What ifs!

If Whittle had been listened to originally?
If the Miles poject had continued?
We could have had supersonic planes during WW2 (on our side)

Martin wrote:
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That's the beauty of "what if's" and normally only found in RAM under "F-111 v Sopwith Camel ?"
Richard.

snipped-for-privacy@spam.spam (Martin) wrote in <dqnq5r$hbe$3$8300dec7 @news.demon.co.uk>:
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Had that happened, the repercussions would still have been noticeable today. Had Britain been a leader in postwar aviation technology, their aircraft industry might not have been is such a sorry state these days.
The US could have had supersonic aircraft during WW2 as well: <http://tanks45.tripod.com/Jets45/Histories/Lockheed-L133/L133.htm
If you're interested in exploring this subject, visit <http://www.whatifmodelers.com/ . Alternate history (and building the models to match) is fun.

snipped-for-privacy@xxxxmsnet.nl.invalid (Harro de Jong) wrote:
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This is the UK SIG? If so, I met you guys in Telford last year and had a great time. I'm from Seattle where our last big 'what if' was the 1949 Schneider event. The organizer, Tim Nelson, wrote the article and i took most of the pictures in there. It was a great deal of fun!
Right now in the early stages of April Fool's planning. It's becoming a tradition here to do a spoof model for April Fool's day.
Have fun!!
--- Tontoni

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The UK SIG is part of it, but there are quite a few people on the forum who aren't in the SIG.
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Cool. I was there too. We didn't meet, AFAIK (I was probably wandering around).

Stephen Tontoni wrote:
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I finally got my copy of FSM (and I can see what the discussion centered on as to the cover plane) but I loved that Schneider Cup exercise. There were some very good models shown.
Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

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Britain was a leader in postwar aviation technology but it's own government failed to understand that. Hence the cancellation of the TSR.2 and similar projects and their replacement by inferior, less reliable and more costly imported alternatives. The US governemnt and aircraft industry knew all too well and did their combined utmost to sabotage Britain's adanced avaition projects leaving western europe at the mercy of Soviet air power for years to come.
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This very scenario was explored in the TV programme "Planes That Never Flew" (which is also available on DVD and which is where I first saw it). The programme presents a computer animated sequence in which Lockheed's L133's flying bomber escort duties go after the Me262 leaving other allied fighters to deal with slower German intercerptors.
(kim)

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Huh? What about all the USAFE units deployed in support of NATO??

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Two points here. One is that prior to the deployment of the F-15 in europe, NATO had absolutely no way of countering reconnaissance missions by Soviet Foxbats that were able to overfly western europe with total impunity. The other is that the US adminstration was haranguing europe to do more to defend itself whilst at the same time doing it's level best to put europe's indigenous defence industries out of business.
You can't have it both ways. You either have a europe which is strong and can defend itself or you have a europe which is totally dependent on US military aid. US industry of course would prefer the latter as it creates more business for them.
(kim)

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How does that equate to "...leaving western europe (sic) at the mercy of Soviet air power for years to come."?
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There was only one US administration during the entire Cold War?
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Instead of riding on the coattails of US defense expenditures to pour its money into social programs. Seems to me Europe got a pretty good deal, and it *still* has neither the will nor the means to defend itself.

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There was a gap bof many years between the cancellation of the TSR.2 and similar projects and the deployment of F-15's in europe to (partially) fill that gap. During thiose years europe was extremely vulnerable to any hostile Soviet actions.
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We outside of the US think of it as being oinetinuous adminstraiton whereas you within the US see it as being several separate administrations.
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By "europe" I mean of course Great Bitain since that was the only european country within NATO which had an advanced aerospace industry. It was exaggerated claims by US manufacturers such as McDonnel and General Dynamics for the performance and cost of its aircraft which persuaded Britain to abandon its own defense projects. The ultimate cost to the UK taxpayer was actually far higher than if those programs had continued. The USA also suffered in that it did not have those projects to turn to when it's own aircraft proved inadequate for the tasks they were designed for.
As an independent observer I can assure you the UK at least has both the means and the will to defend itself against any likely aggressor.
(kim)

kim wrote:
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         I bet there are some people in France who would have some pretty interesting replies to that statement. :-) Flying Frog, where are you when we need you??
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    Crap! It was the British socialist idiots who were pissed at the aircraft industry and did their own industry in out of spite.
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    IIRC the thing that ran the Phantom project through the roof was re-design to use the Spey engine, which was a change insisted on by the British Government after the fact. Your own government screwed you, as usual.
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    And just which aircraft did you have in mind?? Enlighten us.
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    This sounds like the chest thumping we were hearing after the breakdown of the Soviet Union when we were being bombarded with talk about the "New European Union" and it's new combined military. Then this sociopath Milesovich surfaced in Yugoslavia and all we started to hear was "When are the Americans going to do something about him"??
                        Bill Shuey

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Haven't you heard, blaming the US has long since replaced "the devil made me do it" as the number one cop out heard around the world.
WmB

WmB wrote:
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It's being honed down to Ted Haggard and also anyone tied in with Opus Dei!
Richard.

wrote in message
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I'm not blaming the USA as a whole. What I'm saying is that there were two powerful corporate lobbies in the US (J.S. McDonnell and General Dynamics) who were more interested in winning large overseas contracts than in disseminating accurate information to potential buyers. The US taxpayer was just as much a victim of false information supplied by certain defence contractors as UK taxpayers were.
(kim)

kim wrote:
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Probably right but isn't that what most corporations do? I'm darn sure that BAe has never been completely forthcoming when one of their projects comes a-cropper.
Speaking of the thread title, has anyone her tried making an F-111K?
Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

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there is a yahoo group which does this kind of thing that you may enjoy looking at.
http://groups.msn.com/thewhatifandoddballmodelpage
its a uk group but does that realy matter, we all have the modeling bug or we would not be here.
Gondor

Gondor wrote:
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The language barrier could be sticky but I always understand Jules on the phone. ;)
Bill Banaszak, MFE Sr.

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During the time period being referred to, France did not have an 'advanced' aerospace industry, that came later. Besides which France was not a full member of NATO. The Luftwaffe was interested in buying TSR.2 to replace the F-104G and had they done so it is likely many other NATO air forces would have done the same.
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If you examine the records you will that the previous Conservative government had already cancelled many projects and was considering cancelling TSR.2 before the general election which brought the Labour Party into office. The aerospace trade unions who were overwhelmingly socialist marched in support of keeping the project going.
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The order for the bastardised Phantom was placed only after an order for the F-111K was abandoned. The latter was only abandoned becuase of rising costs and delays. Had the UK proceeded with the F-111 order in the same way as Australia did it would eventually have been delivered ten years late and ten times over budget. It was exaggerated claims by J.S. McDonnell for the radar capabilities of the Phantom which persuaded the Conservative UK government to abandon all development of Britain's own fighter-interceptor aircraft as far back as 1962.
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When the U2 was shot down over Russia the USAF was forced to buy the Canberra from Britain in order to fill a gap in its reconnaissance requirements, albeit disguised as the "Martin RB-57". The US Marines were forced to buy Britsh developed Harrier fighters for close support as there was no US plane suitable for the role. During Gulf War 1 the allies had to rely on RAF Tornado bombers to carry out low level strikes on AAA sites as there was no US design suitable for the job and if Britain had proceeded with the TSR.2 project the USAF would eventually have bough that too for the same reasons it earlier bought the Canberra.
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I specically used the phrase "defend itself". Serbia was no threat to UK, european or US interests and anyone who's studied the sad history of Yugoslavia will tell you that intervention by foreign nations has seldom been good for the people who live there. Just for the record it was United Nations forces under Boutros Boutros Galli who first intervened in the civil war in Bosnia not the European Union.
(kim)

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Utter BS. The B-57 was purchased as a replacement for the Douglas B-26 as a light bomber in competition with the Martin XB-51, North American B-45 Tornado, North American AJ-1 Savage, and Avro-Canada CF 100. Its development for the reconnaissance role was an afterthought, not the primary reason for its procurement by the USAF.