PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - RUSI: Typhoon Force "completely overstretched and worn out"
Old 10th Feb 2023, 11:59
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ORAC
Ecce Homo! Loquitur...
 
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The issue of intakes and runway availability is a red herring. Ukraine has plenty of available airfields and Russian hasn’t displayed any ability to be able to close a runway for any sustained period - the inaccuracy of their remaining cruise and ballistic missiles means their chances of cutting a runway or denying a MOS is negligible.

The problems of airframe and crew fatigue won’t be affected by retiring the F2s early - the air and ground crews can be spread elsewhere and the total numbers won’t change and the aircraft were only going to be flown until March 2025 before being stripped for spares. The F4 and F3 were operated under FI reduction programmes for many years and that was when operating low level rather than at altitude.

The F2s are/were going to be stripped for spares, but as the paper says new spares packages can be purchased as an offset instead. If the army can buy new artillery the RAF can buy spares.

The Typhoon may not be optimised for low altitude, but don’t compare it to aircraft that are, compare it to the Mig-29 it will augment/replace which sucks fuel like pig - the Typhoon will have about 4 times the endurance.

As to weapons, the F2 can carry Paveway 2 which can be ground lazed. If they can toss HARM they can toss Paveway. I’m sure they can also quickly fit a TB2 or simile with a designator. Brimstone also fits on the common launcher and, as with HARM, a fix to fire using A pre-programmed mode won’t take long to sort out.

It seems Wallace and Sunak are now backing hastily away from their promise of aircraft in the short term - and talk of Storm Shadow also seems to fading - it seems because of American pressure where they don’t want anyone providing anything with greater range than themselves.
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