Death Spiral - USAF Acquisition Strategy

The Merge - Blog ^ | 4/13/2024 | The Merge

[Portcall24]

The US Air Force may be the largest in the world, but to borrow a line from Toby Keith (R.I.P), it just ain’t as good as it once was.

[Portcall24]

This year, the flying branch plans to divest 250 aircraft, leaving it with less than 5,000 aircraft—the lowest in its history since it split from the Army after World War II. For reference, the service had ~9,000 aircraft when Desert Storm was fought and ~6,200 aircraft when 9/11 happened.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

But it’s bringing a B1 Lancer out of mothballs for refurbishment. So +1.

[T.B. Yoits]

This is manpower shortage, as well as the problem of the country being $34 trillion in debt.

[The Sons of Liberty]

The US Air Force may be the largest in the world, but to borrow a line from Toby Keith (R.I.P), it just ain’t as good as it once was.

But Hey, it's the most WOKE!

[sauropod]

.

[pfflier]

The bean counters always think that we have such a technological edge that less is sufficient. ,

That edge has dissipated if not totally disappeared but the delusion continues. There are just not enough assets to cover all of the mission requirements in a high intensity war.

Lose a squadron of F-22s or B-1s over time in a hot war, and you have effectively lost any qualitative advantage.

[BobL]

“This year, the flying branch plans to divest 250 aircraft”

Glad we don’t have any hot spots with major military powers lurking in our future...

[Bonemaker]

Probably only 300 pilots is the problem.

[Colorado Doug]

But how many planes do they identify as having?

[daniel1212]

This year, the flying branch plans to divest 250 aircraft, leaving it with less than 5,000 aircraft—the lowest in its history since it split from the Army after World War II. For reference, the service had ~9,000 aircraft when Desert Storm was fought and ~6,200 aircraft when 9/11 happened. p span[style*="font-size"] { line-height: 1.6; }

This follows other cuts: they tried to divest 310 aircraft in 2023 and 250 aircraft in 2022.

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And it ain’t over yet.

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This is part of a bigger plan to divest 1,469 aircraft from 2023 to 2027. For perspective, that’s equal to the entire air forces of the UK, Australia, and Japan—combined. That wouldn’t be so bad if they were being replaced…but the Air Force is only buying ~400 aircraft over the same timeframe, which is a 1,000-aircraft net negative for those who don’t do math.

[DesertRhino]

When looking at individual aircraft choices (e.g., the decrepit F-15C fleet), these are (mostly) very reasonable, palatable, and defensible decisions.

The F-15C has never been shot down in combat. Unprecedented in the history of combat aircraft. But ok, “decrepit”.

[delta7]

Using Biblical reference as to what is happening in the US.
1) the corrupted, Godless leader is always exposed, as we are seeing.
2) The corrupted , immoral leadership takes “ Pride” in spreading their anti- God and filthy mindset.
3) The corrupted nation’s military deteriorates into a weakened state.
4) The corrupted nation’s wealth is taken away.

We are witnessing all four, and many more.

Of course, those not schooled in Biblical history and doctrine will never see it…..
But Christians do.

[delta7]

I will add, the ungodly will never see it, for “ it is not given for them to see”.

[DesertRhino]

Not to mention how many times a squadron has been destroyed on the ground. Puerto Rican terrorists destroyed a squadron of A-7s on the ground. The Taliban destroyed several Harriers in a raid.

Low tech attacks on bases are a thing.

[Captainpaintball]

I would take, on a neutral theoretical battlefield, 1991’s army against today’s.

[Jacquerie]

<>6,200 aircraft when 9/11 happened<>

Happened?

Uh, when the sons of Satan, muslims, killed thousands of American civilians.

[Bob Wills is still the king]

Stealth is the only technology that provides any safety in a modern air combat environment. The F-15 is a wonderful aircraft, but it doesn’t have any stealth capability. That’s why the F-22 and F-35 are far superior to any Gen 4 fighter, including the Mig 29 and SU-27.

Only the US, Russia, and China have Gen 5 fighters. Everything else is just a target now.

[DesertRhino]

The 35 Moonpig has some frontal stealth, but it’s far from a stealth. From 3/4th of aspects, it’s not stealth. Hang missiles or tanks on it, it’s not stealth. if it gets caught in daylight, it cannot prevail against an F-16, a MiG-29 etc. It cannot outrun, out accelerate, out turn any Gen 4.

22 is pretty dang good, but we only have 186 of them IF they are all operational that day. Most of the tooling to build new ones was destroyed. We have about 120 in an operational capacity.

Stealth is a losing game except in the opening days. Gen 4 and 4.5 is still very relevant. It is doomed to fail in the battle of airframe vs sensors.

[DesertRhino]

And the Su-57 and J-20 with those stealthy canards are not in the same class. There are 22 Su-57s in service and a handful of 20s.
Our 15s are far from useless.

[GOPJ]

Well really if we're at war with China and Iran at the same time - and they've crossed over a million soldiers into our country at the Rio Grande - does it matter if our Air Force has less than 5,000 planes?

Does it matter if they have any planes at all?

The stupid people running the military can still have funding to teach pronouns and sensitivity and "hate yourself if you're white"... And isn't that all that matters?