For instance, Hanwha used to promote SOM-J in conjunction with Roketsan for ROKAF procurement. Just think about all the lost opportunity the SOM-J had which is now being monopolized by JSM. I still don't think T-LORAMIDS was in anyway worth it. I'm glad that Turks are starting to realize that as well. I used to see very different reactions/opinions from Turks regarding the S-400.
D-3 is only for domestic use afaik. C-3 is its export variant.
You probably meant C8 right?
That‘s an optimistic outlook if everything goes fine according to plans.
The bleak reality right now is: TurAF has zero active fighter jet with AESA radar and BVR missiles. While Greece already operates 12 Rafale F3R with AESA and Meteor AAM and 10 F-16V with AESA and AMRAAM.
Murad AESA radar although installed on 1 Akinci and 1 Özgür F-16 (?) is still in test phase and not in serial production for the foreseeable future afaik.
Well said, which is also the reason the purchase of block 70 makes sense.
Guys, why are you all so eager to put all the eggs, not just eggs but golden eggs, in one basket? Ozgur is not a finished program. It's still going through development phase, and there's nothing out there which indicates when the block 30 aircraft which are meant to be upgraded to the Ozgur standard will be upgraded. Why are you guys so willing to jeopardize the urgent modernization of THK?
If anything, as @Cabatil_TR has noted, this is an interim solution, but an interim solution that THK actually needs. Also, equipment like IVEWS has not been exported to any other country and is the latest EW system with USAF as the first user. Most other block 70/72 users have opted for older AIDEWS (since there was no IVEWS back then) and the Greeks are using much older ASPIS variants. If anything, THK block 70s will have EW edge over Greek Vipers.
Buying that much AA missiles and bombs when you can produce your own … We couldn’t have asked the US to integrate our own munitions into these new Vipers ?
As an extension to what I've said above, it is obviously necessary to procure American ordnances, since that's all that the block 70 could use. Americans have never shared source code for their latest gen mission computers on any fighters, afaik, which is MMC 7000 in this case. It's very simple, really. Nothing's as complicated as some of you people are trying to make.
LM inspected Tusaş facilities last year and given that Tusaş is produced the most number of F-16s outside the US, there is a very good chance that we are going to build our own F-16s an will build them for others, which will turn into more funds for Tusaş. It'd be really shocking if we didn't, as it would harm LM as much as us, their production lines are pretty tied up and they might miss out on orders because of that.
As
@dBSPL has pointed out, LM is planning to ramp up production in the Greenville plant. It was supposed to be ramped up sooner after the transition, but COVID delayed it. 40 aircrafts under license would make sense, but I suspect that it would be off the shelf. Also, Turkish facilities would be busy upgrading the pre-existing F-16s to block 70 standard.
EF was exclusively made by the British.
Most of it comes from Britain even the Prototypes were made in Britain.
It was pretty stupid of the UK to allow Germany have a hand in the EF. Now its costing you sales thanks to the Germans chucking a hissy fit.
No, EF is very definitely a 4 nation joint-program. BAe EAP very strongly resembles EF and its aerodynamic characteristics have carried over into the development of the actual fighter, but that was a TD, not a prototype. Every critical sub-components were joint-developed. You'll be surprised to know how much input Germany, Italy and Spain had in EF mission computer, Praetorian DASS, EJ200, etc. Only recently have the two userbase (UK and Italy, and Germany and Spain) have started to take different paths in terms of AESA development, but even still the Eurofighter LTE program is being run as a 4-nations joint program.
