That's crazy that they would need so many of these. That must be because they never received them with the aircrafts they bought?! But that doesn't make any sense, either, unless they never received enough of the LAU-128s which are also used as triple wracks in the F-15's case. But something is a bit strange that they either never had enough of them, or the launchers, for some strange reason have a life expectancy and need to be overhauled because of their electronics and/or the extreme heat in Saudiya has some impact on them? Or once a certain amount of missiles are fired from them, the initial flaming of the missile's rocket engine impacts the launcher to a certain degree that eventually destroys it and its internal electronics or mechanisms. It's just weird that they need almost 600 of those launchers/pylons. Sounds like a complete overhaul.
I also can't help call out the hypocrisy of the US when it comes to certain Arab countries and even non-Arab countries as far as allowing the AIM-120C-7/8 (in this case) to be sold to, while others like Egypt and Iraq aren't allowed. You take some of the main reasoning such as probably the number 1 reason for permitting the sale of the missile is the cancer's (Usrael as you like to always use lol which I think it brilliant) security.
The other reasons down the list after that number 1 (in no particular order) are 3rd party technology sharing/infractions and the recipient's human rights records, just to name the main ones. So the 3 in probably this order are Usrael's security, 3rd party technology sharing/infractions & human rights.
Of course, not to ever knock on Saudiya ever, as it is the biggest brotherly country to Egypt and this brotherhoods dates back to the days of the Prophet's [SallAllahu Aleihi WaSalam] times and there is no other relationship like this anywhere else in the world. That said, the reason I bring this up is, again, the hypocrisy of the US when it comes to its conditions and arms sales. The fact that it tries to hog world military sales while in the same breath, do whatever it can to exclude Russia and China from its own world arms monopoly, but also limit many countries it has a grip on to arms it would or would not sell to.
So a country like Egypt, has a peace treaty with Israel since 1979 and has never violated it in any way, and uses exorbitant amounts of US military hardware including being the 4th largest operator of the F-16, gets accused of 3rd party technology transfer violations, but those are certainly arguable as the more variety weapons one has, the more potential there is for representatives of other nations to inadvertently come across this equipment in Egypt which was in the last case, Hillary Clinton almost blew a gasket about.
And then, of course, there's the human rights issue where the US leverages against Egypt to its fullest capacity. Yet there are many instances that tally more abuses to citizens at the hands of police, government officials and the judicial system in the US than in Egypt in all its years of existence combined. And back to the disclaimer of brotherly love of Saudiya and this is no intention of throwing the finger at it or anything of the sort, but to expose the US' hypocrisy and for the longest time, the murder & disappearance of Gamal Hashoggshi was a HUGE highlighted reason the US would bring up to temporarily halt any weapon's purchases by Saudiya. Several members of congress would bring up other perceived human rights abuses and use them as well but in the end, the US would turn a blind eye to all these issues and go through with the sale of these weapons. And between all the fighter jets in F-15s, armor of all sorts from the best versions of Abram tanks to personnel carriers etc., and to SAM systems which are some of the best in the world between the Patriot PAC-III to of course, the THAAD anti ballistic missile defense system set up by the US to protect Saudiya. All terrific stuff and well deserved are all permitted including this new purchase by Saudiya for almost 300 AIM-120C-7/8s and the 600 launchers.
Then you have poor old Egypt lol and the measly AIM-120 which it cannot acquire for the reasons listed above. Despite having a major peace treaty agreement signed for well over 40 years and abided by to the fullest, and the incomparable human rights abuses which could be and have been argued till the cows come home as well as the 3rd party tech transfer infractions which were briefly explained due to the variety of differently sourced equipment which risks the run-in of different personnel getting close to US weapons in Egypt and nowhere near the extent needed to classify as a violation and yet, after all that, the advanced medium range A2A munition is closely kept away from Egypt despite the CISMOA treaty being signed by Egypt after refusing to do so for well over 3 decades if I'm not mistaken. That alone should be a green light along with the peace treaty to ease the critical acquisition of the BVR missile by Egypt. But sadly, it's still off limits.
Even Pakistan, a sworn an actual enemy of Israel and a nuclear state which scares the living daylights out of the US that it spies on it and all the movements the Pakistan military does relocating its nuke stockpiles from different areas to new ones for secrecy and none of this is used by the US as a reason to deny the advanced weapon.
Taking all of these matters into consideration and the picture is certainly much clearer as it is full of shameless hypocrisy to no end. The bias the US holds against Egypt is phenomenally ridiculous to no end. Watered-down jets (until the batch of 20 block 52s in 2013) and no AIM-120 while other countries such as Saudiya and Pakistan whom technically have absolutely no peaceful, economic or even diplomatic relationships with Israel (one of them actually being contentious) are allowed to purchase these advanced weapons.
See anything wrong with this entire picture? And now Egypt has to deal with CAATSA on a $2.5 billion deal it made for 26/30 Su-35S fighter jets from Russia which would be Egypt's first heavy, air superiority fighter to ever be in its inventory and which would also open the door for the best eastern BVR missiles to compensate for the lack of US ones and would raise the EAF's capabilities to another level never seen before. But here is the US again putting the sticks into Egypt and trying everything it can to prevent this from happening.
Perhaps (and I did bring this up before) is that most, if not all US made weapons in Egypt's arsenal are acquired through the US' foreign military aid package also guaranteed as part of the Egypt/Israel/US peace process that maybe if Egypt would offer to purchase some of these various systems instead of using the "aid coupon," that it might help a little. But for some reason, based on previous experience and familiarity with the situation is that it wouldn't help in the initial phase.
A big reason why this meeting coming up on November 8th-9th between Egypt's foreign minister and Anthony Blinken as well as the US DoD is very important. Quite possibly the most important meeting regarding the sale/purchase of US weapons and the avoidance of CAATSA in the insistence by Egypt to go through the Su-35S acquisition in every possible way, despite the economic sanctions that could be imposed. This is a huge deal.
It also begs the question if there is any action from Saudiya and/or the UAE in support of Egypt in this go-around as that would help quite a bit. Perhaps some back-channel phone calls to Biden and Blinken from the Crown Prince that would indicate Saudiya's full support of increasing Egypt's fighter jets' advanced air to air weaponry. A theory thrown out there would be the upgrade would help the coalition increase its strength in the region as well as compatibility with the US as well. So much can be done here in this ever so critical phase that needs to neutralize the US' huge level of hypocrisy and its control over the EAF's F-16s. We can only hope and SC, bro, sorry for the slight off-topic and the long post, my brother.
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Back to the launchers, and from this site: A VERY interesting paragraph that we should figure out what exactly are they talking about in relation to these launchers.
A Middle Eastern nation which tends to heavily modify and customize its U.S. aircraft fleet asked that the launcher integrated with their aircraft be modified to support the carriage and release of an indigenous air-to-air missile.
The MRL family of aircraft missile launchers consists of the LAU-127, LAU-128 and LAU-129, designed to safely carry and release the AIM-9 Sidewinder and AIM-120 Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) on the F/A-18, F-15 and F-16 aircraft respectively. These single-rail launchers exist in multiple configurations, with the primary differences typically being related to the coatings used, as many parts are common throughout the series.
Based on the 1st paragraph where it mentions a Middle Eastern nation, I think it's pretty safe to assume they're talking about one of two nations in this case which are either Saudi Arabia or the UAE.
The former using one of its locally produced indigenous air-to-air missile we might've seen on SC's "Made in KSA" thread and the latter could certainly be the main culprit in this case based on the statement of heavily modifying its aircraft which the UAE has certainly done with its F-16 block 60 that we've seen quite a few of those mods. The supplier most certainly would be HALCON in the UAEs case. But what is this indigenous Air-to-Air missile from either HALCON or one from Saudi Arabia they're referring to? Any ideas, SC or Phillip?
marvingroup.com
Or are they actually afraid of the EAF? With all that bravado and self aggrandizing, what's the issue?
