I am sure that you are aware of the veiled threats China has made towards Japan. And those street riots from a few months ago in Chinese cities to where Japanese cars were smashed and businesses selling Japanese products were burned, just re-enforce the perception from the Japanese point of view that China is looking for trouble with Japan.

So the recent riots in Vietnamese cities against (perceived) Chinese interests were an example of Vietnamese aggression towards China?

RAAF F-35A AU-1 revealed

Fitting that this occurred on the same day Tony Abbott swore fealty to the United States, pledging Australian lives and resources in service of whatever folly Washington decides to embark upon next. Truly the F-35 is a fitting aircraft for such an abject and servile nation.

Chrome translates the phrase in Jo‘s link as “plane beyond repair”.

http://fotografersha.livejournal.com/539678.html

And the prettiest bird too. 🙁

Surely your moral ‘outrage’ Rii doesnt extend to condoning the people smuggling outfits that these boats will counter?.

I’m a lot less concerned about the operations of people smuggling outfits than about the desperate circumstances people face that drive them to employ such services. But then that’s one of the fundamental differences between the political ‘left’ and ‘right’ — the left cares about people, their welfare and dignity, whereas the right cares about ‘laws’ and other self-serving abstractions that, as a rule, are crafted by the powerful to protect their interests against those they would oppress.

Well it appears that Action Tony didn’t actually consult the ADF and jumped the gun on that one… 😀

On the question of toys, though. Is there any alternative aircraft left for the ADF on the 2020-2040 horizon? From being touted as the future of all things, the F-35 is slowly but surely morphing into the last man standing (i.e. for US products buyers).

F-35 has been locked in for Australia for a long time now. Which is funny given that one of the key rationales for selecting F-35 was that it would allow Australia to operate a single manned combat aircraft — something which the delays to the program have led to being thrown out the window with the acquisition of Super Hornet. So now we have two sluggish strikers in the same weight class, the difference being that one is more advanced and less flexible than the other. I guess that counts as some kind of hi-lo structure. Of course anyone with even a modicum of sense and foresight wouldn’t have started the comedy train rolling by linking Australia to a paper aeroplane in the first place. But then that’s the sort of thing a US Deputy Sheriff does I guess.

TL;DR: certainly there were (superior) alternatives available to Australia, but not anymore. The 2007 decision to acquire ‘interim’ Super Hornets closed the door on any reasonable outcome.

Most of the work done under the MiG-35 project should be adaptable to another airframe, e.g. radar, EODASki, EW gear, engines+TVC, perhaps RAM coatings also?

Further development of RD-33 and MiG-35-related subsystems would of course be good news for the MiG-29M/K aircraft out there when they come up for MLU also.

Jump jets on navy’s agenda as Tony Abbott orders air strike rethink

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/jump-jets-on-navys-agenda-as-tony-abbott-orders-air-strike-rethink-20140603-39gl0.html

Ah, a thought bubble from the Prime Minister. Rather like the thought bubble from former Prime Minister and US Deputy Sheriff John Howard that got us into the F-35 mess in the first place.

I actually hope the forthcoming White Paper is stuffed with as much wingnut, pie-in-the-sky nonsense like this as possible. It’ll be fun to watch the ADF scream over the next decade as precisely none of it actually eventuates. “Where are our toys? We were promised toys!!!!” The ADF and corporate folks that are currently lobbying Abbott and co. are going to learn that nothing is as easy to cut, compromise, or abandon when trying to fit a round peg into a square hole (i.e. the process of forming the annual budget) as military spending.