P1EA (SRP 10) and P1EB (SRP 12) are the only upgrades that are fully funded.

If you don’t think P1E is significant, by the way, it’s because you don’t understand what it is. It’s massive, though it has not been well described, and many people don’t realise what it entails, and think that it’s just Paveway IV for the Tranche 2 jet.

P2E has been cancelled, because the success of CP193 persuaded EF GmbH that the best way forward was for individual weapons integrations, rather than one huge leap encompassing all of them.

There will therefore be a two year ‘heartbeat’ of upgrades (SRP 14, 16, 18 and 20) and by the end of these, Typhoon will have all of the features and integrations planned for P2E, and more.

Meteor and AESA fit around the two year heartbeat, rather than being part of it.

But because the different nations have different priorities, sorting out the order of integrations, and thus the content of SRP14, 16, 18 and 20 is proving problematic.

News will emerge in the next two weeks, however, that should point to a way forward, and that may give rapid insertion of new capabilities on Typhoon more credibility.

Isn’t it Dunning-Kruger, anyway?

Better a ‘delusionnal’ journalist than a closed-minded fanboy who thinks he’s an armchair expert.

Better someone who knows that hardware is just one element in EW effectiveness, and that software and mission data are crucial, than someone who is hung up on the theoretical limitations of the bearing accuracy of certain types of antenna, and who makes assumptions as to the number and type of Typhoon’s antennas.

There seems to be a huge emphasis on hardware in these Fanboy Typhoon vs Rafale debates, I guess because hardware is easier for the lay person to quantify. But it’s a bit like comparing brand new restaurants entirely on the basis of their online menus and their own websites.

The journalist may not have eaten his dinner their every day as a paying customer, but he went to the launch, sampled some of the dishes, and talked to the chef, the owner, the manager, and a few of the customers……

Anyway, even if we are foolish enough to limit ourselves to hardware:

SEER is not DASS. DASS is not SEER.

DASS differs markedly on different nations’ Typhoons. Austria doesn’t have one, the German DASS has certain limitations, and the Saudi DASS will, no doubt, have been subject to all sorts of constraints.

Bear in mind that, due to ITAR, the Saudi jet even has different radios, so the idea that it might have different RWR antennas is hardly surprising, and the idea that what’s on the Saudi jet might represent an upgrade option for four nation jets is, frankly, completely laughable.

You make the assumption that Rafale can ‘do’ passive targeting, and that Typhoon cannot, and you make that assumption on the basis of assumptions (some of them groundless) about ONE of Typhoon’s systems, and make other assumptions (equally facile) about Captor and PIRATE.

In any case, while emcon ops are entirely feasible, and are useful under certain circumstances, the idea that formations of Rafales will routinely be blundering around the battlespace, their radars switched off, relying on SPECTRA alone to detect targets, is highly flawed. (And there’s still nothing to stop Typhoon from doing exactly the same, though the combo of DASS and PIRATE means that Typhoon might even do it more effectively than Rafale with SPECTRA and (for those Rafales that have the full-up dual channel version) OSF.

If it were the case that you were going to rely on ESM alone to detect, locate, identify, interrogate and engage the enemy, you might or might not win the air battle, but the fleets of low flying helicopters and para-carrying transports dispatched by the enemy in complete safety would certainly mean that the war would be over by the time you landed, and filling the sky with cheap radar-less fighters (perhaps guided by ground based radar or AWACS) could allow the enemy to ensure that when the Rafale’s returned to the ground, it would be as a shower of metallic confetti and bloody chunks of tissue.

I think that the Danish Lynxes are now owned and operated by the Air Force (Helicopter Wing Karup, part of Tactical Command), but used to be ‘owned’ by the Navy (or more properly by the the Sovaernets Flyvetjeneste (Naval Flying Service) and operated by air force crews.

It’s a Mk 90B (and therefore has a new airframe), but I don’t know if its based on a former Mk 80 or on an ex-Argentine Mk 90.

TMor,

What on earth do you think the Indian politician was on about when he accused Rafale of having failed in precision bombing in Libya?

It doesn’t seem to have failed, by any normal standards, or according to any reasonable yardstick (nor even by the standards of the biggest Rafale sceptic ;)), but I can’t even think what he must have misinterpreted to come to that conclusion.

There have been questions about diversions to Malta, availability, etc., but not, as far as I know, precision bombing, though I have taken my eye off the French ball recently.

We know or believe that the AdlA have looked at Sniper (supposedly through some small dissatisfaction with Damocles), but that’s far from ‘failure’ in precision bombing, and whatever the issues with Damocles, it didn’t stop the AdlA and Aeronavale from dropping 950 guided ‘bombs’ including an unspecified number (unless you know otherwise?) of laser guided bombs and 240 air-launched missiles (15 SCALP and 225 vanilla IN/GPS AASM Hammers).

The majority of LGBs dropped by RAF aircraft during the Libyan op used GPS guidance (all or nearly all were dual mode weapons) or were said to have done so but I don’t think that France has any Enhanced PWs, does it?

There has been speculation that the apparently high proportion of GAINS guided attacks by Tornado/Typhoon actually camouflaged the use of friendly ground-based designation, is there a French perspective on that?

The number of Scalps seems small compared to the RAF Tornado’s Storm Shadow tally – no criticism intended, it’s just an observation. Were they all from Rafale, or some from M2KD? If from Rafale, were all from the carrier based Rafales? Has there been a breakdown of weapons dropped just by Rafale, or better yet by AdlA and Aeronavale Rafales?

And what of the Mirage 2000Ds and Super Etendards? What weapons did they use?

Are you blokes still using any indigenous SAMP LGBs?

MilDave,

You have again demonstrated your usual grasp of the truth, and have again highlighted your usual lack of basic knowledge. Robert Wall is of course an American citizen, as is apparent every time he pops up on TV or on webcasts.

Moreover he is an extremely Francophile American, having lived in and reported from France for some years before his move to the UK.

He himself isn’t quite up to date either. Though the four partner nations have not yet allocated money to AESA they have given industry undertakings that they will do so, so the industry funding of AESA development is merely an interim arrangement.

Also a UK Typhoon future capability roadmap is in place, just as it is in Germany, and the UK has committed to funding both Storm Shadow and Brimstone integration.

As much as I would like Typhoon to have AASM integrated, I believe we’d witness the SDB series and Pilum weapons before then.

I wouldn’t bet on that. 😉

AASM Hammer is a great weapon. It will be great to see it on Typhoon…..;)