The Atlas Cheetah more capable then F-16's

The Cheetah programme was aimed at providing the SAAF with a new Strike fighter that would see it through to around 2000. It was based on the Mirage 3 airframe and the Atar 09K50 engine.

It has an air to air radar that exceeds the capabilities of that in the F-16 and other systems are felt on par with the systems in 1990's generation F-16's

Source: AAD 2000 by BAE systems




What do you guys think?

[edit on 2-12-2006 by Shadowraven]

Was the Cheetah based on the F-21 Kfir?.

No it's based on the Mirage 3, and it has a strong resemblance to the Israeli Kfir

The systems in any airframe will be as good as the govt is willing to pay for, however the capabilities of any 1950's airframe design are going to be severely limited by comparison with a 1970's purpose designed agile airframe like the F-16, back in the 50's when the Mirage was designed the only objective was to go very fast in a straight line. See also BAC Lightning, Lockheed F-104 and MiG 21 for similar examples.

The Cheetah was based on the Mirage-3 airframe, but it's design has beter wings, engines and canard foreplanes, It will outmaneuver a F-16 anyday

The Cheetah has an enhanced airframe alright. The drooped leading edges, sawtooth and small canards all serve to enhance its agility over the original Mirage design, I think the Cheetah is also more agile than the Kfir, taking the evolution of the airframe a stage further than IAI did, however this is still a long way short of being able to outfly an F-16.

If these mods truly resulted in a super agile fighter that can beat the F-16 then France would have adopted the Mirage IIING, which instead remained a prototype, rather than spending all that cash on the Mirage 2000 (not to mention Rafale).

[edit on 3-12-2006 by waynos]

Cheetah C (most advanced Cheetah varient) had some advanced avionics right enough, some of which were reputed to be very advanced and still classified on their retirement in 2006, particularly its helmet mounted sight/display, radar and jamming/self defence avionics, missile systems.The South African military industrial sector did an amazing job in keeping a 2nd generation fighter design competitive into the 21st century. Its various airframe developements vastly improved on the mirage 3 it was based on. It was a formidable light strike fighter. If the political system in South Africa hadn't denied them access to a more powerful engine it would have been better still. Then again if South africa had been able they'd have probably bought Mirage 2000 in the 80's/90's to replace Mirage 3, rather than completely re-work the design to keep it competitve (the airframes were practically re-built back to zero hours and airframes were illegally sourced additionally,in Israel)
However, while the Cheetah was a remarkable achievement, and more agile by far than the base Mirage 3. To suggest it could out fly a modern, unstable FBW design like the F-16 (or indeed the Mirage 2000) is a little unrealistic. That said, a Cheetah C with its advanced systems flown by a well trained pilot would have more than a fighting chance in an A2A engagement with either of these aircraft.

Originally posted by Shadowraven
The Cheetah programme was aimed at providing the SAAF with a new Strike fighter that would see it through to around 2000. It was based on the Mirage 3 airframe and the Atar 09K50 engine.

It has an air to air radar that exceeds the capabilities of that in the F-16 and other systems are felt on par with the systems in 1990's generation F-16's

Source: AAD 2000 by BAE systems




What do you guys think?

[edit on 2-12-2006 by Shadowraven]

I think the F16 is a battle proven aircraft, and that statistics on a piece of paper don't really mean much compared to real world battle experience.

I'm sure the Cheetah is as good if not better then a 1990's F16.
But we will never know which aircraft is better in combat because only the F16 has seen combat.