(By Ray D.)
The Eurofighter Finally Defeats a US Plane...Kinda
The editors and staff at SPIEGEL ONLINE are not your patriotic type. But nothing stirs their emotions more deeply than a story about Europe defeating America. In a current article entitled, "Mock Air Battle: Eurofighter Defeats Two US Jets", the magazine gushes about how a test version of the Eurofighter, a new fighter jet just recently deployed*, allegedly defeated two American F-15E's in a mock air battle.
The Eurofighter's First Kill: Victory over America at Last!
The SPIEGEL ONLINE article is, as is often the case, full of interesting contradictions. The fourth paragraph reads:
"The British pilots were just as surprised as their American colleagues, according to the paper. Because the maneuverable F-15, a machine built to secure air superiority, is seen as one of the best fighter jets around by many experts."
Ah yes. Here we go with the anonymous experts again. Who exactly are these so-called "many experts"? SPIEGEL ONLINE never bothers to name them. How convenient it must be to always have a pool of nameless, faceless experts to call on when you have nothing concrete to back your assertions.
But isn't it obvious: The point is that they have to inflate the F-15 to make the Eurofighter's apparent success seem all the more impressive. What follows in the article's (you guessed it) final passage, seems to contradict the beliefs of the anonymous experts entirely. Just two paragraphs later we read:
"Doubts about the effectiveness of the F-15 against modern fighter jets are not new. According to information from the Federation of American Scientists, the British BAe-concern and the British Defense Research Agency conducted simulated air battles with the F-15, the French Rafale, the Eurofighter and the new F-22 against the Russian Su-35. The result: The Rafale was the Su-35's equal. The Eurofighter achieved a shoot down ratio of 4.5 to 1 - for every shot down Eurofighter, four and a half Su-35's went down. The F-22 even reached a superiority of 10 to 1 - in stark contrast to F-15, which was behind the Su-35 by 1 to 1.3.
But what about all of the many experts? Wasn't the F-15 supposed to be one of the best fighter jets around, built to dominate the air? This doesn't make any sense. And why does SPIEGEL ONLINE wait until the very end to mention that America's latest fighter prototype, the F-22, tops them all?
Well, SPIEGEL ONLINE certainly wouldn't want to dampen its readership's faint Euro-patriotism with too many facts like that, now would it...? After all, their collective Euro-egos are still smarting from the Mars-probe fiasco...
Update: One of our readers writes: "Considering the original RFP (Request For Proposal) from the Department of Defense for the F-15 project was launched in 1968, how surprising is it that it is behind the state of art in 2005? Consider for a moment that the production Rafale first flew in 1998 - thirty years after the design project for the F-15 started!"
*Correction: We earlier described the Eurofighter as: "a new European fighter jet still in development". Although the jet is still undergoing testing, it made its maiden flight in February 2003 and has already been officially deployed to at least four nations since then. Thank you to commenter joaninho for pointing this out.
@Querdenker:
Btw, European mars landing did fail (as have previous US ones), but the orbit photos were absolutely great.
So was the European mission to Titan
Your "America über alles" is ridiculous.
Btw Airbus sold twice as many planes at the Paris air show as Boeing.
No need for crowing. But if Europe is competitive that's a good thing
What are you talking about "European mission to Titan." The Cassini rocket and satellite was developed by NASA, the bulk of the project. The Huygens was a small probe that was attached the the Cassini satellite and developed by the European space agency. You just hitched a ride.
AND what are you talking about American mission to Mars failure? I'm aware of only one where (admittedly) they miscalculated data.
But, what about the ESA failed Beagle 2 spacecraft which failed as well? Additionally, what about the two enormously successful Mars rovers built by NASA.
Question: How many Ariane rockets have exploded or failed?
It seems to me that you are claiming that the Americans are flag waving whilst you do the same. And incorrectly so!
energy saving cars,
Funny Toyota and other Japanese are leading this field. Even GM is more advanced than BMW in this field.
GDP per capita and other things. Germany certainly has suffered by taking in bankrupt East Germany.
This is a myth pandered in Germany. Fact, Germany remains completely overregulated, under funded "Rentenveresicheurng" (insurance is a lie), aging population, etc, etc. These trends would have been happening regardless of the East. I would agree however, that the East is so leftist that their membership in parliament has strengthened the SPD and henceforth ruined the chances for reform in Germany.
Ireland really has been a success story... they put quite an impressive EU help (with Germany financing the bulk of it) to good use.
Another myth. Ireland only started economic growth once they deregulated their market and changed their tax laws making Ireland an attractive place to invest. This only started in the 1980s, Ireland had been a member of the EU since 1973.
West Germany would still beat the UK on a GDP per capita level
But not on recent GDP/cap growth in the last 10 years. You see, the UK is growing FASTER than Germany. An obvious statement.
The GDP per capita of Munich is higher than that of Luxembourg (and London btw).
Munich 1.6 million
London 10 million
Even you desired a fair comparison?
[ peace in the ], the Horn of Africa.
What??? Explain this one, cause I need some URL links here...
As for the German contributions to freedom and democracy, you might want to note that Germany has more troops abroad to contribute to that than most other countries except the US.
More than Pakistan, Nigeria or Bangladesh? Ever heard of the war going on in the Congo and the presence of UN troops there? It's just that Germany has difficulty acknowledging genocide where it's happening, like in Darfur.
Posted by: James | June 24, 2005 at 11:28 AM
James, and I always thought Germans were thinking negatively all the time.
The Titan mission was indeed a glorious example of collaboration between NASA and ESA (and there is a good deal of German and European technology in many other US-missions (Mars included).
High Tech is multinational. Even soccer is. When Bayern Munich wins, it wins with players from all over the world. We still cheer for them as "ours".
Jeez, but this is boring. Are we going to compare exploded Arianes with exploded Space Shuttles or what?
Google "Bundesmarine" plus "Enduring Freedom"
And stop blaming Germany for not being everywhere. And yes I'm aware of UN troops in the Congo and about the "fine" job they are doing there.
And yes, you called Darfur a "genocide". And that was it for the moment.
Germany also has no troops in North Korea, Myanmar, Zimbabwe, Cuba. Gonna hang my head in shame now.
Posted by: Querdenker | June 24, 2005 at 12:20 PM
The A380 may be a nice big plane , but economically it will fail.
The A380 may be a nice big plane , but economically it will fail.
The A380 may be a nice big plane , but economically it will fail.
The A380 may be a nice big plane , but economically it will fail.
The A380 may be a nice big plane , but economically it will fail.
Who needs more than 640k RAM?
Posted by: no comment | June 24, 2005 at 09:06 PM
As for the German contributions to freedom and democracy, you might want to note that Germany has more troops abroad to contribute to that than most other countries except the US.
But wait, I thought that the capacity for military projection isn't important to Germany? Right?
Funny Toyota and other Japanese are leading this field. Even GM is more advanced than BMW in this field.
Ouch! Flag on the play, unneccessary roughness!
Posted by: Doug | June 25, 2005 at 12:23 AM
By the way, just wait until you see what the NEXT Euro fighter can do against A-10's! And it will DOMINATE stratotankers!
Posted by: Doug | June 25, 2005 at 12:28 AM
F15E is a fighter bomber they have a crew of 2 instead 1 of F-15C. And F15C are inferior to F-16 in manouverality at least until around 12000m altitude. But this isnt surprising F-15 have been around since 70's. It's an aerodinamic stable aircraft instead F-16 and Eurofighter that are unstable, they only can fly with help from computers. This instability makes the plane to change direction faster. So no surprise. It's just your usual bunch of ignorant journalists reporting.
Posted by: lucklucky | June 25, 2005 at 07:24 AM
Der Spiegel points out that the Eurofighter used in this mock fight was even a two-seater training version (as if that would make its "victory" bigger) but omits the fact that the F15E is a two-seater strike version of a fighter. It´s this childish, tabloid-style writing that makes me puke. Yes, it is pointless, anti-American and immature. Wir haben das anscheinend nötig!
And what about "they kept it secret in order not to embarrass the Americans"? Bullshit. As other pointed out, the training exercize against the Indian air force - where the US lost - was publicized by the US military, probably with the intention to demonstrate the need for the F-22.
Posted by: werner | June 26, 2005 at 12:57 PM