Aviation Week are reporting that Denmark’s Ministry of Defence is gearing up to recommend changing the preferred design to fulfill its fighter replacement programme from the Lockheed Martin F35 Joint Strike Fighter to another design, likely the Boeing FA-18E/F.
Seismic news, not so much in the impact on production orders or even industrial participation but because it would be the first of the launch partners to jump ship and hugely symbolic.
Of course, this is just speculation and no official announcement has been made but whether they do change their mind and go for the F18 or even other contenders like Typhoon, Gripen NG or Rafale it might just be the catalyst for other nations to do likewise.
Typhoon – Okay, maybe they should go for this but personally I do not like it much. The danes are hugely engaged in the Afghans and this plane is a dogfighter.
Gripen NG – cheap as chips no doubt, quite good I would say but… hmm don’t know.
Rafaele – crappy rip-off of the Typhoon.
Just think of the irony of first ditching the Typhoon for a 5th gen blah blah Powerpoint plane and now coming full circle back to a plane which isn’t the most spirited performer in the air-to-air department.
13thSpitfire
The Danes might be fighting in Afghanistan today, but the planes they buy in the next few years will be their primary military asset until 2035 at least.
Its what they expect to do in those years that should dictate equipment purchases.
Also, although the original purpose of the Typhoon was to wipe out incoming MiG and Sukhoi, its just as capable an air to ground platform as anything else with a targeting pod.
The Lightweight Day Fighter is quite a capable night time bomber now.
Is it starting to unravel for the JSF ?
Good god I hope so ! Nothing against LM or what might eventually become a phantabulous aircraft, but at the moment we can’t afford it, and anything that makes it easier for the UK to ditch its commitment to the overpriced, greatly delayed bag of stealthy bolts is a good thing !
To all my lovers.
Je t’aime moi non plus.
Rafale
DominicJ,
With the latest projects, Nato forces wont be leaving Afghanistan for at least 15-20 years. I think that puts the time frame well within reason for not buying the typhoon.
13th spitfire, the main combat is supposed to be starting to end in 2011, with combat forces drawing down over the next 5 years. No one will want to have a military force there past that. The NATo role will continue in a development sense for the timescale you predicted, that will have little impact on the military and their procurement then though.
Gaim,
You assume that the taliban will wind down, why? As I recall it Afghan was supposed to be a quick in-out operation and yet here we are 7 years later embroiled in one of the bloodiest conflicts since WW2.
No one will want to have forces there past 2011 but they sure as hell will have to. The enemy is going nowhere and are gearing up for more and more, and are clearly well funded and trained since not even the mightiest military power on the planet cannot take on a rag-tag gang of junkies in dresses. That is how we view them in the west but we should really be giving them credit; they have properly screwed over western forces yet we continue to publish ad-hoc timelines when possible withdrawal will begin.
No, if anything this war will get worse, much worse and any ‘timeline’ you have been given I would take with a massive shovel of salt before even beginning to consider the validity of the proposal.
Spitfire, you’ve based your argument based on your own opinions. I based mine on the statements of men in charge of the conflict, the military and political leaders.
Also, the Afhgan conflict of 7 years ago was very different to today. I would effectively consider the post 2006 conflict a different mission, with entirely different aims, and rather convoluted ones at that.
You also haven’t taken into account the recent surge. It turned Iraq round pretty quickly once it got fully under way, no reason it can’t happen here.
Obviously we can’t predict the future, especially what turns the conflict will make. But I can predict what the politics back home will do given another year or 2 of conflict. It’s already started to happen. Lets be honest, no nations will have the stomach for staying in Afghanistan much past about 2015 at the latest. 2-3 nations are already going in 2011, and the US has committed to beginning a draw down then too. So either the US is confident it’ll make significant progress by then or they’ll start to go anyway. I can’t see anyone else staying if the US is going.
In a nutshell, i’m going to weight the conclusions of the military experts running the conflict, the lack of resolve of our political leaders and populations, and the recent surge and massive review of strategy over your assessment. No point in arguing past that, we have different views and only time will tell who was right.
Oh, and it’s Grim, not Gaim
I am curious, ‘GRIM’, what makes you think my statement is opinion based? I suppose we can both go into anecdotal evidence why either of use have better coverage of the conflict. But I think it will suffice to say that both have more info than the media does, otherwise we would not be on this site in the first place.
Yes, the conflict is different, more people are dying now and more soldiers as well. Again I reiterate what makes you think the taliban will just up-camp and try their luck in China? There is little which suggest this and no military power, has ever, conquered Afghanistan. Last time the British tried only one medical officer returned from what was a party of several tens of thousands.
As for military tactics, a surge in Iraq is certainly not guaranteed to work in Afghanistan as it did in Iraq. There are not some peasant gaggle-jokes who were just handed an AK47 and told to shoot. These are convinced fighters who believe with every inch of their body that if they fight the West they will go to heaven and 72 virgins. I suppose I will not have you lecture you on the difference between fighters with a mission and fighters without.
But do you not realise that if the taliban are not obliterated from the face of the earth they will only come back when the allies have left and create all manner of trouble, once again. Why the whole endeavour will have been for nought. If they re-estblish themselves in Afghanistan they will spread to Pakistan and from there on; if they are let back in they will properly mean jihad.
Grim and Spitfire – your both right.
The surge will not improve anything, this is not Iraq, its completely different.
We will pull out on a given date regardless of the conditions, because we can use the ‘Iraq model’ of handing over security to hapless, hopeless and inadequate ANF and police.
Then it will be ‘their problem’ – eventual failure will be ‘their’ problem, although the US may step in to prevent the de-stabilization of Pakistan.
When it comes down to it, we dont need JSF and nor do we need to be nation building in Afghanistan – so don’t buy JSF buy some more Typhoons. Pull out of AFghanistan and build up the Navy to protect ‘our’ south atlantic oil reserves !!
My point about the surge etc was that I expect to see a large proportion of the Taliban either lay down arms or swap sides (the low-mid level guys who are either paid or involved in the drugs trade etc, who incidentally make up the bul of the fighter and ARE just peasants with Ak’s baiscally) and the small proportion who are fanatics as you described (and they are a small proportion of the Taliban) to be obliterated, as you rightly said they need to be. The surge in forces should allow that.
At the very least it should mean that within a few years the numbers left willing to fight are at a level manageable for the growing Afghan security forces and perhaps small international support contingents.
Anyway, back to the point that set this off, I can’t see anyone having the political will to go against public opinion and the anger of military chiefs and continue this conflict for anything like another 15 years, let alone restructure their entire procurement strategy to face only the Taliban. So I can’t really see that as an excuse for not buying fighter jets. (And then you have the whole argument of how many lives these expensive and frivolous jets are saving in Afghanistan by doing a large amount of the killing of Taliban etc.)
Nope, Jeds right.
We will be out of Afghanistan almost entirely in a few years at the most.
We’ll just declare victory and leave.
Its a military failure, buts its a political decison.
The UK was driven out of Iraq with its tail between its legs, but simply said, We Won, and that was that.
The US invested 100x what its invested in Afghanistan in Vietnam, but got bored, handed over to its partner and promptly forgot the place existed.
You cant wipe out the “Taliban” Leadership, because its the tribal chiefs of Afghanistans largest group, and half a dozen others besides.
Kill the chiefs and the next guy steps up, We aint got the stomach to exterminate them, man woman and child.
We will just do a “Basra”; announce we have won and get out. Probably in 2011 before the US presidential election in 2012.
The JSF is not the dog some people believe it to be. Most of the problems encountered are simply normal development gremlins associated with any new and advanced aircraft. And we do need it. The Harrier and its associated technology are now a more than 50 years old. Having a supersonic jumpjet will dramatically increase our capabilities.
The heat produced by the vectored engine is the only serious issue, but since the Harrier encountered an identical problem, i am sure it will be solved.
Most of the cost increases are due to new avionic suites being specified to keep the aircraft cutting edge.
In short, the JSF is like UK banks: too big to fail. I certainly don’t think the F-18 Hornet is better. I think Denmark’s decision has everything to do with the state of their economy rather than any fundamental concerns with the aircraft.
The JSF is not a terrible plane, but its not perfection either, but most importantly its not the low cost plane it was marketed as.
Doesnt matter how good it is, if its equivilant model is significantly more than F16/F18/Typhoon ect it wont be bought.
The JSF is the low cost fighter in a Hi/Lo mix, and it really cant do that if it costs more than a Typhoon, which is the most expensive plane available to everyone but the US.
Some people will switch to Typhoon as the cheaper next gen platform, others will simply stick with the teen series, cheap enough will beat good enough in the buying stakes, even if it loses in the combat stakes.
Nicholas said: “The JSF is not the dog some people believe it to be”
This may or may not be true, but its fun to watch Bill Sweetman over at ARES and Solomon from SNAFU sniping at each other over the capabilities of the aircraft.
The plane may not be a dog, but the programme is. Latest figures suggest the $50 million (2002) price is now at least $119 million (2009) for the simplest F35A – I guess that means F35B STOVL could be north of $135 million each – therefore this aircraft is now too expensive for the UK and we should withdraw from the program. At this price if we negotiated tough with the French it would be cheaper to fit the CV’s with French cats and traps and buy 52 Rafales (1 for 1 replacement for old SHAR F/A2). Or buy F18, or SeaGripen or SeaHawk or whatever……. in some ways I don’t care, but however nice the F35 platform is (and I do debate some aspects of that) its just gotten too damn expensive !
You’re right, guys; the F35 has become indecently expensive. So, what should we do? Britain needs a replacement for the Harrier and one with a supersonic capability. The existing GR9 must surely be at the limit of its development potential. If we back out, and go for an alternative design, such as the F/A 18, we’ll get an inferior aircraft. If we wanted to develop our own Harrier replacement – something I’d love to see – the costs would be even higher. Any alternative aircraft is likely to take even longer to bring into service. There is a danger of the Royal Navy launching its new aircraft carriers and having no planes to put on them.
Thinking out of the box, the Boeing X32 was an excellent alternative to the F35. Boeing lost the JSF because the single composite wing technology chewed up too much development time so that the prototype wasn’t as advanced as the F35. Both aircraft exceeded stated requirements., but it seems as if the US DoD wanted to give Lockheed Martin a more equal share of the Defense Budget.
All the Boeing X32 needed was more time, but the concept, especially for the X32B SVTOL version, was better (and more Harrier-like) than the F35. The composite wing technology, which also provides better stealth characteristics, has now been perfected with Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner. It is very clever technology that is now yielding cost advantages for a whole new generation of aircraft.
i’d like to see the Boeing X32 resurrected. it was a great aircraft that died way too prematurely. I’m sure if Boeing was asked to relook at it, LM might somehow find a way to reduce F35 costs.
Tongue Firmly In Cheek…
Wonder if they are going to do a Carrier version:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8617993.stm
Seriously though – I can’t see the Americans restarting the X32 programme. Too political, too much money spent on the JSF already.
I am starting to think the lowest risk course of action is actually the Rafale as Jed said. It works, it is in service, we could probably drive a deal with the french (and possibly come up with some joint schemes for training, servicing etc).
The RAF could then buy Rafales too for commonality, or more tranche 3 Typhoons, or even Gripens (does anyone know how much they cost in comparison with a Typhoon?)
Or even, as has been suggested, some Hawks…. Or reopen the Jaguar line, anybody…?
F-4 Phantoms? Just kidding there.
As you said, the X-32 is a non-starter, it would take a decade to get where we are now. A navalised Typhoon (I’m sure we’ve had this debate before on Think Defence) would take a fair while as well. I think realistically if the F-35 shuffles off its mortal coil it comes down to a two horse race, the Rafale or the Super Hornet, proven technology available now. Unless we’re prepared to ask Uncle Vlad for some Su-33′s/MiG-29K’s, and I can’t see that happening.
I commented on another post about a light naval fighter version of the T-45 Goshawk with wingtip Sidewinders and a Hawk 200 style cockpit and radar, but I envisaged that as an A-4 Skyhawk replacement, we definitely need something much bigger. But if we go down the F-18/Rafale route we may need some T-45′s for carrier qualification.
The other alternative would be to try and convert the Harrier GR.9′s into something akin to the radar equipped AV-8B+, albeit using the APG-73 or AESA APG-79 instead of the existing APG-65. Even fitted with AMRAAM’s, given its limited capabilities this could only be seen as an interim until something more effective became available.
Richard,
If the F-35 becomes untenable, the only alternative solution would be to buy F-18 Super Hornets. I don’t think that the Grippen and Rafaele are realistic alternatives, although a navalised Eurofighter could work.
More fundamentally, it would be such a shame to lose the STOVL capability. The Harrier is a superb bit of kit. Truly innovative in its day while the ability to Vector in Forward Flight (VIFFING) gave our pilots an edge in aerial dogfights during the Falklands.
There is no doubt that the F-35 is an ambitious project: stealth fighter, STOVL, supercruise capability and latest avionics. it was always going to be expensive. If it is taking longer to bring it into service, surely it is only going to delay the point where we have to start lashing out the big bucks when they roll off the production line.
“Britain needs a replacement for the Harrier and one with a supersonic capability. ”
I’, not sure if I agree, certainly, some of the UK’s current carrier planes are held together with prayers amd sticky backed plastic, and a super sonic jet to replace them would be nice.
But we cant afford the F35B, we just cant, we’d get enough jets for one carrier and probably lose the FSC to pay for them.
Rafeals and F18′s are both possibilities, but both require cats and traps, expensive to buy expensive to use.
I’m not saying its a perfect solution, infact its a pretty crap one, but new build Harriers, built with modern composites, would give us some carrier aviation, which at the moment, is looking unlikely.
Nicholas/Dominic, I agree with you both, unfortunately I think it will be Hobson’s choice when it comes to a replacement, a case of whatever it is it won’t be a Harrier. The Harrier design itself may be old, but I think it has so much more to offer, hence the suggestion of the APG-79 AESA radar. Whether it would squeeze into the nose or not I don’t truly know, but its a development of the APG-65, so I’m guessing it would.
To me a Harrier with an all composite fuselage sounds quite feasible, add off-bore sight capability/helmet cueing systems, AMRAAM’s etc and it becomes quite a formidable beast. Although in its present form it does need a supersonic dash capability.
As we’re short of alternatives I would consider the following, it may sound ludicrous but hear me out. Using the radar equipped AV-8B+ fuselage as the starting point:
1. Take the Pegasus engine and remove the rear two nozzles, replace this with an afterburner section and the single rotating type nozzle from the F-35B.
2. Redesign the fuselage, constructed of composites and make it stealthy(ish) so it looks similar to the F-35, albeit with front engine nozzles and pronounced twin booms.
3. Replace the current flight control system with fly by wire. A FBW system was tested on a Harrier T.4, I think it was called the Harrier VAAC, I’ll have to check. Hydraulics would be retained instead of electric servos as it looks as though the technology is not sufficiently mature. Although I would suggest a duplex system for redundancy, I’m sure the current system is simplex and has been responsible for a number of crashes.
4. Design a new supersonic wing, keep the wing and fuselage weapon pylons, plus wing tip missile rails and cannon pods.
5. AESA radar as previously mentioned, new ejector seat etc. Nose undercarriage from current Harrier and rear undercarriage F-35B style.
Ok, there are a number of problems to overcome, such as where does the water methanol tank go or do we dispense with water methanol injection and redesign the engine etc, but I’d be labouring the point.
Pie-in-the-sky stuff I know, but that’s my two pennies worth. Essentially it would be a 21st century Harrier that looks similar to the F-35, albeit smaller. Importantly it would have supersonic capability and still be able to vector and take-off/land vertically, and not require a catapult.
Not perfect, but neither am I. What do you think?
The bits I understood were quite good, some of it sounded like it could be pretty hefty bits of new design work though.
Which is fine if we can afford them.
The design work would be very hefty, it would undoubtedly cost a packet and take a long time to get in to service….a perfect project for the MOD!
I agree the F-35 has become a huge catch 22 situation. The thing with Harrier STOVL is that it relies on the 4 pillars of air method which necessitates location of the engine at the aircrafts C of G. One of the reasons the X-32 wasn’t picked was because it had problems packaging s-ducts (stealth), internal bomb bays etc. around a centrally placed engine. The X-32 also replaced the rear two nozzles with one rotating afterburner section but you’ll lose the whole rear fuselage in the re-design if the engine has to remain in the middle, as you mentioned.
My main worry is whether we’ll get the version we’ve been promised or whether the Yanks will force a down-graded version on us and force us to ship them to the US for servicing.
It’ll end up being a case of staying the course with F-35, the world has put all their eggs in one basket, F-35 won’t fail, we’ll get something, I just hope it doesn’t bankrupt the whole defence budget.
One design feature of the X-32 I wasn’t so keen on was the large central air intake at the front, below the nose. The A-7 Corsair had a similar intake, and from what I gather, had a nasty habit of sucking in personnel that got too close.
The x-32 was ugly generally and you know the saying, if it looks pretty it flies right
(I know there are obvious exceptions)
OK, can a single person tell me why, for the UK armed forces, a Harrier replacement MUST be capable of supersonic flight ? Please provide detailed scenarios to back up your arguments
My thoughts as well, would a re lifed Harrier really be that bad
We would be talking about a limited number, perhaps even a fully re-manufactured like for like fuselage. It is a simple airframe, no excess composites or anything like that. A new nose with an off the shelf radar and self defence avionics, ASRAAM and maybe even Meteor and there you have a competent self defence system for the RN. It is already the king of CAS and ISR so I honestly can’t see why we cannot ‘wait and see’ with the JSF and save ourselves an absolute fortune in the medium term
We are a Tier 1 partner anyway so industrial benefits accrue
Jed, apart from the old adage that a fighter makes a good bomber, but a bomber does not make a good fighter…
Modern fast jets need to be multi-role, therefore they must be able to act as fighters as and when necessary. Supersonic capability allows the aircraft, to take a simple scenario, to dash quickly and intercept enemy aircraft. The longer this takes, the closer the enemy gets to our forces.
If you imagine a Falkland’s style scenario, with a supersonic STOVL aircraft intercepting the enemy before they attacked the fleet rather than catching them in the act, which unfortunately is what happened at Bluff Cove.
An additional scenario would be an enemy force of bombers protected by fighters approaching the area of operations. Supersonic capability allows you to deal with the fighters and then dash after the bombers before they reach there target.
Another scenario, two seperate bomber forces approaching the operations area from differing directions, supersonic dash to one force and attack, then dash to the other force before they reach the target.
A majority of land based fighters are also supersonic, the higher you are, the greater the advantage you have. If you can get to altitude faster, that can only be better. In this sense, it would seem somewhat unfair to send subsonic aircraft up against an enemy with a supersonic capability. I believe the UK air superiority in the Falkland’s conflict was based more on pilot skill than aircraft capability. But they were fighting a force using aircraft of a comparable generation at the limit of endurance. Also, would you knowingly send a subsonic aircraft up against an F-16?
In addition to this, you wouldn’t use supersonic speed for close-in dogfighting, but you would use the afterburner to give you enhanced power to try and gain and advantage. So its not just about getting supersonic, its also about having access to an afterburner, the two just tend to be inextricably linked.
Talking of adages, it reminds me of Russian one, “Jetfighters are like women and racehorses, it doesn’t matter how much you spend, it is never enough!”
Hope that clears it up. Convinced?
Sorry Admin, just read your comment. I’ve said before that the Harrier still has a lot to offer, but there is only so much you can do with it. You wouldn’t send a 1970′s vintage F1 car up against the latest F1 Ferrari. It does get mentioned a lot, but it is true.
The way an F1 team buzzes around the design of a car trying to squeeze the last ounce of performance and shed the last ounce of weight is the same ethos that should be applied to fighters, although sometimes we forget it. Performance is everything.
If the Harrier must remain then a FBW system like the Harrier VAAC must be seriously considered, if only to rid the pilot of the need for three hands when hovering. You’ve got to give the pilot a fighting chance against F-16/MiG-29′s. Once that’s in, stick an APG-79 on the front and see where it takes us.
Speed does increase your survivability envelope against SAMs and in air to air scenarios, the increased dash speed would also enable faster response time in CAS scenarios. The F-35 will be just generally be more survivable irrespective of the supersonic dash ability. I would think a Harrier would have a hard time in any medium threat environment.
As an aside I do think the STOVL F-35 is looking increasingly sick and am leaning more and more to the CV F-35 + EMALS + CVF approach. Any thoughts…
I don’t know if this adds any weight to the argument, but I found this on the PPrune forum. It was from a conversation involving John Farley, dated 2003. John Farley was the Harrier Chief Test Pilot and flew the prototype P.1127, so as leading authorities goes, it doesn’t get much higher than this! Apologies to Mr Farley for nabbing his quotes, but it was in the public realm!
“The Harrier is still a remarkable device, but today is no longer viable as other than a sophisticated low level night bomb truck or BVR interceptor that can operate from small sites. Still not things to sniff at perhaps, but you need a bit more than that for the next generation of kit that may still be around in 50 years time.”
If you want to read the full conversation, which includes JSF, albeit from a 2003 perspective:
http://www.pprune.org/archive/index.php/t-90847.html
What is Naval Aviation for?
If its to breach a tier 1 integrated air defence system, overcome land based fighter cover and then finaly strike hardened enemy targets, then I agree, Harriers are a waste of time.
Are 36 F35B’s any better?
If its to intercept enemy fighters at the limit of their endurance before/during an attack on the fleet, or if its to attack an enemy fleet, are harriers good enough?
F35′s are undoubtedly better, but are Harriers good enough.
Sure, they wont be in 50 years time, but can we get good enough and cheap enough for the next 20 years?
Hell, it might even be worth just doing what we can to get GR9′s air to air capable if notr competant and waiting 5 years to see what becomes of the F35.
To convert the Sea Harrier from FRS.1 to F/A.2 they had to give it a major nose-job. It shouldn’t be a problem doing the same to the GR.9 to bring it up to, what would amount to, a FGR.11 standard.
I know the F/A.2 project cost a packet, but I think a majority of the costs were in the Blue Vixen development, plus it had a rear fuselage stretch. A GR.9 upgrade could use an off the shelf unit and utilise the airframe design on the AV-8B+. This should help keep costs down.
Nicholas, I am not sure why you say that the Rafale is not a realistic alternative when it is already in service, but a navalised Typhoon is?
I think if nothing else we should be seriously talking about giving the GR9s AV8B plus type Radars and BVR AAMs, so at least there will some SOME Intercept capability in the short term.
It got me thinking though. It reminded me of a book I had (and still have) when I was a spotty Air Cadet – Bill Gunston’s Harrier, part of the Modern Combat Aircraft series. In the final chapter he talks about futures.
Afterburning was not considered the way forward but “Plenum Chamber Burning” – I’m no engineer but there might be something on the web about it.
However there were a few interesting design studies:
http://s948.photobucket.com/albums/ad322/georgemccann/ThinkDefence/
The first shows the AV-8SX, apparently jointly proposed by McDonnell Douglas and Rolls Royce in 1981. It had an estimated speed of Mach 1.6.
The second shows a 3-poster aircraft, it has no name, but the copyright apparently belonged to Rolls Royce. The third shows a 3 poster PCB engine.
Not entirely relevant, probably, althour Richard’s post reminds me a lot of the AV-8SX, but interesting, nonetheless.
Oh – and Bill Gunston also provided this gem: “Morale: if you delay decisions long enough, inflation makes them impossible anyway.”
PCB was an interesting concept, I think they got as far as running a modified Pegasus on a ground test rig before the programme was shelved. The main problem using PCB would be the superheated efflux coming from the front nozzles impacting on the airframe, which would melt without significant modification.
Re: the AV-8SX, BAe did a study of the Harrier III in the early 90′s. The incredibly long link below shows a picture of the Harrier III concept as well as some other types.
http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://navy-matters.beedall.com/images/harrier3.jpg&imgrefurl=http://navy-matters.beedall.com/jca1-1.htm&h=192&w=150&sz=9&tbnid=Ksbs_9sEihCWLM:&tbnh=103&tbnw=80&prev=/images%3Fq%3DHarrier%2BIII&usg=__31k58KJhHrFB2viJM4eZeWBpDBg=&ei=txfIS7DMJJi60gTPz-HNDA&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=6&ct=image&ved=0CBkQ9QEwBQ
An idea I came up with to improve dogfighting would be to fit a pair of canard foreplanes on the air intakes, like the IAI Kfir and upgraded Mirage III/V’s. Not perfect, but it would reduce its turn radius and conventional manouvreability without total reliance on the engine for vectoring.
If the F35B failed it would not be the end of the world.
At the moment, some of our existing weapon systems cannot be used with it such as Meteor, whilst using Storm Shadow completely undermines its stealth qualities.
Saab have already been promoting SeaGripen to the likes of Brazil and India, as it was designed as a STOL fighter used off unprepared landing strips.
I also think that BAE Systems would have done significant research into a naval Typhoon so it wouldn’t take too long to develop.
What we might end up with though is a STOBAR carrier rather than CATOBAR so whilst STOBAR has its problems in terms of fighter MTOW these problems could be alleviated quite easily.
Kernowboy,
If the F-35B failed, looking at realities, the SeaGripen and a naval Typhoon will stay on the drawing board. The first of the carriers should be ready in around 2015, which is not much time to design and build a naval fighter or even modify an existing type.
The Rafael and the F-18E/F are ready and waiting and can carry a wide variety of weapons. Why wait longer for an unproven type?
Also, India has gone for the Mig-29K and why would Brazil pay for the development of a Gripen when it only requires a small number? It can buy the Rafael off the shelf with very little development costs.
The more we get shafted by the US on ITAR and other things it seems these days, the more I am inclined to think again on F35B and opt for an interim extension of the Harrier (we have only in the last month fitted a datalink to the GR9 so than can talk to AWACS) to give us some breathing space that either makes the ITAR issue not as urgent or time to pick/develop other options