americas allies are buying americas product. shocker atleast lockheed doesnt have an extensive history of bribery scandals oh wait https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals
yes lockheed was the one responsible for the all-in-one requirements that you reference so frequently - blame DoD or DARPA also as mentioned earlier america's allies are also buying our f-16s which we would not sell if it gave them air superiority third, sorry the a-10 is being phased out. this is how military technology works. perfectly good aircraft are retired.
F-16, A-10, or F-35, it doesn't matter. All that matters is how it does against 5 guys who were farmers one week ago in a rusty pickup truck.
F-35 Information While researching exactly what the F-35 was, what benefits it brought and what features it had, i found a lack of informative and sourced descriptions available to read, this is my compendium of information i have found and compiled to give an accurate picture, everything i state is either directly sourced or within the sources listed. There is often competing information for certain aspects, I give weight to what pilots state is important and those who have relevant backgrounds or good information, i do not give credit to people who do not have the relevant backgrounds and either lack sources or misuse facts as well as those who use emotive language(usually a recourse to lacking knowledge on the subject), i would advise you to do the same. If a link is no longer working it may still be accessible through http://archive.org/ For a general overview of Air Power and journalism read this, for understanding stealth try this and for past & present aerial warfare review this report. For some of these videos, pay attention to the actual system demonstrations, ignore the narration/fancy graphics unless you want a laugh. https://comprehensiveinformation.wordpress.com/2014/08/21/f-35-information-2/ The link above has a lot of cited information on the F-35
Some Juggsian research tells me the US has about 180 F22s. How many F35s do we plan to have? Also really enjoyed both sides of this thread. Damn informative.
I'd like to point out that everything referenced is unclassified (or god damn well better be) so likely we're not getting the full story on either side. And 180 F22s is more than we'd ever need to win air superiority against anyone but Russia or China.
The only reason the A-10 is being phased out is because there's no more money to be made from it and there's no air force officer trying to make a career based on it. When my dad was in pilot training in the early 1980s, they tried to steer everyone away from the A-10 because it was being retired soon. he ended up retiring well before the A-10. Not enough friends in congress.
F22s also increase the advantage other weaponry in the field have bc of what they can see and hit. 4 F22s could clear out 20 of anything else prett quickly.
Drones are completely useless when access is denied. F-35 program may be one of the biggest fuck ups of all time.
Also it's only made to do one thing: murder the ever loving shit out of any fighter it comes up against. And in the last 25 years we've shot down a total of ~50 aircraft, 40+ of which were in Gulf War I. The 35 was pitched to do a whole bunch of shit.
82 page report released today detailing the latest problems with this thing http://www.dote.osd.mil/pub/reports/FY2015/pdf/dod/2015f35jsf.pdf
Wish we had a hair under 400 22s. That way we can maintain air supremacy around the clock over an area if we want to clear the road for 35s, or flying Arsenal ships like the 52h or even the 747s they pack full of tomahawks. The Raptor can also report back where the s-400 system is and allow us to blow the ever living shit out of it
Just so everyone understands, the 22s were cancelled because they are 5th generation dog fighters and no other country is even attempting to create an equivalent at this time so it would be silly to continue producing them. We are trying to move forward with multi purpose aircraft capable of efficiently performing the missions we're actually doing right now.
The 35 gets a lot of heat justifiable but the LCS that the navy rolled out is an equal boon doggle. Our blue water stuff is amazing but our brown water strategy is shit and our insistence on gigantic carriers doesn't fit what they'd be needed for in the Middle East or China. I still think clouds of speed boats with 2 missels on it could take out our carriers in a brown water setting
I think if they manage to get 35 program under control it will eventually be the future of fighters for next couple decades. But the LCSs are an example of bureaucratic disaster.
so instead of staying a step ahead on the the by far most important part of air warfare we chose to spend a trillion dollars on an absolute trashcan of a multirole fighter
Not sure how you determined that air-to-air engagement is by far the the most important part of air warfare now of days. Top Gun was a pretty cool movie but besides that...Pretty sure the opposite is true. The 22 is actually the more expensive aircraft once we get past development costs. You want to "stay a step ahead" by just continuing to produce an aircraft that won't ever be effectively utilized? The idea is to trust our intelligence when it tells us no foreign country is even in the realm of matching our 5th generation dog fighters so let's concentrate on putting out useful aircraft. There's been a lot of mistakes along the way but the 35s are eventually going to be integrated and become a staple the navy and Air Force.
"putting out useful aircraft" 15+ years behind schedule and billions off of budget and STILL NOT WORKING FOR ANY OF ITS INTENDED USES. Use an expensive airplane to gain air supremacy and then use cheap airplanes to blow ground forces to bits. its a simple and time tested strategy that works. instead we have an insanely over the top expensive plane that 1. can't gain air superiority 2. cant provide CAS nearly as well as A-10s or AC-130s 3. can't work on carriers as well as existing F-18s 4. Doesn't work when it rains 5. is 15 years out of date in terms of software and avionics. it's a fucking trash plane and the single worst weapons system boondoggle in history.
Again the devepment has been incredibly shitty, but everyone understands that air warfare is moving past a dog fighter like the 22 towards a multi purpose fighter. All of our threat countries place an emphasis on SAMs now as opposed to fighters. So we're in a situation now where we can roll with the 35 or just completely start from scratch with a new multi purpose fighter. It's really not as bad as your hysterical opinions on the 35.
The 22 isnt a dogfighter. It's an insane bvr missile platform that can dogfight when it needs to. The 35 is fucking trash by every single metric that we have to measure the performance of an airplane.
i mean tom cruises's tomcat in the 80s was a bvr platform that was designed for dog fights. The navy moved towards the hornet for a reason.
Russia and China absolutely have 5th gen fighters. I believe China's just left testing and entered production. Gaining and maintaining air superiority is absolutely the #1 priority in any engagement. America's air superiority is the reason we can continue to operate B-52s, A-10s, C-130s and the like.
Well, an aircraft carrier doesn't float up rivers so while you're right, that comment doesn't make any sense.
The j-20 and Pak Fa are pretty clear multi fighters. The 22 won't really have an equivalent its entire generation.
because it was cheap and effective and had avionics that were 15 years ahead of the tomcat and could also help replace the fleet of aging A-6s. unlike the f35, which is insanely expensive, totally unreliable, and has avionics and software that have become completely out of date during the extra decade of development it's sustained, can't adequately replace the a-10, AC-130, F-22 or F-18. also >70s fighter >bvr missile platform. top kek
Russia's isn't much better. They are supposed to start production this year, but now only plan to make a dozen planes. India reportedly wants out of the program, which would kill it. Indian pilots keeps leaking all the technical problems, while Russia pretends everything is fine.
That's assuming the carrier is out there by itself (it isn't) and that a speedboat can get out that far (it can't). That was the theory behind "torpedo boats" back in the day; they'd sprint out, launch a torpedo at a battleship, and run like hell. That's where Destroyers first came about; to protect the battleships and kill the torp boats.
The Persian Gulf isn't Brown water. Brown Water is rivers. Like speed boats in Vietnam. Carriers don't go there.
While LCS has been a shit show, one of it's primary roles is to defeat swarm attacks. NAVSEA and DOT&E are publicly fighting over a recent sim to test just that. http://breakingdefense.com/2016/02/pentagon-tester-to-navy-lcs-test-was-plenty-fair/
1) Why can't it gain air superiority? 2) A10 can't perform any cas in a contested environment so unless you want the military to not plan for future wars that makes no sense. 3) It will work fine on carriers. 4) It works fine in the rain 5) Has the most advanced software and avionics of any fighter in the world so that's just plain wrong. The 22 has a bad software problem and uses proprietary hardware and software which makes it very hard to upgrade compared to the 35. It still has to use the older AMRAAM and sidewinder variants due to the difficulty in upgrading it to use the new -9x and -120c7(D)
1. because its extremely heavy, very slow and routinely loses simulated dogfights to F-16s. 2. you use F-22s to gain air superiority, then cheap planes like the a-10/ac-130 to run CAS instead of using insanely expensive fighter-bombers that can't loiter or deliver munitions as accurately. 3. "will". just like it was supposed to be ready 15 years ago? The stealth skin can't be repaired at sea. The slightest tear or scratch means the entire plane has to go back to marietta for repair. 4. No it doesnt. 5. it did 15 years ago, not today. http://www.thedailybeast.com/articl...ealth-fighter-10-years-behind-older-jets.html
We were talking about air superiority, not dogfighting. You are aware that dogfighting isn't really a thing and only something we train to improve fractionally on the margin right? The Iraqi air force had Mig-29's in the first gulf war, something that was very much on par with American fighters (-16 -15 -18) that were it's contemporaries. That didn't work out so well for them. Air combat is about information advantage, specifically what the f-35 is designed to dominate, both denying it's adversaries information about it's presence and maximizing it's own pilot's SA. The person who gains it wins almost every time, even if their plane turns slightly slower or has slightly less power or whatever. There hasn't been a dogfight since the Iran-Iraq war. I'm aware of one test of the F-35 flight control laws that it was at an energy disadvantage against an F-16, which an F-18 also would have been. If it "routinely loses simulated dogfights to F-16's" can you please link me to some of the others? Google "IADS, S-300, S-400". I'm sure wikipedia can help you understand what a modern battlespace will look like. Air superiority will not enable the use of A-10's or C-130's. The stealth skin is much more resillient than the old stuff used on the B-2 and F-22. It's now baked into/onto the airframe. I don't think the people who have tested them aboard ship have seen much trouble with damaging the coatings. I think it was restricted from flying into rain due to the inert gas generators, that fill the fuel tanks with inert gas, to prevent fire, not being certified yet. I know they have hit them with simulated lightening hundreds of times without mishap. https://www.flightglobal.com/news/a...ls-advanced-eots-targeting-sensor-for-416631/