Seen this Document ?

http://www.cdi.org/pdfs/AmericasDefenseMeltdownFullText.pdf
December 2, 2008
New Release: “America’s Defense Meltdown” (Press Release – Announcement)
Prepared by CDI’s Straus Military Reform Project, “America’s Defense Meltdown: Pentagon Reform for President Obama and the New Congress” is an urgently-needed new book that addresses the largest issue left untouched by the recent presidential campaign: the continuing collapse in America’s defenses and what to do about it.

[…]

The Air Force’s newest fighter, the F-35, can be regarded as only
a technical failure.

Depending on which “independent” cost estimate one believes, the program could be underfunded by as much as $30 billion to $40 billion, and the schedule likely to slip up to two more years.

This serious situation borders on a fiasco for all three services involved in the F-35 program, but it is certainly a potential disaster for the Air Force. This is the inevitable consequence of the Air Force.

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The engine is different, the avionics are different and the airframe is modified.

You’re talking about the F-35A versus the X-35 now right ?

Oh not as such? Funny that.

And the “Gripen NG” is being flight tested on several test aircraft, Gripen Demo (39-7) being one of them. 39-6 do avionics tests… Other jets do other pieces… Kind of like how the JSF test fleet one day will do different stuff…

Jane’s – Norway like a banana republic

http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.aftenposten.no%2Fnyheter%2Firiks%2Farticle2798506.ece&hl=sv&ie=UTF-8&sl=no&tl=en

– Fighter acquisition will Norway to the memory bit of a banana republic, “said Robert Hewson, editor of the military magazine Jane’s.

If I follow your advise, I guess I should praise the great t-w-ratio of the typhoon and it’s comparably huge order backlog.
But this wouldn’t reflect my perception of the situation. It is Saab’s competition to loose, but Dassault presented a very convincing package.

“Lose” I suppose. Where do you get this idea? It’s rather Rafale’s to lose. The Swiss has never flown Swedish jets, there’s Eurofighters all around them including German industry contacts, there’s various forms of attempts to rebate Eurofighters to make room for T3 deliveries, the requested fleet is not big enough to make a large impact on life cycle costs, France is next door quite eager for a sale to get that important first customer. They have flown French jets before and could get more training space over the border.

You’re right to talk about a package because that’s what decides things like this not individual good results in specific tests, because all jets will be better at something compared to the other ones (shocking piece of news there).

In the end there’s 3 strong contenders and one major enemy, namely Swiss politics.

Technically its not an insurmountable problem but it would be costly and time consuming. The Swiss would have to pay for the integration process or accept MICA into the inventory.

Yes, the French could absorb the integration cost in an offer if they so choose but the problem is later and continuos, who will integrate and test new versions etc.

I think EF has a good chance but not because some neighbours fly the machine but mainly on technical and industrial reasons, plus there’s 3 Gripen users not that far away and the French on the other side….