On Mar 6, 12:42*pm, Jack Linthicum
wrote:
On Mar 6, 1:33*pm, hcobb wrote:



On Mar 6, 8:35*am, Ed Rasimus wrote:

Today our real concern is total numbers. With the Raptor buy
apparently over, we really don't have a nucleus of a globally
effective operational fleet. 187 aircraft, minus not-in-commission
frames, minus training aircraft, minus periodic maintenance aircraft
leaves you with roughly a half-dozen squadrons.

You've got to have more airplanes and that means F-35 numbers in the
absence of F-22s. The flexibilty of the F-35 with A/G optimization and
reasonable A/A capability makes it the next iteration of F-16 paired
with F-15 air superiority.

Against which nation will the USAF require more than six squadrons of
Raptors to shoot down all of their high end fighters? *Either now or
anytime in the next two decades.

The F-16 comparison is apt. *The F-15 and the F-22 were designed for
the BVR long range high speed interceptor mission that the USAF has
never ever done. *The F-16 and the F-35 were designed for the swing
missions of dog fighting and ground support that have been very
common.

The T-50 is a stealth compromised airframe precisely in the way those
last generation engines are mounted onto that airframe. *The PAK-FA
can either go forwards with some RAM spackled onto that cow or start
from scratch and have a fifth generation fighter ready to build in two
decades.

The F-35 will not fly as high, as fast or as far as the PAK-FA. *It
won't out turn it and it won't be able to chase it down.

What will happen is that the F-35 will do its missions and when the
PAK-FA comes into range the only thing it will see are incoming
missiles mysteriously appearing from out of the blue. *Sometimes it
may even spot these in time to evade them.

-HJC

More you have to think of any mission/war in which the United States
will not be the attacking nation. The Pentagon has been looking for a
near-peer, a nation that might want to fight the U.S.. for about 20
years. There do not seem to be any. The F-22 and possibly even the
F-35 seem to be over designed for the real probable use, ground
support in a distant battlefield. Imagine the current situation in
Afghanistan with only those two aircraft for support. The FA-18 can do
that job, now.

Big problem is range. That was a problem in the Libya mission in the
80s, it was a problem in Afghanistan. Carriers are nice if you are
going against coastal nations, supporting Marines hitting a beachhead,
or islands. Start looking a huge hunks of territory, you need an Air
Force and that means bases, tankers, and a bunch of grunts to keep the
bad guys away from the air conditioned O club that is serving steaks.

Hanging a ton of stuff on fighters is nice. Sometimes you just need a
damn boat load of bombs over a target. Bombers do that well. Or you
need a lot of bombs that can loiter over an area for hours and hours.
Bombers did that really well in Afghanistan for probably the first
time. Add on smart bombs to the mix, its one bomb one target.

The gomers aren't as stupid as we think they are. Get a fighter on
target they can count for a half an hour or whatever until he's out of
gas. Time on station depends on range and gas. You can rotate out and
tank but for the most part, you build lots of iddy biddy airplanes and
send them over in waves.

Thing is, we can't build them cheap anymore. And I don't think
Republic has a locomotive works. Sorry, can't see us buying Mitsubishi
for fighters.

Its as much funds as the willingness to just say we need fighters,
bombers, tankers, destroyers, carriers, subs, whatever. Block it out.
Just because we built one doesn't mean we can sit on our laurels and
say the world is fine. That way you end up with sometimes something
that doesn't work, is obsolete quickly (mother nature is a bitch, but
technology is a real mf..) or you wake up and surprise 30 year old
airframes.

Technology is nice, keep the mark I brain out of the cockpit, but
remember when in Desert Storm somebody started to tally up the cost of
each of those $2 million Tomahawks that were neat to watch on the
news. Compare that to a $500 Mk82, or even a smart bomb, and you know
what the heck all those Tea Party people are going to say, and they're
not on this list and they vote. Or at least make a lot of noise. Which
drives rationality from any congressperson.

Frankly I don't see a lot of work on either this is a defense strategy
for the uber long term, a way to cut costs, and getting what the
warfighter needs being done. Lots of contractors with slick brochures
and suits. But they've been along for decades. We used to be a lot
smarter at doing all this.

We may be getting a lot closer to that old joke about the AF spending
all its budget on one airplane.