U.S. General Admits F-35 Is Actually Three Separate Airplanes

The whole idea behind the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter was for it to be, you know, joint. That is to say, the same basic plane would work for the U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps and foreign countries.

Lockheed Martin is designing the F-35 to meet all the requirements of all three U.S. military branches from the outset, with — in theory — only minor differences between the Air Force’s F-35A, the Marines’ F-35B and the Navy’s F-35C.

The variants were supposed to be 70-percent common. But Lt. Gen. Christopher Bogdan, head of the JSF program office, told a seminar audience on Feb. 10 that the three F-35 models are only 20- to 25-percent common, mainly in their cockpits.

In other words, the F-35 is actually three different warplanes. The F-35, F-36 and F-37.

There are very few examples of plane designs that effectively meet the requirements of all three American armed services that operate fighters. The F-4 Phantom was a successful joint fighter, but only because McDonnell Douglas developed it for the Navy — and the Marines and Air Force adopted it after the fact without complicating the design process.

By contrast, the JSF’s design has taken the services’ competing, even contradictory, needs into account from the outset. The F-35A is supposed to be able to pull nine Gs. The B-model has a downward-blasting lift fan to allow it to take off and land vertically. The C-variant has a bigger wing and systems for operating from aircraft carriers. Even trying to bend each variant toward the same basic airframe resulted in a bulky, blocky fuselage that limits the F-35’s aerodynamic performance.

And the compromise didn’t result in a truly common design. It’s “almost like three separate production lines,” Bogdan said, according to Air Force magazine. A real joint fighter, the program boss said, is “hard” because each branch is adamant about its requirements. “You want what you want,” Bogdan said.

Bogdan declined to say whether the Pentagon’s next generation of fighters should be joint. But Lt. Gen. James Holmes, the Air Force’s deputy chief of staff for plans and requirements, said in mid-February 2016 that the Navy and Air Force would probably design their next fighters separately.

For $16 Billion you get 75 combat aircraft

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Gerald_R._Ford

For $1.432 Billion (1989 price ($750 million) inflation adjusted for 2016, it is probably more like $2 to $2.5 billion) you get an LHD with between 6 to 20 AV-8Bs depending on the specific amphibious assault ship class (LHA/LHD)and the mission configuration. MEUs typically have 6-8 AV-8Bs; when specifically designated to conduct “Harrier Carrier” operations (Sea Control), the ships can have up to 20 AV-8Bs.

Keep in mind that the USS Ford is the class leader for a new class of large aircraft carriers and a substantial part of the $16 billion is all the upfront engineering and research and development cost that won’t be expended for later ships of the class.

Among other things that you don’t get with the “smaller” LHA/LHD option is the aviation fuel bunker and the bomb/missile magazine capacity of the latest “full size” aircraft carriers. You also don’t get the very sizable aviation ordnance, fuel, and maintenance divisions needed to keep up with around the clock, continuous flight operations. All this requires space for things and space for people that only the big bird farms can supply. An interesting operational planning/integration issue will occur when the shorter-ranged Marine squadrons are periodically deployed aboard CVBGs as part of routine air group squadron rotations. As is often pointed out, Marines may fly the aircraft but the Navy pays for them.

One last point, during full scale war against a capable naval adversary (something we haven’t had to do for awhile), the Amphibious Squadrons and Groups that LHAs and LHDs are part of will require continuous air, surface, and subsurface protection. They must have outside escort. By contrast, a carrier battle group (CVBG) is a complete offensive package that can defend itself and others when called upon.

“A fact that also applies to the F-35. A substantial part of the cost is for upfront engineering on a new product. Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.”

I thought you were complaining about the high cost of the carrier. Compared to the developmental cost of the F-35, developing the USS Ford was really dirt cheap. Just acquiring four squadrons (48 aircraft) of F-35C ($337 million each) cost as much as the USS Ford including its development costs.

Here’s a link claimimg to detail the actual cost of the F-35 aircraft.

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/how-much-does-an-f-35-actually-cost-21f95d239398#.erx831rq8

Note that the costs given at the link are delivered costs not the airframe cost minus the engine.

I used this link for basic specifications on the F-35:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning_II

To give some perspective, here is a comparison of the cost of various models of the F-35 with precious metals (prices as of 14 Mar 2016) and other expensive things:

Gold: $1236/ounce
Platinum: $948/ounce
F-35C: $605/ounce (@$337 million per aircraft)
Palladium: $570/ounce
F-35B: $485/ounce (@$251 million per aircraft)
F-35A: $317.89/ounce (@$148 million per aircraft.)

(Accusations of cooking the books on the F-35A price to make the Air Force program look good.)

Classic Grey Sevruga Caviar: $180/ounce
Chateau lafite Rothschild 2003 Bordeaux: $47/ounce
Silver: $15.35/ounce
USS Gerald R. Ford: $5.46/ounce (including $4.7 billion R&D costs); $4.00/ounce ($12.8 billion ship acquisition cost only)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Gerald_R._Ford

My question is what is it about the F-35 that makes it so fantastically expensive? You could by 17,000 lbs of GOLD for the cost of one F-35C. (BTW, the cost driver isn’t the engine.)

“One last point, during full scale war against a capable naval adversary (something we haven’t had to do for awhile), the CVNs will require continuous air, surface, and subsurface protection.”

That’s what the rest of the CVBG is for. The primary weapon of an aircraft carrier is its attack aircraft. It carries only short range defensive guns, missiles and countermeasures. BTW, the requirement that a CVBG be provided to defend the aircraft carrier has been known to the Navy since it started building carriers.

As the nature of the threat changes, so do the CVBG’s defensive systems. Right now the big threat appears to be the Chinese carrier killer ballistic missiles, Russian high speed Shkval torpedo, and supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles from multiple countries. To counter the missiles, the US Navy has an anti-ballistic missile variant of the Standard Missile (fielded) and the Mach 7 Rail Gun (in development).

I don’t know what specific countermeasure the Navy is going to ultimately adopt against the Shkval (and similar high speed torpedoes) but I’m sure they are not sitting on their hands. Got a feeling it centers around making the wartime lives of Russian and Chinese submariners very short and terrifyingly exciting.

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