@ Ozair

thing is, it all depends on what you use as weapons… in A2A role, both will have quite discrete RCS increase from their loadout, for example an aircraft having 5m² RCS won’t care too much about the radar signature of its A1A missiles, pretty much insignificant when compared to the rest… an aircraft having 0.5m² RCS will see the missiles become more significant compared to itself clean, but then again, what will be the RCS of an A2A loadout?

Everybody when wanting to denigrate them put forward heavily loaded fighters for A2G, in which case it still can play a role, just as well as the electronic warfare suites and so on… but, in any case they don’t fly around just like that, carelessly. The mission planning is done as to succeed, and if they can fly high, they do it, if they need to get below radar coverage, they do it.. there are pretty much always different tactical options to consider. The only ones who do not want to admit it are those who have an agenda, like trying to justify their own choices as the only ones available

you’re the one that decided to take it with your super argument “i don’t believe it”…

fact is, as you say, Mig-29 and F-16 have been designed at the time where RCS reduction wasn’t taken into consideration.. By the late 1980’s the Rafale and Gripen had it. Now you either consider that the manufacturers just said “oh, who cares” and went on without even trying and, for example, in the Rafale’s case, redesigned completely the aircraft just for fun (so to end with you 5m² RCS from up front just as the previously designed fighters), or that maybe they actually did it on purpose while applying what was known and/or discovered through research to reduce the frontal RCS…

Now, everybody knows that manufacturers just delay their developments and spend cash for fun only, don’t they?

thing is, we are talking about the future european fighter, which is a german-french project to replace the Rafale and the Typhoon, so, if it’s meant to replace the Rafale, obviously, the french will want it to have a naval version. What’s more, when one sees the dependence of the F-35 on the USA, you can be pretty certain that the french will no be willing to consider anything like it (or its successor which will, most certainly, retain similar policy)

as for “projecting power to 3rd world countries”, that’s what everybody does… all nations try to justify their spendings with the “near peer” scarecrow while, at the same time, nobody in these countries will ever risk going to war against anyone even close to be “near peer”.

It is certain that they considered the YF-22 less risky, more conventional in its approach. Unless somebody decides to finance the F-23 development on private funds, there’s zero chance (so, there really IS zero chance today 😉 ) for us to see what the F-23 could’ve been like 🙂

The F-23 wouldn’t have made it, we’d have zero aircraft from the ATF program instead of 187.

er, maybe a bit strong as assertion… maybe it would be more complicated, maybe not… the only thing we can say for sure is that Northrop made the B-2 almost at the same time, which was even more revolutionary in its design than the YF-23 and they successfully made it. If they managed to make the B-2, why wouldn’t they be able to make the F-23? Same as saying that the F-22 had improvements over the YF-22 you can’t dismiss the fact that the F-23 probably would’ve been improved over the YF-23 (one could even say that it would be expected as the prototypes are there for that very purpose: test and improve a concept). Overall, would it end as being a better aircraft? maybe. the only thing we can say for sure is that we don’t know.. Another thing we can say for sure, LM wouldn’t be able to push forward the argument “we have the experience with the F-22” when they promoted the X-35.. would it make any difference is another question…

thing is, everybody wants workshare… and nobody wants to pay for more than own interest. That’s why the Eurofighter is such a mess to upgrade and why there’s little to no benefit of scale .

Now, if germans and french go for it alone, they can manage to do something that’s economically doable, but their operational goals are quite different, so, from the operational standpoint, it is much less probable. Taking the british on board may bring some needs more similar to the french ones (like force projection capability) but others against it (naval operations where the british seem too fond of STOVL aircraft to pay for a CATOBAR version which is mandatory for the french. and what’s more, the british, if they join the program, will do so with the idea of a workshare to get, workshare that by definition won’t benefit to the others… in the end,would it be in the interest of the french and germans to get the british on board? it is highly doubtful at this point…

thing is, it’s easy to make a powerpoint to say “look what we’ll do”.. it is another story to do it for good.. as said previously, they obviously want the customers to pay for the integration, so it obviously isn’tt so simple and cheap

*hearing a sound on the street*

“FRESH RAFAAAAAALES, WHO WANT MY FRESH RAFAAAAALES…. GREAT PRIIICE.. FREEEEESH RAFAAAAAALES…”

😀