Roper Hints NGAD Could Replace F-35; Why? Life-Cycle Costs

Something like a notional Pershing III with conventional warheads backed by a sizable force of land based Tomahawks should do the trick.

Pershing III can't work because it breaks INF and then you don't have problem just with China but with Russia too *

What I think is solution is something like Skybolt 2.0, Russians can't bitching about it because they already field Kinzhal, Chinese have airborne ballistic missiles so they can't bitch either.

So you don't break INF and still have decent answer to Chinese ballistic arsenal.

Only question could B-21 carry something like mini Skybolt internally?

*for new strategic arm reduction it is important to have US as part of INF.

So what you propose is using hugely expensive Trident 2 with conventional warheads against Chinese military targets?

SSGNs, namely

more to the point though we need to take a look at what we can do that China can not. The US has a really big navy. its equipped with lots of cruise missiles. We can move or "park" this navy off the coast of China in a way they simply can't match. Has it occured to anyone that the reason they go with the land based systems Fox1 was mentioning is because they don't really have any other options? The US has far many more options. So deciding to do it like China, because China does it that way (the only way it can) may be not only purposeless, but redundant.

should we underestimate china? absolutely not. Should we act like we have pebbles to throw in a gun battle? also now. We aren't helpless, and this needs to be remembered too.

I must ask becuase nuclear option is out of table, first it is game over for both sides

not necessarily,

and I can't believe some people still believe this.

and second China have big advantage in case of nuclear war,

nope, an Ohio class SSBN has nearly as many warheads as all of China. as many according to some.

we face far far fewer threats than we did against the USSR, yet we are at a huge disadvantage?

MAD doesn't work against nuclear super power which have much bigger population.

MAD hasn't been the doctrine in 40 years, so I guess I'm in the clear on this one too.

INF was abandoned almost two years ago, as both the U.S. and Russia withdrew from it. China was never a signatory party to begin with. Thus, INF was useless to the current environment. If INF had applied to China, then about 90% of their ballistic missile capability would be eliminated. That is why we should develop a strong conventional medium range ballistic missile threat to counter China. It would place us in a position of parity where China no longer has a class of weapon we don't. And in the end, it would probably result in INF being reinstated with more signing parties, to include China. Once these missiles no longer offer them an advantage and actually start to hold them hostage, they will want to come to the table. Either way, we ultimately get what we want.

we already do

So what you propose is using hugely expensive Trident 2 with conventional warheads against Chinese military targets?

While the photo that Xander shared was from apparently from an Ohio-class SSBN submarine, the US Navy also operates Ohio submarines converted to SSGN and each of these Ohio SSGN submarines can carry 154 (one hundred and fifty four) Tomahawk cruise missiles.

I must ask because nuclear option is out of table, first it is game over for both sides and second China have big advantage in case of nuclear war, MAD doesn't work against nuclear super power which have much bigger population.

Really??
Because last time I checked China is a bit smaller than the USA in terms of landmass and the vast majority of China's population lives in a contiguous landmass closer to Pacific Ocean and this landmass compromises somewhere between a third to half of China's total landmass.
On the other hand most of the USA's population is spread between the West coast, Midwest and East coast.

Resuming China's population is much more "densely packed" compared to the USA's population which is far more spread around a territory which is already bigger. And guess what? Nuclear weapons kills much more and 'better' when the population is dense compared to a population which is more spread.

On top of this, the USA has far more nuclear warheads than China (5800 versus 320). So EVERYTHING is on favor of the USA when it comes to an eventual nuclear war (which I hope never happens)!
https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/ ... whohaswhat

And as the "cherry on top of the cake", the USA has by far the best Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) defense system in the world which should be able to neutralize some (a good number, I believe) of those Chinese 320 nuclear warheads.

Pershing III can't work because it breaks INF and then you don't have problem just with China but with Russia too *

Not necessarily. Even if the USA decides to return to the INF treaty, that "notional/tentative Pershing III" could be made in order to have its range reduced in order to comply with the INF treaty. Basically what the Russians did with the Iskander missile.

Really??
Because last time I checked China is a bit smaller than the USA in terms of landmass and the vast majority of China's population lives in a contiguous landmass closer to Pacific Ocean and this landmass compromises somewhere between a third to half of China's total landmass.
On the other hand most of the USA's population is spread between the West coast, Midwest and East coast.

It doesn't matter when you look numbers. You have TEN times bigger rural population! Btw in 1960s when SAC was at its peak power, they esimtated with its arsenal they can "only wipe out "30% of Chinese. And back then Chinese population was 600-700 millions which only little more then rural population of modern China.

That is if you don't count massive city shelters which you have in most of their one cities, especially relics of cold war built ro counter SAC planned genocide of Chinese, like underground Beijing which was design to shelter million people

On top of this, the USA has far more nuclear warheads than China (5800 versus 320). So EVERYTHING is on favor of the USA when it comes to an eventual nuclear war (which I hope never happens)!
https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/ ... whohaswhat

If you look estimates of NK's icbm capability they are already at 30-100 icbm capabile warheads, in just little more then one decade going from not having nuke at all to 1/10 to 1/3 of chicom icbm capability, so if you want to believe in fairy tale in which world leading industry and most populated country of world have just 320 strategic warheads fine.


Russian retired commander of strategic forces estimated lower Chinese icbm capability at least ~2000 warheads and higher at same level as Russia or US. He also explain not rely on silos (even relic like DF-5 are quasi mobile icbm) makes tracking Chinese icbm numbers extremely hard and as US academic study showed, Chinese system of tunnels around 3000km long can allow hiding of huge number of icbm TELs.

Btw in 1960s when SAC was at its peak power, they esimtated with its arsenal they can "only wipe out "30% of Chinese. And back then Chinese population was 600-700 millions which only little more then rural population of modern China.

Before China industrialized, 80% of the population is rural, now the reverse is true.

That is if you don't count massive city shelters which you have in most of their one cities, especially relics of cold war built ro counter SAC planned genocide of Chinese, like underground Beijing which was design to shelter million people

Those abandoned bomb shelters are not what you think. Those are symbols of the crazy Mao era. The great leader ordered everybody dig a hole in the ground so they can survive the inevitable nuclear attack. Estimated one million people living underground in the capital recently because the housing above ground is too expensive for those poor people.

https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest ... s-16989616

Even if one million can survive underground, that is less than 5% of the population of the capital.

It doesn't matter when you look numbers. You have TEN times bigger rural population! Btw in 1960s when SAC was at its peak power, they esimtated "only" 30% of Chinese population would died in nuclear war with US while 70% of USSR population. And back then Chinese population was 600-700 millions which only little more then rural population of modern China.

LoL! What part that the most part of Chinese population lives a relatively narrow area close to the Pacific ocean didn't you understand??
For instance, the population density of China:


And then the population density of USA:


Resuming, if more people are "packed together" then a single (or multiple) nuclear warheads will kill much more - You know that nuclear weapon don't have a limit of how many people they can kill, do you??

Anyway, the maps above clearly show that it's far easier for the USA to wipe out or eliminate all the essencial part of China's population (and all really important assets) than otherwise specially when the USA have far more nuclear weapons than China (more on that below).

Russian retired commander of strategic forces estimated lower Chinese icbm capability at least ~2000 warheads and higher at same level as Russia or US. He also explain not rely on silos (even relic like DF-5 are quasi mobile icbm) makes tracking Chinese icbm numbers extremely hard and as US academic study showed, Chinese system of tunnels around 3000km long can allow hiding of huge number of icbm TELs.

I gave you the link of a real study about the number of nuclear warheads that each nuclear power should possess.
So let's see: you dismiss my source but you want me to believe on some unnamed/unknown Russian retired commander that you mentioned?? That's the problem that I have when discussing things with you. When you are presented with evidence you seem to dismiss everytime the evidence that others give you by countering that "a Russian commander said this", "a Russian General said that" and so on. For all that I can tell those Russian guys could be drunk guys fueled by Vodka

Anyway, even 2000 warheads are A LOT LESS than 5800!

Really??
Because last time I checked China is a bit smaller than the USA in terms of landmass and the vast majority of China's population lives in a contiguous landmass closer to Pacific Ocean and this landmass compromises somewhere between a third to half of China's total landmass.
On the other hand most of the USA's population is spread between the West coast, Midwest and East coast.

It doesn't matter when you look numbers. You have TEN times bigger rural population! Btw in 1960s when SAC was at its peak power, they esimtated with its arsenal they can "only wipe out "30% of Chinese. And back then Chinese population was 600-700 millions which only little more then rural population of modern China.

That is if you don't count massive city shelters which you have in most of their one cities, especially relics of cold war built ro counter SAC planned genocide of Chinese, like underground Beijing which was design to shelter million people

On top of this, the USA has far more nuclear warheads than China (5800 versus 320). So EVERYTHING is on favor of the USA when it comes to an eventual nuclear war (which I hope never happens)!
https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/ ... whohaswhat

If you look estimates of NK's icbm capability they are already at 30-100 icbm capabile warheads, in just little more then one decade going from not having nuke at all to 1/10 to 1/3 of chicom icbm capability, so if you want to believe in fairy tale in which world leading industry and most populated country of world have just 320 strategic warheads fine.


Russian retired commander of strategic forces estimated lower Chinese icbm capability at least ~2000 warheads and higher at same level as Russia or US. He also explain not rely on silos (even relic like DF-5 are quasi mobile icbm) makes tracking Chinese icbm numbers extremely hard and as US academic study showed, Chinese system of tunnels around 3000km long can allow hiding of huge number of icbm TELs.

its not the 1960s anymore. Its not the 1980s either, which is bad news for China, the USSR was a much tougher nut to crack.

I'll keep this brief since we still think MAD is a thing, and we are bringing up SAC capabilities from 60 years back:

*The dirty little secret of SAC was that once the SSBNs got good enough SAC became the weakest part of the triad, in fact SAC's primary goal was to create and impossible tactical problem for the Soviets, that is to force them to defend an impossibly large mass from air attack, this would be impossible, and expensive, and we were happy to keep them trying.


*we aren't using the nukes as genocidal de-populators. This is essentially a counter-force (AKA countervailing) strategy. in fact generally we would try to avoid population centers for obvious reasons.


*The US Navy could park itself from Tonkin gulf to the yellow sea in a giant "half moon" and destroy anything it sees, sink anything that goes out or in, mining harbors, and generally make life miserable conventionally. China has no such capacity against the US, and even if it did, we have a 2nd coast, and we aren't even counting the gulf of Mexico.


*much like 1944 or 1945 you have one force that can "Reach out and touch someone" bombing them at their own homes and factories, vs a force that simply doesn't have that capacity. in that case the side with the intact factory and populace and reach wins, and the side without loses.

*basically there is one side that is in a far more advantageous position. With more firepower and more places to hide it. Vs a side with much less of all those things. theres nothing to worry about 1 billion people, or the population disparity, unless they all learn to swim World War Z style to California. In which case, I will gladly nuke California, starting with San Francisco and working my way south to Baja.

I'll never cease to be amazed by people that can take a rifle or a tank or plane or what have you, and then argue to the tinest detail about strategy, tactics, superiority etc, but when it comes to nuclear weapons, everything is equally survivable, accurate, destructive, etc. and we all just die. Thats how combat goes in real life right? 10 grunts on one side, 10 grunts on the other, and they all die? 20 dead people? yes of course. one side doesn't have superior accuracy, tactics, terrain, training, etc.




obligatory.

ricrunes may have put it even better, but yes China has a hard problem on its hands.

That's one of the things you can benefit with training "playing the red team" and that helps you find problems and obstacles with "your team" and theirs. Theyre in a tough spot once the USN shows up. Even letting the submarines prowl around there going Silent Service 2.0 for a month would cause havoc and eventually no cargo in or out, and its blockaded before the surface ships even show up. American SSNs are terrifying, and they've never had a chance yet to show what they can really do, once word spreads of what happens to the first few "blockade runners" things will stop very quickly.

anywho if it goes nuclear the US enjoys several key advantages having nothing to do with population

its not the 1960s anymore. Its not the 1980s either, which is bad news for China, the USSR was a much tougher nut to crack.

Exactly!

And even today not being the 1960's or 1980's anymore and while in the past most Chinese population was rural, both Chinese rural and urban population still lived in the areas closer to Pacific ocean and those were always the most important for China.
For instance during the Second Sino-Japanese war (1937-1945) which extended into WWII the Japanese forces occupied some of the Chinese territory close to the Pacific Ocean, something which completely limited the effectiveness of the Chinese military forces to the point that they weren't able to recover the occupied territories even after the Japanese forces suffered heavy loses at the hands of the Allies (mainly US but also Australian, New Zealand and British forces) in the Pacific.

Dubbed Continuous Capability Development and Delivery (C2D2), Block 4 will correct
deficiencies discovered in concurrent development/testing and add future
capabilities. USAF is holding to a lower delivery rate until Block 4 production begins to minimize retrofit costs. Initial operational testing began in
2018 and completion has slipped to early 2021 or beyond, delaying full-rate
production.

https://www.airforcemag.com/app/uploads ... eapons.pdf

OK, so it seems one of the reasons why USAF (and probably also USN) have not been speeding up introduction of the F-35 is that they are waiting for block 4...

At 20-30 millions USD per plane it makes sense to wait -- a pity Norway could not wait a little bit longer...

Dubbed Continuous Capability Development and Delivery (C2D2), Block 4 will correct
deficiencies discovered in concurrent development/testing and add future
capabilities. USAF is holding to a lower delivery rate until Block 4 production begins to minimize retrofit costs. Initial operational testing began in
2018 and completion has slipped to early 2021 or beyond, delaying full-rate
production.

https://www.airforcemag.com/app/uploads ... eapons.pdf

OK, so it seems one of the reasons why USAF (and probably also USN) have not been speeding up introduction of the F-35 is that they are waiting for block 4...

At 20-30 millions USD per plane it makes sense to wait -- a pity Norway could not wait a little bit longer...

Well, there will always be a new Block or new capabilties coming up and at some point you have to commit. Even Blokc 3F F-35 are immensely capable jets compared to for example F-16s in Norwegian service. US Services already have something like 500 F-35s, so it doesn't sound like they are really waiting much for Block 4.

OK, so it seems one of the reasons why USAF (and probably also USN) have not been speeding up introduction of the F-35 is that they are waiting for block 4...

At 20-30 millions USD per plane it makes sense to wait -- a pity Norway could not wait a little bit longer...

Is the price of the base model F-35A expected to rise $20-30M per aircraft once Block 4 is implemented? Or is that simply the retrofit price?

Back to NGAD speculation, it seems clear that if a fighter-type aircraft is desired with 1000-1500nm range, the keys will be propulsion advances and big gas tanks. In any event, it will have to be a large aircraft to carry the gas, and since the military buys aircraft by the pound (per Kelly Johnson & Ben Rich), it will be quite expensive. A LOT more than the F-35. But if that is what the requirements specify -- a LOT of range -- some things will have to give, such as agility. 9g? Please. More like 7g, but maybe only 5g -- especially if this thing is supposed to be fast. Speaking of speed... if you want speed AND range, you probably are in YF-12 / SR-71 territory. The SR-71 could go what -- 1 hour between tankings? Maybe 1.5hrs? So it could go 3000nm (give or take) in an hour? But it was being caught by tankers at either end. So an SR-71 size gets you about 1500nm radius (we'll ignore the inconvenient must tank right after takeoff), but it was no 5g aircraft either.

The old aerospace maxim still applies: performance, cost, schedule ... pick two. But performance can also be broken down thusly: speed, agility, range... pick two. The YF-12/SR-71 chose speed and range. If you choose (modest) agility and range...

It seems to me the most straightforward, and possibly cheapest way to achieve a 1500nm combat radius, is to stretch the F-35. But to do so, ADVENT / AETD / AETP probably needs to deliver on +30% greater fuel efficiency and +10-20% greater thrust than the baseline F135 just as all prior aviation performance increases have depended on propulsion advances.

If it could fit, a 51,000lb AETP motor with 30% greater subsonic fuel efficiency might enable an F-35++ to stretch its combat radius to 1500nm while retaining modest agility. The required fuselage stretch could lower wave drag by increasing the fineness ratio (though parasitic drag will increase with wetted area), provide more volume for gas, and lengthen the weapons bays possibly providing enough room for stealthy carriage of hypersonic missiles. This notional F-35++ NGAD would take advantage of established avionics and software. MADL is already implemented, so leverage it. LM has already teased about integrating DEWs into the F-35, so that seems covered.

To handle the extra weight resulting from the fuselage stretch + lots of gas, the F-35C wing already is about 50% larger than the -A model. Leaving off the wing fold structure and mechanism saves some weight too. As it burns off gas, It might be able to retain 7g maneuvering performance as well as decent subsonic acceleration. (And the Killer Bee has shown that 7g with speed agility is quite competitive.)

With an improved fineness ratio, and increased horsepower... it might even achieve a modest supercruise. But if you want to supercruise at 1.5M for a thousand miles (swag), it's going to take a lot of gas.

A 0.8M cruise will cover 3000nm in about 6.5 hours. That's 33000lbs of gas at a 5000lb/hr burn rate (notional F-35 cruise burn). But if that 5000lb/hr is cut by 30%, it becomes 23000lb of gas.... which feels doable with a stretched F-35 (including reserves etc).

In short, want an NGAD without breaking the bank completely? Stretch the F-35.

Well, there will always be a new Block or new capabilties coming up and at some point you have to commit. Even Blokc 3F F-35 are immensely capable jets compared to for example F-16s in Norwegian service. US Services already have something like 500 F-35s, so it doesn't sound like they are really waiting much for Block 4.

The price tag mentioned for upgrading to block 4 is quite high (20-30 million USD), it's approaching an MLU rather than what I would expect from a "regular" block upgrade... Or do you expect going from block 4 to block 5 will be equally expensive?

A massive MLU of the Thai F-16 (bringing their block 15 up to modern standard) cost around 38 million per F-16 and took several years, MS20 for their Gripen was approx. 1.89 million USD per jet...

At 20-30 millions USD per plane it makes sense to wait -- a pity Norway could not wait a little bit longer...

Norway did wait, a majority of their F-35s have yet to be delivered.

But you should spam this in every thread, regardless of reality.

Back to NGAD speculation

No I'm afraid thats not possible. Loke has to spam multiple threads about the F-35s block IV upgrade costs today.

2 days ago he had to spam multiple threads about UCAVs and Loyal WIngman.

He is also having to spam multiple threads with Thailands upgrade cost to MS20 on their Gripens in order to paint the F-35 in a bad light regarding block IV.

So the moderators may have to step in, or he may have to get back on his meds, But there is a distinct pattern where "Loke" is spamming the same info across multiple threads simultaneously about the last week.

A massive MLU of the Thai F-16 (bringing their block 15 up to modern standard) cost around 38 million per F-16 and took several years, MS20 for their Gripen was approx. 1.89 million USD per jet...

Yeah sure, that's why most countries prefer to buy used (often F-16A Block 15) and apply "30 times more expensive" upgrades (Romania being another example) then to buy less expensive Gripen Cs and apply them "30 times less expensive" upgrades. Yeah, these countries are all dump, we are all dumb here and only you are the smart(a$$?) guy around here

Anyway, your logic is completely and totally flawed. Either the F-16s are much less expensive than Gripens or the cost upgrades for both aircraft aren't that different. Or - which I believe to be the case, in case your values/cost above are correct - the F-16 upgrades as well as the F-35 Block 4 upgrades, are FAR, FAR, FAR AND FAR MORE COMPREHENSIVE than the Gripen MS20 upgrade (which justifies the bigger cost) but then this is something that you conveniently ignored during you reasoning/trolling/spamming whatever...

And yeah, I agree with Xander. You clearly seem to be trolling/spamming these threads...