source: Flight international
Date : 21/03/06

Thailand has drafted a requirement for three airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft as part of a new nine-year spending plan. Industry sources expect Bangkok will only consider small platforms, such as the Embraer ERJ-145 and Saab 2000. The requirement calls for the purchase of three aircraft “capable for AEW&C”, but stipulates that only two should be fully equipped.

The Swedish government has already offered to sell Thailand Saab 2000s with Ericsson Erieye radars as part of a proposal to supply the country with the Saab/BAE Systems Gripen fighter.

The Thai air force is now evaluating the Gripen, Lockheed Martin F-16C/D and Sukhoi Su-30 for its new fighter requirement.

Thailand’s recently drafted wishlist includes 12 to 18 new multirole fighters, six transport aircraft each capable of carrying at least 40 troops, 12 8.5t combat search-and-rescue helicopters and six unmanned air vehicles.

Looks like soon we won't be the only one in this region to have AEW&C capability .. erh .. how ah

We cant do anything la . U cant stop others from buying wat, it just a matter of time before every1 buy AEW, u just have 2 be better trained better prepared then them lo

lets get wedgetail ….s-3b? or even p-8?

Huh???? S-3B is an ELINT platform not AEW

Which fighter you think they will get? I think few things can happen here.

I'm thinking they may go for the SU30 also, the su30 can operate from the chakri carrier no?

or they may want to squeeze the swedish by bundling gripens and aew&c to get better price.

but new fighter means again another logistic knotty problem, and the americans may not like and usa has many bases in thailand which contribute significantly to their economy and promoting tourism leh?

wah tough, I'm glad our own selection is over.

SU-30 cant operate from e Thai carrier,Gripen is a gd aircraft but lack acceration n Malaysia already order SU-30 liao no idea le, Gripen maybe lo

I tt the russians hav a naval ver for su30

must be mix up,

Actually there is a naval version of the flanker which is capable of deploying from carriers with ski jumps such as the Thai Chakri class. However, whether the flight deck of Chakri is long enough to launch the large flankers is unsure at this point.

Naval Flanker
http://www.milavia.net/aircraft/su-33/su-33.htm

Specifications of Admiral Kuznetsov class
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuznetsov_class_aircraft_carrier

Specifications of Chakri class
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_aircraft_carrier_Chakri_Nareubet

the website say the chakri already has 6 harriers already, even if they decom the harriers I think the flight deck can only operate 6-7 su33 fighters with folded wing tips.

chakri only cost US$175mil, why dun we buy 1 less C-17 and use the 200mil to get ourselves a carrier also. then we can have our own little carrier battle group also.

1 pocket carrier flanked by stealth frigates, missile covettes, submarines and missile gunboats, trailing behind we have landing ships, flying overhead are our AEW&C ... POWER

Originally posted by four-niner:

the website say the chakri already has 6 harriers already, even if they decom the harriers I think the flight deck can only operate 6-7 su33 fighters with folded wing tips.

chakri only cost US$175mil, why dun we buy 1 less C-17 and use the 200mil to get ourselves a carrier also. then we can have our own little carrier battle group also.

1 pocket carrier flanked by stealth frigates, missile covettes, submarines and missile gunboats, trailing behind we have landing ships, flying overhead are our AEW&C ... POWER

.......

dun like ?

Its not say like or don't like. The problem is whether its realistic or not. The prospect of us having an aircraft carrier even a small one in the next 5-10 years is not very likely.

Sure we have the money and can acquire the technology but do we have enough people to staff this aircraft carrier? Unlikely, because Singapore's birth rate have been decreasing steadily over the years even with baby bonus this trend is not about to be reversed any time soon. I don't think RSN want foreign talent to staff our pride of the SAF too.

Assuming we do have an CBG,which is meant as a show of force, where can they sail then? Our own terriotorial waters is already tiny and further more being cluttered with commercial shipping as we are an important stopover port of call. We sail into Straits of Malacca, the Indonesian and our friendly Malaysian foreign miniters will be knocking(maybe even banging) at our embassy doors in record time. Sail into South China Sea, we may be caught in the squabbles between the various claimants of the Spartly islands namely Malaysia,PRC,ROC,Brunei,Philippines and Vietnam. That is one very volatile area in this region.

Lastly we have 4 relatively new Endurance class LST which have already proven their versatility in both peace time and war time operations. If i am not wrong RSN rejected a bigger design of the LST by ST Marine and chose the Endurance class instead.

Personally i will wish RSN to have a small 2nd hand aircraft carrier just like what the Thai navy had but its just a fantasy at the moment because it will not be realistic, at least for the time being.

see,

yes we have shrinking birth rate but compares our population today to that in 65 or even 70 it is more than before. And if popular notion that we dun have enuf ppl goes then hw come reservist cycle can reduce to 10 years?

Yah they say we use technology to reduce manpower requirement, come on lah can technology replace the rifleman or tankee? maybe in the air-force and navy side you buy better computer systems that use automation or robotics can replace "some" of the human function then overall you require lesser people as a whole then ok thats fine but it does not mean we dun have enuf people to recruit.

Personally I don't buy the argument from SAF that we don't have enuf people to join our armed forces, saf have a regular force headcount of more than 60,000 people largely in logistics, airforce/navy, dun have people then where all these people come from? Outsourced from bangalah?

Anyway if we had a carrier, our airforce dun need to fly from airbase so often with such a platform at sea we can train more often in south china without having need to always fly back to and fro, ppl complain the jet engine noise "disturb" our neighbours sleeping mah. So we want to be a good neighbour so we shud get a carrier to help us help them sleep better with less noise mah right.

E SU-33 can take off with only a ski-jump cos tat r catch on e flight-deck tat hold e aircraft till their engine reach max thurst, so any flight-deck actually can be modify 1 it just whether they went 2 operate anot

A carrier is not a cost-effective choice in e near future,1st many navy r starting 2 operate subs ,2nd a carrier need a lot of support, it dumb 2 use our stealth frigate as excort imagine u c a very big object on e radar screen n some very very small objects tat look like fishing trawlers c also know it our stealth frigate.

But thing r alway changing maybe in 5-10 yrs it unlikely we will operate a carrier , but who can say after 15-20 yrs, we never know

Originally posted by spartan6:

A carrier is not a cost-effective choice in e near future,1st many navy r starting 2 operate subs ,2nd a carrier need a lot of support, it dumb 2 use our stealth frigate as excort imagine u c a very big object on e radar screen n some very very small objects tat look like fishing trawlers c also know it our stealth frigate.

you are right it's dumb to use stealth frigates as escort i didn't think of that ... bad idea

So ... we shall not buy any C-17 at all but re-allocate all the resources 1 billion dollars to buy the only stealth carrier in the world instead then on radar everything will look like fishing trawler happy

WTF ... CBG IS USED AS SHOW OF FORCE you know anot ????

harlow if everything cannot see on radar then show? show what force ah ???

Originally posted by four-niner:

see,

yes we have shrinking birth rate but compares our population today to that in 65 or even 70 it is more than before. And if popular notion that we dun have enuf ppl goes then hw come reservist cycle can reduce to 10 years?

Yah they say we use technology to reduce manpower requirement, come on lah can technology replace the rifleman or tankee? maybe in the air-force and navy side you buy better computer systems that use automation or robotics can replace "some" of the human function then overall you require lesser people as a whole then ok thats fine but it does not mean we dun have enuf people to recruit.

Personally I don't buy the argument from SAF that we don't have enuf people to join our armed forces, saf have a regular force headcount of more than 60,000 people largely in logistics, airforce/navy, dun have people then where all these people come from? Outsourced from bangalah?

Anyway if we had a carrier, our airforce dun need to fly from airbase so often with such a platform at sea we can train more often in south china without having need to always fly back to and fro, ppl complain the jet engine noise "disturb" our neighbours sleeping mah. So we want to be a good neighbour so we shud get a carrier to help us help them sleep better with less noise mah right.

Agreed totally... The SAF has a total mobilised strength of 350,000, I totally dun buy the argument that we dun have enough manpower...

Jus ask around, people will say : " Aiya Spore not enuff soldiers la " This is a comment that irks me to no end. Someone ought to educate those people who dun noe what they are blabbering about, especially those taxi drivers who think they know everything. There was once I booked out during my NSF days and this taxi driver looked at me and said:" Waste of time Spore how to defend, ppl drop one bomb finish liaoz " I felt like punching him.

If they knew so much and were so clever, they would not be taxi drivers in the first place. Ignorant and arrogant people like this should be ashamed to call themselves citizens.

You want a staff an asset like a aircraft carrier with reservists! you've gotta be kidding me.
Our total strength includes NSF leh. If i'm not mistaken only 70% are regulars. Taking into account how many are in logistics and support as well as HQ staffers. Then it takes a crew of at least 1000 to operate a carrier. Not to mention sufficient escorts. Let's say we need 6 surface ships as escorts. At 80 per surface ship that's at least 640 men for the escorts. So we have a 1,600 sailors being used up.
Our frigates are ALL being used up to protect this asset. Leaving us every thing on big surface ships. Seriously. What kind of money and support are we talking about here? it's MASSIVE!!! i'd rather we bought 12 more frigates with that kind of money and requirements.

Edit:Anyway we're off topic here.To get back on topic I'm wondering why the Thais are suddenly decide to spend so much. 1st new fighters,now AWE&C and if i'm not mistaken more tanks too right? Looking to replace the M60s?

Are you sure the manpower for operating an Aircraft Carrier like Chakri Naruebet requires a thousand pple. Apparently, with sophisticated integrated combat management technology massive manpower necessities on the ship are significantly reduced an excellent ie.the delta Frigate and Endurance Class. Anyway, remain skeptical about the procurement of an aircraft carrier. The SAF would rather allocate the fund to the Airforce "Above All" ya!! Acquire more F-15SG and JASSM if the US congress give the nod

are we offtopic?

RSN would be better off with a LPD or LHD. three would be a nice mix for helo and troops deployment.

LPD will be good also nah.

with aircraft carrier or LPD we can do a lot of things, the waters ard here are very congested but see, these waters are ours and we must look to ourselves as guardians of this busy waterway. If an aggressor sends their CBG to our doorstep yes we have a few credible surface ships but realistically it's pretty futile odds dun u think, we can sink 1 or 2 but a CBG ....... there is no fair contest .. KNOCKOUT punch ... K.O !! end of story.

But if we have our own CBG in this theatre there is still a contest and no KO. Somemore our new navy base can accomodate and resupply 2 x Number 12 american shoe size carriers, 4 of them if need be so we already have the facilities in place more than enough for 1 pocket carrier or a few LPD.

But the main reason is cuz we are so small and who is to say a surprise pre-emptive strike on our key facilities won't clean us out. But if we have our own CBG it means a large part of our forces and systems are "forward based" in an unfixed locations any potential aggressor has to consider that we may still have the capability to provide a strong retaliation after sustaining a first strike.

ok les get back to the thread.

Put harriers on floats and tow them

U seem 2 give a CGB 2 much credit liao even if we have a small carrier do u think e small amout of aircraft going 2 change e odds ,whether our aircrafts, ships n subs can take e CARRIER down anot 5 or 8 more aircraft isnt going 2 change much u rather use e $ spend on e carrier which after lanching it aircraft will be sitting behind do nothing 2 buy more aircraft