Well, none of Eire’s armed forces are really much use for defending against an invasion or anything. I think Britain’s given up trying to invade them, and noone else wants to bother, so they really don’t need much.

They do quite a bit of UN work, however.

I don’t think anyone can argue against the F-16 in value-for-money as the US practically give them away if it is in their strategic interest.

If you are a budding Saddam wanting to build an airforce without US support then the FC-1 is probably the best value. It will look great in airshows, and drop dumb bombs and rockets on “counter-revolutionaries” just as well as an F-16.

I guess if the US ever invades France they’ll have to blow up the Nostradamus radar first 😉

The radar in question (Nostradamus) is an OTH-B type radar. It is thought that such radars, operating at large wavelengths, would effectively counter stealth because both shaping and RAM become ineffective. Now, traditionally OTH-B radars are also HUUUGEEE, fixed, gobble power like no tomorrow, have no heightfinding capability and poor resolution. You’d know roughly where the target was, but all you could do with that would be vector a fighter to try and find it visually as the fighter’s radar would still be largely useless.

It looks like the French are using new processing techniques to effectively overcome these limitations.

Russia was working on anti-stealth radars before 1991, but anyone that imagines it would have been cheaper to replace all their radars, upgrade their interceptors and SAMS etc as compared to the cost of making the B-2 is, frankly, mistaken.

Bistatic radar is not some universal panacea. It can allow detection of radar signals deflected by shaping, but the signal will still be attenuated by RAM/RAS. There are difficulties in creating the bistatic radar network, and it is not going to be that simple. How many countries have deployed bistatic radar systems? Oh, about none….

Regarding IRST and RWR I was talking about detecting IR and radar emissions from the ENGINE and RADAR, obviously….

China can now be said to have reached the point of indigenous development with the FC-1 and other current projects.

Mikoyan’s supposed involvement amounted to little beyond some input on the RD-33 engine. The FC-1 is a completely Chinese design.

Now, perhaps the J-10 was also a totally indigenous design, but until we know the real history there will be suspicions that it has some input from the Lavi. Even if was unofficial- maybe someone stole the plans and sold them without government knowledge- this would make it not a 100% indigenous design.

And finally:

This is MY version of the 1.42, if I had been the chief designer.

Three phased array antennas in the nose and wing roots.

Planform aligned to minimum number of angles.

Dotted lines indicate air intakes under the fuselage….

I wish I could find a ruler 😉