What there is on front of it?

F18, F16-blk60, Gripen, Eurofighter and SU27 series.

So don’t make me laugh.

For the future and brochure planes, we’ll talk of it in due time.

And it’s not like the French aren’t working on stealth, AESA, lateral conformal GaN AESA antennas, ECM, on board satellite links (even laser ones), anti-satellite launching, long range ramjet missiles, latest engine tech’ with ‘blisk’ and newest complex alloy, on so on…

… and cooperation with Brazil (if not India…) to gain the critical mass as a bonus.

Laughing makes you younger, so thank me if i do make you laugh.
Currently the F-22, and yes in future the F-35, PAK-FA.
If the general and the king think that the rafale is previous generation technology, i don’t think they are technically false in saying so.

One thing we must all be sure is that Iran won’t be just siting there still after the bombs starts dropping.

To counter weak Iraqi army and virtually untrained Talibans US has to spend hundreds of billions dollars every year through out this decade and still they are not able to achieve the victory they planned at the start of war.

Fighting Iran whose strategy would be to do damage through offensive weapons like IRBMs and AntiShip missiles will have very bad impact on the already very venerable US and world economy which no one wants

no matter how much gulf government are against IRAN what would matter is who they are likely to support in time of war under pressure from their citizens Israel or Iran and i think we all know the answer

Israeli image of a powerful regional power capable of defeating its enemies will be hit hard if they stop at anything less then complete destruction of the Iranian nuclear infrastructure which seems impossible considering widely spread, underground and may be hardened nuclear-related sites. and they will have to do this with dozes of Missiles targeting their cities each day.

or Iran starts opens support to Iraqi or Afghan extremist in their fight against USA coz of their support to Israel.

Saudi to Israel: Clear for takeoff?

Israel would need USA with it from the start atleast or even more better if USA can do their dirty work for them alone

If USA starts dropping bombs over the nuclear energy and weapons sites there is nothing that Iran can do to stop them, this missile mock up will not help, and they don’t have to occupy Iran to do that.
Iran is already supporting insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan, i don’t think they mind US weakening the Taliban and Al-Q in Afghanistan, except for the fact that right now all they see around them are US military bases (Saudi, Iraq, Afghanistan etc.).

Israel has a genuine concern for its survival from a Iran with Nuclear bombs, nations dont tend to care much when the choice is between a few dead pilots and several thousand dead civilians, infact i do not think the pilots will care much about their survival odds either, and the Israelis are known to have some very imaginative plans to handle tough situations. Again i dont think some conventional ballistic missiles or this SAM missile mock up will make them change their decision when the time comes.

the Persian gulf can be shut down for transit.

That reason alone will make most of the nations pressure all the parties involved to stop any possible conflict.

I still do not understand why Iran continues with the computer graphic missile launches and these pathetically fake surface to air missiles, they should atleast put more effort into making them look authentic instead of these welded in a village metal shop kits.

This is obviously based on the assumption, that a) no-one is going to be able to defeat the F-35’s stealth, and that after Israel uses its 20 F-35’s in SEAD/DEAD missions that it can launch an all out air war for 3 -5 days to destroy every single part of the Iranian nuclear programme and survive the economic, military and political consequences.

Personally I think networked SAM sites, ground radars, passive sensor arrays and AWACs systems will mean that Israel will lose one or more F-35’s and if even one pilot is captured then Israel is playing a loosing hand due to the political capital it gives Iran. Does anyone know if the Geneva Convention holds if you are captured during a surprise attack without first declaring war?

I think that basically Iran has worked out that Israel is in a loose-loose position, the Iranian nuclear programme is too big to destroy without totally demolishing their armed forces. As a consequence Israel will either start to see net emigration from Israel due to fact that Iran has nukes, or if they carry-out the massive scale of air strike required to demolish the Iran nuclear programme completely they will turn the entire middle east hostile, and I doubt very much Europe is going to be pleased and the resultant mess (oil shortages, instability in the middle east, possibly several governments collapsing) will cause an economic crisis, which likely will result in the net emigration from Israel due to the economic dire straits of the country.

It will be “interesting” to see how a more assertive China plays things over the next decade, as they have been quietly extending their economic reach in Africa, are a lot more assertive in the Pacific, and have stated they want to expand their economic interests to South America.

Any economic or military offensive behavior makes PRC a risk to trade with, at a time when they need to continue growth with more trade. They will prefer an Iran open to world trade, friendly towards its neighbors with no nuclear ambitions, more than they will like to prop up a anti-USA Iran.

As for Israel attacking Iran, they will do it even if it means that none of their planes can come back home (on account of fuel) and the pilots have to be recovered in the ocean, they have demonstrated they do not need stealth to defeat the air defence systems Iran possess, if Iran goes ahead with the nuclear weapons program even Russia will support Israel.

Apart from the sanctions preventing this currently – I doubt very much China or Russia find Iran a particularly comfortable client and Iran is in a very weak bargaining position IMO and needs to be as self-sufficient as possible otherwise the end up paying money for goods they will never receive.

Of course if they really want to annoy the US they could sign an agreement with China to sell their oil exclusively to China at below OPEC rates, and give China sea, air and land basing rights, in return for say 6 new Type 056 Corvettes, 3 – 4 squadrons of JF-17 and a couple of regiment’s worth of advanced SAM’s such as the HongQi 9 which was “inspired” by the Patriot missile.

I think China will never do that even with the oil and basing (for what? why would they want to end up in that mess) unless it has Russia going the same way, its really not the time to be seen as the protector of Iran.

X Post from BR.

Americans are all over the competition when it comes to Ads.

But do they have advertisements on bus stops???

I think The proposed Mirage 2000 upgrade is being quoted to be for around US$ 2100 million for upgrade of around 51 aircraft at the cost of around US$ 41 million per aircraft and at a slow pace in 8 years. The engines will not be upgraded. Earlier price was for US$ 2900 million but now seems to have come down.

The Mig 29 upgrade of 63 aircraft was for US$ 964 million plus new engines for another US$ 250million or so, i.e at half the cost of around US$ 20million per plane or so.

Dont trust what is written in the media, untill a former statement of contract comes out.

Still the MIG 29 UPG is a great deal. New Engines, New Radar, Digital Cockpit, FBW, HMS. I think the weapons are already in IAF inventory so that helps reduce the cost a bit. Still Mirage upgrade costs way too much with a bit more one could get new Gripen C/D or Block 50/52 Vipers.

Agreed, should have been upgraded earlier, infact there should have been block upgrades, so that by 2000 they had a new radar supporting active missiles and a air to ground capacity with increased internal fuel and avionics.

Will be more that Atolls now, Archer and Adder, plus the weight of the small radar, electronics, countermeasure dispensers, RWR, SPJ etc. etc. Probably the front line fighting force (as in the planes at the forward airbases, not the top of the line fighting planes), with 2 fuel tanks it will only carry two missiles, The plane was around in the old wars.
If they put more stuff on that good old plane, the engineers might have to attach rockets for take-off.