I don’t think you can get a UCAV capable of A2A for less then 70 million. You basically have to take everything out of a F35 and stuff it into a slightly smaller air frame.

You can save some cost on smaller air frame and also allot of fuel costs over its lifetime but there is no real need for UCAV with severely down graded avionics compered to F35 because even degraded cheaper avionics will still result in a 50 million cost. So you may as well go all in on capability and seek commonalty with F35 for 20 million more.

thats looking at it froma US perspective though.

It is important to remember that while the F-35 did suffer from serious programmatic and management issues, a big chunk of its critics are either anti-military in general (POGO and the like) and work to smear the F-35 as part of a broader anti-military agenda… or they are just opportunists in the press who are looking for sensational click-bait headlines and that will simply move on to the next program soon.

I agree there is always a anti any military spending background noise in every weapons procurement. The F35 has those opponents plus also the others I mentioned. The combination of the two is what makes the opposition to F35 more intense then the average project.

The style of opposition we see though to F35 is very meme like reflecting the basic recycling of opposition strategy to past programs.

Thinking about it my guess on origin of the meme were dealing with here goes back to the problems with F111 and it ill advised rush into the Vietnam war. That opened the doors for every armchair critic to suddenly think there opinions were somehow just as valid as defense department experts. They also suddenly gained the ability see the future and predict every single program they opposed would end in some huge technical failure costing billions.

And don’t even get me started on how bad internet journalism is though defense specific reporting is actually no where close to as bad as some other types internet journalism is, Non internet journalism fall bellow the best internet defense journalism but well above the worst.

I agree that it only works “up to a point”. My issue is that they did not even try and it cost us a massive amount of international goodwill and schedule slippage.

I don’t think program being delayed cost much international goodwill because F35 partners were completely happy with putting off there initial F35 purchases for a few more years.

The delay in F35 could well have done so if it had happened at a different time but LM got lucky that there was no real need for F35 in the period when plane was delayed.

Really? All bidding partners knew the size of the program in advance. But LM will do the orders of smaller contractors for years only. Just PW and Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems and *** have no competition to fear. They have to keep an eye to avoid the suspion of the defense department about that.

All US contractors have been burned by Congress and Defense department canceling and reducing planned buys before. They wont order parts in advance unless they have a signed contract for using those items.

Last time I’ve checked the F22 Raptor was fielded in 2005 while the Mirage 2000 was entering sqn service in 1982.

I’m ignoring that fact just like i’m ignoring the fact that F117 meets all definitions of a fifth generation aircraft minus the aesa.

Also I’m not being really serious in ether of my posts.

Added:
Another WTF Indian requirements/ decisions:
India; ARC mulls OV-22 Osprey buy

Why buy just a handful of these platforms for a nearly singular task? The Mi-17s have shown themselves to be very effective at altitude during the Nepalese earthquake HA/DR ops. Why not get a few of those and modify them with kits to meet their requirements? It seems India military is intent on operating every conceivable type of aircraft there is.

Carriers AEW? Seems like recent interest by Japan, US Navy, and now India all point towards a AEW Osprey program being launched soon. If UK suddenly starts talking about a Osprey buy then its almost certain. Maybe looking at exercise in hiding costs. Buy Ospreys for other stated reasons but then hand them back for conversion to AEW thus splitting the cost into two separate parts. That would be a easier sale then a 200-300 million cost of purchasing a full AEW Osprey from the start,

Wonder what cost of of one of those will be? Could be a very popular weapon in export market.

There is a mechanism in place for restructuring a defense development program if it breaches Nunn Mcurdy and if the SecDef certifies it, it has to go through the process. A breach does not automatically result in a termination.

The point about bringing up the previous program news clippings were that in the case of the Hornet (which was the most expensive program in history at the time), the design flaw was found post-IOC and involved operational jets being restricted until it was remedied. The F-16 went from a $6 Million NTE price to a more than $11 Million price for the initial European customers- an 80%+ cost increase over the NTE price. I guess it too should have been terminated because that was totally unexpected and the aircraft bankrupted the users that bought it and that is why its a totally failed program ! It was an honest reminder of what “pains” developers, operators and the tax-payers had to go through when the previous generation of fighters were developed. Changes were made and those programs were brought back on track and the hardware they produced served the operators well. Thats what you do!

US inflation rate in late 70’s was close to 10% per year most of that 80% is just normal inflation.