Well, thanks, that’s what I originally understood and then saw that story…

….salesman of the year… 😉

Very confused situation there. I take it that the French are supporting the berber-muslim population that they actually beat down in previous conflicts.

It doesn’t seem like ethnic conflict is the issue on the front burner right now. There was/is a movement of Touareg separatism, but that was superseded by AQM who have been busy destroying tombs in the Touareg area they control and imposing Taliban rules that aren’t to the sentiments of most Touareg in the area. There seems to have been some effort by the West to get the Malian regime to agree to negotiations/more autonomy for the Touareg area in order to reduce friction between two groups which are both antagonistic to AQM. There may well be the issue of whether Malian military goes into these areas to hold them against AQM, or local Touareg forces are left to hold the area (with EU and ECOWAS support).

The Gazelle pilot supposedly died of his wounds, which I take to mean he (or copilot) was able to fly the helicopter back to land at base (or somewhere safe). He must have been hit by small arms or HMG fire that didn’t substantially damage the aircraft. Usage of these unarmored helicopter platforms in roles like this just doesn’t seem like a good idea. Perhaps the Gazelle replacement will have at least light armoring on the crew area. Likewise for programs like the US’ AAS, a platform with some payload allowance (like EADS) could allow light armoring to be applied to the crew area, if not the passenger area.

I don’t think more C17s is really in the pipeline, there is already the NATO C17 group which could provide more planes if needed, there may be constant demand for them from Afghanistan, but that means they are ferrying cargo between Europe and A-stan, so if a higher priority mission comes up they can be switched. Enough A400M are coming online soon between UK, FR, DE,and others that more expensive C17 isn’t needed. Also more refueling to match. Perhaps ideally, but with budget crunch, no.

…?
This is the line I was referring to in the story from La Tribune:

According to the Ministry of Defence, it was reduced to 10,000 euros per flight hour for Rafale C and B, and 7,000 euros for Rafale M in 2012.

What is cheaper about Rafale M maintenance compared to B/C?

Sure, that’s generally going to be a valid issue with China, but in this case China already has full access to Western airliner engines thru the commercial market, including CFM LEAP-X which COMAC is developing C919 around. I don’t see buying PS-90 as a significant change to that status quo… Regardless, they’re using D30 and that’s that 🙂

AFAIK, there is no Argentine blockade of Falklands, they simply refuse to allow cooperation with what they see as usurpers of their territory, and this policy is extended thru Mercosur to a certain extent. That’s quite a bit of difference. A country has no obligation to cooperate with anybody it doesn’t want to. I would hope that the UK welcomes that Argentina is intent on limiting itself to these peaceful means, while seeking a path forward to optimal co-existence. If Argentina cooperation truly is so crucial to the Falklands, then perhaps that may be relevant to their sovereign status, otherwise, it seems to be what is called ‘agreeing to disagree’.

Re: the issue itself, it seems like it comes down to that the UK cannot point to one date where they legally became sovereign in the Falklands, and have multiple agreements recognizing Argentine sovereignty, apologizing for their previous attempts at invasion/theft… The expulsion of government forces at the time of Vernet was successful militarily but otherwise had no difference to previous attempts which they acknowledged as illegal. Ultimately, there isn’t much moral right to lord over the Argentine invasion of 1982 because there isn’t any fundamental difference to UK’s own seizure of the Falklands, both sides used what means they had and were deemed necessary to the task (albeit Argentina was previously acknowledged as the sovereign by the UK, while Britain was not by Argentina).

I do think the Hague decision on Nicaragua/Colombia is going to be widely relevant in many cases, including here as well as Peru/Chile, Venezuela/Guyana and Venezuela/Colombia, and Gibraltar. Perhaps to the Senkaku/Diaoyu as well.

…or a ‘pelican’ v-tail where each stabilizer is mounted laterally to the engine nacelle…

Yeah, for some reason I was thinking there of oxidizer-less gel fuel, but of course the pictured missile doesn’t have an intake like Meteor… :rolleyes:
Like I wrote before, Meteor is almost certain to outclass this missile as pictured… An even smaller missile, replacing AIM-9X, outclassing ASRAAM and ‘competetive’ with MICA range seems do-able… but I question the need there, a superior high-end BVR weapon seems more important vs. high-end opponents and vs. the rest the US armory is completely fine (if anything, lighter weight/lesser capability weapons that are cheaper is the trend). If the US wanted extreme BVR weapons superior to Meteor, gelfuel + ramjet seems a plausible way to go, but I haven’t seen any sign that is desired, and such a project would just seem to undercut the rationale for stealth platforms achieving A2A superiority. Developing both would indeed be formidable, but there’s even less evidence that is in the cards any time soon.