It’s still April 1st in Europe right????

Originally posted by Vympel
So far, the only countries that have bought in to JSF are:

– Britain (Level I)
– Italy (Level II)
– Netherlands (Level II)
– Canada (Level III)
– Denmark (Level III)
– Norway (Level III)
– Turkey (Level III)
– Australia (I assume Level III, considering it’s pledged $150 million)

I think I remember something about Belgium joining at level 3. Also what about Israel?

When one looks at those countries, there are not many countries left that can actually afford Eurofighter, but who can probably afford JSF because of US subsidies – like Egypt who would probably struggle getting an An-2 off the ground without US $$$$.

Looking at each region and looking at what each traditionally Western friendly country purchases:

It can be safely assumed that the Middle East won’t see much in the way of sales in the following years – Saudi F-15’s and Tornados have a lot of potential while I don’t think the Saudis will be able to afford an F-5E replacement. Bahrain, Qatar, UAE have just purchased new fighters in the last ten years. Egypt as mentioned will live off US subsidies, while Israel is a definite JSF buyer. Morocco is also rather poor and I can’t see it acquiring high tech fighters.

Africa is a joke unless you consider second hand MiG’s/Flanker’s.

Latin America is also too impoverished to acquire expensive fighters and when they do it’s in pathetically small numbers (Peru 12 Mirage 2000’s, Chile: 10 F-16C/D – even the new Brazillian fighter requirement is currently only for one squadron worth of a/c to replace Mirage III).

Asia – some potential in Singapore but where else? South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand are traditional buyers of US hardware and this is likely to continue. Japan is an F-15 user and is acquiring new F-2’s, while Indonesia is drifting towards Russian hardware, and Malaysia is arguably as well – Su-30MKM, MiG-29N, Mi-17 etc.

Europe is the only place where EF2000 has a serious chance and then only with a handful of potential buyers – Belgium, Norway, Greece, Portugal and that’s about it. Most Eastern countries are still too poor to acquire new combat aircraft (Bulgaria, Romania, Slovak Republic). Poland has chosen F-16, while Czechs and Hungarians are going with the “cheap” Gripen.

That’s a couple of hundred a/c at most.

Originally posted by GarryB
The real reason the Germans had problems with the Mig-29s was that they refused to upgrade them and were therefore stuck with an aircraft designed for the cold war to be maintained by Soviet cold war procedures and standards. An upgrade to any SMT standard (1,2 or 3) would have made them easier and cheaper to “own and use”.

They chose not to upgrade because that might threaten the Typhoon purchase (if upgraded Mig-29s could do the job why waste hundreds of millions on a new plane), so the decision was purely political.

I also think the fact that they only had 24 MiG-29’s made the fighter irrelevant. 24 MiG-29’s is a lot in many countries, but ot much for a middle power like Germany who operates hundreds of aircraft.

24 MiG’s require additional maintennance and suplly lines, so it males sense to replace them and the F-4 with one fighter.

Originally posted by Billy Bishop

Also I think most of you are way too pessimistic about Serbia’s economy. They went through 10 years of sanctions and war, so of course they’re poor, but you can’t compare them with other eastern European countries, because Serbia was not part of the warsaw pact and is just as highly developed and industrialized as most western countries. Before the breakup of Yugoslavia, their GDP per capita was higher than several EU countries (such as Greece, Portugal, and Spain). Look at Slovenia, they have already caught up to the poorer EU countries, so why shouldn’t Serbia do the same in another 5-10 years?

I don’t think Serbia will get anywhere near Slovenia in 10-15 years. (http://www.worldbank.org)

Here is part of a World Bank review of Slovenia:

“Slovenia is a high income country with Gross National Income (GNI) per capita of US$ 9,810. The country is strategically located at the crossroads between eastern and western Europe, and is endowed with highly skilled human capital. It ranks among the most successful transition economies and is perhaps the most developed EU accession country. Slovenia’s high income levels are in part the result of very high pre-transition standards of living, the highest among all transition economies ( with 70% of the GDP of current EU members in Purchasing Power Standards per capita, the country is more advanced than Portugal or Greece). Slovenia’s relative prosperity has been a key factor in the country’s strategic approach to reform, which has been substantially different from other Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries.”

Serbia and Montenegro

“Serbia and Montenegro is a lower middle income country with Gross National Income (GNI) per capita of US$ 1,400. Agricultural land is fertile and arable, and the country is rich in natural and mineral waters. Serbia and Montenegro is also well positioned for development as a transportation hub due to its situation on the crossroads of land and air routes linking Europe from North to South and West to East. In 2002, services accounted for 40 percent of GDP, industry for 36 percent, and agriculture for 24 percent.

After a delayed transition, Serbia and Montenegro is progressing steadily towards a market economy despite the political turmoil of the past two years which included the assassination of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic, and the country’s change of name from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Macroeconomic stability, achieved swiftly two years ago, was maintained. The economy grew at 5.5 percent in 2001 and 4 percent in 2002, though growth is now slowing down.

Poverty remains a major concern. During the past decade, a long period of instability, international isolation, and economic turmoil adversely affected the living standards of a vast majority of the population. The country’s poor economic performance led to a decrease in real earnings and was accompanied by a deterioration in the social protection and health services. As a result, poverty rose sharply in the 1990s and remains widespread in both republics. Although 10 percent of the population falls below the povery line (10.6 percent in Serbia and 9.4 percent in Montenegro), one third of the country’s people are precariously above the line, and remain in danger of slipping into absolute poverty should any adverse economic developments occur.”

Slovenia was in a much better position post 1991 than any other ex-Yugoslav country. It would be silly to expect Serbia (or Croatia or Macedonia or Bosnia) to reach Slovenian levels for any time soon.

As for 4th gen fighters being less costly, then why did Bangladesh retire its MiG-29’s and keep its F-7’s. The reason is that spares cost a lot as does maintennance of high tech radars etc. It would interesting if someone had some figures on maintennance costs of older generation fighters and newer ones.

MiG-29 can be made NATO compatible – that’s what the Sniper program is about if I remember correctly.

And remember Poland, Cxech Republic and Hungary will be using a variety of Russian equipment (MiG-29/Su-22/Mi-24V/An-70) even though they’re part of NATO.

But sucking up to the US will get you freebies such as ex-USAF F-16’s.