Future of Saudi F-15C/Ds?

isayyo2

isayyo2

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Saudi Arabias 83 F-15C/Ds have gotten little love these past two decades; the more recent F-15SA order and modernization of the existing F-15S fleet makes this more apparent. Thats not to say they haven't been active, as seen with exercises in Egypt, USAF, and defending their own nation from drones. But what lies in their future? Modernization in-country would be possible as seen with Alsalam Aerospace in their SA remanufacture under license with Boeing. I'd hazard a guess that their F-15Cs are nowhere near beat up as their American counterparts, there are similar parallels with Japan's F-15JSI program on existing airframes. Alternatively, the Kingdom could just purchase more Typhoons to replace the single pilot airframes and then sell off their Eagles to friendly nation as Malaysia was interested in at one point. Or most likely, they'll keep spending money on shiny things and let good airframe rot away in the desert as they did with their F-5 fleet haha Oh well.

Any insight would be appreciated, info is scant to come by!
 
Back in March 2018 Saudi Arabia signed a letter of intent for 48 EF-2000, but no confirmation so far. This country has struggled with economy in the last few years due to cost of war in Yemen and low oil prices.

As you say, a massive contract was signed in october 2010 to upgrade F-15S and buy 84 F-15SA.

Saudi Arabia – F-15SA Aircraft | Defense Security Cooperation Agency

www.dsca.mil www.dsca.mil

And yes, there is little information. After Gulf War Saudi Arabia decided to focus on F-15S because of the low ground strike capability of F-15C/D.
 
The Boeing Co., Defense, Space & Security, St. Louis, Missouri, has been awarded a $9,800,000,000 indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for F-15 support for Saudi Arabia. This contract provides for modernization and sustainment of the F-15 Saudi fleet to include such efforts as hardware, software, and interface design, development, integration, test, subsystem and structural component production and installation of future modifications and enhancements to the F-15 Saudi weapon system as well as product support. Work will be performed in St. Louis and as separately specified in individual task and delivery orders and is expected to be completed by November 2025. The ordering period for this contract is five years from the date of contract award plus an option for an additional five year ordering period. This contract involves Foreign Military Sales (FMS) to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and is the result of a sole-source acquisition. Initial delivery order FA8634-21-F-0015 will be awarded concurrently in the amount of $1,032,649 using FMS modification and development type 4F funds. The F‐15 Division Contracts Branch, Wright Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, is the contracting activity (FA8634‐21‐D‐2703). https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Contracts/Contract/Article/2411921/
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Doesn't say which variant is being sustained, just "fleet". Still, it's quite an impressive number for Boeing.
 
A little off topic.
F-15SA empty weight is listed as 17,010 kg, while F-15E weighs 14,300 kg.
Why such a massive increase? (I thought the only change was addition of CFT)
 
I don't have my books here so no cross checking for me. But make sure you are referring to the E model and not lighter ones.
 
Crap ! With so many drone kills, is the RSAF a) the air force with most drone kills in history and b) the air force with the most A2A kills since Korea ?

We are really living in strange times... !
 
Archibald said:
Crap ! With so many drone kills, is the RSAF a) the air force with most drone kills in history and b) the air force with the most A2A kills since Korea ?

We are really living in strange times... !
Click to expand...
It is interesting to think for future conflicts what type of "kills" will help with Ace progression? How many thousand pounds does a drone need to weigh to be considered a worthy aerial adversary?
 
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Any hits should be considered. Think at the difficulty to line up for a gun kill or the odds to hit a small agile quadcopter with a missile.
There is a lot of work involved there. But to not distract pilot attention from tactical goals, maybe there is a need to open a new category that would segregate what's useful and not.
Think also that tomorrow Directed energy weapons would probably shot down smaller drones automatically once the sweep area buttons has been pressed
 
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isayyo2 said:
It is interesting to think for future conflicts what type of "kills" will help with Ace progression? How many thousand pounds does a drone need to weigh to be considered a worthy aerial adversary?
Click to expand...
Well, V-1s counted as kills, so there's historical precedent for anything over 2000kg counting.

I'd definitely be willing to count 1000kgs and up, which includes things like Tomahawks and ALCMs in the ~3500lb/1500kg class and Predator drones in the 1000kg class.

Sahed 136s are 400kg. I'm not sure if they're counting those or not.
 

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