The Koreans or the Japanese might have something circa 2030, that or (for the same time frame) Russia goes into full “Ukraine is ours” mode (highly unrealistic, thank the gods) and that might propel Germany, France and the UK to actually do “something”, but yep, you are almost certainly correct.

Germany/France/UK cant any thing. if they try complicated thing like real 5G fighter the rest of military will be practically starved. Exports will not save them from closing there factories. the demographic/debt burden along dependence on imports/investment do not allow them to splurge money. that’s on top of dysfunctional system of governance. The word import include labor.
look at the list where is Ukraine standing. They did not have slightest idea about Brexit impact.
http://af.reuters.com/article/metalsNews/idAFEON403ZDA

The case of Ukraine will be soley decided by next commodity super cycle and Russia training and incorporation of next level of military technology. They called it non contact warfare.

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Russia_should_be_ready_for_non_contact_war_999.html
Russia should be ready for non-contact war

The fact that that hardware had been built was reported in 2010. If my memory is correct, the source was RIA Novosti, which cited a named Russian senior official.

I think you should not rely on memory. Russia imposed the most effective embargo on Turkey and Ukraine and that even not going to war with them on industrial scale.
see Ukraine example.
http://m.apa.az/en/azerbaijan-economy/finance-news/ukraine-loses-53-of-export-to-azerbaijan-due-to-russian-restrictions.html
Now Russia is directly involved in largest military campaign in Arab country. And the complete air and sea embargoes hasn’t been implemented yet. It is just training exercise for the beginning of wealth transfer that Arabs owe due to past terrorism. The pressure will escalate.

I am not sure what you mean by ‘matching the basic specification’.

how you can understand
[quote
The topic of suppressing a Russian-style IADS was discussed by several speakers at the recent European EW conference in Rotterdam. The point that was made that NATO needed to move beyond traditional responsive SEAD strikes, and not try to engage every potential threat that radiates or might radiate.

A more effective approach is to get ahead of the situation by using methods that degrade the potential threats. I remember the Israelis telling me in 2001 that they had recently taken down the air defences of Western Syria by a single selective strike, and that it had taken Syria two weeks to restore the missing air coverage.

You are correct to say that decoys and shoot-and-scoot tactics are a potential problem, but countering these is a subject that is not being discussed in much detail in the open literature due to its security classification – the solutions need to stay under wraps until they are required in combat operations.[/QUOTE]
What has EU anything to do with 21st century warfare techniques?

One also has to look at the politics and the political angle. A lot many missile defense deals in the middile-east have been announced as FMS but contracts have not been signed with firm deliveries but that extends to beyond missile defense systems. One example of that is Qatar’s deals for THAAD, E-7 AEW, F-15E and upgrade to the MSE.

There has been movement at the FMS level but at the political level none of these deals are being firmed up and contracts signed. A manufacturer can’t get going in producing a system for a particular customer based on an FMS announcement. There needs to be an agreed and signed contract and payment made. Poland is expected to get its first patriot units between a year and a half to two years from contract signing and it could even be earlier.

http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?129969-World-Missiles-News&p=2323345#post2323345

As I said this things are too expensive. once the customer sees the real costs with training and upgrades they most of time slows down the procurement over multi year periods so that by the time its really operational. its practically obsolete. It takes 6 years to upgrade.

http://www.janes.com/article/61883/raytheon-to-upgrade-kuwait-s-patriot-air-and-missile-defence-system-to-latest-version
Raytheon has received a USD523 million contract to modernise six Patriot fire units to configuration 3+ for Kuwait.

The work is expected to be completed in March 2022 and entails providing Kuwait with the Patriot modern man station (MMS), radar digital processor (RDP), and modern adjunct processor (MAP).

There are multiple options available to the US pretty much across the frequency bands but you can’t compare US needs with those of Russia. Lockheed chose a UHF sensor given MEADS deployment footprint. They could have chosen an existing L band radar but the MEADS AOA allowed them to go for a new sensor. Raytheon chose a VHF radar for its JLENS surveilance role, and they packaged an existing X-band sensor to pair that VHF with (on a separate JLENS). The Marines chose an S-band radar to do a very wide set of mission, not different from Israel’s choice to use the 2084 for everything from C-RAM, surveillance to air defense. The USAF had need of a long range surveillance radar that could double in and support the joint fight and left it up to the OEM to choose frequency with all three choosing a different one in L, S and C band. The US army uses its GaA S-band C-RAM radars for surveilance and soon short range anti UAV missions and Lockheed has L band AESA radars with long range surveillance ranges all the way up to 750km that they have just upgraded to Gallium Nitride.

The US Army determined that an X-Band MFCR mated to a dedicated LFS was the best choice (US Army funded 58% of MEADS) but has since deemed it as unaffordable. A dedicated X-band MFCR has also been determined unaffordable with the likely path being to buy an upgraded GaN C-band Patriot radar with 360 degree coverage in the AAW sense (sectored ABM role). As I had mentioned the US threats at the most stressful scenarios are massive salvos of ballistic and cruise missiles at forward deployed locations across CENTCOM, and PACOM and even EUCOM. Those can only be countered to a small degree using airpower, primarily in the left of launch scenarios (TEL hunt). This mission is entirely provided by the US Army (and against more challenging threats the US Navy using SM3). Ensuring that no hostile aircraft flies above the US Army or Marines is the task of the joint force and has been largely left to the USAF and USN with the army not really considering long range AAW as a priority given the threat (Iran and NOKO are unlikely to have an air-force capable of conducting strike missions) at least for the moment.

Anti Air, or anti-stealth penetrating threat is virtually non-existent while the main low RCS drivers are those sneaky low flying cruise missiles and those are what drove the JLENS and IBCS requirements for 360 degree long ranged coverage. Currently a PAC-3 launcher packs 16 missiles compared to 4 for the larger, longer ranged PAC-2 GEM/T’s using the same launcher – that is the trade they willingly (and gladly) made given that they expect massive raids on forward deployed locations protected by patriots and MEADS. Within a deployed footprint the current Patriot or even the current MEADS kills a lot many more ballistic and cruise missiles than the older PAC-2 based system. A combined deployment of THAAD and PAC-3 gives you between 88 and 104 interceptors (4 Patriot launchers and 5 THAAD launchers) depending upon the interceptor (PAC3, PAC-3 MSE or mix of PAC3 and PAC3MSE per launcher). 4 PAC-2 GEM/T launchers will give you just 16 missiles, and the USAF can easily cover that through the air along with their surveillance aircrafts. While the PAC-3 is generally classified as a 1000km ranged ballistic missile defense weapon it has in OTE shot down 1100+km weapons (an important distinction since it extends it to an anti MRBM capability). MSE should better that given its altitude and possibly higher velocity. Patriot missile intercept performance is probably also inhibited to a degree by the legacy PESA radar and overall quality of data and intercept probability would improve with the AESA.

The rest of the long range threats are dealt by PAC-2 launchers but better still the CAP’s. It isn’t the US Army that needs those requirements but the US Navy, hence their footprint for Aegis extends to 200+ nautical Mile SM6 (AAW) to Short ranged (30-50km) high rate ESSM (soon going active) with dedicated Mid Course defense ABM capability. US Army would like to have that but the way their systems have evolved, from a threats based requirements process they need a different capability given how they deploy. THAAD is over and above since the currently funded 7 batteries with requirements for 9 isn’t a one for one complement to a patriot footprint although they can always deploy to a theater as and when required (or be forward stationed like they are currently at GUAM). The next goal is to switch to a dual band uplink for the PAC-3MSE so that it can accommodate the AN/TPY-2 in forward pass mode given that you don’t have THAAD deployed everywhere but do have AN/TYP-2’s minus the missiles (keep in mind that uplinks are still band constraint given interceptor dynamics) –

There is only a very small homeland defense mission in the AAW and cruise missile scenario in the US whereas in Russia it is a vast majority of its mission. The US Army and MDA are primarily concerned with ABM’s, and one look at the SRBM and MRBM proliferation in their areas of interest will show why its a concern. Cruise missile threat is the next major headache and that was what MEADS did much better than patriot. Even post MEADS (US Army isn’t acquiring any) they are looking at 360 degree anti-cruise missile and anti air mission with sectored ABM because they don’t want a rotating array for ABM role (MEADS didn’t either hence earlier descriptions of its battle elements kept 2 MFCR’s with one LFS, given that one MFCR would be dedicated to sectored ABM while the other will provide 360 degree coverage against cruise missiles and aircraft). Russian threats and national defense needs are completely different.

Israel has similar requirements with the Iron Dome and David’s Sling. Iron dome is primarily for the C-RAM mission while the IAI-Raytheon Stunner deals with cruise missiles, and Short Ranged Ballistic Missiles of up to 300-350 km range (BM range). It being a pure hit to kill means that it really isn’t replacing the entire capability set lost with the PAC-2 but given their threat they can let the air component deal with the fighter threat.

Without knowing the numbers, If i were to predict I’d predict that the MEADS MFCR would have inferior surveillance footprint and range because of the band choice. Thats a trade they could easily make since there was the LFS that was a part of the system. Similarly in terms of range resolution, X-band lends itself to better discrimination than S or C-band for that mission. That is why MEADS focused on because experience told them that it wasn’t always the interceptor performance that improved the PK of a ballistic missile intercept, the ability of the system to provide high quality data is equally as important. On Patriot Analysis of alternative work they even acknowledge that X-band would be better but in the same document admit that it would be the most expensive and therefore unaffordable (The patriot replacement/upgrade needs nearly a 100 radars in the US alone). Its a systems engineering thing and you must trade for overall capability. Ideally you want a Patriot radar to be a mobile, smaller AN/TPY-2 but you can’t afford that. IBCS takes them away from that to an extent because it allows elements to be added as and when required. MEADS does that too at the sensor level. Forward Pass also rids them of having the need to create a mini-TPY-2 for the Patriot modernization, at least when both are present in a theater and is operating in that mode (The Middle East would/should have 3 TPY-2’s by the end of the decade and the Pacific 2 or possibly 3).

Below are a few lines from an old article describing MEADS. One thing to note when comparing an X-band MFCR and S-band MFCR in terms of size is that the latter requires more spacing for its modules given the frequency choice leading to a larger array footprint.

A while ago I had posted an article here describing Lockheed’s internal (at the moment secret) efforts to create an X-Band Gallium Nitride radar for an unknown application. Given the use of such a radar by the US Army, there are no requirements for an X-band ground radar. The improved sentinel (Raytheon-Thales) has AESA in its future but that is down the road and is an antenna upgrade (and not a new radar). When the US joined MEADS, it was agreed upon that if and when the US purchased MEADS they would ask for sensor changes (completely different software than what the others would use but also hardware changes). Since the US isn’t buying MEADS it could be that Lockheed is upgrading the MFCR with GaN modules to compete in an open Patriot radar replacement competition with the X-band sensor, hoping that the US Army will budget more to fund for a more capable (and more expensive) sensor. A more powerful GaN MFCR would improve the surveilance footprint of the X-band radar even though it won’t be as good as the S band G/ATOR or the C-Band Patriot AESA, given the band choice but IBCS allows them to add and subtract sensors easily so its less of a headache going forward than it was in the past. The only problem with that is that the 150+ km PAC-2 missile is TVM guided and mated to the C-Band radar so you would have to potentially modify thousands of interceptors of you switch over to an X-band MFCR. There is however a long term requirement to replace that with an active long range interceptor and some have advocated leveraging the Standard Missile family and technology.

As a reference the legacy Patriot radar had about 170 km maximum search range within its sector. The upgraded Patriot Config. 3 improved that by 20% and the GaN AESA patriot takes it above 400km (50% increase over the upgraded Patriot PESA). As mentioned earlier you go lower frequency and get longer search and surveillance performance within a fixed power budget/footprint hence S band radars will get more coverage (reason for starting with S and going lower for the surveillance mission). C and X band will struggle to go there without impacting T/R module count and power supply but they offer better discrimination for various missions. X-Band GaN MFCR would struggle to get Patriot AESA level performance within the existing MEADS footprint but it will be an interesting thing to look at. For longer ranges they have in the past considered using the S-Band G/ATOR for excellent balance between surveillance and fire control duties but I doubt that they will drop a band moving from the legacy patriot radar.

The idea of using the main radar beam for (uplink and/or downlink) on many systems (MEADS and even russian ones) is/was to make sure that the kill chain is strong. Its very tough to jam the main beam given the power dynamics whereas an extended kill chain would involve less powerful streams. If you can jam a powerful AESA (using a self protection jammer) then the IAD has other major problems. Uplink and downlink is with missile communication so even if you spoof or confuse the radar you still don’t bother the communication. That trade is made to ensure missile communication integrity and to keep an enemy form exploiting that. I believe the Gravestone also uses the main beam for missile communication as will the future AESA Patriot and THAAD. Same with AEGIS, the uplink downlink is handled by the main radars (S or X band depending on the missile). Given uplink band constraints (range, size and space within the interceptor) you are essentially operating in a small trade space and the most powerful, jam resistant emitter in an IAD is generally the sensor (one would hope so). When I referred to burn through i wasn’t referring to the physical act of jamming the radar as in an EW/EA tactic but as a communication burn through for the missile comm. that is and has been a commonly used tactic to break air defense kill chains. To do the latter on the radar main beam you would essentially need to carry around a very large stand off jammer which is impracticable on a tactical mission.

The fundamental difference between Russian and US SAMs is cost, mobility, production rates. Russian SAMs operate from Arctic to deserts of Middleast without large scale city size bases. and they can be delivered in about year time with full scale training. see Iran example. Arabs have to spend ten times and wait 10 times longer to get similar system. new Tor now operates fully autonomous.

16 missiles per launcher and shot on the move. SAM technology is faster than Stealth fighters can add missiles to internal bays.

https://www.rt.com/news/russian-tor-missile-unique-794/
Unique ‘direct kill’ air defense complex unveiled in Russia
The mobile launcher currently stops for two or three seconds to launch a missile, but it could be done on a move, without stopping,” the official explained.

As the Low-RCS threat becomes more prevalent (which it surely will once the F-35, J-20 , J-31 and PAKFA proliferate) many will probably realize that the best counter isn’t a federated system but a distributed one simply because of the interceptor physics, seeker dynamics and the time-compression vis-a-vis the window of opportunity one may get amidst the various things going on over a very short amount of time.

every modern standoff missile whether billisitc /cruise or even small self destructive drones is low rcs. its the missiles that bite not the aircraft.
missiles are getting compact so threat of saturation attacks is getting higher. so the only solution is C350 system that can hit ultra low for cruise missile and higher for BMs. upto 96 missiles control by one radar. the smaller missiles pulling 60Gs.
http://www.revolvy.com/main/index.php?s=Vityaz%20missile%20system&item_type=topic
the domestic version characteristics classified.

https://www.rt.com/news/272341-s350-vityaz-air-defense/
Next gen S-350 mobile mid-range missiles to make Russian air defense impenetrable
Though it is smaller, its characteristics are better than that of S-300ps. It is agile, does better at ultra-low and maximum heights and has longer range,” the general said

The question is though can it take off from a carrier with a payload of 6 AIM-54 (plus 2 SRAAM) and land with 4 AIM-54 like the Tomcat could?
It’s a moot point though because as has already been mentioned, why would the USN adapt the Su-33 for the fleet defence role, when they already have a perfectly fine, american design. Ultimately of course, the fleet defence role was dropped altogether.

when there is 6 AIM-54 on F-14. Is there any space left for fuel tanks as without it F-14 has very limited range. I doubt it has fuel to engage afterburner. how is the deck space for F-14. how is reliability. it was not until 1987 that engine upgrade was implemented it shows it was not easier to upgrade F-14 airframe. Aircraft need to be designed for future upgrades.

MIG-29K carries 1500L tank in center line. and MIG-29K is plane with superior TWR than F-14.

If Schengen is even negotiable….they’ve already said it isnt. Why does ‘more money and a continuation of trade’ have to be appealing to the EU…because it is for us so it ‘just has to be’!?. The EU have a market of over 450mn citizens left after we leave….there are other consumers they can pitch at with zero tariffs across the area.

Thats not the case with us is it?. If, by the point this all blows up, we dont have deals set up with India, Brazil and all those other places that Boris (remember him?) said will surely be battering our door down for preferential trading….who do we have to drop in to send our once-EU-bound trade to?. If we are facing a gap between our ‘global deals’ being realised and the end of our free trade with the EU are we in a strong position to make demands on the EU or do we need them more than they need us?.

Trade with the EU makes up about 17% of our GDP……EU trade with UK makes up about 3% of the EU’s revenue. Do you think they dont know who is in the box seat here?.

If Brexit go through. You can count on Putin to help UK out. As full Implementation of Brexit will likely throw out more than a 1 million East EU. Punishment of East EU is Putin Core principal.

There is 200m people EuroAsian Union. than Special relation with China and Arabs/Iran and squeezing of Turkey to reorient its Germanic way with help of Joint Israel/Kurd/Arabs/Iranian.

http://sputniknews.com/business/20160629/1042140680/brexit-ties-trade.html
Brexit Opens New Prospects for Russian-UK Trade Ties – Commerce Chamber

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/01/putin-dares-britain-to-go-through-with-brexit/
Putin dares Britain to go through with Brexit