F-35 in new dogfight over Chinese, Russian stealth fighter advances

[Otto Harkaman]

Youtube

Pierre Sprey is an aircraft designer, defense analyst, and record producer. Working with John Boyd and Thomas P. Christie, analyst Tom Christie and test pilot Col. Everest Riccioni as well as aeronautical engineer Harry Hillaker, they formed the core of the self-dubbed "Fighter Mafia", advocating the use of Energy-Maneuverability (E-M) theory in fighter design.

His approach was to build an "honest plane"—one focused on the end product. "The whole essence of this is to judge everything by outcomes."

This group worked behind the scenes in the late 1960s to pursue a lightweight fighter as an alternative to the F-15. The group strongly believed that an ideal fighter should not include any of the sophisticated radar and missile systems or rudimentary ground-attack capability that found their way into the F-15. Their goal, based on E-M theory, was a small, low-drag, low-weight, pure fighter with no bomb racks. This led to the highly successful F-16 that Sprey greatly influenced. He also wrote the initial requirements for the A-X program that became the A-10 and optimized its safety features. The "Warthog" appears ungainly, but is "enormously difficult to shoot down", and "devastating against tanks and other armored vehicles."

He is a critic of the F-35. He asserts that despite its 200 million dollar price tag per plane, it is less agile than the F-16, and flies at altitudes and speeds too high and fast to replace the A-10. Compared to the F-16 or A-10 (in both of whose operational roles it operates) he characterized the F-35 as overweight and dangerous, stating “It’s as if Detroit suddenly put out a car with lighter fluid in the radiator and gasoline in the hydraulic brake lines: That’s how unsafe this plane is…" and "full of bugs". He asserts the plane is too heavy (nearly 30,000 pounds heavier than a fully loaded F-16). Most of all, the plane's wings are too small to give the fighter maneuverability in combat.

[Bilge_Rat]

Originally Posted by Otto Harkaman

Youtube

Sprey is a hack, people like him because he does not like the F35, but he thought the F15 was a lemon also.

http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/pie...and-1592445665

[Mr Quatro]

It's not going to get any better for the US Navy or Airforce or Army with prices going up and budgets going down.

They will have to live with what they have till these contracts are finished and then they will be able to borrow no more.

Times are changing ...

as for the F-35 I think the Marine carrier based version will be among the best fighter planes of the future.

I hope we don't have to start a war to prove it

[ikalugin]

Originally Posted by Bilge_Rat

Sprey is a hack, people like him because he does not like the F35, but he thought the F15 was a lemon also.

http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/pie...and-1592445665

The issue here I think it not a capability of an aircraft, but it's cost/effect ratio, something that I have explained above.

The pre 1991 BVR capability and the costs of having it on an aircraft vs the day only F16 is another can of worms entirely. As is multi-role vs specialised plane.

[nikimcbee]

Bah, F-35 is old technology nowadays. Kids are into drones these days. We'll just overwhelm them with our drone hordes.

...oh wait, they are all made in China.

[eddie]

What I don't understand is, we canceled the F22 back in 2009, because it was too expensive. This is from Defense Review article at the time-

"So, what’s wrong with cancelling the Raptor? Well, for one thing, we finally got the production cost down to approximately $143 million per aircraft. If they cancel the F-22 program at 187 total aircraft–56 aircraft short of the 243 aircraft the U.S. Air Force had stated as its requirement–the F-22 Raptor will really come in somewhere around $350 million apiece, with the last four aircraft coming off the line at an estimated cost of approx. $200 million per, due to the $147 million “end-of-production expenses” that will be rolled into their procurement price. Understand that the Air Force originally wanted 750 aircraft, but they wittled that number down to 442 aircraft, then 381, then 243, and then 183, before bring that number back up to 187.
This leads us to the second reason why F-22 Raptor program cancellation is a bad idea. Strategically, 187 F-22 Raptors simply isn’t an adequate number for a future war against China and/or Russia, and the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter (JSF), also made by Lockheed Martin, simply doesn’t have the Raptor’s air-to-air combat capability, so it can’t fulfill the same air-superiority role against the latest Russian fighters, let alone their Gen-5 fighters that are currently either under development or on the drawing board–and Russia likes to export their fighters. DefenseReview would therefore feel much more comfortable with a quiver of at least 1,000 Raptors–preferably half of them in two-seat “Super Raptor” form–for a war against the Dragon and/or the Bear. Both countries (China and Russia) are currently developing low-observable, supermaneuvarable 5th Generation fighter aircraft–like the Russian Sukhoi T-50 PAK-FA, for example–and Russia’s latest 4th-Gen. Sukhoi and MiG aircraft currently being manufactured and exported to other countries are arguably superior to our latest F-15 and F-16 fighter aircraft in a number of aspects."


http://www.defensereview.com/f-22-ra...iew-weighs-in/


So 6 years ago, the F22 was too expensive, now 6 years later, still in debt up to our eye balls, suddenly we can afford the F35? Wonder what Congress is smoking anyway!!


If you got into a Senators face about this, he would simply say "Obviously, you don't know how Congress works!" Well, obviously there are over 400 on Capital Hill, who don't have a stinking clue either! They have gone from serving the people to turning into a bunch of corporate whores! Problem with that though, is the American tax payer is the one being screwed over!

[ikalugin]

Well we would see as to what kind of price JSF goes for, as currently I don't think that it is cheaper than the F22A.

[Bilge_Rat]

The F22 is a great plane, easily the best fighter in the world. However, it was designed primarily for the AA mission and according to most reports had a per unit cost around $300 million.

The F35 is a multirole aircraft and according to most reports, the per unit cost of the CTOL F35A, which most airforces will buy, is probably in the $150-200 million range, which makes it slightly more expensive than the F/A-18 SuperHornet and slightly less expensive than a Eurofighter Typhoon, both of which are older designs.

In Stealth mode, the F35 will be able to penetrate enemy air defences that the F15/16/18 can't and in non-stealth mode, it can carry a comparable amount of ordnance and has a comparable extended range.

critics keep harping on what a POS the F35 will be, yet it is meeting all of its performance goals. People seem to forget that criticism against the F22 was as harsh while it was being designed.