Quick question - does Typhoon have reduced support/operating costs wrt tornado GR4? Is there a financial case to be made for replacing at least part of the GR4 fleet with tranche 3? What about savings from cannibalising the retired GR4 airframes/spreading less flight hours around the fleet.
I would have thought it would have a lot of advantages as a recce/SEAD/PW IV platfrom, maybe not for long range/low level or Storm shadow.
I suspect the bean counters might use this as an excuse to kill a longer term GR4 replacement - whatever the latest mutation of FOAS is.