ABSTRACT
While the superpowers dominate world aerospace in terms of output and the sheer size of the amount of resources devoted to the industry, Europe continues as a significant repository both of aerospace plant and technical expertise. Furthermore, it maintains a broad thrust into virtually all aspects of the sector, ranging from GA light planes through to spacecraft and touching on all branches of commercial and military aviation in between. As intimated in the last chapter, Europe is in many respects positively strengthening its aerospace standing in relation to the USA: AI in the large jetliner arena, EFA and Tornado in advanced combat aircraft and Ariane (and its Hermes successor) in the space field are all clear testimonies to this progress. However, these ventures are international efforts in the main and rest on the resources summoned by several EEC nations operating in concert. Such programmes should not overshadow the purely (or largely) national ventures which the individual European aerospace industries persist in formulating. As a rule of thumb, each self-respecting aerospace enterprise attempts to sustain an indigenous programme and Europe abounds with such enterprises. Sweden and Switzerland contain at least one worldclass aerospace enterprise apiece whereas the major EEC economies--France, Italy, the UK and West Germany--are each capable of sustaining several major aerospace firms. Not to be outdone, Japan is developing a comprehensive aerospace capability, initially as a result of US technology transfer, but increasingly as a product of rising confidence in indigenous R&D and design experience. Conversely, the smaller AICs of Canada and Australia find themselves unable to support fully-fledged aerospace sectors; indeed, their existing industrial capabilities are appearing increasingly untenable. These contrasting cases of non-superpower AIC aerospace industries are amplified in what follows below.
