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Yes - especially as I get the impression Sea Dart ended up much more capable than was originally expected due to the success of ramjet technology and the booster - hence that variant crowding out other options that had been expected (possibly even dominant ones at the outset) and perhaps had driven the design of other parts of the system, e.g. 909s and as you say, ADAWS. After-all the same thing happened with Tartar/Terrier in effect crowding out Talos as they proved able to become much better.It is easy to be critical, but the pace of technology was so incredible it was very difficult to "pick a winner", and also very easy to think the numbers (speed/altitude/size) would keep increasing at the rate they were. It is interesting that now, the systems are about the same as nominal 1960s systems in raw parameters, but vastly more capable (a) reliability, and (b) integration of information. A T45 is so much more of an AAW asset than a T42 or T82 in capability that it does actually cover the hull numbers (in a very niche sense). Of course the threat is the same - similar nominal performance but reliable and integrated, except for example the hypersonics stuff where I suspect they are still a bit more like the 60s/70s weapons.
Yes - especially as I get the impression Sea Dart ended up much more capable than was originally expected due to the success of ramjet technology and the booster - hence that variant crowding out other options that had been expected (possibly even dominant ones at the outset) and perhaps had driven the design of other parts of the system, e.g. 909s and as you say, ADAWS. After-all the same thing happened with Tartar/Terrier in effect crowding out Talos as they proved able to become much better.
It is easy to be critical, but the pace of technology was so incredible it was very difficult to "pick a winner", and also very easy to think the numbers (speed/altitude/size) would keep increasing at the rate they were. It is interesting that now, the systems are about the same as nominal 1960s systems in raw parameters, but vastly more capable (a) reliability, and (b) integration of information. A T45 is so much more of an AAW asset than a T42 or T82 in capability that it does actually cover the hull numbers (in a very niche sense). Of course the threat is the same - similar nominal performance but reliable and integrated, except for example the hypersonics stuff where I suspect they are still a bit more like the 60s/70s weapons.
