Originally Posted by
Easy Street
Tornado, Typhoon and the air campaign all benefited to varying degrees:
Tornado benefited from Typhoon's radar and datalink capability, giving better awareness of surrounding air activity (and making it easier to find the tanker). A cynic might say that it also benefited by being less likely to scrub: a programme consisting of singletons throughout the day is easier to manage when struggling for serviceability!
Typhoon benefited from Tornado's ability to generate accurate coordinates with its targeting pod, allowing weapons to be employed under GPS guidance without the delays imposed by waiting for off-board data: by far the best way of doing business in patchy cloud conditions, strong winds, and densely-packed city streets that can be a nightmare to lase into. It also benefited from the air-ground experience of the Tornado crews, in particular the capacity available to the nav to act as a tactical controller when operating semi-autonomously (as was often the case). Some of the Typhoon pilots were not yet qualified to self-designate their EPW2 so the Tornado did the honours in those cases, just as Buccaneers had done for them two decades earlier on Op GRANBY.
There was never a mutual self-defence consideration, due to the lack of air threat. Another important consideration was that Typhoon at the time was only equipped with EPW2, which did not have anything like the flexibility of PW4 in terms of cockpit-selectable fusing and impact options. Tornado's PW4 and especially DMS Brimstone were therefore the weapons of choice, and mixing the formations effectively doubled the daily length of time during which aircraft with these weapons were on station.
I gather that mixed formations have been used more recently for short periods on Op SHADER, at times when maximum daily DMS Brimstone coverage was desired during urban operations. As Typhoon now has A-G experienced pilots, PW4 and a coordinate generation capability, and Tornado has a datalink of its own, there doesn't seem to be many other reasons to do it.
Good to hear that Typhoon has a few advantages over the 40+ year old Tornado especially as it was developed for a Swing Role.
To me the real question is whether Typhoon will be as capable, adaptable and flexible toward the end of its service life as Tornado has been and still is.
Just as the GR4 has been able to evolve from its Cold War role, Typhoon will face even more demanding requirements than those posed by Op Shader.
In particular maintaining its relevance against the fast developing threats from surface to air and 5th and even 6th generation fighters.