Military Equipment Sperging Thread - The Tiger II is a better tank than the M1 Abrams edition

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Falcos_Commisar said:
Exactly but you'll still need a radar / laser to rangefind and a system to program the shell vs fire and the shell does the work 😎
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Dissecting a dud should provide answers about the exact nature. Then again the biggest issue with all these smart shells has always been if the electronics can tolerate existing in the rather unpleasant environment they are at.
 
A song we all know well by now is sung once again; France wants out of the Eurodrone program, which would spike the total program cost by about €700 million. France says MALE drones are not survivable enough in hot conflicts, Germany Italy and Spain are going ahead with it anyways. Sad, funny, many such cases.

 
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VF-1J Armored Valkyrie said:
A song we all know well by now is sung once again; France wants out of the Eurodrone program, which would spike the total program cost by about €700 million. MALE drones are not survivable in hot conflicts, Germany Italy and Spain are going ahead with it anyways.
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Right, take away the Europeans email systems and cloud servers, they clearly shouldn't be allowed to collaborate on anything ever again. I wonder what the total amount of man hours wasted on all these pan-european projects is, I'm sure it'd be beyond comprehension.
 
Hatewerfer said:
Right, take away the Europeans email systems and cloud servers, they clearly shouldn't be allowed to collaborate on anything ever again. I wonder what the total amount of man hours wasted on all these pan-european projects is, I'm sure it'd be beyond comprehension.
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As a burgermutt who hasn't gotten every last bit of Euro defense news on my radar over the years, it kinda feels like the unifying thread is planning for France to be involved at all. They always change their minds last minute and do their own thing. It makes me wonder why Germany doesn't look elsewhere for funding and/or idustrial partners for Pan-European stuff. Maybe Poland, or the Scandis now that more of them are in NATO. I'm sure for Eurodrone in particular they wanted Dessault in on it but working with the French just never seems to end well.
 
VF-1J Armored Valkyrie said:
A song we all know well by now is sung once again; France wants out of the Eurodrone program, which would spike the total program cost by about €700 million
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How many times has this happened now? The Leopard, the AFVG, the Eurofighter, the 5th gen fighter, now this drone. These group projects always end up going a way France doesn't like and France drops out to do its own thing.
 
VF-1J Armored Valkyrie said:
A song we all know well by now is sung once again; France wants out of the Eurodrone program, which would spike the total program cost by about €700 million. France says MALE drones are not survivable enough in hot conflicts, Germany Italy and Spain are going ahead with it anyways. Sad, funny, many such cases.

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EU totally going to replace the Americans as global superpower. Just as soon as theh figure out how to get France and Germany to agree on everything.
 
Welf Welf said:
How many times has this happened now? The Leopard, the AFVG, the Eurofighter, the 5th gen fighter, now this drone. These group projects always end up going a way France doesn't like and France drops out to do its own thing.
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I guess I'd give those kudos to the UK, they seem much better at balancing the desire to have their own military identity and the desire to participate in big pan-European projects. How is Tempest again these days? The Japanese are on board now? And their shipbuilding is also filling out some navies that depserately need those new ships.

Maybe I'm just baised on behalf of gramps, but Anglo military culture has clearly won this era of the rivalry.
 
VF-1J Armored Valkyrie said:
I guess I'd give those kudos to the UK, they seem much better at balancing the desire to have their own military identity and the desire to participate in big pan-European projects. How is Tempest again these days? The Japanese are on board now? And their shipbuilding is also filling out some navies that depserately need those new ships.

Maybe I'm just baised on behalf of gramps, but Anglo military culture has clearly won this era of the rivalry.
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Them cranking out a few purpose-designed carriers is remarkable considering how under-funded everything is. The tech and competency difference between Europe and supposed superpowers of Asia is quite impressive in some areas.
 
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VF-1J Armored Valkyrie said:
It makes me wonder why Germany doesn't look elsewhere for funding and/or idustrial partners for Pan-European stuff. Maybe Poland, or the Scandis now that more of them are in NATO.
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The UK might be an option now, we just signed onto another European defence programme today: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c875jj3y475o

The current UK government has always been quite pro-European, and Trump's actions have merely encouraged further rapprochement. The biggest obstacle to more UK involvement in EU stuff has up until now usually been the French bitching and moaning, but if they've dropped out I can definitely see us stepping in.

VF-1J Armored Valkyrie said:
How is Tempest again these days?
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Tempest is going surprisingly well all things considered, there's the usual bickering but no major issues. The British testbed plane for radar/comms/sensors was photographed for the first time just the other day, and supposedly the Japs and Italians are on track with theirs as well.
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VF-1J Armored Valkyrie said:
The Japanese are on board now?
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Yep currently an equal 3 way split between UK/Italy/Japan. There's been talk of expanding the program to include the Saudis, and given the FCAS shitshow, potentially the Germans. Of the two the Saudi one seems more likely IMO. While it's likely they'll want at least some workshare since they're seemingly no longer happy simply being everyone's cash cow, I suspect they'd accept a small enough slice to be worth it, unlike Germany who is almost certainly going to want something closer to an equal split.

Man vs persistent rats said:
Them cranking out a few purpose-designed carriers is remarkable considering how under-funded everything is. The tech and competency difference between Europe and supposed superpowers of Asia is quite impressive in some areas.
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While I have my issues with the Elizabeth's, the fact we got them out despite the usual issues for any major project + the 2008/9 recession and a change of Government is a miracle. They're also theoretically surprisingly capable ships, despite the lack of catapults, mostly because they're fucking massive. In terms of displacement they absolutely mog the chinks first two shitty soviet knockoffs, and is surprisingly close to their new Type 003. That has the advantage of an EMALS, but the disadvantage of being built by chinks who know precisely jack shit about running and maintaining carrier operations long term (anyone else remember when they took the flight deck off a scrapped Aussie carrier, then asked for blueprints?)
 
East_Clintwood said:
While I have my issues with the Elizabeth's, the fact we got them out despite the usual issues for any major project + the 2008/9 recession and a change of Government is a miracle. They're also theoretically surprisingly capable ships, despite the lack of catapults, mostly because they're fucking massive. In terms of displacement they absolutely mog the chinks first two shitty soviet knockoffs, and is surprisingly close to their new Type 003. That has the advantage of an EMALS, but the disadvantage of being built by chinks who know precisely jack shit about running and maintaining carrier operations long term (anyone else remember when they took the flight deck off a scrapped Aussie carrier, then asked for blueprints?)
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The Chinese have been operating a carrier for roughly as long as Imperial Japan by the mid 1930s and now had a CATOBAR carrier, something only the French have outside of the USA after the Brits stupidity stopped thinking that capability was important in the late 1970s.

They're going to get better at it and if argue they're probably better at carrier ops now then the Russians ever were.
East_Clintwood said:
Yep currently an equal 3 way split between UK/Italy/Japan. There's been talk of expanding the program to include the Saudis, and given the FCAS shitshow, potentially the Germans. Of the two the Saudi one seems more likely IMO. While it's likely they'll want at least some workshare since they're seemingly no longer happy simply being everyone's cash cow, I suspect they'd accept a small enough slice to be worth it, unlike Germany who is almost certainly going to want something closer to an equal split
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Sweden is also looking to get involved in GCAP.

Saudi will probably want some final assembly done in Saudi Arabia and maybe make some parts.

I'd guess a GCAP prototype will be flying in the next ~24-36 months and service entry by 2035 or so.
 
East_Clintwood said:
While I have my issues with the Elizabeth's, the fact we got them out despite the usual issues for any major project + the 2008/9 recession and a change of Government is a miracle. They're also theoretically surprisingly capable ships, despite the lack of catapults, mostly because they're fucking massive
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Is there still a plan and/or timetable for the drone catapults? IMO the biggest single thing holding the QEs back is a lack of fixed wing AEWC, having those catapults and a dedicated MALE/HALE drone for early warning would be massive.
 
Falcos_Commisar said:
Sweden is also looking to get involved in GCAP.

Saudi will probably want some final assembly done in Saudi Arabia and maybe make some parts.

I'd guess a GCAP prototype will be flying in the next ~24-36 months and service entry by 2035 or so.
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Do you think Sweden's interest makes it realistic that they might abandon domestic development entirely? The world seems more ready than ever for a slightly cheaper but broadly capable jet, but perhaps the KF-21 is going to take away some of that demand.

All of Sweden's neighbours are phasing out everything except the F35 so it seems unlikely that their comparable economy could simultaneously operate two models even though it works well for larger forces.

Maybe it's also an acknowledgement that the second fleet of cheaper planes in future will just be even cheaper fighter-like drones, and manned fighters will become even more expensive motherships (something that I doubt Sweden has the capacity to develop alone).
 
Man vs persistent rats said:
Do you think Sweden's interest makes it realistic that they might abandon domestic development entirely? The world seems more ready than ever for a slightly cheaper but broadly capable jet, but perhaps the KF-21 is going to take away some of that demand.

All of Sweden's neighbours are phasing out everything except the F35 so it seems unlikely that their comparable economy could simultaneously operate two models even though it works well for larger forces.

Maybe it's also an acknowledgement that the second fleet of cheaper planes in future will just be even cheaper fighter-like drones, and manned fighters will become even more expensive motherships (something that I doubt Sweden has the capacity to develop alone).
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The issue of operating multiple models of equivalent aircrafts is already a known one in the Finnish circles, because before the Hornet, the FAF operated the Draken and MiG-21 at the same time. What you do is find whatever niche suits best for each model and more importantly, leverage having multiple models as a way to have a more robust support network because you won't be tied to just one company or country. Also, makes adversary training work better.

Sweden in the past has done independent development work to some very clever aircrafts and the fundamental reasons why the Gripen stalled out as a project was due to the cold war ending. Gripen also was being sold at a time when the main issue with everyone's mind was COIN and it was in the uncomfortable niche of not being backed by the marketing powers of larger countries while Swedish government was drawing down it's military because eurocrats in the 90's really did think that history was over when the Berlin wall fell.

Issue is ultimately the amount of political will and fiscal resources to get the project done. They are not short on good engineers who can make the thing work. I also do think that ultimately, they were the ones with the most fitting doctrine for an european air force because as the war in Ukraine has shown, any airfield within cruise missile range is not safe and proper aircraft dispersal is vital. Making sure their aircrafts can have all the basic refueling and re-armament processes be simple enough that a small team of conscripts can do it also is vital.

If anything, now would be the best time for something like the Gripen to be simplified and sold as a cheap fighter for the EU countries that still are operating MiGs and SUs.
 
The Grognard said:
If anything, now would be the best time for something like the Gripen to be simplified and sold as a cheap fighter for the EU countries that still are operating MiGs and SUs.
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Honestly the Gripen should have a bright future as the 21st century Freedom Fighter, but the Swedes aren't particularly good at marketing. There's a ton of South American, Oceanic, and African nations that would have a good use for the Gripen.
 
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