MMRCA 2.0 - Updates and Discussions

What is your favorite for MMRCA 2.0 ?

  • F-35 Blk 4

    Votes: 44 16.4%
  • Rafale F4

    Votes: 205 76.5%
  • Eurofighter Typhoon T3

    Votes: 5 1.9%
  • Gripen E/F

    Votes: 5 1.9%
  • F-16 B70

    Votes: 1 0.4%
  • F-18 SH

    Votes: 10 3.7%
  • F-15EX

    Votes: 11 4.1%
  • Mig-35

    Votes: 2 0.7%

  • Total voters
    268
  • Poll closed .
I wish for once RST was original , came up with his own bon mots & stopped aping me in an attempt to insult me. It dilutes whatever little effect his intended barbs have which is more like a tooth pick pricking your gums.

Imitation may be the ultimate form of flattery & compliment & I do realise RST is complimenting me by aping me as he has been doing since forever but I sincerely urge him to grow up & cultivate a more sophisticated sense of humour.

Reading is essential for it & I can recommend quite a few authors.


Actually this funding is the crux of the issue . Even now we seem to be spending something like around 80 billion USD per annum on infrastructure . And these massive costs sunk into infrastructure building isn't a the first time we're doing so . We've been doing it consistently for the past 2 years at least. Yet how much are we spending on defence CAPEX ?

Is it affordability which is the issue or something else whatever that something else is ? It's not as if we can't afford the 114 Rafales even today either thru imports or thru MII or a mix of both AND run those indigenous programs but the important part is we aren't . Why ? I've no clue.

If this is the present state of affairs why even look to the future when the maximum threat we'd be facing will manifest itself before the end of this decade or thereabouts. By the same time next decade we should be out of it , in what shape God alone knows but what are we going to do spending all that money on prime defence equipment then ? It'd be like shutting the door after the horse has bolted.

This has been precisely what Hellfire has been flagging since a few years now. The Agniveer scheme is also part of the same thought process as is the fact that we've still not separated the Rashtriya Rifles which is primarily an organisation involved in intensive CI from the main body - the IA leaving the latter to focus on augmenting its war fighting abilities leading many critics to declare that the IA since the past 3 decades is now a fine CI force not a conventional army in the strict sense of how one goes about defining an army .

One doubts whether this government ever considered this move for it's been a decade since it's been in power & never once have we seen anything remotely said leave aside done on those lines. And the Congress has been no better in this regard . All this talk of budgeting past present or future should be seen purely from that PoV not the kind of fanciful statements of our economy a decade hence will mirror what China was a decade earlier & all that blah.

I've explained plenty of times in the past this penchant of RST of passing off his idiosyncrasies as official government policies & then stubbornly defending it as if this is the hill he wishes to die on instead of being matured enough to declare it as his suppositions going by the evidence in hand .

The IAF not going in for the entire quantum of 114 Rafales in 2012 or 2016 or even today is not part of some great brainwave the IAF may have had . It's simply a function of events , the IAF & the government of the day not being on the same page & plain misfortune.

Hence all these huge paragraphs of knowledge RST is inflicting us with is both juvenile thinking & quite unnecessary .

The tweet on MTA was included so as to quote the person in toto. As of now , I'm not particularly bothered on what the government's thinking is on this matter when the more pressing issues of Fighter Aircraft procurement which in itself is the life blood of any AF , particularly ours , at a critical juncture in its journey like it is in the present is being ignored . I mean in the light of all this , who gives a phuck to the MTA.

Having said that the fact that we didn't get into any JVs then or now nor are we supporting indigenous ventures like the NAL's present one for the RTA on the table since AI 23 at the very least & which is since languishing is particularly galling.

The Chinese launched their ventures in civilian airliners when their economy was about our size nearly 2 decades ago & the results are there for everyone to see . The C-919 which was initiated in 2008 now has an order book of in excess of 1000 nos . Ditto for the ARJ21 which is the equivalent of our proposed RTA which began its development journey in 2002 when the Chinese GDP was ~ 2 trillion USD.
 
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Man, what a dumb post by Ignorants. Prefect example for the application of the a** and elbow idiom. And damn, I forgot about the other thread, probably 'cause how nonsensical the discussion was.

IAF's previous doctrine was released in 2007 followed by a new one in 2022 and our procurement plan matches these two doctrinal changes.

There's nothing wrong with Matheswaran's MMRCA, the same thing has been pushed for MRFA as well, only the weightage towards specific technologies has changed.

It was a Rafale/Typhoon problem, both jets being the best of a previous generation and not suitable for the next gen fight.

4th gen began in the 70s and 80s and culminated into its best version in the form of Rafale/Typhoon by 2018 and 2021 (F3R and Tranche 3A) resply. We just had the honor of being unlucky enough to almost sign up for the version just behind the best 4.5th gen jet (F3R vs F3.4).

And now MRFA was delayed to the point we can actually introduce 6th gen tech via Rafale F5. Naturally, other competitors would have cooked up something similar to offer within that timeframe. So we are now entering 6th gen instead of getting stuck with a whole lot of 4.5th gen aircraft with no real future. In the meantime, 36 Rafale F3R, LCA Mk1A and LCA Mk2 will bridge the gap with peak 4.5th and early 5th gen tech.

I had always said that to fight the J-20 and other next gen Chinese jets, we will need a Rafale configuration that's the same as what's coming with F5, and that F4 and below are not suitable for that role. Funny how people tend to forget this.

Now one could argue that MMRCA would have delivered in 2018 and we could have taken F5 deliveries after 2035, even if it's for a small number. That's a decent 20 years right? And that's the problem. We would have paid a huge amount for what's clearly a 4.5th gen jet, locked that budget up for only a temporary superiority, and lost that very quickly, we have already reached that point, and then get stuck with almost 200 inadequate jets that would have been surpassed by LCA Mk2 by 2030 with GaN tech, and then pay an equally large amount to inadequately upgrade the now old Rafales to a lower standard than what would be normal for its time; ie, the F5/F6, when the same old jet would be in the process of being phased out of French service. We were headed for a ridiculous situation, no different from how Russian Flankers are now half a generation ahead of the MKI. We were lucky enough to escape this trap.

Instead, Parrikar killed MMRCA, and what he did was plug some of the gap with 36 Rafales to achieve deterrence, continuing our defensive posture against China, and invested the rest of the money for the next gen fight, like an IADS, force multipliers, a new space plan, BMD, base infrastructure and indigenous fighters.

Another important point to note is Modi went behind Parrikar's back to begin the GTG deal in parallel for a new version of the Rafale, so the IAF was already dealing with MMRCA's obsolescence even before it was signed. I guess China's advancements have come as a surprise to everyone. There should be at least 2 J-XXs in development right now, successors to the J-10 and J-16, so that means Rafale F5 or bust.
Was telling this beginning that Parikar did more harm to force than Antony,he was the person responsible for sad demise of mmrca1 tender. And forced IAF to induct that aircraft akin to a trainer aircraft as a fighter jet .
 
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Post 5284:

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No point in addressing him anymore.

Ignorants claims the IAF thought up all what I said, but that's not the case. In 2015, the IAF wanted MMRCA to go through, the F3+ family. When the F5 showed up, they would asked for a number of those jets too. What would have really happened is had the IAF wanted the F3s upgraded to F5s, the French would have politely declined the request due to the impossibilty of the evolution and would have offered the F5 itself, separate process.

When 18 Su-30Ks and MKs were sold to the IAF before MKI, it was based on the idea that they will be MKIzed once development was complete. When that didn't happen, the IAF asked for the older jets to be swapped out for new ones. We signed the deal in 2009 for 18 new MKIs. So it's not like the IAF has not experienced this before.

But neither the cancelation of MMRCA nor FGFA happened through some stroke of brilliance, it was just the way it was. Even in 2019, the IAF wanted the MRFA to go ahead, this time for the F4 version. The goal being getting the old stuff, and then aiming for a few of the new stuff later on. This is how the forces operate, they want the best thing available today, tomorrow and the day after, and they fight for a bigger budget in the process.

So what I'm referring to is the massive delay between 2015 and 2025 that delayed MRFA. After the MMRCA and FGFA ended, LCA Mk1A took centerstage, this gave the IAF time to create a new set of requirements for 2022; MKI MLU, LCA Mk2, MRFA and AMCA. The new set of requirements for all 4 jets seem to be aimed towards new gen, ie, with drones. And the new MRFA has been timed to coincide with the arrival of next gen avionics and capabilities. Both Rafale and Typhoon are coming with new radar architectures and drones.

An advanced radar that enables RAF pilots to locate, identify, and suppress enemy air defences, has flight tested for the first time.

Airbus is working to develop manned-unmanned teaming capability for the Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jet.

The two-stage development comprises demonstration of teaming capability on the Eurofighter under the X-Platform Capability Study (XPCS).

In the second stage, a twin-seater Eurofighter will be developed, featuring a new cockpit and connectivity elements under System and Teaming Advanced Research (STAR).


The Typhoon is not as ambitious as the Rafale F5, but it's acceptable as a direct competitor.

It's not just the IAF, there are a lot of civilians too deciding how and when to proceed with defense deals. The IAF wants everything. But there are checks and balances to how they go about it. For example, the navy has always wanted 4-6 carriers since the last century. They wanted Vikrant, in a slightly smaller form called ADS, to be a 3-carrier deal, followed by another set of 3 carriers. They had planned to operate 200 fighters by 2020 for that purpose, with it eventually climbing to 400. Similarly, the IAF's wishlist is massive. What you see here is nothing. They have always pushed for a 60-squadron fighter fleet for example. The IA wants 5000+ tanks, and a larger army. But they have to prove these requirements to civilians via debates and exercises, who then decide the budget and inform the forces to create a priority list. In the process of creating these new requirements, we get stuff like all what I've explained over the last few posts.

I also don't think people still understand how our procurement works. I've explained this before. The IAF has to prove to DRDO that their tech is still not good enough before DRDO allows imports. Pretty much all the import projects you see, whether it's Stryker, Guardians or MRFA, none of them go through without the DRDO's says so. Only Emergency Procurement kicks DRDO out of the process. So the IAF has to explain to DRDO and the govt why MRFA is better than DRDO's offerings if they are to go ahead with it. The govt moderates and vetoes one or the other depending on who wins the debate, if there is a debate.

That's what happened to FGFA. DRDO won the debate for the technology bit. They failed at the procurement bit because they couldn't meet the timeframe obviously. But with technology gone, there was no need for a development project with the Russians. The entire goal of the IAF behind a development program was to help the Indian industry catch up.

There's a lot of logic and a lot of process in these things. And DRDO's main goal is to stall the IAF's import bid as long as possible until domestic tech is developed. So I won't be surprised if DRDO has been stalling MRFA over the last 10 years for TEDBF/ORCA. Then DRDO and IAF have to find middle ground, which would have involved IAF buying 60% DRDO products (LCA and AMCA) and 40% imports (MRFA, alongside MKI).

So there's no question that the IAF won the MRFA debate. But in the process, they will have to push for a new Rafale with a new radar that surpasses Uttam to convince the govt to veto DRDO. And MRFA requirements will be such that DRDO won't be able to match it with ORCA. Hence the F5.

So learn the process first, and then debate.
 
Was telling this beginning that Parikar did more harm to force than Antony,he was the person responsible for sad demise of mmrca1 tender. And forced IAF to induct that aircraft akin to a trainer aircraft as a fighter jet .

MMRCA ended due to two reasons, it was mismanaged since the beginning due to HAL's stubborness. FOEMs should have been allowed to pick their own partner instead of just lumping them together with HAL all the time. Thankfully we have done so after that circus.

The second reason being it was too expensive relative to the GDP growth. IAF's plan for both FGFA and MMRCA was dependent on India's GDP doing 9% at the minimum. By 2014 or so the realization had crept in that only MMRCA or FGFA would go through, not both. This was mentioned by Matheswaran as well.

So they canceled MMRCA, went through with FGFA, then realized the Russians were not playing ball, so that's put a question mark on FGFA as well. FGFA was already on the edge of a cliff, what with HAL claiming they can only do 15% of the workshare instead of 50%. I guess we unnecessarily gave the Russians an advantage by canceling MMRCA while not pushing ahead with AMCA to act as a hedge.

Parrikar, no. In both MMRCA and FGFA, the HAL were the main villains. Parrikar's biggest success was the frigate deal followed by GTG Rafales.

Btw, FGFA is still active, just placed on hold awaiting Russia to finish development. The decision to keep it or cancel it could entirely depend on the progress of LCA and MRFA. At least ACM Singh has hinted at it.
 
Funny , really side splitting ! I guess unimaginative memes are RST's new arsenal by way of humour. Well as they say about lycra you either have it or you don't. Same with humour. Full marks for trying though.

Aww , at this point I'm left with 2 emotions at RST's decision not to address me. The first is wonder . While I thought he'd end the post with not addressing me anymore & save me the bother of wasting my time responding , he goes on to post a 10,000 word ode to me in the form of a rant or is the other way around.

I'm equally heartbroken seeing he no longer wishes to address me . Woe is me ! I wonder what would I do now ?

Which brings me to an important point . I didn't want to engage with him too & haven't at least not directly . Just so people don't call me a liar or a hypocrite let me explain the reasons for engaging yet not engaging . It's here 👇

IMG_20241009_170047.jpg

Replace the following words -

Dhume with RST
Garbage with illogical / pointless / extraneous , etc
Dumb with slippery /confused /delusional / juvenile etc


Here let's listen to why the MMRCA didn't proceed from the horse's mouth. Now I realise I D R W doesn't enjoy a decent reputation but in this particular article they've reported the incident as it occurred. It's too recent an occurrence for us to forget about it & too important for them to misreport it without being called out .

http://web.archive.org/web/20241008...rs-warnings-and-the-pricing-struggle-in-2024/

Let's leave aside the co relation to the Rafale M deal they're attempting but the fact of the matter is that Dassault backed out of guaranteeing product quality & time lines by HAL which admittedly was an unreasonable demand which tied the hands of our establishment yet the fact remains that Dassault did commit to those terms initially & later backed out this jeopardizing the deal without even a dissent note at the time of offering their sealed bids a standard term of certain contracts.

This is the reason I remarked earlier RST has no knowledge whatsoever of tendering processes & complex techno commercial bids.

Nowhere does he address the elephant in the room - the price of procurement which was the meat & bones of my entire post he's referring to . Not even once . He brings it up in a post to another member. That's how he's always framed his arguments.

Instead what he does is dive deeper into the rabbit hole about issues which have little or no bearing to the topic. Are we to understand that had the procurement process proceeded as planned with the original MMRCA tender the Rafales procured / mfgd locally couldn't be upgraded AT ALL assuming it didn't fit into standard F4 , F5 upgrades ? That no alternatives to the standard upgrades were possible ?

Is that the point he's making ? Is it even possible ? Are we to understand the great Matheswaran goofed up in framing the technical specifications ? That if the IAF approached Dassault with a request for devising a special upgrade package the latter would send a regret letter across asking them to consider buying the F4 or F5 standard Rafale instead on which they'd extend a magnanimous discount barely 20 years after we bought / mfgd the Rafales ?


If his argument is that DRDO has the veto over IAF's procurement plans well how come the MRFA is still alive then given most of the technologies associated with it will feature in the Mk-2 & the AMCA Mk-1 & the rest are being realised given the passage of time since the tender was scrapped. Previously he used to argue it was the government which had the veto.

There's no ORCA , there never was. It was merely an attempt by HAL to get onto the bandwagon once the Rafale deal was cancelled & the IAF rejected the IN's demand to go in for a joint development of AMCA. ADA pitched in the TEDBF to IN who weren't sure if approvals by the GoI given the limited quantities , hence this brainwave of IN & HAL about pitching in a TE land based derivative of the IN model as an alternative to the Rafale. God knows how many more times I'd have to repeat this here.


The rest of his post is the usual drivel about extraneous information , post facto rationalisation , etc .

The issue for the GoI has always been the high prices. Plus Dassault's attitude post once they were declared the winner of the MMRCA tender may have infuriated the GoI. There's something called bureaucratic ego . As far as possible you don't attempt to prick it . If you do you pay a price as NG is now discovering in the Project 76 I tender. GoI may have signed the contract for 36 nos because the IAF absolutely insisted on it else we may not even have seen that .

If my suppositions are true (& frankly I can think of a million reasons we should've gotten it already or get it even now though the window of opportunity is closing fast ) we won't be seeing the Rafales unless something changes drastically. I've listed two compelling reasons for the MMRCA / MRFA not to be considered.
 
Funny , really side splitting ! I guess unimaginative memes are RST's new arsenal by way of humour. Well as they say about lycra you either have it or you don't. Same with humour. Full marks for trying though.

Aww , at this point I'm left with 2 emotions at RST's decision not to address me. The first is wonder . While I thought he'd end the post with not addressing me anymore & save me the bother of wasting my time responding , he goes on to post a 10,000 word ode to me in the form of a rant or is the other way around.

I'm equally heartbroken seeing he no longer wishes to address me . Woe is me ! I wonder what would I do now ?

Which brings me to an important point . I didn't want to engage with him too & haven't at least not directly . Just so people don't call me a liar or a hypocrite let me explain the reasons for engaging yet not engaging . It's here 👇

View attachment 36989

Replace the following words -

Dhume with RST
Garbage with illogical / pointless / extraneous , etc
Dumb with slippery /confused /delusional / juvenile etc


Here let's listen to why the MMRCA didn't proceed from the horse's mouth. Now I realise I D R W doesn't enjoy a decent reputation but in this particular article they've reported the incident as it occurred. It's too recent an occurrence for us to forget about it & too important for them to misreport it without being called out .


Let's leave aside the co relation to the Rafale M deal they're attempting but the fact of the matter is that Dassault backed out of guaranteeing product quality & time lines by HAL which admittedly was an unreasonable demand which tied the hands of our establishment yet the fact remains that Dassault did commit to those terms initially & later backed out this jeopardizing the deal without even a dissent note at the time of offering their sealed bids a standard term of certain contracts.

This is the reason I remarked earlier RST has no knowledge whatsoever of tendering processes & complex techno commercial bids.

Nowhere does he address the elephant in the room - the price of procurement which was the meat & bones of my entire post he's referring to . Not even once . He brings it up in a post to another member. That's how he's always framed his arguments.

Instead what he does is dive deeper into the rabbit hole about issues which have little or no bearing to the topic. Are we to understand that had the procurement process proceeded as planned with the original MMRCA tender the Rafales procured / mfgd locally couldn't be upgraded AT ALL assuming it didn't fit into standard F4 , F5 upgrades ? That no alternatives to the standard upgrades were possible ?

Is that the point he's making ? Is it even possible ? Are we to understand the great Matheswaran goofed up in framing the technical specifications ? That if the IAF approached Dassault with a request for devising a special upgrade package the latter would send a regret letter across asking them to consider buying the F4 or F5 standard Rafale instead on which they'd extend a magnanimous discount barely 20 years after we bought / mfgd the Rafales ?


If his argument is that DRDO has the veto over IAF's procurement plans well how come the MRFA is still alive then given most of the technologies associated with it will feature in the Mk-2 & the AMCA Mk-1 & the rest are being realised given the passage of time since the tender was scrapped. Previously he used to argue it was the government which had the veto.

There's no ORCA , there never was. It was merely an attempt by HAL to get onto the bandwagon once the Rafale deal was cancelled & the IAF rejected the IN's demand to go in for a joint development of AMCA. ADA pitched in the TEDBF to IN who weren't sure if approvals by the GoI given the limited quantities , hence this brainwave of IN & HAL about pitching in a TE land based derivative of the IN model as an alternative to the Rafale. God knows how many more times I'd have to repeat this here.


The rest of his post is the usual drivel about extraneous information , post facto rationalisation , etc .

The issue for the GoI has always been the high prices. Plus Dassault's attitude post once they were declared the winner of the MMRCA tender may have infuriated the GoI. There's something called bureaucratic ego . As far as possible you don't attempt to prick it . If you do you pay a price as NG is now discovering in the Project 76 I tender. GoI may have signed the contract for 36 nos because the IAF absolutely insisted on it else we may not even have seen that .

If my suppositions are true (& frankly I can think of a million reasons we should've gotten it already or get it even now though the window of opportunity is closing fast ) we won't be seeing the Rafales unless something changes drastically. I've listed two compelling reasons for the MMRCA / MRFA not to be considered.
While MRFA saga may continue, shouldn't we procure 36 more Rafales off the shelf in-between🤷‍♂️. What say?
 
While MRFA saga may continue, shouldn't we procure 36 more Rafales off the shelf in-between🤷‍♂️. What say?
I'd go one better. We should've gone ahead with clubbing the order for 54 nos of the IAF with 26 nos of IN & ordered them with the caveat that Dassault set up a plant in India apart from the off sets which would've accrued .

We could also have added a clause for additional nos amounting to 36 for IAF & 08-10 nos for the IN if at all needed at a future date .
 
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I'd go one better. We should've gone ahead with clubbing the order for 54 nos of the IAF with 26 nos of IN & ordered them with the caveat that Dassault set up a plant in India apart from the off sets which would've accrued .

We could also have added a clause for additional nos amounting to 36 for IAF & 08-10 nos for the IN if at all needed at a future date .
The contract for the Rafale M has not yet been signed, I am appointing you as negotiator for the Indian part of this contract. 😜
 
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It seems that Rafale F5 will be aiready operational by 2033.
If we need 2 or 3 UAVs per Rafale and we have to equip France and export, we'll have to produce more than 1,300 UAVs, and they'll be bigger than the Neuron because they'll have to carry a sufficiently large payload in their payload bay sufficiently far. If they have to be produced at Mérignac, then the Rafales will have to be produced elsewhere... Follow my lead.
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MRFA being expensive had a lot more to do with HAL jacking up the prices during production. They also asked for their own production process, which the French said would require recertification. And the quality guarantees was brought up by the IAF, and this was for a product using a production process not certified by Dassault. HAL wanted to provide quality assurance, but IAF insisted on Dassault doing it.

And my point of IAF's purchases linked to GDP is what led to MMRCA becoming expensive. No growth meant no money. A combination of bad negotiations and bad economy led to the demise of MMRCA. MMRCA being "too expensive" was just one small part of many. Rafale wasn't "Too expensive," but HAL's end product. As per MoD, HAL jacked up Rafale's price to $300M.

Anonymous government officials are creating a high benchmark, putting out the word that Dassault had quoted $300 million per Rafale in the MMRCA tender. The Economic Times quoted government sources as saying Dassault would provide a 25 per cent discount, offering 36 Rafales for $200 million each, in a contract for about $8 billion.

Two Rafale squadrons were later bought due to IAF pressure. They originally wanted 4, GoI settled for 2, with the remaining planned through TE MII. Then they planned on buying 2 squadrons every few years, like GTG, but the IAF shot that proposal down 'cause all those different configurations coming in without sufficient ToT would be difficult to maintain.

It's unrealistic to have 3 different versions of Rafale, and going back to Dassault every time using three different negotiation processes, requiring three different contracts while navigating through the difficult anti-corruption bureaucratic circus we have in the MoD. This is also why we have a new process where the IAF will negotiate directly with the Indian partner instead of the FOEM.

But all of this has nothing to do with the future delays of MRFA. What I've been talking about the entire time was the future delays, ie, from 2015 to 2025.

DRDO's upcoming products are not to the same level as the F5. They are more similar to Typhoon Tranche 4. The Swedes may come the closest to the Rafale, but all other competitors seem to be similar to what DRDO is developing for LCA Mk2 and MKI MLU.

There are two reasons for the delays. The biggest one is financial. We needed a good budget to begin MRFA, which we are in the process of getting via economic growth. The capital budget has been experiencing successive double digit growths. So we almost have that now. Citibank predicted in 2010 that India's GDP would be $6T in 2020. Based on the exchange rate of that time, we are supposed to be $8-10T today. So economic mismanagement under UPA prevented the stronger rupee required to pay for imports. But you can imagine how a $6-7T economy would have easily paid for all the Rafales. So Rafale didn't become expensive, we became dollar poor.

The second is technology. All the FOEMs, including Russia, are ahead of the curve compared to DRDO. They all have operational aircraft with technologies the IAF wants, whereas all of DRDO's products today are only on paper. The only difference is in many ways DRDO's products are about half a generation ahead compared to the competition, so this allows them to buy time.

In 2017: "Why buy more Rafale F3R with GaAs when we are offering Uttam Mk2 with GaN?" would be an argument DRDO would make. The IAF would claim it's not ready yet, to which DRDO would say it's just a few years away, whereas an avionics configuration on a jet would last 25-30 years.

Arguments like that would have bought the DRDO 5-7 years when they were configuring the MWF and AMCA. So the IAF would have to go back to the drawing board for MRFA with much higher avionics specs than before. And out came their new doctrine in 2022. And naturally the RFP would cater to next gen avionics combined with Rafale/Typhoon class airfame performance.

As for ORCA, even though it's under HAL, it's still another arrow in DRDO's quiver to attack the forces with. Hence the need for Rafale/Typhoon class airfame performance that ORCA cannot match, ie, supercruise, higher G performance, proven credentials etc.
 
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Out of all the MRFA competitors, Rafale is the only one coming up with a proper next gen avionics suite.

Typhoon and Gripen are doing what DRDO is doing with LCA, with the exception of Typhoon's radar which is partly unified with some EW functionality, similar to the F-35's radar. Not sure if Virupaksha will do the same. The Gripen being offered to India could match or exceed LCA Mk2. The version they plan to operate in Sweden and Brazil is inferior to Mk2. Both have GaN EW suites.

The F-21 and F-15EX currently come with GaAs radars. Given the time lag between program start and delivery, Both could follow the Swedes in offering GaN radars. Neither come with IRST built into the airframe though. The F-15's EPAWSS is GaN whereas F-21's Viper Shield could have GaN, unsure.

It will be interesting to see what the Russians will do. They will definitely offer their new Mig-35, but I have doubts regarding the Su-35. They could just as easily offer the Checkmate instead. Checkmate is supposed to fly in 2 years with a very rapid development time. It's likely they will fly their production model a year after first flight.

Otoh, it appears the IAF could prevent Russian participation in order to enable the West to bring out the best they have. And I guess the idea is if LCA fails, Checkmate could take over, and if MRFA fails, FGFA could take over.
 
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Interesting eh?

Sources said the Navy had insisted on proven AIP technology because it feared the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) would say it could offer the systems it was developing indigenously, which would delay the programme further.

This is how much power DRDO has that they could offer their own stuff to replace foreign stuff.

One can imagine it was DRDO that wanted Uttam Mk2 on IN's Rafales.

So I hope people stop attacking the forces or calling them liars. It's all uncalled for.
 
Out of all the MRFA competitors, Rafale is the only one coming up with a proper next gen avionics suite.

Typhoon and Gripen are doing what DRDO is doing with LCA, with the exception of Typhoon's radar which is partly unified with some EW functionality, similar to the F-35's radar. Not sure if Virupaksha will do the same. The Gripen being offered to India could match or exceed LCA Mk2. The version they plan to operate in Sweden and Brazil is inferior to Mk2. Both have GaN EW suites.

The F-21 and F-15EX currently come with GaAs radars. Given the time lag between program start and delivery, Both could follow the Swedes in offering GaN radars. Neither come with IRST built into the airframe though. The F-15's EPAWSS is GaN whereas F-21's Viper Shield could have GaN, unsure.

It will be interesting to see what the Russians will do. They will definitely offer their new Mig-35, but I have doubts regarding the Su-35. They could just as easily offer the Checkmate instead. Checkmate is supposed to fly in 2 years with a very rapid development time. It's likely they will fly their production model a year after first flight.

Otoh, it appears the IAF could prevent Russian participation in order to enable the West to bring out the best they have. And I guess the idea is if LCA fails, Checkmate could take over, and if MRFA fails, FGFA could take over.
How well do you assume Praetorian DASS stacks up against Spectra? With the British & Italian Typhoons more likely to receive the ECRS MK2 radar ahead of French receiving RBE2-XG, combined with Praetorian EVO the Typhoon looks set to receive a much-needed tech boost right before MRFA heats up.
 
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Out of all the MRFA competitors, Rafale is the only one coming up with a proper next gen avionics suite.

Typhoon and Gripen are doing what DRDO is doing with LCA, with the exception of Typhoon's radar which is partly unified with some EW functionality, similar to the F-35's radar. Not sure if Virupaksha will do the same. The Gripen being offered to India could match or exceed LCA Mk2. The version they plan to operate in Sweden and Brazil is inferior to Mk2. Both have GaN EW suites.

The F-21 and F-15EX currently come with GaAs radars. Given the time lag between program start and delivery, Both could follow the Swedes in offering GaN radars. Neither come with IRST built into the airframe though. The F-15's EPAWSS is GaN whereas F-21's Viper Shield could have GaN, unsure.

It will be interesting to see what the Russians will do. They will definitely offer their new Mig-35, but I have doubts regarding the Su-35. They could just as easily offer the Checkmate instead. Checkmate is supposed to fly in 2 years with a very rapid development time. It's likely they will fly their production model a year after first flight.

Otoh, it appears the IAF could prevent Russian participation in order to enable the West to bring out the best they have. And I guess the idea is if LCA fails, Checkmate could take over, and if MRFA fails, FGFA could take over.
Most modern AESA radars can do EW/EA as well(though it's highly classified). F-35's AN/APG-81 on a test-bed located and jammed F-22's AN/APG-77.

Virupaksha will be able to do everything a modern AESA is supposed to do and that will also include EW/EA as well.
 
Too late now. It was possible if MRFA was out of the picture.
We indians and planners are nothing but dumb, MRFA if happens also it wont create a knowledge pool or expertise in aviation industry. The sole purpose of any foreign import should be the fast induction of cutting edge tech at lowest possible price with in a lowest possible price tag. Direct import is the best way to achieve this, yeas we shouensure local production of spares so that it will be embargo proof. Though I used to ignore or ridicule all the other post fro @Rajput Lion ,I do agree with him on this,ie we should have place another batch of Rafale, note mere 36,54+ F4s exclusively for IAF with a provision of upgrade to F5 and another follow on purchase of 54 examples after F5 becomes online with a provision of upgrading to F6 standard.

An unpopular opinion, I am still a big critic of LCA mk1 & mk1a ,the though it's just trainer jet equivalent (of course it's on steroid) that program gonna yeild a knowledge pool & expertise to the domestic industry many fold than any MRFA program going to bring.

Lastly, you cannot sustain the knowledge pool by only investing defense sector. You need a solid civilian engineering & civilian technologies ,the defense industry will nurture jn parallel without much boost from government. Look at soko, the k3 tank,k9 tank,rocket artillery etc are big success not only in soko but in international markets.
 
How well do you assume Praetorian DASS stacks up against Spectra? With the British & Italian Typhoons more likely to receive the ECRS MK2 radar ahead of French receiving RBE2-XG, combined with Praetorian EVO the Typhoon looks set to receive a much-needed tech boost right before MRFA heats up.

In the RF spectrum, while the Rafale's EA antennas are strategically placed in the front, around the inlets, the Typhoon has placed them on wingtips. So, if anntenas are placed around radar hotspots, the performance of SPECTRA would exceed Evo's in terms of ACT and other forms of EA. Now, if Typhoon's hotspot is the wing, then I guess that would be good too. But you can tell that these pod-based measures are half-ar*sed compared to aircraft with purpose-built internally mounted suites.

The F-35 is a good example of that. I don't think it has internal EA antennas yet, but it at least carries a towed decoy internally. But the Typhoon's pods house 2 towed decoys without losing hardpoints, whereas Rafale has to surrender 2 hardpoints in the process. That's a pretty nifty design feature. Both have Britecloud-class decoys.

In terms of advancement and maturity, I'd rate SPECTRA higher than Evo by assuming that the French have done this for longer. But we can say the Eurofighter crowd have managed to bridge the gap with Evo quite significantly since the Swiss evaluations.

In terms of hardware, the Europeans tend to be on par with each other. So antenna quality, IR/laser detector quality etc should be similar.

When it comes to other sensors, the Rafale's FSO goes a step further with the TV band compared to IR-only on Typhoon. Both have decent MAWS, although RF vs IR on Rafale.

In any case we need evaluations to get to the answer.
 
It seems that Rafale F5 will be aiready operational by 2033.
If we need 2 or 3 UAVs per Rafale and we have to equip France and export, we'll have to produce more than 1,300 UAVs, and they'll be bigger than the Neuron because they'll have to carry a sufficiently large payload in their payload bay sufficiently far. If they have to be produced at Mérignac, then the Rafales will have to be produced elsewhere... Follow my lead.
???
Not sure early Rafale will be able to deal with UAV.
As the UAV price and perf is not known, difficult to anticipate the number of UAV a Rafale can deal with.