Well look at who all bought the Rafale. Egypt,Qatar,Greece and India. All use some amount of Russian hardware in a major way while they are also in good relations with the west. The Qataris are the only ones who are not using any Russian hardware but they do have a flexible foreign policy since they play against Saudis as well as Iran, while simultaneously cosying up with Israelis and use Al-Jazeera for propaganda against their opponents. French hardware is sanction free and matches up with American tech in most cases so buying it makes sense. Greece can buy the f35 so can the Qataris even India if it scraps the s400 deal.
Qatar was not offered the F-35 they are actually buying F-15's and they already fly Mirage-2000s so it's a no duh that they buy french planes. Greece made the decision to buy the French plane before F-35 was offered. Moment Turkey was kicked out Greece pounced and Greece like India will likely only get a couple dozen French planes as they start receiving F-35's. As for India it's more than the s400 that is the issue but s400 has been made the issue. Even if India scrapped the s400 they'd still be a lot of hurdles for any sale of F-35's to India.
Obviously look at the f-15k slam eagle deal and claims of U.S lobbying to force the Koreans to buy the f-15.
Oy vey. It's always the US forced but they always leave out Dassault bribes in SK... just like in India. Lets look back what the story was all about...
Bribery scandal shakes fighters deal
SEOUL, March 11 (UPI) -- A South Korean military official was arrested on charges of receiving bribes from France's Dassault Aviation, a company that was considered one of the contenders for South Korea's $3.2 billion dollar fighter jet contract.
The bribery case could lead to the French aircraft maker being dropped from consideration. Dassault's Rafale aircraft and Boeing Co.'s F-15K are seen as front-runners for the contract. Also being considered are Eurofighter consortium's Typhoon 2000 and the Russian Sukhoi Su-32.
A special envoy from the French government visited South Korea Defense Minister Kim Dong-shin on Monday to the South Koreans to select the Rafale.
"The procurement project is very important to not only South Korea-France relations but South Korea-EU ties as well," said former French Ambassador to South Korea Jean Bernard Ouvrieu, according to Defense Ministry spokesman Hwang Eui-don.
The French envoy also expressed concerns that the Seoul government may yield to U.S. pressure to buy Boeing's F-15K, citing allegations that the Defense Ministry is favoring F-15K in consideration of its long-standing security alliance with the United States.
Last week, the French daily, La Tribune said that Dassault might not win the South Korean project because of political reasons even though its Rafale jet proved superior. South Korea's secret military report recently showed that Rafale fighters beat all its competitors, including Boeing's F-15K, during last year's test flights.
The French mission's visit came shortly after a South Korean Air Force officer, identified only by his family name, Cho, was arrested on a charge of taking $8,370 from Dassault's local agency, Comet, in exchange for key information on selection guidelines.
Cho, who served as a vice chief of the evaluation team, allegedly advised Comet to increase the scope of technology transfer and subcontracts for local aerospace companies, saying it would help win the contract. Cho was accused of keeping classified documents about the fighter evaluation without approval, officials said.
The scandal could result in elimination of Dassault from the competition to supply the South Korea Air Force with 40 jet fighters by 2008. Under provisional contracts signed last month, the Defense Ministry can cancel contracts if a bidder is confirmed to engage in illegal practices, including bribery.
A South Korean military official was arrested on charges of receiving bribes from France's Dassault Aviation, a company that was considered one of the contender
www.upi.com
So a frenchy who is butt hurt that they got caught is spreading rumors that US MIGHT pressure SK and a "secret military report" that nobody has seen, and that SK government has denied it came from them, says french plane beat out all its competitors... in what? What are the details of the report?
See the french plane fanboys always use this example when its plane and other weapon systems loses to US. They use this rumor started by a frenchy that US only won because of pressure. The frenchy's believe the only reason the F-35 won in Switzerland was because of "US pressure" and use the South Korea rumor as evidence.
Also M1 tanks or Bradley's don't give the amount of strategic overreach that f-35 does. M1 and Bradley's are 30 year old hardware with no big tech jumps unlike the f-35.
U.S naval ships are literally crown jewel tech they far far more valuable than the f35. I doubt the Americans will give zumwalt design to any of its allies(provided they can afford it in the first place.) The only ones using American naval hardware are the Koreans and Japanese who are both basically glorified American colonies. With naval radars and sm6 missiles. America won't even share that tech with any of its other partners
Oh so only when it's the F-35 or other fighters does US "grip" them, right?
Rafale's can supercruise, f-35's cannot.
I always find this funny since supercruise is never brought up by Dassault or potential customers when it comes to the french planes capabilities. It's also funny that dassault doesn't even give an estimation of range of supercruise unlike they do with F-22 and F-35 that can "supercruise" at mach 1.2 over 150+ miles. It's almost as if dassault and potential customers are saying that supercruise is so irrelevant in combat that they don't bring it up. In fact supercruise is so irrelevant that they buy F-35's over fighters that can supposedly "supercruise..." say whaaa?
Rafale can carry similar maximum payloads of munitions (neither the the typhoon or the gripen are capable of that).
No it can't. Not with its three tanks.
It's much more maintenance friendly than the f-35.
Is it? In 2020, if we only count those of AdlA, they had a 62% MCR and it isn't that better today. French have 132 units of AdlA and only 80-82 are available..? That's horrid.
The f-35 does out do it in stealth and avionics with a bigger radar. But stealth is yet to be properly tested. Even though the concept has existed since the 90's
Lol. Stealth has been properly tested in 1991 over Baghdad where they had the second most dense IADS in the world after Moscow. B2s and F-117s also tested against IADS and of of the tens thousands of sorties B2 and F-117 combined have flown only one was shot down due to USAF incompetence. Stealth has existed since the 70's do some research.
Mostly smaller euro-players but yeah. F-35 is a step up over the eurocanards in every way except flight performance.
Flight performance? Care to elaborate more? Are you talking about clean configuration or combat load because the Swiss report talks about F-35's "flight performance" over the 4th gen fighters in combat load and take a guess what they said?
