Australian lawmakers confident in F-35's future

However... USAF recognise - because of the few in number F-whatevers tootoos - that the F-35 needs to have beefed Air Fighting capabilities and there is work being done for that (mentioned last year by a big USAF nabob). Nevertheless peeps without RAPTORs have always relied on what they think is the best - so that is why Oz has not only the F-35As (for the moment) but ALSO the Super Hornets and Growlers and a vast array of Wedgetails networking with everyone including tankers and the like. It is all in a system of systems approach. That is what the F-35 is designed for. Pity that that CDF (commondogfukc - that was your acronym back in the glory days of the RANFAA before CDFpersons were invented) was not mentioned by CDF. CDF=common sense [oops for nonOzzers CDF = Chief Defence Force (ADF)]

Perhaps CADF would be a better acronym than CDF - for us old geezers? No?

Nevertheless the F-35 is no slouch (compared to current western fighter aircraft - a fact mentioned now a zillion times on this forum) especially in a pod of four - is how the USAF and RAAF and probably the rest intend to operate them - to take advantage of their own networking capabilities amongst themselves for mutual support. Pity CDF did not mention that.

Air Chief Marshal Binskin: In fact, you may as well pull out the knife and the pistol that the pilot is carrying and go to that because it is not designed to get into that sort of fight.

That comment there, which I know he meant as something else entirely, will be potentially used as ammunintion that the F35 is not good in a "dogfight". along with the 6 v 4 seconds. sigh!

Thats true, but its a damned if you do, damned if you don't I'd rather them say stuff like that than be accused of a cover up...

Here is what sucks about the great JSF debate, is that anything that is not 100 percent complimentary 100 percent of the time is somehow an indictment. so if some admiral actually implies its not all incredible at all times, that some kind of secret code that it sucks. or if he is always 100 percent at all times that means he is covering things up. Its a no win.

I actually know of a company (non aviation) that is suing someone because their evaluation/study featured the caveat that there was a possibility of physically injury. Other than that the entire thing was flattering, but they were attacked as if they had set out to destroy the company. You can insert all your Airpower Aus, style nasty comments about their "flawed assessments" etc.


I really don't know what the hooplah is. It would be like if someone asked me if a long gun sniper got into a knife fight what would happen. "I guess the better knife guy wins, but that's one crappy sniper" " we gave him that expensive rifle and years teaching him to hit people at 1KM and he let it come down to a 50/50 knife fight... "

Well, if it did come down to a knife fight...the F-35 will do just fine..

CrockyDundy should be wearing a SLOUCH HAT [DiggersChapeau Brim Up/Down] - to be 'no slouch' - in the "this is a knife" department.

http://dictionary.cambridge.org/diction ... -no-slouch

Under what form of combat with a very fixed supply of ammo does the Senator expect anybody to go "FULL AUTO" with?

Has he been watching too many Rambo movies?

Neither ground combat, nor Dogfighting does anybody just sit on the trigger an empty their ammo.

Everybody makes precise burst shots to the best of their abilities and spaces out all shots when in a close range gun fight.

Doesn't matter if it's land, air, or sea, you just don't empty your ammo pouch like that.

Under what form of combat with a very fixed supply of ammo does the Senator expect anybody to go "FULL AUTO" with?

Has he been watching too many Rambo movies?

Neither ground combat, nor Dogfighting does anybody just sit on the trigger an empty their ammo.

Everybody makes precise burst shots to the best of their abilities and spaces out all shots when in a close range gun fight.

Doesn't matter if it's land, air, or sea, you just don't empty your ammo pouch like that.

Remember when they added the 3 shot setting on the M-16? Apart from wasting ammo, no one ever hit anything with spray and pray, unless it was their buddy. Since those days we have become a little more focused on things like collateral damage and fracticide. If that Hornet ever dumped a 6 second shot, he'd be up on charges explaining the school, and farmer's family just as surely as if it was a dumb bomb miss.

That's before we talk about the impact of "blind boxer fighting a seeing boxer with a handgun 20 feet away" analogies of the F-35. Sure you still spend time in hand to hand combat practice. But not as much time as on the range and filling out the Ghillie suit. The issue remains few understand the paradigm shift the F-22 is already demonstrating even now.

How do you tell a Senator it's a stupid question, nicely?

BP

Remember when they added the 3 shot setting on the M-16? Apart from wasting ammo, no one ever hit anything with spray and pray, unless it was their buddy. Since those days we have become a little more focused on things like collateral damage and fracticide. If that Hornet ever dumped a 6 second shot, he'd be up on charges explaining the school, and farmer's family just as surely as if it was a dumb bomb miss.

That's before we talk about the impact of "blind boxer fighting a seeing boxer with a handgun 20 feet away" analogies of the F-35. Sure you still spend time in hand to hand combat practice. But not as much time as on the range and filling out the Ghillie suit. The issue remains few understand the paradigm shift the F-22 is already demonstrating even now.

How do you tell a Senator it's a stupid question, nicely?

BP

Senator, I'm sorry to tell you this, but NOBODY in their right mind uses FULL AUTO when they have a very limited ammo supply. Your perception of how to use gun ammo in a gun fight is incorrect.

<Then General presents actual combat footage of gun fights in the air, ground, or sea>

I'm hoping that Australia takes notice of this concept for our bases/bare bases and even more barer bases up north with the last tranche of F-35s to include B variants so as to take care of this concept (and haha be able to whenever required put a few Bs on our LHDs - but youse knew that).

"...The report recommends a host of other measures, such as shuffling F-35B jump jets among multiple bases to avoid attack..."

http://breakingdefense.com/2015/06/we-c ... sba-study/
ALSO:
http://www.flightglobal.com/news/articl ... ke-414002/

This is just a sad headline ERROR by SLDinfo - for fsake invest in a proof reader. I'll guess every RIFF-RAFF has its day eh. IT does become difficult to take SLDinfo seriously after a while. Anyhoo video and TEXT below.

Air Marshal Brown Bids Farewell to the RAFF
12 Jul 2015 SLDinfo

"In this video, the outgoing Chief of Staff of the RAAF talks about his look back and ahead..." [This is how the official RiffRaff website couches the title "...Air Marshal and appointed Chief of Air Force..." a small thing I know but coupled with the Riffraff CRABs rool - yes? ]

VIDEO: https://vimeo.com/133261411

Source: http://www.sldinfo.com/air-marshal-brow ... -the-raff/

:devil: This is just a sad headline ERROR by SLDinfo - for fsake invest in a proof reader. I'll guess every RIFF-RAFF has its day eh. IT does become difficult to take SLDinfo seriously after a while. Anyhoo video and TEXT below.

Air Marshal Brown Bids Farewell to the RAFF
12 Jul 2015 SLDinfo

"In this video, the outgoing Chief of Staff of the RAAF talks about his look back and ahead..." [This is how the official RiffRaff website couches the title "...Air Marshal and appointed Chief of Air Force..." a small thing I know but coupled with the Riffraff CRABs rool - yes? ]

VIDEO: https://vimeo.com/133261411

Source: http://www.sldinfo.com/air-marshal-brow ... -the-raff/

Man I loved listening to that guy talk. You would watch him just chafe in his chair waiting to speak and then open up with grace and articulation-- despite his face looking like he was ready to strangle someone.

gonna miss seeing him talk

Well, even though it shouldn't need it, the new CAF, AIRMSHL Leo Davies, should have a positive view and understanding of the F-35 with his long background in the F-111 and few years spent in Capability Systems / Capability Planning offices.

Joint Strike Fighter planes take step forward
17 Jul 2015 MICHAEL McGowan

"THE arrival of the new Joint Strike Fighter planes at Williamtown has taken another step forward, after the Department of Environment gave the green light to the project.

From 2018 Williamtown RAAF base, along with Tindal in the Northern Territory, is expected to begin housing 72 new F-35A Joint Strike Fighter planes....

...“RAAF Base Williamtown will remain the nation’s main fighter pilot training base and will house most of the planned F-35A Lightning II aircraft....

...The Final EIS was approved with four core conditions. They include requirements to implement aircraft noise management plans in accordance with the RAAF Aircraft Noise Management Strategy as well as ongoing monitoring and public reporting of aircraft noise measurements around F-35A operating bases."

Source: http://www.theherald.com.au/story/32178 ... p-forward/

Interview canvasses how the RAAF has changed in the last decade with new assets bringing different capabilities. The F-35 bits are well known at this stage (in the interview at URL) but thought to quote this bit about 'testing' to be of interest. Best read it all at URL for the majority of F-35 parts and I'll add the F-35 'common knowledge quote' below this one also.

Looking Back and Looking Forward in 21st Century Warfare: Air Marshal (Retired) Geoff Brown
01 Sep 2015 Robbin Laird

"Air Marshal Geoff Brown retired on July 3, 2015 when Leo Davies became the new Air Marshal for the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). Although retired, no one would consider Geoff Brown retiring in any sense of the word....


...Question: As Chief you decided to push your new aircraft – Wedgetail and the KC-30A – out to the force rather than waiting for the long list of tests to be complete. Why?

Air Marshal (Retired) Brown: Testers can only do so much.

Once an aircraft is functional you need to get in the hand of the operators, pilots, crews and maintainers.

They will determine what they think the real priorities for the evolution of the aircraft, rather than a test engineer or pilot.

And you get the benefit of a superior platform from day one.

When I became Deputy Chief of Air Force, the Wedgetail was being slowed down by the Kabuki effort to arrange specification lines for the aircraft. There was much hand-wringing amongst the program staff as to how it didn’t meet the specifications that we had put out.

I said, “Let’s just give it to the operators.”

And the advantage of basically giving the aircraft to the operators was what the test community and the engineers thought were real limitations the operators did not.

Sometimes it took the operators two days to figure a work around. And the real advantage of the development was that they would prioritize what was really needed to be fixed from the operational point of view, not the testing point of view.

In other words, you can spend a lot of time trying to get back to the original specifications.

But when you actually give it to the operators they actually figure out what’s important or what isn’t important and then use the aircraft in real world operations...."

Source: http://www.sldinfo.com/looking-back-and ... off-brown/

"...Question: As Chief, you were a key player in the decision to bring the F-35 to the RAAF. What do you see that fifth generation brings to the RAAF and the joint force?

Air Marshal (Retired) Brown: The USAF provided the RAAF with a slot for an Australian exchange pilot to fly the F-22, so that gave us direct access to seeing what the initial fifth generation platform brought to air operations.

We have evolved our own capabilities within our classic Hornet force and five years ago added the Super Hornet, all of which has been a significant evolutionary experience.

Fifth generation is not evolutionary; it is about disruptive change.

If you approach it as a step grade improvement you will miss the point of the shift.

I flew in a Red Flag in a F-15 D aggressor and after having gotten killed five different times by the F-22s, we went back and looked at the tapes and it was clear that the situational awareness in the two cockpits was night and day different.

I will take the F-22 and you can take the F-15 if you want; but I clearly want the new definer of air combat, the fifth generation asset.

And as good as the F-22 is, the F-35 represents a significant shift in fifth gen capability.

And the capability of the fleet to operate in an integrated manner and to share unprecedented data over the MADL system is not just business is usual; it is the baseline for redesigning our 21st century force.

And this clearly triggers a need to shape new concepts of operations in redesigning and integrated sensor enabled force...."

And they are still confident after all these years (Australian lawmakers confident in F-35's future). See attached PDF.

Only two pages from a lengthy Oz Senate report otherwise about other ADF matters dated 21 Oct 2015.

SENATE - FOREIGN AFFAIRS, DEFENCE AND TRADE LEGISLATION COMMITTEE - Estimates - (Public)
21 Oct 2015 as above

"...Senator WHISH-WILSON: Could you tell us what you have budgeted for?
Air Vice Marshal Deeble: The current budget for the JSF program, including the infrastructure elements, is
$17 million.[you whish] That includes recent updates to exchange rate.

Senator WHISH-WILSON: Seventeen billion or million?
Air Vice Marshal Deeble: Seventeen billion, sorry. That includes the purchase of 72 aircraft. The first aircraft
were purchased in LRIP 6. The value of that was $126.7 million for those first two aircraft. Over the life of the
production, which will go out to 2023, we are expecting the average cost of our aircraft to be $90 million each...."

Source: http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/dow ... tion%2Fpdf (PDF 1Mb)