Thanks PDR, that’s something I didn’t know - I always thought the Caps were set. Anyway, Cap D eventually delivered and had no SS. Even the CR&J you memtion is some way off anywhere near being even IOC. Do you think the CR&J trials revealed the thermal and vibration issues I heard rumour about and hence the idea was shelved (again)?
It still doesn’t answer the bring-back question even with the GR9’s increased performance. If we were going to operate them from land only then there isn’t much point is there? It always amused me about the Harrier GR in that we never really embarked it on Ops apart from on CORPORATE - for TELIC, HERRICK and ALLIED FORCE it was land based and it wasn’t ready for GRANBY either. It kind of makes you think why bother? The SHAR on the other hand seemed to be always embarked for Ops?