Scorpion82Those half truths or unconfirmed (by anyone else than Lake/jacko) aren’t what I call lies.
The first clear lie from Jackonicko was when he swore to us that the structure of the Typhoon was never reinforced (to carry atg load) so there was no reason for a weight increase, and someone came back with a link from BAe that said the structure of the Typhoon had been reinforced. That’s what I call a lie.
Nic
I barely recall the discussion, but am not sure whether it was related to T1s or T2s. Has this been taken into account? Lying always insists that you are aware of the truth and that you are intentionally telling the untruth. Whether it was the case here lies beyond my judgement. It might well be that people get things wrong, that doesn’t automatically mean that they are lying. Otherwise everyone of us would qualify as a liar as everyone is making errors or simply talks about things he believe to be true, albeit reality may sometimes be different. It’s a little bit annoying that “Jon Lake” is permanently brought up as some kind of beat dead argument, even if he had nothing to do with the discussion at hand in any form. It’s even used as an argument to justify some silly claims like those made by some named officers about Typhoons MMI for example and at some point I wonder what standards are actually applied to such disussions and whether that’s the only argument some people have.
Scorpion82That the NL never conducted any evaluation of the aircraft in form of flight trials is true however and the Dutch competition was in essence a paper exercise. So “completely wrong” is an inappropriate description. Not fault free would be a more fitting description. No one is perfect at all and most people have a certain bias. Those criticising Lake for the lack of neutrality are often not any more neutral themselves, in many cases the opposite is the truth. Journalists aren’t gods, they are justhuman beings like everybody else, they tend to influence the audience with opinions and they make errors. Lake isn’t really a special case, though many of you appear to make a special case out of it.
Scorpion82I agree. Although the point, in my opinion, is that those sources are named, unlike most sources from jackonicko/jon lake.
There is a difference between named sources and “I’ve been told by some well informed dude that…”, especially when the guy quoting those unnamed sources have been cought lying a couple of times, and is always trying to distort the truth (for instanced when he says that the saudis reached a different conclusion… (read: when evaluating the Rafale & the Typhoon. Nevermind such evaluation never took place)).
Nic
Lake isn’t the only journalist reporting on the Typhoon and in fact many pilots interviewed have been named, though not too many were talking about DACT results.
The French at least offered Rafale to Saudi Arabia, at one point the French press even stated that SA is going to buy 96 Rafales. Whether the Saudis were given a closer look at the Rafale at some point I don’t know. The selection of Typhoon was not from an open competition however. So unless there is a confirmation of the opposite we must indeed assume that there was no serious evaluation of these types by the Saudis in a similar fashion as by Switzerland, Singapore or India.
Wrt Lake lying, it lies in the eye of the beyonder. Some of his claims more or less proved to be right. The Typhoon pilots supposedly commenting on Rafale’s “underpowered” engines may feel so in comparison with the Typhoon. The Italoan pilots remarks in the eurofighter world issue, Switzerlands scoring for Typhoon wrt ac performances and Lt. Col. Grüne’s comments are all pointing into that direction. Supercruise adbantages of the Typhoon reported wrt Singapore are now being pointed out by the Swiss as well, while no word about any supercruise capabilities of the Rafale has been made. We know from French pilot comments that the Rafale can supercruise to some extend, but is it really as significant when multiple sources appear to praise Typhoon for this, but not a single indepent source is conforming this for the Rafale? Maybe there is some truth in what is immediately dismissed as lies by you guys…
Scorpion82Check out the earlier FoxThree issues here:
http://www.defense-aerospace.com/dae/sponsors/sponsor_rafale/index.htm
They contain some information about Trident d’Or and the first operational employment of the CdG. Issues 3 & 4 in particular.
Scorpion82As were other airforces. This isn’t proving your point at all, on contrary it’s a rather lame excuse.
Scorpion82Commonality? Such as what, exactly? Not even the apparently similar front fuselage is interchangable.
There are certainly some common items in terms of avionics, related test equipment and weapons as well. That the RAAF purchased some additional weapons with the Supers doesn’t substract from the fact. The RAAF has intesive experience dealing with Boeing and most likely experience in cooperation with the USN as well. That’s much more than any other type could claim.
Why would the results of the Air 6000 evaluation have become outdated? Did any of the evaluated aircraft evolve in a substantially different way post Air 6000? No.
That’s nonsense at the time the Air 6000 was conducted many of the types weren’t in serivce at all, and in the case of the F-35 it didn’t even exist. The original Air 6000 requirement called for an introduction around 2010, when is the RAAF expecting its first F-35s now? The evolution of all these types since these days was significant, but the RAAF never validated it anyway.
As for the stated position of the then opposition (as apposed to their revised position when they were later elected the government), you need to understand that those statements were made during an election campaign, when that party was publicly advocating purchase of the F-22, even thought it was not on offer for export sales.
Doesn’t change the fact that the F/A-18F was selected as a stop gap without any thorough evaluation in contrast to what you alledge.
“Superiority”. That’s the word used repeated by the E/F and Rafale fanboys in this thread. In relation to air to air, I simply stated that the F-18F has its “+s”. In relation to air to ground and maritime strike, on balance yes I am of the opinion that it is a more fully developed and evolved airframe / avionics / munitions package than E/F or Rafale.
OR the word used by the US fanboys…:p Seriously the F/A-18F was a good choice for the RAAF as a stop gap given the aforementioned commonalities, level of maturity, operational versatility and overall capabilities. The Super Hornet has its pluses, no doubt about that, but so have others and some of the pluses you have stated are hardly a true plus. A Rafale may not offer the same range of weapon options, but can perform all of the missions a Super Hornet can perform for example. Spare the AN/APG-79 I can’t really see any advantage of the Super Hornet over the European fighters when it comes to avionics and sensors. Airframe wise the Super Hornet is more compromised than other designs and performance wise it can’t keep up. In the weapons field the Super enjoys advantages in some areas, but not in all.
Scorpion82Scorpion, with all due respect I think you are wrong on this one.
The press conference : what got out of this is just what french journalists wished to publish. He cannot be accountant of those initial reports. And a press conference is by nature less detailed than an interview in a specialized magazine.
You are contradicting yourself here. First you blame it on the journalists and then you point out that press conferences are less detailed than interviews. At the end of the day we don’t know as neither you nor me, nor anyone else here appears to have attended the press conference. What’s certain about this press conference is that it wasn’t centred around the encounters of Rafales and Typhoons, but about the deployment to Al Dhafra in the first place.
The interview : Nobody forced him to take this interview. It his honor and credibility that he put at stake which is something not that usual when you think about it. He brought some nuances to his own initiative and could have kept these “aspects” for himself if he wished. What could you reproach to him ? He took a huge risk being interviewed in a specialized english speaking magazine…Think about it…I mean as a squadron commander and for the french air force reputation. That should mean he was certainly confident enough ! Really I believe that you and others are some times a bit paranoiac each times a frenchmen declare something. If he had something to hide why taking the interview ? Why such a risk ? And he was not forced to give certain aspects of those DACT so it’s all to its credit.
Many pilots were and are being interviewed and named by the press. I don’t see a GrandClaudon taking a “special risk” in doing what many have done before and after him as well.
I am waiting as much transparency from the other side…Waiting for detailed interviews with names and professional reputation at stake with details of the ROE…Nothing like this for the moment hence the credibility deficit. We must swallow the “anecdotal evidences” etc etc of a Typhoon lobbyist for years if you see what I mean…
Lt.Col. Marc Grüne has done so and actually admired strengths of the Rafale as well in contrast to a Cpt. Romain and a Lt. Col. GrandClaudon which may not even have flown against the Typhoon themselves, unlike Grüne. It’s well known that Rafales and Typhoons met each other more often than at Solenzara and Al Dhafra, even at Al Dhafra there were more engagements as acknowledged by GrandClaudon, interestingly he didn’t bother to discuss the outcome or details of these engagements and interestingly they didn’t mention the various other DACTs as well…
And even with those precisions taking down 4 typhoons with full capability with only 2 rafales in BVR only using a single missile at a time and illuminating the typhoon till impact is a big performance. And this scenario was repeated twice with one rafale loss the second time vs 7 typhoon losses in total. And again I repeat that other situations could lead to a typhoon advantage and that I am not one of those claiming total superiority. Just that there is a least no significant edge from on side or another like the F22 could bring.
Well I’m not making such claims either…
As for the so called superiority I would remind you that both Grandclaudon (squadron commander) and captain Romain think that the rafale is by far superior in the AtA arena. They put there name and reputation at stake which is far more credible than a pure PR paper.
Many pilots believe that “their aircraft” is the best. Both commented on subjects they can’t really know without having flown the type and some of the claims wrt the MMI in particular are utterly wrong.
Personally I think the truth is somewhere in the middle but bottom-line the swiss still rated the rafale higher in both defensive and offensive AtA scenarios.
They did yes, they may come to a different conclusion in some areas nowadays where PIRATE, HEA and DASS are more mature and sensor fusion is more developed on the Typhoon. Upcoming further improvements with the P1E not withstanding.
Scorpion82There is in fact very little commonality between the Fs and legacy Hornets, as aircraft or in their support infrastructure. Also the weapons package purchased by the RAAF for the Fs includes unique (in RAAF service) to that platform items like AIM – 9X, targeting pods and stand off munitions.
There was a thorough evaluation of a number of aircraft, including E/F, Rafale, F-18E/F and others as part of the DoD’s project Air 6000. That analysis concluded that F-35 was the best aircraft for the RAAF, and resulted in F-18F being identified as a stand by option. In short, it was concluded that neither EF or Rafale offered the technological and capability advances required given emerging threats. F-18F was seen a an effective means of acquiring earlier access to a number of technologies, and gaining experience in their application, that would be pivotal to F-35. There was a very considered and detailed process that lead to the selection of both the F-35 and F-18F for the RAAF. No “competition” was held, simply because the DoD did not see this exercise as a capability/price/industry offsets trade off. Rather it focussed on singularly on determining the best platforms for the stated requirements. Unless you worked in DoD – RAAF, DSTO or CDG on the project at the time I don’t see how write off this exercise as “not serious”, or simply “a paper exercise”.
There is certainly more commonality between the legacy Hornet and Super Hornet than commonality between the legacy Hornet and other types. The decision to purchase the F/A-18F as a stop gap solution was made in 2007 without any competition or thorough evaluation whatsoever and the results from the Air 6000 evaluation were outdated by that time. In fact the RAAF opted for a paper plane which didn’t even exist at that time and dropped any further evaluation. Neither of the alternatives was flight tested by the RAAF, so it’s not a seriously thorough evaluation and more a paper, possibly simulation exercise than anything else. The selection of the F/A-18F wasn’t linked to any evaluation whatsoever. Only the Austrian government opposition insisted on the consideration of alternatives, but a bidding process or true evaluation was not conducted at that time. I don’t blame the DoD for the selection, but selling it as a proof of superiority is dubious at best. Thus far the F/A-18E/F hasn’t won a single competitive competition by any means.
Scorpion82He acknowledged it after being confronted with those questions only and that was a few month after the press conference. Sounds more like limitation of liability to me, rather than honesty. At the end of the day I don’t want to turn this into another Rafale/Typhoon discussion. You have your views on the subject I have mine.
Scorpion82He left out bits like “it weren’t the only encounters between the two types at Aldhafra” or that “the RAF jocks were young sports still growing on the Typhoon”. These are important facts which put those claims in a different perspective. I don’t think that anyone with a sane mind considers the Rafale as a bad fighter or the Typhoon as unbeatable. The Swiss evaluation reflected the situation at that time, both aircraft moved on since. Typhoon’s capabilities in various fields have grown, be it sensor fusion, PIRATE capabilities, maturity of the helmet, capabilities of DASS and the related mission data for both DASS and Captor play a role as well. Considering claims of vast superiority wrt “superior MMI, ID capabilities or even SA” the evaluation put a damper at such claims put forward by many Rafale fans, many of those claims were and still are equally unsubstantiated as those you have criticized coming from the other side.
Scorpion82@Tribes
The selection of the F/A-18F by the RAAF was largely based on the commonality factor with the existing F/A-18s. It was the logical choice as much of the infrastructure, weapons etc. could be re-used for the Supers. There was no serious competition at all and the evaluation was a paper exercise at best. Concluding anything here is a little bit far stretched.
You are also quite optimistic when you believe that the signature reduction measures applied to the F/A-18E/F provide it with an edge over the European fighters. There’s no doubt that the SH has advantages in that field over legacy Hornets, Eagles, Vipers, Fulcrums or Flankers, though its supporters will certainly argue that later iterations of these types incorporate some signature reduction measures as well. The European fighters are yet a different matter, however, as all of them have been from the outset designed with a reduced frontal RCS in mind. You are right that some features like panel gap sealing, serrated edges or outwards canted fins can not be found on most of these aircraft. However there isn’t much edge alignment on the SH as well and wings and fin on the Typhoon f.e. are aligned. The SH’s modest wing sweep angle isn’t well suited to reduced signature requirements, 45+ deg swept deltas are fairly better suited and all the ECDs are considerably smaller and have smaller control surfaces as well, they incorporate RAM and possibly RAS, treated canopies and other features. The intakes of Rafale and Typhoon are s-shaped and RAM layer treated, which is a different, and in my opinion better solution then a radar blocker. The latter is a measure to reduce the returns of an intake solution which is less than ideal and sacrifices engine performance in return. There’s a good reason why real stealthy designs like the F-22 or F-35 aren’t using blockers in the intakes, but hide the compressor via curved ducts, as is the case for the European fighters. Rumour from Brazil in fact suggest that at least the Rafale offers lower signatures and the discrepancy between the signatures of the F/A-18E/F, Gripen and Typhoon is certainly not big enough to consider it as a plus.
The Super Hornet is an affordable, mature and flexible platform. Its range of weapon options is unmatched and the aircraft likely features the most capable radar at this point in time. However other than that the SH doesn’t shine, especially not in AA. That doesn’t mean that the SH is per se a bad fighter, just that it doesn’t offer too many compelling advantages in that area.
It’s also not true that the F/A-18F is the only aircraft capable of performing AA and AG at the same time, the Rafale was able to do this at a time before the block II was actually introduced and the ACS and AN/APG-79 being fitted.
Scorpion82Looks good that scheme from what is visible.
@Eagle1
Considering how certain details were left out by a certain Lt. Col. when the issue was first raised, the credibility is somewhat demolished. Interestingly those named pilots who have commented on the subject may not have been those who were involved in these exercises as well. I would be careful to conclude that todays aircraft are still the same as those years ago. Much has happened on both sides, though not everything is being recognized.
Scorpion82Thanks for the link Kovy. But the delivery dates look a bit odd to me, especially the first dates. I may have to re-check may own notes as wrt the number of ac in Trident d’Or.
Scorpion82Scorpion,
Do you have delivery dates for the F1s, then?
Unfortunately not. The only dates I’m aware off are the handover of M2 & 3 on 4th December 2000 amd that of M10 in October 2002. The rest are just general milestones, such as the first cruise of the CdG with 7 ac aboard from 21st May onwards and that two F1 were aboard the CdG when it embarked to the Indian ocean in November 2001. 5 aircraft upgraded to the F1 standard were directly ferried to the CdG from France requiring four aerial refuelings in May 2002 IIRC.
Scorpion82I think it were M1-7 which were delivered as LF1, with the rest being delivered as F1s. The F1 standard was introduced in summer 2001, so every aircraft delivered from 2001 must be F1s. IIRC there were 7 ac involved in the Trident d’or exercise in May/June 2001. All LF1s were upgraded to F1 from late 2001 onwards. Changes included a Spectra update, installation of the gun and clearance of MICA EM. 2002 saw the first three ac being modified to carry the buddy-buddy refueling pod. M88-2E1s were reportedly being upgraded to E4 standard.
B316 crashed on 6th December 2007.
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