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The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

forbes.com

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Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#171

Post by [deleted] »

542458 wrote: post #134
tele wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... "Taking into account both the costs of coverage expansion and the savings that would be achieved through the Medicare for All Act, we calculate that a single-payer, universal health-care system is likely to lead to a 13% savings in national health-care expenditure, equivalent to more than US$450 billion annually (based on the value of the US$ in 2017). T…

That really doesn't have any bearing on the point that the costs of the F-35 and M4A are dramatically different. Funding or not funding the F-35 isn't the determining factor in funding M4A.

[deleted]

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#172

Post by throwaway0a5e »

They must have A/B tested the title to see what gets the most smug confirmation bias clicks (title is clearly not intended to optimize for outrage clicks so what else could it be).

The whole article is about the history of the program, why it costs so much and what the options are going forward. If you squint you can make it seem like failure but the article does not make that claim.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#173

Post by evgen »

antattack wrote: post #88
digi59404 wrote: post #7

“The F-35 has failed” is a strong statement that depends on what your definition of success is. Did it fail because it couldn’t replace the F-16? Did it fail because it’s expensive and bloated? Do those things even matter? I’m not defending the F-35 but anyone deeply and intimately familiar with the platform knows and understands that it is a Ferrari. You don’t bring your Acura TSX to a Formula 1 race track to win a…

It's a fail because we are moving into unmanned fighting vehicles. Something that F-35 program has failed to foresee. Basically F-35 is the fighter of tomorrow fighting threats of yesterday.

The F-35 program did not fail to foresee the rise of unmanned vehicles, they built and adapted the aircraft and avionics around this concept. The F-35 cockpit, avionics, and helmet are designed to allow an F-35 pilot to command a fleet of drones performing roles ranging from scouting and EW to SEAD and direct attack.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#174

Post by hindsightbias »

heymijo wrote: post #140
misiti3780 wrote: post #86

The saddest thing about all of this IMO is they have been working on this for 14 years, and how much money was spent/wasted? Now, read about Skunkworks - they were able to build the SR71 (without supercomputers) in less than half that time and for a fraction of the cost. This isn't just planes, this seems to be everything nowadays. Fission was discovered in 1938/1939 and we dropped two bombs on Japan in 1945. No chan…

Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) [0]. You might have missed this news. It’s a modern remix to the Kelly Johnson and Ben Rich days of developing legendary aircraft at Lockheed’s Skunkworks that you lamented the loss of. People in the know confirm it’s legit and shocking, in a good way. Especially compared to the failures of the F-35 and even the F-22’s development. [0] https://www.airforcemag.com/article/ropers-ng…

Building the hardware is easy, it's the systems and software that will kill it, just like the F-35.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#175

Post by usrusr »

abarringer wrote: post #76

If the primary purpose was to funnel money from you -> .mil -> military industrial complex it succeed wildly beyond all expectations. Otherwise not so much. I lived and worked very close to Eglin Air Force base where all the initial F35's went. Many Air Force people thought the primary design decisions were to spend money and little else.

But there's a reason to funnel that money besides padding pockets: the nominal reason (and not a bad one if you are not a full pacifist) is to retain development capability for the next time you actually do need a military aviation innovation burst. And arguably this wasn't really successful. Chances are that rebuilding capability from a hypothetical starved state would yield better results than restoring efficiency from the comically fattened state they got.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#176

Post by hef19898 »

jetrink wrote: post #168
misiti3780 wrote: post #86

The saddest thing about all of this IMO is they have been working on this for 14 years, and how much money was spent/wasted? Now, read about Skunkworks - they were able to build the SR71 (without supercomputers) in less than half that time and for a fraction of the cost. This isn't just planes, this seems to be everything nowadays. Fission was discovered in 1938/1939 and we dropped two bombs on Japan in 1945. No chan…

> Now, read about Skunkworks - they were able to build the SR71 (without supercomputers) in less than half that time and for a fraction of the cost. Not to mention the F-16 itself, which the F-35 was meant to replace: 1972: RFP for prototypes 1974: Maiden flight of the first prototype 1975: Production begins 1980: The aircraft officially enters service

The F-117 as well. A marvelous plane, and development program.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#177

Post by bun_at_work »

nemothekid wrote: post #142
medium_burrito wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You misunderstand the purpose the F35- it is a jobs and pork program first and foremost, like SLS. It has the side benefit of keeping people trained to build this sort of thing, so SpaceX can hire them. We can build cool shit, but our government and most companies don't optimize for that.

Yes, a while back I was interested "where does billions we spend on national defense actually go" and I came to the conclusion that the DoD is really just a giant jobs program. Ultimately I think the reason we don't have things like flying cars is that the private sector gets stuck in local maxima (such as getting people to click ads) and in the public sector it's very hard to have focused time-blocked short term goa…

This isn't entirely true. The US subsidizes military costs for all of our allies. It costs a lot, and a huge amount of funds go to that.

There are parts that are like jobs programs, and the contractors intentionally drive up costs as part of their business model, but there are also real expenses to maintaining stability across the parts of the world where our military operates.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#178

Post by tomjakubowski »

tiahura wrote: post #165
heymijo wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) [0]. You might have missed this news. It’s a modern remix to the Kelly Johnson and Ben Rich days of developing legendary aircraft at Lockheed’s Skunkworks that you lamented the loss of. People in the know confirm it’s legit and shocking, in a good way. Especially compared to the failures of the F-35 and even the F-22’s development. [0] https://www.airforcemag.com/article/ropers-ng…

Roper is awesome. There’s a video of him describing the role of K8s in the next-gen process.

We are doomed.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#179

Post by 3nf »

medium_burrito wrote: post #100
misiti3780 wrote: post #86

The saddest thing about all of this IMO is they have been working on this for 14 years, and how much money was spent/wasted? Now, read about Skunkworks - they were able to build the SR71 (without supercomputers) in less than half that time and for a fraction of the cost. This isn't just planes, this seems to be everything nowadays. Fission was discovered in 1938/1939 and we dropped two bombs on Japan in 1945. No chan…

You misunderstand the purpose the F35- it is a jobs and pork program first and foremost, like SLS. It has the side benefit of keeping people trained to build this sort of thing, so SpaceX can hire them. We can build cool shit, but our government and most companies don't optimize for that.

I have always assumed this and the $500 toilet seats are just making room for black projects. There were no publicly visible budgets for the U2/F117 projects.

Re: The U.S. Air Force just admitted the F-35 stealth fighter has failed

#180

Post by onepointsixC »

nvoid wrote: post #123
rjsw wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is how the US military accounts for them, yes. The engine is not included in the price paid to Lockheed Martin.

Oh interesting. Can they get them with a different engine? Like an add-on when buying your car. Maybe like a sport mode?

At the time they were the best production engines in the world. General Electric originally was competing with the Pratt and Whitney engine F-135, called the F-136 but that was since canceled. However they're is the GE Adaptive Cycle Engine that has since been developed which produces greater thrust while having the ability to also achieve greater fuel efficiency for greater range by changing it's characteristics.
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