US Military Prepares for Combat on the Budgetary Front
The F-35 is the obvious target but i feel that it is so important for the long term.
C-17 production ending may also be a big mistake next decade when if they continue to be used as heaviliy as they are today.
What aircraft will be most likely to retire or cut back?
It seems the USAF may have no choice but to cut back on the number of aircraft it operates and hope that their high quality makes up for any deficiencies.
However if the number of aircraft in service is heavily cut what happens to all the oversupply of pilots?
This may soon mean the USAF will stop training new pilots so that the number of pilots reduce with time as older ones retire, at least until the budget improves.
With the extra maintenance on the older aircraft it may be worth cutting their loss's and retiring 1000 older aircraft for only 50 new aircraft per year. Eventually the money saved from operating older systems would be able to purchase new equipment. Short term loss or long term gain. The longer the US keeps the older aircraft the more it hurts its long term outlook.
Personally i believe the F-22, F-35 and C-17 should be the main procurement priorities with anything extra going towards new refueling tankers. B-1B's and B-52's should be kept as they are current extremely useful with the war on terror due to their long range and endurance.
All upgrades on F-15C's, F-16C's and A-10's should be stopped. In a war with China these aircraft would not be very useful and currently in Iraq and Afghanistan we could get by without them. All that i would keep would be the F-15E's and a few F-15C's that have already had AESA fitted. I'd retire all of the older F-16's and most of the A-10's.
Though the majority of money i'd try and get from the Navy and dramatically improve automation on ships, but that can be kept for another thread.
Things dont look good. It seems like the USAF may have to severely streamline its force structure to save costs.
The F-35 is the obvious target but i feel that it is so important for the long term.
C-17 production ending may also be a big mistake next decade when if they continue to be used as heaviliy as they are today.
What aircraft will be most likely to retire or cut back?
It seems the USAF may have no choice but to cut back on the number of aircraft it operates and hope that their high quality makes up for any deficiencies.
However if the number of aircraft in service is heavily cut what happens to all the oversupply of pilots?
This may soon mean the USAF will stop training new pilots so that the number of pilots reduce with time as older ones retire, at least until the budget improves.
With the extra maintenance on the older aircraft it may be worth cutting their loss's and retiring 1000 older aircraft for only 50 new aircraft per year. Eventually the money saved from operating older systems would be able to purchase new equipment. Short term loss or long term gain. The longer the US keeps the older aircraft the more it hurts its long term outlook.
Personally i believe the F-22, F-35 and C-17 should be the main procurement priorities with anything extra going towards new refueling tankers. B-1B's and B-52's should be kept as they are current extremely useful with the war on terror due to their long range and endurance.
All upgrades on F-15C's, F-16C's and A-10's should be stopped. In a war with China these aircraft would not be very useful and currently in Iraq and Afghanistan we could get by without them. All that i would keep would be the F-15E's and a few F-15C's that have already had AESA fitted. I'd retire all of the older F-16's and most of the A-10's.
Though the majority of money i'd try and get from the Navy and dramatically improve automation on ships, but that can be kept for another thread.