I was hoping for a 16-cell MICA vertical launch system upgrade for Taiwan’s ships.

Hope away but it will almost certainly not happen, France has stopped selling new weapons to Taiwan in the hope that when they get the embargo on China lifted they will go on a spending spree. Taiwans only real option is itself and the US.

The RN originally accepted a lot of “fitted for but not with” in order to get 12 hulls, then it was cut to 8 and they may end up with 6, a far cry from the famous the navy wanted 6, the treasury offered 4 and they compromised on 8 row over battleships before WW1. Makes me wonder what the RN would have pushed for 10 years ago if they’d known the government would fail to honour their part of the bargain, was a bit naive of the RN ever to swallow that whole cuts now for jam tomorrow BS IMO.

Ah pre world war 1, when 4 inch secondary guns instead of 6 inch on the four battleships to be built that year was considered a defense cut!:eek:

Oh, I knew about that system, during the Cold war it was originally the A-35 sytem around Moscow with just a few dozen or so intercepter missiles.
What percentage of NATO’s thousands of ballistic nuclear warheads, homing in on the Soviet Union, do you think the A-35 system could ever have hoped to stop?

I was under the impression that the intention behind the system was to provide Moscow with a few extra minutes of life rather than provide a complete and ultimate shield?:confused:

I too think the F-106 was a pretty good machine but, with respect, speedwise not in the same bracket as the F-12.

This was exactly why I posted the thread – the fact that the Dart ended up filling 20+ squadrons whereas the F-12 had the plug pulled says things to me not just about cost but also about precisely what aero-ecological niche the latter was intended to fill.

It seems to me that a sudden realisation must have set in to the effect: ‘we’ve built a plane which has no role.’

Thats exactly it, there is four factors really,

1) Mach 3+ proved allot harder and more expensive than everybody expected.

2) The cold war chilled out, they call it detente or something but anyway the arms race slowed and high end projects got canned.

3) The expected Soviet Mach 3 bombers didnt exist in reality at that time to the extent that the western ones did (Avro 730 prototype was under construction when it was cancelled and of course the Valkyrie flew).

4) Everyone went low level with the improvements in missile based AD systems.

Interestingly though the Russians at the end of the cold war were pursuing high speed bombers, win the race to Greenland you know.;)

What makes you think the F-23 or the A-12 will come out any better? The F-23 was a prototype and serial aircraft would go through the usual cost and weight increase like F-22 and F-35. A-12 wasn’t even a prototype, when it was axed by Dick Cheney himself the Navy didn’t even figured out exactly what engine it should use. It would come out – like any aircraft specified by USN or USAF – overweight, overbudget and underperformance.

Allow me too say it again- its just a bit of fun.:rolleyes:

So basically none.

Yeah, especially Northrop would be happy to test another aircraft and get another two-digit billion dollar paycheck. Like F-14/F-15 and F-16/F-17->F-18 the aviation lobby is strong and the military stupid enough to ask for many airframes for similar missions.

If you all were defence minister, the air force would go out totally out of money with few inadequate aircraft.

John Boyd would call you “Gold-platers”.

Calm down, its just a bit a fun.:rolleyes:

But whilst I am at it I will scrap the A and C variants of the F-35 and keep the B variant for the USMC only. Both the USN can have F-23’s and A-12s.:diablo:

Every time I look at the X-47 I find myself thinking ahhhhh its the A-12’s revenge!!!:diablo: I have always felt rather sorry for the USN, in the early 90s they had the Tomcat in service and the A-12 project on going……….now they are stuck with carriers full of snornets.

Anyway back on topic, Northrop has previously (2005 IIRC) shown that it can control four UCAV’s within a carriers airspace.

Source: http://www.irconnect.com/noc/press/pages/news_releases.mhtml?d=90991

USAF/USN/USMC

A-12 Avenger 2

B-2 Spirit

F-23 Black Widow 2

F-35A/B/C

As many as can be afforded!