What fighter plane do you think Romania should use?

For the future, I envision the Romanian aviation as it was in the past: part of coalitions where she will not be the major player. From a minor participant of course there are expectations, but not as much as from the biggest partners. Nobody will expect from us to be the best, so we do not need to obtain the best thing money can buy.
A reasonable equilibrium between cost and performance is what we need, and for that Russian equipment is not bad – if they want to sell it to a NATO member. And hopefully (but this is science fiction) no corruption or political pressure will be factors during a purchase.

The F-35 is mired in development hell and it looks like it may be another good few years until anyone gets one to play with it (unless it is cancelled altogether).
The F-16 is not a popular choice in Romania because many simply think it is "old". The F16 is still the most popular jet fighter of all times.
The Gripen is pretty but it is getting "old" and few air forces seem to like it.
Romanians will not accept Russian fighters, no matter how good they are.
No one mentioned China... They have some interesting planes and Romania bought planes from China before. This may be the future.
Romania may have to look towards the Eurofighter.
Radu

1. What planes? When? More details, please...
2. That would be the "normal" course, as long as we're inside the E.U., but... we'll see!

Indeed Romania bought in the seventies some Harbin H-5R bombers/recce planes (chinese version of Il-28) and used them until 2001, when they were retired.

Boys,do you want to fight Russia?Anyway for you all work will make USA...and for us -Russia.You can buy car for every young family or house for this money.Dont buy airplanes at all.

You must be new to the foum... Of course there are some people in Romania who want to fight Russia. Some don't even realise that today's Russia is not Soviet Union. Some are even convinced they will win! Wait a minute, they will chime in. Get some popcorn and a drink, it's a good show!

Romania needs to train pilots, and needs to have some sort of means to patrol the borders (that is needed even in peacetime) so some planes will be bought anyaway. They may not be snazzy or top-of-the-range, but some will have to bo bought/found/borrowed/leased to keep the country safe.

I, personally, would not dismiss Russian planes. They are superb.

Radu

For the pilots using the Eurofighter, the European engineers developed a system showing the pilots all kind of information by overlapping it over the transparent cover of the helmet. It does not matter where you turn your head, you still see all this data. This way the pilots do not need to look only forward (to the board) to get all this flux of information.
The system was copied by the American engineers and introduced to all American planes appearing after Eurofighter.

P.S: Drifting from topic... The armor type used by M1 Abrams was invented in Great Britain, while the canon used by M1 Abrams is manufactured in Germany - by the same company who once upon a time made the canons for Panther and Tiger !

This post has been edited by Florin on September 09, 2012 02:52 pm

HMD is not a new invention and it is not even an Eurofighter "first". It has been around for a while.
Famously, the Apache helicopter was fitted with the IHADSS in the mid-eighties. The Russians had their own version of HMD as well as voice control.
The MiG-21 Lancer has HMD right now.
HMD can be retrofitted to any aircraft.
Radu

HMD is not a new invention and it is not even an Eurofighter "first". It has been around for a while.
Famously, the Apache helicopter was fitted with the IHADSS in the mid-eighties. The Russians had their own version of HMD as well as voice control.
The MiG-21 Lancer has HMD right now.
HMD can be retrofitted to any aircraft.
Radu

The creators of documentaries ending into "Military Channel" or "Discovery" should learn their lesson better - otherwise they misinform countless people like me.

http://www.pesurse.ro/#/2012/09/17/romania...ari-pe-9-avioa/

worst possible decision....

compared with this, Gripen with offset and some Erieye toys would have worked like a charm...

C`mmon, nobody is that stupid. 9 old planes for half a billion?
The reporter must have understood something wrong...

This post has been edited by Hadrian on September 17, 2012 07:03 pm

Nope, it's official:

http://www.nineoclock.ro/romania-to-buy-se...-from-portugal/

This thread can now be closed for 20 years.*

* "According to Dobritoiu, quoted by Romania TV, the fighters passed all technical verifications and can be used for another 20 years."

So basically, we spend the half a billion in order to be allowed 20 years later to buy this:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/18/...E88H00D20120918



Because of the constant budget overruns, at that moment one F-35 will cost half billion



This post has been edited by Hadrian on September 24, 2012 03:48 pm

Half billion... what?! Renminbi? Dirhams? (Well, the Dirham might go down with the oil reserves in the not-so-far future) Or perhaps the famous Botswana currency?

Dolars, of course. If you check actual prices per unit for F-35, they are at the moment for F-35A at US$154 million (flyaway cost, 2012). And still growing...

This post has been edited by Hadrian on September 27, 2012 05:23 pm