Anyway, to summarize, internet scorn I've seen aside (though some of it merits some weight to me) India's shortlisting of the Rafale must mean it very likely has some capability befitting India and I will have a closer look at it. I am confident however, that the EF will be selected.

Also, the article is on target, but exagerrating the importance of operations in Libya.

 

PS. An article, regarding the Dubai selection and some comments that were made from a Rafale website:

http://www.combataircraft.net/...

PS. Also it looks like the F-18 will be selected by Brazil after the change in President and after the US called most of the tech transfer offers. (not the naval ones tho)

Oh, I misread the URL, it's not a Rafale website.

 

And, despite the missile barrage, I do believe Libya is more of a challenge than Afghanistan. Just not that different.

There was no Flanker variant (SU-30/32/35) on offer in the MMRCA competition since one derivative is already in service in India and this tender was for a medium aircraft, not a heavy system like the F-15 or SU-30, which would theoritically have higher costs and maintenance costs. The Russian product on offer was the Mig-35.

 

About the Rafale, there is no clarity on whether it was dropped or not-it was almost entirely internet rumours. Fact of the matter is that the Indian military had little or nothing to gain by dropping an aircraft while evaluations were going on. However, one thing that did happen was after the Rafale rumours surfaced was that a senior Lockheed Martin executive in India was asked to leave..... coincidence??

 

 

The Rafale is a more complete fighter than the Eurofighter, especially in the air to ground domain. The Eurofighter has only three heavy weapon stations while the Rafale has 5 so you have more flexibility if you are looking at long-range strike or anti-ship missions. It's air to air profile is only slightly inferior to the Eurofighter due to it's lower thrust and smaller radar dimensions. So it really depends on how the IAF views the respective capabilities of the two planes. If you ask me, India still lacks a modern strike aircraft like the F-16; the SU-30 is hobbled by its larger radar cross section and the fact that the Russians have never had the best air to ground munitions. That's an advantage the Rafale certainly has. The Rafale is also significantly cheaper unlike what you say-it's supposed to cost about 85-90 million a piece compared to the Eurofighter which costs about 100-110M. The recent upgrade order for India's Mirage-2000s also gives an advantage to the Rafale with commonality of weapons and logistics.

 

http://www.flightglobal.com/bl...

 

 

Looks like the post was edited after my initial comment if anyone was wondering what I was on about. The main paragraph was a cut and paste from this article:

http://www.strategypage.com/dl... 

 

 In terms of comments about the Rafale only going in after a missile barrage, pretty sure there were some doing photo recon before this.

First day strikes around Benghazi were before the missile barrage. Later communiqués by the MinDef gave the impression that the Rafales didn't need the usual American-style SEAD support that other planes in the coalition needed (I'm thinking of the attack on a Libyan SAM site). 

Specifics aren't really available anyway. One could spin it to say that the Rafale waltzed in without fear of the Libyan SAM thanks to Spectra's awesomeness (given the age of those SAMs, not toooo unlikely, but there are still safety margins), on the other side, one could say that the Rafales only flew in the safest areas (well... they did fly in the general area where the American F-15 was shot down/suffered an unfortunate malfunction).

First day strikes around Benghazi were before the missile barrage. Later communiqués by the MinDef gave the impression that the Rafales didn't need the usual American-style SEAD support that other planes in the coalition needed (I'm thinking of the attack on a Libyan SAM site). 

Specifics aren't really available anyway. One could spin it to say that the Rafale waltzed in without fear of the Libyan SAM thanks to Spectra's awesomeness (given the age of those SAMs, not toooo unlikely, but there are still safety margins), on the other side, one could say that the Rafales only flew in the safest areas (well... they did fly in the general area where the American F-15 was shot down/suffered an unfortunate malfunction).

...and still screwed up their Benghazi package speaks volumes about incompetence.

Could you elaborate on that or is it merely another stinky fabrication of yours ?