Forum: F-35 Lightning II

jeffb wrote:

Oh you know...
That the process that selected and then reviewed the decision to purchase the F-35 was political in nature not technical. That the people who have made the decisions that have led us to this point are (out of their own mouths but reported by US diplomatic cable) corrupt. That the people who decide how Australian taxpayer money is spent have deliberately misled the people of Australia. That sort of thing

Well then it is your civic duty to report this corruption, Jeff! Official misconduct is a very serious offence and cannot be tolerated. I should think you'd be straight off to your nearest Australian Federal Police office to report these wrongdoings.

Of course given it was a Labor Party election promise to review this decision, rather than a considered decision of the National Security Council did you ever truly think it might be anything other than a sham?

Quote:

That if the F-35 doesn't "make it" that the Australian Air Force will be replacing it's long range strike force with F-18Fs.

You must have missed all that press in early December 2010 but last I looked, the "long ranged strike force" has already been replaced with the F-18F.

Weird.

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The original decision to purchase the F-35 by the Howard government seems to have been an informed decision based on a lengthy evaluation of the requirements and the platform alternatives available.

The Wikileaks' reference is to a promised review of this decision by a subsequent Aussie Administration. if, in fact the review was a sham, that in no way invalidates the bases for the original procurement decision. To use that as a criticism of the F-35 is illogical.

Now if the Aussies want to criticize that administration for not conducting a proper review as alleged by the Wikileaks revelations, for whatever political or diplomatic reasons, then that's certainly their right. But it can't be used as a criticism against the F-35.

popcorn wrote:

The original decision to purchase the F-35 by the Howard government seems to have been an informed decision based on a lengthy evaluation of the requirements and the platform alternatives available.

No it wasn't, the evaluation procedure involved the Prime Ministers Office in Canberra phoning the Chief of Air Force and letting him know that the JSF had "won" the evaluation.

popcorn wrote:

The Wikileaks' reference is to a promised review of this decision by a subsequent Aussie Administration. if, in fact the review was a sham, that in no way invalidates the bases for the original procurement decision. To use that as a criticism of the F-35 is illogical.

The political party who had promised the review did so because there were obvious short comings with the way the aircraft was selected as the F-111 replacement and with the JSF project as a whole and that these issues had reached a certain volume in the public ear. That a review was promised implies at the very least that those short comings would be investigated to determine the impact on the Australian defence force and defence industries of continued involvement with the project. I do not use the fact that the Labour government deliberately misled a) the Parliament and b) the people to criticise the F-35 itself. The criticisms I do make are based on the ongoing delays and increasing expense of an aircraft with which we are all familiar, and the obvious conclusion that if the delay is too long then the aircraft risks becoming irrelevant or obsolete before it reaches the units who will use it.

popcorn wrote:

Now if the Aussies want to criticize that administration for not conducting a proper review as alleged by the Wikileaks revelations, for whatever political or diplomatic reasons, then that's certainly their right. But it can't be used as a criticism against the F-35.

I'm sure that you would agree that if evidence of a similar deception occurred in your own country it would be grounds for some form of inquiry. Again though, the criticisms I make of the F-35 do not stem from the issue raised in my original post.

I think it'd be more accurate to say increased expense. There's no indication that costs are continuing to rise, or that there'll be further delays.

jeffb wrote:

That the process that selected and then reviewed the decision to purchase the F-35 was political in nature not technical.

WRONG...

According to the section that you even bolded only the decision to do a review was politically motivated, not the review itself and certainly not the initial decision to go with the F-35.

Here is the quote:

Quote:

the Air Combat Capability Review of Australia's future air power he had announced a week earlier was driven by domestic politics

Second, the fix was not in. In the review the results were not certain. If they were, the memo above would have said "will not produce any result..." instead of

Quote:

was unlikely to produce any result other than acquisition of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter

jeffb wrote:

The political party who had promised the review did so because there were obvious short comings with the way the aircraft was selected as the F-111 replacement and with the JSF project as a whole and that these issues had reached a certain volume in the public ear.

They promised a review because they were harping on the opposing party. When they came into power they had to keep the promise. Nothing about the selection or review ever claimed it was a sham. This misconception is based on the first section where it says "unlikely".

Currently Oz has a hung Federal Parliament. If there was 'political hay' to be made by whatever is ailing those hurt by the 'political F-35 review' described above then that 'hay' would be made by the opposition party - the one that selected the F-35 in the first instance. Get it? OR how about this. Everyone knows that the F-35A is the aircraft for Oz at $60 million a pop or less and we are happy with that. OK? Very Happy

We just want youse US chaps to get on with it....

umm, hello?
we had a hung parliament in september...... not now.

there was unlikely to be any other aircraft chosen for us. we wouldnt ecxept anything 4th gen, and out of the 4.5 gen we didnt have much choice. just the eurofighter, really. so it was going to be the f-35 or the f-22, and since the f-22 is banned (wtf) we got the jsf

kristianisme, fair enough - 'hung parliament' no longer. Simple explanations are always good but perhaps don't reflect the effort behind the simplicity.

Forum: F-35 Lightning II

14 F-35As bought for RAAF - Australia - 1st Tranche JSF