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U.S. Waived Laws To Keep F-35 On Track With China-made Parts
An anonymous reader sends this report from Reuters:
"The Pentagon repeatedly waived laws banning Chinese-built components on U.S. weapons in order to keep the $392 billion Lockheed Martin Corp F-35 fighter program on track in 2012 and 2013, even as U.S. officials were voicing concern about China's espionage and military buildup. According to Pentagon documents reviewed by Reuters, chief U.S. arms buyer Frank Kendall allowed two F-35 suppliers, Northrop Grumman Corp and Honeywell International Inc, to use Chinese magnets for the new warplane's radar system, landing gears and other hardware. Without the waivers, both companies could have faced sanctions for violating federal law and the F-35 program could have faced further delays."
Wasn't it a clever idea to let Magnaquench be sold to China? For those unfamiliar with it Magnaquench was one of, if not the, pioneer in rare earth magnets, and their use in various applications, including military. Here are links to articles about it in two websites that are on opposite sides of the political spectrum. Anything that the Heritage Foundation and DailyKos agree on is definitely worth considering.
http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2008/05/magnequench-cfius-and-chinas-thirst-for-us-defense-technology
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/05/03/508203/-Magnaquench-160-Weapon-technology-with-a-bow-on-it
we cannot build electronics in the US anymore. we don't own the plants that produce the transistors, resistors, caps, diodes, etc. for the last 30 or more years, those have been made exclusively in asia (all over asia, not just china). I can't remember the last time I found a transistor or chip made on US soil.
assembly, sure; but making the parts is all done overseas. we sold outselves out in that regard. and see the capacitor problem (badcaps.net) that we have had to live with the past 20 or so years. those parts are also in the MILITARY and other sensitive pipelines. the caps that blow up on your motherboard also exist in everything else we build, unless we pay a premium for japanese caps (the chinese ones are all known to be bad; no one I know builds with chinese knock-off capacitors anymore; but I bet those that want to save every dime do cheap-out and use those bad parts).
I wish we would start a jobs program to bring electronics manufacturing back to the US. if nothing else, just for peace of mind, to be able to use those parts in critical situations and KNOW they are designed and built properly.
Not true. Intel has a number of major semiconductor fabrication plants in the US. So have Micron, Freescale, Cypress, On, Texas Instruments and others.
we cannot build electronics in the US anymore. we don't own the plants that produce the transistors, resistors, caps, diodes, etc. for the last 30 or more years, those have been made exclusively in asia (all over asia, not just china).
Completely false. To name just a handful.
Transistors: Loads. Intel, Freescale, Micron, NXP, etc.
Resistors: US Resistor, Powerohm
Capacitors: American Capacitor Corporation and AFM Micro
Diodes: Sensitron
you don't have common parts (the non-semi conductors like caps and resistors) made here. its not economical and its not specialized, generally, so its NEVER done here other than for rare circumstances (some high end audio parts might be made here but on a very tiny production scale and not for common use).
the wiki article is not the full truth. some higher end chips are made here but that's NOT what the issue is about. you can't build entire systems from US based parts anymore. it simply can't be done.
Oh, really?
I've read that a lot on slashdot... let's see...
American sourced components (from the top of my head):
capacitors (ceramic, tantalum), inductors:
http://www.kemet.com
(look for the defense/aerospace section)
resistors
http://www.micro-ohm.com
discrete transistors:
http://www.semi-tech-inc.com
LED, Displays:
http://wamcoinc.com
IC's, microprocessors, basically the stuff from Natsemi and TI:
www.ti.com
(go to the space, avionics and defense section)
I could go on... basically all microwave components are available as well.