The Mother of all Defence Deal to be finalized this year, who do you think, Will Win Indian MRCA competition ? or Should Win? MMRCA contenders are : The Saab Gripen Eurofighter Typhoon Dassault Rafale Mikoyan MiG-35
The First Kill would obviously be the F-16IN, though the offered Lockheed Martin F-16IN Super Viper is of block 60/70, a 4.5 generation aircraft as stated by the US officials. It will be more advanced than the F-16 Block 52s that the Pakistan Air Force has. (IAF cannot & will not and take a risk of inducting a similar aircraft as the PAF.) A Clear NO to the F-35 by the Indian Defence minister is a sign that no trick will work here? So Good bye F-16IN..
The Second to go will be Mikoyan MiG-35, if IAF had to buy a MIG, there would not had been a Tender Process. (Remember there was NO Tender when the Sukhoi 30 MKI was inducted) it was a direct Government to Government Procurement. And the absence of a MIG-35 from the Aero India 2011 is a strong indicator of what is to come & what will not. IAF has probably decided not to put all the eggs in a single basket, so out goes the MIG.....
Eurofighter Typhoon VS Dassault Rafale The Indian Air Force has zeroed in on French company Dassault Aviation's Rafale and European consortium EADS's Eurofighter Typhoon as its choice of fighter aircraft for India's big ticket medium multi-role combat aircraft (MMRCA) deal. After the IAF recommendations, the ball is now in the Defence Ministry's court to take the call on the $10.4 billion defence deal. MMRCA Contenders at AERO INDIA 2011 [youtube]5oiFnO9HkgI[/youtube]
The Third to go will be Boeing F/A-18IN, the Super Hornet is a twin-engine 4.5 generation carrier-based multirole fighter aircraft. The Super Hornet is operated by USAF & the Australian Air Force. The Tragedy with F/A-18IN is that it comes with a Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) Radar, so to transfer it to the IAF, Boeing needs a approval from the US Senate, & that would come with some restrictions and pre-conditions. Based a a long history of imposing Sanctions which the US has. The IAF better not select this Jet....
# The Saab Gripen , a Swedish jet with a Max takeoff weight : 14,300 - 16,000 kg, a Combat radius:1300 km & Maximum payload:5,300 kg. this is far too less as compared to the competitors. Secondly, JAS Gripen has offered the source code of their AESA radar as part of their bid. what drags down the Gripen is the US electronics, weaponry, and the GE F414 engine.
# Eurofighter Typhoon, the best in its class and the most expensive of all the bidders what the European consortium is offering is "Tranche-3" the latest of the lot. If the EF-2000 (Typhoon) wins the BID, India will be the Fifth Partner for all Eurofighter related developments. The Navy Version of the Jet is also being developed. If selected a common maintenance setup can further reduce operational costs.
# Dassault Rafale seems to be a perfect jet, with a huge Combat radius of 1800 Km, a Maximum payload of 9,500 kg, but it also come with one major problem, it is only operated by the French Air Force & the French Navy, no other country till date has inducted this Jet. Secondly, the AESA Radar equipped first French squadron of aircraft is expected to become operational only by 2012. The Rafale has the advantage of being logistically and operationally similar to the Mirage 2000, thus the Rafale would require fewer changes in the existing infrastructure of the IAF, which in turn will reduce cost. Moreover, being 100 per cent French also provided Dassault a distinct edge over its competitors on the issue of technology transfer. The French government has cleared full technology transfer of the Rafale to India, including that of the RBE2-AA Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar and the transfer of software source codes, which will allow Indian scientists to re-programme a radar or any sensitive equipment if need be. Without the software source codes, the IAF would have to specify mission parameters to foreign manufacturers to enable configuration of their radar, seriously compromising security in the process. (that is BIG ++ to go for this Jet)
