a political secret of MRCA ADV

Why British didn't want JWG(Joint Working Group) members to knew that British initially needed an interceptor as well as other nations in JWG, since Germany and Italian basically want to develop MRA to be an interceptor.?

Hell I don't think it was a secret. I still have copies of the international defence review from the 70s and they show full page advertisments boasting of it's multi role capabilities. I shall dig out some copies and take another look, but i doubt there was any secrecy.

Can you show why you thought it was a secret emile?

The reason that the Tornado ADV was a UK only project was because only the UK had the requirement for it. If Germany and Italy wanted interceptors they would have had them too. Remember, Italy and Germany wanted a strike aircraft to replace their Starfighter and G.91 fleets, not an interceptor, Germany 's F-4E's were still quite new at the time and Italy had developed the F-104S for its interceptor duties, only the UK needed the long range of the ADV.

Emile no wonder you're asking these types of questions. I know where I have met you before. You were on an aviationforum as "Lastone" always pumping members for sensitive information about western fighters.

Your diction is just the same. You ask the same types of questions. It is you Lastone. I am sure it's you again. How many other forums do you gather military intelligence from ?

Originally posted by waynos
Can you show why you thought it was a secret emile?

The reason that the Tornado ADV was a UK only project was because only the UK had the requirement for it. If Germany and Italy wanted interceptors they would have had them too. Remember, Italy and Germany wanted a strike aircraft to replace their Starfighter and G.91 fleets, not an interceptor, Germany 's F-4E's were still quite new at the time and Italy had developed the F-104S for its interceptor duties, only the UK needed the long range of the ADV.

No, Italian does requested an interceptor, not an attacker even bomber. Before MRCA program, Other JWG nations also want fighter but only British was seeking bomber or say heavier attacker in stead of TSR.2

Hmmm, well, not according to every single source on UKVG/MRA-75/MRCA/Tornado that I possess, emile. The Luftwaffe were flying the F-104G in the attack role and had licence produced the G.91 in the close support role, Italy were using the G.91 as well, naturally, but were forced to use the Fiat built F-104S in the strike role, despite it being a quite specialised all weather interceptor produced specifically for the Italian requirement (much as the RAF had also done with its F-4's before the Jaguar entered service). This was due to the obvious lack in payload/range performance of the G.91.

In acquiring the Tornado IDS Germany could retire its F-104G's and Italy could use its F-104S' in the A2A role it was intended for.

Do you have a source that says different emile?

Germmay and Italian used their F-104 to be attacker role is not a strong evidence to prove they want an attacker even a bomber to be an interceptor, not even attacker simply.
According to Tornado Multi-role combat aircraft written by Jon lake and Mike Crutch, Italian and rest of nation in JWG, all want a fighter or interceptor, only Germany need a strike aircraft.
I believe that if no UK joined to, the eventual plan will be much closer to a light fighter not a MRCA.

Germmay and Italian used their F-104 to be attacker role is not a strong evidence to prove they want an attacker......

Do you want to have a think about that emile?

Germany *bought* the F-104G for the attack role, the MRCA was to be its replacement - quite strong evidence there.

Italy bought the F-104S as an all weather interceptor but, due to their *need* for a high performance strike aircraft they were *forced* to deploy a large proportion of their Starfighters in that role, MRCA was purpose designed to allow these Starfighters to be re-deployed. The F-104S was brand new and still in production at Fiat during the MRCA programme so Italy had no requirement for an interceptor replacement. That need emerged with the much delayed Eurofighter.

I'd say that is conclusive that both countries wanted an attack aircraft.

Also conclusive is that they *bought* over 400 strike Tornadoes between them but not one interceptor, despite the ADV being part of the overall MRCA programme from the start, as I said before, the F-4E and F-104S were still new, only the UK was looking for an interceptor.

If they wanted a light fighter they would not have taken part in Tornado at all, they would have bought the F-16 like everyone else did. Do you imagine that the UK forced them to take part?

.....even a bomber to be an interceptor, not even attacker simply.

you'll have to run that by me again, I don't know what it means, sorry.

Italian and rest of nation in JWG, all want a fighter or interceptor, only Germany need a strike aircraft.

You seem to be implying here that the JWG was happily working on a light fighter until the UK muscled in and changed it to a plane that nobody else wanted, are you?

If you are, you are looking at the Tornadoes development 'arse about face', as we say here.

The Tornado is based on the BAC UKVG, that is its basic starting point, all the JWG members came to the programme after this was created as its starting point. During the definition phase some members decided it wasn't really what they wanted or that they couldn't afford it, most of those eventually settled on the F-16, those two that remained in what had now become the MRCA did so freely, because it was the aircraft they needed, over 800 Tornadoes were evenutally built for these three nations.

Right from the very beginning the UK never wavered from the central premise that it wanted to build an all-weather two seater with the very best navigational and weapon delivery systems available.

The only difference between the nations was that the RAF and Marineflieger wanted this all-weather two seater while the Luftwaffe and Italian air force wanted a simpler clear weather single seater. These were being developed as the Panavia 100 and 200 within the same programme so the lighter simpler version you are alluding to was in there.

The sixth member, Belgium, was the first to leave, this was for financial rather than operational reasons though. Canada left, not because it didn't want the Tornado, but because its armed forced were being reorganized into today's joint CAF, and so it didn't want to commit financially to the development of a plane it didn't yet know if it wanted or not.

Then, the Luftwaffe conducted its own study which concluded that the all-weather two seater was the right way to go and Italy concurred with that report so, with the agreement of all partners the, now unwanted, Panavia 100 was dropped.

So, without the UK involvement (apart from the fact there would have been no programme at all) the single seat light tactical fighter you are advocating would, in fact, have been scrapped at the development stage because both Italy and Germany came to their own conclusion that they didn't want it.

According to Tornado Multi-role combat aircraft written by Jon lake and Mike Crutch, Italian and rest of nation in JWG, all want a fighter or interceptor

Can you scan and post this paragraph, like I say, I really don't see two countries buying hundreds of planes they don't want, do you?

[edit on 31-5-2007 by waynos]

You will recieve some pics in your mailbox recently, now let's move to other questions, why the tornado use fly-by-wire, but only four swept angles can be set in flight? Of cource the article I read didn't say this directly but I want a provenance to show that Tornado are stepless VG wing. Could you tell me the truth?

Thanks for the email emile, but even the chapter you sent me states that Italy itself placed more importance on the strike role, which explains why these three countries built the Tornado while those who didn't want that type of plane dropped out.

It is also a bit inaccurate in stating that the F-4E and F-104S were ordered as substitutes for the Tornado, both types were ordered before the MRCA even began, in fact the F-104S was already in production by Fiat by 1968 (1968-9 JAWA), so the books claim is a tad inaccurate.

There is still nothing in there to suggest that Britain was at all secretive or devious as your first post suggests, maybe your imagination is working overtime?

There are two types of VG mechanism used on the Tornado, the ADV has an automatic 4-position wng sweep and the GR.4 (and other IDS models too I suppose) a continuously variable stepless auto wing sweep. This is because the continuously variable wing gives a better ride at low level but is more complex and more expensive than the four position version which is optimised for the air superiority role

For provenance of this have a look in any 1990's edition of JAWA, I looked it up in the 1998-99 edition.