Strollen
1673
I was referring to the possibility of the US ordering 1,000 new F15EX as opposed to 300 next Gen stealth fighters.
Ah, I see. Sorry, I missed that.
abrandt
1675
There are a whole bunch of things you can do with a mix of 5th and 4th gen fighters and I’m glad the Air Force is finally figuring that out. If the 5th gen fighters can be out in front of the 4th gen fighters with networked sensors, the stealth fighters can save their limited missiles and just paint targets for the missile trucks behind them. Hell, at some point the very visible 4th gen fighters essentially act as bait for the much less visible F-35s out in front of them.
I hope the B-21 works out as that lets you take out ground targets with a stealth platform that’s even better equipped for that role than an F-35 would be and you let the F-35 do more fightery things.
Now for them to really embrace the unmanned future as a third leg in this system. Put those on the really risky missions so that your 500 KIA is 0 and you just lost 500 drones that are significantly cheaper than your manned fighters.
Heh, yeah, but billions is composed of millions, right? At a certain point, it’s all just lots of zeroes.
There is no magic answer to any of this. We’ve always had to prepare to fight an equivalent tech foe, even when the chances of that were fairly slim, because the consequences of not preparing could be catastrophic. But the most likely conflicts won’t involve best on best; indeed, we’d be much more likely to work pretty hard to make sure that didn’t happen. Back in the day, when there was a non-zero chance of a major war with the USSR, it was sort of a no-brainer. But today, when the Russians and the Chinese are also having a hard time affording cutting edge tech, and the chances off an actual shooting war with either are extremely low, it is harder to justify massive expenditures on bleeding edge gear that would turn a likely cake walk conflict into an even more lopsided cake walk.
In an ideal world, hell yes, you’d go with the best stuff you could field. I do worry that we are getting close to fielding such small quantities of some stuff that any glitch, any losses, any maintenance problems and we might end up with less capability than we had before the new systems, not more.
ShivaX
1678
It’s not even that imo. It’s that the F-35 was made to be a magical piece of a equipment that did literally everything. One tool for every single job that could exist.
Only… that doesn’t work. We know that doesn’t work and have for decades. You don’t have to choose between an A-10 and an F-15. You make them both. The result is cheaper and more effective at doing those jobs.
Instead we decided to make an F-15/A-10/Harrier/coffeemaker plane. Said plane was insanely expensive and also not as good at those jobs as more specialty planes would be.
The reason the Navy uses F-18 is because it’s a plane designed for them and their needs. Specialization is almost always better. The F-35 was supposed to replace the F-16. And F-22/F-15s. And the F-18. And the A-10. And Harriers.
Taxpayers paid extra to see it!
I really agree. During Covid, I’ve got chance to watch most of the Afghanistan semi-documentary films like Restrepo, The Outpost, Lone Survivor… I’ve been struck by how often a single tanker or aircraft malfunction, deprives the American force of the fire power they need.
We really don’t need a B1 or B2 to win a war, and obviously air superiority has not been a factor since Korea. An A10, AC-130, or even a Blackhawk is all that’s really needed in most situations. It is more than a little scary how in a even a small conflict like Afghanistan we seem to be chronically short of this equipment. I got to wonder how much is that’s because, we’ve spent three fortunes on all the hi tech stuff.
Russia doesn’t scare me and really neither does China now. The US has been fighting wars for 20±years straight, we’ve gotten pretty damn good at. As our lopsided kill ratio shows. Most senior officers and senior enlisted men, would be considered Veteran status in any computer game we play. Whereas very few Russian or Chinese soldiers, and airman have ever been shot at. They’d be fools to mess with us. I think we can safely remain at technology parity with these countries as long we have sufficient quantities.
ShivaX
1681
Given the nature of most conflicts, it’s not even that it’s “all that’s really needed” it’s that it’s actually more effective than the high tech shit. AC-130’s are a cargo plane with a Bofors, howitzer and minigun shoved into the side. They’re also insanely effective at what they do. They can loiter forever over an area and give accurate support fire. Trying to make an F-35 do the same job would require a shitload of F-35s and the results would be vastly inferior support.
Once you have air supremacy you get to pick a CAS strike vehicle par excellence, there’s a commonality to all of them: lots of different ordnance, lots of time over target and usually slow for better target discrimination.
Yeah, the whole “multirole” thing has always been a rabbit hole, a sort of Eldorado, Fountain of Youth, or Philosopher’s Stone that promised everything and usually delivered, well, a bit less. Eventually these beasts turn into useful systems, but never cost effectively and never in the way they were advertised. The old Aardvark F-111–a wicked cool plane, indeed–finally found its niche as a, well, niche strike aircraft, rather than the be-all and end-all master of everything it was supposed to be. It did well in that niche, but really, would anyone have spent that kind of money on it if they knew that was going to be the end result?
But specialization is only half the problem. The other half is actually having a strategic vision or plan, knowing what you want and how to get there. I would argue that we don’t have much of a good track record of that sort of thing. Without a clear idea of what our national goals are and what our military is for, it is hard to design procurement strategies.
You’d think that when the Pentagon gets together with industry to make plans, and someone starts pitching the idea of a multi-role fighter aircraft, someone in the room would say get the fuck out of here with that!. But I guess it doesn’t work that way.
“This vehicle is a multi-role troop carrier. It carries them over land, over sea and in the air. One vehicle for all three missions.”
Translated into contractor-speak, that’s “This is a never-ending fountain of government cash to fund cost-plus contracts for projects that can never work but for which we can be paid not only for designing the unworkable thingamajig but also for fixing what we broke!”
Yes, this, but you’d think that the actual Pentagon brass / administration would see that coming. Unless, I guess, they don’t care that it’s a con.
ShivaX
1687
This is exactly what happens, imo. And since Defense Spending can never be questioned…
Isn’t that called a Hind?
Just kidding. Okay, maybe not.
When I was in that business–not the hardware, big-ticket side, though, more software/systems/black side–the government folks we dealt with were concerned about cost only to the extent it shaped the parameters for the RFP (request for proposal) they sent out. The broader issues of affordability were above their pay-grade. If they were told they had to do it for X, they went with that. If they were told they had leeway on cost, they naturally defaulted to “get it done” mode, because they might get dinged for spending too much, but they sure as hell would get in trouble for not getting it done at all.
Without a national-level understanding of why you are buying this stuff, it is really hard to trickle down any sort of fiscal responsibility.
Aceris
1690
Who do you think they go work for after they retire from the military?
Djscman
1691
I hadn’t read that story before and enjoyed it. Thank you for linking to it.
KevinC
1692
This thread and its discussions around the Zumwalt, F-35, and other advanced US tech often brings that story to mind for some reason. :) Glad you liked it!
