Forum: Program and politics

Just a few things... cause they seem to be appearing a lot in the recent discussion...

First thing, whoever said that the ANG doesnt need stealth capabilities is completely incorrect. The AF is in a process of realligning the ANG (Or so Ive been told by powers greater than myself) to assume a roll closer to active duty units. The ANG's prime objective is no longer soul defense of the homefront but also missions in far away wars as well...

Hi Aaron, interesting discussion. Not picking on you or anything just a few thoughts I had. First, our forefathers have to be rolling in their graves knowing that state militias are now doing expeditionary warfare .... almost as a PRIME mission. There is plenty of work for the Guard to do here at home. Corrupt congress and other leadership not withstanding, there seems no fix available to get rid of the gross abuse of Guard manpower going on. If we are doing enough stupid expeditionary warfare with no end in sight as we are now. There needs to be MORE active force. As for Guard needing Stealth, Once phase one of a war ( beating down airpower and large SAMs is done, I don't need stealth. Also at home I don't need a stealth jet to shoot down an airliner if need be. Just because our leadership is dumb any day of the week and wants to use second gen solutions ( war of occupation ) to fight a 4th gen threat ( stateless terror, doesn't mean we need to go on Operation- Deny Christmas, every GD year since the end of the cold war.

Two, people keep thinking that the blk 60 F-16s are an upgrade of the F-16 and a competive fighter to the F-35. However, it is routinly forgotten that the blk 60 was designed with capabilities to meet the unique missions of the UAE AF. Because our potential threats, enviroment, landscape, weather, standing army size, technology, naval ability, etc... does not near clone UAE's in every perspective, the Blk 60 would be far less effective for us than it would be them. Also, the Blk 60 near rivals the cost of the F-35. (Although I forget the exact numbers, if someone wants to look them up) If we are replacing F-16s we are replacing them with Blk 50/52s IMO.

Yes but a USAF tweaked Block 60 would be far more useful than any JSF over the long haul for generic combat jet duties. As we don't need the stealth on JSF after Phase I of a air war is taken care of, we can do better things with the money. All the existing tech on a new F-16 is highly useful, and cheap: SNIPER XR or similar tech for the pod, CFTs. Twin bomb racks for 1000lb and smaller PGMs. Quad racks for the SDB, awesome A2A and A2G radar etc etc. including the big spine to put stuff in. I already have an F-16 SPO and F-16 depot in place, and people that know more than god about the F-16.

Three, no matter how threatening a force of 1000 F-22s is, they do little to help our troops on the ground. Sure F-22s can drop a few bombs and JDAMS, but this was not their design purpose. It is hard to argue that the F-22 could do it more effective than the F-35. Sure one could argue that F-22s could clear the area of threats for F-16s so that they could come in and do their job bombing stuff, but I dont think it is ever wise to underestimate an enemie's ability to reorganize a defense, especially an air defense. Remember, Air dominance does not win wars. Troops on the ground do. Wouldn't it be nice if you could launch a ground offensive from the first day of the war supported by air strikes before air dominance was acquired? The F-16 in todays world lacks the ability to do this. However, even if they can only carry lighter loads, a fleet of F-35s supported by an aging fleet of F-117s and B-2s can do this. Shorter wars are safer wars. The faster you can get troops in, the faster you can get them out. Speaking of troops, my next point.

Lets talk about that in detail. F-22 ground ability was never intended to do CAS or even thining of the heard ( plinking heavy equipment in a enemy combat division before our troops even make contact ). It is to beat down an enemy air defense without peer. It along with B-2 will do this so well, that conventional legacy jets won't be at anything close to high risk. ( all current legacys with J weps and new pods can kill without medium SAMS, AAA, Small SAMS/MANDPADS or trashfire even touching them. When the F-22 is used for Phase I of a war it does so with reach/range, speed, contempt of engagement. Something the Buick of Stealth F-35 just can't match in Phase I. Also the R&D for F-22 is mostly paid for,... and we don't need a lot of them.

"Air dominance does not win wars". Since when? Without it we can't even think about doing anything else. All of our enemies have fallen because they couldn't do air domination. Air power stopped Japan cold. Linebacker II was so mean it brought NV to the peace tables. Airpower was the first thing out of the bag in DS and is the reason we had low casualties..... in a 100 hour ground campaign. Yugoslavia was so beat up by Allied Force it signed on the dotted line. Etc. Yes it is wise to underestimate an enemies ability to reorganize an air defense. Once Phase I is done ( the beat down of air defense )... things don't get better for the enemy, they get worse with further beatings given out in a Rodney King style to anything that even looks like it can support a war effort. Water facilities, bridges, POL, power plants etc etc etc. As for mentioning ground troops. No where on our ground forces shopping list is an F-35. Our moronic leadership has screwed up the U.S. Army way off the map of known reality in all basic bread and butter areas of grunt needs. If you want we can start a whole new area of the forum on how the Pentagon continuely can't do smart sustainment of grunt related issues. I weep for the poor non performance by the U.S. Army to grow the most important weapon- Good NCOs and Officers . ( Thank god the USAF has this figured out for the most part ..... and more days of the week than not... the USMC. ) As for the ground in general. I don't believe in paying for useless dirt I don't intend to keep. I will bomb a threat all day long for weeks until their only industry is agriculture ( without POL or electricity ) and candle making. Seeing as Iraq had no ability to invade us or Yugoslavia or fill_in_the_blank more times than not our moronic leadership has no clue when to use ground forces. Afganistan being an exception to the rule. Yet we pulled off of that to do dumb stuff in Iraq. Again though back to the immediate topic re: ground, JSF isn't on their top 100 of needs when you talk to a ground leader that has their head wired on.

Four, the A-10 is a remarkable air frame, ill give it that. A lot of people argue that the F-35 will not be able to provide the CAS that the A-10 does. I say that CAS will soon be phased out in warfare. Why? Because warfare is becoming increasingly more urbanized. You no longer see columns of tanks squaring off in the desert but small units of infantry rushing building to building clearning out key areas. CAS is something that is very dangerous to do in an urbanized eviroment. Even now people think that combat is at the epitome of urbanization but its not true. Fighting will increasingly be brought from the streets to inside buildings and homes. Sure, we have the technology to drop a bomb into a single room in an apartment complex and take out only the occupants of that room. But can you garuntee the explosion from the bomb wont start a fire in that room killing the mother and child in the room above? Maybe there were preexhisting stress fractures in the ceiling above and the shockwave of the bomb will colapse the roof. That would be bad. For the CAS missions that ARE neccessary some argue that the F-35 will not be able to travel as low and slow as the A-10. I think that a STOVL F-35 can probably fly slower. Even maybe, hover? It makes sense, who would be put in charge of coordinating CAS missions in the future? Navy, Air Force, or the Marines who are going to support themselves? But I think the majority of CAS in the future will be provided not by fixed wing a/c but by rotaries.

I would totally disagree here. Each war is different. If anything our CAS is getting much more precise to where a ground guy like a USAF GFAC can call it in closer. Thus the need for smaller munitions like the SDB. It is taylor made for this including the ability to do a vertical flight path in terminal phase. UAVs and UCAV are CAS by any other name and they are at the top of the list for ground guys putting together a plan. AC-130 is only getting more precise in bug hunt, work. Thermobaric Hellfire ( now combat proven ) can take out a room and leave a building. Re: Urban, if we have ground folks doing an op. Stuff is going to get broken. ( Fallujah etc. So we aren't going to play nice just so a few buildings can remain standing. If a BLU-109 is going to save a few lives and clear a point of resistance.... it's coming down. The first mission is to make sure our guys go home. Civilians are not targeted with great care given, but if there is a military op, they better get out. If there is a point of resistance, it is going to get FLATTENED. period.... dot, and fk the plumbing or electricity. As for the A-10, it is still useful but not the ultimate, certainly not the ultimate tank killer by a LONG SHOT. It will still be around, but we don't need a lot of them. It isn't a do everything CAS tool. PGMs rule, A-10s can help. Read my other comments re: A-10 in this forum. As for replacing it.... You can't. Nothing can get as low and slow as it can, yet that is the reason it gets SHOT up in the first place. So the idea that it is a CAS god... is false. Again it is still useful. Hog-up SLEP will keep it around for the next 25 years. Again though going low and slow is limited use. It isn't an end all be all with CAS. A B-1 zipping fast out of the JSTARS stack will get there faster ( time is the number 1 CAS concern ) than a pokey A-10, the B-1 arrives with all kinds of sub 4 meter PGMs to keep a GFAC occupied for plenty of time. More: An F-16 showing up with twin racks of 4 GBU-12/GBU38, and 8 SDB on quad racks, CFTs and a SNIPER pod, is money well spent. And nothing is going to shoot at ( Post PHASE I of the air op ) it while it can hit a pickle barrel from 30K + feet. I have doubts on rotaries. In big boy battles ( yes we still have to game against large conventional forces.... all wars are not the same )... A-10 and helos will get shot to pieces. New battlefield AAA, 3rd gen MANPADS and small SAMs KILL anything below 10K with consistantcy. The best use of Attack helos are small elements of 2 at night as APACHE teamed with JSTARS, UAVs has learned well.

Five, I seem to recall years and years ago people argueing that the F-22 program should be dropped for saved money to be spent on other research investments. You have your other research investment people. Its called the F-35. You cant just research research research without product? Sure you may possess better technology than your oponent but if you wasted all your money and time on research and never bothered building it than your still screwed.

What F-35 does is kill resource dollars that could be better spent on any number of needed things from airlift sustainment, tankers, and 100 other non-sexy things that keep USAF running. For any next manned shooter airframe, R&D dollars would be better spent on FB-22. If we must suffer JSF, than put it where it will do the most good: On the deck of an aircraft carrier.

Ive only scattered this thread occassionally so maybe some of this stuff has been addressed already by the opposition. And with so many similar threads its hard to tell if I already addressed this stuff in this thread.

Cheers

-Aaron

P.S. Bwadey, R&D stands for Research and Development. This is the money that has to be paid upfront before you can even produce an air plane. Even if you never decide to produce an airplane, this money can never be given back after it's spent.

Now, Elp, why the f.... don`t you run for a General`s grade or President

You sure seem to have it all figured out

"Air dominance does not win wars". Since when? Without it we can't even think about doing anything else. All of our enemies have fallen because they couldn't do air domination.

Water facilities, bridges, POL, power plants etc etc etc.

I would totally disagree here. Each war is different. If anything our CAS is getting much more precise to where a ground guy like a USAF GFAC can call it in closer. Thus the need for smaller munitions like the SDB. It is taylor made for this including the ability to do a vertical flight path in terminal phase. UAVs and UCAV are CAS by any other name and they are at the top of the list for ground guys putting together a plan. AC-130 is only getting more precise in bug hunt, work. Thermobaric Hellfire ( now combat proven ) can take out a room and leave a building.

What F-35 does is kill resource dollars that could be better spent on any number of needed things from airlift sustainment, tankers, and 100 other non-sexy things that keep USAF running. For any next manned shooter airframe, R&D dollars would be better spent on FB-22. If we must suffer JSF, than put it where it will do the most good: On the deck of an aircraft carrier.

Hi Aaron, interesting discussion. Not picking on you or anything just a few thoughts I had. First, our forefathers have to be rolling in their graves knowing that state militias are now doing expeditionary warfare .... almost as a PRIME mission. There is plenty of work for the Guard to do here at home. Corrupt congress and other leadership not withstanding, there seems no fix available to get rid of the gross abuse of Guard manpower going on. If we are doing enough stupid expeditionary warfare with no end in sight as we are now. There needs to be MORE active force.