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"It's a mother beautiful bridge, and it's gon
This was in the London Daily Telegraph:
RAF gets a new fighter with a gun it cannot fire
By Michael Smith and Peter Almond
(Filed: 13/08/2004)
Attempts by the Ministry of Defence to save money will leave all 232 of the RAF's new Eurofighter/Typhoon aircraft with a gun they cannot fire.
The MoD decided five years ago that it could save £90 million on the £105 billion project by not having a machine cannon in the British version of the Eurofighter.
The Eurofighter project has been bedevilled with difficulties
Senior RAF officers defended the decision by saying that the use of guns on aircraft was outdated and would be a waste of money.
It was too late to stop the first tranche of 55 British aircraft being fitted with the Mauser BK27 gun, but the rest would have a lead or concrete weight in its place.
But engineers found the only way to preserve the aircraft's aerodynamics was to have something that not only weighed the same as the gun but was also shaped exactly the same.
To make matters worse, each individual part of the makeweight's shape also had to weigh exactly the same as the real thing. In short, the cheapest option was to fit the cannon. So all 232 of the RAF's Eurofighter/Typhoon aircraft will be fitted with the gun at a cost of £90 million - but in order to save what is now a mere £2.5 million they will have no rounds to fire.
"This is old thinking, not to have a useable gun on a fighter," said Air Commodore Andrew Lambert, one of the RAF's leading air power strategists and a former commander of a fighter squadron.
"If you are only going to go up against other combat planes then, OK, you use your missiles. But when you are dealing with terrorists and other unpredictable situations you want all the flexibility you can get and a gun gives you a lot of utility.
"We were prepared to use gunfire against helicopters breaching UN rules over Bosnia in the 1990s. You could also use it for strafing targets like pick-up trucks in the desert."
Air Chief Marshal Sir Brian Burridge, the chief of RAF Strike Command, said eight aircraft had already been delivered to the RAF and he expected the first Eurofighters to begin quick reaction air defence in late 2007.
Asked about the gun, Sir Brian said the decision had been "discussed endlessly" and that "nothing is being closed off".
The Eurofighter project has been bedevilled with difficulties. Feasibility studies began in 1984 with production expected to start in 1992. It was 2002 before the first aircraft even flew.
There were a series of production slippages. But these were as nothing compared to the political difficulties.
The collapse of the Warsaw Pact led to the aircraft being described as an obsolete piece of Cold War equipment.
The Germans immediately cut the number of aircraft they needed, largely because they inherited a lot of fighters from East Germany.
The British response was to tie all four partners into a tightly controlled contract in which anyone who pulled out must pay the same amount of money in damages as they would if they took the aircraft. That has come back to haunt Britain, which alone among the four nations has no money to pay for the Eurofighters it ordered and is resisting calls to sign up for its second tranche of 89 aircraft.
30 May 2004: MoD to sell off undelivered Eurofighters
13 May 2004: Forces face 'ruthless' cuts as MoD seeks to save £1bn
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RAF gets a new fighter with a gun it cannot fire
By Michael Smith and Peter Almond
(Filed: 13/08/2004)
Attempts by the Ministry of Defence to save money will leave all 232 of the RAF's new Eurofighter/Typhoon aircraft with a gun they cannot fire.
The MoD decided five years ago that it could save £90 million on the £105 billion project by not having a machine cannon in the British version of the Eurofighter.
The Eurofighter project has been bedevilled with difficulties
Senior RAF officers defended the decision by saying that the use of guns on aircraft was outdated and would be a waste of money.
It was too late to stop the first tranche of 55 British aircraft being fitted with the Mauser BK27 gun, but the rest would have a lead or concrete weight in its place.
But engineers found the only way to preserve the aircraft's aerodynamics was to have something that not only weighed the same as the gun but was also shaped exactly the same.
To make matters worse, each individual part of the makeweight's shape also had to weigh exactly the same as the real thing. In short, the cheapest option was to fit the cannon. So all 232 of the RAF's Eurofighter/Typhoon aircraft will be fitted with the gun at a cost of £90 million - but in order to save what is now a mere £2.5 million they will have no rounds to fire.
"This is old thinking, not to have a useable gun on a fighter," said Air Commodore Andrew Lambert, one of the RAF's leading air power strategists and a former commander of a fighter squadron.
"If you are only going to go up against other combat planes then, OK, you use your missiles. But when you are dealing with terrorists and other unpredictable situations you want all the flexibility you can get and a gun gives you a lot of utility.
"We were prepared to use gunfire against helicopters breaching UN rules over Bosnia in the 1990s. You could also use it for strafing targets like pick-up trucks in the desert."
Air Chief Marshal Sir Brian Burridge, the chief of RAF Strike Command, said eight aircraft had already been delivered to the RAF and he expected the first Eurofighters to begin quick reaction air defence in late 2007.
Asked about the gun, Sir Brian said the decision had been "discussed endlessly" and that "nothing is being closed off".
The Eurofighter project has been bedevilled with difficulties. Feasibility studies began in 1984 with production expected to start in 1992. It was 2002 before the first aircraft even flew.
There were a series of production slippages. But these were as nothing compared to the political difficulties.
The collapse of the Warsaw Pact led to the aircraft being described as an obsolete piece of Cold War equipment.
The Germans immediately cut the number of aircraft they needed, largely because they inherited a lot of fighters from East Germany.
The British response was to tie all four partners into a tightly controlled contract in which anyone who pulled out must pay the same amount of money in damages as they would if they took the aircraft. That has come back to haunt Britain, which alone among the four nations has no money to pay for the Eurofighters it ordered and is resisting calls to sign up for its second tranche of 89 aircraft.
30 May 2004: MoD to sell off undelivered Eurofighters
13 May 2004: Forces face 'ruthless' cuts as MoD seeks to save £1bn
Previous story: Ancient tribal feuds add to carnage in Sudan
Next story: Owzat! Rabbit sets cricket club on fire
). It also has a naval variant, which the Eurofighter doesn't.
