I think the Eurofighter consortium wins by having
– large customer base
– large economical backing (3x as much as the Rafale, probably >10x as the gripen).

Capability-wise, Eurofighter and Rafale are comparable, the EF2k is a bit more of a performer. However, a nation looking for something in that class both are probable alternatives.
The Gripen will remain a niche product, but is better suited for smaller air forces, and SAAB probably does offer more for smaller customers.

All three will have shortcomings compared to F-35 and I don’t think any of them will be a huge export success, the Eurofighter will not jump the 1000 airframe built mark.
With that in mind (and the attractiveness of the F-15E/SK/K/whatever) the decision to make the T3 a real fighter-bomber is more reasonable, with single/dual seat option (dual seater not just trainer), extra fuel and lots of punch. With Italy and UK already having the F-35, it would largely depend on Germany to pursue an “advanced” Eurofighter.

From the pure airframe/engine combination I think the Eurofighter has most potential.

Germany has the capability on it’s Tornadoes, and it used to be practiced. Don’t know if they continue with the capability now the MRTTs are there, but it was a favourite bit of their flying displays during the late 1980s, early 1990s.

The MN should have all it’s carrier-qualified pilots qualified for aerial refuelling as well. Don’t know if it makes any difference if it’s from a buddy-tanker, or a big one.

I think in case of Germany the buddy refueling had the advantage of training without renting other nations tankers. Same applies for naval aviation.

As noted buddy refueling is a rather wasteful way, on the other hand it may add the extra range needed to attack a high value target (with appropriate weapons, for example the Bomb or a anti ship missile).

Another question concerning the RN Sea Harriers: was it tried to refuel them on a frigate or similar ship using the helicopter deck?

Hey guys,

I have been doing some research on modernization of certain aircrafts for my marketing class and I am having some sort of difficulty in finding the target market for these air crafts, i.e. I can’t find the countries/operators of such planes, who would be needing the following aircrafts to be upgraded/modernized.

Su 24
Su 25
MiG 23
Mig 29

If anyone of you has any article(s), or related information about the target audience for this market, it’ll be highly appreciated and credited!

Thanks!
Lynx

You have taken a very strange “marketing” issue.

Su-24:
Few aircrafts were delivered to some nations, but I think most of them will replace it by another type. The legacy Su-24MK is not really 21st century, even with modest upgrades. Target market are those countries that cannot afford new aircraft.

Su-25:
More fantasy here as no real replacement available. Probably we’ll see Su-25 in service for quite a while.

MiG-23:
This aircraft type is dead. Angola is one the last operators, some have -27 left in inventory.

MiG-29:
Most aircraft delivered were MiG-29″A”. To bring them up to standard lots of improvement is needed. Most countries doing a modest “ICAO-update” to use them a few more years. Few countries plan to continue to use their MiG-29, most are looking for replacements (F-16, Gripen, even Eurofighter).

Wikipedia normally has list of users.

Sanctions just punnished the average NK citizen.

While I agree that sanctions normally hurt the average Kim more than the Dear Leader himself, in North Korea the truly miserable state of the country cannot be blamed on the USA. After all, North Korea is much more a problem of the direct neighbors, which are South Korea, China, Japan and Russia. The North Korean issue has once again proved that without US involvement other self-declared superpowers are unable to solve a problem, as Japan and South Korea are not in the position to “demand” anything. Finally North Korea was a Chinese problem (from 1950ies onwards), and it will be the next 30 years.

yes, at least the data is exact, but I saw somebody here even used rootless data to calculate. The baffling result beguile one to very wrong way. Remeber overly depreciate Soviet aircraft won’t enlarge your ability any better.

I actually did, but I can’t see how can make it look right for you and MiG.
And by knowledge and ability actually was enlarged, by myself however.

But if you ask me, the whole A400M thing doesn’t make sense anyway, when there is the C-130, and the C-17…
Of course some (inter?)nationalistic pride had to come into play.

To be honest, when you look at the capability of the A400M, the whole C-130 and C-17 thing doesn’t make any sense. 95% of the missions actually flown with these aircraft can be done with a mixture of A400M and A330-200 MRTT (*). The remaining 5% … there are always issues.
On the upside you get a couple of missions neither C-130 nor C-17 can do, as the first one is too small, and the other one to bulky and with its dirt blowing&sucking turbofan engines just not capable of.

*: Even the USAF figured out that flying palletized cargo over the seven seas into airports that are neither under constant mortar attack, nor have short dusty runways, but lots of logistics on side, that for those missions a C-17 is huge waste of money. Hence they decided for the A330 as running a cargo airline eats up the lifetime of its precious transporters.

The prescribe minimum range Su-24 had is 2775km from Sukhoi web, same data of the F-111 is 3700km from JAWA. the rate is 0.75 where does your 1/3 come from?
We admitted turbofan is superior than Turbojet, but as we quoted previously, the SFC of the TF30 has no 1/3 advantage more than AL-21 neither on afterburner nor without afterburner.

Lacking fuel tank in wing a cause de internal fuel of the Su-24 less than F-111 but, bomb bay also occupied space in fuselage of the F-111, so 11 ton for Su-24 and 14tons for the F-111 also is reliable and reasonable. the rate is approxi to 3/4, where does 1/3 range at least base on?

And you still compare idle/max sea level uninstalled engine SFCs against each other.
I feel sorry for you, you didn’t even take away the most basic technical lesson for the future.

That is what i have heard however i really dont get it , Undetectable while comming and detectable while going doesnt make any sence , Modern Air defence is 3D anyways , their can be radar sites everywhere even behind you and the unbrella defence is scattered all over . One would assume that much like the F-22 the F-35 would have a self control system which assists the pilot in locating Hostile radars (DAS etc) and enabling to provide the best RCS aspect to the most vulnerable direction , i know the raptors because of increased SA choose which aspect to penetrate the AD in , and strategize accordingly. The best way for the Strike force is to deal with the IADS first and formost with a combination of Cruise missiles (Yes surgical strike @ Command and control positions does create a trickle down effect of surprise and degrades the enemies capabilities) F-22’s , F-35’s , B-2’s . The F-22 , B-2 Punch alone is what the GSTF envisioned would be enough to deal with Future IADS of Iran , NK (mainly iran) or anyother country looking to establish an IADS umbrellla to deny air space to US aircrafts .

In the first 24 hours of Desert Storm, after six months of buildup, we launched 1,223 strike sorties, hitting 203 targets. Stealth assets accounted for 40 sorties and 61 targets. With GSTF, four B-2s and 48 F-22s carrying miniature munitions can strike 380 targets in only 52 sorties.

An F-22 egressing a target area with Mach 1.5 (expecting to meet its coming best friend, the A330-200MRTT – or KC-45A), will be a difficult target for any air defence. First of all, shooting down empty bombers looks nice on your balance sheet but doesn’t actually defend anything. Second, the engagement envelope shrinks to a very small cone. Given the agility of an F-22 and the surely available ECM assets, it would be easy to break contact if it is detected by ground2air radar.

What about a bunch of F-22 egressing from a Deep Strike, their backs tracked by radar network and information being transferred to SAMs close to the FLOT, who in turn use command guidance for their AAMs based on this data?

Of course, there are many ways you can defeat stealthy aircraft. And you not even need science fiction for it. However, getting those technics in the field and operationally suitable is a different kettle of fish. Stealthy aircraft still have ECM, and still can fly on the deck. That is, they have trumps beyond the pure speculation on being undetected, or to say better: untracked.
By the way, any radar looking for aircraft (especially these huge long wave radars) can be identified and might get a bomb sent on their way soon.

Actually, Lockheed tried to reduce the RCS of the U-2 some years earlier, when the USAF found that although the Soviet air defences couldn’t shoot down the U-2, they could track it rather more precisely, & from further away, than expected. AFAIK they had little success, as “stealthing” the U-2 without making it unflyable was difficult. I think Soviet radar improvements kept well ahead of their RCS reductions.

Which reminds us of the basic rule of thumb, that you have to reduce RCS by at least a magnitude to have meaningful effects. The reflected energy of a radar is a fourth order function of distance but a linear function of the actual radar cross section. That is, halving the radar cross section reduces detection range by only 15% (or better: at 15% less distance the reflected energy will be similar).