Actually, Uncle Sam decided to invade Grenada without any reference to us.

Which, legend has it, led to the then Commander-in-Chief receiving a telephonic handbagging from the then-incumbent of No.10. The story has it that the majority of his contribution to the discussion ran along the lines of 'Yes, Margaret... no, Margaret... but, Margaret... but.. but... yes, Margaret, yes... I'm very sorry, Margaret... yes [etc, etc, etc]' until she ran out of steam. Which took quite a while. Probably apocryphal, but she was very, very cross indeed. HMQ was none-too-pleased with the invasion of a Commonwealth country either.

I agree. Surely a good argument to project air power by air - it's faster and more flexible and you don't have to spend days days having your teeth shaken out by a carrier travelling at max chat to get to where it's needed because it happened to be on the other side of the world, and then arrive too late.
Most of the ISTAR product and ordnance dropped in both the Afghanistan and the Iraq invasions came from platforms that took off and landed in mainland USA. It can be done.

Just a non-flying yank but isn't it rather odd knocking our next wonder flying machine vs Typhoon on the grounds of cost & internal weapons?

Doesn't the worst case MoD forecast say 150 wonder machines for half the program cost of 232 Typhoons? We may be paying $100m for ours when all the R&D bills come due but be honest that's not the Brit price tag, is it?

Couple other points: there's a lot of shuffling of money around the JSF program right now. External tanks being taken out of this one particular contract doesn't mean they've been dropped. Suggest you chat with L-M/PO before taking that story into print. I think you'll find they just switched money from one pocket into the other.

The smaller STOVL bay was the original brit requirement if I'm not mistaken. Your chappie over here working on his tan said you've not got any 2,000 pounders to drop so it wasn't a biggie. He also said Brimstone & SS remain on the list for post SDD integration. SS is a bit iffy tho' given it's bring back issues. Alarm is obsolete.

BTW, ITAR waiver ain't the issue. What's being asked for is. If you lot really signed for $100m per, then I'd say that issue just went away :O

So where's the thanks for keeping the rolls 2nd team engine alive? wonder which one wins the UK "contest"?

Price check aisle 35!
 

I'm not clear where this figure of $100 million per junk jet has come from. The problem with the Jolly Serious Fraud is that the international customers have no idea how much the thing is going to cost. Any figures used by the UK MoD are guesstimates of the highest order.

The deal with the production sustainment MoU is that the international 'partners' [snort] have to sign in blood and commit to buying a fixed number of aircraft without being told how much they will cost or when they will be ready.

That's the deal on the table. The only deal.

If they decide later that they don't like the price or they don't need so many aircraft then they will be penalised until their ears bleed.

And we already know that the UK will not take 150 jets...even though BAE's entire financial case for the programme is predicated on that exact number...

But apart from that - yeah, sure. Carry on.

VC

Oh, and that bit about the UK asking for the weapons bays to be made smaller is wrong too.

Read your programme history.

VC

The RN (FAA) needs to buy RAFALEs M and not the pseudo F-35 or a Typhon navalised ( what a joke :D :D :D )

:ok:

RonO,

The US GAO say that the cost will be $100 m per jet, or $110 m, more recently. That's for the cheap, bargain basement A-model.

No US politician is ever going to accept a situation where the answer to the question as to "How much are we charging the Brits" is smaller than that headline price figure for the US DoD.

And for every other platform we operate the 2,000-lb PWIII and 1,000- and 2,000-lb PWIV are and will be core weapons. As is Storm Shadow, and as is Meteor. And ASRAAM is important enough that internal only carriage doesn't fly, either.

We were promised ITAR by Clinton, but this Admin has back-tracked on that. ITAR isn't the issue, per se, it's operational sovereignty - the ability to modify and ugrade our own aircraft as we require, to support, sustain and repair them, and to integrate our own weapons rather than waiting for US industry to fail to get around to it.

If we don't get that, this over-priced, over-weight, high-risk, one trick (LO) pony simply isn't worth the candle.

We can do the Day One job (if we ever need to in coalition ops) with TLAM and stand off (Storm Shadder, for example) and Typhoon with four or six Meteor and two or four ASRAAM will be more capable against the likely threat in the A-A role than JSF with a pair of AIM-120s and two AIM-9X.

The situation is more clear cut than even that. Under US law, no US contractor can sell defence equipment to a foreign customer for less than the price paid by the US government.

And foreign sales/support is where the JSF is going to claw its costs back...

VC

Folks - there's some missing knowledge/thought about the bigger future issues here. We are now/will be in the "Effects" generation process. The CVF is only one (big) piece of that puzzle. The idea that the UK will be able to influence another nation 7000 nm away with the threat of a Typhoon with no HNS is a bit of a larf. We couldn't sustain that sort of operation. The EuroF may have a greater payload but then the JSF has supercruise stealth - horses for courses.

The actual airframe isn't that important (they've all got something up their sleeve - and most will be yards better than any opposition in the air), it's the fact it's an enabler for influence that matters. You exert that influence with credible capability, ie sea base your strike force amongst many other options. Anyone who thinks land-based jets can do the job alone is somewhat wide of the mark, and getting bogged down in weeds.

The big picture doesn't plan solely on staging out of a Kuwait or Saudi. That's called putting your eggs in one basket. Our baskets may be small but we want more than one of 'em.

Agreed we couldn't sustain a Falklands type task force but this has been well known for years as the navy has been cut piecemeal in the promise of Jam tomorrow.
I note from other sites the Aussies and canadians are now increasing defence spending and increasing the size of their armed forces

A few more points
 

1. Is the comparison between jets based aboard a carrier and ones ashore a fair one? Consider a possible operation in Africa in nation x (well the 2004 Defence White Paper used a Sub Saharan example). The theatre is n thousand miles from the UK. There are no UK forces established in the area. The nearest established airfield that could take Typhoons or Tornados is 400 miles away in nation y. Nation y opposes outside interference. Nation x has about 200 miles of coastline, and at least 70% of its territory is with 500 or so miles of the coast. This is just an example and not meant to be real scenario.

Assuming that the CVF (with F35 et all) is at 48 hours readiness and is in UK waters, which of these is fastest?

a. Send the carrier and her air group to the area at 25 knots (=600nm per day), carry out planning and preparation on the way, start flying sorties once within range, other capabilities (helicopters, logistics) can be brought be other ships.

b. Negotiate with the Government of y - and hope you get diplomatic clearance Lets assume that after a few days they give in. Now the aircraft need to be prepared, flown to nation y, along with stores, support equipment, weapons etc etc. They need to get in theatre, establish a base with comms back to the UK, before sorties can start at a constant rate. Incidentally how do the supplies get there?

c. Identify an abandoned airfield, secure it, establish it as a forward base with force protection, etc. This assumes we have STOL/rough field capable aircraft.

d. Go to the friendly Government of nation z, use their own air bases, but the distance to theatre is now more like 900 miles. We may need some tanker support.

And the answer is..........

In practice we'd opt for a mix of a,b,d and possibly c. But it does illustrate my point. The "(aircraft x) is faster than a carrier, therefore it can deploy faster than a carrier" argument is very simplistic and ignores factors like diplomatic clearances, logistics, support facilities, force protection, etc.

2. As NURSE says, the cutting of the Services makes the deterrent power of carriers even more important (prevention being better than cure). Nothing says "Stop being naughty boyos" as much as a carrier, preferably in combination with amphibious forces. Worryingly, the MOD seem to regard "Carrier Strike" and Amphibious stuff as totally separate They are not. I've discussed amphibious issues on the Sea Jet thread- I won't link to it again.

3. See this.

The MOD considered all other options very carefully before selecting the JSF as the preferred aircraft for its new aircraft carriers. The other options included a marinised version of the Eurofighter (232 Eurofighters are ordered for the RAF) the American F18E, the French Rafale and an updated Harrier. But the Short Take Off and Vertical Landing (STOVL) variant JSF emerged as the best option.

4. CVF is crucial in a number of ways. One of these is preserving the capabilities of constructing major warships in the UK. Despite claims of the largest ship construction since the Second World War, orders are rather thin on the ground. To my knowledge the only vessels currently being built in UK yards are:

Six Type 45 Destroyers. The last two have not been ordered yet.
Three Astute class SSNs.
Four LSD(A).
One OPV(H).

If we want to retain naval construction capabilities we need to get CVF ordered NOW. If we don't do it soon, we may not be able to. We might have problems building warships of any type.

Let me ask a question - mostly for Navaleye. Does the CTOL/STOVL debate, or the choice of MASC platform effect the hull, propulsion, etc. If not then what reasonable excuse (other than cost cutting or incompetence) does for not getting CVF ordered and steel cut?

It makes no difference at all. The equipment required for CTOL operations resides in the top 3 decks of the ship. I understand MoD wants the design to be completely mature before cutting steel, so that the mega blocks are as outfitted as possible before they are joined up. The speed at which the T45s have been built shows the benefit of this approach.

"The MOD considered all other options very carefully before selecting the JSF as the preferred aircraft for its new aircraft carriers."

The MoD selected JSF to meet the UK's FCBA requirement on 17 January 2001.

This 'careful' selection was made when Typhoon was still a very immature design, before its capabilities and characteristics were fully apparent.

Before we even knew what the JSF was, in fact, since the USA hadn't chosen between the X-32 and the X-35.

(It was not until 26 October 2001 that Lockheed Martin won the Prime Contract to develop the Joint Strike Fighter, as the F-35.)

Back in 2001, when the selection was made, JSF still promised to be an F-16 priced aeroplane, we were still certain of getting a proper ITAR waiver, and there was no reason to suspect that UK weapons would not be integrated on the aircraft with enthusiasm and alacrity. The GAO hadn't judged it as a high risk programme that badly needed to be further delayed.....

It's time to 'carefully' reconsider.


As to your African example, put a name to your country X and we'll see how many realistic (politically sustainable) scenarios would not be able to gain HNS nearby.

Have you seen how many landlocked and near land-locked nations there are in Africa?

The 2000 pound PW series was never (I believe) even an option for internal carriage. It's too long. The proposed Laser JDAM is an option as is a hypothetical precision JDAM with a seeker.
Internal 1000 pound JDAM has always been the baseline for the STOVL version (on the Boeing design, some of the bay capacity was eaten by the STOVL nozzles). There was some hope in 2003-04 that a 2K option would be available but it went away in the weight growth panic of 2004-05.
As for external fuel, it's not clear whether that has been taken off the USAF account or shifted to post-SDD.
As for the price issue, that depends on whether you talk about flyaway, total procurement cost (which I think is the source of the $110 m and may include spares/support for the LRIP aircraft) or program acquisition unit cost (which is total development + procurement + support divided by the total numbers of aircraft).
The real problem is that there is no fixed price until full rate production, by which time the UK will have bought most of its aircraft.

Jacko, you need to learn your way round a GAO/SAR report.

$104m PAUC you quote is the total US program cost divided by expected US orders. It's an accountants fabrication that doesn't differentiate between JSF variants and amortises US R&D across the entire US production run.

Just for fun I did the same math for UK Typhoon and got $158m. Ouch.

The US is not passing it's R&D bills onto the Brits or anyone else. Just like the EF partners don't pass on theirs. So let your eyes drift lower down the GAO page to find the expected flyaway's of the "A" at $45m and the "B" at $59m. THAT's what you need to figure the latest UK stickers. And yeah, they'll go up between now and then.

Check out this thread from one of your neighbors. Scroll down for English. Hilarious in parts.

http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/2006/05/01/464964.html

Don't disagree with the pig in the poke nature of the deal being offered - sign here and we'll tell you the price later. Such is life in the real world. If you don't like it, bail out of the program and come in later when the prices have been fixed. Of course that means a higher price, no UK royalties, no UK industrial benefits, no UK weapons integration and last place on the production line. And absolutely no chance of getting your sovreign thingie. Your call.

Navaleye - will CVF have through deck lifts? I was told that if you go for cats and traps, and if you want to conduct concurrent launch and recovery operations, you need to have a canted off launch deck as per the usual US design with lifts that go up the side of the ship instead of through the deck...all fundamentally impacting the design of the hull. Can you run launch and recovery ops on the same strip of steel, or will a redesign of the top three decks allow the ship to be configured for Nimitz-style ops?

Jackonicko - I thought PWIV is a 500lb weapon? You seem to think there will be 1000lb and 2000lb variants.

WEBF - the decision to procure STOVL JSF was a bit of a rum (sodomy and the lash) do. There were a lot of conspiracy theories running around Whitehall at the time. Strangely enough none of them involved JSF STOVL being 'the best option' as you quote. The best option was actually CV JSF - all the boffins said so. However it made CVF too expensive (cats and traps and a lot more embarked manpower, through life etc.), there was not enough work-share in it for UK industry and (so the rumours go) it was too capable! If we had procured CV JSF, that would have seriously cut into the capability headroom that was at that stage planned to be filled by FOAS (c. 2020), the Future Offensive Air System, subsequently renamed FCAC and Heaven knows what since. FOAS was to be a system of systems, including UCAVs, legacy platforms and (critically) a follow-on purchase of JSF, wherein lay the future of the manned fast-jet Air Force. Buying CV JSF against a background of planned reductions in our overall FJ requirement, would have quickly resulted in a scenario where Typhoon and CV JSF were all that was required ie. no follow-on purchase of JSF for the RAF, just 144 Typhoon, a few Harriers that were going to pass their jump-by date c. 2015 and the splendid old warhorse, Tornado GR4, heroically justifying its continued existence on the basis of a theoretical ability to carry 4 Stormshadows, and launch them at a range where its chronic lack of surviveablity wouldn't have to be exposed to a modern enemy. . .

"So, 1SL, me old mucker, you stop fighting the jumping bean, and we'll stop fighting CVF", said CAS. "When the RAF purchases JSF, we'll get the C-Variant, and then we can fly our jets off your ships!"
"By jingo, you're right", said 1SL, "and with so many JSF flying about, we could probably persuade a future govt to buy a third carrier!"
"Well, quite." said CAS.

:}

That's a joke, right? The point of overseas sales is to lower costs by splitting the R&D costs across a broader base. I can just them trying to sell that to Congress, "the Brits can buy it $xx cheaper than the USMC because we've absorbed the R&D costs for them..."

I mean, give me a break....

Brits are kicking in 2 bill for SDD plus a tad extra for brit weapons integration. You wanna pay that AND part of the US SDD share? Cool.

However you might think about getting the norsemen to cut your deals for you :O

Truth is the Uk will indeed pay the same price as the Marines - $59m plus project inflation.

Ron O,

On price.

Typhoon is c £81m per jet including R&D ($148m), £42m ($77m) without. Not $158m. That price reduces with each Tranche. We've been selling Tranche 2 jets to Johnny Foreigner for €62m ($78m) each. You may assume that there's an element of profit and R&D contribution in there.....

Typhoon's costs of ownership and running costs are extremely low, and are contractually guaranteed.

The expected flyaway costs of the F-35A and F-35B you quote should be on bargain hunt. They're that antique. They're in 1776 dollars.....

Moreover, they represent the 'settled unit flyaway cost' and initial Lots will be priced higher. By the time you factor in a 'now year' dollar conversion and inflation, you'll find that it comes to something astonishingly close to $100-110 m per jet, in fact. This figure was confirmed by Lockmart sources at Singapore, and has been widely briefed.

The UK's $2 Bn investment in SDD buys us nothing in terms of aircraft, but it does "buy" us our industrial participation. It equates to $13m-$23m per jet on top of whatever purchase price is set. Unless and until LM can find a cheaper, 'best value' supplier of rear fuselages (which incorporate some UK IP) than Samlesbury, however, then BAE will build the back third of every JSF regardless of how many jets we decide to buy. Even, in fact, if we delay or scrub our purchase altogether.

This is indeed a pig in a poke, but we have more options than to bail out now and rejoin when the prices have been fixed. We can cancel the JSF purchase altogether and buy something else altogether. And if we don't get the operational sovereignty, that's what we'll do, and we'll lead a rush of other JSF partners hovering on the brink of jettisoning this ill-conceived jet.

And while (even using your figures), every JSF will cost us more than $82m ($59m + $23m SDD costs + inflation, + UK specific integrations), every extra Typhoon over and above 232 would cost us less than $77m. And that would be a T4 jet capable of carrying all the weapons we need, which we could support, sustain, modify and upgrade autonomously and independently, with lower support and operating costs than JSF.

We'd be building more Typhoons, providing more UK jobs, and much of the price would flow straight back to the UK exchequer, and we'd still be an industrial partner in JSF, and though it may lose Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands and Australia, it will still be a programme worth participating in in industrial terms.


Thomas,

I believe that your explanation to WEBF is wrong. All of the documents I've ever seen relating to Staff Target (Sea/Air) 6464 made it pretty plain that STOVL was the preferred solution, and that remained the preference up to September 2002, when the UK announced its selection of the Short Take Off and Vertical Landing (STOVL) variant of LM's JSF as the FJCA - having selected JSF as FCBA on 17 January 2001, when it was still unclear whether it would be Boeing or LM.

I'm guilty of using the term PWIV when I mean EPW. EPW will of course be in 1,000-lb and 2,000-lb flavours, while PW IV is strictly speaking the TM applied to the Lot 4 UK weapon with a Mk 82E body, but using the same guidance and control kits as EPW II and EPW III.

JSF flyaway costs are from Dec 2005 in 2002 $'s. Not sure why the derision on age - doesn't seem that long ago. How old is your EF financial data and what year does it assume?

Don't understand your math on JSF prices either. Each one that the UK purchases should cost $59m. Plus inflation of course. And project escalation. But $100m?? heck no. I'd suggest you check back with LM - that dude in Singapore was feeding you a line. Didn't have a french accent did he?

The UK's $2 bill earns the right to bid for SDD contracts. Production contracts will be awarded based on committed country orders hence the bums rush to get signatures this year. No UK orders means some empty UK lines & unhappy Bae faces. Don't kid yourself that UK is the only place that can do the work.

Gotta love your confidence in those Typhoon Tranche 3 & 4 numbers. Must be the best managed procurement project ever - no escalation, every financial target hit dead center. Impressive.

While I'm here, you keep claiming the UK will get a lower spec aircraft than the US esp LO. Burbage told your parliament committee that's not the case. You reckon he lied? Norway's being told the same thing as I expect you noticed. They being lied to as well?