I love it when an old thread gets new life around here...
Fox1 wrote:The PCA mission will require a big aircraft that has lots of range,decent speed, large missile payload, powerful radar and other sensors, yet it will need to be faster and more agile than a subsonic bomber like the B-21.
Kind of like a stealthy, 21st century Tomcat?
I kid, I kid....
Seriously, I truly believe the day of the "turn and burn"\"knife fight in a phone booth" days are rapidly coming to an end.
We were obviously wrong during the days of Vietnam when weapon and system advancement weren't quite where they needed to be, however we may now be a decade or two away from Point Defense\Offense directed energy weapon systems on fighter sized aircraft.... these weapons may be what 6th Gen is all about if we can figure out the usability and power consumption issues.
That being said, a fighter will always need to be able to be maneuverable and have a gun\point defense\weapon of last resort.
Every once in a while, everything goes to hell and you find yourself off-script and the pilots (or remote drivers) of the future will still need to deal with those situations.
However, (decades ago when I kept up with things such as ACM\BFM\Historical Conflicts on a tactical level) I believe a very large segment of aircraft kills in all conflicts come from a source that the pilot didn't even know was there until he came under attack. And in many cases not until parts of aircraft started coming apart.
History has shown us that Situational Awareness is king in ANY battle space, be it in the air or under the waves.
Being able to stand your aircraft on end and point your nose post-stall does you no good if you don't know where to point it. (while also being a fixed reference point in the middle of the air doing a pirouette is a lovely target for a short range missile shot)
As long as we continue to develop the systems of the F-35 for new and as yet un-thought of challenges, I believe the F-35's unparalleled SA will prove itself time and time again.
I'm rambling.... to the point.
I believe that just about everyone can agree that while the F-35 is a great aircraft, the cost/management/time waste on the government accounting\planning side has been abysmal, and this is not the way we want to approach the PCA program.
We should be focusing on small changes to existing resources that maximize effectiveness.
Why does the F-22 STILL not have an HMS\HMD? (money.. money.. money) From my sources even the Thales Scorpion was a good interim low cost solution.... but still here we are.
An upgraded engine that gets the F-35 squarely in the Air Defense \ Air Dominance role should also be a priority.
Smaller, more exact and time constrained programs that greatly expand performance of existing assets in the battle space would be a good ongoing goal as we reach into the next big thing (PCA\6th Gen\Klingon Cloaking Device\Star Wars Blasters)
Hornets by mandate. Tomcats by choice!!