Took SEVEN years to reply to post?!

Well…….going by how….ah……”extended” the process has been to aquire some new combat aircraft for the Air Force has been, I would say a replacement for Sao Paulo would be a long way off.

Apologies for going off topic here, but it really all comes from the aftermath of Suez. The French formed the exact opposite conclusions that we did and decided that they had to be prepared to stand up for their interests and that meant they needed to have a genuinely independent nuclear deterrent. They refused American help and this meant that it took longer for the Force Oceanique Strategique to reach the water than the RN’s Resolution class SSBN’s did and it was arguably less capable at first, they kept spending money on it. In contrast Britain gave up its rocket technology thanks to good old short termism so we don’t have the expertise to build an indigenous SLBM. Whereas the M51 SLBM is derived from the Ariane 5’s solid boosters and that no doubt helped to reduce the development cost.

That’s the fundamental difference between France and Britain, the French realise that to be at the top table you have to spend money, that’s why Dassault can tell potential Rafale buyers that the aircraft has fully integrated air to surface capability, ECM etc whereas BAe can only tell potential Typhoon buyers “Err can we get back to you on that?” Its that whole short termism and trying to do things on the cheap mentality that has cost Britain so badly in just about all aspects since the War.

Ah well rant over! 🙁

VERY good post!

Jonesy:

of course the type of aircraft is important, but I’m afraid you’ve completely missed the point.

Military procurement in this country is a mess. It’s disastrously bad. One of the worst things about it is the constant changing of direction. We spend billions on equipment that we don’t buy, or do buy but don’t put into service, as a result of those changes of direction. Fixing that problem is more important than any single equipment procurement decision, regardless of how big. We must, absolutely must, stop the chopping and changing. Calling a halt to it with the carrier procurement would set a precedent. Executing another u-turn would be a signal that the next government, or next minister, can carry on merrily throwing away our money with reversals of procurement policy, leading to far more wasted spending than the cost of fitting catapults to one or even two carriers.

If we cancel the catapults now, I fear it’ll greatly increase the chances of cancelling the whole thing. That’s what you risk with another reversal. You’re saying it’s OK to throw away money already spent, that long-term consequences really don’t matter, as long as the current politician in charge can put his stamp on the budget.

It’s a recipe for the current catastrophe to continue forever.

Completely agree!!

Typhoon – currently the Typhoon cant carry 2 big fuel tanks and 2 Stormshadow at the same time.

Consequently I believe it likely that the RAF will go for conformal fuel tanks (already designed and good for the Tranche 3 Typhoon) in order to allow it to carry the Stormshadow and thus take over the Tornadoes main role (given that Typhoon is on the verge of operating with PWIV as of now and Brimstone will be next).

Also by 2018 the AESA will allow it an effective electronic attack capability. When you combine this with “son of taranis”, I don’t see the RAF needing the F35 as much as the Navy does….

Agree.:)

Turboprops from the 50s???:confused:

In general I agree with the above but I feel I must point out that a government is allways commited to a project right up until the cancell it.

As a less thoughtful “person “, i see it like this : the israelis OCCUPIED ( as in military action , tanks rolling in etc.) the Palestine, Golan and for long time Gaza, and the peoples in those areas were SUBJCETED to this occupation( including widespread humiliation, displacement and all kind of pressures to “make room” for those “colonists” of theirs) for 40 years.

It’s simple really , for this madness to end the israelis MUST get out of Palestine and Golan ! Everything else is hogwash. Peace in ME requires this first step to be done.

Not EVER going to happen. Why? The arabs dont want to live in peace with Israel. They want them gone (perferably dead). They have since 48. If you cant see that, it must be antisemitism.