Posted on 06/11/2006 9:13:18 AM PDT by MARKUSPRIME
F-22 proves dominance in Northern Edge 2006 exercise.
I thought I was going to see a house cleaned.
Bahahaha!!! Look at all that "Christmas Tree" ordnance. The Raptor is "clean" with everthing stored internally until it's ready to fire. That enhances stealth capability. That Su-30 will be seen and hit before it knows something else is out there.
No stealth features whatsoever. You can't hit what you can't see, and the F-22 is going to clean the SU-30MK's clock whenever they meet in combat.
Let's see ... the appropriately numbered F-16 costs about $16 million. The F-18 is considerably more expensive, but also with greater capabilities, and costs, let's say $48 million. The F-22, current estimate, costs $100 to $200 million per, depending on the number being produced.
The F-16 is a superb plane, in high demand in the global marketplace, and is a tremendous bargain compared to the F-22. The F-22 is just this side of the B-1, as expensive planes go. And, while the Air Force finally got it into its thick head that the B-1 is just too expensive to replace the B-52, it is still salivating over the F-22.
So what if the F-22 dominates the sky one-on-one? What if it is attacked by five planes having the capability of the F-16; would it even carry enough air-to-air missiles to defend itself?
The justification of the F-22 is that we can use an air-dominant plane in a confrontation with a small but militarily-current power, which has maybe one squadron of F-16 type planes. What country are we talking about? Perhaps Venezuela. In this case, we can take out their fast-movers with little risk of losing one of our own.
In this scenario, the work of taking out their ground-based air defenses and other strategic targets, and the work of supporting ground operations would be left to F-16s (and the joint strike fighter, when it comes on board).
Realistically, this means we only need one squadron of F-22s (which we already have or have contracted for), and that this squadron would have to be considered a special DoD asset. The F-22 is a boutique weapon, way too expensive to constitute the stuff of our main line fighter squadrons.
Nice plane, innit? Be a shame if sum'ting bad should happen to it.
In the immortal words of our own Pukin Dog - "it's a piece of crap" - I think that about sums it up.
I know .. but it's typical of Russian philosophy - having all that ordnance in sight is supposed to scare us .. I guess ..??
No wonder they lost the cold war.
Unlikely at any time on planet earth. After first day of combat--zero probability.
No, the whole premise is silly and it's very badly written. I'm the senior officer here and I haven't had a funny line yet. So I'm stopping it.
The F22 is probably one of the last manned fighters. I think what you'll see is that these $100 M fighters will be used for recon missions and as tools to 'send in the drones' - Which cost perhaps $2M each.
20 drones will even up 5 to 1 odds quite nicely, particularly when the other guy never gets to see the F22 that sic's the drones on them.
They had us by the short ones until we stole their precious Firefox:
LOL!! :-)
It would be interesting to see a dollar for dollar comparison. (I know, trained pilots and ground crew support are expensive, but let's just look at the planes). 2 F-22's at $130 mm each. 14 or 15 F-16 at $16mm each. Who wins?
Now, if indeed over a dozen F-16s are superior to a pair of F-22's, that doesn't mean the F-22 shouldn't be built. But it is an interesting thought exercise.
But we also should keep in mind that there are other tangible costs...for instance, I don't know whether a pair of F-22s or 14 F-16s win in air to air...but I can guarantee that the 14 F-16s can do more/better CAS and interdiction.
Blank -- your cost figures are way short. It's not just the cost of the airplanes, it's also the crews and infrastructure to keep 'em flying sorties.
IF you have 5 times as many f-16s, you need (roughly) 5 times as much support, and certainly 5 times as many skilled pilots, controllers, etc.
Don't just compare costs of the airframes.
I hate Flashplayer. Any direct links to videos?
Realistically, I'd like to see wellfare cut 25%, so we can have 1000 of these babies. Make that 26% so the 5 channel surround sound cockpit option can be ordered also...
Has the price of F-16's, F-18's, etc dropped (with/without inflation) over their life spans? Where is the F-22 pricewise compared to the F-16 when it was first introduced?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.