drabslabIt really does sound ridiculous when written out like that. :rolleyes:
Laments over past failures serves no useful purpose. Nobody has the ability to turn back the clock to 2004.
The vice president responsible for past management failures is no longer with the F-35 program (and no longer employed by LM). Since the former F-22 Program Manager was tapped to run F-35, there have been over a dozen other managers replaced. Experience counts.
The questions that are important…
- “Is LM adhering to the current schedule?”
– and –- “Are there any indications of future calamities that do not have mitigating actions in work?”
The flight test activity being ahead of schedule answers question #1.
Software development is a concern with respect to question #2, but a mitigation plan is being worked.The action to watch for that would be an F-35 program killer is rolling back the airplane’s performance to provide a cost reduction and improvement in delivery schedule. That has not happened. To do so would allow a gen 4 airplane to achieve parity on a value-to-value basis.
It only takes one lucky idea (like e.g. a drastic improvement in radar technology) that compromises the stealth advantage of the JSF and the whole plane becomes far less interesting.
Even with stealth, i doubt its value because of its limited payload when respecting the stealth requirement
drabslabits looking grim for the jsf:
– the Netherlands are close to withdrawing from the programme
– Norway is questioning its involvement
– In Canada the government is accused of hiding the truth about the JSF
– the UK is continuing to cut back its armed forces
– and most importantly, the US has to cut government expenses by massive amounts of money and what is an easier victime that a faulty programme like JSF
add to that a global financial crisis and we are ready for the final implosion
drabslabA fine helicopter for the Belgian forces, the NH90 is an excellent machine.
Then why are the German armed forces hating it so much?
There is a 100 pge german report listing an impressive amount of shortcomings from insufficient ground clearance to tender floorplates, weak seats, a poor hoisting system….
the report recommends to use another helicopter wherever possible and if I am not mistaken, has led to a large delay of the NH90 programme while re-designing parts of the aircraft.
drabslabthe limitations of stealth
First time that I come accross such open statement that stealth is turning an otherwise fantastic airplane into a useless piece of hardware.
Please notice the picture, the f-22 is shown with droptanks, so this one is not even stealthy
drabslabWouldn’t stop the generals for hyping it up and arguing for more F-35s though.:D
Seriously, there’s a good chance the fuel for those planes will already have been looted by the time someone decides to intervene militarily.
I read a “reader’s letter” in the Financial Times lately defending the use of the F-22 to secure Libyan skies.:D:D:D
drabslabToday, with artillery that provides first round accuracy within 1 meter and networks that extend to the squad level, kinetic CAS makes no sense. It is little more than an obsolete holdover to those who reminisce about “the old days”.
Do you mean that coalition artillery can hit every square meter of Afghanistan with a precision of one meter?
Your statement can be correct in a classical warfare scenario with a moving frontline followed by logistics and artillery but in afghan type of confrontations it seems to me that it is impossible to organise artillery support for every small outpost or patrol team in the middle of the dessert
drabslabnicely written but bizarre sentiments drabslab.
For example, I don’t think you can conflate a procurement comeptition for attack helicopters from the early 90s with what has gone on with the SDSR in the past 12 months.
And do you really believe the UK went into Afghanistan on the same premise as Iraq (again conflating the two)?
And do you really believe we are about to ditch Typhoon and buy f15s?
I do not “believe” anything. “Believe” means that you accept something said by someone without any analysis and reflection and I do not fidn that very intelligent.
Do I think that the UK went into Afghanisatn on the same premise as to Iraq. No, I do not but just as for the Iraq war I do not understand why the UK got into such stupid war, at least not after having seent he russian experience in that country, and if not mistaken, having some personal experience with afghanistan in the own british history as well. What is the point shooting that country up?
Are the UK going to buy F-15? No, probably not. That was only an image to say that I think that they will do something really stupid with their Typhoon force. and I would not be surprised to see them buy a few f-18 for their sole carrier left.
For the rest; once upon a time the UK was the pinnacle of fighter development. Spitfire, Hurricane, the first jets until TSR-2 and of course, the Harrier. and let’s not forget the Concorde, maybe a financial failure but “what a potential”!!!
All that knowledge has gone to waste by shortsighted policy! just like e.g. the UK car manufacturing industry.
The UK is a bizare country. Overall brilliant engineering made redundant by poor management and policy
drabslabI wonder how long before the RAF consists solely of an emergency line to Barack Obama!
If I am not mistaken then it has been the long term ambition of the UK government to have its armed forces trully integrated with the US armed forces.
The decision to go for the F-35 monster, to destroy Harrier, scrap Nimrod, buy apache, throw out some Tornado’s, jaguars… are all very logical when seen in that context.
After all, the only thing which UK will need in the future is a small “national guard” with the big decisions, and serious capabilities, being managed in the pentagon.
The UK got involved in long and expensive dirty wars (Iraq and Afghanistan) on basis of false US “evidence”.
I wonder what the costs were of this war (never mind human sacrifice) and to what extend the current cuts could have been avoided when that money would not have been wasted for invading a countries which posed little thread.
As for the F-35, The Uk is the only 1 tier F-35 partner but the US refuses to give key information to the UK.
Despite these huge missers the UK government stuburnly remains on its path of becoming completely military dependent on the US. I don’t get it??!!
Next thing will be that UK will axe the Typhoon in favor of a few old F-15 or F-18.
With that decision the last bit of British aircraft engineering will die a natural death, or will be absorbed by Lockheed or Boeing…
drabslabWhich contains within it ‘can beat’. As if it cannot beat then it cannot compete. Eurojingoism is no more pleasant than any other jingoism so I’d certainly join you in a cry of ‘now hang on that’s a bit steep’ if the quote had been ‘will beat’ or ‘grinds all others into the dust’.
I think that 2 seat tyffie (or 2 seat F16XL whilst we are at at) with TVC and no vertical stabiliser would look awesome and new and worldbeating and trailblazing so should be pursued for those reasons alone. Whether they would be right for carrier ops is perhaps another issue.
The main difference between EU and US is that the US has a joint military. This leads to a very large home market adn a “natural” form of standardisation.
In EU each indivudal state is still perusing its national defecne priorities leading to a multitude of small markets and an industry that prodcues small volumes (hence high development costs per issue).
drabslabI’d change that to “European industry can compete”
Yep, I agree, just a pity that there seems to be no coordiantion, never mind cooperation between the different defence industry and political blocks.
Maybe, just as was the case with airbus, we need to wait until the whole industry has almost collapsed before common sense will kcik in:)
drabslabnavalised typhoon don’t seem a good idea for many reasons (some of these explained right in this very topic a bit earlier)
Considering the politics play a major role in combat aircraft acquisition (much more than the aircraft itself anyway), BAe can propose a navalised BAC Lightning if they like… providing good political support in the “buying country”, they’ll sell it, even if it’s nowhere near todays fighters in many areas
Considering the development of a navalised Typhoon in times of ultimate budget cuts is just ridiculous.
Europe has 3 distinct fighter planes, each with their own strengths:
gripen: small cheap fighter for home defence
typhoon: air superiority
rafale: navy and deep strike
what is needed is that those 3 planes are jointly upgraded, manufactered and promoted for those different roles instead of nationalistic bickering.
Airbus has shown that European industry can beat all competition when joining forces, eurocopter has become relatively successfull as well, it seems obvious that it is time to get past the small minded local policy issues and cooperate also in the fighter area.
drabslab“Should the UK dump the F-35”? That depends on what the British want their armed forces to be.
of course it should!
the F-35 is too much too early (too complicated to accomplish with current technoclogical knowledge), or, too little too late (not at all delivering as project requiremetns dictated)
UK military is not a research institution, it’s there to protect the UK and I doubt strongly that this can be done effectively by embedding forefront research results in what is supposed to be an operational fighter plane.
drabslabI thought that the Navy had already found that the engine for an F35 did not fit in its COD planes, when the engines were in their transport boxes…
I did not know that but it supports the point i want to make
drabslabRegarding rhe refuelling by drogue, IMO the Canadians really should have thought about that a little earlier (unless it was planned and has since been dropped).
Regarding the drogue parachute, my sentiments are the same (unless the landing run distance was increased by LM).
Should the canadians have taken all this into account or should LM have?
If you pay loads of money for such a development, would you expect the manufacturer to pencil in your local requirements or should you agree to build new airfields, buy new tanker planes, use special concrete on the landing patches for the F-35B type… or would you expect the designer to take all these “environmental restrictions ” into account?
Next thing will be that the navy will discover that the F-35 does not fit on their carriers and hence they will have to buy 13 new aircraft carriers?
drabslabboy oh boy, is that thing a disaster or not?
Sign In
