India Just Made Its FCAS Bid Official

India Just Made Its FCAS Bid Official

When we wrote about India circling France’s orphaned fighter programme two weeks ago, the talks were informal and deniable. They are not deniable any more. India’s Defence Ministry has told parliament it has, in its own words, “initiated efforts in a...
He Got It to Base, Then Ejected

He Got It to Base, Then Ejected

The jet was already lost. The 51-year-old major flying it had seconds to decide where it would come down, and below him lay the outskirts of Szolnok, a Hungarian city of roughly 70,000 people. He did not pull the handle. Instead he stayed with the aircraft and steered...
A Drone That Carries Its Own Strike Team

A Drone That Carries Its Own Strike Team

In February we covered Turkey pairing its KAAN fighter with two ANKA III stealth drones, in Turkey Pairs the KAAN With Two Robot Wingmen. A crewed fighter commanding uncrewed ones is now a familiar idea. On 14 August, Turkish Aerospace posted flight imagery of...
The Windmill That Refused to Stall

The Windmill That Refused to Stall

There is a particular kind of genius that begins not with ambition but with fear. Juan de la Cierva was afraid of the stall — that treacherous moment when a wing, robbed of airspeed, simply stops flying and drops its pilot out of the sky. In 1919 one of his own...
A Top Airman Questions the Tejas Mk-2

A Top Airman Questions the Tejas Mk-2

India’s most ambitious home-built fighter has drawn sharp criticism from an unlikely quarter: one of the officers who helped run the air force until weeks ago. Air Marshal Nagesh Kapoor, who stepped down as the Indian Air Force’s Vice Chief less than two...