You still think the Rafale has a chance in Europe? Despite Norway, Netherlands, Switzerland, Denmark and Finland being out of contention. Are you that sure of the Belgian contract going to Dassault?

I haven’t said it has many chances in Europe, but it’s mainly due to politics & economic situation, not because the qualities of the aircraft compared to the competition.

1. South Korea has a signed contract for its F-35As. Australia has a signed contract ($11bn for 58 units incl. base refurbishment & weapons). You could also look at Israel who’s bought its aircraft through an FMS process. The cost is roughly the same as the Rafale.

It’s too bad for them if they spend 7 bn on a lemon. What can I say?

2. The Indian deal does not including operating costs. They are budgeted separately under a revenue heading.

I don’t know about that you may well be right. Thing is we don’t know what the price includes & if we can compare it with the contracts you mentioned. BTW the korean deal is 7+ billions not 6.8.

Nic

the full potential of QE can only be realized with support a/c, like AEW IMO,
F-35B isn’t bad at all, and it allow RAF to reinforce the small air wing of the navy in a heartbeat,
that all by itself is priceless.
Now team up with India and get some Osprey AEW

Well, you could have bought F35C for the RAF too. Then here comes the E2D.

Nic

Fwiw I was suggesting that the Rafale is good at flying low because it was designed to do a specific job. I do think the distinction between tactical and strategic nukes is moot though.

Do people really get paid to argue? Where do I sign up?

One example that has surfaced in the press:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/9845442/EU-to-set-up-euro-election-troll-patrol-to-tackle-Eurosceptic-surge.html

It’s not borderline at all, it actually is dishonest.

Anyway I also would like to remind everyone that when you are hugging the ground, most of your stores don’t give much of a radar return to airborne radars.

Nic

Rafale still carry bomb and missiles outside and these pylon rack as well, it won’t be LO ( you wont have the 0.1 m2 figure. If i remember correctly , according to AW magazine the gripen for example have RCS = 0.1 m2 while clean, but about 0.4 m2 with 4 AAM, so I think Rafale will be similar to that )
Btw talking about jamming, jamming is alot easier when you only need to protect stealth platform , since the power required and burn through range reduced significantly

This is why you fly low & use terrain masking.

The problem is, how to do you know whether they detect you or not? you won’t know their radar processing power or sensitivity
Your RCS isn’t the same from all directions either, and that even more complicated when you carry bomb, missile

Which is why it costs so much to integrate new weapons on a fighter nowadays. This is also why Dassault has used an anechoic chamber to test various loadouts. I’m pretty sure that various AAM + 2 Scalp or 1 ASMPA have been tested thouroughly.

Thanks to SPECTRA, the Rafale tactical display actually shows the radius of various air defenses pretty much like the circles on your LM propaganda images you posted earlier, which means the pilot can fly around them as he pleases (fuel permitting).

this is exactly what i suggest in the first place, to turn your radar on once in a while rather than only use your passive sensor only

Not always. Once you have been detected sure. Before that it’s more dangerous.

Because iam trying to explain to you why it is necessary to turn on radar once in a while when you dont have support from other asset like AWACs or ground radar rather than rely on passive sensor alone
. You are the one who think it better to fly completely silent

Nope I’m the one who think it’s better to avoid turning your radar on if you think you haven’t been detected & don’t plan to be in the near future.

link 16 is omnidirectional, so if they were to share information by it, may as well turn radar on

If you go EMCON 1 there won’t be anything to share anyway. If you detect something with OSF or Mica IR, you can turn link 16 on for a few seconds to update your buddies. Not nearly as dangerous as searching the sky with radar I bet.

How?

See before. Your nice pink bubbles are shown on the Rafale tactical picture screen.

The problem is even with the most modern RWR, you wouldn’t be able to detect enemy that turn their radar and data-links off
what does that mean? , that mean you may know there are a ground radar or AWACs somewhere but you wouldn’t know a flight of Su-27 with their radar turning off are heading to your direction with the guidance from their support asset

You are not going to run into an area where the AWACS or ground radar can detect you, otherwise it means you’re a target from some Su27 indeed. The ESM is there to help you correct course to avoid getting caught. You planned your mission to come in undetected, & your ESM system helps you modify your plan as you go with up to date information about radar coverage. Now if you run into a ground radar detection area, you deserve getting shot, except if you are about to release your weapons & turn tail fast as you can praying for the best.

The whole point, as Archer would say, is to avoid the dangerzone.

The opposite happened too, How often does pilot know that his ESM/ECM will pick up enemy’s LPI signal? How does he he know there isn’t a flight of interceptor with their radar turn off heading to his direction with the help from some ground early warning radar?. That why i say the best tactics is doing what the SAM crew often do, turn radar on and off, snap shot rapidly

He doesn’t. Most fighter pilots who got shot down don’t know what hit them. Now does it mean you send radio waves all over the place just in case someone is waiting for you at the next corner? Mission planning is of utmost importance. Then you know what risk you have being intercepted, not by sending radar signals all over the place, LPI or not. Heck even a stealth aircraft can get shot down by a vintage SA2 with poor mission planning.

there are something called over horizon early warning radar, so no i dont really think it possible to be completely invisible, even with stealth platform, and just because you turn radar off doesn’t mean you will be completely invisible, enemy won’t be able to see you with their RWR , but they still can with their powerful ground radar since Rafale isnot a VLO platform. while yourself turn off your radar may be unaware of a silent flight comming your way

Look if a flight of interceptors is sent your way by AWACS/GCI & they know that your radar is on, I bet they will come at you from an angle that your radar doesn’t cover.

a sub is a bit different since ship and submarine always make noise when they move, thus you are not quite blind with passive sonar, it just take longer to geolocated target
By contrast using RWR only mean you are blind again enemies that turn off radar
P/s : IRST can help somewhat but their performance is quite limited in bad weather, or again enemy flight between cloud

Enemies that turn off radar can’t see you either, esp in bad weather. Which is rather good news in your deep strike scenario. I think it’s rather nice to be able to deny your enemy the ability to use his radar at will. He can still look for you with other means, but you’ve made his job much more complicated.

In the example of a Rafale flying with radar off, there are multiple sensors that can help you increase SA.

1. As you said there is OSF
2. There is also Mica IR, which is integrated as an extra IIR sensor in the Rafale system
3. There is also link 16. (Esp after SATCOM comes online with F3R).
4. Even if ESM doesn’t detect non emitting targets, it warns you if you have been picked up by those Su27’s supporting assets (ground based radars & AWACS). If you have been detected by an awacs, chances are someone is coming at you whether you have detected them or not. Then you can start using your radar if need be since you know they know you’re here.

I think your conception of air combat is way too rigid.

Nic

True, with sensor fusion, one sensor can be used to cue another to have better tracking of target
The problem i have is that, some people seem to think that passive sensors are much better than radar

I haven’t seen anyone say that, but that may just be my poor english.

Fly silently and have support from assets with powerful radar like an AWACs, ground radar or destroyer is always the best obviously, however there are many situations when you don’t have support from these assets For example when you are deep inside enemy’s territory , thus you will have to rely on the sensor on your aircraf.
Btw, DAS is on F-35 not EF-2000 and it is an IIR sensor

Indeed I was mixing up with DASS & the active MAWS from the EF. Anwyay back to the point, when you are deep inside territory, the last thing you want to do is to reveal your whereabouts, so you most likely don’t turn your radar on or emit anything besides SATCOM. Your EWS however enables you to detect people who are searching for you with radar or who are trying to get a lock on you. So yes for deep strike missions EWS is MUCH more useful than a radar for situational awareness.

As explained before, modern radar have advantage in gain compared to RWR so RWR doesn’t always detect radar first. Also, modern AESA radar use many method to achieving LPI such as random scanning pattern, extremely high scan rate, changing frequency thousand time/sec, compress their pulse.. etc thus, it not easy for RWR to distinguish between AESA radar signal and background noise.

All nice & good in theory. Now, how often does a pilot know with certainty that the adverse ESM/ECM won’t pick up his signals because he as an LPI radar? My guess is close to never. Pilots won’t base their mission planning & tactics on the hunch that their LPI radar won’t be detected. If you don’t know for sure you’re going to be conservative & use your radar with caution.

And since modern AESA scanning very fast, they can scan air and ground near simultaneously, the radar wave that hit ground will also be reflected to enemy’s direction, now enemy’s RWR will have to decide whether the signal coming to it is from a ground radar or not . So just because you turn your radar on mean you will be detected instantly

If you’re in a deep strike mission it won’t matter if you are detected instantly or not. It’s already very bad news if the enemy is alerted about your presence in the area. The difference is that now they may start looking for you, and the situation changes dramatically. Better keep your radar shut then than take any risk.

And way, when there is no support from asset like Ground radar , AWACs i think the best tactics is to turn radar on and off in cycle ( turn on for 2 seconds after every 10 seconds or something like that) thus negated enemy RWR ability to passive ranging, also create confusion since they wouldn’t know how many radar are there with their RWR because you move and turn radar on/off constantly

Use the sub analogy, if you use your passive sonars there are chances that the sub you are shadowing hasn’t even noticed you, & you will tell if he has or not by his actions only. Ping him and he knows that you are here.

In other words, even if the ESM hasn’t geolocated you, because it hasn’t had time to do it, chances are you will detect some LPI radar signals with your own ESM when the fighter that has been alerted of your presence wants to get a good track to send you a guided present :p

not just in air combat, in combat in general, the elements of surprise is very important

Indeed, which is why leaving clues of your presence is a bad idea. Didn’t your sergeant teach you to bury your **** in the ground? Why do you think soldiers carry a shovel.

Nic

You are right…

Top gear is sorely missed :apologetic: