The old and the new…

….As for what we’re going to lose in the SDR, I’m guessing 1 AS90 regiment, 1 Light gun regiment, 1 CR2 regiment (may be traded into a 6th formation recon regt), ….

Another formation reconnaissance regiment is definitely not needed. Indeed most of the other five are a waste of time and space. They’re just the toffs in the old cavalry regiments, determined to retain their right to swan about at speed about looking cool.

Chop them all and it wouldn’t make a ha’porth of military differrence.

Can someone explain to me why the RN needs such massive carriers? At 65,000 tonnes, they will be three times the size of the Invincibles and almost twice the size of the Charles de Gaulle. Yet they will only operate 40 aircraft, the same as the CdeG. And furthermore, the aircraft they are currently planned to operate – the F-35B – is a STOVL design: does it really need a 284 metre long flight deck? Seems to me the RN are obsessed with ‘keeping up with the Joneses’, in this case the US Navy. Such a pity: for the vast sums being spent on these great big white elephants, the Navy could have got half-a-dozen smaller but almost equally capable carriers.

Not sure if this is the right thread for this query, but just wondering: does the US Navy’s acquisition of the F-35C make the EA-18G Growler redundant? Why would you need an electronic attack/jamming escort aircraft if the strike plane is stealthy?

A great piece of free PR for BAe and the Navy. No outsiders or critical comments.

or when you want to bag something, never let the facts get in the way
in any case the design isnt locked till 2015

“Rigorous combat analysis revealed that the survivability improvements afforded by the engine fuses and fire extinguishing features were very small,”
“These changes were thoroughly reviewed by the F-35 Operational Advisory Group and approved through the joint JSF Executive Steering Board, which includes membership from all nine JSF partner counties.
All agreed that the weight saved by the elimination of these components would be better utilized in maintaining the performance capabilities of the aircraft.
The present design meets the JSFPO’s expectations for vulnerability.”

Why were all those “fuses and fire extinguishing features” designed and built in the first place, when it turns out after all that they were just a waste of space and weight?

Don’t you recognise marketing/PR BS when you see it? None of those insiders are going to stand up and say the Emperor has no clothes.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0111242120100602
There are huge differences between the USG and contractor cost estimates.
LM says costs for the current LRIP buy are down 20%. P&W says engine costs are down 10%. But USG claims all costs are up. My bets are the Obama administration has ordered the program be cut and the USG cost analysts are following those orders by using tricks to make JSF seem more expensive than it really is. The same tactic was used in the 1990s against the F-22 program.

That suggests that a decision has been taken and communicated to large numbers of officials, but has successfully been kept secret – how likely is that?

The bottom-line to this story is that DESPITE the massive cost overruns, the US Dept. of Defense has re-certified the F-35, using the old reliable excuse of TINA (There Is No Alternative). And you can be sure that LM are very aware of this situation.

According to http://www.flightglobal.com,
“…If the DoD buys all 2,457 jets planned until 2035, the average cost per aircraft rises to $92.4 million in 2002 values, or $133 million if adjusted for inflation each year up to 2035. This is roughly double the average cost across all three F-35 variants that the Pentagon projected in 2001.

But the DoD’s mandatory review under the Nunn-McCurdy law determined that no cheaper options existed to meet the F-35 requirement, and that a major restructuring unveiled in February has created a new set of feasible cost and schedule targets….”

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2010/06/03/342712/us-department-of-defense-raises-f-35-cost-estimate-to-382-billion.html