Let us refresh ourselves on what my claim was.

So, my point stands. The fiscal environment that the F-35 has encountered was no better than that faced by the Rafale or Eurofighter. There is a distinct difference between our positions though, I have provided a number of sources to support my claims, you have provided nothing.

Didn’t prevent the US from spending huge sums for the F-35’s development, typically at the expense of other types. The money that is spent on the F-35’s development alone exceeds the development costs for the Rafale, Gripen and Typhoon combined and it was furthermore spent over a shorter duration of time! Add the previous investment into the F-22.

The problem with F-35 is the fineness ratio. Stubby jet is stubby to fit on the LHD’s elevator. The F/A-18E/F’s fuselage is 19% longer (about 9 feet) than that of the F-35, giving the F/A-18E/F a superior fineness ratio.

F/A-18E/F would be a really nice fast jet if it didn’t have the goofy straight wing to give it a slow landing speed for carrier recovery.

Which is very easy tp grasp if you build a paper plane, you can choose similar folding, just use the longer side as starting point and build one with the shorter side as the starting point.

:rolleyes: Sure, the Rafale was “FOC” if you consider an “omnirole” fighter that didn’t even have a working targeting pod for another decade “fully operational.”

Pretty pointless strawman. You should know very well that the integration of stuff takes time and that priorities and funding allpcation dictate when certain capabilities are being introduced into service.

The F-35 is meant to replace F-16s and F/A-18s among others, would be news to me that the aircraft poses an anti-ship, reconnaissance or tactical nuclear strike capability at Block 3F, which are all missions that the F-35 predecessors performed. I suppose Block 3F isn’t going to FOC at all either, if I follow your logic…

Not at all. You’re not paying attention. That’s a minor detail.

What I’m saying is that taking 15 years to fail to buy aircraft can’t be due to the vendors. If Dassault refused to be reasonable, it should have been thrown out four years ago. But think about that date. It was selected in January 2012, after a process that had lasted ten years at that point. The fact that it had taken so long to get that far is a condemnation of the system. And the fact that there was still so much latitude in the terms that agreement could not be reached is another condemnation.

If it was all the fault of Dassault or France, then it should never have reached that point. Why is this so hard to understand? Sellers were queuing up. Who chose Dassault? If there were conditions that Dassault refused to accept & which were non-negotiable, how did it get that far? Would other vendors have accepted them? If not, clearly the terms were wrong. If others would accept them but not Dassault, how did the system allow Rafale to be selected? Big fail!

Not buying Rafale is entirely understandable. If India had bought something else – well, that’s India’s decision. But taking 15 years to buy nothing is ridiculous. You can’t blame it on Dassault.

FMS from the USA is pretty much a take it or leave it system, in very many respects. If India is happy to buy on terms similar to FMS (as close as is possible without the US structures which support it), it can simply require bidders to offer such terms from the start. If they don’t sign up, the bids can be rejected immediately. And note that India has failed to buy aircraft it wanted from the USA, through FMS, entirely because of Indian administrative failures.

Think! The buyer sets terms. If they’re unrealistic there aren’t compliant bids. If a bid is compliant enough to be accepted & yet it then all falls to pieces, either the bidder’s not sticking to what it’s promised – or the procurement system has major flaws. If the seller reneges on promises & it isn’t thrown out quickly, then the procurement system has major flaws. It shouldn’t keep talking for years to a bidder which won’t cooperate.

The basic point here is that as long as it meets the minimum technical requirements, then anything is better than nothing – & so far the IAF has nothing.

+1
Well written and explained!

As explained in the report, Super Hornet and Eurofighter acquisition cost included initial package of spares, support equipment and so on, which is normally prerequisite for starting to operate a new aircraft. By contrast, F-35 acquisition cost included bare airframes and nothing else (not sure if it included even engines). In F-35’s maintenance model, national air forces only own the airframes and all spares are delivered ‘on-need’ basis. Operators do not need to keep around large stores of spares but just buy what they need, when they need it. This is supposed to bring major savings in lifecycle costs, and the report is calculated under the assumption that it does. Whether it does in real life, well…

The Danish report actually notes that Super Hornet has lower unit flyaway cost than F-35, and also lower “external maintenance” cost, whatever that refers to.

Such a spares approach was already tried within the Eurofighter programme and didn’t work to well. They have meanwhile changed to national spares pools instead of a common spares pool with items being delivered on an as needed base.

The pitot is part of the air data system and has nothing to do with the radar itself.

SDB is like a paper airplane, its range is proportional to release altitude, not airspeed.

Speed is also of importance. Dropping a ballistic weapon at 300 kt, 600 kt or 900 kt from same altitude makes a big difference.

There are TWO on that image!? Didn’t knew that a second prototype was built. Are there any information available about this second example? I.e. first flight, bord number and possibly images? Or was it a static test frame only?