Thunder at 100 feet: Flying France's Rafale Superfighter

[sancho]

Back to topic please!

 

[Secur]

I still fail to understand why France had such a hard time in making the first sale of Rafale to a foreign country

 

[sancho]

I still fail to understand why France had such a hard time in making the first sale of Rafale to a foreign country

Because the such competitions are decided by more than just technical points:

...Chief executive Charles Edelstenne used fighting talk when referring to Team Rafale's victory in India's medium multi-role combat aircraft contest (where it beat the Eurofighter Typhoon), but noted that it must still close out negotiations on the 126-aircraft deal.

"The Indian choice, on technical, operational and financial criteria, confirms the Rafale superiority as soon as the influence of the United States is not the criteria," he says in a statement. Great stuff; especially as it reminds me of Dassault's response on losing a South Korean competition to the Boeing F-15 a few years ago, when it cited a Chinese proverb which states that "bamboo always leans the way it's pushed the hardest."

Four blimey: Rafale half-year deliveries - The DEW Line


Another point is of course the high cost of Rafale or EF compared to US, Russian, or Swedish fighters. Indias requirement was based on technical advantages of the fighter and industrial advantages of the manufacturers.

 

[Abingdonboy]

I still fail to understand why France had such a hard time in making the first sale of Rafale to a foreign country

Well sir, there are a number of reasons, so for you I will try and compact my answer-

Firstly the Rafale is an incredibly advanced 4.5++ gen fighter but this comes at a cost- a big one! At ~$100 mill a piece right off the bat there are only a few nations in the world who could ever even dream of owning such a platform. So it is clear there is a select group of nations able to procure such a system so export market is relatively narrow, of these nations many of them have political considerations to make when selecting a fighter. The US for instance would never procure a foreign built fighter jet similarly neither would Russia- two huge markets down. Then there is China, with China's extremely poor adherence to IP rights and long history of copyright breech no weapons manufacturer in their right mind is going to sell their premier product to them. Then political considerations play wrt foreign influence- Japan,Korea and to some extent Brazil all came under extreme US pressure to go for the US offerings in their respective fighter procurements so, again, yet more large markets were closed out to the Rafale. The only remaining markets remain India and, to an extent, the ME (UAE). The UAE's procurement seems very ad-hoc and lacking any real narrative driving the procurement forward. It seems a number of other factors outside of purely technical ability has gotten mixed up with the UAE bid.


So it can be argued that with the IAF's strict adherence to impartiality and up most professionalism combined with the GoI's commitment to non-alignment that the Indian MMRCA bid was truly the most definitive answer to the best MMRCA in the world as the selection was based purely on merit and not bias or anything else. The fact the Rafale won the MMRCA is a huge validation of the Rafale and its abilities.


As such I hope you will appreciate that the lack of exports for the Rafale up to now has not been in any way a reflection on the fighter's capabilities- this could not be further from the truth. In fact, a part from a solitary sale to the Saudis that has already been marred with controversy with strong allegations of corruption and bribery the EFT program has not been all that successful in exporting the fighter beyond that of the partnering nations who were obliged to under a contractual agreement to purchase a certain quantity of the Typhoon and these numbers are now being revised down. The EFT program naturally enjoys considerably more marketing power given the weight of the 6 partnering nations involved in the project and yet this has not been enough to secure much beyond Europe and existing orders, hardly a ringing endorsement of this fighter's abilities. Of course, the EFT suffers from the same issues as the Rafale when it comes to looking to export namely US pressure on potential markets and ingrained loyalties.


I hope this helps!

 

[KRAIT]

Is it in Indian nature to troll ? and be psychologically obsessed with Pakistan ?

Agree with you but Pakistan did think our inducting Rafale at some time. But the financial constraints didn't make it possible. Then you got offer of 36 J-10B from China on soft loan which hasn't materialized yet.

Again Pakistan shouldn't be brought into this, even if Rafale will be used against them.

 

[karan.1970]

I still fail to understand why France had such a hard time in making the first sale of Rafale to a foreign country

Because its an expensive plane.. And most countries who can afford a 2 engine MMRCA are already locked in with their choice. So the target segment is only countries that are now going in for a state of the art MMRCA. Hence..

 

[Abingdonboy]

Is it in Indian nature to troll ? and be psychologically obsessed with Pakistan ?

Sir please keep this thread clean and respectful, I have tried to answer you query to the best of my ability in post #24, let us end it there.

 

[karan.1970]

Is it in Indian nature to troll ? and be psychologically obsessed with Pakistan ?

Think a little.. Your sampling strategy for generalizing Indians is flawed.. It suffers from something called self selection bias. I mean, you will only find those Indians on a Pakistani forum who consider Pakistan an area of interest. So its quite obvious they would talk about Pakistan on that forum. Else there is really no need to visit defence.pk

 

[danger007]

nice article spark.... thank you ...

 

[Secur]

Think a little.. Your sampling strategy for generalizing Indians is flawed.. It suffers from something called self selection bias. I mean, you will only find those Indians on a Pakistani forum who consider Pakistan an area of interest. So its quite obvious they would talk about Pakistan on that forum. Else there is really no need to visit defence.pk

I know my generalization wasn't really a nice thing but it reflected what I see here most of the time ... Indian members ( not calling others innocent ) derailing threads left to right , dragging Pakistan where it isn't even the topic ... I mean zero positive contribution , only an urge to troll ... Of course , not all are like that ... Yes they should talk about Pakistan but on appropriate threads ... The question " Why it took Rafale that long to make first foreign sale ? " shouldn't have been answered by " Pakistan cant afford it , thats why "

 

[karan.1970]

I know my generalization wasn't really a nice thing but it reflected the majority of what I see here ... Indian members ( not calling others innocent ) derailing thread left to right ... I mean zero positive contribution , only an urge to troll ... Of course , not all are like that ... Yes they should talk about Pakistan but on appropriate threads ... The answer to the question " Why it took Rafale that long to make first foreign sale " shouldn't have been answered by " Pakistan cant afford it , thats why "

Yeah.. that you have to blame on the ever present Indo-Pak animosity..

 

[Secur]

Well sir, there are a number of reasons, so for you I will try and compact my answer-

Firstly the Rafale is an incredibly advanced 4.5++ gen fighter but this comes at a cost- a big one! At ~$100 mill a piece right off the bat there are only a few nations in the world who could ever even dream of owning such a platform. So it is clear there is a select group of nations able to procure such a system so export market is relatively narrow, of these nations many of them have political considerations to make when selecting a fighter.

I know what Rafale's capabilities are , the question is that countries could still go for a few squadrons or small numbers of it ... Not everybody places an order for 126 which is to say - a really highly number ... I know of the American pressure , but seriously their defense hardware sales are so restricted , strings attached and watered down that again they are more of a liability than a capable platform ...

 

[KRAIT]

We don't need Pakistan and what Kashmir you have now. You keep thinking about Kashmir and we will keep it with us with our soldiers and focus more on our development. Both nations started together and you think getting some portion of kashmir and Rann of Kutch as biggest victory you have. Live in this. We got rid of East Pakistan. At the same time started reforms in our country, established our technical institutes as IITs, IISC, NITs, TIFR etc. Invest in providing support to IT companies. Invested in our space program , defense program, even when we had failures, we continued to do so. We think mre about ourselves but you think more about Kashmir and past.

Name 10 things you have achieved in field of science and technology which India don't have. Don't put water car in it.

All your allies wants you to put Kashmir on back burner and start working on other issues. Your brilliant scientists and intellectuals are getting legal notice from a fraud, a fraud who is supported by so many people.

Atleast for a decade, forget about Kashmir, and build your nation. Do it for your own sake.

 

[Abingdonboy]

I know what Rafale's capabilities are , the question is that countries could still go for a few squadrons or small numbers of it ... Not everybody places an order for 126 which is to say - a really highly number ... I know of the American pressure , but seriously their defense hardware sales are so restricted , strings attached and watered down that again they are more of a liability than a capable platform ...

Like I said these planes are INCREDIBLY expensive- $100 mill a peice in today's world is A LOT of mulah! You are right most nations DO go gor for small numbers not 126-200 like IAF, that is because MOST countries DON'T have $11-20+ BILLION to spend on fighter planes. It is simple logice, it is for the same reason most nations don't have space programs or HSR or C-17s or P-8s or whatever.



+WRT to "water-down" US tech and excessive restrictions, this is all true but obviously the US' pressure is significant.



+ I'd agree to your "liabilities" claim, having front line offeniseve military hardware such as a fighter have the kind of controls the US imposes on its exports is a HUGE liability and dramatically threatens national security- if the US doesn't want those fighters used, they ain't gonna be used and then your up a certain creek without proper propulsion equipment!

 

[The A-5]

I know what Rafale's capabilities are , the question is that countries could still go for a few squadrons or small numbers of it ... Not everybody places an order for 126 which is to say - a really highly number ... I know of the American pressure , but seriously their defense hardware sales are so restricted , strings attached and watered down that again they are more of a liability than a capable platform ...

It costs a lot more if to buy small numbers only. Mass production means lesser costs, besides, if to
buy small number no one will give any ToT, all the planes should be bought off-the-shelf, that
makes additional cost.

Typhoon is built and procured by a consortium of nations, so cost reduction for smaller no. sales
is possible, not the case for Rafale.