Lets just look at Brahmos real quick. Russians won't only share the ToT for the components, leaving India just a software and marketing role, but the land attack capability touted in the missile is pretty much a lie.
The only Russian component that we have not yet reached an agreement on is the propulsion system. The guidance is our own, seeker ToT has been provided and has been modified in India, the airframe ToT too has been provided. The rest is upto you to nitpick on since you like to do that a lot.
Have you ever seen the test videos of those targets laying right on the beach or in the middle of the desert? Standalone structures in the middle of nowhere don't make a land attack capability.
Deserts and beaches or even the sea provide excellent challenges to any radar system. The logic is the same as "a needle in a haystack." When an object or impurity is introduced into a large homogenous medium, it becomes extremely difficult to track such an object even with the naked eye let alone a machine.
Ask any seaman how difficult it gets to detect and track a ship at sea and you will know? And the sea's radar returns are barely anything compared to the clutter found on dry land.
But here is the real lie, every one of those tests had the target with a radar reflector on it. Watch...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HDVhX7PZHg
That is a big radar reflector like the ones used to decoy by naval vessels. What building or military target is going to have one of those put on it so Brahmos can find its target? Brahmos is only capable of hitting naval vessels.
Since you have proven yourself to be an idi*t I will explain using a graphical representation of the use of the reflectors.
Now you know, maybe.
Su-30MKI is only better than Russian planes because it has Western components. India wouldn't buy it with the poor level of Russian avionics and defence suites.
India could not opt for Russian equipment because they are not available for export. Russian EW kits is a strict no-no even with India. And can you tell me what are the so called western components in the MKI(barely even 5%). FYI, French components are due to be replaced or are already replaced.
Radar, Engine, Navigation, Communication....all these systems are Russian. The only major equipment used on board is the Israeli Jammer because we don't have access to Russian jammers. The rest are Indian.
There is also a SAGEM GPS T/R module. I wonder why we went to French for the GPS system. Oh! I know, it is because the Russians don't use GPS.
Russian technology hasn't been able to hold its own on the export market for big ticket items without France, Su-30MKI and T-90S are the big examples.
What a joke! The Catherine Thermals we bought from France melted on the very first day of the T-90 trials. They have since been replaced by Indian BEL made Thermals.
PAK FGFA will have ZERO French or Israeli components, Russians won't let us near this bird.
Forget Russians, even we will not let the French near the PAKFA. PAKFA will have only Russian and Indian components. What makes you think we will be sourcing western equipment even 10 years later? We are already developing cutting edge technology thanks to the Israelis. We will also commence development of new avionics for the MCA program that will be used in PAKFA too.
Russia has been unable to meet India's needs without us and the Israelis, do you feel confident they can come through without it?
Yes they will come through. If they don't we will come through. This is not the 90s.
I don't say Indian MoD are "dunderheads" with Su-30MKI, they knew it needed our equipment because they aren't "dunderheads." We won't be able to give saving grace to the PAKFA.
We don't need your saving grace thank you. We are already replacing French stuff from the MKIs.
More like plain capability. Russian R&D has been unable to close the gap where they could even make those platforms. Do you know the base of their R&D complex averages 50+ years in age? The braindrain of the good Russian talent to the West has crippled their research efforts. The Soviet competition for design has collapsed with the consolidation of defence companies. Just look at their UAV efforts, the Generals call them inferior pieces of crap. Medvedev has said repeatedly the MIC has failed to come up with anything knew, just upgrading existing Soviet tech. This is out of the mouths of their own people.
More foolish talk. The Russians have sent more missions to the ISS than the Americans without even a single accident. The Americans have been blowing up shuttles like the Fourth of July.
F-15SE is said to have similar frontal RCS to the F-35 which is 0.001m2. 1m2 is no leap in technology to legacy F-16s with the 'Have Glass' RCS reduction. .001m2 or anything in the same decimal place up to a .009 or even .09 even is a game changing capability to high threat environment on up to China and Russia itself.
Do you have a link or a source? I need a genuine link right from the mouth of a genuine Boeing official.
Let me tell you a little more about the modern warfare environment. LPI is not only good for SEAD but also air-to-air. These high threat environments have IADs which share from ground and air based platforms. When you have a radar you can't lock down they can not only scan to their hearts content without fear of detection, but don't have to worry about jamming either. It makes all the difference in an air battle where your Russian radar is a dead giveaway to your position no matter what your craft's RCS. As great as the Su-35 is in flight performance, the Irbis is going to make it toast to F-35 or F-15SE firing AIM-120D which will detect it long before they are picked up.
Most of this coming from your notion that the SH and SE are stealth. The Australian public have been harassing the Australian govt simply because they tricked the voters into believing the SH is stealthy. Anything that carries only in external stores is not a stealth plane.
First off, there is no R-77M. If you don't believe me go to the Tactical Missile Corps website, they list all the missiles they have and will soon produce. RVV-AE is the best Amraamski they have and is limited to 80km. SH has a frontal RCS that is quite low and won't be picked up by the Bars before SH has a clear lock. With MKI lighting up the sky looking for intruders would give it away like a mini AWACs. Lets say they don't even do that and keep the power down, the APG-79 can power up to several hundred kilometres range and with LPI, won't have to worry about what MKI's TWR sees because it won't go off. One on one there is not much hope for MKI so lets go ahead and throw the great PHALCON AWACs in support. MKI will be outbound protecting so it won't get a full max range benefit, SH will be head on running to take it out with a complement of AIM-120Ds. MKI can keep the radar off and run on the data links, but MKI's 12m2 will give it away so SH can engage at its leisure even if PHALCON picks it up. The combination of LPI, low frontal RCS, and extended range missiles make the SH the clear winner in any air-to-air engagement even if you throw in a nice Israeli radar system.
What the heck is several hundred kilometres. The sun is several hundred kilotmetres from the earth. Be more specific or bugger off. When you talk technical there is nothing called several or some or little or any of those stupid assumptions.
Here is a link that claims the existence of Ramjet missiles in Russia and perhaps India.
Air Force Looks For Long Range (120Kms) BVR Missiles | India Defence
This sudden move has spurred IAF officials to make quick efforts to purchase 120-km range air-to-air missiles. The acquisition of such missiles, which sport ramjet propulsion, will make IAF the lone Air Force in Asia to have such an unparallelled capability, top IAF officials said.
It's a 2007 news.
They won't have to merge, AIM-120D will kill you long before that is necessary for all the reasons I have already stated.
You have stated nothing but fanboy fantasy. Nobody shoots a BVR and be assured of a kill. BVR engagement does not deliver 100% results.
Eurofighter doesn't have AESA because theirs isn't deployable yet. RBE-2 AA is going on the latest tranche of Rafale F4 for the ALA in 2012.
I don't doubt that. But we will see as to how much the Europeans can spend in order to get the AESA on board. Developing is one thing and operationalizing is another.
Australia wouldn't buy Super 'Bugs' if it didn't come with APG-70. Singapore wouldn't buy F-15SG if it didn't have APG-63(V)3, UAE wouldn't buy F-16 Block 60 without APG-80. Every partner nation buying a watered down stealth F-35 wouldn't buy it without an AESA with an LPI capability which still keeps its relevance on the modern battlefield. There is a reason AESA is the benchmark for modern radars, it makes all the difference.
I never doubted the capability of the AESA as a system. Currently, the bone of contention between us is in the AESAs capability against a non AESA equipped aircraft.
If you take two radar sets with the same range and TWS, AESA will still give you a distinct advantage. The PESA will give away its position long before the AESA will, combined with a long ranged BVR can mean an instant victory. If still using a medium ranged missile will still give the AESA pilot the innitiative in angle of approach which can be the difference of life and death.
Sure, we can formulate many strategies for it. However, there are so many ways for an inferior fighter to fight back too.
Only because it doesn't fit with your argument. Multi-role planes are just that and you know AESA gives such a huge advantage you don't want to mention it. Countries don't just buy dedicated fighters anymore and AESA makes all the difference in air-to-ground capability.
The Russian version of PAKFA will be an air superiority fighter. I has already been made clear about that. Also, strike capability cannot be used to compare 2 fighters head to head. Simply because F-15C does not have strike does not mean the AESA is superior. With the same logic the F-16 is a far superior bird compared to the F-22 because of its strike capability. So, strike is not a part of the discussion. We are mainly discussing the impact of AESA against a non AESA aircraft, which according to you is a 100% advantage.
The first jet engined plane, Me-242 also never claimed a 100% advantage against older aircraft of the time. A 100% advantage is something like the F-22 against every other bird with a 108 to 1 kill. A 100% advantage should give you an insane advantage vis a vis the F-22, not lesser.
When a pilot can only handle 9 Gs before they blackout, flight performance isn't that important when modern missiles come with a 22 G-load.
Astronauts handle more Gs. French and Indian pilots are known to have experienced more than 11Gs on the Mirage-2000. A missile does 22G simply because of the speed. the radius of turning is very very big for high supersonic missiles. Compared to fighters a missile is like a stationary object. One of the reasons why BVR is not a 100% guaranteed kill. The fighter can always out-maneuver a missile. The missiles only depends on its kinetic energy to guarantee a kill. Same as a Brahmos.
What is far more important is the protective countermeasures your aircraft can employ. Russians have fallen so far in this field MiG-35 has to be installed with Italy's ELT/568(v)2 self-protection jammer and MKI had to take Israel's EL/L-8222 just to make sales to India. MoD is not full of "dunderheads" and know they have to outsource where Russia has fallen behind. You won't be able to do that with PAK FGFA.
Like I said, Russians will not sell counter measures suite to India due to policy. (Hopefully it will change in the future). Mig corp is just showing off their capability to install avionics of multiple countries as a selling point. And it is a very very big selling point. Till date the Russians(and Indians) are the only ones who have managed to successfully integrate avionics of multiple countries that were not originally developed for the program.
We don't need to do that with the PAKFA since we will either develop our own systems or collaborate with Russia on that too.
Pulse-repetition-frequency (PRF) power for PESA radars is far lower than for AESA. Even the advanced PESA Captor is limited in its scan range without raising its intercept quotient. The multiple T/R modules on an AESA allow it to define a very tight , powerful, and narrow beams with such fast scanning that the PESA just cannot match. PESA is limited in software usage since the number of frequencies are on a monopulse planer array AESA can go full range without fear while PESA has to turn down the heat. It is an obsolete technology India has recognised on and even before the RFP for MMRCA was sent out.
Yeah! Yeah! And where is the advantage in a 1v1? According to Gambits, even if your radar can track multiple targets(64+) the pilot will restrict it to 10 or 15 high priority targets. If you have just one target in the air even that advantage disappears. All you spout is some nonsense that has nothing to do with the current discussion. You said a F-15SE will have a 100% advantage against something like the Su-30MKI. How? AESA will not cut it. It is only a radar. Radars don't kill.
Cooling, beams, LPI etc don't matter as much to give a 100% advantage.
Tell that to the MKI pilots who whooped F-15C in Red Flag. Even MiG-21bis was causing them problems. Pit it against an AESA equipped Eagle and the game changes radically.
That was only tactics used by inferior aircraft against superior aircraft. Mind you that you are not talking about Red Flag but Cope India 2004. The Mig-21 managed to get close to a superior F-15C due to the tactics employed. A F-15C can see the Mig-21 a 3m2+ target from very far. But, an inferior aircraft like the bison still managed to get close enough to score kills.
In CI-2004, the most advanced aircraft in the group were the F-15Cs. The second most advanced in the group were the Mig-21 Bisons. The Su-30
K (not MKI) had their radars turned off and the Mirage-2000 were not exactly as good as the Bisons. It's all in the tactics. The Man beats Machine.
The advantage here lies in the RCS. Meteor will be one of the best missiles in the world, but it doesn't really matter if the radar doesn't detect the opponent. While a Captor equipped Eurofighter is keeping the power down on their monopulse array, SH has detected and locked it. Or if EF lights up the horizon with radiation, SH will be able to see it even further off and come at the angle of the weakest scan. Either way the AESA has the initiative.
This is assuming SH is a F-22. But, SH is not stealth. It is just another fighter.
F-15SE will be far stealthier than anything with external hardpoints.
And anything with external stores is not stealth.
US has kept guns on their planes ever since Vietnam because gunless F-4s with error prone Sparrow missiles was a bad idea as well as keeping dogfights in aggressor training.
So mistakes in the 60s and 70s is an excuse now. F-22s don't use those vintage Sparrows now do they? And sidewinders are also not required. So, why still develop them for the F-22? And why does the USAF still buy them for the F-22? Heck just go armed with AMRAAMs and finish them all. The guns too. I guess they are for show.
However, modern air combat has shown it is decided well beyond gun range. From Yugoslavia to Iraq, it has been shown the game has changed to missiles, mostly BVR. The only kill Iraq made by Lt. Zuhair Dawood was from a MiG-25 firing a BVRAAM, R-40DT. Dogfights aren't over and you should be prepared and trained to use guns, but it is by far not the norm of modern air combat.
Tactics matter. Technology is just an enabler. If you want to kill you have to kill. The guns and missiles won't kill for you. And 1 kill does not matter in the long run.
The essence of BVR is to shootdown the opponent at beyond visual range. Failure to do so is a the last ditch to merge for a knife fight.
Silly assertion. Fighting Yugoslavia, Iraq and Al Qaeda has fanboys convinced that the Russians, Chinese and Indians fight like donkeys and that only US knows what an Airforce is.
You can't simply have a BVR fight against the MKI and think you will do better in a dog fight. The MKI simply has way more legs, more power, more speed etc to either beat the enemy or run away. And this has nothing to do with AESA.
Economics and technology are invariably linked. Russia's R&D capibility has dropped off drastically as I have already mentioned why, coupled with little money it is a deadend.
Why do you think the Russians no longer have no money? Is it simply because your govt said so? They have more money than France. They are the largest oil exporter in the world, if you did not know. They receive funds from India for R&D too. It may have been true in the 90s and early 2000s. But, not now.
Su-35BM is the attempt to bring a stopgap until PAKFA is ready but more importantly to give the Su-27 the modernisation it needs to stay competitive on the export market. With 15 years without a fighter order, they have no choice but to order it regardless of how many delays come with PAKFA. The Soviet stocks that sit unmodernised aren't even worth it for how old most of them are.
Wrong. The Su-35BM is only meant to capture more of the export market before the arrival of the PAKFA. The old stuff that need to be replaced will be done only after PAKFA development has progressed well. The PAKFA requirement for both IAF and RuAF is unknown. But, it could be a 1000 between them.
Same can be said for you. My opinion based facts of tried and tested Western systems vs your opinion based on Russian fantasy and dreams. It is really a case of reality and fantasy which the West has proven in battle its capabilities while Russia rots in stagnation to the point where they have to import French equipment.
Nothing Western is tried and tested against a worthy adversary. Russia against Georgia, India against Mujahideen, US against Iraq are not worthy adversaries. I would simply call them Kitten Kicking.
Alors, your AESA "facts" are fed by Russian fanboys that think R-77M exists and PESA can hold a candle to AESA. Thats fine that you have such faith in the Russian promises, after watching for years how their MIC can't keep up with the West, their fate is evident.
Yes, yes simply remove P and add an A to ESA and it will do wonders. ROFL!
You have been swallowed up by too much hype.
After watching for years and what? The Americans build the F-15, the Russians build something better called the Flanker. The Americans build the F-16 and the Russians come out with the Mig-29. Till date there is not a single plane that matches the Mig-31. All those Russian dreams and fantasies already exist.
Heck even if your country broke into 15 pieces I doubt you would be as resilient as the Russians have been. Their economy fell by 500% and they are still managing to hold their own.