УНН News of the World ✎ Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine Ivan Havryliuk stated that Ukraine expects the supply of Swedish Gripen, French Mirage, and
additional F-16s. Th…
It’s a matter of opportunity cost. Why give Ukraine an expensive air superiority fighter that needs precious resources to operate, and is vulnerable to Russian SAMs, when they could have the equivalent cost in missiles instead?
The Saab Gripen carries more explicit reconiassance/air-to-ground loadout, it’s designed to be cheap to maintain, it’s more flexible with short runaways and such.
…Hence my uncertainty. I am not military, so I don’t really understand the need of a focused air superiority fighter like the Typhoon, as opposed to more SAMs + aircraft that can do A2A like the Gripen.
It’s a matter of opportunity cost. Why give Ukraine an expensive air superiority fighter that needs precious resources to operate, and is vulnerable to Russian SAMs, when they could have the equivalent cost in missiles instead?
The Saab Gripen carries more explicit reconiassance/air-to-ground loadout, it’s designed to be cheap to maintain, it’s more flexible with short runaways and such.
…Hence my uncertainty. I am not military, so I don’t really understand the need of a focused air superiority fighter like the Typhoon, as opposed to more SAMs + aircraft that can do A2A like the Gripen.
Countries that have Typhoons don’t have Gripen, and vice versa. I’m sure Ukraine is thankful for either.
But those countries could also keep their Typhoons and send their G2A instead (which the Typhoons cover the need for).
It’d be more efficient for Europe to set up a no fly zone with them, or something like that.
I realize I’m sort of arguing with myself here, heh.