Lampyriade could have been in service in the middle of the 90ies ad would have been the first supersonic Stealth fighter, if the Cold war would not have ended. So the statement from the US is pure bs.
However we must see that european nations are more defense orientated, which means that fighters like Ef are more designed to keep enemy aircrafts out of your airspace, rather then shooting down enemy airplanes in the enemies airspace.

nice pics

And operating such subs would also be a bit expensive. Especially if they are a known threat and would have to face hunting US SSNs and P-3s.

Same with Flankers. Operating large numbers of Flankers is only an option to very few countries in the world.

I think the discussion is over anyway. Most people seem to agree on the fact that the russian missiles are your best option if you are out to sink an US carrier. Even Jonsey and me are not discussing that fact. However I think that most people also agree on the fact, that they are pure overkill if you are not planing on fighting a US carrier.

The thing about the NSM is that it’s too short ranged. Now matter how stealthy, low observable and etc, it’s 160km range is just too short to attack a CARRIER group. At 160kms, your launch platforms like Helicopters, fixed wing aircraft, surface vessels and etc will probably be detected before then, even if you use these and launch them from lower altitude. You need something longer ranged at least 250kms to kind of stay out of Carrier defences. If you get too close, you’ll really have to tangle with E-2Cs and F-18E/Fs(which is a rather poor interceptor)

If fighting a carrier group even 250 kms is too short if you consider the CAPs and the picket ships.

With the new AMRAAMS reaching up to 100km range (in the near future) you would need at least 350 km range to avoid them. However that is only if you can use a multiple axis approach to the carrier. If you are only able to come from one threat axis the CAP can be postioned to look for that axis only and you would look at a >350km stand-off range. However even if you have the range, do you have the targeting abilities to maken a succesfull launch on the carrier group ?? Especially without being forced to fly high and use active radar searches to pin-point the exact location of the carrier ?? Especially with relative dumb weapons like Granit, who only go for the biggest target. Launching them blindly into the believed position of the carrier is a waste of resources and very risky, as you might hit civilian ships.
In fact the time of the cold war is over, so the the logic that any ship that does not belong to your side, does belong to the other side and can be hit, is truely flawed today. Even for the NKs, hitting a chinese freighter would not help their case in any way.

And that all is apart from the fact, that long range is only usefull as long as you can pinpoint the target at that long ranges.

But those warships did not feel threatened by your presenece, nor did they try to hide from you, nor did they try to keep you away.

Do you believe that they would allow an enemy ship to come so close ?? Even for land based Granits, you need to have the ability to fix the position of a carrier group operating near your coast. Earth bound solutions won´t cut it. So you will be looking at an airborne solution. So you need an AWACS style plane with a good range or an MPA with the same range. That would not mean you find the enemy task force, as enemy fighters would try to down your important targeting assets however.

So before you can make use of Granit even land based :

– airborne recon assets that are able to fix the position of the carrier group within 200-300 kms of your coast

– SAMs and or fighters to keep those assets save

– near realtime data transfer to your launcher units so that they can use the position you have fixed

Well for most countries this is either unaffordable or worthless.

Iran would be mich better of to buy land based cruise missiles to attakc the airbases in the Gulf States, rather then investing in such a carrier destroyer system. Because for them it will be important to hit the amphibs and that can be done by lots of cheap and shorter ranged missiles.

India could do it, but the long coastline means that they would need lots of launchers

China could do it

NK could never afford it

Nice, hope it will look as elegant as the 753

nice pics