well, the fact is: it doesn’t.. unless not yet… Ueli Maurer wants it, but not sure at all the votes go his way

@ Vnomad: about tankers deal

thing is, if you make a competition, you set up the rules from the beginning.

if you change the rules during the competition, to favor one of the competitors, you can be sued (and rightfully so)

EADS made one mistake, once the rules had been changed to, obviously, make sure that boeing win, they should not have bidded, saying, basically, to the US DoD: “ok, you wanna play like that? they pay the price” leaving boeing alone to bid (and, obviously, inflate the price to a much higher level than when having EADS in the competition)

what’s more, that may just as well invalidate the whole process, as for a competition to take place (legal obligation) you need two competitors

In any case, that has little to do with what’s being talked about here: there was no illegal subsidies to the rafale to gain the market, and wanting to claim otherwise is just spinning of the truth, period.

Edit: one funny thought just crossed my mind… should the F-35 with all its cost overruns that are paid for by the US tax payer, be considered as “illegally subsidised”? 😀

considering there was a participation of dassault, the thing went on to be something like a “mini rafale”… but simpler and way cheaper, a direct competition to the gripen (aimed at the same market), more or less

but considering how far it did go in its development before Yugoslavia collapsed, it’s hard to say more precisely how well it would fare

@ Bomberboy

you can see it as a very simple thing (and having nothing to do with subsidies)

dassault and the french government had a deal to finance 25-75% of the develompent of the rafale.

that was done.

from there on, if a customer wants a new capability, he has to pay for it

UAE wanted a 9T engine? they were asked to pay for it (and didn’t like the idea and the requirement was dropped as it wasn’t necessary anyway). same for the other upgrades they wanted.

French forces wanted new capabilities developed (F3 standard), they, as a costomer, had to pay for them.

Eurofighter proposed to India an aircraft with capabilities that aren’t available yet; so, obviously, someone has to pay for them, and that someone is the customer who buys them (in this case, India)

As you can see, it’s always the same story: the final customer pays for it, or the maker get bankrupted, obviously 😉 )

er… eagle1, check rayubik’s post a bit above yours 😀

the articles suggest it will be a “fighter jet” and replace the Rafale and Typhoon. I wonder if this something different from the ground attack UCAV we’ve been seeing (nEuron and Taranis), or if that UCAV will fulfil all fighter roles, including air-to-air and such

what does bother me is that this is a UK/France project, what about Spain, Italy and Germany, who’ll also need to replace their Typhoons and Tornadoes?

a fighter to replace the typhoon and the rafale, having a prototype flyinh in 2020… seems a bit early, unless they plan a 15 years flight test…

as far as Germany, Spain and Italy are concerned, what does that have to do with this news? UK and France can decide to develop a fighter on their own. other countries’ needs are other countries problem.

Besides, when you look at the mess the Typhoon development has become (with always one partner or another that doesn’t want this, pay for that, etc…), you can reach only one conclusion: no partner is much better than too many partners…

no, just a bit longer runway, eventually… 😀

the pilot said, exactly (in your link):

“It’s clear that, when taking off with such a payload in very hot weather” – and in the Emirates temperatures can reach 50 degrees Celsius – “it’s better to take off with 18 tonnes of thrust than 15.”

better, of course, it’s always more comfortable for the pilot to have more thrust at his disposal, but it’s not something you absolutely need

besides, the UAE seem to have removed the 9-ton engine from the “necessary upgrades list”