Defense Tech friend and Strategy Page contributor Harold Hutchison sent this quick piece over to us on the Joint Strike Fighter. Ill post it here as food for thought, and we look forward to Harolds next post on aviation and other defense-related subjects.
My two cents on the issue is that I tend to agree with his thesis that the JSF is a good buy given its performance and stealth. What he does not address, however, is the likelihood the cost will climb even further if the programs buy is reduced. Then the cost/performance ratio wont be as compelling as Harolds analysis today.
There’s rumbling in both Congress and the Pentagon that the STOVL version may get dumped, the Navy won’t buy in the numbers they’d previously thought, the Brits may bail…all these events are possible and could throw the value argument out the window. We’ll see. But on the face of it, Harold’s got a pretty good point. Read on…
Is the F-35 overhyped? That is one question that is being asked in light of both American refusal to release the source code for software, as well as the climbing price (up to $63 million per-plane). The real answer depends on what competing aircraft have to offer.
How does the F-35 compare in the air-to-air mission against likely competitors like the French Rafale, the Swedish Gripen, and the multi-national Eurofighter? All of European planes boast some of the best electronics suites that have ever provided for a combat aircraft. All are capable of high speed (over 2,000 kilometers an hour). All three aircraft carry excellent beyond-visual-range missiles (like the Mica, AMRAAM, and Meteor). All are highly maneuverable. But will they be better than the F-35 in a fight?
The answer, surprisingly, is probably not. The F-35 has one big advantage over these three fighters from Europe. Its radar signature, its vulnerability to being picked up on radar, is very low as is the case with the F-117 and F-22. Given that its speed is pretty comparable to the European jets, and its AESA radar is at least as good as the European systems, this is a decisive advantage. The best weapons in the world are useless if they cannot see their targets.
The F-35 will be able to see the Rafale, Gripen, and Eurofighter long before it can be seen itself. The first rule of air combat may be “speed is life”, but the second rule is “lose the sight, lose the fight”. In the 21st century, sight includes radar. It is very likely that the only warning the F-35 may give of its presence will be when its radar has locked on to one of the European fighters. By that point, the F-35 is already close to launching its AMRAAMs.
The cost differential is not as big as one might think, either. The F-35 runs at $63 million (for the most expensive variant), but the Gripen is $50 million per plane, the Rafale runs about $65 million each, and the Typhoon is $58 million. That is not much difference in terms of cost.
In essence, the F-35’s small additional cost gains a huge edge in a fight.
Ultimately, the F-35 does cost a little more than most of its European competition. That said, in a fight, an F-35 is probably a little better than the competition, largely due to its stealth technology. Even then, there will be far more F-35s than the combined total of the planned production runs of the Rafale, Typhoon, and Gripen. In essence, the F-35 is going to have a qualitative edge, and the quantitative edge.
– Christian
{ 33 comments… read them below or add one }
ooooh, I’m gonna make some jet jocks so sad.
You’re passe guys.
“fighters” were supposed to take out bombers, then, included the bombers’ backup fighters.
$60Million plus a copy? to take out mini, multiple, cheaper-by-the-dozen, ALSO STEALTHY!, UCAVs?
sorry guys, the “air war” is all but over. and the Lightning II (what a travesty in a name!) is to damn heavy for effective attack roles.
Fighters are equivalent to battleships nowadays. The end is near, maybe a couple of decades away, yes, but near…..
actually sir, air controll is key to battle victory. those who controll the air gain advantages such as: recon, air strikes, carpet bombs (to take out enemy buildings) and, of course, easier troop deployment and evac with helicopters.
If the STOVL version is dumped then the Marines are in BIG trouble! The Brits can navalize the Typhoon, the Navy can add more F/A-18′s and the other “partner” nations can go shopping…only the Marines have a TRUE stack in the F-35. If it does go down what will they do? I heard something about a supersonic harrier but can’t find any info.
It would seem to me that the carrier based F-35C, and not the F-35B is most in danger. The F-35B has multiple clients including both the U.S. Marines and essentially all of our allies who want to use it on Harrier Carriers (even the USAF has expressed interest).
The F-35C has but one client, the aircraft carrier branch of the U.S. Navy (the military service, not department), that joined the effort reluctantly, and in the F-18 has the newest of the current generation of fighter aircraft. Also, unlike other services, the U.S. Navy has big competition for big procurement dollars — it must choose between aircraft and ships, while the Marines and Air Force have fewer truly big ticket purchases available.
If the Navy wants stealth, moreover, it may be inclined to leapfrog directly to the production version of the X-47 which is currently in development and will be ready in time for an F-18 replacement.
Most discussions of the F-35 ignore that it’s probably the first manned fighter designed from scratch to accept an integral directed energy weapon (or, sensor) suite.
Apart from the F-35′s stealth, that’s a game changer. DEW and/or lidar means if you can see it, you can kill it, and with lidar, you can see just about anything.
There are allegedly some UAVs on the boards that have had DEW capacity planned for from Block 1 onwards, but assuming that unmanned platforms will be better than manned for all forms of directed energy warfare means making assumptions about the size of necessary power generators, and the range of associated beam propagation in the atmosphere. I can’t tell if those assumptions are valid from open sources, but the history of warfare teaches us that sometimes a big gun is better than a small one.
Bottom line: I wouldn’t assume that either legacy airframes or UAVs can do what a DEW armed F-35 is theoretically capable of doing. If DEW doesn’t pan out, it’s still a good bomb truck, whether manned or unmanned.
Pricey? Yes, but let’s be serious: how could the MINC do it any other way?
Sounds like a great fighter but when was the last conflict that saw lots of real air to air combat? Vietnam? Korea?
Australia will buy into this because of ANZUS. I think we could get better value for money elsewhere.
> to damn heavy for effective attack roles
it’s empty weight is only about 1000 lbs more than the A-10 and it’s far lighter than the F-22 or SU-27 family
> The Brits can navalize the Typhoon
but that wouldn’t do them any good since the CVFs don’t include cats (fitted for but not with as they like to claim). Italy also needs the B and it wouldn’t surprise me to see Australia end up with a few
> Sounds like a great fighter but when was the last conflict that saw lots of real air to air combat? Vietnam? Korea?
stealth is VERY handy for ground attack
That sounds like a great article to advertise the F-22, except we’re talking about the F-35. Isn’t the F-35 supposed to be an attack aircraft, not a fighter? If the article was about its ability to bomb targets and provide CAS, then there’s an argument – not its ability to dogfight allied planes.
“DEW and/or lidar means if you can see it, you can kill it, and with lidar, you can see just about anything.”
Um, yeah. Until the bad guys duck behind a cloud.
“Sounds like a great fighter but when was the last conflict that saw lots of real air to air combat? Vietnam? Korea?
Australia will buy into this because of ANZUS. I think we could get better value for money elsewhere.”
As the U.S. continues to undermine its own prestige and influence, it will be interesting to see how much more we can cajole other states into subsidizing Boeing, Lockheed Martin, et al. Particularly when, as you point out, the JSF is a solution in search of a problem. Maybe this white elephant will be the last really big international scam.
“DEW and/or lidar means if you can see it, you can kill it, and with lidar, you can see just about anything.”
Um, yeah. Until the bad guys duck behind a cloud.
————–
They have to know to duck. When the F-35 doesn’t show up on radar, they have no reason to take evasive maneuvering. They have no reason to hide. The enemy pilot decides to randomly position his aircraft so that a cloud is between him and… nothing?
The reason air to air combat has been a very small factor in the last several wars is because we have a monstrous advantage. The Iraqis discovered that your planes are safer sitting on the ground than they are in the air when you fight the US. We want to keep that advantage well into the future, which is why you always want an “overkill” asset like the F-35.
Good Morning Folks,
The devil in the detail here and once again it is the cost of the F-35. The $63million per copy mentioned here is a very low ball estimate. More likely off the assembly line prices when the F-35 finally goes into production will top the $100million mark. Reduced orders from the USN, USAF and Marines will only bring up the costs.
With the reduced threat of the need in today world for theater level air defense and attack air craft and far cheaper alternatives from countries like India it would appear that the market for a $100+milliom F-35 outside of the U.S. is rather limited.
As indicated the X-45 and X-47B are hot on the heels of the F-35 and at the rates that these airframes are meeting there developmental goals they may be ready for prime time before the F-35 at about a quarter of the cost.
ALLONS,
Byron Skinner
“Um, yeah. Until the bad guys duck behind a cloud.”
I’m sorry, dude — I didn’t know lasers were restricted to visible light, or that pulses are subject to the same restrictions as continuous beams. Or that technical problems like that are insoluble.
I guess these people are on the wrong track:
http://www.laserfocusworld.com/display_article/282653/12/ARCHI/none/News/FREE-SPACE-OPTICS:-Laser-link-offers-fiber-quality-through-cloud-cove
The fools. I guess you showed them.
“is to damn heavy for effective attack roles.”
Heavy? Do we go back to using A-4′s?
Lets face it- the fighter is in the twilight of its career- some kind of UAV will replace it-
But for now, we need it- just like we needed battleships in 1940.
The only mistake would be to spend $50 billion on this generation when they probably will be obsolete in 10-15 years.
Since when do we place a bloody price on our freedom? You have to be bigger, faster, stronger, and more committed than your enemy, or you will be defeated. Over the history of modern armament, we have spent untold millions – but as Benjamin Franklin stated, “Vigilance is the eternal price for freedom” – and expensive armament – armament that no one can touch (anyone remember the Abrams A-1 tank?) ensures that freedom. Lets do the math after we win a conflict, not before – then sit around and moan about the costs – we will find it well justified at that point. Finis-
Again dangerous f-35′s…
I am going to come out against the f-35 A deployment. Sure the B (Vtol) and C (navy/carrier) dont really have any good alternative.
Australia is already considering dropping its f-35 buy in favor of f-22′s.
better air combat. better stealth. supercruise.
As for the UCAV situation. Imagine a fleet of drones blanketing the battlespace. each flys itslef. each has AMRAAM’s. a networked radar picture where one or two planes radar systems can provide real time fixes on all planes and missiles in the battlespace. each has a couple of bombs and rockets for use in an antiradiation mode. And they dont need satelites for communications becouse they can each can act as a repeater.
Use the F-22′s and UCAVS to establish air supremacy. At that point such advanced aircraft as the b52 can act as the bomb bus.
F-22′s cost 50% more apiece. After sunk development costs.
“As for the UCAV situation. Imagine a fleet of drones blanketing the battlespace. each flys itslef. each has AMRAAM’s. a networked radar picture where one or two planes radar systems can provide real time fixes on all planes and missiles in the battlespace. each has a couple of bombs and rockets for use in an antiradiation mode. And they dont need satelites for communications becouse they can each can act as a repeater.”
Imagine jedi-ninjas with lightsabers, invisibility cloaks, and anti-gravity jockstraps while you’re at it, because we’re as close to getting those as we are the mythical UAV swarm you mention.
Most of the people championing UAVs are buying into the hype surrounding them. Science fiction is when every military system lives up to its press release. Sure, in 30 years, we may have some awesome UAV tech. But we don’t have it now, and we shouldn’t ditch what we KNOW works for what MIGHT work in the future.
Compared to the Rafale, Gripen, Typhoon amd even the Su-35, the F-35 Lightning II will dominate. I have no doubt of that. As afr as the AESA is concerned, that will not be used to “lock” onto an enemy aircraft anyways, we don’t do that anymore. The AESA will locate and identify the enemy target, by occasionally scanning the aera where the enemy aircraft is expected to travel. After launching an AMRAAM, it flys by an inertial guidance/GPS system to an intercept point with updates provided by the F-35. Once on top of the enemy aircraft, the AMRAAM turns on its radar, and then it is too late.
I worry about the F-35 in that we are selling it to nearly everyone, with some level of stealth built in. I certainly hope we are saving for our aircraft, an added measure of stealth to retain an edge.
I think the UCAV issue is out there at some point in the future. But I am certain we will have the best. They will roam out in front of an F-35, and will act as scouts and archers, finding the enemy and launching our missiles first, while the F-35, probably a two seat version, will control the fight from a distance. They will then sweep the sky of the enemy.
Brian,
“Imagine jedi-ninjas with lightsabers, invisibility cloaks, and anti-gravity jockstraps while you’re at it, because we’re as close to getting those as we are the mythical UAV swarm you mention.”
sure-except that they dont exist. UAVs do exist. Amraam’s do exist. the networked radar view- current production. using uav or ucav as a data relay node- current tech. Antiradiation missiles- old news.
Why we cant get this into a functioning UCAV in 10 years?
I am in the navy and have worked on F-14 Tomcats for about 5 years, and I gotta tell ya, they dont need to make any more aircraft to fill up the flight decks with. Make a few new squadrons of this F-35 and be done with it. It was bad enough they retired probably the best multi-role fighter in the military. Who cares if it was old, but it stood among the rest of the fighters. The Tomcat will never die baby!!!
“Also, how would this mythical UCAV operate? Remote pilot either ties US air power to a local base, or makes CAS, strike, attack, and ATA missions dependent on a satellite constellation. And this would be 1/4 the cost? When a dodgy ASAT rocket could take out our ability to control our strike packages, there’d be tons of cost in asset protection.”
Manned aircraft are MORE dependent on local basing than UCAVs, and also depend on satellite comms. If ASATs are held to negate UCAVs, they also negate manned aircraft. Plus you assume UCAVs are “remote piloted”, which many are not now, and certainly they will be increasingly autonomous in the future.
“Most of the people championing UAVs are buying into the hype surrounding them. Science fiction is when every military system lives up to its press release. Sure, in 30 years, we may have some awesome UAV tech. But we don’t have it now, and we shouldn’t ditch what we KNOW works for what MIGHT work in the future.”
Networked UCAVs with AMRAAM’s ain’t science fiction. It ain’t even 30 years from now. We could do that now, today, if we wanted.
“I think the UCAV issue is out there at some point in the future. But I am certain we will have the best. They will roam out in front of an F-35, and will act as scouts and archers, finding the enemy and launching our missiles first, while the F-35, probably a two seat version, will control the fight from a distance.”
“Hanging back and controlling the fight from a distance” is like what an E-2 or an AWACS should do, not an F-35. Don’t see why you need an expensive, stealthy fighter for this.
F-22s & UAVs. Old dogs & children AND watermelon wine.
Enoch and Aaron: Sadly, Brian is right, and the technologies you describe simply don’t exist in the real world. There are some UAVs that can fly fully autonomously. None are armed. And do you really want a computer programmer to write software to run on some other programmer’s OS, operating on someone else’s hardware, that has fully independent control over self-deploying, ID’ing a target, and engaging? No human control over where it fires an AMRAAM, a dozen SDBs, or a CBU? Even the eggy-ist of eggheads thinks that’s a systematic method to ensure blue-on-blue and civilian casualties like we haven’t seen in 50 years. I think we can write off the presently sci-fi premise of flying Terminator robots as something we won’t see for decades.
And no, crewed aircraft have less need for basing or satellite support than remote piloted aircraft. Remember, you loose your RC toy aircraft when the radio portion of that RC acronym is blocked. So a manned aircraft flies over a mountain range fine, but the RC UCAV looses signal. So we switch to satellite control (which is what we use now for our UAVs) and the weak links are ASAT missiles and signals jamming. Yes, these countermeasures would affect crewed aircraft by cripple GPS guidance systems, taking away satellite data feeds, and dropping the hammer on long-range communication. But the crewed aircraft can fall back on on-board systems because the man in the loop is on-board. The UCAV fleet just falls out of the sky.
I assure you, if the biggest threat Red Team has to face is a drone army, we’re going to see a huge uptick in development and proliferation of agile jammers and cheap ASAT system. I’d only need to hit a couple of sats and intermittently run wide spectrum jamming to cripple the USAF and USN air component. Against the F-35, I need a huge network of redundant and tightly spaced tripple digit SAMs. Which defense / offense can our potential adversaries afford to field.
And let’s not forget that our premiere armed UAVs are essentially remote control COIN aircraft. Or to put it another way, they are satellite controlled airframes on par with the Beech/Pilatus T-6. What we have in the air now is not in the same category as a multi-role fighter.
Again, someday UCAVs will have a great role to play in air power. But first we’ve got to get them working as test articles. Then we have to make one field ready. Then we need to test the everloving snot out of it. Then we can deploy it in an ancillary capacity and use it. Only then would we be in a position to decide that maybe we would want to bet the farm on UCAVs.
Not right now, though. Real weapon systems are required right now, not research projects.
Personally,I’d have chosen the F-23 Black Widow over the F-22 Raptor.For those who say “the Air Force CHOSE the F-22,not the F-23,” I say,so what,the Air Force CHOSE the H-47 for their CSAR-X helicopter & look how many people are having a fit over that.
Oh yeah,I thought we were not going to export the F-22 Raptor,so how is Australia going to get it,through espionage?
Ahzee, that’s an impressive list of straw man arguments.
The argument is not that the UCAV is going to open fire fully autonomously – although there WILL be situations where you will want it to do that. The UCAV will find the target and ask the operator for permission to engage. That does not take a lot of bandwidth, and you don’t even necessarily need a satellite for that (another UAV can do comms relay).
Relying on external information and control is also something that manned aircraft, right now, have to do. Manned aircraft simply do not fly out and “autonomously” find and engage targets without reference to any other aircraft or controllers. They rely heavily on others for information and usually also for permission to fire, as we have seen in Kosovo, Iraq, and Afghanistan. So, if the C2 network is “down” because of enemy intereference, the manned aircraft are just as crippled as unmanned – they will not be able to conduct their missions, and they are pretty much coming home. If ASATs are held to defeat UCAVs, then they also defeat manned aircraft.
“crewed aircraft have less need for basing or satellite support than remote piloted aircraft. Remember, you loose your RC toy aircraft when the radio portion of that RC acronym is blocked. So a manned aircraft flies over a mountain range fine, but the RC UCAV looses signal.”
This is so profoundly ignorant it’s amazing. UAVs are not “lost” – they do not go haywire and crash – when they lose radio contact.
“the crewed aircraft can fall back on on-board systems because the man in the loop is on-board. The UCAV fleet just falls out of the sky.”
Once again, manned aircraft that lose connectivity don’t just proceed on their merry way like Slim Pickens searching for the nearest target of opportunity. That’s especially true if they’re trying to find and kill mobile targets. A manned aircraft without connectivity is basically useless in a mobile target hunt – it will probably dump its bombs on the nearest fixed target and go home (which is something a UCAV could also easily do). The way we fight air wars today requires real-time communications for all types of aircraft, and if we don’t have that, then both manned and unmanned aircraft are screwed.
“if the biggest threat Red Team has to face is a drone army, we’re going to see a huge uptick in development and proliferation of agile jammers and cheap ASAT system. I’d only need to hit a couple of sats and intermittently run wide spectrum jamming to cripple the USAF and USN air component.”
Nobody is arguing that Red will have to face only or even mostly UCAVs, so this is another absurd straw man. Yet if this type of Red counter actually worked the way you think it would, it would also cripple an air force consisting only of manned aircraft. If you could completely stop enemy satellite and radio communications, then enemy manned aircraft might be able to get to your airspace, but they couldn’t do anything once they got there except maybe hit some fixed targets (but again, a UCAV without comms could also do that). To find and attack mobile targets with manned aircraft that received NO target info from external sources would, among other things, require an unaffordably vast number of aircraft. So this is not an argument that only defeats UCAVs.
“Against the F-35, I need a huge network of redundant and tightly spaced tripple digit SAMs.”
You need robust IADS to stop UCAVs even more than you need them to stop manned aircraft! The F-35 is much more vulnerable to such an IADS than is a stealthy UCAV.
“let’s not forget that our premiere armed UAVs are essentially remote control COIN aircraft.”
Well heck, our premiere manned aircraft are also being used for COIN right now, so what exactly is your point here?
It is dishonest to compare today’s purportedly crappy UAVs against tomorrow’s purportedly awesome manned aircraft. During the lifespan of the F-35, our “premiere” UAVs are going to get a whole lot better. That is the comparison we should be making – cost and operational effectiveness of UCAVs vs. fighters over the next couple of decades, not based on today’s capabilities.
“someday UCAVs will have a great role to play in air power. But first we’ve got to get them working as test articles. Then we have to make one field ready. Then we need to test the everloving snot out of it. Then we can deploy it in an ancillary capacity and use it.”
This is ALREADY BEING DONE. UAVs have been not only tested, but fielded and used in ancillary capacities. Meanwhile, more advanced UCAV test / demo programs are moving forward.
“Only then would we be in a position to decide that maybe we would want to bet the farm on UCAVs.”
Nobody says we should “bet the farm” on UCAVs so this is another irrelevant straw man.
“Not right now, though. Real weapon systems are required right now, not research projects.”
We already have real unmanned weapons systems that have great utility in the conflicts we’re in right now. If you argue that we should kill all development programs that have no relevance to our current conflicts, absolutely first on the chopping block should be the F-35 and F-22. It makes no sense at all to argue that we’ll need the F-35 and F-22 in future conflicts but we shouldn’t bother with UCAV R&D because advanced UCAVs are not relevant to our present conflicts. If we need to develop the F-35 and F-22 “right now”, then we absolutely need to develop advancedd UCAVs “right now”.
Not for nothing, but why can’t the F-35 be used as a UCAV, too?
And, as far as manned vs. unmanned goes, what’s wrong with hedging your bets?
Are those prices correct I thought the EF and rafale were 40 million euros or pounds plus.
Are they threatening to cancel F-35? It just proves that this whole procurement charade is just one big con on all of us. Why argue the merits,for or against,on a weapon system that experience has taught us(Comanche,Crusader,ARH,9th Infantry Division experiment,FCS) never gets put into use? Okay,so we have a few Ospreys & F-22 Raptors(I’ll admit,I’m shocked that the military industrial complex let these two actually get built).We might as well argue about the practicality of the Starship Enterprise & phasers,because right,these other “proposed” weapon systems are nothing more than “science fiction.”
F-22 and F-35 are the wave of the future. Working passively, interactively and out of band with AESA radars, ESM receivers and IR trackers, if these aircraft are airborne they own the skies. On top of that, they match or exceed the maneuverability of any CAT V fighter. Watch the new Raptor airshow – no other aircraft can tailslide followed by a backward flip. At one point he is “flying” at over 90 degrees AOA – I use the flying term loosely – because the wing isn’t making lift – he is positioning that nose with brute vectored thrust.
http://www.f22-raptor.com/media/video_gallery/videos/F22_AirShow_Langley.wmv
This is the wave fo the future – high altitude, supersonic stealth cruising that owns the battlefield with the sensors and networks on the platforms to put the weapons on target before the platforms are detected.
“Enoch, I don’t think you know the definition of a straw man argument. It’s not that I am selecting absurdly weak points in the UCAV debate to argue against. It’s just that the UCAV arguments here in the comments thread are absurdly weak.”
I absolutely know what a straw man is. A straw man is when you deliberately misrepresent the opponent’s position and then “refute” the misrepresentation. When you said “I think we can write off the presently sci-fi premise of flying Terminator robots” that was a straw man, and when you said, “if the biggest threat Red Team has to face is a drone army,” that was also a straw man, because saying that the US is going to have primarily flying Terminator robots is a complete misrepresentation of the pro-UCAV position. It is also a straw man to say “we’re not going to bet the farm on UCAVs” because those who advocate UCAVs do not argue for “betting the farm” on UCAVs. If you are going to attack pro-UCAV arguments, at least present them fairly and sensibly.
“First, having a man in the loop remotely… you seem to want to have it both ways. To paraphrase: ‘Sometimes you’d want autonomous weapons release, and even if you didn’t, it’s no big deal. After all, manned aircraft deal with pull back and push forward, frequently from CONUS. So no biggie.’”
Your claim was that we shouldn’t use robots with “fully independent control” to attack targets without human control. My argument is that the vast majority of the time, that will not be the way UCAVs will operate, but nonetheless there will be *some* scenarios where you will want to do that. This is not “having it both ways”, it is a thing called “nuance.” We need not make a black and white choice between “robots will always under human control” and “robots will always be fully independent”, because we can adjust the level of UCAV autonomy to reflect the needs of the particular conflict. This should not be terribly controversial, since we also adjust the amount of autonomy human pilots have to reflect the needs of particular conflicts (via giving them different Rules of Engagement).
“Yeah, um, that whole thing our two-stars and up have gotten in the habit of doing is a fantastically bad idea. You know, riding shotgun over a satellite link and getting in the middle of every trigger pull? It’s not good, but when we have complete air and communication dominance, we can get away with a lot.”
Yeah, um, and that’s the way we fight now, and that’s the way we’re going to fight in the future. You know, connected via a network, and stuff?
“Yes, we like remote communication, and yes we have been getting more and more dependent on them. But with a man in the loop, we aren’t completely dependent on a radio signal in order to be able to prosecute a contact.”
If you think manned aircraft are going to fight effectively without radio C2 and tactical data links, you’re profoundly ignorant. Everything we do now, and everything we plan to do in the future, is based on the assumption that we will have this connectivity. We simply are not going to be able to prosecute any conflicts if we don’t have it. If we have it, both manned and unmanned aircraft will be able to operate effectively. If we don’t have it, neither will.
“I meant that if you loose connectivity, you loose the damn things.”
Lose. Lose. Lose. NOT loose.
“They aren’t available to do anything to help you if you can’t control them. They’ll fly their little preprogrammed racetrack, come home, and land. Heck, they might even refuel midair! But guns on target, not so much. I meant ‘falls out of the sky’ in terms of returning uselessly on auto-land, rather than successfully executing a mission.”
Manned aircraft won’t successfully execute their missions if you can’t control them, either. They will do “something” – but it won’t be successfully completing the mission. They’ll bore their little holes in the sky as the pilot tries to make out a target with his Mk I eyeball, and then they’ll run out of gas and have to come home. They will not put bombs on many useful targets. Most likely they’ll just jettison their ordnance in the sea before they return to base.
“However, stealthy UCAVs don’t exist now.”
Yes, they do. The X-45 is as “real” as the F-35. The X-47 will land on a carrier before the F-35C does.
“You claim I am unfairly comparing current crappy UAVs against a future piloted aircraft. I disagree. The F-35A is flying now, and the production line is running at LRIP today. It’s current.”
The X-45 and X-47 are equally “current.” They could be produced just as fast as the F-35. That they are not is a matter of choice, not a matter of technological immaturity. There is every reason to believe that follow-on UCAVs will be even better.
“And yes, we are using F-15s for COIN missions. It is intellectualy dishonest of you to make the suggestion that that means there’s no difference between a T-6 and a strike fighter, or that my argument is flawed in some way.”
Since I did not suggest there’s no difference between a T-6 and a strike fighter, no such intellectual dishonesty exists.
“You know full well that the best armed UAV in production today is generations away from last generation’s crewed aircraft. And that’s the point, and the only point.”
That is not at all the only point! And even if one accepts it, it is a stupid point. Manned fighters are designed to do different things from UAVs, and of course they do some things better than UAVs. Other things they do not do as well as UAVs – even today’s UAVs. If the best armed UAVs today are so crappy compared to crewed aircraft, why is the Air Force deploying them and using them in large numbers? Why don’t they just send more manned fighters to Iraq? Why is the Army clamoring for armed UAVs? The fact is that current UCAVs have great utility and future UCAVs will have even greater utility. They will be as good as the F-35 for some missions long before you think they will be ready.
“And that brings us to the real point of all of this, which was in answer to the question of the article: Is the F-35 worth buying?”
No, the real question is HOW MANY F-35s should be bought. Should the planned buy be reduced, and some of that money be diverted to UCAVs? In my view, clearly yes.
“Well, we can’t wait for an optimistic 10 years to start replacing aging fighters.”
Why not? We have a large surplus of manned fighters and no air-to-air threat whatsoever.
“We certainly can’t wait 20 years.”
Heck, the Air Force is willing to wait until 2037 to replace its bombers, why can’t it wait 20 years to replace its fighters?
“I still haven’t heard any realistic assessment for the US to stop using fighter aircraft, so we need to buy something.”
Another straw man! Nobody says the US is going to stop using fighters. Yet the conclusion does not follow that we need to buy a lot more fighters now to the exclusion of any UCAVs or even long-range manned systems.
“Now, I think you can make reasonable arguments for purchasing F-16 Block60s , F/A-18E/Fs, or (less rationally) a whole lot more F-22As. Those are in production now, so those make some sense.”
You can also make the case for buying many fewer F-35s than planned (since USAF modernization plans are clearly unbalanced in favor of buying more manned fighters) and purchasing UCAVs instead.
“”Nobody says we should “bet the farm” on UCAVs so this is another irrelevant straw man.” Well, the topic at hand is ‘do we need to buy the F-35.’ If you think we should use a UCAV, it would be replacing the A/OA-10, the F-16, the F/A-18, the A/V-8B, and the Gr.9. So yeah, that’s betting the farm.”
UCAVs could certainly replace – today! – the “bomb dropper” missions that these aircraft do. What fraction of these current aircraft fleets is devoted to the air superiority mission? Not a lot, but that’s the fraction that the F-35 should replace. We’re not going to replace all those aircraft one-for-one with F-35s anyway, so there is no reason to believe a significant fraction of them could not be replaced with UCAVs.
“Again, feel free to argue about which of the above airframes should be re-winged, re-engined, and updated to remain in service for another 10-20 years. But don’t tell me that replacing them with a UCAV that hasn’t flown yet isn’t betting the farm.”
UCAVs flew five years ago (X-45) and will fly in 2009 (X-47) so the idea that UCAV technology is too immature for serious consideration is balderdash.
“The only tactical missions not mentioned on the above list would be heavy bombing and air superiority. That’s a pretty good farm, as I see it.”
UCAVs could do “heavy bombing” – in fact they’d be a better choice for the Air Force’s next bomber than a manned aircraft. They could not do air superiority – though they could certainly contribute to it (think “stealthy AMRAAM barge”). They could most definitely do close air support and SEAD/DEAD.
“I see a lot of confused about the difference between development and deployment. I vociferously argue in favor of UCAV R&D. It’s just that the US needs for a strike aircraft are more pressing that the 10-20 year timeline we can expect from that research program. And we need so very many different mission requirements filled, I feel it would be incredibly irresponsible to stick the first ever UCAV into all of those roles without it first being field tested. So no, deploying a UCAV in place of purchasing the F-35 just doesn’t make any sense.”
I don’t think you truly understand the current UCAV R&D programs. There is no reason at all a basic stealthy strike UCAV could not be fielded TODAY or anytime within the next 10 years – it’s just a matter of spending the money. If there is a “pressing need” for additional strike aircraft in the next 10-20 years, then we should certainly field a stealthy UCAV. I don’t see any “pressing need” for additional air superiority fighters in the next 10-20 years, but that would be the main contribution of the F-35.
“But hopefully, it’ll be a good starting point for the UCAV airframe that’ll bolster our F-35 fleet in 2030 or so.”
UCAVs could (and should) be fielded a HELL of a lot faster than that!
How about noting just how great the F-35 is compared to its predecessors like the Harrier? The F-35 replacing the Marine Harriers has almost double the fuel capacity of a AV-8B, double the payload, AND 50% more increased range. Those facts alone more than pay for the aircrafts high cost.