The combat took place at low level with weapons, where the Mirage III/5 had no speed advantage and the use of an AB for a little speed gain becomes prohibitive in terms of endurance or range. The Sea Harrier could loiter higher up to dive for the attackers when alerted. The attackers had just raw data about their surface target they had to engage and overcome the AD of that too. The defenders were well informed what the had to defend and to what sectors are the attackers were limited. None party had time for some maneuvring. The closing speed was >1800 km/h and so not much time was left for SH to engage the attackers in time or to distract them. Many times they managed to extract a toll from the disengaging force only. There was no time left to chase the attackers after weapon-release, because an unknown flight may have slipped in for the next attack on the target the SHs had to defend from that at first.
The British had a typical problem of that time scale as well. The surface defences and the Harriers could not be operated in the same cube of space at the same time.
The other way around, when the British had operated the Mirage III in the role of the SH they had come out even worse.

I have said it before and I will say it again Argentina had a month to extend the runway as the British did after the war to operate the F-4’s this would have allowed fighter operations and at the end of the day Argentina chose when to start the war and failed to plan propley for it i.e. a lack of exocet missiles the Runway at Stanley the lack of readiness of naval assets and so on and so on

as for Sea Harrier it proved its self not only in combat but on a number of Ex’s against a number of types including F-15 to be very good in A2A combat the reason no one builds subsonic fighter any more is that most air-forces have one type and need to use it as an interceptor first

anyway this is not a Sea harrier v Mirage thread I only used Sea harrier to prove that speed is not the be all and end all of A2A combat

When exactly did they loose against the Sea Harrier ? As i remember it, the British fleet was placed out of their effective range (probably for a reason)

Is there something i don’t know ?

think what you are missing is The Sea Harrier squadrons shot down 20 Argentine aircraft in air-to-air combat with no air-to-air losses, and some of these were Mirage 111 & 5 including the first kill of the war

This is What I was getting at in post 8.
What changes are actually required to a WAH 64D to make a Boeing AH64E, and is it really worth the UK buying into these changes wholesale, or cherry pick the best parts and allow AW and RR to upgrade what is necessary

The engines are powerful enough and one of the thing with the engine is it is the same one used in the Merlin fleet so if our Apache’s go to sea one engine two aircraft types less parts carried

to my limited understanding of helicopters it is not the air-frame that is the problem most of the time it is the engines- gearboxes – rotors & heads and avionics that need upgrades as in the Puma – Merlin & Chinook fleets the US itself are upgrading 600+ D’s to E’s + 60 odd new ones

what is the different’s from D to E on the air-frame why can’t the WAH-64D be striped out and refitted they already have engines that are as powerful as the E and different avionics

Yes, thats it.

That dome was most probably removed around the days of commissioning ceremony along with the arrestor cables. But even though they put back all arresting apparatus, they did not do the same with the dome at stern. My understanding is that those two area at stern are most probably destined for the VL missiles and close-in weapons and I always found that dome there as a mismatch. So my guess is that it was not its actual place and was just residing at its temporaty location?

@ Tempest414

INS Hansa @ Goa is a proper STOBAR facility with a ramp, chokes and arrestor gear apparatus. It is a full fledged facility for STOBAR and I believe Rafale-M would be better off in India if they want to test the aircraft or train themselves.

The point is that we all know that Rafale M can catch a wire but can it take off from a ramp why would Dassalt spend millions going to India to find out when there is two perfectly good ramps a hour away in the UK if all goes well with the point proved then go all the way to India

http://www.nation.lk/edition/feature-issues/item/25217-after-70-years-of-foreign-troops-bases-should-be-shut-down.html

lots of talks on the UK re-examining its relationship with US forces stationed in the UK. Ranging from stricter controls to outright removal.

in the case the Uk decides to asks its ww2 saviors to go home, how would they redeploy their units to make up for the defensive gaps? It could be a positive for the local defense industry as it might force the UK MOD to purchase more.

Firstly you can stop the WW11 Savior sh!t

as for redeployment of forces with one F15C and two F-15E units of which one is stood down there is no defensive gap as the USAFE has no part in the UK QRA the big hole that would be left if the US left would be the NATO tanker fleet of which the UK uses little or none of

as for stricter controls the USAFE has had a outstanding safety record in the UK and this so call talk is media rubbish

Well I agree that there is no sense in it, but several articles I have read clearly state that one option open to the MOD is to replace the type entirely, due in part to the fact that the US Army’s shift to the E (combined with its funding problems) could cause the UK to have to wait longer than it would like for their own Guardians….

At Wattishan there was no talk of the type going all together just dropping a Sqn we have to remember that the WAH-64D differs alot from the US model in that it has more powerful engines folding rotor head different comms set and defensive aids suite some of the US upgrade is more powerful engines and new blades

Frankly? To me the Hamiltons (irrespective if they are 2, 4, 6 or “50”) are absolutely useless in military terms if the objective of the Philippine Defence Ministry is to somehow “deter” tha Chinese Naval encroachment of disputed South China Sea areas… The Philippine Navy would have to begin with some 10 FREMM-equivalent ships just to START making China Notice them, othewise it is just money thrown away… inevitably ending with the aknowledgement of Chinese ownership of the disputed shoals and reefs…
Also I would never trust the US to guarantee my nation´s territory at sea, at the very key moment they might find themselves too busy elsewhere, then you are screwed.

Regards,

Hammer

Is the Hamilton class a waist of time for the Philippines Navy

As I look at it I think the Hamilton class is a lot of ship for the money cost to Philippines 10 million dollars each operating cost of about 1.5 million a year a crew of 80-100 it has range of 14,000nm and can support helicopter operations these ships could do with a bit more fire power and the Hamilton’s have been deployed with harpoon and Phalanx in the past so by refitting Harpoon and swapping Phalanx for Sea’ram these ship could have some teeth with low costs and if it was me I would be looking for 3 more them to bring the fleet up to 5. Will the Philippine Navy be able to stop the Chinese Navy in the South China Sea if it comes to it No but by having these ships there it forces China to acknowledge there is a dispute and that any military action will be seen as aggression by the rest of the western powers

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