Could always just give it a name like the Europeans do…

I’m not sure about F-16C/D Blk 52+ with 3 EFTs and 2CFTs, anyway at NTM 2013 polish F-16 fly only with 2CFTs + 1EFT. Polish Air Force give 4472 km maximal range for Blk 52+ :
http://www.sp.mil.pl/pl/wyposazenie/samoloty

To be fair most NATO nations aren’t operating F-16s with CFTs, which ofc. come with their own compromises.

The fate of the 18 crew doesn’t appear to have been confirmed as yet, however it is likely they are all dead. A tragedy for the Indian Navy and the families of the crew; RIP.

If there was a carrier race then India won it fifty years ago with INS Vikrant.

On the other hand, there is little doubt that China’s carrier future is at least as bright as India’s, and probably brighter. China counters India’s greater experience and access to foreign technologies with much greater resources and generally more coherent and efficient processes.

But of course it isn’t a race anyway, so… :rolleyes:

That was better reading than I expected, although the SSBN point applies more to the United States than United Kingdom, which lacks the overwhelming conventional capabilities to offset the loss of nuclear weapons. If there is any nation in the world that can afford to relinquish nuclear weapons, it’s the United States. Not that I would actually advocate this, but a considerable reduction from current forces, including the elimination of the land-based leg of the triad, sure.

Like much of Europe (and now the United States), the “choose capability over capacity” mantra has been swallowed hook, line and sinker in the UK. I think deeply engrained in the minds of defense planners in the UK (particularly naval force planners) is the sense that if they just keep the basic architecture of a great fleet together, someday fortunes will change and they can simply add capacity to a vital, balanced fleet architecture.

Bingo.

Mind you, Mr. McGrath is ignoring the political utility of such forces: they allow nations to play at being important (or simply relevant, as in the case of Australia) on issues verging from the trivial to the minor. But if push ever comes to shove, the whole thing will collapse like a pack of cards and politicians and citizens alike will face the rudest of awakenings.

Here you are wrong again. The F-15,16,18 and Super Hornet are all 4th generation aircraft, as are the Eurocanards, Mig-29, Su-27, etc.

That’s a nice simple narrative that, like most American narratives, bears no useful relation to reality. A more considered analysis based upon embodied design principles rather than US acquisition patterns would note at least three eras within the so-called ‘4th generation’, with F-14 and F-15 belonging to the first, F-16/-18/Fulcrum/Flanker belonging to the second, and Gripen/Rafale/Typhoon/J-10 belonging to the third. And of course KF-X as currently conceived would appear to belong to a fourth era within the so-called 4th generation — the same niche as MiG MFI would’ve occupied.

Troll much?

As you should well know by now the Super Hornet is a contemporary to the Rafale and Typhoon with its first flight in late 1995.

And the H-6K first flew in 2007, what’s your point?

Except that India doesn’t have anything like the strategic objectives of the United States which are threatened by anti-access tools such as DF-21D. If anything India vs. China is a reversal of China vs. US with India seeking the ability to control access to the Indian ocean vs. Chinese attempts to secure access.