[ThunderSleeps]

Those developments include likely further slips in the F-35 strike fighter's schedule and an upcoming defense acquisition board review of the F-35 expected to be fraught with bad news on cost.

That would come on the heels of various deficit-cutting proposals that already suggest cutting the F-35 buy.

I have to smile. Only the federal government could look at an aircraft development suffering from cost increases and decide that maybe backstopping it with production of an even more expensive aircraft was a good idea. Who knows, maybe it makes sense, buy one more F-22 and four more F-16s vs the cost of five F-35s???

[ASOC]

Or buy F-15/S/E variants, The USAF have a trained workforce, spares and the platform is a good one.

[djwright]

Most of the cost over runs are the fault of ...wait for it..... the government. And usually the direct result of them trying to save money.

It took 20+ years to get the F-22 in production. Originally they were planning on something like 1500 units, then to save money it was cut to 750, then 375 and the finally the magic number was 187.

To replace something like 1500 f-15s.

Having fewer units to defray the development costs raises the unit cost.

Remember how Obama was going to use the stimulus for “shovel ready jobs” and then they basically admitted there were no “shovel ready jobs”.

Wouldn't extending the F-22 saved some actual jobs. What about the border fence. I can't think of a more shovel ready job.