Its ironic isn’t it? The very service unable to find a mission wants to steal the only valid fighter missions left. As small as the UK is the RN ought to be in charge of RAF assets.

Anyone find pictures of the MiG-31bm with 3000L underwing tanks, yet?

I’m not sure what you are saying about the middle missiles being finless when the middle pair are clearly showing black fins. Perhaps I’m misinterpreting something you said and it did not come across to me what you meant.

The thrust from the engine with higher bypass ratio (F135) falls off faster as altitude increases than the engine with lower bypass ratio (F119). Though the F135 starts with more thrust at sea level, it is surpassed by the F119 by the time it gets to 50K ft.

Yes, the F119 is optimized for high altitude flight. Furthermore its already suited for a tvc mechanism. Two intangibles that the F135 does not enjoy.

But to emulate F-22’s supercruise and 65K ft operating altitude, the F-35 would also need more wing area, more wing sweep and an increase in fineness ratio (basically the same type of treatment the F-16XLs received when they were converted from F-16As).

I can see the fineness ratio in some regards, but a big nose version may just overcome its problems. I would be surprised if you needed more wing for supercruise. The sweep may be an issue, but are you sure the wing area is?

Has anyone considered an F119-powered F-35 option centered around air superiority?

The F-35 in all reality should get three power plant options, F135, F136, and F119. Maybe GE would want to put forth an F120 option, too. Can’t help but think the variable-cycle option F120 mated to the F-35A’s airframe and optimized for an interceptor role couldn’t be anything other than truly bad ass. Definitely would be the ‘Rolls Royce’ of the F-35 variants. (pun intended)

Well, the Russians have been watching us on and off for the past twenty years. And the Chinese are paying much closer attention to us these days. If a patsy nation in the future gets fed information from the Russians or Chinese military intelligence sources then the bad scenario is a real possibility.

I just don’t like the idea of using the B-2A’s airframe. There is no reason a conventional aircraft wouldn’t be cheaper to produce in a vlo configuration. I’d much rather see them take the basic shell of a smaller airliner and give it sloped sides on all of its perpendicular to the line of flight surfaces to reduce the radar signature. You don’t need stealth. You just need a reduced radar return.

Brig Gen Heinz is a wise fellow. The whole idea of the F-35 program is not to make a single common fighter, rather it is to make a single common airframe across the services. Creating an open atmosphere where you have a common airframe and redundant suppliers of plug and play components like engines and radar only makes the program that much more promising to partnering nations. The initial hardware is going to need replacing over its service life. The more competition for those components the better the system as a whole.

Garbage in = garbage out.

gigo for short