http://www.combataircraft.net/reports/rafale.php
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=95765&page=3
This have been going on for years by the same writers but now itis taking some proportions which i think are beyhond the ethics of journalism.
This is the article which is targeted...
http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2009/11/09/334383/flight-test-dassault-rafale-rampant-rafale.html
Your opinions?
Smear Campaign?
I think everyone should have the right to express an opinion and I hope they allways will, even if I as an individual find it offensive innacurate or whatever.
Expressing an opinion is exactly what it says, nothing more. It is not an analysis.
We all construct our individual reality and have differing perceptions of the same events, based on our own differing experiences . I am sure we will all make our minds up about whose opinion aligns the closest to our perceptions
Personally I prefer the Saab Grippen, but then that is based on what I think I know about it, I could be wrong its just an opinion.
"I never learned anything from someone who agreed with me" (Robert Heinlein)
Well let's a gree to desagree shall we?
Expressing opinions is one thing, systematically trying to degrade someone credibility with unfunded stories yet another.
Not an analysis ass you noticed, and which doesn't qualify for journalism work at least not to my standards.
If the event of flying an aircraft and reporting it is this individual's reality, i hardly see how someone who doesn't share this experice (nor any other experiecne of the author btw) can be so critical and more to the point in such a way.
This no longer is expressing an opinion but smear.
"If the event of flying an aircraft and reporting it is this individual's reality, i hardly see how someone who doesn't share this experice (nor any other experiecne of the author btw) can be so critical and more to the point in such a way"
Agreed
Read the article from Combat Aircraft in detail and you'll see that, regardless of your own opinion, it's very subjective and therefore lacks credibility. Think too about the nature - or target audience - of Combat Aircraft as a magazine; it's aimed entirely at the enthusiast. Under its present editorial leadership and direction it will never be anything else. It certainly will never achieve the standard that it becomes 'a voice of the industry', because it's geared towards the airshow reader - in other words the enthusiast! The majority of the writers themselves on Combat Aircraft are enthusiasts and not industry professionals!
If you want objective analysis supported by the emphrical evidence of well-founded research, supported by industry itself, you don't read Combat Aircraft! You go elsewhere.
And as for the Gripen? Scrap JSF and get three or four squadrons of the Gripen in service and the RAF will then be able to meet its ground attack commitment without the need to be tied into a stupid and un-necesarily expensive long-term contract with the Pentagon! And this is me being as subjective as Combat Aircraft!
Michael Leek
Yes Michael exactly.
My own reaction to such criticsm would be just to ignore it.
As you point out they earn their living giving providing a sub-culture with comment for inclusion in what amount to gee-whiz aircraft celeb mags (Subjective). I think they also reveal their prejudices in the article.
The other thing I often look at is who has adverising accounts with them.
But I would maintain that and they have a right to do so .....unless their comments constitute libel.
Maybe Peter Collins should consider a quick call to Carter Ruck?
Re Gripen: Yes and the UK would have the source codes.
I don't have a problem with the Combat Aircraft piece overall. I know one of the authors very well, and his central point that Pete hasn't flown the Typhoon cannot be disputed. However, when Flight was given the opportunity to fly an RAF example (Tranche 1, Block 2) in 2007 the sortie was not offered to our test pilot, despite a request from the magazine. So, if anyone at the RAF or Eurofighter would now like to put Pete up in a Block 8 example for a full evaluation, then we'd be delighted to hear from you.
Overall, I believe that Pete securing the Rafale ride was a major coup for Flight, and I hope that the many thousands of people who have read his report in the print magazine and online enjoyed reading it as much as I did. Hopefully we will be able to feature similar flight test reports on some of the type's rivals over the coming years?
Yes, Sprucemoose, i think it's exactly what we need :
RAF have to offer P.Collins a chance to fly a block8 Typhoon. RAF or any other air force using this type.
I believe this would solve a lot of "problems", i mean for everyone... Even Jon Lake.
Then the author other hot topic:
This MMI was "much vaunted" by virtually every single pilot who flew Rafale, including an RAF Air Marshal and the last sentence implies of course than getting use to the collimated cockpit display doesn’t involves all most advanced its functions and symbology.
Another point:
He made no comments on radar handling or as to what range the TV was used at.
So I suppose that these critics would have been a lot more credible had the Typhoon pilot been named, and unfunded stories about the aircraft capabilities not been written.
Regarding the pilot/author himself, Pete Collins, everyone seems to forget what the job of test pilots is, if he wasn’t capable to asses the aircraft capabilities even during the first few minutes of flying it, I can’t see him doing any testing for a fighter manufacturer.
I have flown more than a few hours with the head of the Bretigny CEV at the time, his analysis and reaction time were in the order of 100 time faster than mine, of course I was a student and he was the teacher but the experience he had from flying anything in French service (and more) from P-47 to Mirage 4000 was easily ported to a Jodel D-90 or a Rafale.
So Pete didn't fly the Typhoon, OK, does this make his comments on the capabilties of the Rafale less credible?
I don't thnik so, if it was the case no one would need to get at him and his credibility, by suggesting that he only have a limited experience of combat fighters and in some forum, going to the extend to write that the Mirage 2000 is not a modern, agile fighter like the F-16 MLU is...
Call this what you like, we call it propaganda.
All in all I find this sort of suggestion and comments are not only inaccurate but also totally disrespectful especially coming from someone who only have a PP background and no experience of fast jets whatsoever.
This article sounds full of ressentment and biternes with lots of personal issues involved, (not my airfan cup of thea), and there are certainly other issues behind this which we will never know about but this is yet another story.
For your information:
Rafale C01 supercruise during its first flight with M88-E1 not at their nominal thrust, we also figured thanks to their pilot comments as well as some programe managers duringthe Paris Airshow, that it does it with 4 MICAs and 1 X 1.250 l supersonic tank at M 1.2, the loss of speed due to the tank drag is 0.1 M, with 4 AAMs only it supercruises at M 1.3.
If any of you is ported on aerodynamics, i would like to suggest to reflect on how an aircraft with such a TWR in dry military power could fail to go supersonic with a sweep angle of 48*, when a Mirage III Avon was happy doing so in 1963.
This is what i meant by smear campaign.
Thanks for expressing your opinions.
SpruceMoose,
Thanks chap.
No 'smear campaign' was, as you have guessed, intended, and Marcus and I were inspired to pen the piece (which is, in effect a one-off blog entry) because of the strength and vehemence of the professional aircrew reaction to the piece - especially at Dubai, where the flight test was reprinted in the show daily. We found this interesting, and worthy of comment.
My central points were entirely unoriginal - I basically repeated exactly what aircrew mate after aircrew mate said to me after reading the piece, because their comments seemed compelling. Especially given the credentials of our primary source......
Our fundamental points were that Pete's conclusions (and your 'Rafale Rules' coverline) were so gushingly enthusiastic that they seemed more like advertorial than editorial. That Pete's conclusion ("That it was the best and most complete fighter he'd ever flown") begged an obvious question ("So what have you flown, Pete, especially for more than a single sortie?").
And when we dug down and found the answer to that question, it seemed an interesting fact (and one that put the Flight article in context) that he actually had no operational experience of comparable modern fighters.
No-one questions Pete's distinguished career, nor his motivation, nor did I (nor do I wish in any way) to attack the Rafale - I'm looking forward to being proved right in my prediction that this year (mid 09-mid 10) will be the year of the Rafale, with an order from Brazil surely being both imminent and inevitable, and with prospects in the UAE still looking very hopeful.
Europe needs Rafale, and I wish the programme every success.
The Combat piece was not really about Rafale, it was about journalism, and about the need to use the best qualified people to write flight tests in what is still the finest aeronautical organ in the world.
I'm glad the RAF put you in the Typhoon - you wrote it up well, and we all knew what we were getting - SpruceMoose's take. The danger with putting PC in the jet (though I'm sure it would knock his socks off) is that people might assume that he was current, and with a really valid basis for comparison. I'd rather see Typhoon face a sterner and more probing judge, who would see behind the sheer performance and more 'gor blimey' cockpit features. The last thing anyone needs is more gushing Eurofighter advertorial.
See you in Munich this week, I guess?
Jon
Dare2,
Thanks, do feel free to lecture me further on the 'ethics of journalism' from behind your anonymous internet identity. I enjoyed the delicous irony. I regret that I probably won't read anything further on this forum, however.
You should be aware that Peter Collins' operational experience was on the Harrier GR3 and Sea Harrier FRS1 - not what I'd call modern agile fighters, and not good enough or modern enough to be usefully compared with Rafale.
The comments in my semi-blog did not come from me (UAS, PPL, a few FJ rides) but from a very experienced TP with recent experience in relevant modern agile fighters. I hope that addresses your concerns as to my supposed 'disrespect'.
You'll be interested to know that at least two serving RAF Typhoon pilots have flown Rafale (in the UAE, I believe) and I assume that at least two AdlA guys will have flown Typhoon in return, since these things are inevitably reciprocal. As you will no doubt soon hear.
Arabian Jon , Alias Jakoniko.
You'll be interested to know that no one cares nor believes a word of what you write and believe expecially not on the subject of Typhoon and Rafale, please go ahead and name the Typhoon pilots who flew Rafale, you're the only one to know about it as usual with no source to demonstrate how much more informed than the rest of us you are.
We know it supercruises without difficulty, we also know the F-12 pilots fought vs Typhoon with very satisfying results, as did those of the 1/7 at Dubai.
We have active AdlA servicemen and pilots laughing at these stories of yours for all the good reasons; the latest being the very "predictable result" of a non-event i.e F-22 vs Rafale in the UAE, we're done with this unfunded, unvalidated and totaly hilarious propaganda.
Pete was not the only one who was at the wrong end of your keyboard, RAF Air Marshalls, RN Admirals of the RIAT board...
All those who are counterdicting your "expert" opinion on Rafale have had it big time, we understand you are the only one in the knows and more qualified than (existing and demonstratively skilled) fighter pilots and flight test pilots, if you really had known ONE of them and flew with one you would have writen something just a little different, particularly in the topic of experience.
To sumerise, you write about what you do not have nor knows about.
PS Pete Collins seems to have some in Mirage 2000 too, not moderrn nor maneuvrable according to your standards...
He have tons more experience and technical abilities to give an opinionthan you do, be it one that doesn't suits you nor your long-vented stories about these aircrafts and stealth contacts/buddies, so go ahead and justify what you do, it doesn't pay you a new credibility, what was writen was by you.
Give it a rest you're uncovered and adding more smear to what you already have done over the year only shows an even better picture of your real skills.
Try flying, it might open your mind to something you seems to have lost of sight for a long time, real enthusiasts and pilots doesn't write the way you do.
Jack.
b.Jacko November 25, 2009 @ 5:40 am Perhaps not such a good flight test report?
Combat Aircraft suggests that Collins’ lack of experience of contemporary fast jets meant that he did not really have sufficient basis for comparison, and that his gushing praise was a little unqualified.
RAFALE, AS GOOD AS ITS PRESS?http://www.combataircraft.net/reports/rafale.phphttp://g2globalsolutions.com/review/?p=2883
Same author, same arguments, same lies...
What NO smear campaign?
http://www.flyingsquadron.com/forums/index.php?/topic/16530-joyeux-noel-et-bonne-annee/
Quote:Perhaps more significantly, and more accurately, what does it say about the power of propaganda? (Because who believes these French porkies? Not me!)
………. And what does it say about the boastful nature of our snail-eating chums?
Well ,we are getting there little by little.
Aren't we Jon?