F-35 is built for the wrong war • Hacker News Board

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#461

Post by tick_tock_tick » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:14 AM UTC

0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #230

carefree-bob wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Iran war is a skirmish by any reasonable measure. It does not exhaust either the US Navy or the Airforce, and the Army isn't even participating. Now I understand it has a large impact because of oil prices and the closing of the strait of hormuz, but don't confuse the economic impact of the closing of shipping lanes with something that "exhausts" the US military. Remember this is the military that spent two decad…

I would dispute the depletion of expensive munitions, but I still believe that is largely irrelevant next to political exhaustion. I do not think most Americans would care to defend Taiwan, even against the China boogeyman. The practical realities of losing Chinese goods would be a devastating reality few are prepared to face.

I think people are pointing out how little it actually takes to wage this war against Iran and that there are basically zero costs to the USA to do so. A classic "political exhaustion" requires some degree of meaningful hardship on the USA and a slight gas price increase just isn't enough.

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#462

Post by tick_tock_tick » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:16 AM UTC

poszlem wrote: post #296

carefree-bob wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by "losing TSMC"? It's not ours. Do you know what does belong to the west? ASML. What makes TSMC actually work.

ASML is not "yours" too in that case as it happens to be european.

I mean it's literally beholden to the USA congress and it's most meaningful parts are made in the USA. There is a reason why they fall in line with every USA export control and restriction.

If ASML is Europe's then I'd say all of Europe is the USA's.

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#463

Post by 8note » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:19 AM UTC

carefree-bob wrote: post #239

nerdsniper wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China is putting containerized missile launch tubes and drone launch systems on their container ships. If these get widely deployed at some point, there could come a time when there will be weapon systems already on-location in all of the major ports of China's adversaries. Most naval facilities have civilian ports nearby. Despite the nuclear reactor, aircraft carriers won't stay in the fight long if their supply lin…

20,000 drones could hit a carrier and not sink it. 100,000 drones would not sink it. Not if they all landed direct hits. It's like firing a handgun against a tank. You need more oomph. To sink an aircraft carrier you really need like 10 direct hits with hypersonic missiles. Or a couple of hits with a torpedo. If you are lucky, maybe even a single torpedo hit. People underestimate how hard it is to sink a ship. You re…

nothing would prevent putting a nuke on the drone, and making a it a tactical nuke delivery system. you can have them as big or small as you want, and in air, on the surface, or under the water.

you are applying arbitrary constraints to a thing thats just "put an rc controller on it"

ukrainian drones are doing something like 700 miles to hit the oil ports in primorsk. its not the 2500 miles that a missile might do for hitting diego garcia, but nothing says you could get one to. after all, a b2 bomber can go on long flights. put controller on it, and control it via a satellite, and the b2 becomes a drone

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#464

Post by nradov » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:20 AM UTC

dinfinity wrote: post #371

2trill2spill wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says right in the article ~200 a year. The base scenario in recent war games, the US lost 270 aircraft total, of which 206 were USAF. Japan lost 112, Taiwan's air force effectively ceased to exist. Across iterations, Air Force losses ranged from 168 to 372(mostly on the ground)in a fight with China over Taiwan. Those are substantial losses but assuming all the losses were f35(they were not) even at current non war…

> The base scenario in recent war games January 2023. Specifically focused on an invasion of Taiwan. And the analysis report hardly mentions drones. Not saying it isn't useful info, but it is in essence not much more than an educated (but outdated) guess. Using terms like "showed that" is thus highly unwarranted. > Those are substantial losses but assuming all the losses were f35(they were not) even at current non wa…

Which specific drone models are likely to be effective in a major air and naval conflict in and around the Taiwan Strait?

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#465

Post by jjk166 » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:21 AM UTC

cm2012 wrote: post #352

jjk166 wrote: post #158

> Meanwhile, modern conflict, from Ukraine’s drone war to naval engagements in the Red Sea to Iran’s own mass missile and drone salvos, increasingly favors systems that can be produced at scale and replaced when lost. The F-35 is a masterpiece. But a force designed around a masterpiece is not designed for long, protracted wars, and U.S. adversaries know this. The problem is that the F-35 was intended to be the low co…

A lot of big words, but also inaccurate. If you compare the F-35 to basically any plane worldwide with similar capabilities, it's very reasonably priced. You can see that in that it's very popular for export, with pre-sales already sold out until 2035. There are plenty of articles out there on this for those who want to Google it.

> If you compare the F-35 to basically any plane worldwide with similar capabilities, it's very reasonably priced.

If you compare corvettes to other sports cars, you'll find they are very reasonably priced. That doesn't make a corvette a good economical option for day to day commuting.

There are only 2 5th generation fighters available for export - the F-35 and the J-35. The F-35 is 40% more expensive than the J-35. No one is buying F-35s for the low price tag.

More to the point, the unit costs are low because the number of airframes scheduled to be built is enormous. The US needs to export hundreds of F35s to help distribute the massive cost of the development program. This development program was nearly 400% over initial budget, and the general managing the project was fired over it. The fact is the F-35 is far more expensive than it was intended to be.

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#466

Post by bdangubic » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:23 AM UTC

carefree-bob wrote: post #303

0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

JP Morgan is predicting $5/gallon gas. Apparently gas prices are one of the best indicators to predict presidential support. In normal times, this seems unfair-lots of external factors can influence gas prices. Rare that you can so directly point towards administration action causing an effect. Every day this conflict continues is going to have devastating political outcomes. I largely subscribe to the belief that Ka…

The problem here is that gas prices have bifurcated to the point that an "average" doesn't mean much. I'm pretty sure I know how California will vote regardless of the gas price, but gas in Texas and much of the midwest will remain cheap. This map should be eye opening. https://gasprices.aaa.com/

Gas is Texas is not that much cheaper than national average and will hit $4 soon if this “war” continues. I have several friends in Texas who are livid about gas prices.

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#467

Post by rasz » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:36 AM UTC

benoau wrote: post #224

spongebobstoes wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$25k per flight hour is a lot more than what drones cost

What's crazy is there's lots of videos of Ukranians shooting drones from open-cockpit propeller planes that barely cost more than the drones! I think in a serious drone war we would just have fleets of Cesnas flying around with a person hanging out the door with a shotgun lol.

In a serious drone war a neutral cargo ship off your coast will open hidden flaps and unleash 10K drones all at once erasing couple bases before they even know whats up.

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#468

Post by defrost » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:38 AM UTC

wredcoll wrote: post #430

defrost wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To launch one requires a submarine Torpedoes cannot be launched from manned / unmanned surface vessels? Wow. Good job China isn't getting into water surface drone swarms. Still, easy to see why close waters near Iran keep the US carrier groups away.

> Torpedoes cannot be launched from manned / unmanned surface vessels? They're getting close enough to target the carriers without being sunk.. how exactly?

Relatively low cost, numbers and sheer persistance.

Post WWII US has always struggled with asymmetric wars that can't be solved with military dominance and rarely addressed on deeper issues.

This current Iran conflict is reminiscent of the Taliban in Afghanistan, who survived 20 years in a frozen conflict with the US before taking back control of the country when the US withdrew.

The betting is strong on Iran still standing when Trump gets bored and carried off stage.

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#469

Post by datsci_est_2015 » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:48 AM UTC

cjbgkagh wrote: post #340

calvinmorrison wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

well yes you need to keep the aerospace and engineering pipelines full if you ever need to actually go to war. So boeing and all the other chumps making gravy is part of the deal in downtime

That is asinine, what do you think happens to those institutions when incompetence is what gets rewarded. The real threat to the US military is not the lack of weapons, or that the F35 is not as good or as cheap as it could have been, it's because it is a lumbering bureaucracy full of people who couldn't get better jobs elsewhere.

> it's because it is a lumbering bureaucracy full of people who couldn't get better jobs elsewhere.

I don’t think that they exploit the military industrial complex for personal job security and fortune makes it likely that they’re incompetent. In fact, as a society we seem to praise those who are exceedingly successful at such exploitation, and even elect them to the highest levels of government and hang onto every word they say.

Re: F-35 is built for the wrong war

#470

Post by laughing_man » Tue, Apr 21, 2026, 3:48 AM UTC

gozucito wrote: post #215

scottyah wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The F-35 is a massive success. It is a common design that brought together what would have been three to five different planes into one. Costs doubling is further proof of how amazing it is- inflation has basically outpaced that. Cost per flight hour has more to do with data analytics and the Socialism within the DoW (it's a jobs program) than actual need. A lot of delays were quasi-on purpose. It has crazy supply ch…

But what would you rather have? 2000 Shahed/Lucas drones or a single F35? Same cost for both. The saying "Quantity has a quality all of its own" is not obsolete in 2026.

Depends. If I need to destroy a bunker, the Shaheds are useless. If I need to shoot down another aircraft (or a Shahed), the Shaheds are useless. That also goes for SEAD, targets that are far away, targets with ECM...

Also, the physical and economic footprint for that many drones isn't small, and a few smart bombs from an F-35 could put paid to your entire inventory.