Originally Posted by Coochycool
C of G considerations aside, whats the problem with simply strapping on some nice neat 'n tidy, tried 'n tested turbofans a la Dornier 328 instead?
Originally Posted by Davef68
Yes, one of the group (I'm sure either France or Germany) insisted it had to be a prop, either for tactical reasons (Being able to reverse on rough ground springs to mind) FOD or economics.
The choice of a turboprop solution was driven by the need to perform Sarajevo approaches (aka Khe Sanh approaches), or so I was told at the time. Ironically it was later
reported that a flutter issue might prevent the maneuver from being used. Unsure whether this problem was ever fixed.
The TP400 was a political solution to a technical requirement: two engine offerings were originally developed (the British-German BR700-TP and the French-German-Italian-Spanish M138, along with an eight (!) engine Canadian PW150 stalking horse proposal), but the competitive selection was abandoned in favor of a collaborative approach, to avoid tripping up the overall program.