Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP) UK-Japan-Italy

red admiral said:
Pretty sure that's just being further along the automation scale where there is reduced human interaction. i e. Human sets a goal and then machine completes that goal in the "optimum" way (many ways to define optimum). The main driver is more about how complex the task is that the machine is being asked to do and within what constraints.
Click to expand...
That's been at a level for a while, the first demonstration of such was while I was still in the service in the early 00s IIRC. "Bomb this target" sent to a quartet of drones and the drones decided among themselves who was hitting the main target based on location and who was going to do SEAD and who was going to do BDA.
 
Hood said:
Maybe the Saudis are tired of bankrolling BAE for nearly 70 years with nowt to show for it in return?
BAe were promising home assembly to various Middle East nations as far back as the 1980s and nothing has happened. Here were are in the supposed age of wireless comms, digital design tools, 3D printing etc., should be easier than ever to rock up in Saudi and set up something. The excuses why it can't be done are going to wear thin.

BAE can't keep expecting Saudi to buy the next fighter they come up with every time just out of brand loyalty.
And let's face it, European defence money is always hanging on a political whim, oil money keep on flowin' until you run out of the stuff - so they know their petrodollars count for more bang in the long run.
Click to expand...

They assembled the Hawk in Saudi Arabia.
1434663658587.jpg
 
I could potentially see something happening like that again for GCAP/Tempest WatcherZero if the Saudis agree to purchase some.
 
Jackonicko said:
Secondly, one could see Saudi participation in the programme as setting it up better to understand and contribute to FCAP, if not to GCAP itself.
Click to expand...
The issue with this is that GCAP will be entering production around the same time KAI is expecting KF-21 to even begin the transition into a 5th gen. Also with how immature Korea's aerospace industry is and how reliant they are on foreign industry participation, what could they really teach SA? Perhaps manufacturing, but SA already said they won't take anything less than development participation.
 
Jackonicko said:
The production configuration has not been frozen yet. This is a concept. What the FTD looks like? Who knows!
Click to expand...
If first flight is scheduled for 2027 (?) I would assume it's about time to freeze the outer mold line of the tech demonstrator.
 
The FTD design is frozen. They've built three intake ducts for it, and an ejection seat test sled, and who knows what else!
 
Hood said:
Maybe the Saudis are tired of bankrolling BAE for nearly 70 years with nowt to show for it in return?
BAe were promising home assembly to various Middle East nations as far back as the 1980s and nothing has happened. Here were are in the supposed age of wireless comms, digital design tools, 3D printing etc., should be easier than ever to rock up in Saudi and set up something. The excuses why it can't be done are going to wear thin.

BAE can't keep expecting Saudi to buy the next fighter they come up with every time just out of brand loyalty.
And let's face it, European defence money is always hanging on a political whim, oil money keep on flowin' until you run out of the stuff - so they know their petrodollars count for more bang in the long run.
Click to expand...
They have just celebrated local final assembly of the last of 22 Hawk 165s...
 
Ok, I concede that BAE let them assemble some Hawks, an airframe 50 years old.
But that's a sign of the times now that Saudi wants to be a more industrial nation and demands workshare. BAe didn't entrust them with assembling anything churned out under Al-Yamanah, even simple stuff like PC-9s. Admittedly Saudi industrial capacity back then was probably lacking, but at the same time BAe were offering Saddam Hussein a full Hawk production line while dangling carrots of P.110 fighter assembly/parts production after that.
 
www.theguardian.com

Europe is unprepared for risks from Russia and Trump, says Airbus boss

Aerospace group chief executive urges UK and Europe to pool efforts and merge fighter jet programmes
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com

“It’s quite clear that we need to find a way to pool our efforts together as Europeans to have one very powerful capability by type of weapon system. Does it make sense to not come together for security and defence with the level of insecurity that we see at the borders of Europe? No, I think there’s no choice."
Click to expand...
 
It's not like European politicians and industry haven't been championing the dangers of relying on US kit since the 1960s.

And its not like the US hasn't been lobbying NATO members to consistently buy US kit since the 1960s or that the US hasn't made every move in the sales book that it can to deny European manufacturers export sales across the world. LM hasn't exactly been shy in extolling the virtues of the F-35 to secure sales and probably other back-door deals to ensure sales.
 
I hope we get to see a united European fighter jet which makes everyone Happy (ok we can ignore the french) but dreams often stay by being dreams
 
That will probably never happen kqcke for you, even if the UK somehow rejoined the European Union.
 
Merging the projects faces the same core discontinuity in requirements that faced Eurofighter, everyone wants a large and capable aircraft except France who wants it to be small enough to be carrier capable (and possibly Germany who want it to be cheap?).

And there's no evidence Dassault is any more of a team player than it was 35 years ago, in fact plentiful evidence from FCAS negotiations that nothing has changed.

(My instant reaction to the article was "Has Faury ever met Dassault?!")
 
Sure it's a great idea but international cooperation needs broad agreement on solutions. The issue in Europe is that not everyone wants or needs the GCAP or FCAS. What gives me hope for GCAP is that Italy, Japan and the UK all have similar enough requirements for a new 6th gen fighter and aerospace industries that (hopefully) there isn't going to be butting heads over details.

I don't want to get into the politics of the US's current, let's say weirdness, but I think a lot of the unpredictability in the US is being driven by partisan politics. There is a good conversation about how seriously Europe takes defence but this isn't it honestly.
 
France are going down the carrier based route again DWG, but this time I think that the FCAS will end up being larger than the Rafale mainly because of the PANG future aircraft carrier will have an estamated Gross Tonnage of 75,000 tonnes so it will be larger than the CdeG so there will be no size limitations for the FCAS.
 
Hood said:
It's not like European politicians and industry haven't been championing the dangers of relying on US kit since the 1960s.

And its not like the US hasn't been lobbying NATO members to consistently buy US kit since the 1960s or that the US hasn't made every move in the sales book that it can to deny European manufacturers export sales across the world. LM hasn't exactly been shy in extolling the virtues of the F-35 to secure sales and probably other back-door deals to ensure sales.
Click to expand...
Point of order! It is vastly, vastly harder to do the bulk bribery that Lockheed did with the F104 today.

There's a very mean law on the books in the US called the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act that has resulted in billion-dollar fines to companies.



FighterJock said:
France are going down the carrier based route again DWG, but this time I think that the FCAS will end up being larger than the Rafale mainly because of the PANG future aircraft carrier will have an estamated Gross Tonnage of 75,000 tonnes so it will be larger than the CdeG so there will be no size limitations for the FCAS.
Click to expand...
There's still going to be limits on the aircraft, just that the limits aren't going to be a big factor.

Carriers can't launch over ~85klbs, and can't recover over about 65klbs.
 
Scott Kenny said:
Point of order! It is vastly, vastly harder to do the bulk bribery that Lockheed did with the F104 today.

There's a very mean law on the books in the US called the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act that has resulted in billion-dollar fines to companies.
Click to expand...
Really?
www.theguardian.com

US defence contractor paid commissions to Saudi firm later alleged to be conduit for bribes

Harris had longstanding relationship with ABTSS, later alleged by British prosecutors to have handled or received illegal payments
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
www.theguardian.com

UK government facing two sets of legal action after Saudi defence deal trial

Whistleblower Ian Foxley alleges MoD had role in him losing his job while acquitted businessman John Mason seeks payment of legal costs
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com

I suspect stuff like this will make Saudi Arabia's participation in GCAP a moot subject.
 
Hood said:
Really?
www.theguardian.com

US defence contractor paid commissions to Saudi firm later alleged to be conduit for bribes

Harris had longstanding relationship with ABTSS, later alleged by British prosecutors to have handled or received illegal payments
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
www.theguardian.com

UK government facing two sets of legal action after Saudi defence deal trial

Whistleblower Ian Foxley alleges MoD had role in him losing his job while acquitted businessman John Mason seeks payment of legal costs
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com

I suspect stuff like this will make Saudi Arabia's participation in GCAP a moot subject.
Click to expand...
Yes, really.

www.justice.gov

Ericsson Agrees to Pay Over $1 Billion to Resolve FCPA Case

www.justice.gov www.justice.gov

Note that I said harder, not impossible.
 
Last edited:
I thought no ITAR solves all of this, no ITAR and open sharing means one big happy family?
 

Similar threads

Back
Top Bottom