Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

jqpublicblog.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 233 posts

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#141

Post by pdonis »

Shalomm wrote: post #50
venomsnake wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally agree with you http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11

Nice rebuttal. The Apollo program was also delivered on time (JFK's "before this decade is out" deadline). I'd also add the Manhattan Project to this list. I wonder: why can the government execute Apollo and Manhattan projects, but botches such simple projects as the Bradley APC carrier?

> why can the government execute Apollo and Manhattan projects, but botches such simple projects as the Bradley APC carrier?

Because they were different governments. Yes, they were both labeled "US government", but the brand has changed a lot.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#142

Post by zaroth »

GoodIntentions wrote: post #14
gnoway wrote: post #6

It is just inconceivable that we have a multi-decade program to develop a new fighter to fill all these roles, and what we've produced is either equivalent to or worse than the incumbent in all cases, is not safe to fly in combat situations, and is more expensive to boot. I mean we've seen this sort of thing happen on a smaller scale before, but versions of this plane are supposed to replace, like, everything in mult…

> just inconceivable. Unless the primary goal was to transfer tax dollars from the unwashed to the privileged.

Don't be silly, the "unwashed" don't pay taxes. E.g. the bottom 50% pay 2.9% of total income taxes collected.

Edit: Heck, according to the IRS, in 2013 the bottom 20% paid -1.6% (negative 1.6%) of total income tax collected! I assume that's because of the EITC.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#143

Post by nas »

transfire wrote: post #35

What should have been. https://www.google.com/search?q=boeing+joint+strike+fighter&...

Hard to say that, we don't know what the final price of the Boeing plane would be. I liked the Boeing design better, simpler and should have been cheaper and more reliable. Complexity just kills budgets, schedules and reliability. IMHO, the Lockheed plane won because it looked nicer and maybe because of politics (up and out).

The VTOL and the complicated avionics is what is really killing the F-35 plane. The software is going to be massively more expensive that what they had planned. Debugging will take years.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#144

Post by acveilleux »

hackuser wrote: post #95
philwelch wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bulk of the requirements for the F-35 are perfectly reasonable; a stealthier replacement for the F-16 and F/A-18, which essentially perform the same role but the Air Force chose one and the Navy chose the other. If you could get a next generation light fighter-bomber to replace both, and make it stealthy enough to replace the F-117 at the same time, that would be the perfectly reasonable aircraft. As it stands, t…

> it's not like the enemy isn't going to notice the slowly hovering jet plane that's strafing them and shooting missiles at them I thought the STOVL was designed to enable take off and landing without airfields and aircraft carriers. Are you sure the intent is that it will hover over the battlefield while attacking? Current planes seem to hit targets fine while flying at a much safer hundreds of miles/hour.

It's not going to hover, that would be insane (in fuel use if nothing else) but the USMC wants/needs a close air support platform. A jet that will fly sufficiently low and slow to attack ground targets effectively. Even when the friendly troops are only a few hundred meters away.

That's intrinsically different from the Air Force and Navy whose planes will spend their time closer to 30k feet then 3k feet.

Flight at low altitudes and speed requires fundamentally different characteristics then flight at high altitude and comparatively high speed.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#145

Post by acveilleux »

hackuser wrote: post #105
philwelch wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, several. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_Douglas_F/A-18_Hornet... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_F/A-18E/F_Super_Hornet#O... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_EA-18G_Growler#Operation...

Thanks. Doesn't that seems like a tiny sample, and aren't those far inferior foes?

It's as well tested in combat as any of the other fighters still flying. Pending a US-Russia or US-China war, that's all that's ever going to happen.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#146

Post by ScottBurson »

ckozlowski wrote: post #101
javajosh wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Utterly false. Prior to involvement in World War 2, the US had hardly any standing army and rather weak tooling industries (being wiped out by the Great Depression) and yet still managed to field like 2 million troops and vast amounts of weapons for allies in a very short period of time.

Prior to WW2, such mobilizations were possible. In the post WW2 era though, the increases in firepower and mobility made this point moot. A well orchestrated and timed advance could conquer a nation in days, nuclear weapons not withstanding. the Army's Active Defence doctrine post WW2 reflected this, recgonizing that in the era, a war would be won or lost in the first few battles. Eisenhower reflected upon this in hi…

I think it's worth quoting a bit more of that speech:

Now this conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet, we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources, and livelihood are all involved. So is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#147

Post by AnthonyMouse »

philwelch wrote: post #81
Tloewald wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The basic perversity is building a gigantic military in peacetime because the arms companies have enormous lobbying power. Everything else flows from and is secondary to that.

Gigantic? http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/24/us/politics/pentagon-plans... Have you considered the gigantic military requirements that are placed on the United States? By treaty alone, the US is required to defend almost all of Europe, Japan, and South Korea. These are not easy requirements to disentangle from; if Japan alone were allowed and required to rearm, it could lead to an arms race that would destabilize all…

Your New York Times article is talking about the personnel count of the US Army -- that has never been the issue with military spending. The real money doesn't go to US soldiers, it goes to defense contractors. Private mercenaries and military weapons manufacturers. That's where the egregious waste is.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#148

Post by Spooky23 »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #47
Spooky23 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly everything you do with computer tech was seeded by government/large corps. For a military contracting specific account: http://www.amazon.com/Skunk-Works-Personal-Memoir-Lockheed/d...

It was seeded by wartime/cold war governments and large corps. But back then government was at least somewhat independent of the large corps. Today Washington is the wholly-owned political arm of the mil/ind/fin complex. The tail isn't just wagging the dog, it's controlling it with direct brain implants. If you don't accept this, please explain how the F35 was allowed to happen. The scale of wastage and - let's call…

War profiteering is nothing new. Corrupt generals and politicians are nothing new either.

Shitshows like the F-35 are just another symptom of the poisonous political landscape. These big projects get jobbed out to hit every congressional district to make projects tough to kill. They turn into monsters that aren't managed by anyone.

Re: The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35

#150

Post by hackuser »

icebraining wrote: post #128
javajosh wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There was hardly a single American who lived through that war who didn't make sacrifices and materially contribute to victory. Contrast this with how Americans were told to support Iraq 2 and Afghanistan: "Go shopping." The best possible policy for peace-loving American's to adopt would be a "no war without conscription" law. This seems counterintuitive, but it is my believe that when Senators' and Presidents' and C…

Members of the all-volunteer military are significantly more likely to come from high-income neighborhoods than from low-income neighborhoods. Only 11 percent of enlisted recruits in 2007 came from the poorest one-fifth (quintile) of neighborhoods, while 25 percent came from the wealthiest quintile. These trends are even more pronounced in the Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) program, in which 40 percent of…

Unfortunately Heritage has become a propaganda outlet, paid for by people like the Koch's. That doesn't make their information right or wrong, just not useful for determining facts (IMHO).
Post reply on HN