thunderboltdrgn From Sweden, joined Jan 2012, 147 posts, RR: 0 Reply 1, posted (4 months 3 days 17 hours ago) and read 2158 times:
Thats good and the only sensible thing to do even if Swedish (especially right wing)
media is doing the best their can to convince the readers how sh-tty it is and that we
should rather spend themoney on American planes instead despite that it would be
much more costly.
SAS A340 From Sweden, joined Jul 2000, 695 posts, RR: 0 Reply 2, posted (4 months 3 days 17 hours ago) and read 2142 times:
This is by far the most sensible thing to do,we can also ad up the number of fighters at a reasonable cost in future if we need to....
Then we should ad up a membership to NATO also to make the level of secutity " a bit" higher
celestar From Singapore, joined Jul 2001, 257 posts, RR: 0 Reply 3, posted (3 months 4 weeks 1 day 22 hours ago) and read 1831 times:
I am not an expert on defense matter but I always ponder on this type of question.
You spend so much money on new plane development and manufacturing, and yet you cannot affort to have a sizable number of aircraft in the air-force, it seems the maintenance and operation of the aircraft exceeded the investment on building new plane.
I can see this is good for Swedish military industry but I would have expect the new E/F model to co-exist with the previous C/D model and the number of aircraft grows. It seems the reality is otherwise.
Sorry to use the word 'you' I did not mean to refer to any particular person or subject. Pardon me.
Its called budget cuts. The military budget have been decreased over and over and
over again the past 20-30 years and today there is hardly anything left of the Swedish armed forces.
Probably also a very top heavy organization.
A small budget but still needs for acquiring of new materiel like artillery (we only have 12 Archers),
new Submarines (2 Type A26 on order) and we also needs an anti-air defence
as we currently don't have any at all.
Also the Gripen aircraft is not that maintenance "heavy" but rather the opposite.
I also think that acquiring new aircrafts and developing our own is to sort of
support the domestic manufacturers like Saab. Although in some cases like with new IFV,
FMV opted for a non-Swedish manufacturer despite having a equivalent domestic option.
Even if the acquiring cost might be higher, I think it still could be of benefit for the country to keep
the jobs within the country.
Personally I think the Governments that have been involved in the Gripen decisions
have made the right decisions in keeping the Gripen-project alive.
SAS A340 From Sweden, joined Jul 2000, 695 posts, RR: 0 Reply 5, posted (3 months 4 weeks 21 hours ago) and read 1655 times:
Quoting thunderboltdrgn (Reply 4): Its called budget cuts. The military budget have been decreased over and over and
over again the past 20-30 years
To say at the least.....
By 1960, we had the fourth largest air force in the world with over 1000! units
As late as 1994 we had approx 400 fighters in service left.
At the end of 2005 we were down to 150....
2013.... approximately 100..?
2015- 60-80?
SAS A340 From Sweden, joined Jul 2000, 695 posts, RR: 0 Reply 7, posted (3 months 4 weeks 21 hours ago) and read 1638 times:
Quoting ptrjong (Reply 6): A a bit unsustainable, isn't, with the 88th population in the world.
The point was to visualize the downsize within the Swedish air force,not to claim that we should have a 1000 fighters at present today...
Also, one Gripen today can do the job that required 2 or 3 Viggen in the 1970,s so.... so in that sense its difficult to just compared total numbers of fighters....
olle From Sweden, joined Feb 2007, 238 posts, RR: 0 Reply 8, posted (3 months 3 weeks 5 days 12 hours ago) and read 1462 times:
also have in mind that the main goal of Swedish airforce has always been to sink an russian invasion fleets in the batlics and to destroy bridges and transports in north in case of invasion.
This was in the 60s and 70s done with Viggen AJ and Lansen using RB04 and later RB15.
Today the RB15 has become a cruising missile with very long range and also GPS capabilities. This means that a lot tasks that 20 years ago (carry a RB15) needed a Viggen or Gripen. Today a truck do the same job.
Even the Swedish navy does not need to leave harbour to reach major part of baltic sea.
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