Posted on 05/27/2015 11:43:33 AM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
ABOARD THE USS WASP — It has wound a tortured path to get here. The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter has been derided as a trillion-dollar boondoggle, the “plane that ate the Pentagon,” a failed project billions over budget and years behind schedule that should be killed.
And yet here it was Tuesday, the sun glinting off its wings on a beautiful day as it approached this amphibious assault ship for a landing 100 miles off the North Carolina coast. It nestled in undaunted, touching down vertically like a helicopter onto the deck. Crews rushed around in a well-scripted choreography, getting ready to usher it off the ship again. And with the pilot’s salute from the cockpit, and a thunderous rush toward the horizon, it was off again over the deep blue water.
For the Marine Corps, the flights the F-35s have been taking around the USS Wasp for the past week have been as much a victory lap as they were training exercises. And in the days ahead, as the stealthy fighter jets begin their first operational tests from a ship — tactical exercises designed to simulate Top Gun-like engagements — the Marine Corps will move one step closer to declaring that the F-35 is ready for combat.
When exactly that day will come is still uncertain . . .
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Hopelessly outrun, out accelerated, out turned, and out gunned buy almost every potential adversary.
Of course it has no definable mission at present and no where to practice its outstanding capabilities. An aircraft with a mission that doesn’t exist at present but that is OK since if it was needed Obama would not use it anyway. Maybe Iran would like to buy a few. Have Jarrett give them a call or check Hillary’s E-Mails to see if the deal is already in the works?
This is America, we make it up in volume.
Reminds me of the F-4 one-size-fits-all fighter, that kept getting its a$$ handed to it in combat over VN (7x).
the primary mission of the JSF program is to subsidize defense contractors and the defense lobbying community. Air flight is a welcome side effect, but not a requirement.
Hopelessly outrun, out accelerated, out turned, and out gunned buy almost every potential adversary —
So we use the #stop bullies.
Now we are ready for combat.
It’s not ready for anything. The Marines are putting it into service when not even 40% of the testing has been completed, because they desperately fear losing fixed wing air in budget cuts. They’d rather put a broken airplane on the line.
Maybe if we sold advertising on the underside of the wings we could recoup some of that cost................
Sounds like the F-104. Deja vu.............
But wait, their Lobbyist paid very well to the elected whores in Washington.
Really? What was the kill ratio during the Vietnam war vs the NVA airforce?
Which potential adversaries are you talking about?
Seems to me the F-35 is not intended to be an air superiority fighter, so what is your point?
The F-4 was designed as a navy long range missile fleet defense interceptor. The USAF bought it because it was the best option available at the time. Before the F-4 the USAF relied on the F-100 as their primary tactical fighter. The navy, the F-8.
The F-4 was neither designed nor intended for the mission either branch assigned to it. It was supposed to go straight and fast to a missile launch point and destroy it's target BVR. It was never designed as a dog fighter. To it's credit it did better that it should have because of the pilots and improved tactics.
When each branch was finally given control the design of it's respective air superiority fighter, two spectacular successes evolved, the F-14 and the F-15. The F-16 and F-18 are no slouches either.
It would be more proper to villify the F-111 using your words "one-size-fits-all fighter" although it also developed into quite a package on it's own when used as a deep strike bomber.
They want to keep the VSTOL capability and no other options are on line.
“What was the kill ratio during the Vietnam war vs the NVA airforce?”
The kill ratio against the Mig21 about 2.5 to 1 in favor of the Phantom.
In 1972, air-to-air combat resulted in the loss of 12 MiG-21s, 4 MiG-17/19s, and 11 F-4s, yielding a kill-ratio of about 1.5 MiGs for every Phantom shot down.
In the Yom Kipur War, Israeli Phantoms had a MUCH better kill ratio (against Soviets and North Koreans, oddly enough).
Of course, we had Israeli pilots. ;-)
We apparently lost 89 birds in air-to-air combat. Unsure how many were F-4s. The NVA lost 195. So a 2 to 1 ratio. It’s this horrible ratio that was the impetus for creating Top Gun school and Red Flag. Compare and contrast that to the F-15. But then again the F-15 wasn’t a one-size-fits-all aircraft.
All new designs have their teething problems as well as a very motivated group of demonrats and others who will do anything to kill it off, slow down the design process and make it cost more to develop than it otherwise would.
The same is true for the F-35 and will be true for all designs that come after it, just as it was true for all that came before it, even the designs we now love and depend on.
Based upon past experience, I suspect it is way better than its critics and their criticisms and that it will become what it designed to be and do well what it is designed to do.
Past experience and current progress reports tell me the F-35 will be a great and continually evolving weapons hauler for the next several decades.
Don’t you need a gun?
Also the missile they want does not fit inside the plane.
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