How good is the Sepcat Jaguar A2A?

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french stratege 1982 5/1/2005 6:31:01 PM

Why 20 crusaders only and not 30 or 36? After all crusader carried Magic and could also use AM9L.As US provided AM9L to UK demand, we could have done that also. French did have a good advantage vs UK in 82: 2 real aircraft carrier and Crusader were 17 years old aircraft at that time and better than old Mirage 3 of Argentine, not to mention missiles, And our fleet did have protection against seaskimmer missile, unless UK (except for the few ship with sea wolf):indeed our 100 mm antiaircraft was able to intercept seaskimmer with its NAJIR firecontrol and all our ship did have it. UK have to refit their ship with Phalanx well after the war. I did not see that the rough sea would have impeached us to do operations. Our carriers were twice the size of Invicible class and perfectly able to operate in rough sea.Maybe it would have compelled us to coordinate more with meteo and choose more protected areas . And to think that Harrier were equal in CAP duration with Crusader, it is a joke.Crusader were able to stay longuer and refueled in flight by Supertendard. The only thing UK did have is that Sea harrier had better radar but it did not count as Argentine aircraft did not have jammer.

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Phaid RE:1982 5/1/2005 7:15:02 PM

Why 20 crusaders only and not 30 or 36? After all crusader carried Magic and could also use AM9L.As US provided AM9L to UK demand, we could have done that also. 20 is actually too high. When I posted earlier, I had forgotten that Flotille 14F had converted to Super Etendard in 1978, leaving 12F as the only Crusader squadron in the Aeronavale. And historically, the French never deployed more than 12 Crusaders on a single carrier, even for potential combat engagements like Lebanon (in 1982 as a matter of fact) where they deployed 6 on Foch. French did have a good advantage vs UK in 82: 2 real aircraft carrier and Crusader were 17 years old aircraft at that time and better than old Mirage 3 of Argentine, not to mention missiles, And our fleet did have protection against seaskimmer missile, unless UK (except for the few ship with sea wolf):indeed our 100 mm antiaircraft was able to intercept seaskimmer with its NAJIR firecontrol and all our ship did have it. That's great, but not really relevant. The British fleet had formidable SAMs and guns, but nonetheless without CAP the landing at San Carlos would have been a complete disaster. Same would go for the French. "Real aircraft carriers" is not necessarily an advantage: I did not see that the rough sea would have impeached us to do operations. Our carriers were twice the size of Invicible class and perfectly able to operate in rough sea.Maybe it would have compelled us to coordinate more with meteo and choose more protected areas. Rough seas is one thing; ice, snow, and impenetrable fog is another. The British carriers were able to operate aircraft in the Norwegian Sea when even the US Navy Nimitz class carriers had to cease air operations due to the sea state and weather. And given the ranges involved, you don't really have the option to withdraw to calmer seas. Once your troops are ashore, you have to cover them. And the British carriers don't rely on catapults, which if the bow catapult on either French carrier broke would reduce the ship to a very restricted operational cycle. And to think that Harrier were equal in CAP duration with Crusader, it is a joke. Crusader were able to stay longuer and refueled in flight by Supertendard. The only thing UK did have is that Sea harrier had better radar but it did not count as Argentine aircraft did not have jammer. Jammers? What? The only advantage the French aircraft have is buddy refueling from Super Etendards. In every other way, the Sea Harriers are superior, and the very limited number of French fighters combined with the much greater problems the conventional carriers would have faced with the weather completely negates the range advantage.

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Aussiegunner1 RE:1982 5/1/2005 7:16:28 PM

I agree that France could have sent all 36 of its Crusaders and left some Super Etenards at home, to emphasise the fleet air defence mission. Also, the Super Etenard can be used in a secondary air defence role with 2 Matra Magics, which might have been credible against heavily laden fighter bombers if needed. However, I think using them as tankers and for ground attack when needed would probably have been the better option. The radar advantage of the SH was not very important, because most intercepts occurred either with the assistance of surface radar or purely visually, as the Blue Fox did not have any look down capability. On that basis, conditions permitting I reckon the Crusaders would have provided slightly better coverage, but I don't think it would be that significant. The Harrier's did have an advantage of being able to take off in much worse weather than the Crusaders and SE's would be able to. They have that advantage over any catapault launched type, though you have to question whether the Argentines would be operating in such weather anyway. They also don't face the disadvantage of being grounded when the catapaults are malfunctioning. Essentially, the Crusader/SE combination is probably slightly more capable than the SH one, but is also slightly less reliable. Pretty much horses for courses really. I never thought I'd here FS making this statement, "Crusader were 17 years old aircraft at that time and better than old Mirage 3 of Argentine." Apparently a French Mach 2 fighter is inferior to an American Mach 1.7 one. I'd have to disagree, as I think they are probably about equal. So, we have a Frenchman barracking for an American aircraft and an Aussie sticking up for its French competitor. How perverse;-).

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Aussiegunner1 RE:Ander 320 5/1/2005 7:20:51 PM

"For lebannon raid the SE used 4x400kg bomb or 6x250kg bomb as load." Not being able to read French, I'll take your word for it. The carrier must have been able to get pretty close into shore due to a lack of a credible anti-shipping threat.

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Phaid RE:1982 - Aussiegunner1 5/1/2005 7:21:44 PM

I pretty much agree with everything you said, except for the 36 Crusaders part. As I said, France only had one Crusader flotille since 1978. I suspect that one carrier would have been sent with a normal fixed wing air complement, the other with mostly helicopters -- this is actually the way the two carriers operated together most of the time from the late 1970s onward. I wasn't going to touch the whole Mirage III vs Crusader argument ;)

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Aussiegunner1 RE:Ander 320 5/1/2005 7:24:24 PM

"We should have bought Jaguar but Super Etendart is not as crap as it seems.At least it has similar payload*range than a seaharrier." Don't forget that the Sea Harrier is a fighter, not a strike aircraft. It evolved into a fighter far superior to the Crusader, with Blue Vixen and AMRAAM. The Harrier evolved into the GR-7/9 and AV-8B with a far superior capability than the Super Etenard had. Also, even the Sea Harrier FRS-1 was able to take 2 Sea Eagle in the anti shipping role(+ 2 tanks, vs the Super Etenard's standard 1 Exocet. Essentially even though it was a fighter, it was able to do a better job of one of the SE's most important missions than the SE was.

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Aussiegunner1 RE:Jaguar and the French 5/1/2005 7:26:27 PM

"Pure speed isn't that a difference the Jaguar using PC to go Mach 1.6 clean when the SE go Mach 1.3 WITHOUT PC." I don't know what you mean by PC, but in any case, I've read that comments by its pilots indicate that the SE was generally only able to make Mach .98 under normal flight conditions, even though the specs give a top speed of Mach 1.3. That is a considerable difference to Mach 1.3 for the Jag.

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french stratege Phaid 5/1/2005 7:51:02 PM

I 've answered to you in naval air thread. The problem was the crusader after 1985.Last US crusader have flown until 87.It was one of my favorite aircraft.I remember the "cruze" flying above landivisiau: impressing! What would have been a "cruze" refited in 85 with M53P2, M2000 avionic, S530D, magic 2 and Helmet Mounted Sight! The Superetendard is maneouvrable like a A4 I 've flown many time Supertendard combat simulator and it was lot of fun (I was responsible for its update).Pretty difficult to land on an aircraft carrier. In fact I think we should have bought second hand crusader and refit them in attack role (maybe with a new wing) with modern engine and avionic rather than buying either Superetendard or Jaguar M. One hundred crusader would have been fun!

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Aussiegunner1 If they were really interested in economics... 5/1/2005 7:57:22 PM

... they should have ditched the Super Etenard and bought a bunch of ex-USN/USMC A-4's and fitted them with Agaves and Exocets. The US had retired heaps of them by the time the SE came out, so the French navy would have got them for a bargin. The Singaporean's and New Zealanders have shown that fitting them with radar and advanced weapons is a viable option. Finally, they had a much better warload than the SE did in the ground attack role, were cheap to operate and were smaller, hence you could fit more of them on your ships. In fact, I think that the difference in performance between the A-4 and the Jaguar M would have been sufficiently small to mean that purchasing the later would not have been justified.

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french stratege RE:If they were really interested in economics... 5/1/2005 9:10:10 PM

In fact it was what the navy wanted: A4 or A7 also was considered.But Dassault proposed SuperEntendard with a a bargain price and a strong political lobbying.This to avoid US industry entering French market. In fact French industry was under pressure after failure of Mirage F1E M53 in 1973 for the NATO market, then abandon of ACF supermirage. ACF supermirage was an equivalent of F15 which was abandoned just before first prototype flown in 1975: 2 M53, FBW, mirage F1 style wing with automatic variable camber, outstanding performance with a top speed of Mach 3 !!! and great maneouvrability (I would have liked to see it fly).Dassault was well aware of the risk of abandon. Too costly and more over its HFR radar was not ready (its little brother was later RDI) because Thomson was late to start development of digital HFR radar like those of F14 or F15.French industry was struggling to come back and was critized to be backward US.This was corrected later with strong push on R&D. The lack of radar was a reason added to cost to say that French should make US planes under license. French air force evaluated F15 and wanted Dassault (or Aerospatiale ) to produce it under licence. A great fight with Dassault but Dassault have anticiped that and has already started M2000 development on its on funding and specifications then proposed it in 75 to arm�e de l'air.Snecma were late to provide the right engine and thomson the radar.At the end everything was ready in 1985 (7 year late) and Dassault have benefited of all procurement credit since the Crusader buying until today (interesting to see that Dassault has a 3 billion $ cash reserve today). But it is true that making plane is a strategic issue!We were close from UK decision of sixties to abandon independant development of high end fighters.

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VelocityVector French Stratege: If they were really interested in economics... 5/1/2005 9:45:50 PM

FS, please direct me to the authority for your statement "automatic variable camber, outstanding performance with a top speed of Mach 3 ...." I stumbled across a paper claim the aircraft was capable of Mach 2.3, but never did locate substantiation for Mach 3 or variable camber wing. A French-language authority will be fine. v^2

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Aussiegunner1 RE:If they were really interested in economics... 5/2/2005 3:16:02 AM

"In fact it was what the navy wanted". Do you mean that the A-4 was what the navy wanted? If so, did they propose any upgrades with Radar and Exocets at the time?

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Phaid RE:Phaid 5/2/2005 5:04:50 AM

I replied in the Naval Air forum. link Bottom line, the French would have had a more difficult time of it than the British, though they could possibly have done it. With regard to the Crusader numbers issue: in 1982, there were only 29 F-8E(FN) in existence; of the original 42, 13 had been lost to accidents. The high loss rate and maintenance had forced the Aeronavale to disestablish one of the two Crusader squadrons in 1979, so Flotille 12F was the sole French F-8 squadron in 1982, with 12 aircraft. They could possibly have scraped together a few more, but nothing close to 30.

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Ander320 RE:Jaguar and the French 5/2/2005 6:58:20 AM

I don't know what you mean by PC, but in any case, I've read that comments by its pilots indicate that the SE was generally only able to make Mach .98 under normal flight conditions, even though the specs give a top speed of Mach 1.3. That is a considerable difference to Mach 1.3 for the Jag. PC is for Post Combustion. The SE loaded is subsonnic but i don't think a Jaguar loaded without PC can go supersonic. The Cruise speed and the operationnal speed of the SE may not be that far from the one of the Jaguar even if the Mach1.6/Mach 1.3 seems a good adva&ntage. Jaguar never have been known for good "acceleration" and using PC for long period isn't that a good idea.

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Aussiegunner1 RE:Jaguar and the French 5/2/2005 10:43:18 AM

"Jaguar never have been known for good "acceleration" and using PC for long period isn't that a good idea." Still, it only needs to beat the Super Etenard, not too hard an ask. Also, with a much better endurance, the Jag should be able to spend a lot more time in afterburner(PC as you call it), than the SE can. While both would be subsonic on ingress(probably necessary anyway, if they are to aim their bombs properly), egress speed is what is really important to avoid being shot in the arse by a SAM or an enemy fighter.

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