Srbin

Yeah, I got your argument. So far, countries still seem to want large patrol aircraft for versatility. ASW, the capability of carrying large standoff weapons, huge payloads, long range. I don’t see why they wouldn’t use both. Top speed of a Mariner is 220kts versus 400kts+ for an Orion. Payload is 3800lbs vs. 20,000lbs, with the Orion able to deploy mines, torpedos, asw weapons, and anti-ship missiles. Probably a bunch of other stuff is carried for flexibility on a typical mission.

No doubt Mariner is a better system for certain tasks. Orion for others. It’s not really a question of whether a country will want one or the other.

As for the need for fighters, as I said: if you don’t feel comfortable leaving yourself open to enemy strike aircraft, you’ll want some long range fighters. The world changes, and you can’t count on rebuilding a modern air force overnight.

Srbin:

What global hawk will give you is high altitude imagery over a 36 hour period. If you go with the Mariner, it’s true you get a weapons payload with the long endurance, but it’s a slow aircraft and won’t be able to carry the range of weapons of the full size patrol aircraft.

UAVs will have a big role in maritime patrol, but I doubt they’ll fully replace aircraft like the Orion. Size, I suspect, still matters in that role. Then again, at some point they might make a huge UAV that can carry a massive payload. I remember reading about an idea to adapt existing fighter aircraft (I think it was an F-16) to ground control for attack use in hi-threat operations. Don’t know if it is going anywhere though.

Charlie Echo:

Oops. You’re right. Got my gases mixed up. And apparently the cause is still the subject of argument. This is from wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindenburg_disaster

Most current analysis of the accident assumes that the static spark theory is correct. There is still a debate, however, as to whether the fabric itself or the hydrogen used for buoyancy was the fuel for the initial fire.

Proponents (http://www.dwv-info.de/pm/hindbg/hbe.htm) of the “flammable fabric” theory point out that the coatings on the fabric contained both iron oxide and aluminium-impregnated cellulose acetate butyrate dope. Cellulose acetate butyrate dope is known to be flammable and iron oxide is well-known to react with aluminium powder. In fact, iron oxide and aluminium are sometimes used as components of solid rocket fuel or thermite. (However, the oft-cited claim that the ship was “coated in rocket fuel” is a significant overstatement.) While the coating components were potentially reactive, they were separated by a layer of material that should have prevented the reaction from starting.

After the disaster, the Zeppelin company’s engineers determined this skin material, used only on the Hindenburg, was more flammable than the skin used on previous craft and changed the composition for future designs. Nonetheless, the Hindenburg had flown for over a year (and through several lightning storms) with no reports of adverse chemical reactions, much less fires on the fabric.

According to a wire report I saw, Japan is planning to cut their defense budget and trim the number of fighters in their fleet by about 7%. They want to do more with missile defense. I don’t think we’ll see any new indigenous fighter programs out of them for a while.

What about the dramatic burning of the Hindenburg being due to the leak of helium gas? I saw a thing on TV where they argued that the cause was the result of stuff they used to coat the outer surface of the dirigible.

Memory of that is misty though, so maybe I got it wrong.

SOC:

There’s a May ’04 report from the GAO talking about the need for a new ‘business case’. Basically asking the USAF to justify why it wants the aircraft. I’d say add the development costs to the Eurofighter and see what you come up with. However, I’m not sure of the significance of the percentage of GDP or GNP of an individual weapons system. The defense budget as a percentage of GDP is largely based on perceived need in peacetime, and on necessity during a war.

Are these their only four Su-30s? Or do they have some earlier variants in service?

If the Colombians are interested, can the Venezualens be far behind? And once they’ve got an ‘in’ with Chavez, the Cuban market is a lock. The cubans are good for a few million pounds of sugar per year.