The Art of War/Rev L

The Swedes have their shit together regarding weapon systems design using modularity as key to keep said systems current at minimal cost. Combine this aproach with in-depth thinking of what a platform should be vis a vis a country's specific military needs and one comes up with the updated Gripen E that's efficient and affordable to the max.

For a country with a population of just over 10 million people, it’s impressive that Sweden is able to maintain an indigenous fighter aircraft program that is first and foremost designed to meet a domestic need. The Saab Gripen is a small and versatile fighter that meets a very specific Swedish requirement, but its mantra of being “affordable” doesn’t mean it compromises on lethality. In fact, the latest Gripen E variant includes features that could help to inspire others’ future fighter plans.

The first serial production standard Gripen E (6002) first flew in November 2019.

It gets better.

It is the Gripen E’s avionics architecture that is particularly noteworthy. Saab claims that its design is nothing short of revolutionary. It is configured to enable the rapid insertion of new hardware and updated software applications to embrace new missions. This is an area in which Saab says it has invested enormously in developing. The computers themselves can be swapped out quickly to allow constant increases in processing power. It also means that customers can design and develop their own software, enabling the rapid introduction of new technologies and systems to deal with ever-evolving threats without hardware impeding progress. 

Saab says it is actively working towards avionics and mission systems that are adaptable on the battlefield so that an operator can fight ‘day one’ of a conflict, learn, and then adapt by adding new or adapting existing software applications to give a combat advantage for ‘day two.’ It’s the kind of agile avionics performance that is being mandated for U.S. manufacturers as the military seeks to field smaller fleets of “Digital” fighter aircraft far more swiftly and apply new capabilities to new and existing types extremely fast, with software updates even potentially occurring while the aircraft is in flight.

The Art of War applies.

John R. Boyd would appreciate this smart approach without question. Read the detailed The Drive piece to see why the Swedes definitely know the drill in developing lethal tech at reasonable cost.