2) Tactical bomber is a description of role.

3) F-22 has to radiate to get such shots, or to rely on not-very-reliable uplink. In former case, Typhoon can use EW suite to cue IR missile.

4) F-22 may shoot down a single Typhoon (6 BVR missiles * 0,08 + 2 WVR missiles * 0,23 = 0,94), but even 1-1 exchange ratio is acceptable for any air force using 4,5th generation fighters… not so for one using stealth fighters.

As an example, the Super Bug, with its pathetic low service ceiling of 55,000 feet, its pathetic low speed of Mach 1.8, and its large (despite reduction efforts) radar signature would be easily detected and shot down from a long distance by any Russian or Chinese fighter. An EW suite or an IRST would not help at all; jammers can reduce the range from which the enemy can detect you, but not completely prevent him from doing so. And jamming the radars of large fighters like Flankers would require big, powerful jammers that the F-16 and the Super Bug cannot carry due to size and power constraints.

The ideal fighter would excel in both BVR and WVR combat, but to engage in WVR combat, it must first survive the BVR engagement. Legacy aircraft such as the teen series fighters stand no chance of surviving it. Even the F-15 cannot, because 1) its RCS is too big; and 2) most F-15s still have obsolete non-AESA radars installed.

The Typhoon would fare better, but it’s highly unlikely that its radar signature reduction efforts and its jammers can prevent it from being detected by enemy aircraft before it comes close enough to launch its IR guided missiles (with the retirement of AIM-9 Sidewinders from German, Italian, and Spanish service, their only iR missiles are now IRIS-Ts, whose range is a paltry 25 kms). The Russians and the Chinese have long-ranged Adder and Alamo missiles whose different variants use different (radar-guided, IR-guided, and passive anti-radar homing) seekers.

2) There is no such thing as a “tactical bomber”. The proper term is “tactical strike aircraft”. “Tactical bomber” is a misnomer used by ignoramuses who can’t distinguish a bomber from a tactical strike jet.

3) Yes. Eight missiles internally, 8 AMRAAMs or 6 AMRAAMs and 2 Sidewinders. That gives the Raptor four freebie shots at a Typhoon.

4) Your claim of the AMRAAM’s Pk against Generation #4.5 fighters is purely hypothetical and unproven, and likely to be too low. Even then, the F-22 has Sidewinders besides AMRAAMs, and Sidewinders are IR-guided. They outrange the IRIS-T by 10.4 kilometers. When your missiles have a range of only 25 kilometers, the best you can do is to watch the IRST warn you about an incoming fighter about which nothing can all can be done until you’re within 25 kms of it. But the F-22 will shoot you down before you make it that close, as its IR-guided missiles outrange yours by over 10 kilometers.

2) What you are describing is a strategic bomber. There are also tactical bombers.

3) F-22 can carry eight missiles internally, and these can be either 2 Sidewinders + 6 AMRAAM or 8 AMRAAM.

4) AMRAAM Pk you are quoting is only correct against enemies who don’t have ECM suite and aren’t bothering to evade missiles. Against fully-equipped 4th / 4,5th generation fighter, AMRAAM Pk is 8%, resulting in best-case total Pk of 64%; thus, 12 F-22s can only kill 7 – 8 enemies at BVR.

That being the case, the F-35 is already MORE expensive than the F-22 while being significantly less capable. The only wise course now is to cancel the F-35, produce 600 additional F-22As (with upgrades), and produce 680 Naval and STOVL variants of the F-22.

The only Western fighter capable of taking on and defeating the newest Russian and Chinese fighters is the F-22 Raptor, or to be more precise, evolved and enhanced variants of this aircraft which need to feature an IRST, a HMD, and a Link 16 system. With these upgrades, the F-22 can guarantee continues US air superiority for decades to come.

The F-35 is not a bomber. A bomber is a large plane designed to deliver large, heavy bomb payloads over long distances. The F-35 is a short-range strike aircraft designed to bomb opposing tank armies once enemy fighters and air defense systems have been eliminated (in other words, once the airspace has been sanitized by the F-22). It can never be a substitute for the F-22 or even the F-15. It can never perform the fighter or CAS role.

As for missile payloads (#2): the F-22 can carry EIGHT air-to-air missiles internally: 6 AMRAAMs and 2 Sidewinders. The Typhoon can carry none internally and must carry all of them externally, thus adding significantly to its already large RCS. If the Typhoon carries only 4-6 A2A missiles, that gives the Raptor, with 8 A2A missiles carried internally, 2-4 freebie shots at the Typhoon. If an opponent can carry twice more weapons than you can, that makes his aircraft far better than yours and reduces your chance of survival dramatically, because if one of his missiles doesn’t hit you, 2-4 will. For the same reason, adversary aircraft (which normally carry 10-12 A2A missiles) have an advantage over the F-35, which can carry only 4 A2A missiles internally.

A single AMRAAM has a 0.59 Pk, so 8×59% is 4.72. That means that, with 8 A2A missiles, an F-22 is virtually certain to kill 4 enemy aircraft and has a 72% chance of killing a fifth one.

3) F-22 usually carries missiles internally, and external missiles will increase RCS so it is unlikely it will carry them on combat missions. As for F-22 enjoying “parity” with Typhoon in WVR, it does enjoy it relative to weapons range, but not platform capability.

4) F-22s maintenance downtime was 45 hours per hour of flight in 2011. As for superhardened hangars, Chinese use underground ones.

5) Luftwaffe Typhoons have beaten USAF F-22s in WVR. FACT. Exercise consisted of 1vs1 sorties, and was not rigged in any way except for starting at WVR. Which can’t be said for USAF exercises with F-22.

6) I have given you figure. 7 F-22s for 1,75 billion USD.

7) F-35 is a bomber, that I agree on. But it is still cheaper than F-22, although not nearly enough to justify cessation of F-22 production in favor of F-35.

2) The Typhoon’s T/W ratio is 1.12:1 at 50% fuel plus the goodies, NOT at 100% fuel. At full fuel, it’s even lower. Moreover, when the F-22 carriers 8 BVR and 2 WVR missiles, and the Typhoon carries only 4 BVR plus 2 WVR missiles, that gives the F-22 four freebie shots at the Typhoon, which the Typhoon does not have. Thus, the F-22 wins the deadly missile game.

3) IR missiles can’t rival the IRST, and I never claimed that they can. But they CAN detect enemy aircraft at the range their seekers are designed to work at.

And your precious Typhoon’s vaunted IRST gives it no advantage over the F-22. Want to know why? Because, being a SENSOR system, it can only detect and track other aircraft – but not shoot them down. For that, you need weapons. But the Typhoon’s longest-ranged IR-guided missile right now is… the AIM-9 Sidewinder, also used by the F-22 (the USAF, however, has the most advanced variants of this missile, which Germany, Italy, and Spain do not).

Detecting an opposing aircraft is meaningless if you can’t shoot it down. Yet, the AIM-9X, the newest variant of the Sidewinder, has a range of only 22 miles (35.4 kms). At that range, the F-22 will shoot you down with its own Sidewinders even if you survive the BVR fight, as the F-22′s Sidewinders’ seekers will detect you from 35.4 kms. Thus, in terms of IR-guided weapons, the Typhoon enjoys, at best, parity vis-a-vis the F-22.

The Luftwaffle, Aeronautica Militare, and the Spanish AF are now replacing the AIM-9 with an inferior missile, the IRIS-T, which has range of only 25 kms, 10 kms less than the AIM-9X, so if you fly an IRIS-T-armed Typhoon against an AIM-9X-armed Raptor, you lose.

4) The F-22′s maintenance requirements may be high, but they are much lower than for the F-15. The surprise attack on airbases problem can be solved easily (albeit at some cost) by storing F-22s in superhardened hangars and hardening ammunition and fuel storages as well as runways. Which the CSIS has already advised the DOD to do.

5) German pilots have not beaten anyone in anything. Rigged exercises whose rules assume that F-22 pilots and ground planners would actively cooperate in getting themselves killed don’t count as victories. How many hours do Luftwaffle pilots fly annually? Answer: a lot less than F-22 pilots. How much combat experience do they have? Oh, wait, I know. ZERO.

The only time the Luftwaffle really fought against anyone (WW2), it got creamed.

Fighters don’t fight alone, they operate in flights of several (4 in the F-22′s case) aircraft, often with AWACS and tanker support.

Even on a one-vs-one fight, the F-22 can easily beat the Typhoon, especially when it’s flown by inferior Luftwaffle pilots.

Come back to me when the Luftwaffle takes part in REAL air to air combat against anyone. Until then, by bragging here about how good Typhoons and Luftwaffle pilots are, you’re just making an ass of yourself.

(And before you say “the F-22 hasn’t seen air combat yet”: it will, probably very soon, as China prepares for war with Japan and SE Asian countries over natural resources. The F-22 will eat China’s J-10s, Su-27s, Su-30s, and J-11s for breakfast.)

6) When F-22 production ended in 2011, the flyaway cost stood at $150 mn, as confirmed by AirPowerAustralia. So your $250 mn claim is a lie – a figure taken out of thin air. You have no evidence to back it up – because there is none. (Claims by POGO hacks are not “evidence”.)

7) The F-35 is already far more expensive than the F-22. The cheapest variant, the F-35A, costs $197 mn in flyaway cost per plane, versus only $150 mn per plane for the F-22. The F-35 was never intended to be nearly as good as the F-22, nor was it ever intended to be a fighter.

The only aircraft that can ensure US air supremacy for decades to come is the F-22 Raptor, or to be more precise, evolved and enhanced variants of this aircraft (ones that include an IRST, the Link 16 system, and other upgrades).

2) F-22′s TWR is 1,26 at 50% fuel, 8 BVR and 2 WVR AAM. Typhoon’s TWR of 1,12 is for 100% fuel, 4 BVR and 2 WVR AAM. Say what you want, but 50% fuel difference is important.

3) F-22 may have better IR signature reduction measures, but it does not mean it automatically has lower IR signature. It is far larger aircraft:
http://www.aviatia.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/f-22-vs-typhoon.jpg

And don’t try to tell me that IR missiles – which F-22 carries internally – can rival IRST. I do hope that IRST will get added to F-22 (and not only F-22) but I haven’t found anything indicating that USAF is even thinking about it, let alone doing something.

4) F-22 would easily decimate Typhoons from range, assuming it has magically-multiplying BVR missiles. It doesnt. And while F-22s higher speed does make it possible for F-22 to disengage (Mach 2,35 estimated vs Mach 2,0), its high maintenance requirements would mean that it is likely to get bombed on the ground.

5) German pilots in Typhoons have proven to be able to beat USAF pilots in F-22s in dogfight:
http://cencio4.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/closeup1.jpg
http://cencio4.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/df_3029_neuburg_18-07-12.jpg

Two Typhoons with 4 F-22 kill markings out of 8 1 vs 1 sorties. And they didn’t get off-bore capability until month after.

6) When debate has been held about ending F-22 production at 187 aircraft, proposal was to buy seven more F-22s for total price of 1,75 billion USD. Since it R&D expenses have already been paid, and production line was still active, sum shows an actual F-22 flyaway cost of 250 million USD per aircraft. As for Air Power Australia, it is not reliable site, and I don’t assume you have checked date at whatever article you have read it at?

7) F-22 is far better option than F-35, which itself is likely to end up far more expensive than F-22 was. But new 4,5th generation aircraft – or mix of F-22s and 4,5th generation aircraft – would be far superior choice to F-22+F-35 mix.

America’s total military budget for FY2012 was 645 bn USD, including the base defense budget, war spending, and the DOE’s defense-related programs. The US has never had a 1.2 trillion military budget. Not even close. 1.2 trillion is a totally false figure invented by Bruce Fein and other anti-defense leftists who seek deep defense cuts. But they will not get what they want.

The F-22 has a MUCH better T/W ratio than the Typhoon: 1.26:1 versus barely 1.12:1. So your claim that there is near-parity between the two aircraft in this regard is patently false.

The F-22 has BETTER IR signature measures than the Typhoon – across the entire airplane, not merely its engine nozzles. And it is possible to detect IR sigs without an IRST. The IR seekers of an air to air missile can do that easily. (BTW, want to know what the primary IR A2A missile of Typhoon users is these days? The AIM-9 Sidewinder.)

In any case, an IRST can and probably will be added to the F-22 at little cost to taxpayers.

The Typhoon is the one that is lucky it has never gone head-to-head with an F-22, because it wouldn’t stand a chance. F-22s would easily decimate the Typhoons from a long range and take care of the few remaining Typhoons in air to air combat. The F-22 is highly stealthy, but it isn’t its primary strength. Its primary virtue is its ability to engage and disengage enemies at the pilot’s will and to defeat most opponents (aircraft and IADSes alike) through kinematics alone. This is something it would’ve been able to do even if it weren’t stealthy.

And yes, European pilots, with the partial exception of the few combat pilots that the too-small RAF still retains, are decisively inferior to American ones. German, Italian, and Spanish fighter pilots have zero combat experience and fly much fewer hours every year than their American counterparts, while the RAF suffers from a shortage of qualified pilots.

The Raptor’s real flyaway cost is 150 mn, not 250 mn, despite your false claims. Look it up at AirPowerAustralia before spouting your ignorant gibberish here.

Its unit costs did not begin to significantly climb until AFTER orders were cut in the 1990s as a part of the “end of history/we no longer need weapons” post-Cold-War fantasy. Orders were cut from ca. 660 to ca. 450 under Dick Cheney, to 332 by the Clinton Administration early on, and to 187 by Rumsfeld.

The USAF does not want to procure more F-22s, and neither does any official of the OSD. Robert Gates purged the DOD of such officials and officers, despite many of them being willing to stake their careers to make the case for more F-22s. RAND expert John Stillion was fired for the same reason.

Strategically, the F-22 would be a necessary asset without which the USAF could not hope to establish air superiority or conduct tactical strike. It is no coincidence that the F-22′s Global Strike Force is built around the F-22 and the B-2. In any combat situation against anyone but the primitive opponents the USAF encountered during the 1990s and early 2000s, the F-22 would be necessary to establish air superiority, especially since it can defeat J-10, JF-17, Flanker family, and MiG-29 fleets easily, and with an IRST (which will eventually be added to it) would be very effective against the PAKFA.

1) The APA cannot “want” Australia to acquire the F-22 by any means, because the F-22 production line has been shut down and the ban on F-22 exports was never abolished. When the line was open, they did want Australia to buy the F-22 (and openly stated that repeatedly on their website). Guess why? Because the F-22 is unquestionably the best fighter in the world today, better than your beloved Typhoon, the PAKFA, the J-20, the Su-27/30/33/35, and the Gripen. The F-22′s superiority has been proven, again and again, in their holistic, impartial, unbiased, peer-reviewed analysis, which has been widely acclaimed and frequently quoted (and their website gets 200,000 hits daily and has an information download rate approaching half a terabyte per month), and has been found by their peers to be highly accurate, while Western bureaucrats, obviously displeased with its results, have tried their best to ignore or dismiss it. The APA’s view that the F-22 is the best choice for Australia is the result, and not the cause, of their analysis and its results. Their analysis – unlike your ramblings – is credible. And they don’t receive funding from any defense contractors (nor would they accept any, per their own policy).

2) There are no “elements” in the USAF that want to, or are pushing the DOD to, buy more F-22s, and neither is Secretary Panetta. It is arrogant and ridiculous for you to claim that you’re inside their heads (or have insider information as a Croatian, when you don’t even live in the US) and know better what they want than they do. Your claims are just that – claims. They are nothing but your fantasies.

Even if Panetta wanted to buy more F-22s, the Congress would never agree to that. Even if it did, there’s one problem: the F-22 production line has been closed. There will be no more orders for the F-22. Fact.

Prior to 2009, there were many in the USAF, including many generals and civilian officials, who wanted the DOD to buy more Raptors. It is precisely for that reason that they were all purged from the DOD by Secretary Gates, who did not tolerate any dissent or independent thinking.

3) The F-22′s flyaway cost TODAY is $150 mn according to DOD data (NOT according to data from some loony amateur sites). Adding all R&D, upgrade, and problem-fixing costs increases this to $377 mn per copy. Not stellar, but far less than the $421 mn per copy you claimed.

4) Oh yes, the Typhoon is decisively inferior to the F-22, and its actual unit cost is 125 mn GBP today (as opposed to 2011). The UK’s own National Audit Office has comprehensively documented the Typhoon’s scandalous cost overruns.

5) Wrong. The USAF have not used, and do not intend to use, the PAKFA nor the J-20 to push for resuming F-22 production. This was repeated yet again by the USAF’s Chief of Staff. Your claim that you know better than the DOD and the USAF what they intend to do is ridiculous and arrogant, especially since you don’t even live in the US. And the US has a DOD, not a MOD.

5a) You have clearly not done any research on anything. You’re just a boy with a big mouth who is spamming other people’s blogs with his ignorant garbage. The decision to develop the PAKFA and the J-20 was made at the highest echelons of the Russian MOD and the Chinese CMC, and was not initiated to enrich Sukhoi or the CAC. It was made as a deliberate decision to pursue a carefully planned and well-thought-out industrial and military strategy to match the US militarily. Your claims to the contrary will not change that fact.

6) The USAF. The Typhoon’s T/W ratio at 50% fuel load and its standard weapons load is 1.15:1, and will never be higher (absent empty weapon stations). Period.

7) Whether the Typhoon can jam the F-22′s radar successfully remains to be seen. I strongly doubt that it can, however. The F-22′s IR signature is not larger than the Typhoon’s, because the F-22 has numerous IR signature reduction measures including, but not limited to, slit, stealthy engine exhaust nozzles, and as you admitted, it doesn’t have an IRST that coud emit heat, while the Typhoon has classic nozzles that emit far more heat, jammers that emit still more heat, and an IRST that also emits heat. And if you try to JAM the F-22′s 1500-module radar, your jammers will generate so much heat that you’ll be detected fairly easily even without the IRST. Jammers are double-edged swords, but in your fantasy world, they work only against the F-22.

8) You’re extolling the supposed virtues of the Typhoon here, so don’t try to change the subject. NATO countries are highly unlikely to obtain the Novator from Russia.

9) ROTFL! Who do you think gets to fly F-22s? Rookies? You clearly know nothing about the USAF and its aircraft. F-22s are flown only by the most experienced and best-trained pilots in the USAF. Those guys have seen more combat than the Luftwaffle has seen in its entire miserable time of existence. Almost all of them are experienced ex-F-15 pilots. And no, European (except British) pilots don’t get training that is even nearly as good as the training received by USAF pilots. How many hours do German, Spanish, or Italian fighter pilots log every year? Answer: far fewer than their USAF counterparts. Your claim that their training is as good as the USAF’s is just another fantasy of yours, which only proves how ignorant you are.

9a) The Typhoon has never shot anything, let alone an F-22, except in rigged “mock combat” exercises whose assumptions were that F-22 pilots and operational planners would cooperate in getting themselves killed. And yes, the Luftwaffle’s pilots are as crappy as the Serbs. They have zero real world combat experience, and have had none since 1945. The only time the Luftwaffle actually saw combat, it got its ass kicked nicely by the Brits in 1940, the Western Allies in 1944-45, and the Soviets on the Eastern Front. Today’s Luftwaffle pilots not only totally lack any combat experience, they receive inferior training and fly significantly fewer flight hours than USAF pilots.

10) The F-22′s flyaway cost today is $150 mn, not $250 mn, per copy. The Rafale’s flyaway cost today is 90.5 mn EUR per copy and has SIGNIFICANTLY increased since 2007, when it was only 64 mn EUR per plane.

11) The Raptor can actually supercruise at Mach 1.8 when clean. The F-22 has a significantly higher T/W ratio than the Typhoon at 50% fuel and a standard weapons load, and its size and weight are irrelevant, given the superior T/W ratio generated by the F-22′s much more powerful engines. Looking only at weight is like looking at only one part of the picture. It’s ridiculous.

12) The Meteor is not a ramjet missile. It will be one – if it’s ever delivered. Even if it is, its nominal range will still be only 160 kms, far less than the AIM-120D’s, which can be increased even further (by up to 40%) due to the F-22 flying at much higher speeds than the Typhoon. Try using jammers and you’ll instantly give away your position, especially if the F-22 is equipped with an IRST. The F-22′s gun’s shells are more than sufficient to kill the Typhoon if it comes to a gunfight.

13) “Using an IRST would put an F-22 at a disadvantage, but doing the same would not put the Typhoon at a disadvantage”. Nice logic. Or rather, a lack thereof. The Typhoon has a LARGER thermal signature than the F-22 due to its conventional design and classic engine exhaust nozzles, despite the F-22 being slightly larger. Thus, the Typhoon is easier to detect for IRST systems. An IRST can be added to the F-22 easily at very little cost. It hasn’t been added yet – but then again, the Meteor and the IRIS-T are likewise only possible future additions, and not current equipment, of the EF-2000.

13b) The F-22 doesn’t rely solely, or even primarily, on stealthiness, as it has a smaller thermal sig, far better agility, the same weapons, a far better radar, and a far higher maximum speed than the EF-2000. It is not excessively expensive to procure or maintain – it costs only $150 mn per copy in flyaway costs, and it’s far less expensive to maintain than the F-15 Eagle. If it came to a fight between 4 F-22s and 8 Typhoons, the Raptors would win decisively. Of that, I can assure you. A scenario of 24 Typhoons fighting against 4 F-22s is a fantasy… just like the rest of the garbage you’ve posted here.

14) The F-22 doesn’t have to use thrust vectoring, and despite being larger, has a better turning capability, so your incessant celebration of its larger size is irrelevant. As you Euros will find out yourselves if you try flying the EF-2000 against the J-20 or the PAKFA.

14b) No, my calculations for both types are for aircraft with a 50% fuel load and their standard weapons load. And the Typhoon’s T/W ratio at that exact load is a mere 1.15:1, significantly lower than the F-22′s 1.28:1. Fact.

15) No, the F-22 would clean the Typhoon’s clock. That, I can promise.

15b) Defense spending is not destroying the US economy. The total US military budget amounts to a paltry 4.22% of the US economy, so it’s hardly “destroying” it. Deregulation is not destroying the US economy, and in the last 3.5 years, the US has actually seen an EXPLOSION of new regulations accumulating on top of older ones. Tax exemptions are necessary because of the generally high marginal income tax rates in the US. If these were lowered, there would be no need for exemptions for anyone. General unaccountability on the side of government and on the side of corporations? To whom? You clearly don’t understand how a free market economy works, but that’s not surprising, since you don’t really have a free market economy in Croatia and just a few decades ago your country was a part of a socialist economy. Free markets don’t need regulations to work – regulations only INHIBIT free markets – they work best without government regulations. Free market economic policies are the ONLY ones that lead to significant economic growth, as demonstrated by Ronald Reagan when he set off an economic boon that lasted, with a few brief interruptions, for 25 years and without interruption until 1990. It is no coincidence that the wealthiest, most prosperous countries in the world are those with the freest economies (Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, etc.), and those with government interventionism and regulations are now suffering a deep economic crisis (that currently includes the US). But that’s a lesson you Euros will, of course, never end.