I observe the situation on the Russian side.
The insolence of the US and NATO “knows no bounds”. State of Russia – 1000 years, its “childhood diseases” is over. Now an adult, experienced “man” (40 – 45 years).
USA – 200 years This is a young man of 18 – 25 years. He “does not know what he was doing.” He knows only one word – “I want to”. He thinks only of himself and his own interests.
The United States in 1945 – 1991 years repeatedly provoked the Soviet Union. Only the the common sense of the Soviet Union saved the world from disaster.

US occupied Europe, Japan and other places. They have placed military bases around the world. What for?
They used to call an enemy of communism. Today, Russia is not communist. In Russia, capitalism, as in the US.
What is the problem?

Approximation of NATO to Russia’s borders. “Orange Revolution” in the former Soviet Union – the result of CIA activities. Financing of a “fifth column” in Russia.
All this creates a danger to the country’s territorial integrity and its statehood. What is surprising is that Russia has decided to defend themselves?

Motives operations in Syria, I do not understand. I guess I look for them in mysticism.

If Turkey will dare again “prick Bear”, then it will lose control of the Black Sea Straits and part of its territory. In any case, the period of tension (or war) will end in 2018.

Oh dear! What’s next? Istanbul is renamed “Czargrad”?!
No Paralay, Turkey wont loose the “Black Sea Straits” for the foreaseable future, the chances of that happening are zero, nill, niente, Nada. And the idea that the USA “ocupied” Western Europe are borderline ridiculous.

Whos to say in a period of weekness, they cant grab the Baltics and then sue for peace? It has already been mentioned that there isn’t a force east of the german frontier that can stop them.
As long as there is a threat, we will be concerned. They have invaded 2 sovereign countries in the last few years,
So lets not pretend Putin is a patron saint. Are the Baltics near worthless? Yes. Are the Baltics a buffer against Nato adventures? Yes. Would Putin like his Soviet ERA buffer to return gloriously? Yes.

And would Putin risk a war with NATO?
NO
Putin is not a patron saint, far from it, but the thing that he´s even less is stupid.

http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/air-space/2016/02/15/f-35-trans-atlantic-flight-featured-all-italian-support/80406388/

During the 2,442 nautical mile flight to the US, the aircraft flew in a corridor 10-12 miles wide by 3,000 feet while the two slower C-130Js took up positions along the route, so either would be nearby if a pilot went down.

Despite strong turbulence, the F-35 refueled four times and the Eurofighter five times, often enough to mean that if a refueling appointment was canceled, the aircraft still had enough fuel to make it to an alternate airstrip.

And according to the picture in the article:

F-35A: no external fuel tank.

EF-2K: three 1,000L fuel tanks.

The Phoon in question was a twin seater (the frontal fuel bag is deleted on that one) and while the F-35A landed in Patuxent, the Phoon had to go to Pease (up North).

Could these actually sink all the carriers of any NAVY ?

http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/sweden-has-a-sub-thats-so-deadly-the-us-navy-hired-it-t-1649695984

Swden is a supapower after all.

No, a modern SSK in the right place can indeed be a dangerous thing, but it has to be “in the right place”. Submerged, (using an AIP system) an SSK is SLOW, if they go into battery mode and make a dash, the range is small, they are (sometimes) called a “moving minefield” because of that. It cant go hunting a battle group that moves at 25/30 knots in the open ocean because it is slower, thats a job for the nuclear submarine.
Throw a Gotland, U214, Scorpene, whatever, into a confined space (Baltics, Adriatic, etc) or near a choke point (Gibraltar, Ormuz, etc) and when well used is a very dangerous thing, on the open ocean, well, it has some disadvantages.

MADL is classified (or my GoggleFu is not up to snuff) but I did find that Link 16 is about 115kbps.

Thanks Spud

Over what time period and for how many jets?

Those are the numbers for the development (UK part of it) and the acquisition of 160 airframes, start of the program till delivering the last one of them in 2018, plus the following programs “Typhoon Future Capability Programme” (the insertion of the “austere” ATG capability that was used in Libia), “Meteor Integration”, “Storm Shadow Integration” and “Brimstone 2 integration”. Basicaly everything that has a budgeted development or production contract.

I hate knowing something but not KNOWING something, so I opened up the last 15 years of budgets and crunched the numbers.

1. The USAF budget site (for you masochists out there who feel like repeating my calculations) is http://www.saffm.hq.af.mil/budget/
2. I used the complete Rec Flyaway costs, including ECO for the F-35 even though it was not an F-22 line item.
3. I used Tom’s Inflation calculator http://www.halfhill.com/inflation_js.html
4. I included both then-year (Green Row) and inflation-adjusted to 2016 numbers (Red Row)
5. I use Rec Flyaway numbers for comparison because they are the only numbers that can be used to judge manufacturing efficiency over a long period of time and across platforms.

Conclusions:
1. The entire F-22 production run was in 10 batches of 179 planes.
2. The first 10 years of F-35 production will end with FY2016 and 178 planes, yes, that is only a 1 plane difference in the F-22’s favor.
3. The F-22 benefited from a faster ramp=up (2/10/13/21/22 = 68) for the 1st 5 years vs (2/6/7/10/25 = 58) for the F-35.
4. The F-35 did not overtake the F-22’s annual build rate until it’s 9th LRIP.
5. Even when looking at Then-Year dollars, the F-22 was ALWAYS more expensive than the F-35 in all but one year (in LRIP6 the F-22 was $1.29mil less)
6. The average Then-Year cost of an F-22 was $161.53mil and while the F-35 is $143mil
7. In Then-Year dollars the F-35 was on average $18.22 mil cheaper and in FY16 dollars, $53.72 mil cheaper.

Without further ado, the numbers.

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Hats off Spud, thats a seriously good job there.
Well done

The first order will end 2018 probably. But Tr1s will eventually be replaced, which will entail a new batch probably.

Not a chance. The talks about T3B being ordered to replace T1´s are dead for years now.
The Kuwaiti order throws the production lines to 2020.