Navy To Ignore History With 6th Gen Fighter

[SysError]

...the designers conceived the plane as a land based aircraft first and then tried to cut it down to fit it's VTOL and CATOBAR roles. This strikes me as ass-backwards.  

I do not remember clearly,  but wasn't the original spec that it be sort of a Swiss army knife of jets and is that not why they beat Northrop in the selection process?  i.e. that they had already proven the multi role capability and Northrop had not?

[Hetzer7]

The VTOL requirement was stupid; meanwhile Kelly Johnson is doing barrel rolls in his grave.

[PR3D4TOR]

The VTOL requirement was stupid...

Words spoken as a ...?

[Muzzy]

I do not remember clearly,  but wasn't the original spec that it be sort of a Swiss army knife of jets and is that not why they beat Northrop in the selection process?  i.e. that they had already proven the multi role capability and Northrop had not?

It could be. I admit I'm not familiar with the design process other than they appear to have gotten the land-based version out first, before modifying the design to fit the carrier and VTOL versions.

[Meatwad]

50 years.

It will be 50 years before it goes into service at the current rate

[mbailey]

 

[PR3D4TOR]

So 100 years then before this 6th gen fighter becomes a reality.

[USRanger]

The F-35 is a piece of crap that should have never even left the drawing board.  Seems like everyone except those that make the decision to keep it knows that.  Someone has some VERY good lobbyists.  We will pay for it one day when we have to use that junk when it's most needed, instead of all the updated F-15s & F/A-18s (waayyy more) we could have had for the same price.

[SysError]

I think I posted this before, maybe six months ago or so.  I was surprised that it went down with a bit of a thud.

I think that it is assuming.  It is a few years old.  The facts cited were accurate at the time.  It starts out about the English Navy and around the 3 min mark gets into the F-35.

Hope that some of you enjoy it:

Bird & Fortune - Admiral Sir George Parr

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0jgZKV4N_A

 

[BaDkaRmA158Th]

Like people have said, no such thing as stealth anymore. Anything can be hit with triangulation. Not to mention rail guns & lasers coming online all around the world. Drone's its all about the drones now.

 

[Rich46yo]

Like people have said, no such thing as stealth anymore. Anything can be hit with triangulation. Not to mention rail guns & lasers coming online all around the world. Drone's its all about the drones now.

 

What do rail guns and lasers have to do with stealth? Want to beat stealth? Just shoot at the stealth plane you can see during the day.

Of course at night things become different. Most of all when facing an enemy that owns the electromagnetic spectrum. Even the drones of the future will be LO too. Maybe the Chinese and Russians are spending zillions on stealth just for air shows and plan to fight all future war's with 4'th Gen. Its an idea.

Yaknow we terrified them during Gulf-1 with a glimpse of the future. Up until then they figured they could win just by making more stuff then we could make bullets to shoot them with. They never figured the invisible airplanes and smart weapons that hit the crack when the bent over would actually work.

[guncrasher]

http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/us-navys-6th-generation-fighter-jets-will-be-slow-unstealthy-12193

The Navy's next fighter will be abandoning pretty much the ENTIRE HISTORY of fighter design in its proposed 6th Generation fighter. Not only will it NOT be particularly stealthy, and it won't be fast, either.

So you know, two of the BIGGEST flaws of the F-35.

While I can see where they're coming from with stealth -- radar technology has frankly evolved to the point where it's not the tremendous advantage it used to be, and it raises questions of how much its worth it -- abandoning the old addage "Speed is Life" comes as a surprise.

Yes, a fighter can't outrun a missile. But on the other hand, it CAN outrun the aircraft firing it. The trend has been for faster fighters throughout history for a REASON.

I thought missiles could be fired when you dont even see the enemy con. 



semp

[MrRiplEy[H]]

What do rail guns and lasers have to do with stealth? Want to beat stealth? Just shoot at the stealth plane you can see during the day.

Of course at night things become different. Most of all when facing an enemy that owns the electromagnetic spectrum. Even the drones of the future will be LO too. Maybe the Chinese and Russians are spending zillions on stealth just for air shows and plan to fight all future war's with 4'th Gen. Its an idea.

Yaknow we terrified them during Gulf-1 with a glimpse of the future. Up until then they figured they could win just by making more stuff then we could make bullets to shoot them with. They never figured the invisible airplanes and smart weapons that hit the crack when the bent over would actually work.

I just recently read an article that noted that current radar technology has evolved to counter stealth technology. Stealth works only on modern radars, the crude early radars still see them due to the longer wavelengths used. So now they're starting to build radars that combine many wavelengths and polarity and the stealth stops working.

But stealth is still a great weapon for pounding a technologically inferior enemy. It may not work so well super power vs super power.

[Saxman]

I thought missiles could be fired when you dont even see the enemy con. 



semp

And the military has handcuffed BVR by requiring positive ID since BVR was a thing.

But stealth is still a great weapon for pounding a technologically inferior enemy. It may not work so well super power vs super power.

Neither would drones. It kills me every time I see people insisting that UAVs are the future of air combat even though simulations have repeatedly demonstrated that drones are only effective if you have a technological advantage over your opponent. In conventional warfare between two technologically equal powers they'd be almost useless.

[PR3D4TOR]

Autonomous UCAVs are the future of air warfare. Unmanned aircraft the size of today's fighter-bombers. The remote controlled toys of today can't be compared.