Free Republic

The United States Navy's F/A-XX fighter is expected to receive almost full funding, NavalNews.com reported on Monday. It comes as a compromise in the Fiscal Year 2024 (FY24) National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) to fund a special access program (SAP) believed to be for the next-generation stealth fighter. Earlier this year, the House Armed Service Committee had cut $1.1 billion from the Link Plumeria line, citing "unjustified requirements." The U.S. Navy had requested $2.1 billion for Link Plumeria in its budget request for FY2024. However, the current version of the bill cut just $50 million from Project 2937, which is...

The pilot who ejected from a $100 million F-35 fighter jet claimed to have lost the plane in the weather — and likely bailed out before he could activate its tracking system, sources and experts said. “He’s unsure of where his plane crashed, said he just lost it in the weather,” a voice can be heard saying of the pilot on a Charleston County Emergency Medical Services call posted Tuesday by a meteorologist. The unidentified pilot landed in a North Charleston residential neighborhood and was taken to a local hospital for treatment. He has since been discharged. Military officials have...

The U.S. Navy has begun to make plans to recover the F-35C fighter jet that crashed Monday after striking the deck of an aircraft carrier in the South China Sea. The jet is the most advanced stealth fighter jet in the world and would have made an enticing target for China if it had attempted to recover it from the depths of the Pacific Ocean. The crash of one of the most advanced fighter jets in the world into international waters had fueled speculation that the U.S. Navy might quickly launch a salvage operation to prevent other foreign powers, especially...

A fighter jet has crashed while attempting to land on the USS Carl Vinson in the South China Sea, injuring at least seven crew members, the U.S. Navy says. The pilot safely ejected. The accident happened on Monday when the F-35C Lightning II aircraft was attempting to land on the deck of the USS Carl Vinson, which is carrying out routine flight operations in the South China Sea. A statement from the U.S. Navy said the pilot safely ejected from the aircraft and was later recovered by a U.S. military helicopter, but 7 service members were injured, including 4 sailors...

<p>By Richard Bitzinger, an independent international security analyst. He was previously a senior fellow with the Military Transformations Program at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) in Singapore.</p><p>How good is China’s most advanced fighter jet, the J-20? The J-20 is a “fifth-generation” combat aircraft, which ostensibly puts it in the same league as the U.S. F-22 and F-35.</p>

On April 26, Xinhua, the mouthpiece of the communist regime, published an article to commemorate a Chinese carrier-based J-15 fighter jet pilot, who died in an accident as a result of his jet’s electronic control system malfunctioning during a landing; the article inadvertently revealed the weakness of the carrier’s combat capabilities. There have always been doubts about the true capability of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) aircraft carriers and their carrier-based J-15 pilot training. This unprecedented report appears more of an attempt to restore public confidence, as the CCP’s media rarely publicizes such accidents involving the military. In fact, the...

China borrows a page from America’s TOP GUN book A J-10 and a Su-30 took off from an airfield in East China's Zhejiang Province and engaged a 'bad guy' fighter group by Dave Makichuk December 16, 2020 I wouldn’t exactly call it “TOP GUN” school, but Chinese fighter pilots are learning valuable dog-fighting techniques by taking on “hostile” jet fighters in mock combat. According to China Central Television (CCTV), in a session at dusk, a J-10 and a Su-30 took off from an airfield in East China’s Zhejiang Province, and engaged a “bad guy” fighter jet group consisting of two...

When something isn’t very good, someone may joke that it’s still “good enough for government work.” Maybe the thinker who coined that expression had the F-35 program in mind.The F-35 (also known as the Joint Strike Fighter) is a military jet that was supposed to be able to do it all. The program was started in the 1990s with the intention that it could serve the Air Force, the Navy and the Marines and their various mission needs with only minimal changes to the initial platform. That would deliver cost savings across decades as one jet replaced (at least)...

Do you have dreams of buzzing the control tower after a day of barrel-rolling and air-to-air training against those goons on the red team, and then hopping on your hog and cruising to the beach so you can douse yourself in tanning oil and play a spirited game of volleyball — while maintaining eye contact with your buddies for far too long? Now, you can make those dreams a reality thanks to the folks over at Platinum Fighters: For a cool $4 million, they’ll sell you your very own F-4 Phantom II. The Phantom McDonnell Douglas F4H-1F Phantom II Bu.145310...

The F-35 is an absolute disaster, and it needs to go. The scandals around it are legion. The supersonic stealth plane called F-35 Joint Strike Fighter was supposed to be the greatest and best military plane the world has ever seen. While the United States' stealthy F-22 is an "air superiority" plane, ensuring the country's dominance over the skies, which is why exporting it is illegal, the F-35 was supposed to be able to do everything, and be the standard fighter-bomber of the U.S. and most countries with which the U.S. has friendly relations. It was supposed to be stealthy,...

A Russian fighter jet, carrying out operations against the terrorist organization “Islamic State”, was shot down in Syria, Turkish newspaper Haber7 reported citing sources in the Syrian opposition. Reportedly, the Russian fighter jet was shot down in the Ghouta region of the Syrian capital of Damascus.

Did You Know that American advanced F-14 Tom Cat Fighter Jets, helped to keep Ayatollah Khomeini in Power during the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s? When Iran was under the pro-American Shah of Iran, America sold 79 F-14 Tom Cats to Iran in 1974-1978. The world's most experienced combat pilots in the F-14 are Iranians. According to Wikipedia: "...In 1980, an Iranian F-14 shot down an Iraqi Mil Mi-25 helicopter for its first air-to-air kill during the Iran–Iraq War. According to research by Tom Cooper, within the first six months of the war Iranian F-14s scored over 50 air-to-air victories,...

The US has lodged a formal protest with Beijing after a Chinese fighter jet conducted a barrel roll "very, very close" over an American Navy plane this week, the Pentagon has said. Rear Admiral John Kirby said the Chinese plane exposed its undercarriage to show that it was armed to the P-8 anti-submarine warfare aircraft during Monday's incident in international airspace near Japan. He said the Chinese aircraft came within 30ft (9 metres) of the American plane, while the wing tips of the two aircraft were just 20ft apart.

A spokesperson for police in the district of Hochsauerlandkreis in the German Federal State of Nordrhein Westfalen, reported the accident. The German armed forces and a spokesperson for the German Air Force confirmed for the magazine Spiegel Online.de and the daily Bild, that the military plane was a German Air Force Eurofighter.

This site exists to inspire all Canadians that given how much money we spend on taxes that we should mandate that if we as Canadians are going to spend tens of billions of dollars for new aircraft to patrol the blue sky of Canada, then we should build them here. We have the engineering depth as a nation, we have the skilled professionals that can and should come together to manufacture the new Super Arrow or build the Arrow as submitted by Bourdeau Industries.. With the hundreds of millions we have invested into the development of the F-35 JSF, Canada...

New Chinese Stealth Fighter Photos Emerge By Bethany Whitfield / Published: Sep 20, 2012 The new Chinese stealth fighter, believed to be the J-21. Photos of what appears to be a new Chinese stealth fighter recently surfaced on the Internet, triggering a flood of speculation regarding the jet’s potential capabilities and what implications it holds for the evolution of Chinese military air power. The single-seat, twin-engine fighter has been designated as the J-21 or the J-31, and is the product of Shenyang Aircraft Corp.

The head of India's Aeronautical Development Agency yesterday revealed key details of the roadmap for development of the proposed indigenous medium combat aircraft (MCA) in an interview with Flight Daily News. ADA will complete a feasibility study on the MCA by the end of 2011. The study will be submitted to the Indian government and air force, and discuss key aspects of the programme, says PS Subramanyam, programme director at the ADA. The study will consider several areas: the number of MCA prototypes, prototype timelines, funding, and production schedules for the final aircraft. "The MCA will be in flight trials...

The first single-seat instrumented production Eurofighter (IPA4) has completed 500 hours of air time, Cassidian Spain announced. The multinationally produced aircraft "pioneers the most advanced technology within the Eurofighter program" for acceptance and subsequent entry into service with national air forces, following a functional upgrade from the original Tranche 1 standard to the more modern Tranche 2, the company said. Test plans for the aircraft include in-flight verification of the communication function and the MIDS data link system, which exchanges information with other components of the combat network, as well as integration trials and the launching of air-to-surface weapons.

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program took up a lot of real estate in the national and international press and trade media in 2010, and the critical attention will continue into 2011. The sheer size of the program to supply the U.S. military and partner nations with a stealthy and relatively affordable strike fighter, coupled with questions about prime contractor Lockheed Martin’s ability to stick to the schedule and meet cost targets, makes it the No. 1 target of industry speculation. The JSF program, currently in its system development and demonstration (SDD) phase, includes three different variants: the conventional takeoff...

former Ukranian MiG-29 fighter has become the second privately owned MiG-29 to fly, taking to the air over Washington six years after it left Eastern Europe. Capable of speeds of Mach 2.2 and altitudes of nearly 60,000ft, the Mikoyan Gurevich MiG-29 “Fulcrum” is a far cry from the 1927-57 vintage airplanes that Historic Flight Foundation specializes in restoring. However, the opportunity to work on something so different was an irresistible lure to John Sessions, the founder of Historic Flight, who wanted to verify that a complex high-performance aircraft could be restored by following the same rules and guidelines as a...