Tuesday, December 23, 2014

Now we know why the USMC and USAF are pushing an early IOC for the F-35.


During peacetime, the US military has never put into service an airplane that has not completed testing.

Quite honestly it violates the spirit, if not the letter of the law.

I've always been curious about the rush.  Until recently I believed that the plane was protected from any real threats of cuts (emphasis on the "until recently")...but War is Boring Blog has filled in the missing info...
The Pentagon has claimed the J-20 could enter squadron service in 2018, seven years after the first prototype began flying. That’s consistent with the F-22’s development and the J-10B’s. And if so, full-scale production will need to begin soon in order for Chengdu’s workers to finish adequate numbers of J-20s to line the tarmac a little over three years from now.
Yeah.

That's the kick in the teeth that the Pentagon cannot allow the uninformed to catch onto.  If you're following the program office account of when the F-35 is due to finish flight testing (assuming no more delays...which is highly probable) then the J-20 will complete flight testing and enter REAL frontline service a full year before the F-35.

This also gives clues to the US Navy's strategy.  They're extending EA-18G production till 2018...which means that they will get a two-fer.  They'll get to keep buying Growlers and they'll also have a SOLID reason to skip the F-35 and start a crash program to develop a 6th generation fighter.

13 comments :

  1. im curious on J20/31 avionics.. how good are they in avionics compared to western aircrafts.. and the chinese EW capability against western threat.. even the APA excellent site didnt desribre them in much detail

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    1. the answer to that is unfortunately very simple. they're as good as our own...especially if you consider that they have stolen everything they wanted in the past 10 years. the only thing left to wonder about is how well they operate it.

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    2. Not so fast Sol. They may "look" on par, but given their track record with engine, materials and software development, I'm not convinced at all. The impetuous to develop the F-15 was in response to the MiG-25 Foxbat, which turned out to be a shitty aircraft - fast, but nothing else. Anyway, I do agree that the F/A-XX has been the Navy's strategy all along: why buy the F-35 when it offers little over the F/EA-E/F/G (at 2-3x the cost?) If the NGAD continues to get funded, and realistic design goals for UCAS are set, the carrier decks are going to get long range aircraft that are crucial to continued CVN relevance.

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    3. They may "look" on par, but given their track record with engine, materials and software development, I'm not convinced at all.

      Never underestimate your opponent. Not one bit. They could/may have shitty equipment or they may not know how to operate or exploit their equipment but it boils down to the person flying the plane. A good F-35 or F-15 pilot may, as an example, one day face an opponent flying an aging MiG-17 and get shot down.

      Another thing ... there are things China can do BEFORE your aircrafts take off. EMP is one. How about "remote exploits" of components? These are some tricks that China has up their sleeves.

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    4. They are as good or better than the russian ones at the very least, because they would not choose to produce a domestic design for something as important as the radar, if it was inferrior to what they could get from russia. And russian ones are comparable to the US.

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  2. Considering that they have access to both US (Pakistan) and Russian hardware i doubt that they would be far behind. You also have to consider that china manufacturers much of the avanced comercial electronic that is sometimes much more advanced than military hardware simply due to its design date.

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  3. Completion of testing and F-35 Milestone C production decision is scheduled for 2019 according to the SAR. Several media articles have reported that the F-35 will be "combat ready" upon IOC but of course that is incorrect.

    What will probably happen in the Marines is that the F-35B will be declared to have initial operational capability within the next year but when the planes can't be deployed nor actually used in any productive way the plane's immaturity will become painfully obvious and an embarrassment.

    Regarding China, they probably rate proper plane design and effective engineering above profit.

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  4. Bill Sweetman takes Canada to the woodshed on F-35: Canada Backtracks On 2010 Fighter Claims
    concluding graph:
    "One way or another, it seems Canada’s fighter procurement is headed for the competition that Ross and others maintained in 2010 would be a waste of time. If the Harper government had started a competition then, it would have a decision by now, and that does raise an interesting question. If Harper and his colleagues thought the F-35 was so great, why didn’t they want to prove it through an open contest?"

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    1. South Korea had a contest and the f15 silent eagle won. Then as if by magic, politicians changed that.

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    2. ROK is FMS, Canada is a JSF partner, which (as you imply) ties both of them into the F-35 scam, in different ways.
      ROK under FMS is susceptible to Lockheed offset arrangements to sweeten the F-35 purchase, as Lockheed did by offering ROK a satellite plus tech data.
      Canada being a partner, and a political subject of the US, earned itself an obligation toward the US-run JSF program (but not necessarily to procure faulty prototypes years before a production decision).

      Nevertheless, it's a breath of fresh air to read Sweetman because he uses actual facts instead of brochure-based bloviations.

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  5. Actually I think PAK-FA, which is supposed to enter service in 2016-2017 might have their attention a little more than the J-20.

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  6. i dont know how much truth in this , but some people said the USAF allegedly already have another Silver Bullet in their secret arsenal , ready for the next war. And these same people said it was a triangular craft / hypersonic bomber type.. these people said the F35 fiasco was just a distraction and the RQ-170 drone captured by iranian was a red herring to mislead the iranian/china/russia on the extent of US stealth.

    i forgot the links, but i think it was posted in F16.net forum and on Pakistani Defence forum.. Just food for thought

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  7. Won't be a surprise as Project Have Blue and the B-2 were also kept top secret before their combat debut.

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