In message , Chad Irby
writes
In article ,
"Paul J. Adam" wrote:
So, you plan to consign US pilots to agonised fiery deaths as their
antiquated deathtraps are blasted from the skies by newer, deadlier
enemies?

Note that those old "antiquated deathtraps" are competitive with the
current offerings from Europe, and much better than anything else in the
world.

If that were true, then we'd have binned Eurofighter in 1994 and leased
F-16s instead.

Seriously examined and pushed quite hard.

Or are these upgraded aircraft thoroughly capable against the current
and projected threat, making the F-22 an expensive luxury?

They're good enough for air support and moderate-threat missions, but
not as good as the next generation planes (the F-22 and F-35).

So what threat _does_ demand the F-22?

Either your existing platforms are obsolete and need replacement, or
they aren't...

False premise. There's more than one mission, more than one level of
threat, and more than one plane in the inventory.

But the new aircraft will make the old aircraft disappear overnight.
Your own words.

I'm interested in the scenario where this is the case.

Long range missile combat.

Interesting to recall that the F-16 was designed explicitly to avoid
this "useless boondoggle" and BVR capability was a late addition; and
the F-15 was designed to be an agile dogfighter that also carried the
Sparrow. (1970s dogma, complicated causes.)

Interesting also to know that the only aircraft to better the Typhoon in
BVR combat is the F-22... except that for a constant-cost comparison you
can't afford enough F-22s to match the Typhoon force. (Being better only
counts if you can intercept enough Red raids: 'better aircraft' that are
spread too thin don't help)

"Not many" being around 150 Typhoons for the RAF _if_ Tranche 3 bites
the dust (which is by no means a given - serious contractual and
workshare issues to resolve before it's doable).

Just wait until the new planes hit the inventory, and watch the old
planes disappear completely overnight...

So the "old planes" (the F-15s and F-16s you were previously expecting
to upgrade) are actually _not_ up to the job, since they'll 'disappear
overnight' when the new airframes arrive?

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBoxatjrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk