Saab JAS 39 Gripen - the $5,000 Jet That Destroyed China’s Air Force in 4 Days
November 2015. Chinese pilots flying Russian Su-27 fighters took to the skies to face something strange in a joint military exercise – a bizarre, lightweight aircraft with an unconventional wing design that they had never encountered before in combat.
Over the next four days, the airplane wiped the floor with China, claiming 41 victories to just 9 losses.
The bizarre fighter that completely dominated the Chinese Air Force wasn't America's super-advanced F-35. This wasn't some Pentagon superweapon. Instead, it came from a nation that hadn't fired a shot in anger for over 200 years.
Six people – mostly conscripts with basic training – can rearm and refuel it in under ten minutes. It flies for just $5,000 per hour. Compare that to America's F-35 Lightning II that costs just a tiny bit more at $35,000 per hour.
This aircraft exists to answer an impossible question: When your worst enemy can destroy every airbase in the opening minutes of war, how do you keep fighting?
Simple: you build an airplane that can turn an entire country into a runway… and make it cheap enough that some call it an F-35-killer.
The Saab JAS 39 Gripen (IPA: [ˈɡrǐːpɛn] pronunciationⓘ; English: Griffin) is a light single-engine supersonic multirole fighter aircraft manufactured by the Swedish aerospace and defence company Saab AB. The Gripen has a delta wing and canard configuration with relaxed stability design and fly-by-wire flight controls. Later aircraft are fully NATO interoperable. As of 2020, more than 271 Gripens of all models, A–F, have been delivered.
In 1979, the Swedish government began development studies for "an aircraft for fighter, attack, and reconnaissance" (ett jakt-, attack- och spaningsflygplan, hence "JAS") to replace the Saab 35 Draken and 37 Viggen in the Swedish Air Force. A new design from Saab was selected and developed as the JAS 39. The first flight took place in 1988, with delivery of the first serial production airplane in 1993. It entered service with the Swedish Air Force in 1996. Upgraded variants, featuring more advanced avionics and adaptations for longer mission times, began entering service in 2003.
To market the aircraft internationally, Saab formed partnerships and collaborative efforts with overseas aerospace companies. On the export market, early models of the Gripen achieved moderate success, with sales to nations in Central Europe, South Africa, and Southeast Asia. Bribery was suspected in some of these procurements, but Swedish authorities closed the investigation in 2009.
A major redesign of the Gripen series, previously referred to as Gripen NG (Next Generation) or Super JAS, now designated JAS 39E/F Gripen began deliveries to the Swedish Air Force and Brazilian Air Force in 2019. Changes from the JAS C to JAS E include a larger fuselage, a more powerful engine, increased weapons payload capability, and new cockpit, avionics architecture, electronic warfare system and other improvements.
Top Photo: Saab JAS 39 Gripen at Kaivopuisto Air Show, June 201
Sources: Wikipedia; YouTube
