Really that was a one on one training exercise, mean the RDFAf vs. the RAF. Now in times of shrinking budgets both side need to learn from such exercises. Neither the RDAF nor the RAF would learn anything from a free fight, as the outcome is mostly predictable. So to give a challenge to both sides the “stronger” aircraft is often put at a disadvantage. This could be something like the fight starts at 300kt with the F-16 at the six position of the Typhoon. Looking at the first part of clip the HUD seems to show that the altitude warning was set to 6000ft and it was blinking, so maybe the fight was off.

The MMRCA competition from another perspective :

http://www.dedefensa.org/article-l_inde_ses_avions_et_le_pakistan_et_les_francais_25_05_2011.html

That is a certain way to not get a contract with any government service. Nothing more pleasing than giving a big deal to the guys who stated in public that your organisation has taken bribes for decades. I really hope that was not said.

@ scorpion

nobody claims rafale is a stealth aircraft, nor that it is invincible (besides, distorting other guys’ arguments like that sounds pretty much like “I have no argument, so I’ll try to trash yours” ).

the only thing some people here say (me included) is that it obviously does have quite a low RCS, and that’s about it. how low? as said previously, the ones who do know can’t speak about it…

It is quite easy to calculate at around 1/10th of EF so around 0,1-0,3m².

From my understanding , the Europeans chose deliberately not to wait for a full fifth generation aircraft technology to catch up and develop what would have been a very complex , expensive weapons program , hence they chose to go with 4.5 gen fighters which they see more then ample in defeating the projected threats to them. Given the funding problems and the constant demand to cut defense budgets in Europe it has on hindsight been a wise decision.

Europe has never been nor is SLEEPING on LO and stealth technologies , just they have chosen to not go with a fully LO airframe with Internal bays and all (like the F-22,F-35,PAKFA,J-20) and have put R and D efforts towards UCAV’s which have considerable LO features.

No, the European projects and the ATF were brothers designed to fight future War Pac fighters. ATF would fight the WarPac in their territory, blasting openings for NATO strikers. The European brother would keep War Pac strikes from reaching their targets and WarPac fighters from blasting open a hole on NATO defences.

Rafale developed into a omnirole “nearly-stealth” fighter in the process. Typhoon stayed a super-cruising missile launch platform with a minor RCS reduction on the frontal section.

The favourite is switching with virtually every new article, so take it with a pinch of salt. 😉 Better wait for official announcements, otherwise you might be deeply disappointed…

I tend to beleive Typhoon as well, for one simple reason. Stefan Zoller told FlugRevue with regards to the cuts that are coming for the Luftwaffe, that Cassidian wants to take their chances in emerging markets like India. He sees growth potential for Cassidian only in those emerging markets and is willing to invest money into those countries and set-up factories for highly skilled wokers there.

Data fusion and processing power is great, but it doesn’t address any increase in radar detection range.
Only power and antenna size does.

In the versions offered for export, probably yes. Even the PEASA radar of Rafale seems to lack very little to current AESA radars on US fighters, so it seems logical that the AESA for Rafale will be ahead of those export versions the US is offering. One must admit, that when it comes to avioncs Rafale is a 5th generation plane, in fact I would call Rafale a 5th- generation plane, instead of a 4.5 generation. Only the all around RCS is not quite 5th generation, while for some angles it seems to be really stealthy compared to other 4.5 generation planes.

Why do they and who is they? Governments and Air Forces must base their decisions on need and money. Currently there is no money and the need is limited, due to other available and mature strike platforms. If the choice is between integrating some currently not needed capability into Typhoons or more flying hours for flight training, then the decision is (unfortunately) obvious under current budgets.