The only Air Force that seriously considered purchasing the A-10 was South Korea. For all the other AFs, it was simply too specialized an aircraft.
I believe the Jordanians came very close also to buying second-hand A-10s from the USAF, however the deal attracted intense and ultimately successful pressure from the Israel-lobby and the proposed sale was cancelled. Jordan, which has always suffered problems achieving tank-parity with Israel, regarded the A-10 as the perfect solution.
but i think they get more flight time than the Israeli air force
I
keep saying this here - yes, RSAF does achieve plenty of flying hours, the F-15 squadrons especially. But they don't do much
productive flight training for those hours. Large-scale exercises are too few and rarely of any meaningful quality. Multi-squadron operations are unheard of, as is close air support training for ground units. Yes, the RSAF does practice plenty of ACM but very little dissimilar air combat training. Lastly co-operation with other GCC air forces can only be described as woeful - but to be fair this is changing.
Israel, Egypt and Jordan certainly in my opinion, put less hours to a lot greater use and benefit.
I think the Saudis have comprehensive radar coverage over there territory...
This is true, the 'Peace Shield' system is a state-of-the-art integrated air defence system finally developed for RSAF by ThalesRaytheon Systems. The program began in 1985, with the aim of bringing all of Saudi's fixed wing interceptors, land-based air defence and AWACS into one single networked entity backed up by a very comprhensive C3I system based in Riyadh.
Large delays were experienced introducing the system and it was only partially available for the First Gulf War. This renewed the urgency to get the system fully operational and lead-contractor Boeing was repleced in 1991 by Hughes Corporation (eventually to become ThalesRaytheon Systems). It would still take however another five years to get the system fully operational by which time 5.6 Billion US$ had been spent on the system. Prof. Kenneth Pollack describes the final product as the "The most comprehensive air defence network outside of NATO".
Given the need to provide coverage across the Gulf, along the southern borders with Yemen, across the Red Sea and protect the northen borders; five Sector Operations Centres (SOC) at Dhahran, Taif, Tabuk, Khamis Mushayt and Al Kharj feed into the network data from their respective regions.
17 x AN/FPS-117 long-range, solid-state 3D radars provide the backbone of the system. Each SOC has three AN/FPS-117 available, apart from Tabuk which has five AN/FPS-117 covering the sensitive Jordanian/Israeli/Iraqi border region.
A further 28 x AN/TPS-43 3D and 35 x AN/TPS-72 mobile tactical radars are available for short-to-medium range coverage and provide data to the Patriot SAM Batteries (numbering 20 units with 160 launchers) and the I-HAWK III SAM batteries (numbering 16 batteries with 120 launchers). A further 48 Crotale SAM systems and 16 independent-mobile acquisition units provide internal coverage over the vital oil production facilities in the Eastern Province. The system is also directly links the 5-strong RSAF E-3A AWACS fleet into the network.
Peace Sheid relies on a comprhensive communications network that includes HF radios, its own mobile telephone network, microwave line-of-sight radio systems, a store-and-forward message-switched network and a Kingdom-wide fibre optic grid. Links to the Royal Saudi Land Forces and the Royal Saudi Navy are also provided for. Further integration has seen the radar systems of GCC countries like Kuwait and Bahrain added to the system.
The RSAF currently has plans to further enhance the system with possible new SAM and ground-based radar acquistions, more AWACS and a new
C4I control network. Peace Shield would likely also provide the basis for any future Saudi ABM defence system.
