Posted on 03/29/2010 8:36:16 PM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
Denmark has decided to wait, until 2014, to decide what to replace its elderly F-16 fleet with. Meanwhile, 18 of the F-16s will be retired. But the other 30 will be refurbished so that they can continue to operate for the rest of the decade. Denmark had wanted to replace the F-16s with F-35s. But the F-35 keeps getting delayed (now more than two years behind schedule), and is becoming more expensive (nearly a hundred percent over budget). The Danish F-35 buy is no longer a sure thing. The delays have lots of users concerned. The U.S. Navy has been nervously watching as the costs of the new F-35C and F-35B carrier aircraft versions go up. It comes down to this. Currently, it costs the navy, on average, $19,000 an hour to operate its AV-8 vertical takeoff and F-18C fighter aircraft. It costs 63 percent more to operate the F-35C (which will replace the F-18C) and the F-35B (which will replace the AV-8). These costs include buying the aircraft, training and maintaining the pilots, the aircraft and purchasing expendable items (fuel, spare parts, munitions.) Like the F-22, which recently had production capped at less than 200 aircraft, the capabilities, as superior as they were, did not justify the much higher costs. The F-35, at least for the navy, is headed in the same direction. The navy can go ahead with the more recent F-18E, and keep refurbishing, or even building, the AV-8. Politics, and lobbying by the F-35 manufacturer, will probably keep the F-35 headed for fleet service, no matter what the cost
Cancel this dog and open up the bids!
I think the defense industry will implode on a global basis. Just China, India and a fe wothers will be buying bug ticket defnse items. Suits me because companies like Raytheon and United Technologies are filled with union line scum. they voted for this.
Meanwhile, our fleet of aging F-15 and F-16’s just keep getting older and the Raptor program has been canceled for being “too expensive.”
Swell. Just swell.
We still have the F-15SE and the Super Hornets. Australia’s squadron landed yesterday at RAAF base Amberley.
The table below [1], points to some of the early weight history of the F-35 program.
F-35 Target Weight
*240-1 CY2002 (lbs)*240-2 CY2003(lbs)*240-4 CY2006(lbs)
F-35C___ 30,049________ 30,700________ 32,072 +6.7%
F-35B___ 29,735________ 30,500________ 32,161 +8.2%
F-35A___ 26,500________ 27,100________ 29,036 +9.6%
http://www.f-16.net/news_article2784.html
Very Interesting. Thanks for putting those numbers up.
Boeing is still cranking out F/A-18Fs and F-35 funds can easily be diverted to buying Super Hornets.
The Navy is controlling purchases for the Marine Corps, and the Navy is buying more -E/F-Gs as gap fillers for Navair until the F-35C comes online for itself. It's up to them to determine when Marine air needs its own gap filler.
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Here’s a thought.
Repeal Obamacare. Period-dot.
Delete the Department of Education. All of it. Give’em 2 weeks to clear out their desks, and let them discover the joys of high unemployment, like the rest of us. Sell off all the furnishings and physical plant.
Cut every other Department in the Executive Branch by a minimum of 50%, with favorites like the Dept. of Energy, and the Environmental Protection Agency by 75%, budget and staff.
When these non-constitutional goodies are seriously downsized, we can use the savings to spend on one of the only CONSTITUTIONALLY legitimate Federal programs. You know, Defense.
Then crank up the F22 and F35 lines till they match original targets. (On the F35 A-B-C, stop the mission creep and let LockMart start turnin’ them out)
Get General Dynamics and Ingalls off their dead asses with the LCS’s, and start tuning up the DDG-1000s. Lay down enough Sea Wolves so every carrier group has at least ONE of their very own. A few more Virginia’s would be nice, too. The point here is the enemy of the good is the perfect.
Oh, yeah. Maybe do some fine-tuning to Defense Dept. Procurement, too. Like; Go back to X-Projects, and old-school competetive bidding contracts.
Lord, wouldn’t that put a bug up the @$$es of the ‘Perfumed Princes’ of the Pentagon...
Just gives me the warm fuzzies thinkin’ about it.
—ExIntrepid
"Repeal Obamacare. Period-dot.
"Delete the Department of Education. All of it."
Much as I'd like to see it, none of that is even really necessary.
There are now hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars sloshing around in unspent "economic stimulus," "troubled asset relief" and other Federal bailout funds.
A tiny fraction of these monies would quickly solve any legitimate National Defense budgeting problems.
When we get our ass kicked by China or some other Third World tyranny, we sill see a rising-up by Americans not seen in 100 years.
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