It has been categorically stated and restated within USG that the F-22 is not available to Australia or Japan.
End of story.
F/A-22: To Fly High or Get its Wings Clipped
- Thread starter LancerMc
- Start date
End of story.
It should be ...... but I doubt it.
Maverick65
New Member
Once Again, Hello
I also seem to remember the USG 'categorically stating' that there were no US service personnel in Laos or Cambodia during the Vietnam war and that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Two eras, two loads of bulldust, so I would take anything that Uncle says with a grain of salt.
As to the speculations re: sales of Raptor to Japan, the net seems pretty well inundated by such speculations, ranging from Japan merely asking out the aircraft to negotiations taking place. A simple fact is that such speculations can't be purely that for much longer without some hard evidence that they are or aren't. I know Uncle will quite happily bleat about not selling to Japan primarily to keep anyone else happy, but when is the last time that the US government has made a statement regarding an important issue, only to retract it later with some glib rejoiner?
Regarding my other comments, to put it quite bluntly, I am sick and tired of hearing everybody and his dog singing the company song when it comes to Uncle and his products. JSF is a classic example of our defence forces being shoved into a deal that was a problem from the get go. I seriously wish people would make up their minds. Some say it's an F-111 replacement... with less payload, less range and not even designed for the interdiction role. Others say we don't need long-range capabilities because Uncle is soooo willing to help us out in times of crisis. I am one of the few that isn't placated by such statements? And the number of people who sing the Company song and also feel that Australia has no concerns strategically is quite laughable to the extreme. I personally don't care how old someone is, but when they start rattling off the same hackneyed phrases about 'net-centric warfare, stealth' and all the other garbage that the likes of LM and NG love to blurb about it quite simply makes my blood either boil or run cold, depending on whether I put myself in the position of our Pilots or whether I see the defence of my nation being put a severe risk by some backslapping bunch of politicos and yes-men.
And finally, Rich is who he is, how old he is, but petty name calling puts him in a child's category any day, unfortunately of course, this runs the risk of insulting children...
I also seem to remember the USG 'categorically stating' that there were no US service personnel in Laos or Cambodia during the Vietnam war and that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Two eras, two loads of bulldust, so I would take anything that Uncle says with a grain of salt.
As to the speculations re: sales of Raptor to Japan, the net seems pretty well inundated by such speculations, ranging from Japan merely asking out the aircraft to negotiations taking place. A simple fact is that such speculations can't be purely that for much longer without some hard evidence that they are or aren't. I know Uncle will quite happily bleat about not selling to Japan primarily to keep anyone else happy, but when is the last time that the US government has made a statement regarding an important issue, only to retract it later with some glib rejoiner?
Regarding my other comments, to put it quite bluntly, I am sick and tired of hearing everybody and his dog singing the company song when it comes to Uncle and his products. JSF is a classic example of our defence forces being shoved into a deal that was a problem from the get go. I seriously wish people would make up their minds. Some say it's an F-111 replacement... with less payload, less range and not even designed for the interdiction role. Others say we don't need long-range capabilities because Uncle is soooo willing to help us out in times of crisis. I am one of the few that isn't placated by such statements? And the number of people who sing the Company song and also feel that Australia has no concerns strategically is quite laughable to the extreme. I personally don't care how old someone is, but when they start rattling off the same hackneyed phrases about 'net-centric warfare, stealth' and all the other garbage that the likes of LM and NG love to blurb about it quite simply makes my blood either boil or run cold, depending on whether I put myself in the position of our Pilots or whether I see the defence of my nation being put a severe risk by some backslapping bunch of politicos and yes-men.
And finally, Rich is who he is, how old he is, but petty name calling puts him in a child's category any day, unfortunately of course, this runs the risk of insulting children...
thought you were sick of this post and taking a break from it....i hope your next break is your..i mean a bit longer!As is the "I want the big shiney one" even if the 8yo doesnt need it. "Nyaaa, Nyaaa, Nyaaa", "you cant have it".:
we work with what we have. anything else is just a continuing exercise in speculation.
either way, the F-22 lobby group did themselves no favours in the way that they approached this all - esp by appealing to armchair support in the public domain - and by using tame broadsheet journos who got some basic facts repeatedly wrong.
I'm far more interested in what the US is doing in country on other projects, and which has not hit the public domain. The impact of those projects is far more important than the F-22 being in red rat roundels...
The F-22 debate is a sideshow event.
So they forgot to write some code like this:
Code:
bool leapYear(unsigned int year)
{
return ( year % 4 == 0 ?
( (year % 100 != 0) || (year % 400 == 0) ? true:false ) : false);
}
You,ve indicated that you don't think that either the the JSF or the SH is suitable for Australia and you described the F-22 as "Ridiculously over tech," so what direction do you suggest that the RAAF ought to be taking with its air combat force? Also I'd be interested in some details about what you see as wrong with capabilities like stealth or net-centric warfare.
Cheers
A
Aussie Digger
Guest
I think you need to do a bit more research before you come on here, making your ridiculous claims.
F-22 is NOT available for anyone besides USAF. Period.
Australia is not "propping up" the JSF program. Canada, USA, Netherlands, Italy, UK, Denmark, Norway, Turkey, Singapore, Israel and very likely Japan are "propping it up", as you put it. How can an order for 100 aircraft, possibly greatly effect a build that will likely be in excess of 3000 aircraft?
As to your body bag comments. I can only use "kids" terminology and say WTF? What exactly do you base this comment on? That RAAF is somehow going to be LESS capable with SH?
No Senior officer in defence has stated a preference for the F-22 over JSF. What many HAVE said is that they acknowledge the F-22 is a superior air to air fighter than the JSF. How this translates into them "preferring it" to anything is beyond me.
If you expect people to take you seriously, start using actual EVIDENCE to support your opinion. Misquotes and half truths will get you about as far as Air Power Australia is getting in this "debate"...
Mods haven't we beaten this horse enough times in this thread? We've been thru all of these points time and time again haven't we? Its at a point this thread has degenerated into one liners and thoughtless Yank bashing, much of which has nothing to do with the topic at hand.
And your grammar sucks. "....." isn't allowed in the forum and "i" should be capitalized "I".
Thread re-opened. Note comments below before contributing!
This threads getting locked in the cooler until further notice.
Hopefully if its re-opened, and by then, everyone will realise how they're supposed to conduct themselves in future.
This threads getting locked in the cooler until further notice.
Hopefully if its re-opened, and by then, everyone will realise how they're supposed to conduct themselves in future.
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An interesting article in todays Mercury Newspaper suggests that the F-22/F-35 debate will re-open if Labor wins the next election:
I was interested in the comment describing the Raptor as 'a jet bomber'!
It does seem that interesting days are ahead for the fighter debate, particularly if there is a change of government, which opinion polls suggest is possible.
Cheers
http://www.news.com.au/mercury/story/0,22884,21395829-421,00.html
I was interested in the comment describing the Raptor as 'a jet bomber'!
It does seem that interesting days are ahead for the fighter debate, particularly if there is a change of government, which opinion polls suggest is possible.
Cheers
Good ol' jet bomber
Atleast that error was made by a newspaper and not the USAF
Remember the F-117 stealth "fighter" that could only drop bombs
Considering the F-22 can perform the majority of bombing missions that the joint "strike" fighter can perform then calling it a fighter isn't entirely correct.
That could be compared to calling the F-15E an "eagle" instead of "strike eagle".
Maybe they should call the F-22 the strike raptor.. Atleast that would have been better than the F/A-22 idea.
I believe calling it a Jet bomber is for your average joe who didn't know the F-22 can drop bombs better than 99% of the aircraft in the world.
Atleast that error was made by a newspaper and not the USAF
Remember the F-117 stealth "fighter" that could only drop bombs
Considering the F-22 can perform the majority of bombing missions that the joint "strike" fighter can perform then calling it a fighter isn't entirely correct.
That could be compared to calling the F-15E an "eagle" instead of "strike eagle".
Maybe they should call the F-22 the strike raptor.. Atleast that would have been better than the F/A-22 idea.
I believe calling it a Jet bomber is for your average joe who didn't know the F-22 can drop bombs better than 99% of the aircraft in the world.
A
Aussie Digger
Guest
And here's the rebuttal to the GAO report and the wonderfully accurate Australian media reporting of these issues:
CPA 068/07 Saturday, 17 March 2007
JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER (JSF)
On 15 March 2007 the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its annual report to the US Congress on the progress of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program.
The GAO Report acknowledged progress in a number of areas, including:
* Completion of the Program re-baselining;
* Flight of the first test aircraft;
* Analysis which shows that the JSF is meeting all performance specifications, except for one, which is dependent on progress on another program;
* Positive progress in developing production facilities; and
* The benefits of some concurrency between testing and production.
The GAO report also identified a number of cost increases but many of these are outside the control of the JSF Program and include general economic factors, increases in the cost of materials, etc.
Australian media are incorrectly reporting that the cost of the JSF has risen to US$112 million. This reporting is based on a misinterpretation of the figure quoted in the GAO report. To determine the cost of individual aircraft the figure needs to be discounted because:
* It includes development costs;
* It is based on a 'Then Year' cost basis - which takes into account inflation out to the end of the JSF Program, around 2040 - rather than a 'Constant Year' cost basis;
* It includes the cost of such factors as spares, support equipment, training systems, facilities etc;
* It does not include the effect of JSF buyers other than the US - with around 500 additional aircraft planned for existing partners alone.; and
* The lower average price for the Australian-preferred Conventional Take-Off and Landing (CTOL) variant.
The resulting figure is consistent with US Department of Defense (DoD) reporting to the US Congress of an average CTOL 'flyaway' cost of around US$47 million (BY02US$). Lockheed Martin is predicting a lower cost.
These, and other cost factors - including the cost effect of Australia planning to buy earlier than the overall average buy - were taken into account in the First Pass approval for the New Air Combat Capability project in November 2007.
The GAO report also identifies some slips to the Program schedule but these are generally in the order of a few months and the JSF Project Office has strategies in place to recover the schedule.
While the GAO report identifies risk associated with too high a level of production before testing is complete, the US DoD argues that: 'the current JSF acquisition strategy provides an effective balance of technical risk, financial constraints and operational needs of the Services.'
Defence concurs with the US DoD position and is confident that the JSF will mature to provide the capability Australia needs in the most cost effective way.
Courtesy: www.defence.gov.au
It's good to see defence responding to the half-truths and misquotes that perpetuate those that are against the Australian F-35 acquisition. Defence have decided the F-35 is the plane we need, it's good to see them actually arguing against those that think they are wrong.
CPA 068/07 Saturday, 17 March 2007
JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER (JSF)
On 15 March 2007 the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its annual report to the US Congress on the progress of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program.
The GAO Report acknowledged progress in a number of areas, including:
* Completion of the Program re-baselining;
* Flight of the first test aircraft;
* Analysis which shows that the JSF is meeting all performance specifications, except for one, which is dependent on progress on another program;
* Positive progress in developing production facilities; and
* The benefits of some concurrency between testing and production.
The GAO report also identified a number of cost increases but many of these are outside the control of the JSF Program and include general economic factors, increases in the cost of materials, etc.
Australian media are incorrectly reporting that the cost of the JSF has risen to US$112 million. This reporting is based on a misinterpretation of the figure quoted in the GAO report. To determine the cost of individual aircraft the figure needs to be discounted because:
* It includes development costs;
* It is based on a 'Then Year' cost basis - which takes into account inflation out to the end of the JSF Program, around 2040 - rather than a 'Constant Year' cost basis;
* It includes the cost of such factors as spares, support equipment, training systems, facilities etc;
* It does not include the effect of JSF buyers other than the US - with around 500 additional aircraft planned for existing partners alone.; and
* The lower average price for the Australian-preferred Conventional Take-Off and Landing (CTOL) variant.
The resulting figure is consistent with US Department of Defense (DoD) reporting to the US Congress of an average CTOL 'flyaway' cost of around US$47 million (BY02US$). Lockheed Martin is predicting a lower cost.
These, and other cost factors - including the cost effect of Australia planning to buy earlier than the overall average buy - were taken into account in the First Pass approval for the New Air Combat Capability project in November 2007.
The GAO report also identifies some slips to the Program schedule but these are generally in the order of a few months and the JSF Project Office has strategies in place to recover the schedule.
While the GAO report identifies risk associated with too high a level of production before testing is complete, the US DoD argues that: 'the current JSF acquisition strategy provides an effective balance of technical risk, financial constraints and operational needs of the Services.'
Defence concurs with the US DoD position and is confident that the JSF will mature to provide the capability Australia needs in the most cost effective way.
Courtesy: www.defence.gov.au
It's good to see defence responding to the half-truths and misquotes that perpetuate those that are against the Australian F-35 acquisition. Defence have decided the F-35 is the plane we need, it's good to see them actually arguing against those that think they are wrong.
I think it's getting more and more important for our defence leaders to develop good PR skills and to become proactive in arguing their case. They need to make certain that defence decisions are not made as a result of politicians responding to the popular media, which in turn, is influenced by vested interests, armchair critics or academics with a particular "barrow to push," for example, the evolved F111.
Cheers
A
Aussie Digger
Guest
Agreed. I think it's very important for defence to concentrate on what's best for defence, based on the very best professional opinion ADF can provide and leave the politics to those best suited to it: politicians...]
I do like them responding to the technical questions asked of them and the decisions made about defence capability though. It's illuminating for the rest of us, if nothing else...
The cost rise from US$256 billion to US$276 billion is old news. Part of this happened with the weight saving event for the STOVL which ended up being helpful and some other R&D things. Given how far and how fast they have come, not a bad R&D job.
The current GAO press release doesn't make much sense. As it is the cost of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan that is driving planing for almost all of our DOD budgets. We spend tons of money on things but for the last few years what you don't see are lots of programs going into fallow. Obvious things like the E-10 going away, reducion in flying hours or many other lesser known systems canceled. A lot of support things that allow the DOD to function. That is how much cash Iraq and Afghanistan suck up and it isn't all covered by war supplementals.
While I am not the biggest JSF fan and my selfish reason is, ( for us ( USAF ) ) we can do all of our strike warfare without it... F-22 and and if we need newer airframes... new build F-15 and F-16 can still do the work. We have enough to break any stiff integrated air defense ( IADS ). JSF is nice but we also need healthy tankers, transports, support aircraft, new ISR satellites and many other things.
The JSF program, now, is very very well run. This is unusual. Usually there is some big show stoppers, but there really aren't. This is one of those rare government programs where it has gotten over most of the serious hurdles and is well on it's way to success.
Now what the GAO has no clue about and fails to mention... The JSF, if it kept on it's original production program would cost out OK with no real bad problems. The Administration/ Congress/Iraq/Afghanistan, USAF, USN... is most of the problem on this. Congress is trying to "save" money using the following method: With Iraq and Afghanistan, tacked on to everything at $10 billion plus a month, they have x amount of dollars to spend in a year. For the most part they are only looking at one year at a time and pay lip service to any long range plans. They have the attention span of a new born chimp. They look at it and say "here" is the money available for this ( lets say JSF ) for this year given everything else that has to be paid for. The problem is, the money that they are giving out for JSF for this next budget, is well below the projected JSF plan that is needed for x amount of JSF airframes to be built on year y. So now due to congress, the USAF & USN being cowed by so many budget woes, the administration, for getting us into a high cost ground war, the whole JSF production schedule is slowed down because congress is only willing to hand out a certain amount of cash each year. The GAO which is their own oversight office... with this convenient report, is an effort to deflect the congressional blame for JSF production slowdown. The GAO report will most likely do just that for the clueless rabble that doesn't know anything. JSF could only stay on budget if the production schedule was not messed with. Again, you see some problem come from USAF and USN where with Iraq and Afghanistan eating into their planning and they start thinking the same thing: we can't pay for x amount of JSFs for year y.
Back in 2001 when the JSF selection process happened ( right after 911 ), no one dreamed we would be locked into an expeditionary war that costs so much. Again where the administration comes in, is getting us into a high dollar war in the first place without proper planning. Like it or hate it, Iraq alone is sucking up a lot of cash.
Now everyone is in damage control mode. Team JSF just mentioned the other day some kind of offer to the non-U.S. JSF partners to encourage them to buy early, so as to help on the shortfall of production requests from the U.S. side, thus helping to reduce overall program cost. Don't know if that is such a hot idea either. If you look at the planning chart on JSF.mil in the download section from their public consumption progress report dated Sep 06, it will show you that Block III avionic might not be tested out enough for these early deliveries not on the original plan. Even on the existing plan, in the case of RAAF, there could be a risk of early RAAF jets being delivered with Block II avionics. Block II doesn't have all the full air to ground, functionality. If it was me, I would only want a Block III jet delivered.
For the most part, JSF isn't a problem if it is kept on production schedule. Breaking the production schedule is where cost problems are going to come from. The GAO release the other day, in my opinion, didn't adequately explain that.
The current GAO press release doesn't make much sense. As it is the cost of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan that is driving planing for almost all of our DOD budgets. We spend tons of money on things but for the last few years what you don't see are lots of programs going into fallow. Obvious things like the E-10 going away, reducion in flying hours or many other lesser known systems canceled. A lot of support things that allow the DOD to function. That is how much cash Iraq and Afghanistan suck up and it isn't all covered by war supplementals.
While I am not the biggest JSF fan and my selfish reason is, ( for us ( USAF ) ) we can do all of our strike warfare without it... F-22 and and if we need newer airframes... new build F-15 and F-16 can still do the work. We have enough to break any stiff integrated air defense ( IADS ). JSF is nice but we also need healthy tankers, transports, support aircraft, new ISR satellites and many other things.
The JSF program, now, is very very well run. This is unusual. Usually there is some big show stoppers, but there really aren't. This is one of those rare government programs where it has gotten over most of the serious hurdles and is well on it's way to success.
Now what the GAO has no clue about and fails to mention... The JSF, if it kept on it's original production program would cost out OK with no real bad problems. The Administration/ Congress/Iraq/Afghanistan, USAF, USN... is most of the problem on this. Congress is trying to "save" money using the following method: With Iraq and Afghanistan, tacked on to everything at $10 billion plus a month, they have x amount of dollars to spend in a year. For the most part they are only looking at one year at a time and pay lip service to any long range plans. They have the attention span of a new born chimp. They look at it and say "here" is the money available for this ( lets say JSF ) for this year given everything else that has to be paid for. The problem is, the money that they are giving out for JSF for this next budget, is well below the projected JSF plan that is needed for x amount of JSF airframes to be built on year y. So now due to congress, the USAF & USN being cowed by so many budget woes, the administration, for getting us into a high cost ground war, the whole JSF production schedule is slowed down because congress is only willing to hand out a certain amount of cash each year. The GAO which is their own oversight office... with this convenient report, is an effort to deflect the congressional blame for JSF production slowdown. The GAO report will most likely do just that for the clueless rabble that doesn't know anything. JSF could only stay on budget if the production schedule was not messed with. Again, you see some problem come from USAF and USN where with Iraq and Afghanistan eating into their planning and they start thinking the same thing: we can't pay for x amount of JSFs for year y.
Back in 2001 when the JSF selection process happened ( right after 911 ), no one dreamed we would be locked into an expeditionary war that costs so much. Again where the administration comes in, is getting us into a high dollar war in the first place without proper planning. Like it or hate it, Iraq alone is sucking up a lot of cash.
Now everyone is in damage control mode. Team JSF just mentioned the other day some kind of offer to the non-U.S. JSF partners to encourage them to buy early, so as to help on the shortfall of production requests from the U.S. side, thus helping to reduce overall program cost. Don't know if that is such a hot idea either. If you look at the planning chart on JSF.mil in the download section from their public consumption progress report dated Sep 06, it will show you that Block III avionic might not be tested out enough for these early deliveries not on the original plan. Even on the existing plan, in the case of RAAF, there could be a risk of early RAAF jets being delivered with Block II avionics. Block II doesn't have all the full air to ground, functionality. If it was me, I would only want a Block III jet delivered.
For the most part, JSF isn't a problem if it is kept on production schedule. Breaking the production schedule is where cost problems are going to come from. The GAO release the other day, in my opinion, didn't adequately explain that.
very good post ELP but isn't the most important aspect of the JSF is STOVL plane as it very important that the marines have somekind of fixed wing CAS as the AV8 won't last for ever and will need a replacement more than the legacy jets [f15,f16].
and the politics will mean that the USMC will have to have something fixed wing to fly off the WASPS and future assult ships.
and the politics will mean that the USMC will have to have something fixed wing to fly off the WASPS and future assult ships.
Well, and this is only my opinion, ... I am not a proponent of STOVL jets for us.
-Marines did just fine with fixed wing aviation before. Today, and considering today we have smaller carrier airwings, there is plenty of room for a Squadron of Marine Super Hornets. This jet brings a lot more weapons to the fight. If the Marines need support they need a full up aircraft carrier supporting them.
Bare base STOVL... OK fine, however the fact that it is a bare base in indian country, (the old west kind) means you have to bring in a lot of aviation specific supplys many times by ground convoy. Attack helos, have a lot smaller logistical foot print, are just as close to the toops and that with the advent of GPS assisted artillery ( I don't care where the fire support comes from arty or air....and neither does the grunt on the ground ) which also has a lower logistical footprint, these are enough until carrier air or an orbiting B-1 or B-52 or whatever, arrive. 911 fast response emergency CAS requests are all about response time. A GPS assisted arty round is the fastest response around. And there are light non-tube arty soloutions for country where traditional heavy arty isn't as doable. Also for a bare base in hostile territory, the following should be good food for thought. In Vietnam, in one night we had most of our night ground interdiction capability stomped out when a large mortar/rocket attack took out our fancy night interdiction B-57s at Bien Hoa.
Also consider the big Marine bare base we set up in Afghanistan in the initial 2001 effort, had lots and lots of available off-base carrier air and large bombers available in addition to their attack helicopters. Putting Harriers there was more show than anything else and just a big logistical mouth to feed that didn't have much fire support value compared to other solutions. That is a logistical tail that could have better been used on GPS assisted arty rounds either tubed or rockets or some other resource.
STOVL JSF hasn't had a lot of testing yet so we don't know. One thing we do know is STOVL Harrier ops eat up a lot of jets. In 31 years of service, 143 Harrier accidents ( both USMC versions ) have claimed the lives of 45 Marines, including veteran combat pilots. An accident rate that is around 12 per 100,000 hours give or take. Compare that to a conventional fighter that is around 1.5 per 100,000 hours. Thats a lot of men, hardware, and resources to dump just to prove a pet theory. Now someone may say... "but look how well Harrier performed in the Falklands". My answer to that would be: Think of what a route the Falklands would have been had the RN had real catapult aircraft carriers with real combat jets.
Doesn't matter what I say anyway, and of course in my post before this I stated my USAF specific reasons were selfish which in fact they are. I am more interested in the welfare of the USAF than welfare of sister services or allies on what airframe they chose to use.
STOVL JSF may in fact be very successful for USMC. I don't know. I do like the ideas of STOVL only bare bases but in our case if we take over a hard airfield why bother. Todays rapid off the shelf targeting technology, means that a STOVL base is just as at-risk to an improved SCUD-like attack as a conventional base. And any bare base is many times more at risk to various artillery like threats.
As for our flatdeck Amphibs that a STOVL jet flys from, given that if it is a serious op and we would have a real aircraft carrier for fighter support, I would rather see the volume space used up by the Harrier on that Marine Aphib, used up to carry more supplies for the Marine grunt. Again, just my opinion.
-Marines did just fine with fixed wing aviation before. Today, and considering today we have smaller carrier airwings, there is plenty of room for a Squadron of Marine Super Hornets. This jet brings a lot more weapons to the fight. If the Marines need support they need a full up aircraft carrier supporting them.
Bare base STOVL... OK fine, however the fact that it is a bare base in indian country, (the old west kind) means you have to bring in a lot of aviation specific supplys many times by ground convoy. Attack helos, have a lot smaller logistical foot print, are just as close to the toops and that with the advent of GPS assisted artillery ( I don't care where the fire support comes from arty or air....and neither does the grunt on the ground ) which also has a lower logistical footprint, these are enough until carrier air or an orbiting B-1 or B-52 or whatever, arrive. 911 fast response emergency CAS requests are all about response time. A GPS assisted arty round is the fastest response around. And there are light non-tube arty soloutions for country where traditional heavy arty isn't as doable. Also for a bare base in hostile territory, the following should be good food for thought. In Vietnam, in one night we had most of our night ground interdiction capability stomped out when a large mortar/rocket attack took out our fancy night interdiction B-57s at Bien Hoa.
Also consider the big Marine bare base we set up in Afghanistan in the initial 2001 effort, had lots and lots of available off-base carrier air and large bombers available in addition to their attack helicopters. Putting Harriers there was more show than anything else and just a big logistical mouth to feed that didn't have much fire support value compared to other solutions. That is a logistical tail that could have better been used on GPS assisted arty rounds either tubed or rockets or some other resource.
STOVL JSF hasn't had a lot of testing yet so we don't know. One thing we do know is STOVL Harrier ops eat up a lot of jets. In 31 years of service, 143 Harrier accidents ( both USMC versions ) have claimed the lives of 45 Marines, including veteran combat pilots. An accident rate that is around 12 per 100,000 hours give or take. Compare that to a conventional fighter that is around 1.5 per 100,000 hours. Thats a lot of men, hardware, and resources to dump just to prove a pet theory. Now someone may say... "but look how well Harrier performed in the Falklands". My answer to that would be: Think of what a route the Falklands would have been had the RN had real catapult aircraft carriers with real combat jets.
Doesn't matter what I say anyway, and of course in my post before this I stated my USAF specific reasons were selfish which in fact they are. I am more interested in the welfare of the USAF than welfare of sister services or allies on what airframe they chose to use.
STOVL JSF may in fact be very successful for USMC. I don't know. I do like the ideas of STOVL only bare bases but in our case if we take over a hard airfield why bother. Todays rapid off the shelf targeting technology, means that a STOVL base is just as at-risk to an improved SCUD-like attack as a conventional base. And any bare base is many times more at risk to various artillery like threats.
As for our flatdeck Amphibs that a STOVL jet flys from, given that if it is a serious op and we would have a real aircraft carrier for fighter support, I would rather see the volume space used up by the Harrier on that Marine Aphib, used up to carry more supplies for the Marine grunt. Again, just my opinion.
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Most of the STOVL accidents were early in the program during the painful, "learning to fly the dadgum things" stage. Now we have 30+ years of operation these types of aircraft so the pain should be less as our corp moves to F-35bs. The number one factor here is that the marines want them. Further, the F-35b is going to be ordered by several other countries and screwing up the eventual amount of airframes will play havoc with "their" prices.
But mostly we should build the things because of the force multiplier advantage they give us. Instead of air operations revolving around a dozen carriers we also have 13 40,000 ton class LHDs each capable of operating 6 to 20 STOVL air craft. I think the edge this type of setup gives us is obvious. And not just that, but imagine the arguments on a carrier regarding USN targets and USMC tasks? This way we pretty much avoid that and both types of ships can do their own thing.
So I think the STOVL version will, and most surely should, march on.
But mostly we should build the things because of the force multiplier advantage they give us. Instead of air operations revolving around a dozen carriers we also have 13 40,000 ton class LHDs each capable of operating 6 to 20 STOVL air craft. I think the edge this type of setup gives us is obvious. And not just that, but imagine the arguments on a carrier regarding USN targets and USMC tasks? This way we pretty much avoid that and both types of ships can do their own thing.
So I think the STOVL version will, and most surely should, march on.
Hi Guys. Lets get the facts from the horses mouth. This article is hot of the press from the Australian MOD
JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER (JSF)
On 15 March 2007 the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its annual report to the US Congress on the progress of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program.
The GAO Report acknowledged progress in a number of areas, including:
* Completion of the Program re-baselining;
* Flight of the first test aircraft;
* Analysis which shows that the JSF is meeting all performance specifications, except for one, which is dependent on progress on another program;
* Positive progress in developing production facilities; and
* The benefits of some concurrency between testing and production.
The GAO report also identified a number of cost increases but many of these are outside the control of the JSF Program and include general economic factors, increases in the cost of materials, etc.
Australian media are incorrectly reporting that the cost of the JSF has risen to US$112 million. This reporting is based on a misinterpretation of the figure
quoted in the GAO report. To determine the cost of individual aircraft the figure needs to be discounted because:
* It includes development costs;
* It is based on a ‘Then Year’ cost basis - which takes into account inflation out to the end of the JSF Program, around 2040 – rather than a ‘Constant Year’ cost basis;
* It includes the cost of such factors as spares, support equipment, training systems, facilities etc;
* It does not include the effect of JSF buyers other than the US – with around 500 additional aircraft planned for existing partners alone.; and
* The lower average price for the Australian-preferred Conventional Take-Off and Landing (CTOL) variant.
The resulting figure is consistent with US Department of Defense (DoD) reporting to the US Congress of an average CTOL ‘flyaway’ cost of around US$47 million (BY02US$). Lockheed Martin is predicting a lower cost.
These, and other cost factors – including the cost effect of Australia planning to buy earlier than the overall average buy - were taken into account in the First Pass approval for the New Air Combat Capability project in November 2007.
The GAO report also identifies some slips to the Program schedule but these are generally in the order of a few months and the JSF Project Office has strategies in place to recover the schedule.
While the GAO report identifies risk associated with too high a level of production before testing is complete, the US DoD argues that: ‘the current JSF acquisition strategy provides an effective balance of technical risk, financial constraints and operational needs of the Services.’
Defence concurs with the US DoD position and is confident that the JSF will mature to provide the capability Australia needs in the most cost effective way.
Media contact:
Defence Media Liaison
JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER (JSF)
On 15 March 2007 the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its annual report to the US Congress on the progress of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Program.
The GAO Report acknowledged progress in a number of areas, including:
* Completion of the Program re-baselining;
* Flight of the first test aircraft;
* Analysis which shows that the JSF is meeting all performance specifications, except for one, which is dependent on progress on another program;
* Positive progress in developing production facilities; and
* The benefits of some concurrency between testing and production.
The GAO report also identified a number of cost increases but many of these are outside the control of the JSF Program and include general economic factors, increases in the cost of materials, etc.
Australian media are incorrectly reporting that the cost of the JSF has risen to US$112 million. This reporting is based on a misinterpretation of the figure
quoted in the GAO report. To determine the cost of individual aircraft the figure needs to be discounted because:
* It includes development costs;
* It is based on a ‘Then Year’ cost basis - which takes into account inflation out to the end of the JSF Program, around 2040 – rather than a ‘Constant Year’ cost basis;
* It includes the cost of such factors as spares, support equipment, training systems, facilities etc;
* It does not include the effect of JSF buyers other than the US – with around 500 additional aircraft planned for existing partners alone.; and
* The lower average price for the Australian-preferred Conventional Take-Off and Landing (CTOL) variant.
The resulting figure is consistent with US Department of Defense (DoD) reporting to the US Congress of an average CTOL ‘flyaway’ cost of around US$47 million (BY02US$). Lockheed Martin is predicting a lower cost.
These, and other cost factors – including the cost effect of Australia planning to buy earlier than the overall average buy - were taken into account in the First Pass approval for the New Air Combat Capability project in November 2007.
The GAO report also identifies some slips to the Program schedule but these are generally in the order of a few months and the JSF Project Office has strategies in place to recover the schedule.
While the GAO report identifies risk associated with too high a level of production before testing is complete, the US DoD argues that: ‘the current JSF acquisition strategy provides an effective balance of technical risk, financial constraints and operational needs of the Services.’
Defence concurs with the US DoD position and is confident that the JSF will mature to provide the capability Australia needs in the most cost effective way.
Media contact:
Defence Media Liaison