The Indians modified the Jaguar nose (but only on a small batch) to fit a radar, but it was just an Agave for anti-shipping strike. AFAIK nobody's tried to fit anything bigger, though it's been reported the Indian Jaguar IMs have had the Agave replaced by something newer from Elta.
Nothing imaginary, the Jaguar M flew in 1969 and Jaguars equiped with Agave radar are still flying with the Indian Airforce today. I would hazzard that a number of other radars avaialable in the 60s and 70s could have been comparatively easily integrated with the Jaguar. Ferranti Airpass comes to mind, Blue Fox, (with later retrofit of Blue Vixen), APG-65 was fitted to the AV-8B+ and APG-66 to Skyhawks and Hawk 200s, NASARR R-21G/H as used on the F-104S; all could have been fitted to the Jaguar.
30,000 would seem light, though DK Brown mentions 1953 discussions of a cheap 20,000 carrier, but studies showed it was difficult to get below 24,000 tonnes. A 28,000 tonnes ship similar in size to Hermes was proposed but judged a bit too small before a larger 35,000 tonne ship was looked at in 1956, carrying 12 Scimitars, 12 Vixens, 8 Gannets and 9 Buccaneers. The ships then seem to evolve upwards in tonnage. bearing in mind the Arks airgroup was 12 Phantoms and 14 buccaneers, you might be able to squeeze that number on a very basic 30,000 plus ship, depends how bog standard you go.
Which all seems rather to give the game away when the RN was claiming we need 65,000t carriers to have an effective air group of 36-40. It is such a pity no Politicain was clever enough to look up on Wiki the air groups of the CDG or last conventional one for Hermes; they might then have told them to go back and think again at 45,000t.
Oddly, operators of both arrived at figures of 65-70Kt for their replacements.
The French have already concluded CDG is not big enough, hence PA2 is a completely new and larger design notably different from either QE & CDG.
Hardly surpising, if you ask a child how much cake it wants it's likely not to be small. The issue is how much is needed and can be afforded.
Even to the point that the child gets no cake? Because that's what happened when the French turned down a second CDG on the basis that it was too small, oddly the design they tried to replace it with would be been larger and cheaper. Interestingly the design that they want for PA2 now is both larger and more expensive.
Do you have any sources about the Jaguar's TO/Landing speeds? I find it surprising that it would be rated worse than Phantoms, which when loaded had the reputation of ground lovers. I'd have thought that with all the wing lift devices the Jag would be better than the Phantom.
Actually I think 30,000t would be to small with cat & traps, how Hermes operated Vixen/Buccs has always amazed me. I actually think Harriers on invincibles/or Centaur class ships would be more effective than F4 on a single Ark to operate in the South Atlantic. The area of superiority of the Ark/F4 is access to AEW & Sparrows, both of which could have been overcome (as they later were). Even the basic FRS1 capability could have been achieved in time to replace the Sea Vixen by 1972-74, if the RAF could get the GR1 in by 1969, saving on the F4 and the need to build 3 Invincibles so close together (the mistake we have paid a very heavy price for with CVF). Additionally it would have been a boost for the UK industry rather than the kick it got from the F4.
You appear to be agreeing with something I have not said.
I was agreeing with your statement about ending up with no cake at all.
No they are very definitely size issues as well, you cannot get a 40 strong airgroup on that hull now that they have moved over to Rafales, there are reasons that the proposed PA2 is 20k tonnes bigger and has the same (mythical) size airgroup as the CdG.
By basic FRS1, I assume you mean no Blue Fox? There isnt much definitive info about that sets history online other than it was a requirement set out in 1975, and trialled in Hunters in 1977 derived from the seaspray . I understand the Pegasus 104 took a while to develop as well. There seems little scope to turbo charge the Shars development bearing in mind it relied on modest development of existing programmes.
Charles de Gaulle full load 42000 tons, according to the MN website. 45000 is 7% more than 42000.
CDG is 37k-42k which is roughly 20% on 45k-50k?
They didn't start the FRS1 until the RAF had GR1 in service, had they started earlier it is probable the Harrier in RN service would likely have had a different radar weapons combination.
Saying FRS1 would likely have a different radar and weapons combo is one thing, but to seriously make the point that Sea Harrier was viable in that period, you need to be able to suggest one that would be suitable. Nothing used in our current fighter would do eg Lightning, Sea Vixen. The US sets were designed for far bigger airframes and the one for the F16 was also into service at the end of the seventies. The RN therefore only had an option to keep the Phantom going , that is as long as it wanted a radar equipped fighter.
I just don't know how you can continue to defend a position against logic and in the back drop of a £10bn bill for 2 carriers we face, which should have cost c£4bn?. You ignore all the other points about budgets/risk mitigation.