Originally Posted by
Asturias56
Great in theory, but in practise the combat bit starts to drive up an awfull lot of costs and weight and then the basic trainer becomes very expensive
Yes, this is a bit of a can of worms. Any meaningful combat capability costs money, but, and it's a big but, if you combine the procurement for a future aggressor force / fleet support / JTAC training etc with your advanced trainer, then you could potentially make some signinficant long-term savings whilst significantly increasing FL capability. (And it's called something like the F/A-50!)
That way, you'd get a capable training aricraft that is somewhat representative of the current UK FL capabilities as well as a common fleet for Red Air (because fighting bizjets has been pointless for years now). The issue will be the larger initial procurement cost, so I sadly don't see it happening. The UK is a world leader in short-sighted procurement and the idiocy of saving money in the short term to cripple future capability.