Sounds like the F-35 has a sale coming unless Germany just shrinks their fleet. It doesn’t have any real competition for the Tornado replacement.

Would be suprised if Germany pulls the trigger before the early 2020’s. Then again Mrs. Merkel seems a bit more twitchy toward her eastern neighbor as of late. Defense spending is about as popular in Germany as balancing the budget is among US politicians.

SAAB stands that their GaN based Giraffe 4A detects stealth airplanes as far as their older Giraffe did for other fighters.

And quantum radars are going to be fielded in China soon, and laser carrying USAF fighters are just around the corner. Claims are one thing, doing so in an operational environment is an entirely different matter. GaN radars are becoming operational in the US, Thales has theirs, etc. Would you expect Saab to claim that their new product cannot detect LO aircraft? Surely wouldn’t help sales.

Are we to believe that none of the nations pursuing LO aircraft (manned and unmanned) are aware of limitations of both RF low observability and the means to detect LO aircraft? Existing radar can detect LO aircraft, the questions are: how reliably at what ranges, how accurately can they track the target, how do adverse atmospheric conditions and realistic operational scenarios in a hostile EW environment impact the ability of the radar to detect “stealth”.

I “personally” don’t think there is one panacea that will make the pursuit of LO aircraft irrelevant. Even if there is a steady degradation in the detection margin for LO aircraft, that margin will still be decisive near term in real combat conditions. Perhaps the days of the F-117 flying through the face of overlapping radar coverage and SAM sites based on route planning and LO alone are over (or never really existed), but LO aircraft aren’t a “silver bullet” anymore. They are integrated with the other assets, capable of utilizing the greater standoff ranges of weapons like GBU-53/B, SPEAR, and will always benefit from stand-off jamming assets to a greater degree than aircraft will a large signature not to mention the EW capabilities of the aircraft themselves. The significance of the PCA program possibly having a complementary PEA platform or component shouldn’t be lost in this conversation.

It’s a crap article from “National Interest”, hardly worth discussing other that his direct observation of the fight in the T-38’s, the rest is classic clickbait. Majumdar’s editorializing about the F-35’s kinematics aren’t worth discussing. The articles of National Interest have one purpose, generate revenue with sensational headlines such as:

The Simple Reason Why America’s F-22 Stealth ‘Raptor’ Would Crush Russia’s PAK-FA in a Fight

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/the-simple-reason-why-americas-f-22-stealth-raptor-would-19390

Here is an article from The Aviationist from another writer who flew as an observer in Atlantic Trident:
https://theaviationist.com/2017/05/05/we-flew-red-air-against-f-22-raptors-f-35-lightning-iis-rafales-and-typhoons-in-atlantic-trident-17-heres-how-it-went/

Direct observation, writing about the experience without the Majumdar “opinion” additions.

Is that extra bump on the petal specific to the B (and therefor maybe something to do with articulation rather than IR suppression)?

I can’t see it on the A or the C, but that was a just a quick look.

The nozzle of the B is different from that of A&C (it is shorter for one).

In any case, the patents that I posted a few years ago during a nozzle debate describe the cooling ejectors for the divergent flaps and seals (which is what you are seeing in the picture) . I will see if I can find the correct one again.

Here is the GE patent for their similar Axis symmetric nozzle:
https://www.google.com/patents/US6983602

Ironic, rare earths can be mined in Canada and Australia (or US), but those pesky environmental laws make it expensive (and toxic). People don’t want to pay 1,000 US for an IPhone.

Having a sole source supplier seems a bit risky considering the use of rare earths in military applications.