No need to IM me … I will detract my “light fighter” example with a medium fighter instead, as I was just using it as an analogy. How come India is not going on to develop its own fighter instead of trying to get an MRCA for the better part of this decade? After all, how many detailed briefings have the Indian officials have had on a variety of platforms!?
My point basically is that it is a retarded line of thought to think PAF will cancel the deal with Saab just because they received all the information they needed from briefing by Saab and now China has that knowledge as well and will provide PAF with a copy cat solution!

India knows what it wants, and its industry can only support one fighter program. once the Tejas is reached FOC and squadron service, it’ll probably start thinking of the MCA if the PAK-FA is taken as the 5th gen heavy fighter.

I’ll agree on the Saab Erieye though..its hard to believe that someone thinks that a briefing or simply knowing the specifications and capabilities of a system will allow a country to develop it on their own..:rolleyes:

Thanks,buddy. This is due to my business. I’m very busy on work in these months, traveling all over China, from northeast provinces to Hainan Island. And I visited India in last month, stayed in New Delhi for one week.:)

how was it ? the New Delhi visit I mean.:)

Not true. Eriye is a fine system as everything has been developed in sweden so it should not have any integration or export control or IP issues.
But you are correct that the swedish AWACS systems have not been used in anger in a war. So if i had a chioce, i would have prefered wedgetail to fly with. But im sure they would have cost a hell of a lot more even if they were on the table.

and so is the Flanker as attested to by any number of sources. that its newer avatars outperforms the F-16 in any of its blocks is also obvious since they belong in different classes- heavy and light. all of the avionics that have been integrated from different sources are also fine systems and as such read Nicks reply on Open Architecture systems as to why integration should not be an issue. I dont want to repeat it all over again. besides, the Flanker is combat proven as well, you forget the Ethiopia/Eritrea conflict ?

I did not call any airforce dumb but was rather stating what id be comfortable going to battle with if my neck was on the line. As for Erieye, both Saab and Ericsson are swedish so no integration issues there that i can think of.

well thats fine as long as you’re saying that its your neck that was on the line. And integration issues are not necessarily only going to come along if the systems are from different countries- they can occur within systems that are sourced from within the same country as well. it depends on how open ended the system architecture really is.

All else being equal, if the differential between chinese and western tech isnt a lot, all chinese JF-17 would be the prefered choice. As things appear right now, the chinese equipment seems to be competing just fine with the westerm vendors so the JF17 kit is full chinese. I dont expect that to change but i then again, i could be wrong. Time will tell.

what I was talking of is how you would’nt be raising the issue of integration had the JF-17 gone in for the RC-400 or a Selex AESA or a Grifo radar or any other western avionics or arms..its about you raising a non-issue (that of systems integration on the MKI series) just because you have no other point to trumpet as to why a MKI would have problems against an F-16 Blk50/52.

I’m quite sure that the PAF has its own reasons to opt for a Chinese fit on avionics but thats moot.

yup. so it was ANI that gave them that tampered article.

F-16 vs MKI is a matter of choice ofcourse. But if i was flying in a war, id rather be in a combat proven, AMRAAM equipped F-16 block52 rather then an MKI. The use of so many different equipment vendors is an integration nightmare and the performance of the package is yet to be put to test in a real war. In addition, the AMRAAM is the best long shot projectile going around and the MKI doesnt have it. But we are offtrack so lets compare the F-16 vs MKI in another thread.

the F-16 is combat proven in theaters where it faced no real threat and was backed by good AWACS support and other Air superiority types..:D had it been up against the likes of well flown Flankers that were also backed by AWACS, I’m afraid its record would have been marred.

also, what exactly would make proven, tested systems bought from different vendors to suddenly stop working in a real combat scenario ? they’re working fine in exercises and in live fire testing, and are demonstrated to be superior to the Blk 50 Falcon in exercises and all of a sudden they’ll fail coz they get the jitters during live combat ? All customers of the MKI series have had customisation to fit their own choices- India, Algeria and Malaysia all have differing systems and they would’nt accept the weapon platform unless it is fully integrated. a small eg. Litening LDPs for the MKIs and Damocles for the MKMs. or are you suggesting that all these three customers are flying Flanker jets with non-working systems ? In the case of the IAF, the very fact that even for the Fulcrum-K, Fulcrum upgrades and the Mirage upgrades its sourcing components from various countries shows that such integration works fine.

I’m afraid the argument just does’nt hold any water. :rolleyes:

I’ve been in touch with the site admin, & had a reply. They thanked me for pointing it out, & said that they got the report in that shape, from a 3rd party, & didn’t edit it themselves. Sounds as if they intend to correct it.

lets for a second assume that they did not intentionally add the “not”. but someone who supplied them that info did. that itself clearly indicates what a lot of people have been crying themselves hoarse about- that DDM is more into mischief making and they have agendas of their own- they have links with arms dealers as the links of Vishal Thapar and Abhishek Verma (who was arrested recently in the War Room leak scandal) attest to. there is very little integrity left in most of these journos who’ll more than happily slander indigenous products if they’re paid by those who compete with these indigenous products. case in point- the 5 series articles on DRDO by Indian Express’ Shiv Aroor, a typical DDM journo- things got to a point where the Govt. itself had to intervene and defend the DRDO. then the PAD test occurred and the ******* went into hiding..Such is the clout of the media in India that’ll tom-tom lies and raise it to a fever pitch..

even today very few people in India appreciate just how much technology has been developed on how little funding and where it stands relative to technology in other sectors in India. for instance a country that cant even produce a decent car or even an Internal combustion engine indigenously till a few years ago came up wtih the Arjun-and instead of ever taking pride in their own country’s achievements, these lowlife *******s take pleasure in pulling it down in their own countrymen’s eyes. 😡 this particular incident that I caught just reflected that.

Swerve could you ask them to provide the name of their “source” who provided that article ? that “not” was planted intentionally thats for sure.

I doubt the IAF has any larger “mandate.” In fact, the PAF had traditionally played a role outside South Asia unlike India.

There are more than a few Soviet jets attributed to the PAF during the war in Afghanistan. The IAF on the other hand has never played a role other than against Pakistan.

what a joke !:rolleyes: you’re comparing the Afghan air force to the PLAAF that the IAF has to defend against ?? the PAF’s job is to protect Pakistan from the IAF. the IAF’s job is to protect India from both Pakistan and China. thats a larger “mandate” for you..:rolleyes:

Apparently, PAF is not as worried about its planned aircraft acquisitions and force numbers as India is if one were to go by the latest article concerning dwindling fighter aircraft in IAF in the coming years that can be operational at any given time. In that scenario, given the size of two countries, Pakistan’s skies will be much better defended than India’s

India does’nt need to have dense fighter populations in the Southern half- the region near Pakistan airspace is the one where most aircraft are based anyway, and that is’nt going to change soon. Its the Eastern theater that needs more cover- its that region that the IAF talks of when it asks for more fighters, to be able to defend both theaters adequately.

whereas the PAF has always been IAF centric and for that its numbers are adequate, the IAF has a much larger mandate.