, SSK´s and mines…
Fine way of getting tin cans in the botton of the sea.

First: the Tornado GR4 has 1 mauser gun, used a ridiculously low number of times outside of training.

My, my

Do you have any idea of how many times the Mauser was used in Iraq? I´ve thought so. In case you havent noticed the RAF maintained combat missions for nineteen years in there, most of it was covered by gun armed Tornados and Jags. The ADEN 30 and the BK27 have seen their share of action.

Second: Storm Shadow and ALARM can be mounted on the Typhoon with an integration process endlessly cheaper than retaining whole squadrons of Tornado.

Oh no, they cant. Forget it.
The RAF needs four active sqns of Typhoons to maintain QRA over GB…
The RAF is only going to get five SQN´s of Typhoons…
The last sqn of Typhoons will be standing in june 2016, and will be ready in 2019.
With four fiths of the fleet tied to QRA, the CASOM, RAPTOR, ALARM, BRIMSTONE (did i forget to mention that the Harrier doesnt use Brimstone?), etc, will be introduced in operational sqns on the double… That and snowing in Ougadougou.

Third: their range, speed and such is not really needed in Afghanistan, and if we are looking at a major war requiring Tornado to penetrate into SAM-crowded sky to launch Storm Shadow at russian command posts, then IT IS BETTER TO THINK TO INCREASE THE DEFENCE SPENDING. A bunch of Tornado won’t be salvation.

Right!

The Third World War!
Nothing less, nothing more!
Yep, because the CASOM capacity wasnt used, and the RAPTOR pod isnt being used now, and the ALARM wasnt never used, and…
Were have you been in the past twenty years?!

[B]Fifth: Tornado was scheduled, incidentally, to be replaced by Typhoon in Afghanistan in 2011, once. I bet the RAF will now all but lenghten the Tornado stay to justify their existance! Talk about service’s greed!

No, thats actually called lack of money, the reason why the Typhoon didnt went to A´stan, one was because the Tornado Fmk3 was slashed and there´s only so much intecerptors in UK (its called QRA).

All these points together do not make a single valid reason to privilege Tornado over a proper carrier capable force. Now and in the future. Honestly, i’m a lover of the Tornado. I drool when they fly above me around here coming from the nearby air base. But realism calls for them to be scrapped, not Harrier.

[B]It ultimately comes down to the question: what scenario makes Tornado indispensable and Harrier unsuitable?

Anything that requires more combat range than 300 NM… Anything that requires overflying any contested airspace, anything that includes blowing up something protected by SAM´s, etc, etc, etc…
And in case you havent noticed, GB PLC from 1991 to today was involved in three of those.

Answer: the Third World War.
Consequence: if that’s the case, a budget uplift for the Armed Forces is the way to go.

Either we accept that, or logic imposes the Harrier.

Logic?!

Talk about blindness. Slashing half of the RAF (actually 60% of its combat fleet) for maintaining a token capacity. Grand idea.