Eurofighter Typhoon carrying four Enhanced Paveway IIs, a Litening III pod and two external fuel tanks, plus two Raytheon AMRAAM and two MBDA ASRAAM air-to-air missiles

Perfect configuration if you want to smartbomb your very own airport.

In answer to the original post, of course they will be planning to bomb Iran.
the real question is will they get what they are after and will it prove an effective strike or simply counterproductive.
The leadership in Iran is not particularly popular with the Iranian people. An attack by Israel would suddenly make them the most popular in the region. I am sure even in the best case situation… ie they only fire a few medium range ballistic missiles at nuclear facilities in Israel for example, then the result will likely be a fairly large weapons shopping list for Russia and China from Iran. The worst case could involve direct agitation in Iraq and Afghanistan… they might blame US presence for making this Israeli attack possible… therefore the best way for them to protect themselves would be to take action to get the US out of the region. The Iranians make lots of weapons themselves… a few Iranian TOW IIs and a few modern MANPADs and Iraq and Afghanistan will likely both collapse into civil war. Bad for their neighbours but Iran will likely feel safer.

Although Dimoa is a large installation, attacking it with conventionally armed ballistic missiles is pretty much pointless, at least if true interruption of the Israeli nuclear program is planned.
Any action versus troops in Iraq or Afghanistan would be suicidal, both politically and military. An invasion by Iranian troops is exactly what the weak Iraqi government needs to stabilize its position.

As soon as any real war-like action of Iran versus USA is opened, China and Russia will close their shop doors, which only have been marginally open the last years. There is something like common interest between the greater powers and nobody is interested in a such a situation. For China and Russia, Europe and USA are more than a magnitude more important than Iran is.

And never forget: a mobilized USAF and USN force (using bases in Iraq, Diego Garcia) needs 2 weeks to completely dismantle any target of interest in Iran (air defence, air force, key military installations). After that they can go for the small fishes.

Again, I am no expert when it comes aerodynamics, its complexities, the variables in question etc, etc therefore I cannot comment on that, I am not qualified for that nor do I claim to be ;). I’ll leave it to the experts.

And note that “star49” isn’t one, either, although the ferocity of his claims might indicate that. In the end, he doesn’t have any idea and desires to be member of ones ignore list.

This whole argument is nonsensical! There won’t be a “Super Eagle” or a “Super Falcon” (atleast for the foreseeable future). We can come up with all sorts of dreamworld, fantasy island possibilities.

There are F-15E and F-16E, which one could call the definitive version of either type. However, they reflect limited upgrades in terms of changes to the basic concept. Their primary usage is fighter-bomber. And they scored considerable success in the market.

Canards were for the F-15 S/TMD, ACTIVE, IFCS. The F-16 MATV had no canards. These projects started quite some time ago. And when it comes testing of maneuverability, High AoA etc, etc there are x-planes like F-16 AFTI, X-29, X-31, F-18 HARV. F-16 AFTI: 1982, X-29 FSW: 1984, F-15 S/TMD: 1988. All experimental and geared towards a particular goal.

Exactly, and the general sense of canards, thrust vectoring and other fancy stuff is sometimes questionable. It has to serve the aircraft’s mission, and no aircraft’s primary mission is “super agility”.

How would these translate to a “Super Eagle” or a “Super Falcon”, not just maneuverability but other factors as well? I have no idea (this is also, assuming the US will pull all its resource for such 4.5/4+++ gen fighter). And the chances of it happening is pretty much

I guess the reason some nations procuring 4.5++²adv. aircraft is that they either missed the 5th generation specification or just lacked the resources.

Could it be those are from mission configuration data sheets rather than physics books? I’ve only seen this kind of notation as a kind of “mission-related shorthand” for stores really. Numbers you add up to get a drag value that dictates your technical and procedural requirements. Those aren’t true coefficients though. You can’t derive a force from a dimensionless coefficient without introducing the necessary dimension at some point.

Physics books in regard to general aerodynamics usually work with different properties and start a level deeper than that, the classic aerodynamic equation being Fd = 0.5*p*v²*Cd*A. Of course it actually gets a bit more complex for planes and wings with different kinds of drag acting upon the object and each other if you analyze things even closer than that and look at the single components.

The given “formula” is only the way to recover the actual force from a given drag coefficient (because that is what you want to do in a simulation). The Cd does the whole trick, it is the aircraft.

There are – theoretically – many ways of representing drag. The commonly used approach is to use drag coefficients as function of several parameters. These you have to take from tabulated data, you cannot guess the drag of a store as function of Mach number.
For the clean aircraft you go fine with a CD0 as function of Mach number and lift induced drag as quadratic function of lift (with little factor).

The usage of Cd as being actual drag (or more exactly: body x-axis force) divided by dynamic pressure and wing area is an old convention. For subsonic low altitude aircraft the drag is then largely constant and only depends on the actual lift. For trans- and supersonic aircraft the whole convention system becomes a bit questionable.

You see these?

All made in the USA.
Read the text below the picture:
Maj. Paul Moga in an F-22 Raptor flies in formation with the Royal Air Force Aerobatic Team, The Red Arrows, during an afternoon practice flight June 18 at Langley Air Force Base, Va. The aircraft will perform at AirPower over Hampton Roads, the Langley AFB airshow, which is scheduled for June 20 to 22. Major Moga is an F-22 Demonstration Team pilot.
So, who has been there this weekend?

A coefficient as unit-less figure can hardly include a measure of area in any way. You have to add lift-induced drag and parasitic drag. As both types of drag mix up in real airflow, it’s hard to separate them on paper without any kind of tunnel or CFD analysis. You can’t just ignore it though.

CD – or Drag Coefficient – is the composed value from several drag contributors.
Primarily:
CD0 – Zero lift drag f(Mach)
CDL – Lift induced drag f(Mach,CL)
CDH – Altitude dependent addition on CD0 f(Mach,Altitude), sometimes skipped
CDstore – Store drag, can be added to CD0, too
[CDtrim: normally included in 1g CD0/CDL data]

We see that CD is a function of at least Mach, Lift, Altitude, Configuration.

Any friction drag stuff is normally included in those figures. This is how drag is used in today’s flight mechanics. Now, how you get to those CDx is another question and generally not straight-forward. There are some methods, however, they mostly apply for subsonic jets.

How about a high speed low altitude pass through Syria, upon reaching Iraq, a smooth bank to N – N.E toward Turkish-Iraqi border and then again banking to S – S.E, with the timing and “coincidence” with the occasional Turkish air strikes in Northern Iraq against P.K.K camps, thus disguising the package as Turkish fighters, and after that striking targets in Iran, meeting with the tankers which circled around the Arabian Peninsula over the Gulf (under US naval SAM protection)?

Yeah, I know it’s too much fantasy and no, I’m not a Tom Clancy-wannabe.

The problem with any long (and fast) low altitude legs is the considerable fuel consumption. A strike on Iran is possible with a hi-hi-hi profile, refueling just before entering Turkish/Syrian/Saudi airspace. But flying low level through either of this countries will require refueling either before entering Iran’s airspace or just after exiting it. No matter how, it would require the permission of the airspace’s owner, either Turkey, the USA (actually the Iraqi government) or Saudi Arabia.