Forum: F-35 versus XYZ

The recent thread on the APA paper got me thinking about popular perception. The F-35 is often couched in terms of being the only option we have for fighter recapitalization. Personally, I see the program as being necessary on its own merits as it provides capabilities that will important in the future, capabilities that the F-22 could never have. I still believe Raptor production was cut way too short, but I can somewhat see why the hard choice was made to focus on the F-35 even though the F-22 was already in serial production.

That said, given what the average person/congressman knows about fighters, would the F-35 program still be alive today had the F-22 not been eliminated as an "option" in 2009?

F-16.net Sponsor

A may be question. Compared with the F15 and development of the F16, the F16 was not allowed to be that advanced at that time. This was a risk for the F15 program.

Another may be, would the F22 be that advanced, as it is now, without the F35?

If the two had coexisted long enough to threaten each other, F-22 production would have lost and been ended ahead of schedule anyway, just maybe not as far ahead. If it has to be a choice between the two, then the F-35's superiority for the mission we know our armed service are routinely put to (air to ground, not so much air to air), plus the fact that it's 3 planes in 1 and can go places an F-22 can't go, would have made this no contest. That situation is only made more drastic by F-35's own air-to-air competence, since even in strict air-to-air context the advantages of F-22 are not so much about being better at defending itself as they are about being better at hunting & chasing down others. Also, a favorite tactic of the people in politics who love to cut military things is to paint them as Cold War relics, and F-22 is significantly easier to paint that way than F-35 is.

I really don't know where to begin, but I suppose the idea that we no longer need an airsuperiorty fighter should be explained. The F-22 is the high in a Hi-Lo mix, the F-35 is the low. Would I be correct in assuming that you don't believe that the Pak-Fa and J-20 will be a threat, and what of countless Flanker upgrades, which the Russians and Chinese are cranking out at present, not to mention a myriad of other very capable fighter aircraft? To my knowledge the F-35 has yet to release a single weapon in weapons testing, but maybe you know something the rest of us are not privy to.

Given what they know (or have enough knowledge of):
1. Performance of AMRAAM and knowledge of upcoming upgrades
2. RCS (both in shaping and RAM) of F-35
3. Performance of Avionics (APG-81, EOTS, Barracuda, EODAS, etc)
4. Flight performance
5. Build rate of Pak-FA and J-20

Don't you think that they have enough information to determine if the F-35 will be sufficient to be a capable force until the F-22 follow-on fighter is developed?

airframe wrote:

I really don't know where to begin, but I suppose the idea that we no longer need an airsuperiorty fighter should be explained. The F-22 is the high in a Hi-Lo mix, the F-35 is the low. Would I be correct in assuming that you don't believe that the Pak-Fa and J-20 will be a threat, and what of countless Flanker upgrades, which the Russians and Chinese are cranking out at present, not to mention a myriad of other very capable fighter aircraft? To my knowledge the F-35 has yet to release a single weapon in weapons testing, but maybe you know something the rest of us are not privy to.

The F-35 is the low part of the mix, but was designed to be 2nd only to the F-22 in A2A.

I can accept it as the 'Lo' to the F-22 in the A2A arena. I can accept the F-35 as the 'Hi' to the F-22 in A2G.

This high/low thing is getting badly overinterpretted. Exactly what is the spectrum along which one is higher and the other is lower? Altitude? Speed? Size & weight? Cost? Technological advancement? Number built? Some vague undefined concept of overall quality?

Those who bring it up seem to usually think it's that last one, but the historical truth is that it's cost (and thus the inverse of number built, and size & weight as a result of the cost thing), and that it's also not really a valid way of looking at the two stealth fighters. F-16 was invented right after F-15 partially because of the increase in maneuverability that you can get from a smaller lighter plane at the sacrifice of payload and range and the bigger radar, but mostly because it would be cheaper and would allow us to put a higher population of fighters in the air so the Eagles couldn't be overwhelmed by vast numbers of individually inferior MiGs. Several air forces have relied on only the "low" member of this pair and found them perfectly effective. Being the low one doesn't mean being of low quality, and to the extent that it ever even did, that same reasoning just isn't applicable to 22/35 anyway. These two had rather more different design goals from the start, and differ mainly in ways that are related to each one being better than the other at its own specialty... not the same general goal with one of them just doing it bigger.

airframe wrote:

the idea that we no longer need an airsuperiorty fighter should be explained.

It's not that we don't need a fighter to establish air superiority; it's that that need itself doesn't necessarily dictate that it must be done by its own separate specialized kind of plane that isn't particularly good at the other main task that is usually demanded from modern fighters. Compared to F-35, F-22 is more expensive to obtain, more expensive to fuel, and more expensive to support, for a plane that can't internally carry 2000-pound weapons, JSOWs, or JSMs, can't use laser-guided weapons even externally, can't see in all directions and identify & map targets and threats on the ground or share that data with ground forces, can't land on or launch from any kind of aircraft carrier or at imperfect airfields on land, and would do nothing at all for our allies.

Remember, the subject of this thread isn't whether either F-22 or F-35 is completely useless or pointless; it's about the outcome of a conflict between the two development/acquisition programs if they had happened at the same time and it had been decided that we couldn't fund both. So the choice I'm answering is either a world with 22 but no 35, or a world with 35 but no 22. I don't dispute that the combination is more effective than either alone; I just say that the loss of 35 would be a bigger loss than the loss of 22. What's at stake if we were to keep 35 but lose 22 is that our best air-to-air fighter would be slower and shorter-ranged but still able to defeat anything else it came across. What's at stake if we were to keep 22 but lose 35 is any fifth-generation vehicle at all for the Navy, any armed STOVL jet better & newer than Harriers, any fifth-generation vehicle at all for our allies, and a lot of aspects of air-to-ground functionality and electronic functions even to operate from standard Air Force bases.

airframe wrote:

Would I be correct in assuming that you don't believe that the Pak-Fa and J-20 will be a threat

To fourth-generation planes, they probably are, but to F-35s, no. Thrust vectoring might make them slightly more maneuverable, but that's about all they've got on F-35. Even the Russians' own claims about T-50's stealth still put its radar signature many times higher than an F-35's at best (just significantly lower than previous Russian planes), its engines and electronic systems are nothing special, and China is even farther behind than them.

airframe wrote:

and what of countless Flanker upgrades, which the Russians and Chinese are cranking out at present, not to mention a myriad of other very capable fighter aircraft?

Nothing else but T-50 and J-20 is even pretending to be any contender at all to F-35. They're closer to an even match for the fourth-generation planes that we and our enemies already fly. But if we were to drop F-35, then what would those advanced enemy planes be up against instead? In most situations, the answer is not F-22; it's whatever fourth-generation planes have to be fielded instead, because of F-22's numbers and distribution around the world being so limited (even if the entire original plan of 700 were built). I'd rather have us and our allies send F-35s against them than no fifth-generation plane at all.

airframe wrote:

To my knowledge the F-35 has yet to release a single weapon in weapons testing

And what do you suppose that has to do with anything?

airframe wrote:

maybe you know something the rest of us are not privy to.

Sarcastic personalizations do not constitute a valid case for your position or any other.

delvo, I understand your arguments, and they make perfect since, but let me rephrase the original question. With the F-35 so far overbudget (and customers threatening to jump the program like rats from a burning ship), would the F-22, being already in service, seem like a viable alternative to those less-knowledgeable (especially in Congress) if it were still in production?

1st503rdsgt wrote:

delvo, I understand your arguments, and they make perfect since, but let me rephrase the original question. With the F-35 so far overbudget (and customers threatening to jump the program like rats from a burning ship), would the F-22, being already in service, seem like a viable alternative to those less-knowledgeable (especially in Congress) if it were still in production?

Frankly, the big issue with the F-22 was that to continue production, they would have needed to fund a new avionics package to fit into new aircraft. That was tens of billions there and no guarantee of success. Given the fairly serious corrosion and serviceability issues facing the F-22, I think alot of congressional members are actually thanking their good graces that they cut the program when they did.

Furthermore since 2009 there are MORE customers and more aircraft being produced. Cost wise the price hasn't increased significantly, though we will will have a better picture in April.

airframe wrote:

To my knowledge the F-35 has yet to release a single weapon in weapons testing, but maybe you know something the rest of us are not privy to.

Nor have the PAK-FA, J-20 or SU-35S to my knowledge (conducted let alone completed weapons testing) yet you obviously consider them a significant threat.

Why is this an issue for the F-35, but not an issue for the even further behind in development PAK-FA or J-20? Neither of them have even passed what in the West would be termed a "critical design review" yet they are already considered the biggest, baddest boys on the block.

All 5 airframes...

hb_pencil wrote:

Given the fairly serious corrosion and serviceability issues facing the F-22, I think alot of congressional members are actually thanking their good graces that they cut the program when they did.

These are not uncommon problems. How many of the first 90 or so F-16s, F-15s, or F/A-18s stayed in service for very long? Congress/Obama cut the F-22 because it was an easy way for them to throw a bone to their liberal base, not because they were well informed on the matter (Gates was also establishing dominance over the USAF at the time).

Just sayin, if the already-in-production/service F-22 hadn't gotten the ax back then, might not the unfinished/overbudget/behind-schedule F-35 be in the cross-hairs now given the typical lack of congressional understanding?

1st503rdsgt wrote:

hb_pencil wrote:

Given the fairly serious corrosion and serviceability issues facing the F-22, I think alot of congressional members are actually thanking their good graces that they cut the program when they did.

These are not uncommon problems. How many of the first 90 or so F-16s, F-15s, or F/A-18s stayed in service for very long? Congress/Obama cut the F-22 because it was an easy way for them to throw a bone to their liberal base, not because they were well informed on the matter (Gates was also establishing dominance over the USAF at the time).

Just sayin, if the already-in-production/service F-22 hadn't gotten the ax back then, might not the unfinished/overbudget/behind-schedule F-35 be in the cross-hairs now given the typical lack of congressional understanding?

No, you don't get it. Basically the entire Avionics core of the F-22 has to be redesigned if they wanted to build more fighters. That's not an "uncommon" problem... that's an unprecedented problem. Basically all the stuff that's keeping the F-35 out of service right now, had to be repeated if they wanted to buy more F-22s. There was some thought to integrate the F-35's cores, but, well then it too would be waiting for the program to complete its development.

I don't think you really understand how badly the F-22 program is fairing right now. Its far more a disaster than the F-35 can ever be. From its mess of a avionics suite, to its bleed air issues and the serious corrosion problems, I suspect the fighter might be folded in the next decade due to exorbitant costs. Given the disclosures in the past three years, alot of congressional members are actually thanking their lucky stars they decided to agree with the cancellation rather than keep the program running.

hb_pencil wrote:

1st503rdsgt wrote:

hb_pencil wrote:

Given the fairly serious corrosion and serviceability issues facing the F-22, I think alot of congressional members are actually thanking their good graces that they cut the program when they did.

These are not uncommon problems. How many of the first 90 or so F-16s, F-15s, or F/A-18s stayed in service for very long? Congress/Obama cut the F-22 because it was an easy way for them to throw a bone to their liberal base, not because they were well informed on the matter (Gates was also establishing dominance over the USAF at the time).

Just sayin, if the already-in-production/service F-22 hadn't gotten the ax back then, might not the unfinished/overbudget/behind-schedule F-35 be in the cross-hairs now given the typical lack of congressional understanding?

No, you don't get it. Basically the entire Avionics core of the F-22 has to be redesigned if they wanted to build more fighters. That's not an "uncommon" problem... that's an unprecedented problem. Basically all the stuff that's keeping the F-35 out of service right now, had to be repeated if they wanted to buy more F-22s. There was some thought to integrate the F-35's cores, but, well then it too would be waiting for the program to complete its development.

That may or may not have been the main issue, but that's certainly not what I heard any of the F-22's opponents telling the public at the time, and this thread was stared to discuss "public perceptions" (informed or uninformed) and how they can affect decisions on weapons procurement.

What would have been wrong with building new Raptors with the same kind of avionics that the already-built ones have?

Forum: F-35 versus XYZ

F-35 vs. F-22 question