Dassault Rafale, tender | News & Discussions

[Abingdonboy]

SO $24 billion TO BUY 125

Wow, your figures are off- even the order numbers!

And Pakistanis are accused of needless speculation and fantasy . From plain news,and something known as common sense, it is clear that the deal is put off until a new government comes in. There are many reasons for this.. the new GoI could be aggressive towards past policies in an effort to whitewash its predecessor and cancel or review the deal(delaying it further) , A new government signing the deal would absolve the current one of any problems(if it goes sour)..and so on. Secondly, the government requires a smooth sailing for elections and signing a $20 billion plus deal give your opposition a lot of political ammo.

The Rafale or MMRCA is not the holy grail though, it is built around IAF requirements and if the IAF finds itself unable to meet its requirements(or revised req...which it does yearly) with the deal then it can go for something else. I find this unlikely.. from a very businessman point of view.

Every deal goes through a cost analysis and the whole feasibility thing.. where NPVs are taken(even if in some other name and so on). The IAF probably gamed out other alternatives to putting its $20 billion elsewhere(quick FGFA,LCA Mk2, AMCA etc etc) and the benefits it would bring.. and at the end arrived at the MMRCA program. So unless heaven forbid there is a massive natural disaster in India that wreaks its economy.. I would consider the MMRCA deal safe(if albeit prone to more delays) .

Sir the deal is NOT $20BN, this is a fallacy that some ignorant types like to flout. And all the other things you have said have been accepted for some time now both the Indian and French sides have said as much. The Rafale contract will only be signed by the next GoI but 100% before the end of 2014- I believe the CEO of Dassualt said sometime in the Summer.


The MMRCA process has been clean throughout that is undeniable so there is no ammo in which to scupper the deal with.

I am not sure how you perceive saudi goverment as if whatever they want they throw money at without consolations and professional evaluations. I said it before if Rafale was of a great benefit they would have gone to french for it and maybe even more F-15s would have been dropped...even a radical plan why Rafale when F-15 with excellent capabilities for A2A/A2G can do the job very well and is still relative cheaper than Rafale and comes with much wider range of weapons suite plus the infrastructure is in place.

Of course they will conduct a professional analysis but what I was saying is that the Saudis/RSAF are not constrained by the same sort of finical restraints as other AFs around the world. The Gripen is pretty much tailored to the latter, its main selling point is affordability/cost effectiveness. As far as capabilities go the Rafale has it beat.


As for the F-15 vs Rafale, I would venture that political considerations come into play here, almost the entire Saudi military inventory is of US origin and the USG has a lot of sway with the royal family.

 

[IND151]

I have been the biggest cynic of Rafale over the last 18 months posting numerous threads that i felt it would be cancelled or massivelly delayed.

TODAY i have reasessed the current scenario and changed my opinion and am certain the deal will be signed and very importantly it will be signed before the Autumn of this year.

There are several very good reasons for this.

1. Both the french and the indians are too far up the garden path to let this fail too much time and money spent making this happen.

2. IAF is in a terrible state about to phase out 320 obsel;ete MIG21/27 fighters by 2018 literally half their fleet. LCA tejas going along at typical indian snails pace the Rafale will have to come. There is no other credible choice

3. The cost intially seems high TOO HIGH but this is country that paid USA $4.5 BILLION for 10 Transport planes and $2.7 billion for a russian scrapped scarrier. SO $24 billion TO BUY 125 of the worlds most advanced fighters with TOT will not scare the indians.

4. IAF premier fighter the SU30MKI is no longer state of the art as it was in 2004 surpassed and overtaken by euro canrards , F35 and soon J20 iaf NEEDS a kick *** tip of the spear multi roler to give IAF the state of art fighter until FGFA arrive in 10 years time. Rafale is needed for hundred different reasons.

FOR THIS REASON it will be coming SOON

From where yo got this figure.

The Rafael deal will cost us 12 to 15 billion dollars.

 

[halloweene]

Acccording to latest Air&Cosmos issue, Snecma would agree on a 100% indian built M88 engine. They are in talk with an indian subcontractor specialist in high precision forgeing (makes parts for BMW)

The Rafael deal will cost us 12 to 15 billion dollars.

. Very hard to say honestly. ToT (training ppl etc. and setting up a production line isnt cheap...

 

[IND151]

Acccording to latest Air&Cosmos issue, Snecma would agree on a 100% indian built M88 engine. They are in talk with an indian subcontractor specialist in high precision forgeing (makes parts for BMW)

. Very hard to say honestly. ToT (training ppl etc. and setting up a production line isnt cheap...

Kindly give source for claim.

 

[halloweene]

Air&Cosmos n° 2401, April 11th 2014 page 3. Section "Confidentiel"

 

[sancho]

French AF will deply 3 rafales in India for next Garuda exercise (May 5-16) so as to showcase Rafale capabilities

So finally an exercise with the Rafale, wonder what else will be part of the detachment? AWACS possibly like the Brits did, when they came with the EF.

 

[sancho]

If saudi goverment was interested in Rafale and cost was not the problem they would have dumped Typhoon deal in favor of Rafale

They were interested, since the Rafale was a contender in the Saudi competition back then too, but political reasons (close relations to the UK in the first place) and corruption issues, which made the EF the first choice and not any technical capabilities of the fighter.

 

[Donatello]

They were interested, since the Rafale was a contender in the Saudi competition back then too, but political reasons (close relations to the UK in the first place) and corruption issues, which made the EF the first choice and not any technical capabilities of the fighter.

Saudis already had Tornado, so it made natural choice to go for another Brit-German aircraft and to milk the defense firms in those nations to the max.

 

[sancho]

Saudis already had Tornado, so it made natural choice to go for another Brit-German aircraft and to milk the defense firms in those nations to the max.

Not if you have operational requiments in mind, but as we all know, that has not much importance for there. In operational terms, the offered Rafale was far better suited to replace their Tornados and to remain with a credible cruise missile attack capability.

 

[Donatello]

Not if you have operational requiments in mind, but as we all know, that has not much importance for there. In operational terms, the offered Rafale was far better suited to replace their Tornados and to remain with a credible cruise missile attack capability.

How is Rafale far better? Why did nations other than Saudi choose Typhoons over Rafale? Clearly, it was not far better. Both are excellent aircraft with room for upgrade. However, since Rafale has yet to see an export order, it seems limited in upgradation compared to Typhoon.

 

[Abingdonboy]

How is Rafale far better? Why did nations other than Saudi choose Typhoons over Rafale? Clearly, it was not far better. Both are excellent aircraft with room for upgrade. However, since Rafale has yet to see an export order, it seems limited in upgradation compared to Typhoon.

In the Strike/A2G role(s) the Rafale is FAR better than the EFT.


As for why the Saudis went for the EFT over the Rafale -ehem- -ehem-:


Al-Yamamah arms deal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



BAE pays fines of £285m over arms deal corruption claims | World news | theguardian.com



BAE admits guilt over corrupt arms deals | World news | The Guardian


Britain yields to bribery and corruption / ISN



This is quite well known/reported here in the UK.

 

[Donatello]

In the Strike/A2G role(s) the Rafale is FAR better than the EFT.


As for why the Saudis went for the EFT over the Rafale -ehem- -ehem-:


Al-Yamamah arms deal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



BAE pays fines of £285m over arms deal corruption claims | World news | theguardian.com



BAE admits guilt over corrupt arms deals | World news | The Guardian


Britain yields to bribery and corruption / ISN



This is quite well known/reported here in the UK.

Everyone knows about the bribery case.

In any case, how can you say Rafale 'is far better' (other than that India might sign the deal) ?? If you are referring to the Libyan combat ops, they were done by Tornados and Mirage as well.

 

[Abingdonboy]

Everyone knows about the bribery case.

In any case, how can you say Rafale 'is far better' (other than that India might sign the deal) ?? If you are referring to the Libyan combat ops, they were done by Tornados and Mirage as well.

For a multitude of reasons that are well known and well discussed here and around the net. India has VERY little to do with it.


I could talk about the Swiss AF's findings, what weapons and capabilities have been integrated and proven on both a/c but @sancho can take care of this for you, I'm too tired to sir.



As for the Libyan campaign yes I could point to this, and why not? As you said Tornados were used and what were they doing there you might ask- well providing targeting data for the EFTs who were unable to do this themselves of course!

I could also point to the fact the Rafale has been deployed to Afghanistan where the EFT has not and the Mali campaign where the Rafale again proved itself.


Maybe one day the EFT will be as good as the Rafale with Tranche Nth but with the finical issues the EFT consortium is facing, the lack of a clear and coherent road map coming out of the member nations and the fact they failed to sign up India that was willing and able to pay for the enhancement of the EFT's A2G capabilities, this is a LONG way down the road if ever.

 

[sancho]

How is Rafale far better? Why did nations other than Saudi choose Typhoons over Rafale? Clearly, it was not far better.

We have discussed this in this thread often enough, so just in short. In any real fighter competition where the EF, Rafale and other fighters were evaluated against each other, the Rafale was always shortlisted based on technical reasons, while the EF in most cases was rejected, or lost out at the end just like the EF on cost, or political reasons.

Fighter procurements in most cases have a political importance, so selecting a fighter as the winner doesn't automatically mean it is technically or operationally more capable, as shown in the Saudi case.

Thirdly, every country has it's own technical / operational requirements and while the one country might have higher importance on propper multi role capabilities, other are ok with air superiority.

Wrt the EF customer, Austria made a selection to buy mainly 2nd hand and very early EFs and they already regret it, because of the high costs and limited upgradability. Oman selected EF after adding more F16s to their fleet, so they selected a twin engine medium class fighter for air superiority, on top of a single engine multi role fighter at the lo end. A reasonable selection, especially if it comes with some additional UK benefits thanks to their relations with them. Saudi as said, political reasons and corruptions, so non of these exports were based on technical advantages of the EF, in most cases it wasn't even a real competition that went to the selection of the EF.

Wrt to future upgrads, the EF productionline will end around 2017 if no further export orders come. The partners already struggle to fund even basic upgrades and with the end of the production, not even the consortium companies will focus much on upgrades anymore, unless somebody pays for it. But with F35 coming in for UK and ITA, while ESP and ITA are facing finacial and economic problems, there is simply no money to waste anymore.
France on the other side will produce the Rafale at least till 2020, has already allocated funds for the next upgrade and has no alternative to Rafale till 2030, so has to keep upgrading it.

Wrt why the Rafale is clearly better for the Saudis, simply because it aready offered what the Saudis are paying extra to upgrade the EF today. Targeting pod, 250Kg LGB / PGM, Cruise Missile. Their Tornado had these features, so going by technical / operational reasons, you obviously choose a successor, that is able to provide at least the same capabilities, if not better. The EF T2 that the Saudis got, didn't offered these capabilities, the EW of Rafale is better, offers more payload, weapon options and a longer range. All these are clear points in favour for Rafale, when you compare it as a replacement for Tornados, while it's capabilities in A2A would come on top of this.

 

[Storm Force]

With the 4th largest Air force in the world signing a massive deal for rafale minimum 126 fighters prehaps 189 fighters the Dassult rafale fututre will have completely catapulted to another level.

For rafale its a massive cash injection worth tens of billons dollars
Massive credibility when a real proper combat experienced air power like india,s makes the rafale it bench mark fighter of choice over typhoon and usa legacy teen fighters.
The prestige of india selecting this MMRCA is huge win win for Dassult.

This is why the FRENCH will nerver scupper the deal now and india will squeeze every drop they can out of Dassult