I have to seriously question the assertion alluded to in the article that $2.7bn is a bargain, and that a new ship would cost $4bn. It has to be taken into account that the ship is fundamentally an old ship that has been re-worked. The $4bn figure is suspiciously high, considering the costs of other carriers – heck, even the British CVF project only just touches that figure (c.£4bn for two – c.$8bn for two, i.e. $4bn each); and that is for very large, very capable carriers. I suspect that the Indians would have been much better getting the French to simply build them a modified Charles de Gaulle, with conventional propulsion. This would have been a bit more expensive, but far more capable – the Indians had a long experience of CTOL operations prior to buying Harriers, and it makes more sense. I also suspect that a deal with the French would have allowed the new Indian-built carriers to be of the same design – the French would build the lead ship of the class. As it is, India is getting an elderly orphaned ship, from a supplier that seems to be becoming less and less cooperative. Not an ideal situation!

It would appear that the Russians are really playing a dangerous game with India. Lately they seem to be messing the Indians around a lot, with the Gorshkov and Mil deals especially. It is actually pretty odd – at a time that the US is trying to make inroads into the Indian market and buy their favour, the Russians should be trying to cement their relationship, not sour it!

could you tell me more about the Mil deal?

speaking of MiG-21 models, whatever happened to the FTC-2000.

Both aircraft seem to be stuck in the test stage. In order to develop a new fighter it needs consistent effort on all fronts. A new stealthy fighter is useless without the right avionics (rather put the new avionics into the old aircraft). In the end, Russia was unable to afford any new fighter program in the 1990, only able to keep the capability by financing prototyping and modernization efforts, interestingly only for one manufacturer.

We’ll see how the PAK-FA finally looks like, I think today’s best fighter is about 10-12t empty and a careful compromise between stealth and cost. Something like a Eurofighter with some more stealth features integrated (while the problem with stealth is that you can hardly go half the way: either you reduce RCS by at least 90% (rather 99%) or you can skip that totally).

Hi schorsch, thanks for the reply!

although from what you said, wouldn’t the Rafale design fit your description.. since its roughly the size and capability of the Eurofighter with more attention on lowering its RCS than the Typhoon. Or perhaps a larger Mako

one thing I wonder is why did the PLAAF choose to use the Il-76 as the aircraft to attach their AWACS to rather than say, an aircraft based on an airliner instead

Modernize the Flanker and produce a smaller more versatile aircraft with supercruise and stealth features, probably above those of the Typhoon. As I said, the full eye-level solution versus the F-22 will run into serious problems on either the cost side, or the time, or the technical performance, or the operational suitability. Remember how long the last aircraft that was aimed at a specific US design (F-15) needed to become operational. No operational PAK-FA before 2019?

On a national level it is more important to bring one new aircraft from requirement status to operational status in order to keep this capability within the industry.

had to quote an earlier thread since it is now locked.
what do you think of the Su-47 and MiG 1.42 (or 1.44 whatever it was). Probably not on the smaller side but has a bit more “stealthy” features than the standard flanker.

^ thats a great front shot

is this damocles?