Thailand selects Gripen and Erieye

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jaffo4011

New Member
good news for all concerned with a purchase of 12 gripens by 2012 and a number of the erieye aew aircraft too.....
the gripens one of my favourite platforms so i'm pleased to see another country adopting it.....
excellent result for saab and bae......:)

Mod: Add your source.
 
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Q

qwerty223

New Member
jaffo4011 said:
good news for all concerned with a purchase of 12 gripens by 2012 and a number of the erieye aew aircraft too.....
the gripens one of my favourite platforms so i'm pleased to see another country adopting it.....
excellent result for saab and bae......:)
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Bangkok post did mention about gripen, but where you get the aew from?
 
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highnndry

New Member
Wow, that's like $100 mil for each aircraft. I thought they were around $40 mil each... is 12 aircraft going to make any difference in an airforce? Wouldn't 30 Su-30 for $35 mil a piece would have been a better choice and more in numbers. I know the grippen has better electronics but still.... unless I'm missing something.

Grippen is really on a role....
 
R

Ryttare

New Member
radiosilence said:
The 600 million include 6 Gripen, 1 Erieye AEW system aircraft, spares, and training.
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I have also seen reports that a number of RBS 15 should be included, but I can't find a link right now. However there seems to be no formal contract signed yet, exact details might not be available right now.
 
K

KiwiRob

Well-Known Member
Does anyone know what type of aircraft the Saab Erieye Airborne Early Warning (AEW) system will be mounted on? Or are Saab building the 2000 again for these types of deal?
 
M

Maskirovka

Banned Member
KiwiRob said:
Does anyone know what type of aircraft the Saab Erieye Airborne Early Warning (AEW) system will be mounted on? Or are Saab building the 2000 again for these types of deal?
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This is not 100% but I read somewhere they will use the SAAB340. Actually I read that Thailand will buy/get all of the Swedish airforce six 340s. Two for AEW&C and the remaining for transport and VIP.
That could be true since the swedish airforce has decided to go with the SAAB2000...
 
K

kato

The Bunker Group
Verified Defense Pro
Some sources for the OP.

Gripen Press Release

10/17/2007 | The Thai Cabinet has approved a budget of 34,400 billion baht (US$ 1.1 billion) for the Royal Thai Air Force (RTAF) to procure 12 (twelve) Gripen multi-role fighters, to replace its ageing fleet of F-5 B/E aircraft, and 2 (two) Saab Erieye AEW aircraft, together with associated equipment and services. Negotiations between Thai and Swedish government officials will now commence in order to conclude a formal agreement.
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Swedish Government

"I welcome the fact that at its meeting yesterday, Thailand's government decided to initiate negotiations with Sweden on the purchase of both Gripen and the reconnaissance aircraft Erieye", says Minister for Foreign Affairs Carl Bildt.
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C

contedicavour

New Member
It makes sense to replace F5s and early generation F16A/Bs with Gripen because of similar sizes, similar multirole capability, relatively easy maintenance, and access to weapons systems like Meteor and IRIS-T...

cheers
 
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Ozzy Blizzard

New Member
The fact that they were sold with Erieye shows the co-dependance of platform and AEW&C. Individual platforms dont matter so much any more, its the whole package. Grippen + Erieye offeres a truely impressive capability, all for a small price tag and ease of maintinance. A great choice for the RTAF, but i wonder wether there is an option for an aditional 12 JAS 39's???
 
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kato

The Bunker Group
Verified Defense Pro
Ozzy Blizzard said:
A great choice for the RTAF, but i wonder wether there is an option for an aditional 12 JAS 39's???
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Thailand originally defined a need for "12-18 fighter jets" and 3 AEW aircraft.

Doubt there'll be more; if at all a third batch option of 6 Gripen + 1 Erieye i guess.
 
C

contedicavour

New Member
kato said:
Thailand originally defined a need for "12-18 fighter jets" and 3 AEW aircraft.

Doubt there'll be more; if at all a third batch option of 6 Gripen + 1 Erieye i guess.
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Leaving financial constraints aside, Thailand has to replace about 50 planes between F5, F16A/B and A7, so in theory they do need more than a dozen Gripen...

cheers
 
S

swerve

Super Moderator
Ozzy Blizzard said:
The fact that they were sold with Erieye shows the co-dependance of platform and AEW&C. Individual platforms dont matter so much any more, its the whole package. Grippen + Erieye offeres a truely impressive capability, all for a small price tag and ease of maintinance. A great choice for the RTAF, but i wonder wether there is an option for an aditional 12 JAS 39's???
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Gripen & Erieye aren't co-dependent. Thailand is the 5th Erieye customer, & 5th Gripen customer. But they aren't the same 5 - 3 of the other Erieye customers don't have Gripen, & 3 of the other Gripen customers don't have Erieye.
 
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raymaned

New Member
raymaned (thai man)

i wonder how a plane from the nation which doesn't have the experience in aircraft fighting will make such a good plane like US. At first Thailand has chosen for three choices first it is SU-30 (in Thailand therer is criticize that it consume such a lot from its two motor and the weapon which use for them must be buyed for all because thailand hasn't used any russia planes) second it is f16 c/d block60--after coup success in thailand at first the government plan to buy ths kind of plane but US don't deal to coup government (in my opinion i think that this is proper for thai not only the grteat performance ....than grippen.....but also the familiar of f16 which have used in thailand for decades ) and the last "jas 39". Sweden offer an attractive deal which is 2 erieyes, 3 round stations, 200 scholarships to educate areospace engineering in sweden and the last grippen source code ,which will improve thai engineer to develop or...... . So i dont quite sure that grippen will proper for it mission to protect the southern thai + gulf of Thailand from any threat . ps. Malaysia have su30mkm f18a/b
 
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paskal

New Member
raymaned said:
i wonder how a plane from the nation which doesn't have the experience in aircraft fighting will make such a good plane like US. At first Thailand has chosen for three choices first it is SU-30 (in Thailand therer is criticize that it consume such a lot from its two motor and the weapon which use for them must be buyed for all because thailand hasn't used any russia planes) second it is f16 c/d block60--after coup success in thailand at first the government plan to buy ths kind of plane but US don't deal to coup government (in my opinion i think that this is proper for thai not only the grteat performance ....than grippen.....but also the familiar of f16 which have used in thailand for decades ) and the last "jas 39". Sweden offer an attractive deal which is 2 erieyes, 3 round stations, 200 scholarships to educate areospace engineering in sweden and the last grippen source code ,which will improve thai engineer to develop or...... . So i dont quite sure that grippen will proper for it mission to protect the southern thai + gulf of Thailand from any threat . ps. Malaysia have su30mkm f18a/b
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Yup i agree with you.
Just wanna correct one of your sentence malaysia doesnt have f18a/b the only have the f18c/d that is mainly used for night strike missions.
 
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Ozzy Blizzard

New Member
swerve said:
Gripen & Erieye aren't co-dependent. Thailand is the 5th Erieye customer, & 5th Gripen customer. But they aren't the same 5 - 3 of the other Erieye customers don't have Gripen, & 3 of the other Gripen customers don't have Erieye.
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Mate i didnt mean to imply that you cant use grippen without Erieye. You've missunderstood me. The point i was making was that in a combination of the two you get a much better capability than just spending the extra cash on more grippens. Its the whole "intergrated system" that GF talks about so much. Its the package that counts rather than just the platform, and although grippen may be outclassed by SU 30, the package of grippen and Erieye more than evens the score. And the fact that grippen and Erieye were purchased as in onedeal, 6+1 and 6+1 rather than two compleatly different purchases, shows this trend away from a "platform centric" mentality, as one member put it, to a "system/package centric" mentality. Thats all i meant.
 
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Ryttare

New Member
raymaned said:
i wonder how a plane from the nation which doesn't have the experience in aircraft fighting will make such a good plane like US. At first Thailand has chosen for three choices first it is SU-30 (in Thailand therer is criticize that it consume such a lot from its two motor and the weapon which use for them must be buyed for all because thailand hasn't used any russia planes) second it is f16 c/d block60--after coup success in thailand at first the government plan to buy ths kind of plane but US don't deal to coup government (in my opinion i think that this is proper for thai not only the grteat performance ....than grippen.....but also the familiar of f16 which have used in thailand for decades ) and the last "jas 39". Sweden offer an attractive deal which is 2 erieyes, 3 round stations, 200 scholarships to educate areospace engineering in sweden and the last grippen source code ,which will improve thai engineer to develop or...... . So i dont quite sure that grippen will proper for it mission to protect the southern thai + gulf of Thailand from any threat . ps. Malaysia have su30mkm f18a/b
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You seem to be doubtful that Gripen is capable of defending Thailand, but I don't think you need to. According to what I've heard the main mission will be to protect the Thai waters and coasts and with modern anti shipping missiles and Gripen is very capable of that.

It's correct that Sweden has not been to war for a long time, but during the cold war the Swedish Airforce played cat and mouse with the Soviet fighter pilots. These experiences was used in the development of swedish fighters and Gripen was designed to be able to take on Su-27 and it's future versions.

But the Thai Airforce will be able to evaluate Gripen first hand and see what it can do. Also remembre that it's not only the machine but the pilot too and a good pilot can explore the strong sides of his plane. With the high availability and relatively low operational costs hopefully the pilots has a chanse of getting many hours in the air to practice their skillls even better.
 
S

swerve

Super Moderator
Ozzy Blizzard said:
Mate i didnt mean to imply that you cant use grippen without Erieye. You've missunderstood me. The point i was making was that in a combination of the two you get a much better capability than just spending the extra cash on more grippens. Its the whole "intergrated system" that GF talks about so much. Its the package that counts rather than just the platform, and although grippen may be outclassed by SU 30, the package of grippen and Erieye more than evens the score. And the fact that grippen and Erieye were purchased as in onedeal, 6+1 and 6+1 rather than two compleatly different purchases, shows this trend away from a "platform centric" mentality, as one member put it, to a "system/package centric" mentality. Thats all i meant.
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I can't argue with that. Makes sense to me.
 
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