[David_Hayward (RIP)]

I see that the dreaded Patriot system has had a go at another but US 'plane this time!

Actually the latest thinking is that the MoD will actually purchase the Glob 111s that they have on lease and buy a load more outright. If you see the terms of the lease you will see that basically it would be better if they just stayed in their hangars and never get used. The amount of money being spent on lease payments is huge, but there is the option to buy and I think Boing-Boing-Boeing would love to sell them because that might pave the way for the sale of more Glob 111s to other countries, and then the cost price will come down, and then the bean-counters will sanction more for the USAF/USAFR/ANG in turn. The A300M should be sidelined and the US 'plane drafted in instead.

The question of the deletion of the cannon really is a hot and live wire, and as the correspondents to the various magazines have said, what happens when you want to shoot at a helicopter? Perhaps the pilot should take a pistol and shoot at it a la 1914? What about slow-moving fabric covered planes such as the AN-2, which have a low or no radar signature? This is what they came up against in Korea with Po-2s attacking at night.