vikasrehmanAs for buying mirages, ambassadors can say a lot to media for their own reasons. I dont think, PAF would be in a hurry to introduce another type into their inventory taking into consideration their current projects.
vikasrehmanBased on those modifications, it is unlikely that the 04 prototype will be rolled out soon.
I have come across at least one source which claims the roll out to be around December 2005…i think it was assumed to be around April 2004 before.
vikasrehmanIt’s a LEASING contract
Makes a lot more sense.
vikasrehmanHe may have been about Rose 3 upgrade which was applied to 14 mirages.
vikasrehmanI assume the first batch (limited series) of 20 or so would be used for operational testing/evaluation/clearance etc. Hence, to me personally, the signing of official contract is only a matter of time.
vikasrehmanI have a simple question.
Recently when china sent a few UAVs to Israel (for whatever reason), US made so much noise. We all know what happened to China-Israeli deal of phalcon AWACS under american pressure.
Does anyone here know if US officially protested the sale of Lavi tech to China (since western sources claim that J-10 is based on Lavi project) or when israeli were supplying patriot-2 guidance system secrets to chinese so they could use them R&D of their HQ9/FT-2000 system? I can imagine such transactions must have been kept secret, but they are of extreme sensitive nature. Did these have any affect on existing US-Israeli military relations and/or military tech cooperation???
vikasrehmanextra signing of GE engines is news to me. alteast 25 engines are necessary for this.
Bush admin sent a notifications to US Congress (dated 9/16/2004) regarding the sale of 16 F404-GE-IN20 aircraft engines to be used in LCA. I have also seen sources claiming the number of engines to be as high as 40 or even higher.
vikasrehmanso no orders for LCA while impression of 20 was given before through media.
IAF said (to the effect) that an order for 20 LCA (plus 20 optional) will be signed shortly. Official signign is only a formality and inevitable…India has already signed an agreement for extra GE-404 engines.
vikasrehmanYou get what you pay for.
According to The Times of India (4 May 2005), Indian defence minister Pranab Mukherjee, defence secretary Ajai Vikram Singh, DRDO chief M Natarajan and others told Parliamentary Consultative Committee that Tejas, which will be the world’s smallest, lightweight and relatively cheapest frontline combat aircraft, had excellent “export potential. Since LCA is not as expensive as F-16, M2K, Gripen, Mig-29 etc., ur post implies that its not as good either. Would u agree???
As far as ‘ludicrous claims’ r concerned, AFs generally tend take public consumption into consideration. An example was ex IAF chief Krishnaswamy’s statement-to the effect-that Mig-21 and its operational capabilities were equivalent to amercian F-15. How does this sound to u?
vikasrehmanWith the IPR deal with Russia underway, I guess all it would take to press Ivan to lean on China is an Indian deal for a few billions
I hope those new purchases (to stop RD-93 supplies to PAF) would fit within your modernisation plans without much of a head ache 🙂
Sounds great. I’ll call PAC and place my orders. My desk needs some plane models for decoration purposes.
Tell ur other rich friends to do so as well as number of units produced is one of the main determinants of fly away price 🙂
On a more serious note, 2 the best of my knowledge 12-15 mil is the fly away price based on the assumption that at least 300 units would be produced. Just take a look at MKI (empty weight 2.5 times greater than FC-1, 2 engines etc) and fly away price is about 34 million…right? How about LCA with all modern avionics, composites…around 21 million?
vikasrehmanI know its hard to come back after being given a categorical statement. So now the AVM’s words are his personal opinion? Can you say, clutching at straws? To most people when the #2 man of an airforce says “I don’t think my AF will buy x” to a military aviation magazine, it means that he is stating his air force’s current institutional thinking. But you seem incapable of following your own claim of taking “most logical” interpretation.
Whereas the use of words ‘i think’ by an AVM may reflect his ‘air force’s current institutional thinking’, wot im still failing to understand is how his words could be interpreted as AVM said PAF found Chinese avionics crappy and that PAF will only go for Western stuff. On page 31 of the same article, number 1 man of PAF (ACM Sadaat) is quoted as saying ‘i think we will buy chinese J-10‘. While this statement may reflect PAF’s ‘current institutional thinking’, could this also be considered a ‘categorical statement’??? Right now, PAF has decided to purchase F-16s, and with both JF-17 and F-16 joining PAF soon, J-10 doesn’t really have much chance of entering PAF in near future. Does this mean that ‘chinese J-10 is crappy…at least for the time being’???
Moving slightly away from this, why do AVM Aslam’s words carry so much weight with u, while u describe AVM Latif (another number 2 in PAF)’s as ‘blustering’? 🙂 Right now AVM Latif is saying that the engine supply contract of Russia with China is well intact and there is no ambiguity in it. What is your opinion regarding this? A categorical statement or blustering?
BTW ‘logic’ is always open to questioning. One intelligent person may not agree with what another considers as ‘most logical’, and vice versa. Its that simple, and does not really involve their ‘capabilities’ and/or ‘aukaat’. 🙂
When a stone falls from above and there is just one building nearby, the most logical explanation is that it came from that building. There is also the possiblity that it came from outer space. My conclusion is the former while yours seems to be the latter.
Was this why a few changes in FC-1 intakes first turned into ‘significant’ changes and then an indication of ‘engine change’? 🙂
vikasrehmanVikas, Read the first page of the interview with AM Shahzad Aslam. He clearly says that PAF WILL NOT go for a Chinese plane with Chinese avionics. One cannot get more categorical than that at all. AFTER that statement, if PAF says it will go for Chinese avionics, then what does it most logically mean? Aren’t you a proponent of the “most logical” explanation? Heard of Occam’s Razor?
First page of the interview with AM Shahzad Aslam???
First of all, if both of us r referring to the same article (AFM; Issue July 2004, pp:30-34), then AVM Shahzad Aslam’s interview only gets about half a page coverage, so there is no question about first page or second. Second (if we r referring to the same article) AVM Aslam does not say (as u have quoted him) that PAF WILL NOT go for a Chinese plane with Chinese avionics, but that ‘i dont think we will ever operate a purely chinese aircraft with chinese avionics‘. Do u see the difference between the two? Whereas ur statement makes it sound like a collective PAF decision (PAF WILL NOT), the real quote (from the article) reflects individual thinking (i dont think). Furthermore, whereas in this particular paragraph AVM states that PAF prefers to fly chinese aircrafts with western systems, he makes this statement clearer in the next paragraph when he refers to western fighters (could also be applied to western technologies) as being more mature vis-a-vis chinese’ (further backed by AM sadaat’s statement on the same page that ‘it will take time for chinese technologies to catch up with the west‘). So, u c see, what i fail to understand is how u reached ur conclusion, i.e. AVM said PAF found Chinese avionics crappy and that PAF will only go for Western stuff. Please help me to understand if u may.
PS. Of course im a proponent of the “logical” explanations, yet i also recognise that such explanations are always open to questioning. This is the reason y i enjoy discussing alternative “logical” explanations, and am also not in the habit of questioning/reminding others of their aukaat when they do not agree with my opinion/interpretation. 🙂
vikasrehmanVias, I have absolutely no problem with what you say, it is rather more logical and rational
Sameer, we all have (to one or another degree) some form of biasedness which does hinder our approach to most logical interpretation of available information. However, i guess if we can simply agree to disagree an/or simply put alternative ideas/explanations etc., such forums provide us an opportunity to learn a lot more from each other.
vikasrehmanSameer
From your quote, it would appear that the Air Marshall would never accept a plane that is 100% Chinese, they would want a certain % of French etc LCD screens, HUD etc etc etc
Hence we can deduce that the PAF believes that Chinese avionics are not as good as western ones, well daaaa, but now the PAF is having to accept these avionics perhaps by force or to keep the price down.
AVM’s statement reflected individual thinking and not collective PAF decision. In the next paragraph AVM was also quoted as saying ‘we would always consider western aircraft for the pure reason that those technolgies are mature’. PAF may have simply made is choice due to the facts that an active BVR is PAF’s current top priority (PAF needed it yesterday) and that there were some anomalies with Grifo S7 which need some time for correction and integration of chinese or other weapons with western systems would require even more time.
vikasrehmanThat article has been posted here many, many times. If you don’t have the aukaat to go and use a simple search button, it’s not my problem.
And just last night i posted (see post number 298 in this thread)…I have a hard copy of this mag, and i might be missing something. In even more simple terms, i have the AFM issue July 2004 containing this very article. So its not a question about anyone’s aukaat but rather ur claim, i.e. i.e. AVM said PAF found Chinese avionics crappy and that PAF will only go for Western stuff. So once again, please help me to find the particular sentences where AVM talks of chinese stuff ‘being crap’ and that PAF will ‘only’ go for western stuff???
Yes. The Air Marshal is blustering, like his ilk is wont to.
Is this the best explanation u can provide? 🙂
Since I’ve answered your questions many times, it’s your turn now. Without posing a question, answer this:
1. What specific design/manufacturing contribution do you know was made by Pakistan to the FC-1 project.
Unless you answer this question in a separate post, I’m not going to waste my time with you.
I simply do NOT know, and as i previously stated in post number 295 My personal assumption would be nothing too significant, since fighter R&D is a new thing for Pakistani engineers. Usman kindly provided a little more information regarding this topic, but i guess that we simply have to wait for sometime in order to get more specific details. 🙂
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