Fighter jets for the Air Corps?

The $3billion as I understand it is the entire life cycle cost for planes, weapons, training and support.

New build Rafale are in the $120 million ballpark but let's say $1.5bln for the airframes and $1.65bln for training, equipment, weapons and support.

I agree it's the same price as F35 but? The US won't sell F35s into South America for a long time yet.

I guess not. But at the same time, I'm surprised the US let the sale go to Europe.

Lets face it, for Colombia's needs, the F-16 Block 70/72 would have been more than adequate, unless they're planning to go to war with Brazil or something.

Could also be time related? Some of the Eastern European orders have been delayed for the F16 already, maybe that factored into things? Also I wonder perhaps would the US be less willing to give the financial package that France might offer, or alternatively might South America politics make such a deal less attractive? Meanwhile of course Argentina continues to get nowhere with any purchase from anyone.

I suspect any EU/NATO sales to Serbia will be cancelled within the week.

Another bunch of bargain-basement slavic fascists giving it the Billy-big-balls, that need their toes stamping on.

No, because its got feet of clay. Russia and their acolytes are in a situation of great desperation.

Germany militarising is only a positive for those of us that live under the umbrella of the western alliance, as themselves and Poland are the bulwark of NATO in the east.

There is a lot of old guff being talked by Lavrov and Medvedev and Vučić and Lukashenko, but really they are all fart and no poo.

Maybe not but to offset low wages they need to offer good benfits.

There are various versions of the home loans being run by councils.

One such version is if you cant get a mortage from a bank the government via the councils will organise a mortage for you @ around 2% fixed for 25 years

Poland gives DF personal interest free loans/mortgages. Well according to the Polish men I worked with.

You will note, I never said it was a success. It was a good idea but very badly handled. I believe that part of the quid pro quo, of having a public sector job, where it is practically impossible to be sacked or made redundant, is that the government can redeploy you to wherever is required,, within reason. I have many friends in the RAF and it part of their basic terms and conditions. For example, many personnel opted to stay on the E3 awacs, even tho it had regular foreign deployments as they were settled with family etc at Waddington. They assumed the E7 Wedge tails would also be based there. Now the E7s are going to Lossie. Much cheaper housing etc, but 500 miles north. They were given a choice, move or give up your job. That's how most militaries around the world operate

Its in two other threads on this forum.

Apropos of nothing other than many folk here and in the broader defence and aviation communities being fairly certain that if/when Ireland makes the transition to fast jets that the Gripen should be where we lay our money down.

This is a very interesting article and makes clear the abilities of the Gripen versus peer adversaries. Highly capable airframe with capabilities that are tailored to austere operation and the data-link seems to really be a game changer.

Imagine those capabilities in the hands of Ukrainian Air force!?! The Gripen was originally built to be a Sukhoi Slayer.

I'd be curious to know which of the latest crop of Chinese fighters? I'd fancy the Gripen E and Meteor combo against any of the Chinese Gen 4.5 fighters, the Sukhoi based J11, J15 & J16 and the J10 too.

With regards the Chinese Gen 5 stuff? The J20 hasn't partaken in exercises with anyone aside from Russia and the FC31 is being developed into their Gen 5 carrier borne fighter. So I don't think that the Gripen E has been pitted against China's Gen 5 gear outside of Simulations.

Would love to see the Boyd's theory breakdown for the gen 4.5 & 5 kit and lay that against RCS, Pk and general support requirements for the new gear.

Is anyone really surprised, that like Russian gear, Chinese military equipment is in fact all fart and no poo?

Canada are buying 88 F-35s and are doing away with the CF/18s, I thought recently upgraded these with the FA18s Australian got rid off. Or at least they were suppose too. Looking at the CFs ugrades it cost 862million to upgrade them as part of the The Phase 2 extension is designed to help bridge the capability gap until new jets come online. That’s serious cash to just tie them over. Would the CFs be going to scrap or resale?

Yeah they’ve been thrown about alright, I would imagine they would go to a scrap yard, its nuts that’s literally only nearly a billion on upgrades

Absolutely true. From being a tier 1 F35 partner with an agreed workshare, to ditching the F35 to reopen the tender. A tender that Dassault feel was dodgy and lop sided, to deciding to buy the fighter they'd plumped for 1st time around anyway.

Canadian procurement decisions have always been a bit mad IMO. The Avro CF105 is a case in point. Especially when you consider that after ditching that, they went with the F101 voodoo, a plane that those in the know rated as even more dangerous to the pilot than a Starfighter.