Pakistan and India linked with Eurofighter….

[waz]

Austria prepares to dump Eurofighter order

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.guardian.co.uk/austria/ar...888906,00.html

· New government to examine 'senseless' deal
· British firm insists it is delivering on contract

Ian Traynor and Mark Milner
Friday October 6, 2006
The Guardian

Europe's ill-starred fighter aircraft project was facing a further major blow yesterday when Austria's newly elected centre-left government threatened to scrap the purchase of 18 planes. The social democrats made cancelling the €2bn (£1.4bn) Eurofighter order a centrepiece of their campaign and signalled yesterday they would table a motion as soon as the new parliament convenes to bin the contracts.

The move would be a further blow to hopes of generating a string of orders from outside the four-nation consortium behind the aircraft - Britain, Germany, Spain and Italy. Saudi Arabia has said it wants to buy 72 aircraft but efforts to sell it to South Korea and Singapore have not been successful. Another customer, Greece, is reviewing its order for 60 aircraft on budgetary grounds.


So far 100 aircraft have been delivered to the consortium's armed forces, including 35 to the RAF. Export orders are seen as important because of their contribution to the overall profitability of the programme. Other countries tipped as possible buyers include India, Pakistan, Turkey, Norway and Denmark.

Austrian participation was pushed by the outgoing Schüssel government and has been controversial in Austria, a small country that is militarily neutral. The new Social Democrat chancellor, Alfred Gusenbauer, made cancellation of the contracts, worth €2bn but expected to cost €6bn over the next 20 years, a main campaign pledge. Austria's final decision could come quite quickly with the new parliament in Vienna meeting for the first time at the end of the month.

"A committee of inquiry should clarify the political responsibility for the senseless procurement of this unbelievably expensive war machine," Josef Cap, the Social Democrats' floor leader, told Vienna's Standard newspaper.

The first four are due to be delivered next year and are in the final stages of assembly near Munich. A further 12 are to be supplied in 2008 and the final two the following year. Mr Gusenbauer said he needed to see the contracts and to assess the likelihood of penalty payments if Austria backs out. "I want to see the contracts and they need to be examined by our best lawyers," he said this week.

"We don't need the Eurofighter. It is not an ideological, but a financial issue. I've got nothing against these planes as such. But they cost an awful lot of money. I always believed that there were much better things to be done with that money."

Eurofighter is built by three companies, BAE Systems in Britain, EADS in Germany and Spain and Alenia in Italy under a work sharing arrangement which reflects the number of aircraft being bought by the partner countries. Though final assembly of the aircraft ordered by Austria is being carried out in Germany, BAE Systems supplies a substantial amount of work on all Eurofighters and conducts final assembly for those bought by Britain as well as for export orders where it has the lead role.

Yesterday a BAE Systems spokesman said the companies building the Eurofighter were "under contract with Austria. We are delivering against that contract. The first aircraft are in production."

Work on the aircraft in Britain is centred on plants at Warton and Samlesbury in Lancashire. The four countries behind the aircraft, have said they will buy 620, though some defence analysts doubt whether the full total will be achieved.

 

[waz]

To be honest I predicted this would happen to Eurofighter as European states as rich as they are would be reluctant to part with vast sums of money to bring in a fighter that they have no real need for. War is unlikely for them and they are now looking to the true fifth generation aircraft to bring into their inventories.

Pakistan’s name has now been linked three times to this fighter and we know India is looking as well. Our air chief marshal has given his plan as to what is happening with the PAF. When asked about if he had the choice and resources what fighter would he like to induct he mentioned the Eurofighter first. Pakistan is looking to purchase FC-20 aircraft from China which I believe will be an advanced 4.5 generation plane but they could give that miss and take the Eurofighter up and wait till the Chinese develop something on the lines of Fifth generation aircraft. Again this is speculation by myself and we will have to wait to see what happens.

 

[Quwa]

I doubt PAF will procure EF-2000; unless we're talking like a squadron (18 aircraft), as well as Saudi funding and/or a large Turkish order. These aircraft were about 130mn USD per plane for Austria; if the PAF was so serious about a heavy fighter, I bet it would've confronted the U.S for the Super Hornet or Eagle-E.

 

[Kaiser]

True

Why go for the eurofighter when China is almost done with developing something in the same class at a much cheaper price.

Pakistan has once again revaluated the eurofighter over the summer but didnt meet the requirments of a multi-role, maintanable, durable, upgradable, and universal platform that the PAF was looking into. The only fighter that so far seemed to meet PAF's requirments are the

-Gripen
-F-16
-Mirage-2000
-F/A-18
-J-10

All of these fighter have met PAF's requirments but, the mirage-2000 was eliminated because it was to expensive and the F-16 could provide a better system to work on. The F/A-18 E/F was eliminated since it was out of question and had strings attached (pakistan would have probraly gone for the F-18 over any other fighter in the USAF including the F-16). The only options that where left were the F-16, gripen, and J-10

At that point the PAF chose the F-16 since it would be easy to integrate into the mainstream PAF fleet. Then when IAF said it would go for 126 multi-role fighters the PAF starting looking into another fighter to go for and that when the Gripen and J-10 competition started

The gripen provided many advantages over the J-10 such as its better platform for weapons, reliability, and data-link (via eireye) then pakistan started evaluating the J-10's capability and started planning the long term in which it only had one choice.... J-10

Know PAF has made its order for F-16s, JF-17, and J-10's the data-link prob with eireye has also been solved since eriscom also offered its advanced datalink system to be produced by kamra which will be used to equip ever single one of PAF's fighter fleet

 

[Iceman2]

I think we must go for EF-2000 as we are trying to buy submarines and coverettes from Germany we should also push for EF-2000 and bring its cost down.

 

[waz]

I doubt PAF will procure EF-2000; unless we're talking like a squadron (18 aircraft), as well as Saudi funding and/or a large Turkish order. These aircraft were about 130mn USD per plane for Austria; if the PAF was so serious about a heavy fighter, I bet it would've confronted the U.S for the Super Hornet or Eagle-E.

I can understand your doubts bro but as the days go by we saw more and more in the way of this aircraft being linked with the PAF. We know about the trials, we know about the evaluations and we certainly know the desire to induct this aircraft if the resources are made available. I am more inclined to your squadron idea and this is not something new to the PAF especially with our given history [see star fighter era]. As for the strike eagle I have never seen anything in the way of evidence that shows that we wanted such a craft and at best would only match the MKI…If we were going to go for something we would go for the best and something that can act as a force multiplier many times over. As with regards to Saudi funding we know they have ordered a great deal of aircraft which involves many being assembled in Saudi itself. If the Turks jump aboard which is more than likely considering US reluctance to share technology from the JSF then I am pretty sure the PAF will seriously consider procuring the Typhoon.

 

[waz]

True

Why go for the eurofighter when China is almost done with developing something in the same class at a much cheaper price.

Pakistan has once again revaluated the eurofighter over the summer but didnt meet the requirments of a multi-role, maintanable, durable, upgradable, and universal platform that the PAF was looking into. The only fighter that so far seemed to meet PAF's requirments are the

-Gripen
-F-16
-Mirage-2000
-F/A-18
-J-10

All of these fighter have met PAF's requirments but, the mirage-2000 was eliminated because it was to expensive and the F-16 could provide a better system to work on. The F/A-18 E/F was eliminated since it was out of question and had strings attached (pakistan would have probraly gone for the F-18 over any other fighter in the USAF including the F-16). The only options that where left were the F-16, gripen, and J-10

At that point the PAF chose the F-16 since it would be easy to integrate into the mainstream PAF fleet. Then when IAF said it would go for 126 multi-role fighters the PAF starting looking into another fighter to go for and that when the Gripen and J-10 competition started

The gripen provided many advantages over the J-10 such as its better platform for weapons, reliability, and data-link (via eireye) then pakistan started evaluating the J-10's capability and started planning the long term in which it only had one choice.... J-10

Know PAF has made its order for F-16s, JF-17, and J-10's the data-link prob with eireye has also been solved since eriscom also offered its advanced datalink system to be produced by kamra which will be used to equip ever single one of PAF's fighter fleet

Bro saying China will bring out something as advanced as the Typhoon is inaccurate and most aviation experts agree with that. It will take in my estimates 5-6 years before we see anything like an aircraft that posses the abilities and advanced avionics of the Typhoon [supercruise,Captor radar, small radar signature and it's advanced armaments]. Also the technology is now maturing and there has been little in the way of mishaps and the Chinese even if they were to bring something out on this level they would spend a considerable amount of time with trials, overcoming obstacles etc to make sure the craft is capable.

As for it not meeting requirements bro it met every requirement with ease and let's not forget this is the best combat jet out there save the Raptor. The reason why it was not picked was clearly stated by the Air marshal which had little to do with meeting operational abilities.

AnsWe want to acquire all these things within our resources, and these things in the European market are quite expensive.

But the Eurofighter is still a hot favourite with the air marshal and something he mentioned ahead of the aircraft you put up.

Ans. The western world has a huge variety of high tech aircraft in which I personally like Typhoon, Grippen, Rafale and FA-18/E.

Time will only tell and like I said if the resources are there would see the PAF getting hold of this machine especially since it will bring a whole new world of tech and capabilities to us that we previously have not seen. It’s prowess could mean it being used as air superiority fighter especially when backed by the block 52.s and J-10’s, thus negating the threat of the MKI’s and the multi role aircraft that India will be obtaining .

 

[Nasir]

I always knew that

F-7/Mirage will be replaced by JF-17
A-5 replacement with J-10 (Cheap chinese favorite)
F-16 replacement with another advanced western fighter.

Guys it is really unlikely that we will go for another advance western fighter in the future, something like that can only happen after 2020. We dont have enough money to go for a fighter like Typhoon considering that we have to upgrade our facilities, air defence systems, F-16 aircrafts, F-7 aircrafts, and Mirages, maintenance, and let alone that we are considering to buy J-10 aircraft by China.

Rafale and Typhoon are probably the main contendors in the future, but i am sure not now, and we will not be offered anyway, due to western pressure that the technology in these aircrafts can end up to China.

 

[Kaiser]

By 2020 china would have already matured on the J-XX and it would possibly be in PAF's services!

 

[Adnan88]

salam... im new to this forum... my name is adnan patel
now regarding this eurofighter deal, i dont think its a good idea ....

i mean just think about the cost for one reason... i mean i agree this jet is a beauty and it match greatly against the su-30... but u have to be able to look at the cons... if pakistan goes with this, which btw i highly doubt they will, they will have to scrap the deal with china for j-10... now im not a big supporter of china(matter of fact i hate the chinese), but i truly believe that at one point china will pass on the lisence to pakistan to build j-10s at home... i mean if we're really looking forward to spending that much money, lets spend it on the earthquake victims... and isnt j-10 a fourth generation fighter anyways? paf has gotta tke the advantage of 36 of them... and insh'Allah in the future, more j-10s will come their way...

and btw, have u guys heard of the shafaq??? the iranian fighter that will be starting to be produced in 2008... what are ur opinions on that???

 

[Iceman2]

shafaq might be a good aircraft for iran but our jf-17 surpasses it and it is superior.

I think we must push the germans for this EF-2000 deal as they are strong contenders in modernizing our navy as well. i think we should buy u-212/214(subs) and some coverettes from german and also go for ef-2000 deal ask saudis to help us.

or could buy marlins(sub) and go for raefal to reduce it's cost.


what do you guys think?

 

[Quwa]

Procuring Eurofighters would be expensive - but maintaining them would be even more expensive; unless the Saudis decide to fund the PAF's EF operations - PAF will not procure the EF in its AFFDP-2019 plan.

Within AFFDP-2019 I can imagine the addition of the following;

1) An additional J-10 squadron (18 planes)
2) An additional F-16C/D Block 52+ squadron (18 planes)
3) An additional F-16A/B MLU3 squadron (15 planes)
4) 3+ Y-8 AEW&C aircraft.
5) A squadron of advanced lead in jet trainers (L-15?)

I base the F-16 assumption on a JDW article stating that the PAF will order a second phase of F-16s consisting of 33 aircraft.

 

[Adnan88]

shafaq might be a good aircraft for iran but our jf-17 surpasses it and it is superior.

I think we must push the germans for this EF-2000 deal as they are strong contenders in modernizing our navy as well. i think we should buy u-212/214(subs) and some coverettes from german and also go for ef-2000 deal ask saudis to help us.

or could buy marlins(sub) and go for raefal to reduce it's cost.


what do you guys think?

---------------------------------------------------------

just a reminder that pakistan is not like the saudi or uae... what u are suggesting is out of our league... we need to co-operate with such nations like china to get our hands on some latest tech.... insh'Allah pakistan will become self dependent one day so we dont have to worry about all this...

 

[waz]

salam... im new to this forum... my name is adnan patel
now regarding this eurofighter deal, i dont think its a good idea ....

i mean just think about the cost for one reason... i mean i agree this jet is a beauty and it match greatly against the su-30... but u have to be able to look at the cons... if pakistan goes with this, which btw i highly doubt they will, they will have to scrap the deal with china for j-10... now im not a big supporter of china(matter of fact i hate the chinese), but i truly believe that at one point china will pass on the lisence to pakistan to build j-10s at home... i mean if we're really looking forward to spending that much money, lets spend it on the earthquake victims... and isnt j-10 a fourth generation fighter anyways? paf has gotta tke the advantage of 36 of them... and insh'Allah in the future, more j-10s will come their way...

and btw, have u guys heard of the shafaq??? the iranian fighter that will be starting to be produced in 2008... what are ur opinions on that???

There is no deal it’s just that the fighter is being touted to the PAF…As for matching the MKI it will eat it alive. The Eurofighter was made to operate in air space that is saturated with high end soviet aircraft such as the SU-30 series and make large amounts of kills in the process. This is why it was and still is the most ideal craft to deal with the MKI threat posed by the IAF.

If Pakistan went for the Typhoon it need not get rid of the J-10 but look to this craft to replace the FC-20 option as many are thinking this is the twin engine advanced variant. What I would propose is to go with the Typhoon and then work flat out with the Chinese in their JXX projects so we have viable 5th generation fighter coming about. I’m surprised at your dislike [which is a first] for the Chinese seeing as how much they have done for us.

As for the Iranian fighter I am sure it is good for the small roles it will fulfil but offers little if anything in the modern combat aviation age.

 

[waz]

Procuring Eurofighters would be expensive - but maintaining them would be even more expensive; unless the Saudis decide to fund the PAF's EF operations - PAF will not procure the EF in its AFFDP-2019 plan.

True bro but seeing as the Saudis are on board and if the Turks come in both of which are our most trusted allies besides China the stakes would favour the PAF immensely. We know our air chief has a fondness for this aircraft so things could happen. As for expense to maintain a squadron would not be much of a drain compared to procuring higher numbers. They will be smaller in number but could outperform any number of our other aircraft.