Kuwait’s air force is exclusively Western. Apparently the F/A-18 replacement is based on whatever UAE choses out of Rafale/Typhoon.

Other than Algeria, I doubt any Arab states will be buying Pak-Fas.

I don’t think Russians will be handing these out for for free to countries like Belarus either.

Belarus gutted the vast majority of it’s fleet in 2012 – Su-24 and Su-27s were retired without replacement.

Leaves a hanful of MiG-29s and Su-25s. Belarus is headed down the same path as the rest of Eastern Europe – a handful of jets for airpolicing and that’s it.

Sale of 12 F-16s from Portugal to Romania in progress

1) US multi-role fighters seem to be primarily used in the strike role. They barely break even between kills and losses on the air-combat scorecard.

2) The F-15 Eagle is completely dominant as a fighter, 1) because it’s a really good aircraft, and 2) because it’s so expensive it can only be used by nations with enough money to invest in the training and maintenance it takes to make really good air forces.

For USAF, these two are related. F-15A/C is assigned primary air defence role.

Since introduction of teen series fighters. the US has never encountered a foe that would require utilisation of F-16 and F/A-18 or even F-14 in a primary A2A role (though F-16s scored kills in NFZ enforcement and Kosovo 1999).

3) Looking at the losses of the F-4 to ground fire, one can see how big of a threat SAMs were in the 1960s and 1970s. Compare this to more modern fighters and one can see how aircraft design has outpaced SAM systems.

Modern jet fighters have never encountered modern SAMs. Since 1980s there’s been a significant decline in combat between peer level opponents.

Iraq had a relatively outmoded AD network in 1991. Bosnian Serbs/Serbia had an extremely outdated one. Libya’s was poor in 1986 when US first bombed them and saw virtually no investment 1986-2011 period. AD in Iraq 2003 wasn’t really operational anAfghanistan did not have functioning AD systems.

It would be interesting to take a Yom Kippur or Vietnam scenario and update weapons with modern S-300s and EW to get a proper result.

4) The poor performance of the Mirage F.1 is somewhat surprising.

Not really. Iraqi pilots were not top of the line, nor did Iraq have the support assets that someone like the French would’ve had if they’d ever gone to war (e.g. AWACs, EW).

Morrocan F1s fell prey to SA-7s when those were new.

Only other major user of F1 who saw combat was South Africa and they did quite well with it.

5) The ridiculously high kill ratio of the F-14 in Iranian service is also surprising. The common canard is that training trumps technology, but an air force with great technology but beset by political purges and struggling with maintenance problems and embargoes can still have a turkey shoot against an air force with both poor training and poor technology.

Iran did release large numbers of pilots to fight in the war. Iranian pilots were quite well trained – a lot had gone through training in the US.

6) Su-27 is the only Russian fighter to have a positive kill ratio in combat, but as we all know this is likely due to “monkey model” export fighters, as well as the poor training standards of Arab air forces.

Su-27 has also never faced Western fighters. It’s only real combat was in Eritrean-Ethiopian War where it dominated the MiG-29.

Only other A2A kill was a Chechen L-39. Hardly anything to brag about (still better than Cuban MiGs shooting down Cessnas).

7) The unbeatens (aircraft that have engaged in significant air combat but never been shot down in air to air combat): F-15 Eagle, Sea Harrier, Su-27.

I would hardly call Su-27’s experience as “significant air combat.” A few dogfights in Ethiopia-Eritrea and that’s it really.

– – – Updated – – –

I’m reading John Boyd’s biography and he’s obsessed with gun-fighting and manoeuvrability as late as 1971. It strikes me as extremely limiting to build aircraft only able to fight close-in during daylight, but Boyd was no moron so I’m trying to get an idea of the capabilities of weapons systems as a way to get kills rather than the performance of the aircraft.

Late as 1971 a lot of kills were gun kills. Missiles were extremely unreliable in those days and also had very restrictive launch parameters.

It wasn’t until late 1970s (AIM-9L) that you got any degree of accuracy and flexible enough launch parameters (due to all aspect seeker) to replace guns.

There were rumours that Serbia was acquiring 12 MiG-29M2’s and S400s in December.

http://www.politika.rs/rubrike/tema-dana/Novi-migovi-i-S-400-stizu-u-Srbiju.lt.html

Also mentions an option for 8 MiG-29s in addition to 12 required.

Wish list was as follows:

12 MiG-29 (8 single seat + 4 dual seat) + 8 options

Apparently MiG-21s are being in 2013=8 (was meant to be 2013), which would leave a measly 4 MiG-29s for airspace control.

http://www.novosti.rs/vesti/naslovna/aktuelno.69.html:351970-Vojska-Srbije-ostaje-bez-aviona-MIG-21

Apparently the S300s would be capable of launching S-400 missiles? Isn’t that a strategic system designed for shooting down large bombers? My SAM-fu is weak.

Finally it mentions Serbia getting representation in Russian orientated Collective Security Treaty Organization.

Finally the 4 MiG-29s have not flown in 2013:

http://tangosix.rs/2013/19/04/vipvo-desetkovano-mig-29-prizemljen-od-pocetka-godine/

this deal were to happen. Would Serbia choose to install Western systems like Datalink, software compability for Western Weapons? I mean they could do it if they want to, right?

They could but I doubt they would. Serbia does not want to be part of NATO and is technically neutral. Hence NATO compatiability is kind of irrelevant.

I don’t think there will be 4-5 Eurocarriers capable of operating a C-1 type aircraft in 20-30 years time. Europe is in terminal decline (and that started in 1914 before anyone starts talking about GFC).

I think there’ll be 1 Eurocarrier capable of such aircraft and that’s whatever the French are operating. British and Italian carriers have ski jumps and acquisition of F-35B will ensure that carriers are ski jump equipped. They’ll use Merlins or maybe even V-22s for COD/AEW.

As for Australia and Argentina, most likely not. Australia is doing well and is still not considering F-35Bs for FAA or Canberra LHD’s let alone a COD/AWACS aircraft.

I can see small orders for Brazil and India but that’s it.

As for Argentina, again a military in terminal decline. They’ve got far more pressing needs than aircraft carriers. The investment needed even to bring their Navy and Air Force to a basic modern capability is massive.

And it may also win additional orders for land based use, just like the S-2 Tracker and E-2 Hawkeye did.

The market is a lot more competitive these days.

For MPA you have a massive variety of airframes available – Super King Air 200/300, Dash 8s, CN-235s, C-295s .

Large business aircraft/regional airliners are being used for small AWACS – e.g. EMB-145 or SAAB340. A lot more countries are buying large AWACS – E-767, A-50, Chinese Y-8 derivatives etc.

Basically you take any airframe with good endurance and payload and you shove a radar in it and a few crew stations.

The upside of the civilian airframes modified for military use is usually cost of operation and large availability of spares.

Specialised military aircraft aren’t really being developed for these roles as the demand is extremely small.

130 Ching Kuos were built
115 Dassault Rafales so far built
99 Super Frelons were built
90 Dassault Etendard IVs were built
89 Breguet Alizes were built
85 Super Etendards were built
76 Supermarine Scimitars were built
58 C-2 Greyhounds were built

Yes but was it profitable for those companies?

And it was a different era too – Cold War with massive defence budgets and massive subsidisation of defence industries.

And given lack of large-ish home orders heavily subsidised by country of origin, it means they’re likely need to get massive export orders to be sustainable.

Also for Ching Kuos – there was originally 250 planned and it was a matter of utmost national securty as no other aircraft were available to replace F-104s and F-5s. Once US and France released F-16 and Mirage 2000, the Taiwanese cut the order by half.

As for Rafale, there’s 180 ordered and French plans call for maybe another 90 (212 for Armee de l Air and 60 for Navy). Also the Rafale is meant for exports and has just won an Indian competition for 126. So if all goes according to plan, that’s 400 Rafales and probably more if Indian options are exercised and other orders are won.

For all reasons above, my thinking is sales prospects of such an aircraft are quite small

From memory Sweden in the past operated 600+ fighters in 1960s and 1970s and about 400 in early 1990s. It’s now about 150 and being reduced to 100 and potentially as low as 55 JAS-39E/F.