On 10 Jul 2003 12:47:22 -0700, JGB wrote:
(phil hunt) wrote in message ...

Couldn't Israel have funded construction itself? Another small
country, Sweden, manages to.

Yes, you're basically right that Sweden is an anomaly. A relatively small
country of about 8 or 9 million that manages to develop and produce
some of the finest military equipment in the world, as well as automobiles
and other high priced consumer goods. Still, Sweden's population is
nevertheless over 50% larger than Israel's, and it has not been involved
in a single war in well over a century, and sits on mountains of iron

Not really relevant, since (1) raw materials amount to an
insignificant fraction of the cost of a fighter aircraft, and (2)
national wealth isn't really determined by mineral deposits -- ask
any Japanese.

with a highly educated population.

So has Israel.

Althogh Sweden's GDP is higher than Israel's, Israel spends a higher
fraction on defense, so the amount each country spends on its air
force (including procurement) is probably roughly comparable.

Israel, by contrast, is a mere 54
years in the making, with smaller population, that was only recently
industrialized, and has been expending vast treasures and large amounts
of blood over that period of time with little letup. Israel bit off more
than it could chew with the Lavi in the early '80s. But at this time it
would not be sensible to produce a first rate platform on its own. Even
France, Germany, England and Russia will have a tough time keeping up with
latest generation US platforms, such as the F-22.

Firstly, England doesn't have a government, so its isn't having a
tough time, or any other kind of time, doing anything.

The UK and Germany (together with Italy and Spain) together produce
an aircraft which is roughly comparable with the F-22: the F-22 is
more highly specified (F-22 has stealth and a higher power to weight
ratio, but a higher wing loading), but costs rather more than the
Typhoon, so on perfermance/price they are probably about the same.

Frankly, the best thing that could happen to ISrael is if
the entire world would be a global arms and aid embargo on the ENTIRE
MIDDLE EAST, including Israel and the Arab and Muslim countries altogether.

This isn't going to happen, and if it did, I doubt if it would
help Israel. Sure, Israel has got more technology than the other
countries in the region, but without aid they can't afford to make
many high-tech weapons, and without imports it's going to have
difficulty making military jet engines.

The Muslim countries in the middle east have a much larger aggregate
GDP, and proably more of the highly skilled and educated people
needed to make morern weapons in the aggregate, so in the long term
they would be able to make more weapons, of all types than Israel.

--
Phil
"If only sarcasm could overturn bureaucracies"
-- NTK, commenting on www.cabalamat.org/weblog/art_29.html