Romania joins F-35 Lightning II program

[Ravendriver2008]

Romania joining Lockheed Martin F-35 program for 32 x a/c

https://www.f35.com/f35/news-and-featur ... ogram.html

cheers

[Reaper02]

Can totally understand their choice for buying the 35 as most European countries do and it's probably the best out there at this moment, but from our hobby point of view... Imagine going to an exercise in a few years time: only these grey and boring flying bathtubs and if you're lucky a few Typhoons and/or Rafales... :-( But what can you do!?

[Nighthawke]

Hmmm - just like the F-16 era.

[STN RAMP RAT]

Can totally understand their choice for buying the 35 as most European countries do and it's probably the best out there at this moment, but from our hobby point of view... Imagine going to an exercise in a few years time: only these grey and boring flying bathtubs and if you're lucky a few Typhoons and/or Rafales... :-( But what can you do!?

The amount of countries using the F35 is worrying me a little. in the old days the "opposition" would need to know the tatics and operational characteristics for all of the different aircraft types that the NATO countries used, Now they just need to know how to defeat a single aircraft type and if that aircraft type has a fleet wide engineering or software defect then they don't even need to do that.

[Vulcanone]

To be fair STN RAMP RAT, I think the main enemy is happily destroying his Armed Forces quicker than any UK Defence Review can. China Will likely have realised that Taiwan is really a bad Idea. That mostly just leaves Iran and North Korea.

[binbrook87]

To be honest from a NATO interoperability standpoint it seems to make perfect sense (especially in these times) and I would expect most other members to go this way either with F-35s or updated F-16s. I watched a programme recently about NATO exercises and the complexity of getting all the cogs to work together is mind blowing. So having the same frontline 'kit' makes everything a hell of a lot smoother. Imagine if Ukraine had purchased Western hardware some years ago....how much easier it would have made things. But yes from a spotting perspective the future doesn't look that interesting

[Snoop 95]

DACT will be a thing of the past!!!

[Thunder]

DACT will be a thing of the past!!!

How’s that? DACT is to train you to fly against the enemy not your allies.

[NorvilleRogers]

DACT will be a thing of the past!!!

Is that not what Draken Aviation are for?

Add to that Rafale, F/A-18, Typhoon, Gripen , FA50 , F-16V... it's not quite all F-35.

[TealRain]

Me thinks if the Romanian public vote into power the pro Putin right winger that’s been in the news this week I see the possibility that they could be kissing this deal good bye. If they can ban sales to Turkey (ok for a different reason) then the deal could well be scrutinised by the Senate or Congress.

[capercaillie]

Hmmm - just like the F-16 era.

Nothing like the F-16 era to be honest.

For the first ten years of F-16s being operated in Europe, the USAF operated F-15, F-111, F-4/RF-4 and A-10 in front line service alongside. The Belgians kept their Mirage 5s for another 12 years, the Dutch their F-5s, The Norwegians kept their F-5s for 20 years and the Danish had Drakens alongside for 12 years as well.

At that time the RAF operated six front line fast jets none of which were F-16s, the French also had six frontline fast jets none of which were F-16s, the Germans had F-104s, F-4/RF-4s and Tornados without including their combat Alpha Jets, the Italians had F-104s, Tornados, G91s, and so on and so on

It wasn't for another nine or ten years until we saw the Turkish (who also had F-4/RF-4s, F-5s), Portuguese (who had A-7s and Alpha Jets), Greek (who had Mirage 2000s, A-7s, F-4/RF-4s, F-5s) start to take on F-16s and even later before Polish and Romanian and a brief loan spell for the Italians receive theirs.

Now if we compare the F-35 that are all identical anyway era.
UK - just the Typhoon alongside
USA - F-15 and F-16 remain
Belgium - nothing else alongside once they arrive
Nertherlands - as above
Denmark - as above
Norway - as above
Italy - Typhoon and a few Tornados and Harriers which will both be replaced
Germany - EF2000s and Tornados which will go
France - God bless them no F-35s, but just Rafales and Mirage 2000s remain.
Greece and Turkey still have some variety at present but the F-4s ain't going to be around forever and the Greek Mirage 2000 days are numbered.

So this totally wrong misconception of the F-16 wiping out loads of variety is utter nonsense, its first dozen years in European skies only really saw the demise of the USAFE F-4Es and the four partnership nation's F-104s. Nothing like the F-35 sweeping takeover.

[Finty]

A pity for us plane cranks but surely it’s better in the long run to have the best kit than clinging on to multiple outdated types. Especially since we’re firmly in Cold War 2.

[Canberra TT.18]

Hmmm - just like the F-16 era.

Nothing like the F-16 era to be honest.

For the first ten years of F-16s being operated in Europe, the USAF operated F-15, F-111, F-4/RF-4 and A-10 in front line service alongside. The Belgians kept their Mirage 5s for another 12 years, the Dutch their F-5s, The Norwegians kept their F-5s for 20 years and the Danish had Drakens alongside for 12 years as well.

At that time the RAF operated six front line fast jets none of which were F-16s, the French also had six frontline fast jets none of which were F-16s, the Germans had F-104s, F-4/RF-4s and Tornados without including their combat Alpha Jets, the Italians had F-104s, Tornados, G91s, and so on and so on

It wasn't for another nine or ten years until we saw the Turkish (who also had F-4/RF-4s, F-5s), Portuguese (who had A-7s and Alpha Jets), Greek (who had Mirage 2000s, A-7s, F-4/RF-4s, F-5s) start to take on F-16s and even later before Polish and Romanian and a brief loan spell for the Italians receive theirs.

Now if we compare the F-35 that are all identical anyway era.
UK - just the Typhoon alongside
USA - F-15 and F-16 remain
Belgium - nothing else alongside once they arrive
Nertherlands - as above
Denmark - as above
Norway - as above
Italy - Typhoon and a few Tornados and Harriers which will both be replaced
Germany - EF2000s and Tornados which will go
France - God bless them no F-35s, but just Rafales and Mirage 2000s remain.
Greece and Turkey still have some variety at present but the F-4s ain't going to be around forever and the Greek Mirage 2000 days are numbered.

So this totally wrong misconception of the F-16 wiping out loads of variety is utter nonsense, its first dozen years in European skies only really saw the demise of the USAFE F-4Es and the four partnership nation's F-104s. Nothing like the F-35 sweeping takeover.

Your right.
But your talking about the 80s early 90s. Which is 30-40 years ago!
A lot of countries used only F-16s for a good 20-30 years.
Dutch NF-5, Belgium Mirages and Danish Drakens were all replaced by F-16s at the end. The Dutch took 13 year to deliver 213 (!) F-16s, first the F-104s and after that the NF-5s were replaced (as planned from the start)
Types were used for 20-25 years in those days. With new types entering every 10 years.or so. So most types were parallel used for some ten years. Since the 90s we have MLUs. With 10-20 year extensions of service life.
And in 1989 the world in Europe changed a lot. So a lot was not replaced at all, but simply withdrawn.

And I agree less and less variation in fighter types. But that is going on you could say since the 60! And the start of multi country programmes in Europe and stopping with smaller local projects (one exception being Sweden)

We (as spotters, photographers, enthusiasts) are very spoiled in Europe with different air forces, unit colours and locally produced types (in sometime low numbers)

The USA doesn't seem to have the problem with DACT. The number of different types there have always been much lower. Just rent you adversary trainer.

One more thing the F-16 didn't take over at once nor will the F-35.
First F-16 delivery in 1979 and with orders from Bulgaria and Turkey delivery will be well into the late 2020s. That is over 50 Years (!!!)
First F-35 were delivered around 2015 in very low numbers. With production still not fully running and a lot of orders being delivered from th late 2020s well into the 2030s. Romania will get theirs from 2032. Still some years to go for their F-16s wiith about half of them still not delivered yet!.

And we complain about the F-35 look at civil avaition Just Airbus and Boeings. How many types/brands have gone there?


Pieter

P.s.
'Greek (who had Mirage 2000s, A-7s, F-4/RF-4s, F-5s)' Mirage 2000s mentioned should be Mirage F-1s I guess. 2000s came around same time as F-16s in late 80s replacing the F-1s
P.p.s.
Sorry bit long.

[cat1]

But your talking about the 80s early 90s. Which is 30-40 years ago!

Blumin eck, wheres that time gone

[capercaillie]

P.s.
'Greek (who had Mirage 2000s, A-7s, F-4/RF-4s, F-5s)' Mirage 2000s mentioned should be Mirage F-1s I guess. 2000s came around same time as F-16s in late 80s replacing the F-1s
P.p.s.
Sorry bit long.

Yes, spot on Piter, although most of the types flew alongside the first F-16s for quite a while including the Mirage 2000s.

Appreciate that back in the 80s and 90s the whole make up and rapid decline of fast jet numbers was for a whole host of different reasons, but the so called F-16 era has never really existed, it just has staggering longevity finding new customers for brand new aircraft, some 45 years after first going into service as the first customers replace theirs with the F-35.

However, we will reach a stage where Belgium, Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Romania, Switzerland, Canada and maybe the Czechs will all be operating a single similar fast jet type, with Germany, Italy and the UK flying the same alongside the Typhoon/EF2000 and Poland and Greece alongside their F-16s (the latter + Rafales), as well as having the USAFE around. The thrill of up to 15 nations operating the same lookalike machine around Europe simultaneously and others may add to that total. Most the F-16 achieved was 10 nations at once, not all in the same schemes and only five having it as their only front line fast jet for a period of time.

We have been spoiled but the F-35 is really going to kick the life out of the fun bucket for airshows and exercises of the future.