bossovich wrote:Apparently the F35 is no where near the latest Sukhoi jets including the Su-30 and Su-35 when it comes to A2G capabilities. As far as I see this makes the JSF already somewhat incapable to be the country's replacement for air superiority fighters and make it's main use A2G. Does this mean America will now be behind russia and have to start struggling to catch up to them in air to air combat? Monetarily will this even be possible?
Well, before you get piled upon... its really the other way around. The Su-30 and 35 don't hold much chance against an F-35. It has inferior sensors, stealth, comms, ECM and likely transonic performance (the flight regime most A2A actually occurs.) The Sukhoi has significantly poorer air to ground... the weapons it could carry are markedly inferior to western systems like the JDAM, JSOW, AGM-130 ect.
The Russians are actually significantly behind the United States in fighter technology... simply by virtue of an economic collapse and the paucity of funding given to aircraft development. By comparison the US has developed and in the process of fielding not one, but two 5th Gen fighters, as well as a series of new generation stealthy UCAVs (X-47B).