Why not spend that money on their own program? Nobody can’t beat Western technology anyway. 😉 It doesn’t even need to be a true 5th generation. This is just a case of like buying a luxury handbag to them.

because it will be economically inefficient. 5th generation aircraft in the veins of the F-22 or F-35 will be expensive, and even the US is having a hard time funding it. In addition, any Japanese equivalent will probably result in low production numbers and the inability to export them, cutting off economies of scale right there.

If the EF typhon can carry 4 1000lb bombs, why it won’t be able to carry 4 ASM-2s?
The ASM2 only weight 520kg. http://www.missilethreat.com/cruise/id.40/cruise_detail.asp

I am sure you know quite well that dumb bombs are not the same as AShMs and not any pylon can do. It also requires avionics changes.
Right now it does not appear any operational Typhoon is wired for ANY AShM. Out of the three European aircraft, the Rafale was recently cleared for the Exocet and I think the Gripen has a smaller AShM.

Finally, Japanese media itself states a replacement need for the F-4s not the F-2s. http://stamen.iza.ne.jp/blog/entry/828546

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/12/09/military.jet.crash/index.html

SAN DIEGO, California (CNN) — A Korean immigrant who lost his wife, two children and mother-in-law when a Marine Corps jet slammed into the family’s house said Tuesday he did not blame the pilot, who ejected and survived.
Firefighters and military personnel sift through wreckage Monday in San Diego, California.

“Please pray for him not to suffer from this accident,” a distraught Dong Yun Yoon told reporters gathered near the site of Monday’s crash of an F/A-18D jet in San Diego’s University City community.

“He is one of our treasures for the country,” Yoon said in accented English punctuated by long pauses while he tried to maintain his composure.

“I don’t blame him. I don’t have any hard feelings. I know he did everything he could,” said Yoon, flanked by members of San Diego’s Korean community, relatives and members from the family’s church.

Authorities said four people died when the jet crashed into the Yoon family’s house while the pilot was trying to reach nearby Marine Corps Air Station Miramar. Another, unoccupied house also was destroyed.

Yoon named the victims as his infant daughter Rachel, who was born less than two months ago; his 15-month-old daughter Grace; his wife, Young Mi Yoon, 36; and her 60-year-old mother, Suk Im Kim, who he said had come to the United States from Korea recently to help take care of the children.

Fighting back tears, he said of his daughters: “I cannot believe that they are not here right now.”

“I know there are many people who have experienced more terrible things,” Yoon said. “But, please, tell me how to do it. I don’t know what to do.”

Marine Corps authorities said the pilot, whose name was not released, was hospitalized after he parachuted from the jet, and an investigation into the cause of the crash has been launched.

The jet had just performed landing training on a Navy aircraft carrier before the pilot reported having trouble, according to the Marine Corps. Authorities described the jet as disabled.

Three bodies — those of two adults and an infant — were recovered hours after the crash on Monday. The fourth body — that of a child — was recovered Tuesday as firefighters sifted through the rubble of the Yoon house.

Authorities said they did not expect to find any other victims of the crash.

Yoon’s minister, Daniel Shin, told reporters the Yoon family had moved into the house a little more than a month ago. He said Yoon came to the United States in 1989 and had since become a naturalized citizen. Yoon works as manager of “a variety store — a store where they sell a variety of things,” Shin said.

Yoon’s wife came to the United States about four years ago, Shin said.

Yoon spoke softly when he talked about his wife.

“It was God’s blessing that I met her about four years ago. She was a lovely wife and mother,” he said.

His voice fading, he added: “She loves me and babies. I just miss her so much.”

The Marine Corps said Tuesday it would take “a minimum of five to seven working days” to clean up the crash site.

San Diego resident Ian Lerner said he was heading to lunch at a shopping center about a half-mile from the neighborhood of about 20 homes when he saw the jet flying low.

“It was, oh, gosh, maybe a couple of hundred feet off the ground. And it was quiet; I think the engine was off,” Lerner said.iReport.com: See Lerner’s photos

“Then all of a sudden, we saw the canopy of the jet explode and go up, and then we saw the pilot blast out of the plane and the parachute open,” Lerner said. Video Watch a witness describe the pilot’s main concern »

Another witness said the jet was flying at a low altitude and “just spiraled, right out of [the movie] ‘Top Gun.’ “

A photograph taken at the crash site showed the pilot, after ejection, sitting on the front lawn, making a call on his cell phone before he was taken to a hospital. Video Watch burning debris near crash site »

The pilot was the only occupant of the two-seat aircraft, according to the Marine Corps.

The Union-Tribune spoke with Steve Diamond, a retired naval aviator who said he found the pilot in a tree behind a house. He told the paper he helped the man, who Diamond said was a lieutenant in his 20s, down from the tree. See satellite photo showing crash site, airfield »

The pilot told him that after he lost power in one engine, it was decided he would try to get the jet to Miramar on the single working engine, Diamond told the paper.

The pilot was in communication with military air traffic controllers before the jet crashed about two miles from the airfield, the Federal Aviation Administration said.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the pilot ejected moments before the crash and landed in a tree. Jason Widmer said he talked to the pilot, who said he had tried to steer the jet from the homes and into a brushy canyon.

“He was pretty shook up and pretty concerned if he had killed anyone,” Widmer told San Diego 6. “He had seen his bird go into a house.”

A retired general, a pilot who has flown for 40 years and more than 270 missions in Vietnam, said the decision to eject is up to the pilot. F/A-18D planes are very dependable, but any aircraft is subject to error.

That model has two engines, and it can operate with one engine. But if one engine malfunctions, it’s possible that a blade can break off and fly into the other engine, causing it to malfunction, too. If both engines are inoperable and the plane descends below 10,000 feet, it’s likely the pilot will soon lose control.

When the pilot pulls a ring-like lever, a series of automatic actions is set off: The pilot’s harness comes loose, and he is pushed through a canopy, which is rigged to facilitate him breaking through it without causing injury. A pilot can opt to manually activate his parachute, but if he doesn’t, the parachute will open on a timer.

The plane would crash randomly once the pilot is no longer in control.Photo See photos of fiery crash site »

Inside a house in the neighborhood, Robert Johnson sat in his living room with his daughter, Heather Certain, and her 2-year-old son, Nicholas, according to the Union-Tribune. They heard the explosion and then saw a giant fireball in the picture window facing their front yard, the newspaper reported. They ran out of the house. Video Watch aerial footage of crash site »

“The house shook like an earthquake,” Johnson said. “I saw the flames right there in front of my house.”

What’s a Thai trawler’s business in the Gulf of Aden?

sadly global fish stocks have dwindled significantly these past 30-40 years. They have to go farther, deeper, and settle for different sizes of fishes compared to the past.

Some countries have special bilateral treaties in which a foreign country is allowed to fish in their EEZ, etc.

on a side note, if you’re interested in fishing and potential conflict, check out the “Cod Wars” between UK and Iceland.

Oh, I am sure it has nothing to do with Obama wanting to tax everyone making over $250.000. Which, is about 95% of all Small Business Owners. Of course they also do most of the new hiring! That should give the economy a boost………..PLEASE.:(

that is an issue between Obama’s policies and small business owners. The financial crisis has more to do with the collapse of the shadow banking system and liquidity/solvency crisis that developed in the last 20 years and ballooned within the last 10. Partisan mentality from both sides will attempt to put all the blame on one party, but it developed since the end of the Reagan years, and Clinton didn’t make it any better, nor did both Bushes. This is a large scale issue that’s also affecting tax heavy Europe and the US.

The Yen carry trade and related interest rates that has been the de-facto standard for most of the west, is broken, currency exchange rates are wildly fluctuating, and because of this no one can trade properly because values are constantly changing.

Neither Obama or McCain can instantly solve the existing consumer debt amounts in both the US and Europe and banks in both regions are heavily invested in credit derivatives..

you can do what free market economists want to do and lower the interest rates even further, lessen the tax, etc but that won’t stop the stock markets from sinking the day after next.

The day after the election the DOW DROPPED almost 500 points.

there’s no real accurate way to indicate the causes of the dow’s dramatic behavior for the past several weeks. It probably would’ve dropped if McCain won, its dropped even after interest rate cuts, etc.

OK, maybe to other countries where socialism is well known and regularly seen, the US has nothing along those lines. However, to myself, I see “American style socialism” on the rise. We already have a welfare state, massive amounts of government health care, insurance, bailouts, etc etc.

it really is misleading to describe what democrats like to push as “socialist” because its certainly peanuts compared to what’s already been done in Europe.. let alone true collective economies like the Soviet Union. They are all capitalists. How they plan to spend tax money on government programs has nothing to do with capitalism. How they propose regulations, how the government controls the economy, etc does. Bush, Clinton, and W still followed roughly the same economic policies by Greenspan which was laissez-faire capitalism (or in other words Free Market capitalism). Countries like Iceland, etc where the government has high taxes and lots of state programs for people, still run on the same free market capitalism.. its how they spend that tax money that differs.
and quite frankly, in the end Greenspan, Bernanke, Sarkozy, and Johnson all ended up realizing that unrestrained free market capitalism had some serious flaws, especially in the development of shadow banking, and the ones who followed it (despite how they spent their own tax money at home) got hit hard (iceland, US, western Europe, etc). Free Market capitalism isn’t dead, but the US, Western Europe, etc will certainly be more cautious from now on and probably less keen on deregulation.

In the past, many conservatives would call what liberals propose as a “welfare state”, and in many ways thats a much more accurate description than “socialist state”.