It's funny when people (I assume probably Brits or Germans) try to tout the Meteor missile as the best BVR missile and that it's far better than the AIM 120 (and somehow tied to meaning the 4th gen eurofighter can easily beat the f-22 and f-35 but usually in excercises where the 22 and 35 are not allowed to use any of what they are actually built for). well one (missile) was in service for a little more than a decade before the other even started development. Also the U.S. is about to put into service the AIM 260 to replace the 120. and from what little I can find it matches or outperforms the meteor.
Well for the time being Meteor does seem to be the best. Can't really comment with confidence because I am not eligible to know the details and the details are not public information. That said AIM 120 is still a really great missile and something the rest can't throw anything against. And when mounted on a full aspect stealth fighter - something everyone else is just dreaming of - it's even better. Now, I don't see anyone stopping the US from acquiring as many Meteors as they want but politically they will be building their own throttling missile just so they don't have to buy licenses. European tech and military consortiums are every bit on par with the US ones and indeed the two are often engaged in mutual defense contracts in various alliances. Most European countries have been culturally so emasculated that they have all but disbanded their militaries entirely so they cannot really support advanced military designs the way Americans can but the tech is on par with that of the Americans albeit with less experience in some of the more expensive fields. Meteor missile is a great example of this; Europeans could be having their own full aspect stealth plane by now but they don't. But they built the best missile in the world, for now. Some of them are now hoping to have it installed on the F-35, an American full aspect stealth multi-role fighter, because Europeans don't have anything like it - not even close. Meanwhile Sweden is trying to make a big show of their economy class budget fighter that "is the least expensive of them all and it has modern computers too and can mount missiles". Even their EW platform is just a Learjet that has a EW pod welded on the hull. But apparently low GDP low tech countries that are not offered modern American fighters have been excited of getting cheap fighters - which for them is a nice combination of Western quality but low cost which tend to be a nice upgrade to their MiG-21's and fits their budget.
I just mean how they act so superior about how great the Meteor is (I'm not saying it isn't great). I believe it can be mounted on the F-35. Internally I'm not sure about. I think they are also about to put into service the companion missile to the AIM 120. It was a joint program where the americans would develop the AIM 120 and a joint british/german group would develop the ASRAAM (Advanced Short Range Air to Air Missile)/AIM-132 (UK name/US name) to replace the AIM-9 sidewinder. wait it's been in service with england since 98? but why isn't anyone else using it. and the germans exited in 93. So Raytheon (they make the AIM-9 and AIM-120) is internally developing the Peregrine which will supposedly match the 120 in range and the sidewinder in maneuverability while being half the size of the 120 so theoretically they can put 2 Peregrine's in the space of 1 120. Lockheed Martin is also developing their own missile with the same idea as the Peregrine (half the size of missiles currently in service with great maneuverability and range) called the Cuda. May also have limited air to surface and anti-ship capabilities. The idea behind these is mostly doubling or tripling F-22 and F-35 payloads. So an F-22 could carry up to 16 missiles internally and the F-35 from an abysmal 4 (at the moment) to 8 internally. Neither is supposed to replace the AIM 120 or 9. So instead of 2 120s it could be 1 120 and 2 Cuda's/Peregrine's. And I think the Cuda/Peregrine are supposed to be cheaper than the 120 and 9. And Lockheed is also designing the AIM-260 I mentioned before that is supposed to replace the 120. https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/sacm.htm https://www.raytheonmissilesanddefe...r, effectively,current fighter jets can carry. While those missiles wouldn't really do anything for 4th gen fighters that carry ordnance externally it would do alot for internal ordnance.
Well you've got the company guys who are always making a big show out of something like how a machine gun fires 5 more rounds per minute than the other one as if that made any difference at all - or how in theory you can save 10% from logistics costs by having a round that penetrates 10% less. That this somehow again has some sort of real meaning or so. They're a dime in the dozen: "our country has a new howitzer, now we're unstoppable" or "the English longbow was the best, we could have conquered the world with it but we were modest back then".
Between the Cuda and Peregrine it sounds more like a "we don't want to worry about not having missiles because one guy can't make enough"
Certainly lets you toss more of them away to both deter the enemy from trying to swamp them with numbers and to keep the enemy busy. All of that said missiles are only ever useful when you can lock on to your enemy.
Oh. Now this comes out. Finland is probably going (silently) "fuck you South Korea". They apparently just unveiled a 4.5 gen version of a scaled down F-22 for export. Weapons will be exterior. So radar signature will probably be small than any 4th gen in existence but larger than any of the 5th gen fighters (if they even show up on radar, I'm still not certain if stealth means they don't show up at all or just so small that is could be a plastic bag. Because I see both explanations for stealth aircraft). https://www.popularmechanics.com/mi...-fighter-jet-kf-21-boramae-f-22-similarities/
Stealth the emitted beam and the surface areas that it touches the angles of those surface areas the materials of those surface areas the wavelength of that beam the relative angle of the emitted beam, surface angles brushed and the receiver That's the passive side. Some also include radar jamming signal masking decoys And that's all stealth. Now, there are these massive static ground based huge radars that can detect stealth aircraft - but their methods are not very precise and they can't pinpoint where exactly it is but they give you a (literal) ballpark idea of where they might be at, if they're detected. Then there are smaller static ground radars that are not as good. And mobile ground radars. Unsurprisingly the mobile ground radars suffer from both small size and available power limitations. And then there are the airborne radars that come in two primary shapes - the AWACS style dedicated large dish support aircraft and the rest. The rest don't have too powerful radars and the wavelengths are especially poor against the stealth materials. Also the aircraft radar is doppler radar so they primarily detect things that are moving in distance relative to you - they tend to filter out the rest as clutter so that you can't fly against the ground and use the ground to clutter your return. But this means that if you fly in a certain way then the fighter radar can't see you. And if it can get a return from you then it has to be strong enough for it to be able to detect you. Stealth tends to be optimized against these wavelengths so good luck. And that's under ideal conditions without any jamming. Jamming is literally aiming a beam at the enemy radar so it can't pick up the faint signals. Meanwhile you're probably also making false decoy signals that 'looks just like what you're looking for'. Get the enemy engaging those and exploit the weaknesses of his radar and sneak up on him and fire a couple of missiles that don't use active radar so he doesn't get the radar lock or missile warning. Furthermore the electronics in the Russian radars are not the best in the world and they have been carefully studied and found to have certain exploitable weaknesses. The very skill and expertise of modern pilots is in learning everything there is about the systems the opponent uses, the best plays against those systems and so on. -------- Finland just requested the final offers from the aircraft bidders. I will be surprised if it ain't F-35A. The price really isn't all that different from the others, all things considered. It can get the new AIM 260's or whatever, peregrines etc. - no problem. The enemy fighters won't see it but it can also carry missiles on all pylons and if it gets radar lock warning then it can just dump the external missiles if need be. Or you can have one or two with external ones act as bait as others move to the enemy's side. If you can then simultaneously fire missiles from two directions perpendicular to each other it will be insanely difficult to try to evade both directions. Meanwhile those firing can just evade any missiles that were thrown back - if the enemy managed to, that is. Also always flown over friendly territory and so, not nearly as much threat from stuff like IR manpads etc. unlike the enemy which can be lured into range of friendly SAM and other systems which we have a plenty of the latest types. Oh yea. I'd bet money on F-35A.
Not just probably but indeed. It also depends slightly on relative angles and whatnot. If you're lower than the enemy and head on the missile silhouette has a small cross section or can even be fully obscured. In worst conditions it could throw a higher return than a 4th gen aircraft in it's optimal situation. As in if you're 'on your side' with 90 degree roll, the enemy is beaming at you from your belly side and you've got a full load of missiles on external pylons vs. a 4th gen perfectly aligned frontal aspect. But to me a battlefield of enemies with varying visibility ratings is an awful place to go to - as your attention is drawn to what you can see you are even less likely to be wary of the ones you don't see.
My dad also spent time staring at ground radar screens during his pilot training. Once on his turn he saw something 'impossible'. A contact climbing well over 20km altitude and going close to 2.5 Mach. This was I think late 60's or early 70's and it was one of the first foreign sightings of the Su-25 high altitude high speed interceptor. At the time our FAF had MiG-21F's and Folland Gnats with Saab Drakens entering service promptly in "72. Nowadays the enemies that are sitting by their radars facing stealth attacks? If you actually see anything it's probably not what you think. In Iraq the Iraq SAM batteries were lured to turn on their radars with glider drones that they mistook for fighters and tried to shoot down. As they turned on their radars the radars were engaged with anti-radiation missiles, rendering the effort at hiding those radars void. With the loss of their guidance radars these systems are neutralized no matter how many launchers or missiles they have available. In some cases if I remember correctly a single control radar could be responsible for a whole battery but take that with a grain of salt.
Final bids for Finland are in now, now we wait for the FAF staff to pick the best one. The process will take until the end of the year and each candidate fighter will be put to war games where it will fight as a single plane and as a part of 4 plane flight. The simulated war game lasts 2 weeks per candidate and will be fought in our environment against our threat types using our methods. For instance they will have a mission to complete and the completion of the mission and survivability will be evaluated. This will ensure that any issues with a fighter being built and suited for some other operational environment will be revealed and the one that best matches our FAF's needs will be chosen.
Saab went first public with the contents of their offer - 64 Gripen E-models and 2 GlobalEye AWACS planes. Boeing was close behind announcing 50 F-18E Super Hornets and 14 EA-18G Growlers. Saab's offer includes large scale industrial cooperation with expressed intent of producing Finland the capability to independently supply and reinforce the fighter wing domestically. Which honestly isn't that much of a deal maker considering war time scenario where Russia can just level all industrial facilities on day 1 with massive saturated cruise missile attack, nevermind swamping us with thousands of ground attack planes. Nevermind - just how many could we actually produce per week? And if it became an issue of not getting imports in then similarly hard to source fighter components would likely be just as easily intercepted as fighters themselves. Boeing boasts that the transition from F-18 C/D to F-18E/F and the EA-18G's would require the least retraining. But regardless of what they want to add as topping, the cake is in just how well the planes fare in the 2 weeks of simulated warfare. Where the performance values announced by manufacturers have already been verified and tested in field in Finland.
Lockheed came forth saying that Finland would get the responsibility of manufacturing one of the F-35 components for the whole F-35 fleet for the next 20 years. That's a lot of components or at least sounds like it. They also clarify that they're going ahead with the AIM 120 for it now and also offer the Norwegian stealth cruise missile in the package that can fly with passive sensors only, very low altitude and is hard to detect or intercept. Range of 180km, F-35A can carry 2 internally and more externally. No figure on the amount of aircraft.
that's a lot of money. wonder if they (Finland) would be taking over for whatever Turkey is making/supposed to be making? My guess is it would Since Turkey is pretty kicked out. that has to really sweeten the pot. Sure Finland is buying the F-35 but it would also give them who knows how much 100s of millions back (if not more). I'm not certain but I don't think any other country makes the parts that Turkey makes. I think economically the F-35 is great (in some ways) because it was divvied up parts wise. 1 country makes these parts another makes these but I don't any 2 make the same parts, so it's also really stupid from a logistics point because 1 country gets taken over (or even just has problems with manufacturing or something) it could screw over the whole worldwide fleet. I'm not absolutely certain on that but I think that is what they did.
https://corporalfrisk.com/2021/05/02/stop-bafo-time/ Here's an overview on the Finnish HX project. ------ As to the "one country gets taken over" - they have all the designs and the reasons for one place producing something are more about licenses and legalities, contracts and such than sheer capability. There are dozens of companies across West that could each just pick up most of the parts but obviously not all. For the most complex parts I have no idea. Also it's kind of unlikely that a NATO country would be taken over given that this always carries the risk of escalation towards a full blown nuclear war. And that's assuming NATO would just sit by and observe as a country falls with it's assets not moving strategically to thwart an invasion. And that's exactly where the escalation to nuclears starts very rapidly.
Yeah no, I didn't stare at the screen. I tore it apart, put it back together again and made sure the damn thing worked right. I have more than a passing understanding of how it functions. Like, to the component level. I worked on both a standard ATC radar and a NEXRAD. The fundamentals are not significantly different. I mean, Iraq wasn't really fighting within it's own weight class, let's be realistic. Even had they been fighters, and they'd gotten a shot or two off, they still would've lost those batteries and barely bloodied our nose, so to speak.
