Gripens at Red Flag

[X-man]

Swedish media is reporting that 7 of Sweden's JAS 39 Gripens will participate in a Red Flag exercise this summer. The cost of participating could have funded 1000 flight hours at home :( Earlier this year, other cuts were made to the Air Force budget and now this. IMO, our government is taking our Air Force down the drain...

 

On a positive side, it'll be nice to see how the Gripens do in such a large scale exercise...

 

http://www.sr.se/cgi-bin/International/nyhetssidor/artikel.asp?ProgramID=2054&Nyheter=&artikel=2072625

Swedish Radio News reports that the military is spending nearly 5 million dollars to take part in air exercises in the United States, while cuts in the defence budget mean that other pilots are hardly allowed to fly.

 

Seven Gripen fighters and 90 members of the Swedish Air Force are to take part in the latest round of Red Flag exercises in southern Nevada in July and August.

 

The military’s chief of staff says they would rather have stayed home, as there are around 50 Gripen pilots who will remain more or less grounded this year because of defence cuts. They need the flying time to maintain their skills, he says.

 

But the government doesn’t agree, with the State Secretary at the Ministry of Defence commenting that it is important to see how well the Gripens do internationally.

 

Sweden’s Supreme Commander Hеkan Syrйn presented his proposals for military cutbacks Thursday, including the closing down of a light infantry unit in Arvidsjaur in the far north.

 

Syrйn told a press conference that the cuts mean that in the future Sweden would not be able to resist major military operations against this country.

 

Further reading in swedish: http://www.sr.se/ekot/artikel.asp?artikel=2071999

[Pilotasso]

Things are often not as bad as they say. Things do get exarcebated to be more melodramatic. That being said I have no Idea why a country like Sweden needs to cut back at all.

[Teknetinium]

Because JAS cost more then it gives back. Not many countries are buying it. So I would think taking part in RF could make JAS-39Gripen more interesting for some nations when they have something to compere whit.

Would bee interesting to see a dogfight between JASvsF-16/F-15/F-18.

[VMFA117_Poko]

Because JAS cost more then it gives back. Not many countries are buying it. So I would think taking part in RF could make JAS-39Gripen more interesting for some nations when they have something to compere whit.

Would bee interesting to see a dogfight between JASvsF-16/F-15/F-18.

It would indeed.

[Mugatu]

The best thing they could do for sales would be do shoot down a couple of F-22s. :)

[mvsgas]

Because JAS cost more then it gives back. Not many countries are buying it. So I would think taking part in RF could make JAS-39Gripen more interesting for some nations when they have something to compere whit.

Would bee interesting to see a dogfight between JASvsF-16/F-15/F-18.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but Red Flag would prove the JAS-39 in so many ways. Red Flag is a miniature complete war zone, IIRC. JAS-39 could prove all of its roles, not only dogfight. Some countries might discover that maybe it is better or cheaper to maintain. I think if they have a successful exercise they could find more potential costumers for the aircraft and train some of your pilots in situations they would never be able to train other wise. Like a large scale combat area (30+ aircraft), working together with any of the countries participating, etc.

[X-man]

I agree, this is probably a good promotion for Gripen sales. But doing it at the expense of Swedish pilot traing/skills is questionable...

[Pilotasso]

or maybe its just personel venting their frustrations and throwing theories into the air. I dont beleive they will fly less because of a simple question of money. Its ridiculous.

 

BTW, defense aviation has to do more with homeland defense than economic profit. Exports are a bonus only.

[X-man]

I dont beleive they will fly less because of a simple question of money. Its ridiculous.

It sure is ridiculous, but thats whats going on with the Swedish air force...:(

 

BTW, defense aviation has to do more with homeland defense than economic profit. Exports are a bonus only.

I wish our government would have the same attitude... :P

[-sulan-]

It'd sure be interesting to see how she does!! :)

Does anyone have any info about that excercise? And when is it?

 

It sure is a pity they get to fly so little.. :/ A relative of mine works at FLSC (a part FOI (fцrsvarets forsknings nеnting)), where they do tactical simulated excercises with 8 JAS-39 simulators.

The simulators fly alot, and they do alot of testing and training.. But it's never the same thing as flying for real I thinks, us simulator nuts sure know that, hence our never-ending search for more immersion :P ie. Hotas setups, track-ir and now this butt-kicker thing lol

[D-Scythe]

I agree, this is probably a good promotion for Gripen sales. But doing it at the expense of Swedish pilot traing/skills is questionable...

 

At the expense of Swedish pilot training/skills? What other type of training in the world offers the kind of DACT/large-scale exercise exposure than Red Flag?

[X-man]

At the expense of Swedish pilot training/skills? What other type of training in the world offers the kind of DACT/large-scale exercise exposure than Red Flag?

Well, if you would have read the original post, you would have seen that only a handful of pilots are going to Nellis, while the rest (about 50 pilots) will sit at home and do nothing for the rest of the year. Dont get me wrong, It's nice to see Swedish pilots at Red Flag but Id rather see that we had a consistancy in our pilot skills rather than just a few "top" pilots with the rest beeing falling behind...

 

You can have all the fancy planes in the world, but in the end, it all comes down to pilot skills and training :pilotfly:

[D-Scythe]

Well, if you would have read the original post, you would have seen that only a handful of pilots are going to Nellis, while the rest (about 50 pilots) will sit at home and do nothing for the rest of the year. Dont get me wrong, It's nice to see Swedish pilots at Red Flag but Id rather see that we had a consistancy in our pilot skills rather than just a few "top" pilots with the rest beeing falling behind...

 

You can have all the fancy planes in the world, but in the end, it all comes down to pilot skills and training :pilotfly:

 

Um, even in the U.S., not all pilots can participate in Red Flag or Fighter Weapons School. If you look at the detachments, each participating squadron usually sends about 6 jets and their associated pilots. These pilots can in turn return to their home base and not only share what they learned with their squadron mates, but also structure their practice around what they learned.

 

Thus, the value of Red Flag is not *just* limited to the people who participate. The original argument that Red Flag only trains a select few pilots at the expense of others can logically be extended to the USAF as well - one can make the argument that the money spent on Red Flag can be used to improve the overall quality of training of the entire Air Force. Just like how the original argument was that the money spent on sending Gripen pilots to Red Flag (a LOT less than actually RUNNING Red Flag) can be better used to improve training of a wider sub-set of pilots.

 

Which is false. Believe what you want, but the idea that Red Flag trains a few select pilots at the expense of overall training of the rest of the fleet is ridiculous.

[mvsgas]

Just like D-scinthe said, most, not all, but most military exercises run for the AIR Force( whether it is the USAF, IADF/AF, FAA, RAAF,etc. ) are designed to train the most experience or best pilots so they can train the rest of their unit. Whether run by Siły Powietrzne Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej or กองทัพอากาศไทย, Kong Thab Akat Thai, they are designed to hopefully spread knowledge to all the pilots in the Air Forces involved. IMO anyway.

[X-man]

I agree with both of you. It's just that according to the article the pilots "at home" will pretty much be grounded for the rest of the year. THAT is not good. Pilots must keep consistent flying hours to keep their skills, thats common knowledge...;)

[mvsgas]

You can not thrust news reports much. Case in point, look here, at the photo with a F-16 turning to the left. Third one , left to right, top row:http://www.kunsan.af.mil/photos/index.asp?page=7

The photo says they are carrying AIM-9X, when in fact that is a CAP-9 (training AIM-9, AIM-9 seeker head with no explosives or rocket motor nor rocket fuel) Just saying, news report tent to be erroneously, some times just to get more rating or boost sales of new papers, etc.