Back in the days when I was a huge F-35 supporter, this latest by Bill Sweetman would have me frothing at the mouth preparing to slam him at every turn. His latest proves that he's willing to go out on a limb and basically give critics the middle finger.
In this article he sings the virtues of the Gripen. But I have to ask...What does the Gripen bring to the fight that the Advanced Super Hornet couldn't? Why does the Gripen have him acting as such a fan but the ASH doesn't?
Read the article here, but the questions remain.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteNo comment on the South Korean's choosing F-35, Sol?
ReplyDeleteWhere's Slowman now to tell us all again how the official statements are incorrect? Even Giovanni isn't denying it any more, just ignoring it as he does with anything he can't paint as a negative...
http://www.defense-aerospace.com/article-view/release/152648/lockheed-says-s.-korea-selects-f_35.html
Jason Simmons
DeleteIt is not as clear as it seems on surface, because
1. US DoD made a deep price discount of $6.8 billion for 40 units.
2. Lockheed is said to have basically matched the other bidders in scope of technology transfers. Korea unlike other countries are demanding tech transfers to be used in the KFX project and are rejecting "industrial participation"(No taker among Korean vendors) and hard goodies, like a free military comm satellite(rejected by the president personally). Handing over technology is a lot more damaging in the long run than giving work share as is done with other buyers.
3. The requirement for 20 additional units have been rolled over to the KFX program.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/10/28/is_south_korea_stealing_us_military_secrets
Is South Korea Stealing U.S. Military Secrets?
Right now, the dialogue between the two countries is focused heavily on the potential sale of the advanced F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to the South Koreans. American officials are putting into place a strict security agreement to ensure that nothing is shared, either with the wrong people, or for use by a buyer of a Korean-made copycat for Korea's own competitive purposes. The South Koreans are interested in the F-35, but their interest comes at the same time as South Korea's bid to build its own stealth jet, raising bureaucratic eyebrows in the United States. It could be the equivalent of South Korea taking a fighter jet on a test drive, as it were, flying it around the corner to kick its tires, only then to return it to the dealership and say it's not interested, but first looking under the hood and taking some pictures.
"If any country is taking our JSF around the corner to try to exploit it, that's going to be a real problem," McCormick said.
Giovanni, like any other sensible observer, is probably waiting for South Korea to announce its choice. Lockheed's statement provides no details, and only quotes its own exec, with no indication of Korean source.
DeleteAs for ignoring it, it's the second lead story on defense-aerospace.com, so that comment like the previous one is unfounded
DeleteSlowman,
Delete1. Korea is not a partner nation. It can only buy F-35 through FMS. Check US law mate. USG can NOT sell F-35 cheaper to Korea than it is buying it, themselves. So your "deep discount" is simply made up nonsense.
2. I've no idea how the rest of that post relates to the fact that Korea has chosen the F-35. You however have made countless claims that it will not be chosen by Korea. Sol will undoubtedly not allow it, but your rubbish claims are all over the internet.
Prepared now to publicly admit how wrong you've been on this issue all along?
Zapaton, yes it was a news-story on defence-aerospace. But compare the sale of 40 F-35's to the sale of ANY small number of any aircraft on that site and you'll see what I mean. If 40 Typhoons or Rafales get sold to someone watch Giovanni praise it from the heavens. Only i the world of the mindless group that criticises a program incessantly does the sale of 40 fighter aircraft become effectively meaningless.
If any other program even looks like selling 40 aircraft, my goodness. The world is about to change or something...
Good god, could you imagine the hubub if Brazil bought 40 Gripens....
DeleteFor one, the Gripen is not a stealthy aircraft wrt the Advanced Super Hornet. The ASH OTOH will have a weapons pod designed to reflect RF energy away from the radar receiving antenna. The Gripen is also not carrier capable atm, although some studies were done to explore developing a carrier version. The other thing is that we do not know how much a new build Gripen E/F will cost. But the Gripen is a fine aircraft, and would make a fine addition to smaller air forces.
ReplyDeleteGripen will be much cheaper to buy and operate and realisticaly world is ready for a cheaper and smaller footprint fighter in as opposed to ever heavier ,bigger and more expensive fighters that ultimately result in shrinking airforces.
ReplyDeleteAs to why Bill is pimping the Gripen? Who's paying his lunch bill this week, will be most instructive as to that question...
ReplyDeleteJust like Giovanni (sponsored but not in any way influenced of course...) by the Dassault and Eurofighter Consortium banners all over his webpage...
Because the Gripen is a perfect balance of cost and capability.
DeleteHonestly? It was intended for austere operations from day one. I would think a Marine would like that.
ReplyDeleteThe Hornet has 2 large vacuum ducts to suck in debris. The LEX magnified the issue as the intake cannot pull air from above, like it can below. FOD walks are just to keep people busy. If you ever get a chance walk up to one. The cockpit is almost as high as the original F/A-18. The intakes are much higher and 2 feed only 1 F414.
If you are willing to step back and look at the spec's it can compete with the F/A-18C/D quite well in the payload and range. SAAB has also talked publicly about CFT's, since I have never actually seem a militarily use its full "Payload" the CFT's would not over stress the gear. Have you honestly ever seem a MC Hornet go to combat with it's nearly 7 tons of ordnance loaded out? Per AV week a few years back: They compared the F/A-18C, the F-16C and the Rafael. Payload: full Gun, 2 x 2000 lbs bombs, 2 AIM-120's. and 2 Sidewinders (MICA/Magic on the Rafael) both the Rafael and Falcon had a 50 nmi range advantage over the Hornet. 500 nmi vs 450 nmi.
If you take some time and read up on the Swedish AF, you might actually like them allot. The expect all the installations they have to be destroyed in a few days. Period. They plan on flying from roadways and hiding air craft in the tree's under camouflage. This leads to different maintenance strategies and support models from day one.
With a production of a whopping 247 air frames, the unit cost is 69 million each. The super hornet now has a flyaway cost 67 million. Flyaway cost = no spares, and no R&D as that was paid for over the fist 500. The Gripen C/D cost include spares R&D training the whole nine yards. On less than half the number of air frames.
Some reading: http://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/saab-reveals-full-gripen-e-design-cost-savings-396977/
Where did you get these range figures for the F/A-18C? The classic F/A-18 was never able to meet requirements for range and payload when compared to the A-7 and F-4 Phantom II it replaced but the Navy accepted this. However I highly doubt the F-16C would have a range advantage with such a payload unless it was carrying external fuel tanks while the F/A-18 did not.
DeleteThere's also going to be a greater speed penalty for that payload with just a single F414. I'm no huge fan of the French but the Rafale is a downright better machine than the Gripen unless you are just looking for something very cheap. A modern F-20 if you will.
The classic Hornet is also out of production. What the Gripen E/F has to compete against is the Super Hornet which does significantly better in regards to range and payload.
The Gripen's STOL capabilities still far very short of being able to operate the aircraft from an LHD or LHA. STOVL is of far more value to the USMC than being able to operate off a somewhat shorter stretch of highway than a Hornet could.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNuVCvIGKxE&feature=youtube_gdata_player
DeleteWell Nuke... The Marines are not replacing Super Hornets. They do not Operate Hornets from LHD or LHA's.
DeleteI am not sure how you missed this "Per AV week a few years back". You can email them and ask.
Also you failed to note the F-16 has wet wings the F/A-18 does not. The Hornet/Super Hornet do however have the least fuel efficient engines in DOD service now that the turbojets are gone. The J101/F404 was called a "Leaky Turbojet" do to its minuscule by-pass. And the F404/J101 share the same basic core as the F101 (B-1) and F101FDE (AKA the F110) that powers the F-16. Any you have two of them.
And SuperBug, if you are going to link to something make a point? Where in the OT&E and Development of the Hornet did the US Navy or USMC have a stated requirement to operate off of highways and unimproved strips? You can launch an SR-71 on a highway, it was not a USAF requirement. BTW "Super Rhino" really? Hated that name first time I heard it use on the super bugs.
Why in God's holy name is he audacious enough to call it a stealth fighter? That's selling it as even more than saab is. I don't doubt that it will fill the position that the F-16 did back in the 70's, but there is always room for the hi-lo mix in fighter designs and that's where the F-35 has found its place. I mean hell, even with the issues surrounding Canada and Italy, the project is far from dead, and is really looking to be the mainstay fighter of the west for the next 50 years. No amount of complaining or rabid proclamations of death spiral will stop that.
ReplyDeleteNot just a stealth fighter, A 6TH GENERATION FIGHTER - IS ANYONE GOING TO CALL HIM OUT FOR THIS????
DeleteBesides the fact that the Super Hornet has 2 engines (2 lives) and can operate from carriers or short airfields or routes like the Gripen, is much better for CAS and groud attack, it is able to make a square loop over the target, diving to attack and to use it's amazing intant turn and pitch FULLY LOADED with out crashing like a Sukhoy in an exhibition. The Gripen NG is a small interceptor with steroids, is not in the same league as the 4.75 Gen Super Hornet, the best trully multirrol aviable. The other asset of the Super Hornet and the F-18 family is the Growler. The Gripen will need close if it wants to go to a real war.
ReplyDeleteAny way, the gripen could be use as an advanced trainer or complementing of the Super Hornet/ Growler for countries interested to have cappability and big numbers affordable.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYGM-aB1Luc&feature=youtube_gdata_player
www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0C6OfKKQy0&feature=youtube_gdata
Compared to the Advanced Super Hornet the Gripen E/F would have a faster speed for short range combat air patrol or interception missions but that's really the only advantage. The radar is smaller and presuming the same level of technology wouldn't be as capable.
Delete"Besides the fact that the Super Hornet has 2 engines (2 lives) " and still has a higher loss rate then the A-7 and F-16 single engine fighters? The A-7 finished its carrier with one of the lowest loss rates for any jet, and with only 1 life! Maybe they had better pilots back in the day (your theory and those lifetime losses include Vietnam). It is not like the A-7 was one of the 3 air frames to survive Gulf War 1 with no combat loses. Oh wait it was! The Midway lost 1 craft due to a nose gear failure on launch.
DeleteAlso "The Gripen will need close if it wants to go to a real war"? It is not going to fly with its AMRAAMs or Meteors?
You keep talking about the Gripen like it is some F-5. The JAS 39C MTO is 15.5 ton's, the JAS 39 has 2400 lbs more internal fuel the the C/D. The weights of the JAS39 C/D are close to the original F-16 Block 1/5/10/15 before the mods were introduce. The E/F with its increased fuel will approach the weight of the OCU. Note the F100-220 produces roughly 25K in A/B the F414 24K.... Hhmm
"the 4.75 Gen Super Hornet, the best trully multirrol aviable." I think the the F-15K, SG and SA fliers may beg to differ. Given they have a fully integrated EW setup. IRST, automated train avoidance radar (separate from the enormous AESA), and various FLIR pods. And do not have to sacrifice the AIM-120's count or fuel to carry them. Then again a lot of those guys are in denial that they fly a multi-role anyway...
The Gripen E/F is an impressive upgrade from past versions which are simply outclassed from the competition ranging from improved F-16s to the larger Rafale and Typhoon. Yet it isn't anything special.
ReplyDeleteBut do you want the real reason for this article where Sweetman treats the Gripen like the greatest advancement in aviation in the past 20 years? It's European and Bill Sweetman is the guy driving the Eurocanard "stealth is dead" bandwagon. It doesn't offer anything the Advanced Super Hornet wouldn't besides for a marginally higher top speed under ideal conditions. It is more optimized for low-to-medium altitude interception than the Super Hornet and can sustain a higher turn rate under most conditions but that doesn't factor out all of the advantages of the larger aircraft.
On the positive side the Gripen NG is one of the few truly "light" fighters on the market today which means it is low cost and worth considering for smaller countries who feel they don't need much of a capability beyond local air defense and occasionally dropping some ordinance on a poorly equipped neighbor.
On the negative side there are all sorts of reasons why countries looking to maintain a strong capability to influence events by airpower have moved towards larger aircraft with the occasional exceptional of high-performance trainers with a secondary combat role. Having only a single F414 to work with comes at a price in the range you can deliver any significant payload of air-to-ground weaponry.
With this article Bill Sweetman again loses more of his credibility. This fluff piece is of the same quality as the rest of the rubbish on that site. Even the Swedes aren't so mad as to make statements like these. The Gripen E/F is not a "stealth fighter" by any stretch of the imagination. 6th generation? Nobody even knows what the defining features of a 6th generation fighter are. It could include directed energy weapons and defensive systems, ADVENT type engines, and new standards for stealth.
If affordability is all that matters than UCAVs would make more sense as you wouldn't be losing huge numbers of pilots in some mad attempt to overwhelm the enemy with your "cheap" $50 million dollar aircraft. Sensor and IFF advantage? The F-35 has one of the most impressive sensor suites for a fighter in the world and electronic support measures that easily eclipse the ALR-94 on the F-22. Software? Well countering past problems with software/hardware obsolesce was one of the goals of the program and many aspects of the F-35 reflect that, although one can certainly question how well Lockheed has handled that aspect of the program. Boeing's work isn't anything to dismiss either.
Yep.
DeleteThe Gripen E will be a good jet when it comes into service in 2018 or so, baring ANY delays.
The problem is, who will want such a jet? The Russian Mig-35 and Su-35 will be either the same price o a bit more expensive. The Chinese JF-17 will be cheaper.
Ok, lets say that Russian/Chinese jets are a no-go.
Upgraded F-16, an maybe even new build F-16s will still be around, with second hand jets available for next to nothing.
For richer nations, it is the F-35, or nothing, especially in Europe, as the Typhoon and Rafale lines will be shuttered by then.
The Turkish, Korean, and Japanese indigenous fighters are mid-2020s jets a best.
I wonder how well would do 6 Gripens in interdiction role against 20 F-16
ReplyDeletehttp://m.qt.com.au/news/top-guns-show-us-how-its-done-during-war/2204422/
http://globalaviationreport.wordpress.com/2014/03/24/australias-exercise-lightening-viper-wraps-up-a-video-report/
Probably as good as the SuperBug did against TEN F-16's...? Give the ENTIRE squadron is only 18 air frames they could never have brought 20. Listen to the interview you linked too....
Delete"Of course, in an exercise like Lightning Viper, winning ultimately means learning all the right lessons."
The problem is cost F35 will mean you have 1 fighter per every 4+ you retire (that is what falling orders show) with super hornet you might have 1 per 2+ you replace while Gripen might enable 1-1 replacment of the fleet. And the cost follows the plane till the scapheap ,Super hornet will cost twice or more to operate than Gripen,F35 even more so. So far there are no takers for the Super hornet and the last one Australia paid something like 100mio $ while Growlers cost 1.5bilion $ for 12 planes
ReplyDeleteThat's true if you need to replace old F-5 like the ones from Zwiss or Brazil. Noy the case if you need to replace F-18C/D like the Australians, Canadians or the USNavy. They fell more confortable wit a tween engine airplane considering the big distances they have to cover in the ocean or the artic.
ReplyDeleteIn no particular order:
Delete- Both Canada and the USN are committed to the single engine F-35, so single vs. twin engine is clearly not a deal breaker for them.
- Sweetman never said the Gripen was a stealth fighter, that's the headline writer from the Daily Beast not the text of the article.
- Sweetman is proposing a definition of "6th Gen" based on different criteria, primarily on how modern fighters are actually being used as opposed to the 'hot war with a peer opponent' scenario both the F-22 and F-35 are optimized for. Because "6th Gen" is a marketing term, Sweetman's take is no more or less accurate than that of LockMart's PR flacks. BTW, you might consider that supercruise was considered part of 5th Gen until the F-35 couldn't do it, so we're hardly dealing with clear, static definitions here.
- No the F-35 does not have an impressive sensor suite. Yes it will when it is finally operational with block 3 software in 2018-2020. Meanwhile capabilities that the F-35 promises "some day", like cooperative targeting for BVR, have been in service with every Gripen off the production line. The F-35 will eventually have a more capable, and vastly more expensive, sensor suite than the Gripen, which will also have AESA, IRST, data links, etc.
- Criticizing the Gripen for limited load capability in an environment where the free world is supposed to limit itself to 2 x 2000lb bombs (2 x 1000lb VSTOL) with the F-35 seems like a discrepancy.
- Spend some time trying to figure out what percentage of combat sorties the AV-8 has flown STOVL vs. STOL vs. CTOL in actual combat experience. Real world experience shows that STOL has been far more valuable for the USMC than STOVL.
- Sweetman has never said stealth is dead and he has been, for instance, highly critical of the glacial development pace of the Typhoon. The "Sweetman loves eurocanards" idea is a myth that people use for ad hominem attacks on Sweetman in lieu of refuting his facts and arguments. Bottom line is that Sweetman's commentary on the F-35 has always been substantially more correct than anything out of LockMart or the JSF program office.
When replacing F-5 even Gripen is probably to expensive taking 1 for 2 or even 3 ratio but F35 would then take one to 10+ and F18E one for 5-7. Many Worlds airforces need planes to replace Mig 21 ,Mirage III-5 ,Kfir, F16A and for them Gripen is by far the best candidate as proven that with export sales.
DeleteYou have to know that most fighters be it US,Russian ,Chinese are sold with considerable political backing that is in many cases the main reason for the buy.
One thing Gripen has going is more or less continius low cost development with evolutionary steps and off the shelf equipment.
@Milspec
DeleteWhen the Gripen is hauling 2x 2000 lb JDAMs it won't be able to supercruise nor have a very impressive range. There are limits to the size of the weapon bays you can fit in a fighter. Lockheed can't be blamed for being unable to do the impossible and fit 7 tons of ordinance inside of the F-35. If need be you can load the F-35 with external stores. Of course it removes the stealth advantage but its a capability for after you've dealt with the enemy's air defenses.
Even Block 2I F-35s will have an impressive sensor suite. It won't have the full level of sensor fusion and networking but the pilot still has access to a very capable AESA radar and EOTS with capabilities that should at start match something like the Sniper XR targeting pod. Considering that F-22s and F-15s have practiced cooperative targeting in the past, I'm guessing the F-35 can do it to, it just may lack automated features and require more coordination between pilots until later Blocks.
The generation talk may be a marketing term but it has some basis in reality. Certain concepts can be applied to different "generations" of aircraft. Making a claim that 6th generation ought to be based solely on affordability is foolish, especially when you consider that UCAVs could do better than the Gripen in that regard.
AV-8B pilots in the past several wars have done a lot of missions from LHDs, LHAs, as well as rather poorly maintained Iraqi airbases on land. Perhaps Marine F/A-18s have operated from those same airbases, but has STOL been more useful to the Marines than STOVL? No it hasn't.
Bill Sweetman predicts some problems on a program as and ambitious as this and some people like yourself would call him some sort of prophet. With any large enough program these days you can bet on delays, cost overruns, and unforeseen problems and have a good chance of being right. Meanwhile his "the F-35 will never be affordable" and "the F-35's stealth won't matter due to VHF radars and IRST" is nothing more than his personal wishes. He takes any opportunity to attack the planes kinematic performance at every chance but never compares it to the F/A-18 its performance is similar to in many areas.
Now he's singing the praises of the upgraded Gripen because it's cheap and the F-35 isn't. Of course the F-35 should cost something close to the Rafale or Advanced Super Hornet but he's more interested in making it look as "unaffordable" as the F-22 which really wasn't unaffordable to the United States and had production drastically cut due to poor choices. Maybe Saab is paying for his dinners too.
what about reports that software delays will add another 15 billion dollars to the final price tag of the plane and indications that the mythical "cost the same as a 4th gen" is about to be proven the lie that i believe it is.
Deletealso note that the USAF is pointing to some very disturbing problems with Maintenance at their training base for the F-35. long story short. its costing an arm and a leg to keep the plane flying and even with the high cost they still have trouble getting enough ready for pilots to maintain proficiency.
DeleteWho needs to replace 48 F-5 with 48 Gripen NG? Brazil or Swiss, with economies that can pay for them. Brazil only needs to control it's borders against narco-planes. Nobody in S.America will mess with them. The leasing of classic Gripens is perfect for small economies, the Gripen NG is not that cheap for them, specially when there are so many F-16 ready to retire and can be upgrade.
ReplyDeleteCanada is not buying the F-35 yet. The main issue is the price and single engine.
For littoral countries like Australia or Canada they will have much better capacities with 24 Super Hornets and 12 Growler like Australia is doing NOW. As I showed in one of the previous post in the Australian exercise, they are doing pretty good with 6 Super Hornets fighting 20 F-16, imagine 24 of them. I'm not sure if the Gripens will have the same punch.
20 F16 vs 6 Super hornets ,depends what kind of ROE and limitations were put in place on the wargames. We had wargames with a SAR scenario couple years back where 2 F16 and the helicopter were lost to a loss of 1 Pilatus PC-9M ,but i do not claim Pilatus is a Fighter much less a better than F16.
DeleteWargames often very optimisticaly value BVR missles ,that in practice rarely exhibit over 50% hit rates even at nowhere near peer oponents.
At least in an excersice you have a better sence of your capacity and weakness. Just In a promotional video you can defeat many Sukhoys with few gripens.
Deletewww.youtube.com/watch?v=oKlQyPOiRuE&feature=youtube_gdata_player
www.windsorstar.com/technology/report+warns+more+delays+affordability+issues+with/9656106/story.html
ReplyDeleteBill Sweetman's latest praise of the Gripen. http://www.aviationweek.com/Article.aspx?id=/article-xml/AW_03_24_2014_p15-673319.xml
ReplyDeleteGripen C operating costs: $7500 /hr
ReplyDeleteOn top of the up front per unit costs, the Gripen is an economic no-brainer.
which is why every single Western nation is battering down Saab's door to order them.....
DeleteActually, only pooer nations, or nations with tiny defense budgets that want "good" western gear are, and who don't want an F-16.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThe real 6th Generation fighter exist already and nobody noticed. Is the combination of the Growler and the Super Hornet. Together they have a complete radar spectrum stealth capability, with kinetic and non kinetic warfare suit than no other airplane provides today. It is so versatile that can be use for absolutely any kind of mission with more bang for the buck than any other airplane today or in the next decade.That's my definition of a real 6th Gen. or New generation fighter as Boeing prefer to say for a good reason. The F-22 and the F-35 are designs from the cold war era with technologies already outdated for the advance of the sensor fusions and computer information.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.boeing.com/boeing/defense-space/military/ea18g/index.page
http://www.boeing.com/boeing/defense-space/military/fa18ef/
oh dear god.
DeleteAre you SERIOUSLY calling a Gripen E and and ASH a "6th generation" fighter....
Not the Gripen, just the Boeing planes.
DeleteThe Growler and the Super Hornet together are a 6 Gen Strike/fighter force. But you ae right, they are not a 6g in the sence of an evolution from the passive stealth technology. They are an evolution from the LO/active electronic stealth technology. They are in a diferent universe than the L.Martin Kingdom and they are in the right path and they will continue evolving with the next Gen. Jammer and the advanced Super Hornet plug and play gadges.
The term Next Generation is very appropiate. The 5th Gen stealth fighters had their climax with the F-22. The F-35 is a step back plenty of mistakes and with out a clear future in front of the advances in anti passive stealth technology, that's why it will nees the growlers to cover his ass against L Band radars, the same for the F-22.
Reminds me the Netflix program Fringe, where to parallel universes collide and fight each other to survive. At the end both of them collaborate to fight the observers that invade our universe. In this case it seems that the pentagon was taken by the L. Martin observers.
DeleteDoes the USNAVY really wants to spend a lot in software development, to wait another decade and to pay x3 times to have a semi-stealth airplane with an external gun pod and aim-9x in conventional racs for Air defence when they can have a better solution for 75 Million practical immediately?
ReplyDeletehttp://beta.images.theglobeandmail.com/2aa/news/national/article9391774.ece/ALTERNATES/w220/F35-web.JPG
http://i2.wp.com/news.usni.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/superhornetmodel.jpg?zoom=1.5&fit=660%2C660
An appropriate term for the Boeing proposal could be "Advanced Generation" for the:
ReplyDeleteAdvanced Super Hornet
Advanced Growler
Advanced Jammer
Advanced Sensors
Advanced data link/Sat com
Advanced Stand off weapons/Malds/Decoys
Advanced sensor fusion
Advanced counter measures
Advanced IRST
Advanced Aesa
etc.
www.aviationweek.com/Article.aspx?id=/article-xml/AW_03_24_2014_p24-674336.xml
ReplyDelete