From memory CdG would carry 30+ aircraft only when the majority were SE’s. The Rafale is a much larger aircraft, so 24 is probably about right.

2) F-35B’s could always be cat launched (as was planned for the P1154),

They arent Strengthened/Stressed for Catapult launches.

That’s a rather childish response. We’re talking about the value of fixed wing versus rotary wing carrier borne AEW, and the point is that ASaC7 cannot operate very far inland – certainly not over Afghanistan or much of Iraq. Helicopters are not well suited for AEW in a world where carrier aircraft reach ever further inland.

Not what you asked. You said they arent deployed to Afghanistan and E-2 is, I corrected you by saying that actually, at this very moment, there are ASaC7’s deployed to Afghanistan. It seems that as well as AEW, they are also rather good at tracking ground targets.

LIES all LIES , he’s a hero down here :diablo:
obviously the fanboys here are right too, speed is everything

huh?

Please make sense.

Are you either Mr Goon or Mr Kopp or not?

And if you are not, I suggest you look into your “Hero” a bit before idolising him so much.

Ahem. Sorry to burst your bubble, but the French Navy never stopped advocating for a second nuclear carrier, and so did the French parliament. The conventional option was pushed through by Chirac in 2003, mainly for political and economic reasons linked to cooperation with the UK. Those reasons proved to be illusory when the UK decided to pursue a UK only build strategy for CVF, and now the nuclear option is firmly back on the table.

The French wanted to build all (or the majority of) the CVF blocks in France, thus giving them a large workshare on the project out of proportion to the amount of ships they would receive. The UK said no, the French had a dummy spit and pulled out. It should be noted that the taxes they’d collect from their construction of the UK carriers would have gone a long way to funding their own PA.2.

PA.2 also had a lower build and operating cost then the other design under consideration, which was an enlarged CDG.

From a technical perspective, CdG had a few too many corners cut in its design, which led to more corrective work than would have been ideal, but that does NOT make it a compromised design. All things considered, it is a very capable medium carrier and also successful example of how to build an extremely complex ship despite a decades long hiatus in carrier production.

The reactors fitted to CDG are not designed for powering a large aircraft carrier (but rather an SSBN). It took ten years to build her, her propeller’s were faulty, hell, she wasnt even big enough for one of the aircraft she was supposed to carry.

Hardly what I would term a success.

It’s exactly the reverse actually. ASaC7 is a limited blue water asset and a holdover from the Cold War mid-Atlantic threat scenarios. When was the last time ASaC7 operated as an overland C3 node in Iraq or Afghanistan? You must not have seen those pictures of Hawkeyes operating over Afghanistan…

Actually, they are deployed in Afghanistan right now, sorry.

.”somehow magically end up with their pet project (an upgraded F-111)…”

even though i’m a f-35 fan, the sad thing is an uberpig would probably out class a few of the 4+ platforms that are raved about here. lets start up the f111 production line again ,,LOL,

Don’t encourage them.

What are you guys defining a small airforce as?

I believe this is an inaccurate statement. According to the logic you have provided, one of the European customers who have a quoted cost in Euros would not have seen any cost increase. Yet, many articles in the aviation press have detailed the massive cost increases to the extent that the whole program is threatened.

The European countries are not merely purchasing the aircraft though, they are also funding development as the aircraft is being designed to their specifications.