Lockheed to offer Japan advanced F-22 F-35 hybrid?

[XanderCrews]

IMO, F-35 might not be best for everything, but it's likely best bang for the yen. Japan has rather small defece budget and buying F-35 and F-22 derivative would be very expensive and would reduce numbers of both significantly. It would be very expensive to develop F-22 derivative that would suit Japan in the first place. Then it would be costly aircraft to manufacture and operate. It would need own support and maintenance infrastructure and personnel. I think pure F-35 force would be more effective given the budget even though F-22 might have big advantages. IMO, Japan just doesn't have large enough budget to go for two types at the moment. Hell, even USAF is seriously reducing different types in inventory because of this.

This actually makes sense.
But I think the JSDAF are not trying to buy as many F-35s as possible
They already have an idea of how many they want to buy from now to 2040+ maybe. Kinda like how the USAF plans to buy 1763 from now to 2037 IIRC.

And by their estimates, they have the economic power to launch another 5th gen program.
This is Japan we're talking here, 3rd biggest economy, richer than any European country. Yes they have more debt, but so does the US. And they don't have their own fighter program.

They are clearly interested in a Raptor class platform.
Can they afford it?
Thats what we're trying to find out.
But lets not argue that the F-35 is good enough for all their wants.
It may be good enough for all their needs, but thats not enough.
They want a Raptor, plain and simple. The F-35 is not a Raptor. It comes close, but its not.

Now they're lobbying, if they can afford it, they'll push through

This wont be a Raptor either though. That's a bit of an important note.

When all is said and done it may not be even much better than an F-35. It woudnt be the first military program that goes from "wonder weapon" to "wonder why"

[XanderCrews]

Maybe the JSDAF will use her F-35's primarily as strike aircraft.
They badly want an F-22 class fighter a.k.a overkill, best in the world air dominance platform.

Something that will be untouchable while flying at 60,000 feet, Mach 1.8.
Japan has a lot of pride, they don't want to go around flying the second best air superiority fighter like 15 other allies. They want to be on par with the US, they wanted F-15s when the F-15 was king. Now they want the reigning air dominance king.

This is absurd.

[sferrin]

When all is said and done it may not be even much better than an F-35. It woudnt be the first military program that goes from "wonder weapon" to "wonder why"

*cough* F-2.

[marsavian]

The deal with Japan is distance to China and the disputed islands, it wants a long range air superiority platform to confront J-20s far from its shores. The F-22 with 2 tanks surpasses the stock F-35 in combat radius and no doubt they will plumb the other two pylons so it can carry 4 tanks and have a combat radius over 1000nm. This is not taking into account its greater radar range and kinematic performance making it a more effective interceptor. The reasoning behind this aircraft is the same as that behind the PCA, performance at long fighter range for the Pacific environment which is why it probably will happen, Japan probably views it as essential to safeguard its extended sovereignty.

[element1loop]

If it happened (I have my doubts), I'm fairly confident they would not be at all interested in bags and pylons under VLO wings designed for high-altitude fast long-range cruise. Think conformal tanks or else a fuselage stretch, for lower drag and VLO. And if you're going to do that, then you may as well make the bays bigger and give it F-35A-like sensors, comms and max-adaptive tactical and role flexibility.

Then you're looking at something very similar to PCA--and that will not escape anyone's notice or logic in their further considerations.

Your point about Pacific geography and its scale is entirely correct. F-35A and F-22A still fall well short on the typical tactical strike ranges involved for an Indo-Pac archipelagic conflict. Significant war stocks of theatre-range precision BM strike upon fixed targets means extra tactical range is desirable, and will be becoming more important from here. The reply to much longer cruise distance needs is to have a much faster and superior-efficiency high-altitude cruise (something which is not as unavoidable in a European theatre conflict and smaller more compact countries/territories--and the "need for speed" is almost entirely for cruising--i.e. not merely for a BVR kinematic advantage). So a large PCA with its modern variable mode efficient cruise propulsion will be ideal for the Indo-Pac regional range problem (and the J20 design is clearly aspiring to be that). I think that's what everyone who shares this problem will conclude, and will seek to invest accordingly, for the middle-2030s forwards, with that sort of range capability and F-35-like extreme tactical adaptability in mind.

So I think PCA is a no brainer for USAF from here, and for US's Pacific Allies--a 'need to have' platform.

2c

I suspect that's what Japan is expected to conclude from an evaluation of its options.

[popcorn]

Maybe just buy new-build F-35s with AETP engine and consider swapping out F135 in their fleet at some future date. The affordable and prag atic solution in terms of capital outay and ongoing sustainment of a common fleet

[element1loop]

Maybe just buy new-build F-35s with AETP engine and consider swapping out F135 in their fleet at some future date. The affordable and pragmatic solution in terms of capital outay and ongoing sustainment of a common fleet

As I understand it an AETP design won't fit in the F-35--but if it did, conformal tanks may provide the needed legs.

The problem then is achieving a stable envelope region with genuinely high-altitude fast long-range cruise. In that respect the F-35C's large wing would certainly be more stable in thinner air (plus adds more fuel).

So the question then is, do you have enough internal weapons with an F-35?

The answer for the F-35 is to buy more of them and operate more in aggressive deep-striking.

Then the question is, will F-35 meet PCA-like requirements for survivable loiter at long range over a defended heartland in say, 2055?

There's a few ifs there, but maybe it can do most of it--enough to work with it, tactically, anyway.

[popcorn]

A key design requirement of the adaptive engine designs from GE and P&W is compatibility with the.F-35 engine bay.

We can see the move toward new.generations of weapons designed for the F-35 internal.weapons bay eg. JSM, SACM, AARGM-ER, and this trend will.only accelerate so I think war planners will have lots of choices.down the road.

With 5G a/c, SA has clearly superseded kinematics as the decisive must-have advantage. A networked battlespace extending over much greater distances affords the precious luxury of longer response times to threats so absolute interception speed becomes even less critical. Couple this with longer-range multimode AAMs that will provide all the kinematic performance to deal with threats.

[element1loop]

I tend to agree with that, as long as the relative SA and systems advantage can be maintained.

The other big advantage here is you still have an extremely small VLO jet, which can then operate 20km above sea level, and as you go upward the tops of all the imaginary projected sensor footprint "bubbles" rapidly shrink in radius, at your altitude, and it becomes much more difficult to detect, track or engage with a useful pk. Providing a less obstructed path to targets, or to nav. And a good insurance policy against newer detection and tracking tech evolution.

It also sets the propulsion bar much higher for those airforces forced to use heavy-twins with dodgy self-FODing engines, who'd like to do something about it.

However, the need for speed needs some re-emphasis here (it seems to be getting lost in your last reply). With very long distances comes very long flight hours. A single-pilot regional-range deep-strike pilot needs that flight time to be made several hours shorter. So this has to be a serious consideration in high-altitude high-speed cruise efficiency, and long flight pilot comfort. Else strike tempo will not be maintained. Sustained high-speed will need to be a major feature of a suitable jet so must be a major focus of the development of any such variant.

[Corsair1963]

Japan isn't spending "Billions" to build just 38 F-35A's........

Great, cause nobody is saying that.
The F-35 will be their workhorse, taking out surface targets, punching holes in the PLA's A2/AD network and taking out it's fair share of enemy aircraft. But for the JSDAF, this is not enough, they apparently are interested in an A-A platform that is second to none.

The F-35 is great, but we need to get over the "its the best for everything" mentality. It's not an F-22 and the F-22 is better at A-A. Japan knows more about the F-35 than most of us and they know this as well.

WILD SPECULATION.....The F-35 is more than capable of performing the "Air Superiority Role" for Japan against all comers! As a matter of fact the F-35's advantages in Stealth and Sensor Fusion. Give the Lightning many advantages over even the Raptor including some in the "Air to Air Role". So, spare us that it's "not enough"???


To make it clear Japan is not building the F-3. Nor, is it buying any version of the F-22. What it is doing is planning for post 2030-40. Which, likely will include joining with a partner or partners to jointly develop a future 6th Generation Fighter.

[Corsair1963]

The deal with Japan is distance to China and the disputed islands, it wants a long range air superiority platform to confront J-20s far from its shores. The F-22 with 2 tanks surpasses the stock F-35 in combat radius and no doubt they will plumb the other two pylons so it can carry 4 tanks and have a combat radius over 1000nm. This is not taking into account its greater radar range and kinematic performance making it a more effective interceptor. The reasoning behind this aircraft is the same as that behind the PCA, performance at long fighter range for the Pacific environment which is why it probably will happen, Japan probably views it as essential to safeguard its extended sovereignty.

Sorry, according to your own graph the F-22 doesn't exceed the range of the F-35. Unless it carries external fuel tanks. Which, would take away its main advantage of stealth. Regardless, I can tell you the F-22 in "never" going to return to production.....Which, has been explained over and over again on this very forum.

[Corsair1963]

A key design requirement of the adaptive engine designs from GE and P&W is compatibility with the.F-35 engine bay.

We can see the move toward new.generations of weapons designed for the F-35 internal.weapons bay eg. JSM, SACM, AARGM-ER, and this trend will.only accelerate so I think war planners will have lots of choices.down the road.

With 5G a/c, SA has clearly superseded kinematics as the decisive must-have advantage. A networked battlespace extending over much greater distances affords the precious luxury of longer response times to threats so absolute interception speed becomes even less critical. Couple this with longer-range multimode AAMs that will provide all the kinematic performance to deal with threats.

Yes, the F-35 is slanted to get continuing upgrades as the aircraft matures. As a matter of fact it will receive the lion share of the funding. Which, will come from the US and a number of it's customers. This will not be the case with the F-22 or any existing type....(F-15, F-16, F/A-18, etc.)

[Corsair1963]

IMO, F-35 might not be best for everything, but it's likely best bang for the yen. Japan has rather small defece budget and buying F-35 and F-22 derivative would be very expensive and would reduce numbers of both significantly. It would be very expensive to develop F-22 derivative that would suit Japan in the first place. Then it would be costly aircraft to manufacture and operate. It would need own support and maintenance infrastructure and personnel. I think pure F-35 force would be more effective given the budget even though F-22 might have big advantages. IMO, Japan just doesn't have large enough budget to go for two types at the moment. Hell, even USAF is seriously reducing different types in inventory because of this.

This actually makes sense.
But I think the JSDAF are not trying to buy as many F-35s as possible
They already have an idea of how many they want to buy from now to 2040+ maybe. Kinda like how the USAF plans to buy 1763 from now to 2037 IIRC.

And by their estimates, they have the economic power to launch another 5th gen program.
This is Japan we're talking here, 3rd biggest economy, richer than any European country. Yes they have more debt, but so does the US. And they don't have their own fighter program.

They are clearly interested in a Raptor class platform.
Can they afford it?
Thats what we're trying to find out.
But lets not argue that the F-35 is good enough for all their wants.
It may be good enough for all their needs, but thats not enough.
They want a Raptor, plain and simple. The F-35 is not a Raptor. It comes close, but its not.

Now they're lobbying, if they can afford it, they'll push through

[zero-one]

the F-35's advantages in Stealth and Sensor Fusion Give the Lightning many advantages over even the Raptor including some in the "Air to Air Role".

Publicly available RCS figures put the Raptor's RCS lower than the F-35's

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military ... ft-rcs.htm
F-35 0.005
F-22 0.0001

Granted that these are not accurate, there is nothing out there to suggest that the F-35 has better stealth
the closest that we get from official sources is from Gen. Mike Hostage
https://breakingdefense.com/2014/06/gen ... -starts/3/

“The F-35 doesn’t have the altitude, doesn’t have the speed [of the F-22], but it can beat the F-22 in stealth.” But stealth — the ability to elude or greatly complicate an enemy’s ability to find and destroy an aircraft using a combination of design, tactics and technology — is not a magic pill, Hostage reminds us.

in the same breath he says

The problem is, with the lack of F-22s, I’m going to have to use F-35s in the air superiority role in the early phases as well.....“Because it can’t turn and run away, it’s got to have support from other F-35s. So I’m going to need eight F-35s to go after a target that I might only need two Raptors to go after.

This from Gen. Hostage who knows more about these 2 planes that we can ever hope. So all this talk about the F-35 being better than the F-22 in A-A has to stop. If it was, the USAF would label it as their premier A-A platform and not the F-22.

It's the second best A-A platform, wildly better than anything else EXCEPT the Raptor.

To make it clear Japan is not building the F-3. Nor, is it buying any version of the F-22. What it is doing is planning for post 2030-40. Which, likely will include joining with a partner or partners to jointly develop a future 6th Generation Fighter.

This is simply your personal interpretation of what's happening. And who knows, maybe you're right,
but unless you have access to the JSDAF's top brass board meetings, you can't confirm

Maybe this Hybrid F-22/35 will be Japan's next gen fighter. They can call it 6th gen, we can call it 5.5 gen, heck I'll call it an X-wing.

[Corsair1963]

the F-35's advantages in Stealth and Sensor Fusion Give the Lightning many advantages over even the Raptor including some in the "Air to Air Role".

Publicly available RCS figures put the Raptor's RCS lower than the F-35's

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military ... ft-rcs.htm
F-35 0.005
F-22 0.0001

Granted that these are not accurate, there is nothing out there to suggest that the F-35 has better stealth
the closest that we get from official sources is from Gen. Mike Hostage
https://breakingdefense.com/2014/06/gen ... -starts/3/

“The F-35 doesn’t have the altitude, doesn’t have the speed [of the F-22], but it can beat the F-22 in stealth.” But stealth — the ability to elude or greatly complicate an enemy’s ability to find and destroy an aircraft using a combination of design, tactics and technology — is not a magic pill, Hostage reminds us.

in the same breath he says

The problem is, with the lack of F-22s, I’m going to have to use F-35s in the air superiority role in the early phases as well.....“Because it can’t turn and run away, it’s got to have support from other F-35s. So I’m going to need eight F-35s to go after a target that I might only need two Raptors to go after.

This from Gen. Hostage who knows more about these 2 planes that we can ever hope. So all this talk about the F-35 being better than the F-22 in A-A has to stop. If it was, the USAF would label it as their premier A-A platform and not the F-22.

It's the second best A-A platform, wildly better than anything else EXCEPT the Raptor.

To make it clear Japan is not building the F-3. Nor, is it buying any version of the F-22. What it is doing is planning for post 2030-40. Which, likely will include joining with a partner or partners to jointly develop a future 6th Generation Fighter.

This is simply your personal interpretation of what's happening. And who knows, maybe you're right,
but unless you have access to the JSDAF's top brass board meetings, you can't confirm

Maybe this Hybrid F-22/35 will be Japan's next gen fighter. They can call it 6th gen, we can call it 5.5 gen, heck I'll call it an X-wing.

Go waste someone else's time..........