LOL, how's the Kool-Aid?



 

What has led you to believe this? I certainly don't think it's true.

The reason why I say the F-35B model has the potential to be the biggest game-changer is because it doesn't need a CVN or airfield in Saudi Arabia to launch from or recover to.

Not only can it launch and recover from an LHA or LHD, but it can do it from other smaller vessels as well.

Imagine deploying an aircraft that has LO, Information gathering capabilities more like an AWACS, who knows what kind of ECM, can fly faster with a combat load than any of the teen fighters, has awesome loitering time, and can netlink with other aircraft, ships, and soldiers on the ground while sharing that information with them.

For example, I suspect taking down Iran becomes a possibility if they violate the nuclear non-proliferation agreement and whoever the POTUS is decides to use military force, in conjunction with Gulf partners.

On a much smaller level, a limited conflict in Africa with regional terrorist factions could be dealt with in a totally different manner that we would today with a small multi-service CJSOTF with F-35's in support as command and control birds, with CAS and aerial reconnaissance as secondary missions on-call without needing totally different planes.

That makes the logistics footprint and Theater Commander response times much quicker, since nobody needs to wait for a CVN to arrive.

The other thing is that many F-35's don't need to fly in the "front wave" or forward trace in a conventional setting.

With Gen 4 + aircraft equipped with Link-16, and all the other Link-16 equipped assets in theater, you can basically roll into anyone's integrated air defense network and erase their CAP and SAM defenses like it was fun.



I think a lot of us have been pigeon-holing into the framework of a lone F-35 up there fighting against Su-30's with AESA radar and Russian advertised A2A capabilities on a Top Gun movie set, which was already total BS for the mid-1980's.

Even if we just leverage the reality that the F-35 might be held in a C3 role behind a pack of Raptors and F-15's, everything changes.

For one, if we chose to fly the F-22 in the old framework of A2A, which most people are clueless about BTW, it is still without equal.

Heck, even a 1990's-era F-15C squadron would spank the living dog crap out of pilots equipped with the latest Su-27's and Su-30's for a number of reasons, the main ones being training and logistics, followed by proven missile systems and other aspects of air dominance that the layman doesn't know about.

The F-22 capabilities alone are enough to give Raptor pilots such an overmatch, that career fighter weapons pilots (who have been flying teen fighters longer than new Raptor pilots have been living) are getting spanked by the noobs over and over, even to the extent that one of the most experienced & cross-trained USMC fighter pilots took 6 months to re-learn how to conduct aerial warfare with the F-22, and that was with him flying F-22's vs. F-22's.  That should send shivers down the spine of every pilot in Russia, China, and Iran.

With just the F-22 by itself, you could realistically erase any of the largest air forces in the world in a campaign measured in hours.  Even if you limited the F-22 to a 4th Gen fighter, it exceeds the operational speed, maneuverability, and lethality of any other fighter aircraft hands-down.  The F-22 represented the first operational 5th Generation Fighter, call it Gen 5.1

Now team it up with a Gen 5.N with the F-35, and something synergistic happens.  Throw in some other programs that have been kept deep under wraps, and consider the net-centric capabilities of leveraging UAV's, and I think the swiftness by which we could abuse any of the biggest militaries in the world would be shocking.  The political implications are huge, and could really get to the head of someone who does not keep the love of power in check.

Since Russia is technologically playing catch-up, that does not bode well for any of her customers, especially as the Su-30 uncommanded self-ejection plagues the foreign buyers in China, India, Vietnam, and Malaysia.

No, he talks about what this plane and the F22 do right now.  Did you not hear him talking about how he, a TOPGUN instructor pilot --the best of the best at killing aircraft -- with thousands of hours, got beat, and beat, and beat again by 200 hour pilots who understood how to fight the fifth generation air war?  Watch the whole video.  

And I don't believe that China or Russia are building the network centric warfare capabilities we are.

I never said that losing the war was a military failure, the failure just makes the military irrelevant.



 

If it's VTOLing, it's not having an awesome loiter time.


As to the rest, we'll see how accurate the brochures are.

Look at the history of almost any major aircraft project in the last few decades... they ALL had/have problems, and many have gone well over their expected costs. And yet we keep cranking out awesome machines like the F-15, F-16, F-18, F-22, etc.





The F-35 is just having fairly typical growing pains, and it's also extremely complex. There's a lot more to think about in terms of development and integration than there were in the 70s.





I think the 35 is going to be an amazing aircraft that does its job very, very well.



ETA: Didn't realize there were 4 pages already with people a lot smarter than me posting. Nevermind





 

Thus Japan's interest in an export version that lacked the LO and an exportable avionics suite.

Network you say,  

With the number you quoted above for the F-35 cost, it's still cheaper than many airliners. The most advanced aircraft in the world is cheaper than a bus in the sky. Most of the R&D costs have been spent....

Even something as relatively simple as the M1 Abrams had numerous problems when it came out.



They were fixed.



Hell, the even simpler AR had problems that were rectified.



 

I can control my house thermostat, security cameras, and music on both my car and my living room with my phone while buying plane tickets and checking my email.  With a couple of extra software programs I can use my phone to remote access my home PC from just about anywhere.  Connectivity and interoperability is already here.  Applying it to military applications is just the next obvious step.  The difference is that we are making the pitch that no one else will have these capabilities and that because of that we dont need the historically proven physical capabilities necessary to win in a peer to peer fight. We have thrown every available dollar and then some into developing the F35.  So much so that there is no extra money for a backup plan if the F35 suddenly becomes outclassed or irrelevant.

I did, it was a good video.  Just pointing out that the F35 has already failed or missed almost all of its initial promises.  Russia doesnt have the capability to have network centric warfare.  Im pretty sure they just recently started producing basic computer hardware so they are pretty far behind the curve.  However I think it would be naive to assume that china isnt.  They have already stolen the plans to the F35 and started implementing them in their own designs.  Networks are the future and one of the worlds largest economies combined with the worlds largest labor/talent pool will certainly be developing network centric systems.

So what you are saying is that there are no guarantees in this world? OK.

Pretty sure there is no way the F-35 is in danger of being "suddenly" outclassed or irrelevant.

Those old F-15s , F-16s, F-18s won't fly forever and historically the US taxpayer get a much better ROI on military tech than any of our potential adversaries.

No there are no guarantees, but to think that we are the only ones to be focusing on network connectivity is stupid.  The F35 has fantastic capability but its physical limitations are defined by a naive and stupid demand for a VTOL system based around an event that happened in WW2.  The older air frames wont be around forever but we have put all of our eggs in one basket under the assumption that we will be the only kids on the block with the golden gun of networking.  Its a foolish assumption and we shouldnt limit an aircraft's potential based off of one services ridiculous demands for flying without a runway. The insistence of the F35s designers is that networking will protect if from everything else.  So much so that it doesnt need to be able to out shoot out turn or out run any physical competition. If it loses that single networking capability it becomes a multi billion dollar target that cant run, turn, or shoot.

What, precisely, has the F35 "failed"?  I'm curious, because aside from being late and costing money (which every program is and does), all three variants are flyin and on track for IOC.

Again, you're not paying attention, and you need to go back and watch the video again.

It can turn, fly, shoot, and matches up well to 4th gen fighters in that regard. It's not an f22, but it was never meant to be and doesn't need to be.

Its initial fielding and virtually all of its initial cost estimates.  On top of that its created such a problem in the airforce that generals are getting "retired" for telling subordinates that its treason to talk negatively about the program.  1 Trillion dollars is FAR beyond the scope of any other military program in history and so far we dont have much to show for it. When this many people deeply involved in the program have problems with it, its time to admit we have made mistakes and correct them.

No its a 5th generation fighter that wont be able to hold its own against enemy 5th generation fighters unless everything in its network is working perfectly. Its functionality and usefulness requires that it be connected to everything else on the battlefield.  Take that connection away or degrade it and its either a sitting duck or a useless asset.  One LTC talking about its amazing capabilities is not anywhere near enough to ease the tensions caused by this program within its own community.  When airforce generals are getting retired because they are trying to quell dissent within their own ranks over a program we need to take a harder look at the program.  Sorry it im not going to blindly believe industry insiders with a trillion dollar contract on the line.

There are two fifth gen fighters in existence. The F22 and the F35.

If your only problem with it is cost and delivery date, you haven't paid attention to every other weapon development program since the 1940s.

If you think thats my only problem with it you havent read the last 4 pages.  My entire argument is that the F35 has amazing potential but we are limiting it based off the marines historical fear of not having a CAS platform that requires runways.  VTOL is a waste of time and effort and the compromises necessary to make it happen hamstring just about every other asset necessary in an aircraft that does anything more than beach head CAS.

And that, folks, is why ARFcom GD was created. To get the truth out.

Seriously you are in the same boat as all of us and are going to have to wait a while until the real story plays out.

I, for one, hope we get that for which we have paid (borrowed).

Yet.  The F35 isnt operational and the F22 had most of its orders canceled (admittedly because it was so awesome that it didnt need as many, but it isnt a strike aircraft.  Its only designed for a certain role)

I would just like to take a moment and rewind to the early 2000s when the media stories were all in agreement that the F-22 was too overweight and underpowered to hang with the F-15C.

The F-35 is going to be operational before the end of the year.

Yup, not joking.

ETA:
I should add the caveat that positive stories about the performance of the aircraft were dismissed as "he's a company test pilot, of course he's going to say that", and so forth.

We hope. From everything put out it still has a LOT of kinks to work out.

Oh no, the USMC is going to declare IOC, come hell or high water.  There are no standards for how we define IOC and they've already got them on the Wasp, so short of crashing all six or catching them on fire, they will declare IOC.  Look at what bullshit they pulled with the MV-22, falsifying maintenance records and the whole nine yards.  The -35 will be no different.

I have very little doubt that this is what will happen.  The actual results and capabilities of the F35 wont truly be shown until it is actually expected to perform.  We just have to hope that when that happens, its competitor isnt able to beat it.

VTOL doesn't hamstring the a and c models at all, and the b model is far more capable than the harrier it replaces. You're simply too deep into your biases to listen to a guy who actually flies the aircraft.

Arfcom gd would have said that about the f15 and f16 if it had been around in the 70s too.

What competitor?

Correct me if Im wrong, but wasnt much of the system (all three of them) built around the engine? The VTOL Concept is one that has never truly been needed and never actually been used.  The fact that much of the aircraft is built around it propulsion system means that all models had to make compromises in order for one model to have its "special" capability.

We've already developed it.  It makes no sense at this point to cancel any of the models.  Plus, the STOVL gives us a capability to have a top tier fighter off of a very short deck, a capability we haven't had since we were flying F4U's off of escort carriers.  

 

Yes you are wrong.

Feel better???

And gives that capability to a bunch of our allies that can't afford CATOBAR carriers: UK, Italy, and possibly Spain, Australia, Turkey, and Japan.

China.  You know, the ones that stole a significant portion of the design plans?  The worlds fastest growing economy? That one?  Russia will spend itself to death long before its anything more than a regional threat.  China however has almost limitless capabilities, a massive manufacturing base, and the worlds largest population/ labor force.  Considering they seem to be basing most of their militar7 capabilities off of countering ours, and stealing our technology every chance they get, we should be concerned.

Well Id love it if you backed it up with something.  No your right, I should simply agree that Im wrong and just move on.  

ETA
-If you can actually give me something Id appreciate it.  Most of what I have read is telling me that much of the system is designed around the engine and the marines ridiculous insistence on an STOVL capability.  If you can actually give me something to counter that Id like it.  

I'm going to do ARFCOM a favor and stay out of this one.
You are welcome.

We have developed it compromising much of the aircrafts capabilities in the process.  And we made those compromises based off a capability that we have never truly needed or used. Our military might is based off of carrier groups that will likely not be rivaled in any of our lifetimes. Letting the marines have "carriers" so that they can act as some tiny independent fighting force outside of the joint environment is stupid.

F35 fanboys. Answer me this.  If this thing is so amazing, why is there so much pushback from the airforce and aeronautical industry? If its so amazing, why is almost everyone not involved with its acquisition saying that it isnt?

China is building up their military, but where things stand today, they'd get crushed by us. I strongly suspect Japan alone would stomp them. Hell, even Taiwan would give them a significant fight.

When you look at what they have economically to back them, this can only last for so long.  Today isnt the problem, and its not what our military plans for.  Half of the F35 is political based off a 2/4/6 year election cycle.  Meanwhile China is developing its military capabilities based off of a 50 year plan and where they want to be in the next century

It still is, we just don't have a peer enemy with tanks anymore to expose it.





 

It might save you some embarrassment. Your call.

Everything is open source but that requires a little search.