Airbus to offer Eurofighter for MMRCA 2.0

Parrikar was a good and effective defence minister for few decades already
He was perhaps the most educationally capable DM

Sending him to Goa was a necessity as else BJP might have lost Goa,

BTW he is suffering from Cancer and was recently in USA for his treatment.


honestly, i was impressed with parikar saab.

may he find the strength to fight and beat cancer. My heartfelt wishes are with him even if it means sh!t.

I wish he is brought back as the permanent 5 year long DM of the NDA-III in 2019. I wish..

There is no real wastage of time here.

While this tender is ongoing, we will be taking deliveries of the 36 Rafales. Once the tender is signed and we are waiting for the first delivery, we will be taking deliveries of the 2nd tranche of 36 Rafales. In the meantime, the Rafale F4 will become available. So we will get at least 72 Rafales before the tender aircraft come into play. By going for 2 bases, the IAF has practically guaranteed 72 Rafales even without the tender coming into play.

Pappu and co are just noisy, they can't do much here. But we have to follow the tender process anyway or the French will rip us off. For them, it's all about the money.

dude, Gripen WON'T be bought if we have an iota of common sense since we are going to spend twice on equal capabilities in tejas and gripen. it will be rafale. it will be manufactured by reliance in india. by ambani. under modi govt. if we cut the crap and negotiate with Dassault now, we can cut the crap and do business, arrive at the same conclusion we arrived at during MMRCA I. but no, we will do exactly what we did in MMRCA I at the end of MMRCA II.

But we have to follow the tender process anyway or the French will rip us off. For them, it's all about the money.

money has never been the bone of contention between GoI and Dassault. there is a difference between the rafales brought earlier and this buy. the previous one was a govt to govt deal which had to happen that way cause dassault wasn't willing to commit for HAL's quality assurance on india made Rafales, forget the money. so the ripping off didn't happen earlier and ripping off now will not happen if we negotiate well. this time, since it will be a dassault & reliance to govt. deal, and dassault doesn't have problems with reliance made rafale's quality, none that we know of, yet, in public domain. in any case, there will be another few years of prolonged negotiations even after MMRCA-II no matter who wins it. now, lets all pretend rafale has again been selected. yay. I'm simply asking to fast forward to that stage. now. the negotiations with govt, dassault, reliance and IAF on one table.

this time,cut the evaluation crap as the same planes are participating anyway. same freaking story. only difference, HAL is not the fixed indian manufacturer. cut the noise, go for the deal and voila monsieur, you will arrive at same conclusion post MMRCA II. rafale is still best pound for pound except gripen E which we shouldn't buy. same conclusion. MMRCA I.

this is for transparency dude. so that no can point fingers and even accuse Modi govt. of being partial to ambanis ie rafale.
 
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I do not think he will come as defence minister, but he can be an advisor and having third person perspective
Many people wish him a healthy recovery.

honestly, i was impressed with parikar saab.

may he find the strength to fight and beat cancer. My heartfelt wishes are with him even if it means sh!t.

I wish he is brought back as the permanent 5 year long DM of the NDA-III in 2019. I wish...


I do not understand when people say medium weight etc etc
The criteria for that weight is by IAF, they can slide that scale up or down
Weight is important when its a carrier plane, but why the weight criteria when its land based plane?
Criteria should be performance, ability to carry load, what type of load, fuel saving rather the terms that show how the plane performs and if it can dogfight or not (LOL)
Ideally i would prefer the planes to have their own pilots and they have combat with each other. maybe best of 10 rounds. 4 vs 4 and also asymetrical 4 Vs 1 etc. ultimately we want a plane which performs and fights, and not just flies, which all planes do


dude, Gripen WON'T be bought if we have an iota of common sense since we are going to spend twice on equal capabilities in tejas and gripen. it will be rafale. it will be manufactured by reliance in india. by ambani. under modi govt. if we cut the crap and negotiate with Dassault now, we can cut the crap and do business, arrive at the same conclusion we arrived at during MMRCA I. but no, we will do exactly what we did in MMRCA I at the end of MMRCA II.

But we have to follow the tender process anyway or the French will rip us off. For them, it's all about the money.

money has never been the bone of contention between GoI and Dassault. there is a difference between the rafales brought earlier and this buy. the previous one was a govt to govt deal which had to happen that way cause dassault wasn't willing to commit for HAL's quality assurance on india made Rafales, forget the money. so the ripping off didn't happen earlier and ripping off now will not happen if we negotiate well. this time, since it will be a dassault & reliance to govt. deal, and dassault doesn't have problems with reliance made rafale's quality, none that we know of, yet, in public domain. in any case, there will be another few years of prolonged negotiations even after MMRCA-II no matter who wins it. now, lets all pretend rafale has again been selected. yay. I'm simply asking to fast forward to that stage. now. the negotiations with govt, dassault, reliance and IAF on one table.

this time,cut the evaluation crap as the same planes are participating anyway. same freaking story. only difference, HAL is not the fixed indian manufacturer. cut the noise, go for the deal and voila monsieur, you will arrive at same conclusion post MMRCA II. rafale is still best pound for pound except gripen E which we shouldn't buy. same conclusion. MMRCA I.

this is for transparency dude. so that no can point fingers and even accuse Modi govt. of being partial to ambanis ie rafale.
 
I do not understand when people say medium weight etc etc
The criteria for that weight is by IAF, they can slide that scale up or down
Weight is important when its a carrier plane, but why the weight criteria when its land based plane?
Criteria should be performance, ability to carry load, what type of load, fuel saving rather the terms that show how the plane performs and if it can dogfight or not (LOL)
Ideally i would prefer the planes to have their own pilots and they have combat with each other. maybe best of 10 rounds. 4 vs 4 and also asymetrical 4 Vs 1 etc. ultimately we want a plane which performs and fights, and not just flies, which all planes do


we have 6 types of fighter planes.

all we need is three types at most.

a light fighter, a heavy fighter and a ground attack aircraft.

rest is immaterial to an actual airforce. we have an elephant for an airforce.

Ideally i would prefer the planes to have their own pilots and they have combat with each other. maybe best of 10 rounds. 4 vs 4 and also asymetrical 4 Vs 1 etc. ultimately we want a plane which performs and fights, and not just flies, which all planes do

you can't judge a fighter like that. you base a purchase on what capabilities are you buying for how much. how much will it cost overall to maintain it. economics is a big part of a purchase like MMRCA-II.

you balance your needs with the capabilities offered on one hand, how much money you have on the other hand. weigh both hands and make up your mind.
 
I do not understand when people say medium weight etc etc
The criteria for that weight is by IAF, they can slide that scale up or down
Experience shows that the LCC cost depends on mass and technological level. For two aircraft with the same capacity and the same level of technology, the lighter aircraft will be preferred to limit cost. To request an aircraft of a certain weight category is to ask not to exceed a certain budget during its operational life
 
IAF introduced the weight clause in order to keep the Su-30MKI out of the contest. Nothing else.

MRCA had a 20T MTOW limit.

And for MMRCA, in order to bring other heavier jets in, they relaxed the weight clause to 30T MTOW.
 
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The LCC would not be proportional to the weight,
In all honesty when someone talks of weight class for land based fighter planes I do feel they have vested interest and nothing else
BTW on of the ex-Air Marshals of IAF who was involved in putting the conditions did mention that they put the "Medium" part to keep out the entry of Su-30 MKI. So its on record. Please do not come with other BS please

Now lets say IAF becomes "eductated" and without vested interest, They should take out the "Medium" part and jjust go by the various performance criterias and testings, and then give points for the various criterias and rank them as per the same. Better to give points like in F1 racing. Then they can consider their financial bid, and it would be better to for all the companies to know that we shall need the Tot of the critical tech like say Active and passive avionics, etc etc etc, so that each plane that enters the RFP should be open to supply us the required tech that has been informed to them in advance. Any company that has reservations should be ranked last due to these critera as being "NOT PREFERED"

What you explained that is more or less something for bean counters and not for pilots. I suggest that you dont act like a bean counter.



Experience shows that the LCC cost depends on mass and technological level. For two aircraft with the same capacity and the same level of technology, the lighter aircraft will be preferred to limit cost. To request an aircraft of a certain weight category is to ask not to exceed a certain budget during its operational life
 
I do not agree with your weight theory my friend,

You say "three types" and you get into three weight classes? How about adding say Bantam weight, Feather weight, and super heavy weight?
I do classify planes with their Range + Load

Planes like Tejas (short range due to less fuel and light war load) are good as
1. Close range Strike-attack (using stand off missiles) Close range means range from base to the place of action.
2. Interceptor (since they have short range, they would have to be based near important cities or industrial areas to give them aerial protection
Even flying CAP over say Mumbai to give aerial cover for Mumbai city.

So in a way Tejas due to its small size and fuel capacity is short range MRCA. Agree?

Planes like Su-30 MKI using them as CAP planes is an overkill, as that would be like using a tank to kill a mouse. They are good as
1. Long and Medium range Strike, Attack (also using stand off missiles)
2. Tactical strike using Brahmos
3. Air superiority and Air Dominance,

These planes can be based in far bases and which reinforce the forward bases (Tejas bases) and provide areas which can be force multipliers

The biggest problem with IAF is that they lack the vision for the future, they are leadership and not a proactive leadership like a spolt brat.

Capabilites are important and realistic ones which are more important, What IAF ends up doing is selects something like 500 m water proof watch even though they have hydrophobia, Surely can get a good watch which is 50 M water proof, but they want 500 m water proof because its available,


we have 6 types of fighter planes.

all we need is three types at most.

a light fighter, a heavy fighter and a ground attack aircraft.

rest is immaterial to an actual airforce. we have an elephant for an airforce.

Ideally i would prefer the planes to have their own pilots and they have combat with each other. maybe best of 10 rounds. 4 vs 4 and also asymetrical 4 Vs 1 etc. ultimately we want a plane which performs and fights, and not just flies, which all planes do

you can't judge a fighter like that. you base a purchase on what capabilities are you buying for how much. how much will it cost overall to maintain it. economics is a big part of a purchase like MMRCA-II.

you balance your needs with the capabilities offered on one hand, how much money you have on the other hand. weigh both hands and make up your mind.
 
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I do not agree with your weight theory my friend,

You say "three types" and you get into three weight classes? How about adding say Bantam weight, Feather weight, and super heavy weight?
I do classify planes with their Range + Load

Planes like Tejas (short range due to less fuel and light war load) are good as
1. Close range Strike-attack (using stand off missiles) Close range means range from base to the place of action.
2. Interceptor (since they have short range, they would have to be based near important cities or industrial areas to give them aerial protection
Even flying CAP over say Mumbai to give aerial cover for Mumbai city.

So in a way Tejas due to its small size and fuel capacity is short range MRCA. Agree?

Planes like Su-30 MKI using them as CAP planes is an overkill, as that would be like using a tank to kill a mouse. They are good as
1. Long and Medium range Strike, Attack (also using stand off missiles)
2. Tactical strike using Brahmos
3. Air superiority and Air Dominance,

These planes can be based in far bases and which reinforce the forward bases (Tejas bases) and provide areas which can be force multipliers

The biggest problem with IAF is that they lack the vision for the future, they are leadership and not a proactive leadership like a spolt brat.

Capabilites are important and realistic ones which are more important, What IAF ends up doing is selects something like 500 m water proof watch even though they have hydrophobia, Surely can get a good watch which is 50 M water proof, but they want 500 m water proof because its available,


i did not really mean three wight classes, but three classes of fighters according to their role. let me put it this way, three classes of fighter according to their capabilities, not weight.

class 1 :

light fighter : lighter in weight and with capabilities reduced from class 2. basically lesser ferry range, lesser ground attack capabilities. like our tejas. gripen. what is basically called a point defence fighter but it is superfluous to call it a point defence fighter.

class 2 :
medium or heavy fighter : heavier than light fighter in size, fuel and capability. higher ferry range. will be used as the air superiority fighter. may or may not be an equally great ground attack fighter

class 3 :

dedicated ground attack fighter : designed to carry more payload like ordnance. will not and should not be sent for air superiority. will always fly under air fighter cover.

the above three classes is all any AF needs. ever. look at the successful and very successful AFs and compare their inventory with what IAF has bought. we should have bought enough mirages and not bought any other light capability fighter till tejas came online. what do we have ? 50 mirages, 50 mig29s, hundreds of jaguars which are an old buy. in any thinking air force they would have retired the jaguars in phases and not go for dubious and very accident prone DARIN systems, IMO. the sheer amount of money they cost and for how long can we use that capability ? not feasible. i would have been happier for the IAF to work closely with Dassault and they could have redesigned the mirage while it was in production, to be a bomb truck. we could have had 100 mirages and 100-150 redesigned mirage bomb trucks. imagine the simplicity it would have brought. without any..any reductions in capabilities. but no, IAF acts like spoiled brats of rich dad. the kick backs. the foreign tours. the free women and booze.
 
The LCC would not be proportional to the weight,
In all honesty when someone talks of weight class for land based fighter planes I do feel they have vested interest and nothing else
BTW on of the ex-Air Marshals of IAF who was involved in putting the conditions did mention that they put the "Medium" part to keep out the entry of Su-30 MKI. So its on record. Please do not come with other BS please
I have here an article that compares several cost models for fighter aircraft and among these models there is one that gives the following formula:
0.003069*(static thrust)(max speed)/combat weight which is called specific power, and Rand corporation said
In all previous airframe cost model developed at Rand, airframe unit weight and maximum speed were found to be the most reliable independent variable.
But the specific power applies even better to fighters.
But perhaps you are better than Rand corporation to model fighter cost?
https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/papers/2008/P6011.pdf
 
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If you do agree with part of what I said mostly about capability and Load (Fuel/weapons and range)
You might start classifying them as Short Range MRCA and Long Range MRCA.

When A-10 was the best plane for CAS, CAS was usually done with bombs and missiles that were not that reliable The technology was with USA only and these smart weapons were expensive, but now, with cheaper Standoff ASMs we are able to conduct CAS wth Tejas or Jaguars or Hawks, What would be important is to have a good Targeting pod (you can use co-ordinates given by other planes to target also, And you need good accurate missiles that can strike target with high accuracy from Stand off range. There is no need to get "down and dirty"


For Strike version, you need plane that can carry a heavy useful load to useful range. something that is within the Su-30 MKI alley.
Thus in a way I see Tejas as something that manages something at short range (within few hundred kms) like short range attack, strike, interceptors etc
Su-30 MKI does rest of the complimentary roles like Mid-long range Strike, interdiction, Air superiority, Air domiance etc.

If France and European countries had a need they would have tried to build something similar to what Su-35 is, but their land mass is small and thus "medium range" plane which is suitable for them. but for land mass as big as India or Indonesia, etc Rafale with its Range + warload does not have the ability to hit countries like China where it could hurt them.

i did not really mean three wight classes, but three classes of fighters according to their role. let me put it this way, three classes of fighter according to their capabilities, not weight.

class 1 :

light fighter : lighter in weight and with capabilities reduced from class 2. basically lesser ferry range, lesser ground attack capabilities. like our tejas. gripen. what is basically called a point defence fighter but it is superfluous to call it a point defence fighter.

class 2 :
medium or heavy fighter : heavier than light fighter in size, fuel and capability. higher ferry range. will be used as the air superiority fighter. may or may not be an equally great ground attack fighter

class 3 :

dedicated ground attack fighter : designed to carry more payload like ordnance. will not and should not be sent for air superiority. will always fly under air fighter cover.

the above three classes is all any AF needs. ever. look at the successful and very successful AFs and compare their inventory with what IAF has bought. we should have bought enough mirages and not bought any other light capability fighter till tejas came online. what do we have ? 50 mirages, 50 mig29s, hundreds of jaguars which are an old buy. in any thinking air force they would have retired the jaguars in phases and not go for dubious and very accident prone DARIN systems, IMO. the sheer amount of money they cost and for how long can we use that capability ? not feasible. i would have been happier for the IAF to work closely with Dassault and they could have redesigned the mirage while it was in production, to be a bomb truck. we could have had 100 mirages and 100-150 redesigned mirage bomb trucks. imagine the simplicity it would have brought. without any..any reductions in capabilities. but no, IAF acts like spoiled brats of rich dad. the kick backs. the foreign tours. the free women and booze.
 
YES. why not? We are a country which managed to send Probe to MARS a cost per km as cheap as taxi ride in India.. For the very same the Americans spent a lot of amount more.. We gave the world ZERO....

I have here an article that compares several cost models for fighter aircraft and among these models there is one that gives the following formula:
0.003069*(static thrust)(max speed)/combat weight which is called specific power, and Rand corporation said

But the specific power applies even better to fighters.
But perhaps you are better than Rand corporation to model fighter cost?
https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/papers/2008/P6011.pdf
 
When A-10 was the best plane for CAS, CAS was usually done with bombs and missiles that were not that reliable The technology was with USA only and these smart weapons were expensive, but now, with cheaper Standoff ASMs we are able to conduct CAS wth Tejas or Jaguars or Hawks, What would be important is to have a good Targeting pod (you can use co-ordinates given by other planes to target also, And you need good accurate missiles that can strike target with high accuracy from Stand off range. There is no need to get "down and dirty"

A-10 is a different bird than a fighter plane. A-10 has advantages in it's design, it's focus. an A-10 hunts on the ground. it's not a multi purpose plane even if it can carry AAMs. I hope to effing non existent god that DRDO makes something like an A-10 and hands it over to the Army air corps. you know what it will do ? it has the potential to redefine our strategy just like the apaches will do. but rightly enough we can't use an A-10 in kashmir nor in NE. a heli is more useful. a tejas or any fighter jet is a type of bird while A-10 is another. A-10 can slow down, catch it's breadth, carefully aim and hurls 30mm monster bullets while scores of enemy is also carefully shooting puny bullets at it. it's brute force. no tactics. i mean tactics is there, but a A-10 doesn't run away from a hail of bullets.

If France and European countries had a need they would have tried to build something similar to what Su-35 is, but their land mass is small and thus "medium range" plane which is suitable for them. but for land mass as big as India or Indonesia, etc Rafale with its Range + warload does not have the ability to hit countries like China where it could hurt them.

my dear phellow, i think you're making a mistake here. let me explain what I mean when I say that. su-35 is a Russian design through and through which has it's consequences. remember su-35 actually is a su-27. basically. when was su-27 designed ? in the 1970s. plus, see, here's the nub. the soviets ordered two types for development. one small, one big. you see, they started work on a mig 29 as well as a flanker. almost at the same time. they also felt a need for a mig 29 as well as a flanker. (it's just a sad story that USSR had no money to pursue another small jet after the mig 29 series, while Russia pursues new technology in a heavier air superiority fighter, the replacement for the flanker design).

you're partially right that france doesn't need a long range fighter just because it has a smaller landmass. now think about this. Rafales have flown from French mainland, completed operations in northern africa and ME and flown back home.with the help of refuelers. So ? that negates the lack of long range of rafale, no ?in fact, if you design a plane to be a part of a strategy, you will design it differently than a fighter designed to carryout lone wolf attacks. your objective changes. Now, why is rafale small ? because it can do even better not just equally well than a su-35 in it's smaller design. a smaller plane is better than a larger plane when the capabilities are matched, atleast for air fighters. its easier to operate a smaller machine and since its smaller and lighter, it also will save fuel. cheaper to operate. the su-35 series and the su-34 series were designed to carry out stand alone missions through out the European theater not just the russian borders. without refuelers. that was the extreme end of operations which was kept in mind while the design was done in ? that's right 1970s. look at the su-57. exact same philosophy. long enough range to go bomb france and UK and come back without any other help. see, technical changes could have made it possible to build a smaller su-57 but they still went for a large af plane. because the strategy and requirements of 1970's USSR and 2010's Su-57 hasn't changed with time. still the same. resulting in similar strategies and similar requirements out of their fighter planes and bomber designs.

rafale has not been designed that way. rafale follows another philosophy altogether. rafale could have been bigger and more powerful. the thing is, that's not the designers wanted. they knew and assumed while designing rafale that french refuelers will be available to assist rafale. they did not compromise on it's all other capabilities. they just made it more lethal by making it smaller in size. it was a choice out of strategy. just like su-35. so, land mass theory is correct except that the designers didn't think of national borders. they thought of capability balanced with expenditure to keep such a machine running.
 
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The landmass argument is a bad one.
  1. France is an expeditionary power, it doesn't just stay at home. In particular, there are commitment to help defend many African nations.
  2. France isn't just its European mainland, it has scattered overseas territories as well, which the French military need to be able to defend. The distances are huge: 16000 km between Paris and Mata Utu, for example. France notably has the largest Exclusive Economic Zone in the world.
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YES. why not? We are a country which managed to send Probe to MARS a cost per km as cheap as taxi ride in India.. For the very same the Americans spent a lot of amount more.. We gave the world ZERO....
India gave ZERO to the world.

India gave @smestarz to the world.

A conclusion?