SintraWhat good did it do for the EF to be multinational?
a) Vastly inferior costs by unit for the four partners by comparison with France
b) More external sales than what Dassault obtained
c) Money spent on the program maintained in Europe (not gone to MCDouglas or General Dynamics)
d) Maintaining in house design capability in Great Britain, Germany and Italy. Without the FEFA/EFA/Eurofighter program, you wouldnt seen Airbus throwing its weight around today and BAE would not be the prefered partner for the TAI program and would not be working with Mitsubishi on the I3.
By 1989, right after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the alternative was not to develop severall diferent aircrafts, one German, another one British and another one Italian, it was acquiring American.
It’s only advantage over the Rafale is the biased reporting on the english speaking press for many years until it was pretty obvious it was completely false, at which point only jon lake kept at it.
Blind nationalism is blind.
The two airframes are quite similar, both have their (small) advantages, one climbs a mit faster and has more real estate in the nose, the other can carry an awfull lot of external fuel and ordnance coupled with an Aircraft Carrier variant, and thats about it.
Actually they are so similar that a common program would have been an idea to be considered. Oh wait…
An historical note – If by 1986 the French MOD and Dassault were aware that the hoped 600+ external sales would turn out to be 84 airframes sold by 2017, its arguable that the Rafale program would never went forward, the Marine would have got the Hornet and the Adla would have kept improving its Mirage 2000´s.
This coupled with a receding defense budget might be the explanation for not having any French MOD or Dassault executive calling for a “Franco/French” FCAS for the last decade and a half and going full “European” with the NEURON.
Cheers
SintraAnd since Germany is effectively an occupied country, they will
The sillyness is strong in this one.
KGB, Germany, is an occupied country? By whom?
Let me remind you that we are talking of one of the richest, most prosperous and peacefull countries in the world here…
Hell, something i´ve just remarked, a chap calling himself “KGB” on the internet making claims on Germany being “occupied”! Oh the irony of it!
SintraLooks like the same brown envelopes that are being passed around inside the Indian AF are being passed around in the Lufwaffe.
Can you explain your reasoning? Without the nationalistic ********, please?
The Luftwaffe wants to replace some 60 strike airframes in the 2025/30 with a LO airframe.
Why do you think that Luftwaffe officials are being bribed after one of them suggested that the “bench mark” for that particular competition is the ONLY LO airframe available in the mentioned time frame?
SintraIs there anything else actually in its size range?
Quite a few, the LCA, the JF17, the Ching Kuo, the Mirage 2000, the F/A-50.
The Gripen E being a bit bigger can be compared with the Viper or even the J10.
Cheers
SintraOther options on the market are F-18E/F/G and advanced F-15. Luftwaffe has been briefed about the Boeing fighters.
Typhoon is not really on the market, at least not with the capabilites required.
With the AESA set contracted by Kuwait and P3E funded the vannila SH doesnt bring much to the table that its not already on the Typhoon´s menu (well, outside of the B-61), the Growler could make an interesting acquisition, the Strike eagle would bring Range and payload.
Being realistic (i think), i can see the Luftwaffe wanting and “selling” to the Government the LO airframe of “Dave”, but i cant see the Luftwaffe selling (or even wanting) what are equivalent airframes to what they already have, suport costs and all that.
And if the German Industry (Airbus and MTU) would/will make a hell of a noise if the Luftwaffe goes for Dave i can only imagine what would happen if sudenly some Luftwaffe chap went along and publicly said something like “those Super Hornets are jolly nice” 🙂
Indeed. It looks like the green party will be part of the next German government. Buying nuclear bombers might be a bit unpopular with some of them. Would be funny though. The first time the green party was in the gov, Germany went to war for the first time since 1945 (Kosovo 1999), the second time with the green party, Germany gets new nuclear bombers
LOOOOLLLLLL
Cheers
SintraAs for the Rafale, while it could replace the Tornados easily, nobody expected the germans to buy it anyway, as it would be complicated to pretend to sell teh Typhoon (as they still try here and there)
“They still try here and there”?!
Eurofighter has more competitions going on than Dassault and untill now they´ve sold 127 airframes to non partners nations versus the 84 Rafales sold by Dassault…
There´s absolutely zero reasons for any Eurofighter partner nation to acquire a Rafale.
SintraThat other Typhoon operators will simply abandon upgrades now that Germany is committed to F35 and sixth gen aircraft is also questionable
Germany is not commited to the F-35A or to a sixth gen aircraft.
One Luftwaffe official, under Chattan House Rules made a few comments in an international conference, that doesnt mean that the Luftwaffe is going to acquire the F-35A (it would be a sensible thing to do, but its far from assured).
SintraRip Typhoon.
Rafale and Gripen are probably the only eurocanards that will see further development.
?
Can you name one combat jet that was present in the Luftwaffe and the RAF, in the last five decades, that was not “developed” and upgraded across its entire operational life?
By the way the Tornado is still receiving upgrades today, the last airframe was delivered in 1998.
Cheers
SintraThe Vigilante’s design with the broad body, wing on top and side air intakes with the top over hang was indeed the grandfather of the later fighters. Altho it had just the one vertical tail member, look it up, NA’a first design had two, but the Navy reject it. With the original design the Vigilante looked exactly like a larger F-15.
I supose that the Fairey Delta was the prototype for the Eurofighter Typhoon, and the Dassault Rafale then… Or was it the Mikoyan ye-8? It looks just like a Gripen, just like a Vigilante looks like a Tomcat.
Look, North American Rockwell did answer to the FX (the one that MD won and gave the USAF the Eagle) competition with this:
[ATTACH=CONFIG]256850[/ATTACH]
And the only thing in common with the Vigilante its the name of the company and the fact that its a twin engined jet, nevermind all the other jets that you´ve mentioned, Grumman didnt build the tomcat based on the Vigilante, neither did MDouglas for the Eagle and the idea that the Fulcrum was based on North American Rockwell work is… Words elude me.
SintraI’ve seen a different clip. Those Barracuda esque remote carriers fill the DEAD role (jamming and weapon release). Typhoon: Standoff weapons carrier/mud hut bombing. Barracuda: SEAD/DEAD. New top of the line fighter/sensor platform.
The Typhoon in that video was doing ATA escort, the FCAS was doing the RECON job in contested airspace, relaying data to the rest of the fleet, the DEAD “drones” were receiving the information from the FCAS sensors, it was the FCAS that was the enabler for the “DEAD” mission, not the drones.
If Airbus wanted to show a Typhoon replacement we would have seen SU57´s being blown to pieces, that video was directly aimed at the ATG/RECON/EW missions, the ones performed by the Tornado in the Luftwaffe.
The video is quite explicit, FCAS working alongside Drones and Typhoons, doing the Tornado job, the Tornado is not in the video because it was replaced by FCAS. If somehow the video was meant to be describing the replacement of Typhoon, then we would not have seen Typhoons on the video and the ATA mission would be proeminent, its not.
Cheers
SintraA CAS based Su-34 wont be a bad idea
Its an awfull one.
The SU-34 its a 22,5 tons clean weight behemoth, its a massive aircraft, its operating costs will be huge by comparison with the SU-25, the chances of the VVS getting a one to one airframe replacement are zero.
SintraIt is clear to me that Airbus have decided that there is only one show in town, and this is the Typhoon replacement. They are promoting it along the same lines as Dassault/France are their FCAS.
F35 for tornado because it’s too soon, and plenty of time to create a beast of a Neurofighter.
mrmalaya, i have to (respectfully) disagree, that video is the epithome of a XXI century Tornado ECR (Electric Combat / Reconnaissance) replacement. Airbus, with that video describes a Tornado replacement not a Typhoon.
The design has a bit of a F-16XL “look” to it.
Cheers
ps – I would love to see Dassault manned designs made in the last decade, the chaps have been pretty closed.
Sintrathere are, basically, 4 nations capable of making their fighters by themselves, independently
Forgeting (at least) the UK and Japan? Both have the capability to design and produce the airframe, engine and sensors independently for such an endeavour.
All others: make parts at best, haven’t designed a fighter on their own since decades (some never) or are in the learning process like India, who has a loong way ahead before making something competitive
The last time that France designed a fighter that went operational was around three decades ago, from the moment that C01 was completed the main bit of “design” was done.
SintraSo if the Luftwaffe now officially wants the F35, France and Germany are definitely going to build one fighter to replace Typhoon and Rafale right?
Careful there, one Lufftwaffe official under Chatan House Rules said that the Luftwaffe looked on whats on the market and its favorite was the F-35 (i would imagine the “A”). Thats understandable, they only have three realistic options “on the market”, a) keeping the Tornado till the late thirties, b) more Typhoons or c) the F-35A, looking at the mission the Luftwaffe would choose c) almost automaticaly, now the MOD will have to agree with the Luftwaffe and the Government will have to agree with the Luftwaffe and thats far from certain. And that acquisition will be resisted “tooth and nail” by the industry and (i suspect) by parts of the Government.
Mind you, replacing the Tornado with the F-35A while ordering the replacement of the Typhoon to Airbus/Dassault is entirely sensible.
Cheers
Sintraits design was the prototype of many fighters such as the F-14, F-15, and the MIG 29 and 31
It was?
The chaps at Grumman and Mig might be surprised with that one.
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