Schwartz, in Memoir, Says F-22 was Traded for B-21 Bomber

[Corsair1963]

China's J-20's, J-31's, J-10B/C, Flanker derivatives and SU-35 fleet is worrisome. It's not a "given" they'd be wiped from the skies. Face it: Truncating the F-22 buy was the wrong decision. Even Gates has to acknowledge that now. But he's got his pension, while our pilots have to make due with relics from the 1970's...

Disagree 100% as the F-35 is more than capable of handling any current or projected threat in the next 20+ years. In addition it will be built in vast numbers and will be continually upgrade over it's lifetime.


In short the F-35 will be around long after the F-22 is retired.......

[count_to_10]

So, even with the “operational” squadron, the projection that the Chinese won’t have usable stealth fighters until the 2020’s isn’t looking that bad.

[marauder2048]

So where would it end? He objects and gets fired. Replacement objects, gets fired.. down the line until all 4-stars are fired.. then all 3-stars.. 2-stars- 1-stars.. . Fact is civilians get to make the call. Schwartz saw the writing on the wall and played the hand he was dealt. His fingerprints can be found all over the B-21.

Or that amount of attrition would result in Congress recommending that the Secretary of Defense be dismissed.
With just Wynne and Mosley fired it looked like a personality clash but with this amount of blood letting it's a problem
with the Secretary..

Congress was absolutely right to oppose Schwartz's nomination; as events have shown he was not particularly qualified.

[popcorn]

Congress opposed him? He was appointed so obviously had enuf support.

[marauder2048]

Congress opposed him? He was appointed so obviously had enuf support.

Looking above:

"Gates fought for Schwartz’ nomination to be Chief against congressional resistance."

Gates also admitted in his books to exaggerating much of the Air Force's alleged non-cooperation
with things like ISR. So who knows what Gates misrepresented to Congress during this period.

[Scorpion1alpha]

Disagree 100% as the F-35 is more than capable of handling any current or projected threat in the next 20+ years.

Disagree 100% with your 100% disagreement

[Corsair1963]

Disagree 100% as the F-35 is more than capable of handling any current or projected threat in the next 20+ years.

Disagree 100% with your 100% disagreement

So, what type do you believe will out perform the F-35 in the next 20 years to so.......

[mixelflick]

China's J-20's, J-31's, J-10B/C, Flanker derivatives and SU-35 fleet is worrisome. It's not a "given" they'd be wiped from the skies. Face it: Truncating the F-22 buy was the wrong decision. Even Gates has to acknowledge that now. But he's got his pension, while our pilots have to make due with relics from the 1970's...

Disagree 100% as the F-35 is more than capable of handling any current or projected threat in the next 20+ years. In addition it will be built in vast numbers and will be continually upgrade over it's lifetime.


In short the F-35 will be around long after the F-22 is retired.......

I think it'd be fair to say that for the next 10 years, the F-35 may hold an advantage vs. foreign adversaries. It's a pretty bold thing to look 20 years out though, don't you think? China's LO/VLO airframes are only going to get better, and I'd expect them to be at parity with us on that front eventually. The same however, probably won't be true of engines and avionics/sensors. Still, maintaining our lead 20 years out I think is..... dicey.

It's going to be interesting to see how the USAF deals with the PERCEPTION that the F-35 can't hold its own air to air. I'd bet anything though the Israeli's do it for us first, as they did with the F-15/F-16...

[mixelflick]

Thus, the "we traded F-22's for B-21's" hoax..

As said by four star general mixelflick who has as Ph.D. in Military and Strategic Studies.

Correction: 5 stars

Plus I've built several scale models including an F-14, 15, 16, 18, B-1B, Testors F-19 stealth fighter, an A-10 etc.. And I've been to a lot of airshows...

[XanderCrews]

Remember the context of that time.


GOP had a gigantic defeat in Nov. 2006 (lost House and Senate, because of Iraq.)

December 2007 ushered in the beginning of the "Great Recession".


Neither Bush or Obama were going to ask for, or give their approval to X number of F-22's or NGB when our economy was shedding over +300,000 jobs a month and people's homes were going into foreclosure. Not to mention fighting 2 wars, one of which was extremely unpopular.


That would have been political suicide-

They suicided anyway

So they spent a trillion dollars on a stimulus everyone agreed failed, killed actual jobs with the F-22 production, doubled down in Afghanistan, Withdrew prematurely from Iraq setting the rise of ISIS, introduced a massively divisive and deceptive healthcare plan and lost the Democrat Super Majority within just 2 years.

Obama was re-elected in 2012 they held the white house at least, with yet more republicans moving into both houses, and by 2016 the democratic golden girl lost to Donald Trump. The Republicans had more power than they had since the 1920s.

If that isn't suicide I don't know what is. The entireity of Obama's first term should have been nothing but jobs and the economy but that Super Majority was just too much fun to let go to waste so they engaged in stupid crap.

You'll never get anyone on the Obama dream team to admit to it easily but they screwed it up badly when they had blank check basically. Even at the time congress critters from F-22 manufacturing districts were asking why we were killing jobs on the F-22 assembly to "create" jobs with the stimulus at the cost of trillions. And why on earth couldn't F-22 production simply be rolled into there somehow. But it was important we gave all this money for "shovel ready" jobs in the near future rather than jobs we already had going, but wanted to kill off. Government will always government. The stimulus failed hard. Turns out just unleashing a trillion dollars in fun money lead to a lot of waste and make work projects without much effect (shocking I know)

But lets use the context argument. I don't really agree with the notion of this "horse trade" for B-21s thats kind of ridiculous. (didn't we horse trade it for the F-35 back then? thats what I was told)

The biggest issue at the time was that the F-22 was taking a bunch of heat for huge cost and you had unarmored humvees and other gear that was seemingly defenseless against the latest in haji technology leading to more casualties. Rumsfield was "cavalier" about all this and seen as an uncaring monster. Gates was the breath of fresh air to ge things back on track but seems just as cocksure and pigheaded for other reasons. So its not like we "traded" F-22s for MRAPs directly but the F-22 was the white elephant.

However, even at the time people who could think beyond election cycles were pointing out that it would not be RPGs and IEDs forever, and F-22s were going to take us into the next 50 years, and in wars that you had to win, rather than just get bored with and leave eventually. Theres no getting the F-22s back, and its telling as had been said how many times bringing them back comes up, and not just in internet land.

The B-21 had better deliver, I would hate see the F-22 "traded" for the A-12 Avenger II

[Corsair1963]

I think it'd be fair to say that for the next 10 years, the F-35 may hold an advantage vs. foreign adversaries. It's a pretty bold thing to look 20 years out though, don't you think? China's LO/VLO airframes are only going to get better, and I'd expect them to be at parity with us on that front eventually. The same however, probably won't be true of engines and avionics/sensors. Still, maintaining our lead 20 years out I think is..... dicey.

It's going to be interesting to see how the USAF deals with the PERCEPTION that the F-35 can't hold its own air to air. I'd bet anything though the Israeli's do it for us first, as they did with the F-15/F-16...

Honestly, I don't think even 20 years is that much of a stretch at all. As the US still has a considerable lead in a number of technologies and some are even growing. For example China isn't close to matching the current F119/F135 Turbofans. Let alone something like the New ACE (Adaptive Cycle Engine) in development by both GE and P&W.

As a matter of fact while China is trying to catch up with todays technology. The US is hard at work on tomorrows.....So, unless the US takes if foot way off the gas and in a big way. It should be able to maintain a healthy lead for sometime to come.



"IMHO"

[wrightwing]

I think it'd be fair to say that for the next 10 years, the F-35 may hold an advantage vs. foreign adversaries. It's a pretty bold thing to look 20 years out though, don't you think? China's LO/VLO airframes are only going to get better, and I'd expect them to be at parity with us on that front eventually. The same however, probably won't be true of engines and avionics/sensors. Still, maintaining our lead 20 years out I think is..... dicey.

It's going to be interesting to see how the USAF deals with the PERCEPTION that the F-35 can't hold its own air to air. I'd bet anything though the Israeli's do it for us first, as they did with the F-15/F-16...

The J-20/31 will never reach parity with the F-35, in terms of signature reduction, even 20+ years from now. The F-35 will be at Block 6/7 20 years from now, so the Chinese won't reach parity, in terms of systems/avionics, either

[weasel1962]

The aircraft may be "invisible" in the air but the airfield isn't "invisible" on the ground and neither are the aircraft that keep the rest in the air. The Chinese don't need stealth parity to threaten air superiority just like the Russians don't need ballpoint technology to write in space. Since the 90s, the Chinese have already adopted "asymmetry" in their approach to the US military technology advantage.

The Chinese don't need 30cm accuracy to take out facilities on the ground. They can do it with the 15m accuracy they have already achieved. They just need to ensure that enough airplanes survive (including those the F-35s and next gen fighters will take out both in the air and ground) to do the job. That means numbers.

The Chinese don't need F-35 level stealth to penetrate defended airspace. They just need enough stealth to lob increasingly faster and stealthier bombs/missiles which they are increasingly able to do from further distances.

The J-20 is more difficult to handle than the flankers and it will constantly evolve. There will be new "j-series" fighters. 20 years out is exactly what US planners will need to look. However at this moment, imho many more F-35s are required especially 20 years out.

[F-16ADF]

XC,

I would also add, since the Democrats have great influence in our news media; If the GOP (Bush 43, or even the 2008 candidates) would have been in favor of more -22s or whatever. I could just have heard it now, the Dem control news media (CBS, NBC, ABC, NYT, WP, MSNBC, CNN, ...) would have said (circa mid 2008):

"Bush or candidate X is in favor of more gold plated overtly expensive jets that are not needed while people are losing their homes (to foreclosure), the stock market is in near free-fall, and people are losing their jobs. Hence, the GOP is out of touch and doesn't understand the middle class or the problems facing working families."


Fast forward to post Jan 20, 2009. It really doesn't matter if Gates or whomever want more -22's. Obama would never been if favor of it. And he wasn't. For 2 years his party controlled everything. That type of military procurement was never on his (Obama) and their (the Dem controlled House and Senate) radar.

[XanderCrews]

The aircraft may be "invisible" in the air but the airfield isn't "invisible" on the ground and neither are the aircraft that keep the rest in the air. The Chinese don't need stealth parity to threaten air superiority just like the Russians don't need ballpoint technology to write in space. Since the 90s, the Chinese have already adopted "asymmetry" in their approach to the US military technology advantage.

You know that pen/pencil thing is Bulls**t right?

https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... nasa-spen/

The Chinese don't need 30cm accuracy to take out facilities on the ground. They can do it with the 15m accuracy they have already achieved. They just need to ensure that enough airplanes survive (including those the F-35s and next gen fighters will take out both in the air and ground) to do the job. That means numbers.

The Chinese don't need F-35 level stealth to penetrate defended airspace. They just need enough stealth to lob increasingly faster and stealthier bombs/missiles which they are increasingly able to do from further distances.

The J-20 is more difficult to handle than the flankers and it will constantly evolve. There will be new "j-series" fighters. 20 years out is exactly what US planners will need to look. However at this moment, imho many more F-35s are required especially 20 years out.

So China perfected the cruise missile/saturation attack? Overwhelming the target with SSMs, and then sending in waves of fighters is nothing new either...


The F-35 is about what you can ask for as it can across the F-35 A, B, and C launch and attack from anywhere. For as much as people whine about the F-35B "ruining" everything about the program its a beautiful hedge against the unexpected. China isn't the only one playing the asymmetry game either.