A pilots perspective on F-22 and F-35

[SUBMAN1]

Seems what I get from this video is that the F-35 is not only second best in the world the way he describes it, but its a DISTANT 2nd best! If its as cheap as they say, then its a good price performance ratio. If it starts approaching $100 mil though, ditch it for F-22's.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-xpD-2FAWA&

-S

[Max2147]

Keep in mind that's a Lockheed PR video. I'm sure Lockheed wouldn't mind the DOD buying some more F-22's, even if it's at the expense of a few F-35's.

That said, I've never been terribly impressed with the F-35. In air-to-air it's good, but nowhere near the F-22's level. It's primary mission will be ground attack, but its need to carry all its weapons internally for stealth will be a huge drawback, since it's not a very big plane. You can put stuff on the external hardpoints, but once you do that you destroy the stealth. A non-stealthy F-35 is no better than an F-16 and probably worse than an F-18 (for a strike mission).

Supposedly the big advantage of the F-35 is that it can carry out a strike mission and defend itself in air-to-air combat. But it can't do both effectively at the same time because of the lack of internal weapon storage space. If you arm it with air to air missiles for self-defense you're not going to have much room left for air to ground weapons.

The F-35 will be good at a lot of things, but except for SEAD missions it won't really be great at anything. It tries to do too many things with one airframe, and the result is a plane that's too much of a compromise on everything.

What the Air Force needs is a plane that can pack the ground attack punch of an A-10 with but be safe from SAMs. It needs a stealthy dedicated ground attack aircraft. The F-35 won't be any good for close air support, and that's a void that needs to be filled. This plane would need a big internal bomb bay to carry a lot of weapons while still being stealthy, and it would probably need to be twin engined to carry the load and be more survivable. Low speed maneuverability would be more important than outright speed, so it could even be subsonic. Forget air-to-air capability except for Sidewinders - stealth would be its main defense, and we certainly have enough fighters to give it a fighter escort. Give it all the latest and greatest in sensors, so it would have true all-weather capability. Finally, give it a nice big gun!

[Zachstar]

That's a job of a pack of drones.

The F-35 is the last. Sure there will be 1 or 2 developments here and there but the A-10 is already getting updated and I just don't see a "Stealth A-10" like thing being even halfway considered.

Oh and BTW there is not going to be any more F-22s ordered. They tried that (Stimulate the economy and buy more fighters!) Thing but people at once said it would create very few jobs as opposed to say road work or something. Regardless on one's views it is dead in the water. The whole idea of the F-22 was to pay alot up front so that you don't have to maintain a huge fleet of them later (Like the F-15s they are replacing)

[Max2147]

Of all the Air Force's missions, I think close air support is probably the least suitable to UAV's. You need somebody in the cockpit who can see and react to what's going on below him.

The A-10 is an awesome plane, but I'm not sure it can safely operate in a SAM-infested environment. Against weaker enemies it's brilliant, but I'm not sure it would be effective against a well-equipped enemy who is methodically maintaining a SAM umbrella.

Look at the 1973 Yom Kippur War for a good example of how that works. The Egyptians established a strong SAM umbrella over their ground forces, and methodically moved it forward so it would always cover the front lines. The Israelis tried to wipe out the Egyptian ground forces with close air support like they had in 1967, but they got absolutely mauled by the SAMs. The Israelis only won the war after some of Sharon's raiding parties managed to slip behind the Egyptian front lines and take out the SAM sites.