geogenConsidering that US has the most advanced programs of stealth UCAV, who would be this threat you are talking about?
You are talking 10 yrs out though. Much can happen between now and then surprise wise. I’m sure you would have been blown away in disbelief 10 yrs ago, if someone contemplated out loud the current day situation and outlook today. It would be foolish to underestimate the capabilities of unprecedented, fast paced technological and asymmetrical advances going forward.
Yes, these are very uncertain times and if you don’t believe it, I can refer to you the Quadrenial review as an interesting synopsis (albeit one year old data already). Better to be flexible and not tied down to any one budget killing MIC bomb truck in particular.
If anything, it will be US based UCAV which will threaten the F-35, procurement and doctrine wise by 2020.
We’ll have to unfortunately wait a couple years still to see if and where the policymakers regain control of a prudent Tac-air recapitalization strat.
geogenYet… Why not get the unit of cost* of the F-15 and F-16 at say 300 units. (for example) Then compare them to the latest projection for the F-35 at the same level then compare all three..
Not sure if you are implying a cost comparison of 300 units per year? Or 300 unit total buy, over a 10 yr period e.g.??
Unfortunately, Scooter… there will not be the dreamy 250+ units per year produced.
Unless catastrophic WWIII breaks out and US is buying war bonds, US defense budgets are at best going to see shrinking buying power (not the substantially increased procurement budgets necessary for sustained F-35 acquisition, per currently estimated schedule). Most likely however, the actual base budget and hence core procurement budgets – in addition to reduced buying power – will be further reduced from the official expectations.
USAF will be fortunate to have something in the ballpark of 30-35 per annum FRP buys. That’s with a frozen procurement budget probably around the expected FY13 level. imho.
(as a p.s., with that budget AF could have continued with about 18-20 block 35 F-22 units per yr + 10 F-16s) during the LRIP years to offset tacair’s rapidly expanding gap and mitigate the JSFs high risk.)
geogenSpud,
The point is clear… if USAF is buying 30-35x F-16 or F-15E+ (SA/SG equiv) in FY15, they will pay a sustainable F-15 or F-16 per unit price.
If USAF is buying 30-35x F-35A in FY15, they will NOT be paying anywhere close to the mythical F-16 cost, nor likely even an F-15SE Procurement Unit Cost price for that matter. The old cost estimate is based on USAF buying 70-80 F-35 units per yr and apparently after >1,000 total F-35 units have been produced.
So one can argue that an FY15 F-16 block would not have this F-35-unique system or that one, but the point is that substantially reduced F-35A buys would not give you a mythical F-16 priced F-35. (unless heavily subsidized).
Unfortunately, we’ll likely have to wait until late summer 2011 to get a better picture on exact FY12 orders and costs. If not in 2011, then by Feb2012 more radical pressure will likely be put on the expected estimates for FY13 and beyond.
geogenThe problem with that logic as I see it, Scooter, is that the F-15, F-16, Supers, MiG, Gripen, Typhoon, etc can be sustainably priced as ‘affordable’, under relatively low rates of 30-35 units per yr production.
The F-35A however will not be sustainable as ‘affordable’, i.e. ‘F-16-priced’, with only 30-35 buys budgeted in FY15 under such an example..
Hence the unfortunate F-35 Cost issue being misunderstood and needing proper recalibration soon, on which to base more sound policy.
geogenToo bad F414-INS6 can’t be integrated into Rafale, nor a cheap MOTS SABR radar(?). Integrate LM’s IRST pod and possibly a PAWS-2/SAPIR MWS + day/night view? One could assume Rafale’s computer and bus is adequate?
Do that for Rafale-M w/CFT though and both USN/USAF should look into it as a license-produced ‘plan B’ joint-stopgap contingency (a ‘PBJSG’ if you will :cool:), imho.
geogenUnfortunately, with all due respect to Dr. Carter but right off the bat, the whole $92m price quote thing is a disservice to any informed debate… It’s only a portion of the supposed unit price which USAF will be paying for, out of it’s Procurement budget.
And unfortunately also being lost in the understanding, is that these ultra cheap expected unit prices being ‘fought for’ are based on the unsustainably high annual procurement rates still being officially scheduled. These recalculatd buy orders and unit costs will probably begin to come into play by FY12 though, as FY11 should squeak by via ‘staying the course’.
Interesting comparison for perspective sake: FY11 EA-18 Growler Unit Procurement Cost = about $90m. FY10’s LRIP IV ‘victory buy’, will hopefully be released in Feb 2011 will probably see it’s final Unit Procurement Cost north of $170m.
Bottom line, with future AF ‘buying power’ being reduced and base Procurement budgets likely seeing actual reductions vs forward expected budget increases still being planned on, there will unfortunately not be a 70-80 per yr USAF buy rate starting in FY15 and not be these ‘fixed’ cheap F-16 priced Unit Procurement Cost prices accordingly. (Short of major subsidy). imho.
geogenTo which both are pretty extreme viewpoints, imho.
Chinese and North American/US economies will both be around for a long time at least in relative terms to the world metric. Once we as world players can respectively tackle the major theater-based conflicts e.g., M.E. final settlement, NK, Taiwan/PRC normalization, Japan/Korea/PRC normalization, (oops… water and oil/gas dependency and future demand – such pending crisis will take some luck, equal cooperation and prayers)… then a better heart beat in global inter-relations can manifest itself. It’s going to be a long journey yet (perhaps beyond the F-35’s lifetime, cough), but we’ve somehow come this far (w/ limbs missing and toothless most the time) and are seeming to evolve at a brutally tortured crawl nonetheless. imho.
So who knows, maybe F-35 sub-assembly and components can be produced in China for the Program save? What data on the jet they don’t already have they’ll like get before say, Australia will anyway, yes? Might as well yield something material out of the compromise?
geogenWell hopefully China is advising the good leader to check out as a peacemaker and not another reckless war-maker. A smart chess-playing policy would be to soothe the good leader via being profitable as hero and populist, to all Koreans and not just another radical in frustration.
Unfortunately, it does boil down to Beijing though. They are arguably holding many of the cards and could highly influence the final settlement at will. (Moscow can help also, imho).
On the other hand, in playing this crisis partly to counter the USA (and manipulate Japan to lesser extent) as much as possible, well then it only forces this undesirable game to played longer than it needs – an prolonged lose-lose for region.
Now thinking way outside the legal box… I’d like to see a last minute SK and US invite for Chinese Navy destroyer + submarine, Russian Su-33 (6 jets to operate off USS George Washington), yes, and a couple NK missile boats to join SK/USN training exercise as part of this traditional joint-training collaboration/relationship. Operation: Cool your Jets.
Alternatively, SK could invite NK air force to conduct a joint-maritime patrol off both E and W coasts, extending both north and south of airspace.
Either way, it’s time for Beijing to intervene as part of the solution. imho. God speed-
geogenIt’s very much the actual attacks on the South recently, in addition to the threatening rhetoric, which creates the tension and risk.
It is definitely an increasing part of the problem and not the solution, despite what the propaganda is putting out. Yes, they are desperate and dependent on the outside and probably humiliated by it somewhat. But it’s no excuse for the actions chosen and opposite of the direction needing to be taken.
It would be if SKgov boasted they were going to order F-22s, or GLCMs to go down town if necessary, if NK didn’t start showing respect. That would be pretty destabilizing.
That being said, it was prudent that SK didn’t further escalate the situation during the artillery barrage, by employing tactical combat aircraft counter-strikes.
As for how to conjecture on the situation going forward, that’s for another thread and probably different discussion board?
geogenMSphere –
It’s a common misconception actually, that US was ever in a ‘position to dictate’ vis-a-vis NK and/or China in terms of influence within that sphere of Aisan geopolitics. It’s always been a pretty much ‘multi-polar’ part of the World theatre.
The sentiment of your post is understood though and indeed US is exercising in a far weaker financial, political and military posture today, relative to various other powers over the past 10-20 yr time frame. imho.
Ironically, the F-35 is a pretty good analogy of flawed US economic, political and strategic policy making/estimating over the past 10+ yrs. (very unfortunately).
geogenReminder and relevant point re: LRIP Price/Cost estimates…
For discussion sake, we can search all day and night for pertinent DoD and LM contracts related to LRIP IV, and one could say it makes for a fun treasure hunt… but once again; it seems as if the general public (and possibly Congress?) will have to wait until Feb 2011 for the line item budget analysis (estimate) release.
This budget analysis will (hopefully) show LRIP IV’s ‘target’ price estimates including the relevant items:
1) The Gross and Net unit cost.
2) The weapon system unit cost.
3) The Procurement Unit Cost.
Everything else ‘speculated’ on price-wise in the meanwhile, are unfortunately only subsets of scraps of price data either researched privately, or reported by officials.
Must therefore keep patient for Feb 2011 (after FY11’s F-35A order has been voted on/approved?) :confused:
geogenThe updated LRIP IV price will need to be seen in the detailed standard budget item analysis format to be better understood, perhaps not released until next spring?
Also, it could be questioned if LRIP IV pricing in any way was based on an ‘understanding’ or expectation, etc, of 2,400+ or some such eventual US buys? The point being; if near-term orders are reduced and longer-term projections indicate significantly reduced buys accordingly, then perhaps the LRIP IV’s ‘fixed’ price would be again modified (and difference made up) regardless of its tentative pricing?
geogenVery interesting info, Mercurius, I hadn’t known about that. And welcome back.
This original post was in fact purely from the gut-derived as it seemed plausible, especially when potentially coupled with a dual-mode seeker. Timing was lucky I guess. Well, for one thing this tech will certainly rise in cost per round relative to counter-balancing the high-value avg unit cost of new age jets, it would seem. The counter-measures will get extreme in 15 yrs for sure too. Crazy game. 🙂
geogenInteresting, thanks for the update.
I’d personally be equally interested to see a modified, MOTS-centered system achieving even 85-90% of the T3’s objectives if it were actually be capable of IOC within say 5 yrs?? We’ll have to see next yr I guess, as to what the next phase in all this is about.
geogenaurcov — SABR will only have ~ 60 % of the detection range of the APG 81 because the smaller number of T/R modules;
True, SABR will not have the range vs APG-81 – I should have qualified that. I was intending to argue that, via similar radar mode updates and future growth potential of SABR, including claimed High Rate Data transfer Air-air, combined with the other EO and passive RF sensors… that a properly modernized F-16 (by 2017 mind you) would be adequate in terms of ‘combined’ sensor capabilities, in comparison to F-35 block III IOC. Yes, in some aspects, superior sensor capabilities can be argued.
– the HTS will only detect radars in frontal sector (120 deg) not 360 deg;
Fair enough, although the latest HTS update might be able to perform that specific geolocation capacity in it’s specialized parameters at farther ranges. Furthermore, realizing this is a 2017, 2018 forward looking comparison: there will be Next Gen (e.g. Northrop’s) digital EW Receiver/geolocation suites available for legacy/F-16 airframes which could be at least equal to F-35 block III’s.
– the SABR will process a much smaller number of targets (vs. ~ 40 in APG 81 case) because it won’t get the huge processing power of the F 35 (a battery of 48 PowerPC, GigaHertz clock speed processors, and a high speed digital bus with around 1,000 times the throughput of the Mil-Std-1553B on the F 16);
A battery of them?? One can only imagine the potential tech support and maintenace required out in the field – first thing that comes to mind. :confused: And I guess I was eluding more to an advanced, late version F-16 variant w/ the MIL-STD-1773 fiber-optic data bus and improved computing/data storage.
– because the mentioned lack of processing power, the pilot will have to mentally put together informations from radar, HTS, datalink); this means slower firing solution, slower reaction time, risk of redudancies…
Adequate processing power to react and put a weapon on target if required (given some equal and some arguably superior targeting/situational awareness) or launch pre-planned from stand-off. A 2nd helmet in the back-seat as part of package wouldn’t hurt either.
– the EOTS will bring the more than 100 % of Litening capability in air-ground and let’s say 60-70 % of LW IRST in air-air (but strongly weather dependent, so this F 16 advantage is disputable);
I highly question that claim of EOTS 3rd gen FLIR. It looks great in the vids along w/ the vids showing Sniper AT performance. For A2G, Litening ATP-SE next gen pod (incl new laser imaging functions) would arguably be superior. It builds on the G4 which already sets unprecedented standards (1k pixel CCD TV), which itself builds on the amazing Litening AT (which RAAF is just now integrating into Hornets).
– need I add what this sensor load (+ of course weapons stored underwings, and 3 EFTs) means for the F 16 max. speed, maneuvrability, acceleration, climbing speed? Someone posted the polar graph of F 16. A clean F 16 can reach in mil power 1.05M; with a modest load (2 x Sidewinders 6 x 225 lbs. bombs and 1 EFT it barelly go 0.65M in mil. power ! That’s a 40 % reduction in kinematics for a modest load (1,5 ton of weapon and 1 EFT) !
This is a legit disadvantage of the F-16 (even the upgrade powered mod) no doubt. Granted, this specific comparison is with an F-16 Legacy variant (others could do better), but for sake, let’s conjecture a CFT and 2 wing drop tank config. Range would probably be similar. Upon punching wing tanks and dropping payload though, acceleration and other performances on the egress would arguably go to the properly equipped F-16.
– still no DAS on F 16 (and on any other fighter for that matter);
Remember, we’re comparing a 2017 scenario. By then there will be adequate and perhaps near-similar day/night vision 360 IRST/warning apertures for legacy and F-16. (LM and Raytheon/elisra already have developments in enhanced multi-spectral apertures, e.g.) The capability will be sufficient enough by 2017 if required for F-16s to have this SA data.
– no “discrete” datalink on the F 16, only the Link 16 — great for receiving info from AWACS/Rivet Joint, etc; not so secure (read it can be located) when transmitting from above the hostile territory
Not yet, no. But 2017? Let’s see what is required and what is needed and ordered by a customer who is keeping their legacy/F-16 platforms relevant. As said, there is growth for this SABR (and other) AESA high rate data transfer. How about add some small cheek arrays? Other adequate concepts will surely emerge, if required. imho.
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