Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Nypsy on September 23, 2011, 06:32:47 PM
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The first part of a 4 part series. An opinion from someone who does not work for the govt. or a major contractor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=UQB4W8C0rZI
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Good link, but...
will it blend? :bolt:
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Paging eagl?
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I watched four of the parts on Youtube last night. I'm not sure whether I should call BS on the statements made in the videos, or rage over the failure of the project. I do feel, however, that we should've made three or four specialized airplanes rather than trying to fit every role into one plane. Could have saved a lot of money.
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Well weve got 4 of them down at Eglin now flight training for the fresh 2nds starts very soon so we shall see...
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Paging eagl?
Not really caring about F-35. Not only is it just a front-aspect stealthy viper, the program overall is running far over projected cost, the US budget problems are driving down procurement numbers which makes them even more expensive, so to save money we're looking at cutting one of the models which will cause some partner nations to leave the program entirely which will drive the cost up even more. In the end we'll end up with a front-aspect stealthy viper that costs 3-4 times what a viper costs, the same or somewhat more than what an F-22 costs, and nearly double what the "silent eagle" would cost. And it can only carry 4 or 6 missiles.
Yea it'll have gucci avionics and information management, but they could have put most of that stuff into an F-18 or F-15 refresh and gotten twice the airplane for half the cost. Yea those alternatives aren't stealthy but as we already found out with the B-2 and F-22, maybe we can't afford a lot of stealthy manned fighters. We sure as heck could buy a ton of silent eagles and upgraded super hornets (with the AESA radar and 20% thrust improved engines) for the cost of the F-35 program, and after many theorists are going to say that after day 3 you don't need stealth anyhow, so we've traded airframe numbers and overall combat capability for front-aspect stealth and a big touchscreen panel in the cockpit.
There is more to it than that of course, but frankly I'm not a believer in either the F-35 or the belief that UAVs are the future. The F-35 might make a great wild weasel and UAVs are awesome in low-threat environments where persistance is absolutely critical, but both systems also have some pretty harsh limitations in real life that make them practically one-trick ponies. That's pretty much the opposite of how the F-15 evolved into becoming the jack of all trades, and since I'm a born-again strike eagle HUD baby I'm admittedly biased towards the more robust airframe of the F-15 and it's cousin the F-18.
Plus viper drivers are f**s.
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Ive got to agree with you on UAV's not only because I want to fly IN a plane not in a cubicle. But also because in a combat situation the human element can very well be the deciding factor and I like to think our pilots are well trained.
I think the F-35 will have that scare factor where if we advertise it enough it should never need to fire a rocket. Or they could call our "bluff" (since even we dont know how it will perform yet truly) and see how it goes....
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I guarantee that if another major war breaks out, we could see a huge increase in competition in aircraft technology. The problem is that there isn't really much competition, therefore we can only really guess as to what the future of aerial combat will look like. I have a hunch we will see something like how WW1 started when they had all this new technology but little experience/tactics on how to harness it (except that in the future, it will be in the air).
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Hey Eagl.. what's your take on the 16? I used to help build them so I have a soft spot for them. I'd like an honest opinion from somebody I know and respect.
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In all honesty, manned aircraft are becoming Obsolete; it's no longer how fast, and hard a jet can turn if the pilot can't handle it. An unmanned F-15 could probably down a manned F-35.
Stealth -Having or providing the ability to prevent detection. <<< They're just kicking a dead idea until it poops a new one.
Truth is... You're still on radar. It costs less to protect against these "stealth" aircraft then it does to manufacture them.
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F35 can kiss my ***
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I agree with ya eagl.
I spent 11 years with the Hornet and had a lot of exposure time to the Eagle as well (through NATO etc) and I am pretty sure that the F35 is nowhere near the airplane either of those are.
It's all gadgets and long range targeting. It will never be a fighter. It just won't turn with Eagles, Hornets and Vipers (and as far as I am concerned the Viper was pretty much a throw away airplane anyway).
It is able to gather a whole pile of information and sort it all out, but it isn't capable of really dealing with the result of all that info. The Eagle and Hornet could.
Just the opinion of an old and grizzled retired RCAF member.
cheers,
RTR
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Skuzzy, I'm not being partisan so...
During the 1980's with the Reagan buildup there was so much money pumped into defense corruption was rampant. Since it is defense it was almost treason to point it out. Famously, $75 hammers or $900 coffee pots.
Both the F-22 and the F-35 were born during a time when the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact had 15,000+ combat aircraft poised to stream across West Germany's eastern border. I dare a majority of the players on this game were not even alive when West Germany was a country. The Cold War ends, Soviet Union dissolves, 15,000+ planes shrinks to less then 2,000 yet the F-22 and F-35 programs continued full steam ahead.
As these programs went down the road more and more was pumped into them. They failed to hit program targets, gates, deadlines and audits yet the money continued to flow. If we were serious about air superiority or close air support they would have put into production the F-15SE for air superiority and advanced models of the F-16 to own that role for two decades.
Right now America faces the greatest threat in our history, and it relates to financial insolvency and loss/adjustment of the dollar as world reserve currency. As we face this we daily take into consideration our excesses. For me the F-22 and F-35 will always represent our failure.
Boo
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I've always thought the RAAF procurement of the F-35 was a mistake. We should've kept our F-111G's and gone for a then F-15K/SG instead of our F-18A/B HUG's, and wasting the money on interim F-18F's.
Considering if there is a local fight, our smallish tanker force is no way going to be able to give us the range and bomb load a mix of F-111's, and F-15's could've bought us.
I am yet to see anything that says a F-35 is the same bomb truck and or gunfighter as an F-15
Tronsky
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I have two questions:
1.) Who needs stealth if your enemy doesn't have radar?
2.) In addition, it seems that those enemies that have radar also have nuclear weapons, thereby making conventional war (or any war for that matter) impossible.
Perhaps I am wrong, but at 3:00 AM, fact and fiction blur into one.
-Penguin
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Hey Eagl.. what's your take on the 16? I used to help build them so I have a soft spot for them. I'd like an honest opinion from somebody I know and respect.
It's a nice plane. It has some limitations like endurance and range, but overall it's fairly capable considering not only what it was intended to do (be a lightweight short range good weather fighter) but what it grew into.
I do think that it's a bit small for some of the missions it has grown into though. For example, as a wild weasel it really ought to be able to go in before the strike package and hang out until everyone leaves, but sometimes it just doesn't have the gas to hang out. And it's weapon payload isn't all that big which means more sorties or limits on the tactics.
And that's pretty much the major gripes against the viper as far as I know... Limited endurance due to not enough gas, and limited weapon payload. Oddly enough, the competitor against the F-16 was the F-18, and after the Navy ended up buying the F-18, they had the same gripes with the hornet. So they grew it into the superhornet to directly address those gripes. Of course, that meant that the superhornet is almost as big as an F-15 :)
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I have two questions:
1.) Who needs stealth if your enemy doesn't have radar?
2.) In addition, it seems that those enemies that have radar also have nuclear weapons, thereby making conventional war (or any war for that matter) impossible.
Perhaps I am wrong, but at 3:00 AM, fact and fiction blur into one.
-Penguin
he's BAAAAACK!!!!!
I still stick to my theory that the next big war will be conventional, because no one wants to deal with the repercussions of retaliatory nuclear strikes.
The JSF will be a total failure, I can't think of any reason why it would be superior to the f-18 or especially the a-10, besides radar systems that could be easily integrated into those two airframes. I honestly think the f-16 does the job better.
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I work on the F-35 out here at Edwards. AF-03 is my plane.
The F-35 is actually performing better than anyone thinks or what is being told. Being such a new system that is still highly classified, they are not going to go out and say what this plane can and cant do. We have been flying alot of mission and hitting our test points with ease. It is a fun plane to work on, maintenance for the most part is just like any other plane,except for certain things.
Oh, by the way. Supposedly the serial numbers used on the F-35 are where the USAAF left off on the P-38. Just a bit of gee wiz for ya.
Here is a link with pictures from work that I posted on another forum. http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/off-topic-misc/f35-pictures-30362.html
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I have two questions:
1.) Who needs stealth if your enemy doesn't have radar?
2.) In addition, it seems that those enemies that have radar also have nuclear weapons, thereby making conventional war (or any war for that matter) impossible.
Perhaps I am wrong, but at 3:00 AM, fact and fiction blur into one.
-Penguin
F22 and F35 are meant to serve in a future war with other countries as well as the one we fight now, its always good to be prepared
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I have two questions:
1.) Who needs stealth if your enemy doesn't have radar?
2.) In addition, it seems that those enemies that have radar also have nuclear weapons, thereby making conventional war (or any war for that matter) impossible.
Perhaps I am wrong, but at 3:00 AM, fact and fiction blur into one.
-Penguin
MAD, most nations don't sprint to nuclear weapons use.
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These aircraft are being designed to fight a hypothetical war against a hypothetical opponent in a hypothetical future. In addition, this hypothetical future does not include the possibility the deployment of MAD systems. Though international tensions have eased, there is no reason to assume that these systems are not readily usable by countries that have them. Just look at the recent scare during North Korea's ICBM test, the trigger is still a hair-pin.
We (US, UN, and NATO) also cannot waste precious resources developing weapons that might possibly be effective in an unlikely future war when the current one(s) deserve full attention. To put it simply; World War Three, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
-Penguin
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edit: I'm just snarky today.
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I have two questions:
1.) Who needs stealth if your enemy doesn't have radar?
2.) In addition, it seems that those enemies that have radar also have nuclear weapons, thereby making conventional war (or any war for that matter) impossible.
Perhaps I am wrong, but at 3:00 AM, fact and fiction blur into one.
-Penguin
A third-world country used modified radar to shoot down a F-117, and the 'conventional war is impossible' thing has been going on since Vietnam
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According to wikipedia and Logan, Don. Lockheed F-117 Nighthawks: A Stealth Fighter Roll Call. Atglen, Pennsylvania: Schiffer Publishing, 2009, the Yugoslavian Army had radar, but operated at unusually long wavelengths. I agree on that point. So it seems that some opponents do have radar.
However, the question was do our current opponents have radar?
-Penguin
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^^^ yes!
Well hypothetically they do.
:salute
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F35 can kiss my ***
Hater! My bro is helping/helped machine parts for the 35 here at out AFB. He can't say what he made though :)
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^^^ yes!
Well hypothetically they do.
:salute
However, enticing and sexy it may be to have stealth fighters (I understand completely, those things look SWEET!), the money would be better spent giving troops more drone coverage, and lightening their equipment. I remember that a group of mountain infantry came before Congress to request that they would no longer carry artillery because it was too difficult to use in the rugged terrain. Their alternative was to use unmanned aerial vehicles to shoot missles at the enemy. Congress flatly denied the request, but it shows that troops need different tools to fight now than they did before. The joint-strike fighter would be unsuitable due to its limited time over target (jet engines eat fuel) and low payload.
In addition, experience shows that "quantity has a quality all its own". Look at the Eastern Front of World War II; the German tanks had thicker armor, larger and more accurate guns, and radios to allow better communication. They were feared by all allied forces due to their formidable combat effectiveness. However, they were expensive to produce, maintain, and replace. The Soviet T-Series tanks were cheap, reliable, and easily mass-produced. The German tank corps simply couldn't manage the sheer volume of enemies, and were subsequently overwhelmed. This also applies to fighter aircraft.
Let's use real data, the United States has ordered 2,443 JSF's at $132,214,490 each. For conveience's sake, let's say that the enemy is China. Their main fighter is the $27,840,000 Chengdu-10. For each of our JSF's, they can produce 5 Chengdu's. That means five times the sorties, or five times the firepower, or five times the defense; however you slice it, it spells trouble for the vastly outnumbered JSF's. However, if the United States used the
$55,000,000 FA-18E Super Hornet, we'd only be outnumberd two to one. At that point, tactics and superior technology may win the day.
-Penguin
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Penguin, while I agree with some of your statement, for your sake make sure you don't mention actual countries as hypothetical enemies, or else you get slapped with a rule 14
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It's a nice plane. It has some limitations like endurance and range, but overall it's fairly capable considering not only what it was intended to do (be a lightweight short range good weather fighter) but what it grew into.
I do think that it's a bit small for some of the missions it has grown into though. For example, as a wild weasel it really ought to be able to go in before the strike package and hang out until everyone leaves, but sometimes it just doesn't have the gas to hang out. And it's weapon payload isn't all that big which means more sorties or limits on the tactics.
And that's pretty much the major gripes against the viper as far as I know... Limited endurance due to not enough gas, and limited weapon payload. Oddly enough, the competitor against the F-16 was the F-18, and after the Navy ended up buying the F-18, they had the same gripes with the hornet. So they grew it into the superhornet to directly address those gripes. Of course, that meant that the superhornet is almost as big as an F-15 :)
Gracias sir...
I was fortunate enough to work on the periphery of the AFTI and the F16XL programs which was pretty cool for a 19 year old kid that loved aircraft. I got to play in a simulator once because I did the program manager a big favor. Good times back then man :aok
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uh60....................... :noid
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For the next 10-15 years China can be handled like a 5-year old with F-16s, F-15Cs and F/A-18C/D/E/F's, throw in some B-52s, B-1s and B-2s, with cruise missiles opening the holes, it would be a repeat of Sadam circa 1991 and 2003.
IF we went to war with China the F-22 would never be used unless the Chinese mounted an attack on Alaska. The money spent on both the F-22 and F-35...better spent elsewhere.
Boo
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Penguin, while I agree with some of your statement, for your sake make sure you don't mention actual countries as hypothetical enemies, or else you get slapped with a rule 14
It's hard not to, if one is to discuss war. I have to use some country's fighters.
-Penguin
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It's hard not to, if one is to discuss war. I have to use some country's fighters.
-Penguin
It was a reasonable hypothetical example, I think you're fine.
The best argument towards continuing the F-35 project IMO, despite the upward spiraling costs, is that all the nations we're going to sell them to besides ourselves really want some kind of next generation fighter aircraft. Better that it comes from us (the US) than from the Russians, French, or Chinese. Because if the US doesn't supply it, those other countries will, and then they will build their capabilities for creating and maintaining many nation's aircraft while our (the US') capabilities suffer.
According to Wikipedia on the F-35, 3100 are due to be built for nine US allied nations, compared to 2400 being built for the US military itself. So well over half of the production is going elsewhere, and no matter how expensive the aircraft ends up being, that ratio will probably remain constant. If the US scraps the project, that's a lot of money being funneled to other nation's military aircraft industries, to the benefit of their economy and not ours.
The question is really whether the aircraft is going to end up like the V-22 and eventually be something that can be built and depended upon, or should it be considered a sunk cost and scrapped. Before you say sunk cost, you have to consider all the economic elements, including the costs of putting all the people working on the project into the unemployment line, and essentially outsourcing those jobs to the countries I named in the previous paragraph.
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I have two questions:
1.) Who needs stealth if your enemy doesn't have radar?
2.) In addition, it seems that those enemies that have radar also have nuclear weapons, thereby making conventional war (or any war for that matter) impossible.
Perhaps I am wrong, but at 3:00 AM, fact and fiction blur into one.
-Penguin
um.... radar is a rather common gizmo these days for all nations with a military. Very few of them have nukular weapons.
F35 is prolly going to be a great plane but i still wish we would have gone for Rafale, Eurofighter, Gripen, F18 or Silent Eagle. We would prolly have ended up paying half of what we will pay for the F35. I just dont see the point for us. IF russia ever becomes an enemy for us again it will not matter if we have the F35 or any other plane. They will kill our airfilelds within a short time anyway whatever plane or air defence we have just by the numbers of russian jets alone. In peace time or smal scale NATO stuff like we do now.. Libya, Bosnia, Afghanistan etc any of the listed planes will do. For going up and meeting Bears, recon and showing flag in the north any of the listed fighters will do just great. They can all do recon, carry ASM missiles. F35? we really dont need them.
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The F-35 is a clear overkill for the real needs. The main reason to develop it is to keep the military aviation industry alive. Without continuous development much of the ability to develop will be gone with it - when the time comes and new capable fighters will be needed, this ability will not exist.
The US is basically subsidizing its private industry to keep it working. It is not as bad as it sounds because basically they create jobs and circulate tax money back into the economy. It is not a waste of tax as much as an investment and an employment plan. The US also does that with the "foreign aid" which can only be spent in the US to buy from American companies - so again this is american money circulating back into the US economy for the purpose of subsidizing the industry, plus buying diplomatic currency in this case. This is much easier to "sell" to the public than "we give this money to these companies for nothing, just to exist".
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My guess is F35 will end up being another Phantom...fairly good plane, which is outclassed by dedicated versions (naval attack, land-based fighter, etc) of its potential enemies
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um.... radar is a rather common gizmo these days for all nations with a military. Very few of them have nukular weapons.
F35 is prolly going to be a great plane but i still wish we would have gone for Rafale, Eurofighter, Gripen, F18 or Silent Eagle. We would prolly have ended up paying half of what we will pay for the F35. I just dont see the point for us. IF russia ever becomes an enemy for us again it will not matter if we have the F35 or any other plane. They will kill our airfilelds within a short time anyway whatever plane or air defence we have just by the numbers of russian jets alone. In peace time or smal scale NATO stuff like we do now.. Libya, Bosnia, Afghanistan etc any of the listed planes will do. For going up and meeting Bears, recon and showing flag in the north any of the listed fighters will do just great. They can all do recon, carry ASM missiles. F35? we really dont need them.
First off Norway is a member of NATO and any attack on it by Russia would trigger a massive NATO response, most of all American. Why would they start something they would lose? In 1975 when the F-117 project was started who could have foreseen the war it would end up shining in would be the Desert Storm 15 years later ? You dont buy expensive systems for the wars your going to fight today. You buy them for the wars your going to fight 10 to 20 years from now and do you really want to live in a country that cant control its own airspace?
Let's use real data, the United States has ordered 2,443 JSF's at $132,214,490 each. For conveience's sake, let's say that the enemy is China. Their main fighter is the $27,840,000 Chengdu-10. For each of our JSF's, they can produce 5 Chengdu's. That means five times the sorties, or five times the firepower, or five times the defense; however you slice it, it spells trouble for the vastly outnumbered JSF's. However, if the United States used the
$55,000,000 FA-18E Super Hornet, we'd only be outnumberd two to one. At that point, tactics and superior technology may win the day.
No it doesnt mean "5 times the sorties". The reliability of American engines and tech, along with the much better trained and equipped support personel, will whittle any sortie comparison down far lower then 5 to 1. Not that it matters anyway. Their air bases and CNC could look forward to about a thousand big bangs on opening night alone within 3 meters of where we want them. It wouldnt be like an Aces High furball.
We can thank our Paki "friends" they even have the C-10.
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Yes Rich we are a NATO member but NATO wont react until all our airfields are bombed anyway. IF they did attack to invade any reaction from NATO would be to slow. Maybe it would take day, weeks or months depending on all the talk that would have to be done first. The idea of a swift response to any NATO members aid within hours may have been possible during sertain periods during the cold war but not now. Unless the US plans to station a couple of CVs off our coast on a permanet basis any aid would at best be hours away IF our southern neighbours had more than a couple of jets each on permanent readyness to be forward deployed to our airfilelds. The distances we are talking about here are huge Rich. IF russia attacks the airfileds would be overwhelmed within an hour or two with cruise missiles and jets. They would lose all their radars and stationary command and control along our borders though. "stuff" have been in place to ensure that for decades. An invasion by them would be alot harder but we are talking about the need for F35s to defend ourself and not any other systems. Best bet would be to fly all fighters to Britain and fight from there.
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My guess is F35 will end up being another Phantom...fairly good plane, which is outclassed by dedicated versions (naval attack, land-based fighter, etc) of its potential enemies
Yeah the f-4 was totally outclassed :rolleyes:. What are you talking about? I hope you aren't talking about the dedicated naval yak-38s, or mig-17-19-21s for that matter.
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He's referring to dedicated platforms within the US inventory at the time and not foreign assets.
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My guess is F35 will end up being another Phantom...fairly good plane, which is outclassed by dedicated versions (naval attack, land-based fighter, etc) of its potential enemies
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Yes Rich we are a NATO member but NATO wont react until all our airfields are bombed anyway. IF they did attack to invade any reaction from NATO would be to slow. Maybe it would take day, weeks or months depending on all the talk that would have to be done first. The idea of a swift response to any NATO members aid within hours may have been possible during sertain periods during the cold war but not now. Unless the US plans to station a couple of CVs off our coast on a permanet basis any aid would at best be hours away IF our southern neighbours had more than a couple of jets each on permanent readyness to be forward deployed to our airfilelds. The distances we are talking about here are huge Rich. IF russia attacks the airfileds would be overwhelmed within an hour or two with cruise missiles and jets. They would lose all their radars and stationary command and control along our borders though. "stuff" have been in place to ensure that for decades. An invasion by them would be alot harder but we are talking about the need for F35s to defend ourself and not any other systems. Best bet would be to fly all fighters to Britain and fight from there.
The punitive measures taken torwards Russia would be a cost far higher then they would be willing to pay. Russia is a Ghost force compared to the days of the Cold War. NATO has them completely outclassed and they know it. So again, why would they even consider attacking Norway in the first place? Not for the cooking thats for sure.
We have Intel assets that would see an attack coming anyway.And since Ive been to Europe I know there aint there aint no "huge distances" about the place. Try driving from one end of Texas to another. Oslo to Berlin is 841 Klms from each other. Texas is 1,200 Klm wide.
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Gah missed that part. Of course the Phantom did prove a point. With enough power you can get a brick to fly.
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The punitive measures taken torwards Russia would be a cost far higher then they would be willing to pay. Russia is a Ghost force compared to the days of the Cold War. NATO has them completely outclassed and they know it. So again, why would they even consider attacking Norway in the first place? Not for the cooking thats for sure.
We have Intel assets that would see an attack coming anyway.And since Ive been to Europe I know there aint there aint no "huge distances" about the place. Try driving from one end of Texas to another. Oslo to Berlin is 841 Klms from each other. Texas is 1,200 Klm wide.
Bigger question: why would they attack Europe if they make so much money from selling natural gas to them? It's a fundamental part of their economy. In addition, there doesn't seem to be any tension between Russia and NATO, they're just chilling out. The same applies to China, they make a huge amount of money on the global market, and war would leave them without funds. Furthermore, in the words of Einstein, even if we don't know what weapons could be necessary in World War III, we know exactly what we'll need in the war directly thereafter-stones!
Nukes and international business interests have made war between major powers an unacceptable risk. If your country isn't vaporized, you'll run out of money and your government will fail. Too much rides on international trade and earth that is not radioactive glass to make war survivable, much less profitable.
However, the argument that military R&D projects will stimulate the economy is only partially true. It will only stimulate the economy in the sense that people get jobs, but no product enters the economy to offset the labor provided to produce it. Imagine an iPod factory that destroys the iPods as soon as it finishes creating them. The only other instance in which this could benefit the economy would be if in doing so, the hypothetical company developed a new technology that improved efficiency or became popular elsewhere.
-Penguin
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Yeah the f-4 was totally outclassed :rolleyes:. What are you talking about? I hope you aren't talking about the dedicated naval yak-38s, or mig-17-19-21s for that matter.
It went REALLY fast, carried lots of ord, and it went REALLY fast
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The punitive measures taken torwards Russia would be a cost far higher then they would be willing to pay. Russia is a Ghost force compared to the days of the Cold War. NATO has them completely outclassed and they know it. So again, why would they even consider attacking Norway in the first place? Not for the cooking thats for sure.
We have Intel assets that would see an attack coming anyway.And since Ive been to Europe I know there aint there aint no "huge distances" about the place. Try driving from one end of Texas to another. Oslo to Berlin is 841 Klms from each other. Texas is 1,200 Klm wide.
Not saying they would attack... _thats my point_. Why buy that uber expencive F-35 for our needs when the only theoretical enemy around our parts would still overwhelm it by sheer numbers?
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Perhaps because you won't use them against the only theoretical enemy around your parts, but against a very real enemy in other parts of the world as part of a NATO/UN operation. If I recall correctly you guys sent about half a squadron's worth of F-16s to Italy to support NATO against Libya. Against Libyan air defenses the F-35 would be far safer to operate than any 4th gen fighter-bomber. Likely you will send aircraft to operate with NATO against many other 3rd world nations during the next 50 years, but only in small numbers. If, as you say, you won't stand a chance against the Russians no matter what aircraft you buy, then why not buy one that that works best in the military operations you actually do commit to?
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For most of what was done in Libya a B17 with upgraded weapon guidance system would have been sufficient. Also, if half a squadron is all you gonna send, it makes no difference what you send.
As far as I recall, the last conflict involving a NATO nation that did not start with complete air superiority was the Falklands. Since then, even a serious SAM threat has not been met. Yes SAM threat was a concern in Iraq or Bosnia but nothing that really stopped or even slowed aerial operations. There is such a thing as too good weapons. You do not need to upgrade from an assault rifle to a death ray if you fight men with spears. As long as you can maintain a clear advantage having an even greater advantage gives little return an the money and development are better spent on other weapon technologies in which your relative advantage is not as high.
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Perhaps because you won't use them against the only theoretical enemy around your parts, but against a very real enemy in other parts of the world as part of a NATO/UN operation. If I recall correctly you guys sent about half a squadron's worth of F-16s to Italy to support NATO against Libya. Against Libyan air defenses the F-35 would be far safer to operate than any 4th gen fighter-bomber. Likely you will send aircraft to operate with NATO against many other 3rd world nations during the next 50 years, but only in small numbers. If, as you say, you won't stand a chance against the Russians no matter what aircraft you buy, then why not buy one that that works best in the military operations you actually do commit to?
F35 is overkill for the operations on libya, serbia afghanistan and any other third world nation UN/NATO decides to reform or help. The F16 is and was more than capable of performing its tasks. The other options are far from useless dated airframes yet they may end up costing half. We need to spend our defence budget on other areas and many of the generals and admirals feel the same way. The choise of F35 had a lot to do with politics.