Originally Posted by
Leon Jabachjabicz
Airbus Military have the A319 MPA on the cards - hopeful of a sale to rplace Atlantiques and Canadian Orions I'm led to believe?
The problem with the A319 MPA is that it is a paper aeroplane - it doesn't exist in any form that potential customers can touch it, feel it and assess its actual performance. This is why it lost to the P-8 in the competition in India - I'm led to believe!
Any first customer is going to have to pay for all of the D&D and T&E costs for a potential sale of a handful of aircraft. Unless Airbus invest company money to build a demonstrator, then its unlikely to rack up any sales.
As for the Mighty Hunter Mks 1 & 2, that was a brilliant and very capable platform. MRA4 had lots of issues still to be resolved and was never going to sell anywhere other than the UK. Cancellation was probably inevitable despite its apparent potential; it did have better performance than the P-8 particularly weapons carried, range and endurance.
Originally Posted by
PDR1
especially when you consider that the MRA4 was equipped to take over the whole of the MR2 role (including all the non-sub-hunting and non-maritime roles) which I gather the P8 isn't.
PDR
Out of interest, what is your evidence for that?