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

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

#171

Post by quanticle » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 9:09 AM UTC

Silhouette wrote: post #156

philwelch wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Have you considered the gigantic military requirements that are placed on the United States? Placed by whom, exactly? It's not as if the US took on those treaty commitments involuntarily or expecting no benefits in return, and it's not as if the rest of the world would not adapt if the US reduced its military commitments over time. For example, you talk about the US being required by treaty to defend almost all of Eu…

There is a reasonable school of thought that argues the world would be a much safer place if the number of military superpowers in it was zero, and that as the only old-school military superpower remaining, the US is therefore a negative factor on global stability and peaceful relations.

So, in other words, you'd prefer a situation similar to the world as it was before World War 1? That world wasn't exactly peaceful either. You say that you would prefer a world with no superpowers. Such a world has existed, and it's always been rather unstable, with many regional powers jockeying for position, often leading to massive wars. And in the end, a superpower or two (Spain and Portugal, France and Britain, USA and USSR) always emerges. In fact, it's the periods between superpower domination that have been the bloodiest, as declining superpowers and regional powers jockey to see who will be the next global hegemon.

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

#172

Post by philwelch » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 9:30 AM UTC

Silhouette wrote: post #156

philwelch wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Have you considered the gigantic military requirements that are placed on the United States? Placed by whom, exactly? It's not as if the US took on those treaty commitments involuntarily or expecting no benefits in return, and it's not as if the rest of the world would not adapt if the US reduced its military commitments over time. For example, you talk about the US being required by treaty to defend almost all of Eu…

The last time the US followed an isolationist foreign policy, the Europeans got themselves into two world wars in a row. It's true that Europe has a continent-wide mutual defense agreement now. What you didn't mention is that it's called NATO and the US is the backbone of it. That's part of how it works. Otherwise you don't get the combined forces of Europe, you get indifference at best and European war at worst.

Look at East Asia. South Korea can't afford to defend itself from the North and hope to maintain their standard of living, Japan is barred by their own constitution from rearming (and if they did, that would start a regional arms race), and Taiwan would have no hope of maintaining their self-determination by themselves.

I will be the first to say that the U.S. has followed an unnecessarily aggressive foreign policy. But a very large part of how the world works depends upon the American military, and if it just went away, we would all be poorer and less safe for it.

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

#173

Post by philwelch » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 9:35 AM UTC

tim333 wrote: post #151

xnull2guest wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it more complicated than that? Today being behind on military technology by as little as 5 years can be decisive in confrontation. The last decade has brought huge changes in military technology including super and hypersonic missile delivery systems (these can defeat the US's current interception capabilities), THAAD technology, directed energy weapons, new reactive armors, satellite bombing systems, startling…

>US's military might has everything to do with the geopolitics that continue to make it rich I'm sceptical that the military might does that much to make the US rich besides providing basic peace. Obviously things would be screwed if WW3 started. The US has got rich mostly by trade and enterprise and producing much of the worlds high value stuff. Spending a huge portion of governments revenues on the military rather…

The US military also effectively subsidizes the national defense of a large portion of the world, much of which we trade with. It's because of our treaty obligation to defend South Korea that, instead of investing in an arms race with North Korea, they can afford to manufacture cell phones and cars and televisions and trade them to us. Likewise for Japan and the NATO members.

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

#174

Post by MaysonL » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 10:57 AM UTC

philwelch wrote: post #77

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.

The US began the WWII draft over a year before Pearl Harbor, and was manufacturing arms for the Allies months ahead of Pearl Harbor as well. Even a weakened American industrial base was significantly larger than that of any other country in the world at the time ( http://www.combinedfleet.com/economic.htm ). World War II was an unusual case, though. Every war since then has been a relatively limited one in the sense…

The US began the WWII draft over a year before Pearl Harbor

But not before World War II started... Notice that you called it the WWII draft. U.S. involvement in WW II did not start with Pearl Harbor.

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

#175

Post by weavejester » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 12:13 PM UTC

sremani wrote: post #162

Silhouette wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you considered the gigantic military requirements that are placed on the United States? Placed by whom, exactly? It's not as if the US took on those treaty commitments involuntarily or expecting no benefits in return, and it's not as if the rest of the world would not adapt if the US reduced its military commitments over time. For example, you talk about the US being required by treaty to defend almost all of Eu…

So will Germans fight for Greece ? I doubt so, so what if Poland is attacked are the Spainyards willing to fight and die for that. We all know, the answer, and its a resounding NO. Italians are not going to fight for estonians. When it hits the fan, and I am sure it will, Americanos will come to rescue and lead the charge. You have to not look beyond the late 90s and Kosovo, to look at the collective action, or shoul…

European countries have gone to war over Poland before. The idea that the EU would sit back and allow another country to invade its member states is just crazy. If nothing else, it would cause huge financial disruption to all the other countries in the union.

Britain, France and Germany alone have a combined military budget greater than any other nation save the United States. The UK went to the other side of the planet last time its dependant territories were threatened. The idea that the EU wouldn't defend itself, when it has the capability, the motive, and a long and bloody history of warfare, is so bizarre I can't even begin to understand your reasoning.

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

#176

Post by Symmetry » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 12:37 PM UTC

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?

Apollo and the Manhattan project were both executed by fairly new bureaucracies that had people in key leadership roles who weren't selected by their ability to get promoted from within large bureaucracies.

It is possible to have institutional mechanisms or culture that keeps rot to a manageable level but nobody really knows how to do that deliberately - it's always a matter of luck. That's why it's important to allow organizations to fail. I wish we had some systematic way of allowing that for government departments the way we do for corporations.

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

#177

Post by Symmetry » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 12:41 PM UTC

zaroth wrote: post #166

tim333 wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bottom 50% pay a bunch of other taxes. Payroll taxes, sales taxes, taxes on booze, cigarettes, property etc.

Bottom 40% - All Federal Tax - 2013 - 5.6% of tax revenue. Bottom 60% - 16.5% [1] A good rule of thumb is all state & local taxes paid generally work out to about 1/5th of your mortgage/rent cost. But that's also not funding the F-35. (neither are payroll taxes) [1] - http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/numbers/displayatab.cfm?DocID...

State taxes are systematically less progressive than federal taxes so despite that rule of thumb you can't assume that relationship holds across income levels.

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

#178

Post by Symmetry » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 12:53 PM UTC

protomyth wrote: post #45

krapht wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The A10's minigun is ineffective at killing modern main-battle tanks, so I wouldn't say it's a raging sucess. In addition, it would certainly be blown up immediately if it came within shooting distance of a tank by any number of man-portable anti-air missiles. What it can do is provide reasonable close air support against Toyota pickups and infantry, but replacement parts for the plane or the molds to create them don…

"I don't see why mothballing the A10 is a poor decision" Because we do not have any aircraft that can stay on station above our troops stuck out in the middle of nowhere and keep them safe by shooting for multiple hours. Every other aircraft (drone include) is a drop-a-few-and-leave. That is not good enough. Where have we faced modern main-battle tanks? We should remove close air support from the Air Force's mission…

I thought the AC-130 was pretty good at that. It's even worse at not getting shot down of course but could provide fire support for just as long and over a wider area.

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

#179

Post by mschuster91 » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 12:59 PM UTC

Silhouette wrote: post #156

philwelch wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Have you considered the gigantic military requirements that are placed on the United States? Placed by whom, exactly? It's not as if the US took on those treaty commitments involuntarily or expecting no benefits in return, and it's not as if the rest of the world would not adapt if the US reduced its military commitments over time. For example, you talk about the US being required by treaty to defend almost all of Eu…

> There is exactly one sovereign state on earth that could single-handedly give the combined forces of Europe a serious fight today

The point is that we Europeans are so divided we can't even name a Foreign Minister of Europe because the Brits once again needed to prove they're special.

Hell, just kick GB out of the European Union and have a MUCH better organized and FVEY-free EU.

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

#180

Post by Symmetry » Sun, Mar 22, 2015, 1:01 PM UTC

tomjen3 wrote: post #97

WhitneyLand wrote: post #25

What's the biggest practical limitation to switching to unmanned drone fighters?

Lag and poor visibility. Drones work on slow ground attack convoys and buildings where they can fly around for a time but they are controlled via satelites so there is a couple of seconds of lag between when the image is recorded and the orders are received by the drone. In a dog fight, which is really what you have to build a fighter plane for, that kind of lag means you lose every time. Add to that that drones are…

I imagine the problem with control is to just direct semi-autonomous UCAVs from an AWACS. Current drones are slow and have little agility but that's due to them being optimized for cost and loiter time. The MASTAC Frisbees used at the Navy Fighter Tactics school could pull 15 G turns, for instance.