Saudis to buy jets for £4.43 billion from UK

[sultanmuradII]

Saudi Arabia says it is to buy 72 Eurofighter Typhoon jets from UK firm BAE Systems for £4.43bn.

In addition to the price paid for the planes, there is also expected to be a lucrative deal for the munitions that go with them and for their maintenance.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6998774.stm


Saudi's like to help their original masters' economy by splashing out the Ummah's wealth, now and again.

Will these jets be used upon the occupying forces in neighbouring Iraq and palestine?

[fakher el islam]

Embarrassing, instead of trying to make the stuff they need home using the Muslim bright brains who are panhandling in the western countries. They are buying tuff from their enemies with imaginary prices while the Muslim Ummah is starving....!

[Abu Maryam PK]

Embarrassing, instead of trying to make the stuff they need home using the Muslim bright brains who are panhandling in the western countries. They are buying tuff from their enemies with imaginary prices while the Muslim Ummah is starving....!

Just a technical opinion, since my background is Aerospace industry. These jets are top of the line aircraft in military aviation. It has been compared to F22 raptor even. The threat to the kingdom from the north does not have these planes. The tornados the suadis have are not very impressive, though some are reported to have stealth capability. But they have about 90 F -15s. It is good that none of their adversaries in the region have Migs or russian generation 5 aircraft. This is because russian aircraft have persistently performed better than western counterparts. Some years back the indians and us had wargames, and the indian migs and sukhois beat us F15/16s comprehensively.
It would be nice to see the typhoon pitted against migs, but from the videos, certainly the migs look like winning the day.

Add to this, that the saudis are getting complete transfer of technology (TOT) for the planes too. Everyone knows that NATO nations are very reluctant to do any tech transfer, as opposed to russians and chinese. It is high time that our nations should do every defence deal only with TOT. This is what pakistanis have been doing with chinese assistance, and now they have a good indegenous industry.

[Rehmat]

Saudi Arabia also signed a US$20 billion contract last month to buy arms from the US. Past history tell us that with all the modern armament Saudis have been buying from the West - they have never been able to protect themselves with those arms and have always begged the American forces to protect their regime. In 1990s, when they were scared of Saddam Hussain - they opened the doors for US forces and even King Abdullah (then crown prince) is on record of blessing the American forces for fighting against 'the infidel' Saddam.

Irony of the situation is that every Saudis buys 'the junk' - Zionist Israel gets free delivery of US arms to kill Muslim Palestinian youth. Two Muslim countries, Pakistan and Iran, have made significant advancement in manufacturing high-tech military arms.

[kamran]

Assalam o alaikum,

TOT for a Muslim state without a price? You can never be more naive!

Furthermore, Tornados do not have stealth capability. It is just that the IDS version can evade enemy radar if it flies too low.

Secondly, Eurofighter with its TOT or for that matter, any 'top of the line' weaponry won't come without a price. The hidden costs would never be revealed until Muslims are cornered when these weapons would never be used 'for them'. The Kuffar won't let Muslims meet the demands of Surah al-Anfal Verse 59 unless Muslims themselves are stupid enough to believe otherwise. And there are many who do: Whether they are the jingoistic Pakistanis or else, they always have their day.

As for Russian fighters, yes, they are more agile but they have always lacked the technology that NATO offers. Indian MiGs and Su-30s did win those mock fights but then again Russian fighters have always had an edge in dogfights over their US counterparts. US weaponry though is battle-tested. Russian technology is not.

It may be nice to see Saudi Muslims fight some other Muslims flying MiGs but I would love to see if they ever take on the US or the Israelis. That would never happen. Whether it is about weaponry or succumbing to US pressure regarding petty matters such as Nawaz Sharif's forced exile, we all know who has the strings.

The worst part is the myopia: Just like Saudis cannot look beyond Yemen in the South and Syria in the North, Pakistanis, as a nation, too cannot look beyond the Indians as their enemies. Just like Saudis would chicken out when Israelis flew over their land to bomb Iraqi reactor, Pakistanis do the same when Americans kill at will inside their land.

The indigenous factor in the Pakistan Industry is just as relevant: While Indians brace up for an unlimited supply of Western ammo, Pakistani Air Chief is happy claiming that even Americans cannot match what PAF is upto.

Kamran

[Abu Maryam PK]

Assalam o alaikum,

Tornados do not have stealth capability. It is just that the IDS version can evade enemy radar if it flies too low.

Bismillah
Wa'alaikumussalam
Actually some of them are applied with heat shields to reduce the signature.

As for Russian fighters, yes, they are more agile but they have always lacked the technology that NATO offers....Russian fighters have always had an edge in dogfights over their US counterparts.

Not really. You have to look at the whole battle-suit. The on-board missiles like AA-12 are better than side-winders. Both have BVR's etc. The overall philosophy of aircraft design in both hemispheres is diferent. US systems are more fancy with sleek inflight avionics. Of course they are easier to maintain. There have been some dogfights in the past between Soviet/Afghan sukhois(SU-25) and paki F-16s, where the F-16s won the day, but then again it was not a match of similar technology/pilot skill. The afghans were poorly trained, and SU-25 is not MIG 29. Similarly F15s shooting down Mig 21 in the gulf war is not a techno comparison. Arab Israel wars are a good pointer, but it mainly had to do with pilot skill, as Pakistani pilots performed better than Arab ones when they did overnight conversions. Infact many aircraft were lost on the tarmac. However in the korean wars and veitnam wars soviet fighters did perform well against similar technology. So it is still an open debate which is better.
I think indo-us war games were a good example not to downplay the soviet technology.

US weaponry though is battle-tested. Russian technology is not.

Much of the US technology is not battle tested either. How many F18s,15s,117s,22s have been used in direct aircombat. Almost none. Because both russians and us/israel have chiefly used their weapon systems in bomber/ground support roles almost exclusively, because almost always the adversary had little/no air power.

[Abu Dharr Al Kashmiri]

Where is Shaykh Salman al'Awdah? Is not al mamlakatil arabiyyah as-saudiyyah plundering the wealth of al bilad al haramayn? It's goodness and wealth.....

[kamran]

However in the korean wars and veitnam wars soviet fighters did perform well against similar technology.

Assalam o alaikum,

The comparison may not be entirely relevant today but I agree there are some good pointers:

Americans take great pride in shooting down some MiG-17s with Phantoms. Just like they take may take pride in having "complete" air superiority over Afghanistan.

The way they 'assumed' that guns would never be used in air-to-combat and ended up pitching gun-less phantoms and then getting embarrassed was hilarious.

However, that still does not take away anything from the disgrace that Muslims countries like Saudia and Pakistan face: All they need is a single phone call from George Bush's secretary. So weapons or no weapons hardly matter in the end.

Kamran

[walid]

Waste of the ummah wealth, when was the last time the saudi's used any of these aircraft, which are of little use as we see from iraq and afghanistan. who are the saudi's going to bomb?

[Abu Maryam PK]

Waste of the ummah wealth, when was the last time the saudi's used any of these aircraft, which are of little use as we see from iraq and afghanistan. who are the saudi's going to bomb?

I have no knowledge of the unseen.
Have good hopes and pray to Allah to guide those who u think are misguided rather than cursing them.