JediMaster

They don't come much worse than 2013. I bid a totally NOT fond farewell to unlucky 13.

As the AMRAAM hasn't been used in combat in 10 years to say definitively one way or another it is or isn't as good is disingenuous at best. Training and exercises with simulated firings are good for crew responses and procedures, but they don't indicate ECM or ECCM effectiveness of/on missile seekers. In other words, I'm not going to worry about my AMRAAM not working great until I fire it and it DOESN'T get a kill. Until that time, I'll assume it's PK is still at AIM-9 levels.

Because it doesn't matter what religion you are, what ethnicity you are, what you believe...people will always find ways to divide themselves into "us" and "them" to address the problem of "I want what they have."

Many small dogs are similarly on edge, and would be considered dangerous if they were actually large enough to cause harm. What they need to breed are teacup pitbulls...problem solved.

Thank you!!!! Hey, Rocky...

Of course, cash is easily stolen, lost or burned in the fires of time.

F-20 never was better than an F-16A, it had a tiny radar and limited weapons ability. Now if the argument is F-16 vs Gripen, it all boils down to "which models?" The NG isn't yet around, so it's hard to definitively state how good it is. The latest F-16 blk 60 (I don't want to call them E/F because to me those will always be the delta-winged prototypes) is a known quantity, but it's still an older airframe. The Gripen has a "modern" airframe in that it's over 10 years newer, but it's still an 80s design. As for the Mirage deal, countries aren't buying as many planes anymore, so aftermarket support is a business the OEMs have expanded into. No more "we just build them, let the other guy maintain them", they want to be making money for the life of the plane. Foolish of Dassault, though, to overload the deal like that so they just give up on the F1 altogether. They could've gotten something from the Spanish F1s but they wanted more than was available to give.

Hey, Jetfighter II! Also MS' old TF1942.

It's used as an excuse. Of course, in China's case they're far better now than they were 30 years ago, but we didn't start recoiling until 1989. Since then we trade more with them than ever, but have this bogeyman created at the same time. What's ridiculous is the idea that if we don't export or work with someone they'll never get whatever it is. Like no one else has it, or no one else can get it. So we don't work with them, they're delayed a few years, and then whoever DOES work with them gets the money. Meanwhile, if we had let them work with us we would know exactly what they had, how to defeat it, and would've made the money on top of it. So short-sighted.

That's why I said "practical" and not "ideal". As for your final sentence, that is exactly what is happening. When you have parties run by idiots who believe it's ok for the country to collapse as long as it gets them voted in (because once they're in total control it'll be easy to fix it all), the non-ruling citizens (ie 99.999% of the population) are screwed.

Ve are going to need to make detailed observations!

I have the P-51D but have maybe 10 mins with it, so other than a takeoff I've done little else. A friend who backed the WWII KS got it free but already had it, so he gave me the key.

I can't imagine there being an embargo issue. Pretty much the only reason that happens anymore is "human rights issues" and Brazil is not likely to have that. I don't think there will be many if any substitutions. The engine especially is hardly easy to replace. As for local assembly, no idea.

The brainless celebs are entertaining to watch flail about stupidly. There's nothing entertaining about this story. Ever since news became entertainment the need to report NEWS has fallen by the wayside.

But doesn't it warm your heart to know the stock market is back up there and the people in charge can now afford to...do something or other? I've not seen it yet. I'm assured by the news, however, that it's really happening. Perhaps I'm not working hard enough. Went from upper middle class to making so little we won't owe any income taxes next year. Fortunately we bought our house back in 2000 and hadn't pushed it, my car is 10 years old for example, so we've not had to worry about losing the house or anything. Still, this REALLY sucks. She has stuff lined up, too, but so far every time she interviews it falls through. Maybe one of these will work out...

So is this an even mix of new build and rebuilds, or is it mostly or even all rebuilds? The US helicopter industry for awhile was going the mostly rebuild route until the contractors managed to finagle it so that a new unit cost less than 10% more than a rebuild. Programs like the AH-64, UH-1Y, CH-47, and others have seen more new units than originally planned because the tiny discount for rebuilds combined with taking working units out of service for 2 yrs made it far less attractive.

France doesn't deny a country equipment because of politics almost ever. However, that doesn't mean they don't look to make money. Other than the Exocet suspension, every other point Boresight made boiled down to "they wanted to get more money". Even the tech transfer, you don't want to give it to someone else if you think you can use it to make more money off them later. The simple truth is France is the smallest country in the world making its own military equipment for the majority of its requirements. Others make boats or planes or whatever, but buy the rest. The UK, Spain, Germany, Italy...they all went in together years ago on stuff and stopped going it alone. France is the last one where multinational projects are a clear minority of their programs. Yet they can't afford to pay what it costs to do that, they're just not big enough. That means exports, France's industry NEEDS exports, but it seems like they seem to forget that they need to compete on pricing with other offerings. The Rafale is not so clearly superior to everything else out there that they can get away with charging more, but don't tell Dassault that! They're just not as flexible as they need to be, for whatever reason, and that's costing them sales. The era when they could get away with it because no one else would sell to them has ended, all countries now see the need to export to fund their work. Only China is going it alone, but they do sell a few here and there and their costs are low compared to Western nations.

The practical definition of a compromise is an agreement where no one is happy. As long as it's too much for one side but not enough for the other you know you've found a decent middle ground. Probably not ideal, but better than one extreme side or the other getting their way. Also, any commander will tell you it's always better to make a decision, even if it's bad, then to make no decision and waffle. Because if you make a mistake you can then work to correct it, but if you haven't DONE anything then nothing is getting done!

Been there, done that. Now that my wife's unemployment has run out, my job alone will no longer carry the bills.

In retrospect, I'm sure ED wishes they'd never announced Nevada for A-10C and left it until EDGE was done. Of course, I'm also wondering if it wasn't possible for them to have done it pre-EDGE instead. I accept that the one in the beta needed fixing, but I don't think anyone including them expected it to take this many years for EDGE integration. I think tying Nevada to EDGE was a marketing mistake, even if the final result will be better than a pre-EDGE version would've been.

The Indian deal is taking forever. Hard to know what's going on there until either the planes are delivered or they say they picked another one again.

I always thought the F-35 looks like a smaller single F-22. It looks a LOT better than the losing X-32! We could've been stuck with THAT. It looked like it had lockjaw and need a serious diet.

If we say it 3 times looking in a mirror, will it appear behind us? "Exp 3...Exp 3..."

It sounds like the idea is some sort of modern-day "deputizing" of TSA agents. Not a good idea historically to give LEO powers to those not trained as LEOs.

I guess Dassault never looked at the Mirage F1 or Super Etendard then. Not nice looking at all.