It Turns Out the F-35 Can Dogfight (defensenews.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Writing for Defense News, Lara Seligman reports, "For the first time since a controversial report detailing how the F-35 performs in a dogfight emerged last summer, an F-35 pilot gave an in-depth analysis of his experience flying the jet in a close-range battle scenario. Norwegian Air Force Maj. Morten 'Dolby' Hanche, the first Norwegian to fly the F-35, analyzed the jet's performance in a dogfight in a March 1 blog post published on Norway's Ministry of Defense website. Although Hanche never mentions the 2015 report, 'F-35A High Angle of Attack Operational Maneuvers' revealed last summer by blogger David Axe on WarisBoring.com, he counters many of the anonymous author's claims."

Comments

One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Which test pilot do we believe? The unnamed one or the Norwegian one?

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

The first report didn't say 'it can't dogfight'. They identified deficiencies in the flight control system which was set up for a higher margin of safety during flight testing. They also identified a not-so-surprising energy deficiency against an F-16.
The Norwegian pilot flew with the combat tuned FCS, and they effectively pointed out the advantages of high AoA control.

Both reports taken together are important. The F-35 can dogfight, but like any fighter, it has strengths and weaknesses.

Re: One says it can, One says it can't

[Type44Q]

Dunno but it was an interesting read; the contrast between the F-16 and the F-35 greatly reminded me of the the 'MIG-21 vs F-4 Phantom' situation...

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Rei]

The whole debate seems to me to be missing the point. The main driving design principles of the F-35 were to have it to detect and destroy from longer distances while reducing the distance in which it can be detected and destroyed. No, you can't just discount dogfighting and everything else, but the whole point is to avoid dogfights in the first place by taking down the opponent from long before they'd have a chance to do the same to you. It's particularly designed to be effective at taking out antiaircraft systems.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[ShanghaiBill]

The F-35 can dogfight, but like any fighter, it has strengths and weaknesses.

Whether or not it can dogfight against other manned fighters is irrelevant, since that scenario is unlikely. A more important questions is if it can dogfight against drones with half the turning radius, when outnumbered 5 to 1.

The era of piloted aircraft is rapidly closing. I fear that we are preparing for a gunfight by spending a trillion dollars on a really nice knife.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

You're overestimating drone capability as well as mis-stating and mis-understanding the purpose of drones. Sure, what you say may happen in the future ... but no one's working on any type of dedicated air to air drone. It's all about CAS and surveillance, they're all relatively under-powered, efficient, and generally autonomous things don't fare well in a real, ECM-filled combat scenario.
It's also not particularly true that any drone is going to be built to turn much better than a manned fighter. That costs money, too. Drones aren't going to be cheap and you can see that right now. Add more capability, pay more money.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[mbkennel]

Sure there are drones that can do all that: they're called air to air missiles, in particular the Russian K-77M missile.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep, Russian arms sellers pimping 'new' stuff that the US has had for decades

WOW, they stuck active phase array radar on an existing missile platform

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. The Russians are just now catching up to slightly older AIM-120 variants with the RVV-SD, and they're just fielding that now.
K-77M is a wikipedia missile.
At the same time, I have some doubts about any radar guided missile having good performance against a stealth target, unless you get close and in that case it almost doesn't matter what you're shooting with.

Re: One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, and the effectiveness of beyond visual range tactics has increased considerably since then

The entire force is designed as a networking mesh to share information on threats and targets

And, as you state, the value of hard learned lessons should not be forgotten.

How long before we get an F-35 in a dogfight with a Russian 5th gen fighter?

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[ShanghaiBill]

You're overestimating drone capability as well as mis-stating and mis-understanding the purpose of drones.

We should be designing aircraft to meet future threats, not current threats.

no one's working on any type of dedicated air to air drone.

No one in America is working on it, because it would be a threat to the MIC. The USAF is run by pilots, and for pilots, and nearly all drone innovation has come from outside their ranks. Defense contractors dread the far lower costs of drones. They prefer lucrative boondoggles like the F-35. Politicians don't want to stand up to the MIC, because they will be subjected to withering attack ads claiming they are "weak on defence".

It is more likely that China and Russia are working on air-to-air capability, since they have more to gain from challenging American hegemony, and, although they are corrupt, their corruption doesn't involve the same military-political-lobbyist links that America has, and they don't have super-PACs supporting the status quo.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

....Whether or not it can dogfight against other manned fighters is irrelevant, since that scenario is unlikely....

In a Visual ID (VID) environment, I think the F-35 could probably have a higher probability of winding up in a dogfight than the F-16 or other similar 4th Gen. aircraft. A VID is over once the ROE is solved. This can also happen if the aircraft being identified takes the first shot, thus showing hostile behavior, and the VID quickly becomes a BVR missile fight. The F-35 has a lower radar cross section than 4th generation fighters, so the aircraft being intercepted might not be aware of the F-35 until it is in a merge.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

No, they're not. What they are working on is cruise missiles (and other types of missiles). There's your kamikaze drone which is cheaper than a fighter and you can use for saturation attacks.
No one's working on an autonomous fighter, though there might basic research going on with respect to various autonomous combat vehicles.

With that in mind, the F-35 is designed to meet future threats. The real ones, not the made up ones.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[LostMyBeaver]

I'm with mbkennel, there are many many many drones which are constantly improving for specifically attacking airplanes.

Making a small drone kamakazi is a far better idea than making a device which deploys weapons. Once the weapon leaves the deployment device (the jet fighter for example) it is extremely limited in its abilities to aim and eventually runs out of fuel etc... Creating one based on an airplane design which can be piloted either autonomously or remotely to chase a plane, smash into it and eliminate it is far more optimal. The cost itself is extremely low as well compared to multiple missiles and bullets deployed by a jet. It's more efficient as well.

So, this leads us to the follow up.

1) We believe no one is working on this tech. We don't actually know.
2) Why are we spending a trillion dollars on planes which require pilots and life support systems and all kinds of things like this when we should be focused on a making a factory which can autonomously produce large numbers of drones on demand extremely rapidly. Then instead of pissing away huge amounts of resources cluelessly, we can simply "print on demand" what we need and exploit the disposable nature of new tech.
3) Where is the value in piloted planes in 2016? Can you honestly say that a jet fighter can be superior to smaller, faster, more agile devices without the needs of transporting or risking humans?

The only answer I have is that most economies in the world depend on government sponsored jobs. Wasting tax payers money on worthless crap like this feeds larges amounts of money into the economy to produce jobs everywhere from useless sales people at DoE contractors down to the girl at the drive through window asking "Would you like fries with that?" three towns over where the floor cleaner lives. It's basically social welfare and/or something leaning towards basic income without saying socialism.

Governments of western nations generally are not allowed to build their own companies to compete with the free market. As such the only way to make government created jobs is to build stuff we don't really need. Sometimes, the only option is to just give money wastefully to some asshole sales guy who will jump off immediately with a golden parachute to avoid job losses.

I would like to see us be a little less stupid with the money than wasting it on putting pilots onto jet fighters and then having to publish articles about "Yeh... in the end, the F-35 is a good plane... the F-16 is a good plane too... I think I could get used to it... it seems like it was really really worth spending a trillion dollars to make another plane which isn't really clearly superior or really needed."

Can anyone actually make a clear statement like "The existence of the F-35 was worth it and the militaries which have it are now clearly better off than they were because of...."

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[kimvette]

Missiles ARE a type of drone.

Re: One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Drones have problems against hi-tech enemies that can spoof gps+glonass at will, jam all remote control, and launch decoys for ir/radar sensors. A pilot can launch his emp bombs and rely on visual.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[peragrin]

The problem is a stand away from battle and launch missiles makes a poor CAS plane and makes a poor cheap air to air combat vehicle

The f-22 is supposed to breach an enemy's defenses that is when bvr attacks are most likely to occur. The f-22 take out SAMs and initial air craft. The f-35 is cheap and in large numbers to follow behind and clean up while slower planes provide air cover for ground forces.

Saying the f-35 is for bvr takes away the purpose of the f-22

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[lars_stefan_axelsson]

The main driving design principles of the F-35 were to have it to detect and destroy from longer distances while reducing the distance in which it can be detected and destroyed.

Yes, that has been the driving design since the sixties. It has never come to pass. Problem has always been, and will probably continue to be, identification of far away targets (BWR). IFF "doesn't work", i.e. there are too many situations where your own forces won't have IFF, or it will be switched off. There are also all the third parties that don't have IFF (civilian aircraft). This has always lead to an ROE where you'll first have to acquire visually to confirm your target. In almost all instances where fast jets have operated.

And with stealth aircraft that has only gotten worse, not better, as you now cannot turn on your own radar, for fear of being the first to give up your position. Which means that your own stealth leaves you relatively speaking more blind than before. Before you could light up your enemy, since they were already lighting you up. Now, not so much. And without radar, no BWR shot. (Advanced IR has gotten much more important, but isn't generally good enough to shoot with.)

So, sensors and technology do get better, whether they'll finally be good enough to actually be safe to use, that's still very much up for debate. My money is on "no, not really", dogfighting is still going to be the order of the day, as it always has been.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[drewsup]

The f-35 is cheap and in large numbers to follow...
At 100 million per aircraft I would hate to see your definition of expensive!

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Rei]

How does destroying targets while being safe make you a poor combat vehicle? The primary goal of a combatant is "destroy enemy targets and not be destroyed yourself".

F-22 is and will remain a great long-range air superiority fighter. It can carry more anti-aircraft missiles and get into battle faster. But F-35 can carry larger ground-attack weaponry without ruining its (superb) radar cross section and can be operated from a smaller basing footprint. There's a role for both of them.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[dsmatthews9379]

Who cares what the lumps of meat think, in AI we trust. ;-)

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

The f-35 is cheap and in large numbers to follow...
At 100 million per aircraft I would hate to see your definition of expensive!

The F-35 program is clearly messed up and to expensive. However it's not meant to be "cheap" overall. The point is "cheap marginal cost". In other words, the next F-35 you order extra, on top of the ones you already ordered, should be much cheaper than ordering an extra F-22. They invested lots in making expensive production techniques to reduce the cost of mass producing the planes. The current estimate for "cost per hour" is $32000, which is much cheaper than the $44000 estimate for the F-22. That's the average over the lifetime though, so the next additional hour you want to add would be cheaper than that. That's really important if you get into a big long war where you need to keep producing more and more aircraft to replace ones being shot down.

Of course this is all in comparison to other US aircraft. The shocking thing is that much more effective aircraft like the Eurofighter come in around $18000 per hour or the even the Grippen, which has limitations such as range, but due to it's lower visibility tends to beat the F-22 in air to air combat comes in below $5000 per hour. Cheap is relative.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Dutch Gun]

And with stealth aircraft that has only gotten worse, not better, as you now cannot turn on your own radar, for fear of being the first to give up your position. Which means that your own stealth leaves you relatively speaking more blind than before. Before you could light up your enemy, since they were already lighting you up. Now, not so much.

Is this as much a problem nowadays? I can't imagine a realistic scenario in which our combat aircraft are going to be without AWACS support in any sort of conflict in the foreseeable future. Any modern allied aircraft should be able to see whatever the allied sensor grid can see. Granted, there are many "lukewarm" conflicts in which you'll need to visually identify first, but why would we send piloted aircraft to do this these days? That's precisely what we should be using disposable drones for.

I'm not saying dogfighting and close-range combat aren't important, but you'd certainly want to look at recent history and determine probable engagement distances. I have no idea what it actually is (a quick Google search didn't turn up anything - that information may be classified). But I have to imagine - or at least I'd hope - that such data would drive future development. Although... given this boondoggle, maybe I'm giving them too much credit.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Harlequin80]

2) You will never be able to manufacture while moving at the same efficiency as you can in a large factory with established infrastructure lines. In fact if you are trying to manufacture while moving you would have been better off dedicating the spare and weight capacity to just carrying the finished product. You are infinitely better off with a huge stock pile and an efficient damage resistant logistics system

3) A piloted plane does not have the communication system point of failure that a remote controlled drone has. If all your aircraft can be either taken offline or severely degraded through targeting communication facilities they will be. For example, if a war happens between major powers and one side is using manned craft and one is using remote controlled craft how long before the long range cruise missiles hit every sat dish and tower they can find and how long before the anti sat missiles take out that communication network? Once that happens how will your drones perform against the manned craft?

Also I think you need to think about the F35 or any other plane in a different way. They are not combat vehicles, they are weapon platforms that operate in combat environments. Their role is to bring weapons into range of a target, & deliver those weapons. At one end of the demand spectrum something like the B52 is brilliant because it can carry a truly stupid amount of weapons. But you may as well be flying a giant neon sign saying shoot here. At the other end of the spectrum is the F22. It can get in get close and get out. What it can't do is carry lots and lots of weapons.

So "The existence of the F-35 was worth it and the militaries which have it are now clearly better off than they were because of.... low radar signature, interoperability with allies, large install base reducing part cost, high commonality between variants, relatively cheap even at early production levels (1/3rd cost of f22)

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

The risk of blue on blue has never deterred the US military - just ask any of their allies who fought with them in Desert Storm.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

No, nobody is working on it because it's a bloody stupid idea. If you want drone fighters, you need AI, because otherwise jamming, or input lag for instance might screw the thing over. And AI is hard, if not impossible.

Then, you have to teach your killer AI to reliably ID it's targets, something our current systems are far, far from good enough for - hence the need to dogfight in the first place.

And then you've got to deal with international treaties regulating human-independent robots wielding lethal weapons, but I guess that's the least of your concerns. It's not like international conventions ever mattered much to the USians, unless they are at the receiving end.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[CBravo]

They are different in the fact that most missiles are not configurable platforms.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

The BVR (Beyond Visual Range) kill of a MIG-29 over Bosnia is already more than 20 years ago. AWACS is the game changer. No longer do the fighters need a radar, that's now a remoted sensor. And since the planes themselves only need passive radar, stealth makes a whole lot more sense.

If things get so hot that AWACS planes aren't safe, civilian planes will not be in those theaters. And you'll be keeping outdated stuff without IFF on the ground as well. But even the A-10 now has the AN/APX-101 IFF.

Is it perfect? No, and there will be accidental kills. But the advantage of BVR combat makes limited collateral damage acceptable.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

And with stealth aircraft that has only gotten worse, not better, as you now cannot turn on your own radar, for fear of being the first to give up your position. Which means that your own stealth leaves you relatively speaking more blind than before. Before you could light up your enemy, since they were already lighting you up. Now, not so much.

Is this as much a problem nowadays? I can't imagine a realistic scenario in which our combat aircraft are going to be without AWACS support in any sort of conflict in the foreseeable future. Any modern allied aircraft should be able to see whatever the allied sensor grid can see. Granted, there are many "lukewarm" conflicts in which you'll need to visually identify first, but why would we send piloted aircraft to do this these days? That's precisely what we should be using disposable drones for.

I'm not saying dogfighting and close-range combat aren't important, but you'd certainly want to look at recent history and determine probable engagement distances. I have no idea what it actually is (a quick Google search didn't turn up anything - that information may be classified). But I have to imagine - or at least I'd hope - that such data would drive future development. Although... given this boondoggle, maybe I'm giving them too much credit.

That's exactly what the DoD thought when designing the F-4. They simply couldn't think of a scenario where dog fighting would be important anymore becuase radar and radios would identify hostiles and missiles would destroy them before they got into range. Therefore the first models of the F-4 Phantom had no guns.

Low and behold, during it's first major combat operation, the F-4 pilots still couldn't identify targets and had to close to visual range. Without guns, they were at a disadvantage to North Vietnamese MIG-15s and MIG 17s, as they were always having to go for the missile lock.

Just because you can't imagine a scenario where that will ever happen again doesn't mean it won't happen. Technology does not solve all problems.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[dywolf]

almost as ignorant as your "reagan governed like a liberal" comment.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

IFF? Yeah, because everyone wants to fly around with an active radio transmitter on in hostile airspace.

"COMRADE, IS SEE UNKNOWN BLIP ON SCREEN WHAT DO I DO?"

Yeah, right. Even if it only transmits when a friendly targets you, that's bad.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

I would say it has come to pass. If you look at the CSBA report on trends in air to air combat, BVR missiles have made up the majority of kills since the 90s, followed by improved IR missiles which have ranges approaching older radar guided missiles, are accurate, all aspect, off bore-site, fast and super maneuverable. What you're proposing is very dangerous, the idea that tactics haven't changed with technology improvements, an idea just as deadly as the concept in the 60s that technology had revolutionized all tactics. Plus remember in the early stages of the war, US pilots were not trained how to dogfight, just how to look at their scope and fire. Thats definitely no longer the case, with US pilots being one of the most trained air forces in the world. Missiles were immature in the 60's, but I think it's safe to say the age of missiles is here and its effective. Even when it was the age of guns and IR missiles in the 60's it was always the enemy that you didn't know was there that got you. A stealth platform will always hold the advantage of performing a sneak attack. They can approach from behind while the target is unawares and fire IR missiles. No warning. No options.

CSBA report: http://csbaonline.org/publications/2015/04/trends-in-air-to-air-combat-implications-for-future-air-superiority/

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

no one's working on any type of dedicated air to air drone

Sure they are. That's one of the proposals for the Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike program. Here's some more background on the air-to-air concept for UCLASS. The drones would be commanded from a piloted F-35. Boeing is even experimenting with using the F-16 as a drone.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

The F-22 is a sniper on a high mountain.
The F-35s are a pack of wolves that fight as a group.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[tsotha]

You're mixing up two different roles. In air combat situations it's BVR. For ground attack it's not.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[tsotha]

And with stealth aircraft that has only gotten worse, not better, as you now cannot turn on your own radar, for fear of being the first to give up your position.

Which is why you have AWACS, E-2C, ground radars, and ship radars. Fighters are just one piece of an air combat system.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

"The main driving design principles of the F-35 were to have it to detect and destroy from longer distances while reducing the distance in which it can be detected and destroyed. No, you can't just discount dogfighting and everything else, but the whole point is to avoid dogfights in the first place by taking down the opponent from long before they'd have a chance to do the same to you."

Which is hardly a new capability ever since they've had long range missiles and on-board radar. The problem is that the ROE have rarely allowed BVR weapons release, nullifying any long range advantages, and making dogfighting capabilities more important. Those that don't learn from history...

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

"Making a small drone kamakazi is a far better idea than making a device which deploys weapons."

With far higher speed, and much higher maximum turning g-forces than a pilot could stand. You could call it a "missile", and you could attach multiple of them to a ferry vehicle, lets call it a "plane" that can confirm targets using organic intelligence before deploying them, even in heavy EMI/jamming environments that would render remote flying impossible.

The drone argument is just the missile argument from the 60s. Given how that turned out in practice, is there any surprise that they're dubious this time around.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Dutch Gun]

Yep, I'm well aware of that history. There's a reason all modern fighter craft still carry guns, although apparently the F-35 will be able to only carry a fairly minimal amount of ammo, which some have taken issue with. But that's why I suggested that it's important to look at the actual data rather than making assumptions about what sort of engagements pilots are likely to encounter. To be honest, I have no idea what that data is, so I'm not trying to say one way or another. But it seems logical that you wouldn't want to sacrifice too many of your long or short range missiles for your guns if that's what you're using 99% of the time (hypothetically speaking) - it's still considered a weapon of last resort. A soldier keeps a knife or a pistol on him, but obviously reaches for his combat rifle first.

And just because technology doesn't solve all problems doesn't mean technology can't easily solve some problems. Communication of complex information, including surveillance, in real-time happens to be something that modern technology is pretty darn good at.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[trenien]

The problem here is that design principle is going down (has gone down?) the drain: radar suites have evolved as well and modern ones are able to pick up and recognize the radar signature of the so-called "stealth fighters". That is very far from being a secret, by the way. Here is one article reporting it, but there are quite a lot of others:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/a...

That shouldn't be a surprise to anyone on slashdot, really. "Stealth" technology has nothing in common with Star Trek like cloaking, it simply is a matter of reducing the signature. With greater computer power available, it was only a question of time until it became obsolete.

Of course, all of that is without even talking about how unreliable and fragile the stealth tech really is (the coating must be redone after each sortie and is vulnerable to rain, among other problems)...

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[lars_stefan_axelsson]

Nope, I wouldn't call it "dangerous". Rather "realistic". What Stillion is saying are the same things that were said in the sixties... They weren't true then, and they probably aren't now either. So there's nothing new there. Development is surprisingly slow. And that you can kill an unaware and (essentially) non-manoeuvring target with a BWR missile is actually an improvement. The earliest missiles couldn't even do that. (Pk with any sort of radar guided missile is surprisingly low in actual combat). Against a manoeuvring and aware target a long range kill is a very difficult thing to achieve. Just turn 90 deg to the missile to make it lead you that much more (it has to) and then make an out of plane manoeuvre when it's too late for the missile (at the end of its flight it has too much speed and no fuel left for hard manoeuvring). Or you can turn tail and run away from it. That works well at long ranges as well.

Which incidentally illustrates your point nicely. There have of course been lots of tactical adaption to the new battlefield in the fact of long range missiles. Due to physics (air launched missiles are limited in size and weight, in order to have long reach they have to burn their fuel early and then cost on down from up high, etc. etc.) many of these tactics are difficult to counter by the missile developer. Hence long range missiles aren't used for kills against targets that can turn and pull Gs, they're often deployed as "pushers", forcing the enemy to manoeuvre into a disadvantageous position. Until you turn the missile into a "drone" the same things are probably going to be stay or less true.

But all this depends on there being all out total war, where you can deploy your weapons without restrictions. That's only happened a small number of times since the advent of the jet aircraft. The overwhelming majority of engagements have happened under much more restrictive ROEs, and a plane that can't operate under such, realistically isn't much use. Or rather, is at best a strategic deterrent, not very useful operationally against an enemy that can shoot back. The last two wars you've been in, that wasn't really true however, hence the explosion of drones...

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[lars_stefan_axelsson]

Is this as much a problem nowadays? I can't imagine a realistic scenario in which our combat aircraft are going to be without AWACS support in any sort of conflict in the foreseeable future.

That depends. With the sort of conflict you've been in the last couple of times, you didn't even need AWACS as the enemy couldn't shoot back. Hence drones...

Against an enemy that can shoot back AWACS is more useful, but not a panacea. While AWACS can warn you of far away aircraft, it isn't that much better at identifying them, and they don't help you shoot them. You have to use your own radar for that. And when you do, you've given up your own stealth. Opening yourself up for a return shot.

Against a stealth capable opponent, the argument that "stealth aircraft can get in the sneak attack" can be turned against the AWACS. If that's true, then the AWACS aircraft (being such a valuable asset) has to be protected at all cost, this means lots of escort and a very defensive posture. Both of which means that the effectiveness of AWACS is diminished. (It's interesting to note that NATO planners expected AWACS to survive for one, max, two, days if the balloon ever went up. Not very survivable. Sure, AWACS is better at detecting stealth aircraft than other aircraft are. But on the flip side, it can't turn-and-burn to get out of the way of a missile worth a damn either. Having to rely solely on ECM/chaff/flares etc. that historically haven't been 100% either. So its anybody's guess which factor will dominate.

So of course you're onto something fundamentally true. "What do you need the aircraft for?". Scenarios can be very different. But fundamentally, if you have a highly capable "top of the line" aircraft, expecting to meet adversaries that are likewise equipped, then don't hope for many long range kills. There are much too many things conspiring against that happening. The need for identification (a must in anything short of an all out, no holds barred, total war scenario, one we haven't had that often, thank God) is only one such thing.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[lars_stefan_axelsson]

Or the friends and family of the passengers of Iranian Air 655...

Now granted, and to their credit, the crew of the USS Vincennes did try to make the ID, but failed, with horrible results. If that had been an F-14 instead, the pilot+RIO would have had even worse tools at their disposal to make the ID...

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

The "destroy from long distance" strategy, or shooting BVR (Beyond Visual Range) missiles, simply does not work against a capable fighter jet with a well-trained pilot... due to laws of physics: a = v^2 / r.

If a fighter at 0.6 mach pulls a 9g turn, a missile at 3 mach would have to pull 225g to follow the same turn radius. No missile on the planet is able to do that. The long-range AIM-120D AMRAAM can pull about 30g, and the latest top-of-the-line missiles still under development top out at 60g.

BVR missiles against capable adversaries have a real-world Pk (probability of kill) of only about 3-7%.
(source: https://defenseissues.wordpress.com/2013/04/27/usefulness-of-bvr-combat/)

BVR missiles only work if the target is unaware of the incoming missile (misfunctioning radar, poorly trained pilot), or unable to pull a tight turn (a heavy weapons load, low on energy, fuel issues, technical problems...).

This is why dogfighting and raw fighter performance still matters. Stealth and all the gadgets in the world are not going to change the laws of physics.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Creating one based on an airplane design which can be piloted either autonomously or remotely to chase a plane, smash into it and eliminate it is far more optimal. The cost itself is extremely low as well compared to multiple missiles and bullets deployed by a jet. It's more efficient as well.

Jet-engines are very expensive compared to solid fuel engines. Also, a mission like air patrol might need the plane to be able strike multiple targets over a period of time while keeping up the task of observing the area.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[dywolf]

^ armchair expert with little knowledge of actual combat doctrine and capabilities.

these design capabilities and doctrines are not meant for lukewarm battles, where things such as airliners might be overflying the Ukraine, etc.
they are meant for shooting wars, where the question of who a target belongs to is a binary answer: us or them.
and even an armchair expert should be well aware that the F22 and F35 both are intended to be part of a data grid, where their accompanying AWACS craft, well back from front lines, is providing targeting information and identification, precluding the need to use their own radar until after the initial contact.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[dywolf]

and technology hasn't progressed in the ensuing 50 years?

hint:
IFF didn't exist back then.
neither did AWACS.
both are a result of that lesson.

and the biggest reason the F4s came to a dogfight was they ran out of missiles. the number of enemy aircraft likely to be faced was simply underestimated, leaving them vulnerable once their load was depleted. and no they were not at a disadvantage: missile lock can be done far far longer away than a gun shot can. the idea of taking them out at range with missiles worked.

the problem was once the missiles were gone., and their were still bad guys left.

its just that our doctrine wasn't exactly secret, so the obvious counter of sending up more aircraft than we were loaded for easily presented itself, which forced us to spend more effort in establishing air superiority than we had planned for. but we did establish almost unrestricted air superiority.

let me be clear: there was no disadvantage from the F4 to the MiGs until the missiles were gone, and even then only if the remaining MiGs closed the distance, which didn't happen very often. the most frequent scenario where an empty F4 encountered another hostile was when they were already on the way home.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Bitbeisser]

Since when is the F-35 "cheap"? And in what "large" numbers? The project has one of the most epic cost overruns of any military project ever (so far $1.3trillion) and it is likely never be procured in the numbers initially envisioned. Save the A10!

Re: One says it can, One says it can't

[phocion]

Your suggestion of a drone that could be used to "smash" into enemy aircraft has some issues. Such a drone would be like a missile, except much slower and with much longer range. While a missile will optimally hit a target aircraft, that's not required. Missiles will detonate in close proximity to a target, turning a near miss into a successful kill. Drones could also carry a warhead, but that will impact speed and/or range. If direct impact is the only "weapon" a drone has, that's going to be hard to achieve with something that is not significantly faster than its target, regardless of increased maneuverability. There's a bigger window of time for a pilot to react and more chance that a last second maneuver will generate a miss. The slower speed also makes the drone more vulnerable to counterfire. I'm not saying the idea won't work, but it would take a lot of drones to guarantee success. Clouds of drones have their own problems, the main one being control. A competent enemy would certainly be trying to jam anything controlled remotely, and unless you have a way for a single pilot to control multiple drones you have the problem of coordinating them. Could they be autonomous? Sure, with an increased risk of hitting the wrong target. (Why hello Mr Civilian Airliner! You look kind of like a bomber or military cargo plane. Time to die!) It's not a bad idea, but it's not a simple recipe for success either. Offense and defense constantly adapt, and then it's back to the drawing board. If we're not actively developing this, one factor might be that we think it's too easy to counter.

Re: One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Who actually cares? When did the last dogfight actually happen?

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[smithmc]

Whether or not it can dogfight against other manned fighters is irrelevant, since that scenario is unlikely. A more important questions is if it can dogfight against drones with half the turning radius, when outnumbered 5 to 1.

I'm not sure how relevant that is, since those drones will probably also be in the US arsenal, rather than in the enemy's, at least for the foreseeable future.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[Anonymous Coward]

Bingo. Even outside the cockpit, military command tends to be cautious when engaging, and for mostly good reasons. There are endless reasons why the need to engage in combat is unclear and the risks of making the wrong choice are significant. Absent a clear battlefield with no civilians or friendlies, visual sightings and confirmations are going to be valued. The whole Fog of War issue is so well-known and important it is practically a cliché.

The "but missiles, beyond visual range!" argument has been rebutted endless numbers of times in the last 50 years. Time to drop that old canard. Dogfighting is here to stay; pretending otherwise just shows you are out of touch.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[dywolf]

and, ok, yes: the F4 wasn't designed for nimbleness. It was designed for range, speed, and robustness, being a an all weather interceptor design for carrier battle groups that the air force later adopted for both bomb trucking and air-air roles. Not quite the workhorse the Thud was when it came to ground attack, but still fairly adaptable.

In comparison The MiG 17s and 19's were more maneuverable...but slower.
Mig21s, the other major type seen, were about on par in maneuverability, being likewise designed for speed above other concerns.

And those design limitations combined with the Air Force fighter culture having lost its dogfight mindset (ie, it wasn't a big focus of training doctrine) meant if caught our pilots could be in trouble. But again, this was corrected and overcome. Dogfighting became a part of training again, and gun pods were quickly produced that could be attached to the aircraft.

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[david_thornley]

: The problem in Vietnam, from what I've read, wasn't a lack of missiles. It was a lack of a reliable long-range way of identifying aircraft, which meant that the rules of engagement called for visual identification. (It might also have been a lack of a reliable way of figuring out where friendlies were to be expected, possibly because both Air Force and Navy aircraft operated in the same airspace.) Those RoE meant that the Sparrow long-range missiles were useless, and that, without a gun, the only air-to-air capability was the Sidewinder missiles. Those weren't anywhere near as good as modern heat-seekers, and in particular could only be fired from a position fairly close to directly behind.

If an F-4 was attacking enemy aircraft by surprise (the ideal scenario), the Sidewinders were very effective. In any sort of meeting encounter, a MiG was safe as long as it could keep its tail away from a less maneuverable aircraft, and it could take advantage of its superior maneuverability and the fact that its cannon could fire effectively at considerably more target angles (although shorter range).

Re:One says it can, One says it can't

[lars_stefan_axelsson]

Sure, call me an "armchair expert" if you will. (That's not strictly true, but my time in the business is long ago, and I was only ever on the outskirts).

But, that doesn't unfortunately save you from underestimating the complexities of even the "simple" battlefield scenario you're drawing up.

Even in an all out shooting war, with nothing civilian in the air---the only remotely modern situation I can think of is the Falklands---you still cannot escape the IFF problem. You don't know if "those aircraft over there" are a flight of enemies starting their attack on you, or a flight of your people, returning from a job well done, or someone else. They won't be running active IFF over enemy territory, for many good reasons (Google "MiG in the middle" for one explanation why that is not a good idea, but there are others, such as when German night fighters used RAF tail gunner IFF signals to direction find the bombers during WWII).

This is especially true in a more complex situation in an all out shooting war, where you'll have allies, and the enemies allies to contend with as well. There are too many variables, and too many things that can go wrong, for you to start shooting at everything that doesn't squawk today's code. And since there aren't that many codes to go around (due to radar limitations), in a few days the enemy will know all your variations, and will pick up on them really fast. Faster than you can change them. And the faster you change them, the higher the risk that someone will not get the message.

And data links are good and well, but they don't work in a highly contested ECM battlefield, you know, the kind that a technologically advanced enemy can muster. And the more you transmit the easier you are to find. (Our data links are better than yours, i.e. NATO's, and ours don't work nearly as well as you advertise. And yes we have our own mini-"AWACS" in the grid as well.)

So no, its not nearly as easy as you make it out to be. It's like a (missile) air defence officer told me just the other year, after a cooperation with her american counterparts: "So I was very keen to learn how they handled the more complex situations on the modern battlefield that we can only handle by not shooting. And even though they have all this gear we can only dream of, their answer was the same as ours, they don't shoot either!"

So the situation still isn't that different from the Falklands, you sit in the actions information centre of the Cardiff and you see a blip with no IFF that matches the expected flight profile of an Argentinian C130 Hercules. Do you take the shot? The people on board the Cardiff did take the shot. To their regret...

Norwegian

[Anonymous Coward]

meh

They had to do it in Norway

[Anonymous Coward]

Because in Washington everyone trusts an anonymous source but no one trusts the official story.

Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Assmasher]

If you read the article he mentions being capable of being marginally more offensive than he could be in an F-16. While this isn't to be dismissed as meaning 'nothing.' F-35 defenders should be careful to trumpeting the fact that a pilot finds the F-35 is not, in fact, worse than a 40+ year old airframe design.

The problem with the F-35's dogfighting is that it's performance is not remotely comparable to aircraft being sold abroad by the Russian aviation community. Yes, it has capabilities that many aircraft do not, and some capabilities that have not even been fully enabled as well; however, ALL of these abilities are unrelated to the basic physical performance of the aircraft and the basic performance of the aircraft is the area of primary concern as a platform for enabling these technologies.

Are people under the impression that the Su-37 can't get a 'look-thru' helmet cueing system? That, unlike fundamental airframe design, software capabilities cannot rapidly advance post construction of the aircraft?

I don't think the F-35 is useless, but it sure is an INCREDIBLY expensively mediocre aircraft intended to carry excellent (someday) software and sensors.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[NormalVisual]

If you read the article he mentions being capable of being marginally more offensive than he could be in an F-16.

I can be more offensive than almost anything, and I don't even need an airplane.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Assmasher]

Look out for Norwegian pilots wanting to fly you ;).

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[whoever57]

Also in TFA, the pilot refers many times to the F35's ability to slow down. In the prior report, the fact that the F35 was not maneuverable with "losing energy" (slowing down) was listed as a problem.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

it's means it is. You'd think that someone who can bang out a treatise on combat aerodynamics on a Sunday morning could grasp that it's means it is.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[50000BTU_barbecue]

So it's this century's F-111?

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[HornWumpus]

Su-37 is a prototype. They have built _one_ of them. All they can afford.

Su-35 is 'production'. They have built 48 of them, have another 50 on contract with the Ruskys and signed a contract with India to build an updated version. At least a few have crashed/burned.

The Su-27M is the export version. If you had 40 million burning a hole in your pocket and good relations with Putin, you could buy one.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[blind biker]

The Falcon's design is actually even older than four decades - it was selected in 1972!

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Solandri]

The F-16, by virtue of its light weight (the F-35 weighs 1.8x more, F-22 weighs than 2.3x more), is one of the nimblest dogfighters out there. Its thrust to weight ratio is substantially better than the F-35's. You think a 40-year fighter jet is still in service worldwide just because it's cheap to maintain?

I agree that the F-35 is a boondoggle. They tried to make a single airframe do too many different things. But if its dogfighting capability compares favorably to an F-16, I'd have to take back some of my past criticisms. This report contradicts earlier tests last year which showed the F-35 losing badly to the F-16. Is the pilot just BSing, or have they really improved its performance that much in less than a year?

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

If the F-35 is marginally more or even nearly as capable than an F-16, it's a great accomplishment considering the new capabilities and systems, and how good the F-16 is. Su-37 and similar planes appear to be competitors to the F-15 and F-22, rather than to the F-35.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Assmasher]

The point in mentioning the S-37 is because it is the test-bed for the Su-35 and emerging Russian technologies for integration into their existing front line and export aircraft.

The Su-27M is the export version.

The "Su-27M" is the Su-35. The 'K' version of an Su-27/35 Russian aircraft denotes an export version. Maybe you were referring to the Su-35S (the more recent upgrade, which is also available for export - China and Algeria have already bought them.)

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[saigon_from_europe]

I don't think the F-35 is useless, but it sure is an INCREDIBLY expensively mediocre aircraft intended to carry excellent (someday) software and sensors.

SAAB's Gripen Switzerland proposal: $3.5B for 22 planes, it is $159M per plane. For an more-or-less an outdated plane. Does F-35 still looks that expensive comparing to this? I don't think so.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

The greatest "advantage" the pilot in the article points out is that the F35 can slow down better than the F16, and has some kind of yaw advantage at low speeds. He doesn't counter the claim the the F16 has and widens an energy advantage in combat maneuvering. Admittedly I've only spent time in game simulations, not real combat aircraft (so, yes, I could be very wrong), but it seems to me that of these two characteristics, the energy advantage is going to be the decisive advantage far more often. That is the plane that will ultimately get to control a dogfight, and a wary and skilled pilot just isn't likely to be drawn into a situation where he can be "outbraked" and then killed. I bet a WW1 biplane has some similar advantages over an F16, but if these are your only advantages the combat probably isn't going to go well for you. I want to see a lot more impartial head-to-head tests before I'll be convinced the F35 is living up to expectations and its high price!

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

Helicopters have great turning at low speeds, better than the F35 I expect, and presumably would be more effective against the F16 in that domain. Which is to say: not very effective. The phrase "charcoal pilot" comes to mind.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[ilguido]

Not exactly: it was 3.12B Swiss francs, about $3.2B, for the leasing of 11 Gripen C/D, the acquisition of 22 Gripen E (to be delivered in 2018-2021), spare parts, support, training, certification and a joint venture between SAAB and RUAG (Swiss aviation company) for the production of Gripen E. The individual cost of just one F-35 aircraft without the engine (LOL) is still over $100M, and its operating cost is way higher than that of the Gripen.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[currently_awake]

The Dogfighting ability of an F18 is limited by the pilot, the Dogfighting ability of an F35 is limited by the overweight airframe. Once you switch your anti-aircraft missiles to use the UHF radio spectrum where F35 stealth doesn't work you realize the F35 is a less capable aircraft.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[willy_me]

But can you fit an air-to-air missile with a UHF radio and antenna? I was under the impression they were too large - but do correct me if I am wrong.

Re: Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't knock the F-111

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

If all else fails, you can always fall back to semi-active missiles, or have it entirely guided from the ground.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[KGIII]

I'm a gun-toting, red-blooded, patriot that loves things that go boom and vroom. I love this country and I'll lie, cheat, and steal to do what I can to ensure the rest of the planet knows it.

That said, err... You don't know much about Russian aircraft, do you? They've got great pilots and make "reliable enough" aircraft - historically. Today, they're not just reliable, they're well designed. The Russian aerospace industry is actually really good. For example, check out the Su-27 (a bit old now) doing something called 'the cobra.' Then, some crazy Russian decided he'd bring it to a near stall and keep going with the maneuver - and he flips it, it's not really a loop, it's just a flip. Like a kick-flip on a skateboard, kind of.

No. If you try that cobra in combat you're gonna die. But... It shows some serious skill, physical integrity of the plane, and some serious balls. Also, it is awesome.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[thrich81]

The F-111 got a bad reputation early on because it didn't work out for the Navy mission, but it turned out to be a heck of a medium bomber for the Air Force, both USAF and the Royal Australian Air Force. It was fast, carried a big bomb load, and long ranged; in service with the USAF until 1998 and the RAAF until 2010. Designed as a tactical bomber, the Strategic Air Command had some built for the strategic bomber role to fill the gap in capability from the B-52 until the B-1 and B-2 came on line. The USAF used in various combat actions, notably very effectively in the 1991 Gulf War. This is a quote about the Australian Air Force F-111s from Wikipedia, "The purchase proved to be highly successful for the RAAF. Although it never saw combat, the F-111C was the fastest, longest ranged combat aircraft in Southeast Asia.[74] Aviation historian Alan Stephens has written that they were "the preeminent weapons system in the Asia-Pacific region" throughout their service and provided Australia with "a genuine, independent strike capability" The whole wikipedia article is worth a read, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.... The F-111 is probably the most unfairly maligned combat aircraft ever built.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

SU-37 is not being produced. A mythical airplane is not going to magically get a 360 degree helmet.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Anonymous Coward]

The F-35 got its first production avionics suite between those two tests. The first guy flew with the software they used for development and testing.

Further avionics upgrades are planned down the line.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[aliquis]

Are people under the impression that the Su-37 can't get a 'look-thru' helmet cueing system? That, unlike fundamental airframe design, software capabilities cannot rapidly advance post construction of the aircraft?

I don't think the F-35 is useless, but it sure is an INCREDIBLY expensively mediocre aircraft intended to carry excellent (someday) software and sensors.

What the Russians will do:
Put wings on the S-400 and call it a day.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[Xest]

"Are people under the impression that the Su-37 can't get a 'look-thru' helmet cueing system? That, unlike fundamental airframe design, software capabilities cannot rapidly advance post construction of the aircraft?"

I don't think that's really the point of the F-35, it's not really it's job, it's a strike fighter, not an air superiority fighter. Comparisons to the Su-37 are the F-22 (which it would lose against, hard), and the Eurofighter, Gripen, and Rafale which could all also easily stand up to it.

The point of the F-35 is to get into airspace that isn't open because of SAM sites, and maybe enemy aircraft. It doesn't need to be a great dogfighter because that's not it's job, if there's a risk of dogfighting happening it'll be sent in with F-22s or similar.

The F-35 is intended to get in and destroy SAMs and enemy aircraft in BVR engagements before it's even detected and it does that incredibly well, possibly better than any other aircraft in existence right now. It's meant to clear a path, either by itself, or if up against other 5th gen fighters like the PAK-FA with backup from the likes of the F-22.

The Su-37 can't do this, it stands out like a sore thumb on radar and is fodder to advanced SAMs and 5th gen Western fighters. The attrition rate of using Su-37s against states with advanced air defence networks would be massively higher than using F-35s and/or F-22s.

Given the PAK-FA programme looks like it's pretty much dead - Russia cut it's order to a mere 12 aircraft, and that's before the now not so recent oil price drop that is making it bleed money faster than ever, and it's been peppered with problems so serious that the F-35 programme looks like a blistering success in comparison - it doesn't look like the F-35 will have too many threats in the near and mid distant future, with China being the only source of such a threat. So sure, a far cheaper 4th gen fighter might out dog-fight it, but that fighter has to find it and not get shot down by it in a BVR engagement which the F-35 will basically always win first - the F-35 is only likely to be dogfighting if it encounters another 5th gen fighter, at which point the question is, what other 5th gen fighters can out dogfight it? Right now the only aircraft that exists that can is the F-22, which is why the US makes that a not for export technology.

Re:Against an aircraft that first flew in 1974...

[david_thornley]

The F-111 was supposed to be THE main tactical aircraft, satisfying every need from carrier-based interceptor to bomber, and was a miserable failure at it. It was a darn good land-based bomber, but it sure didn't deserve to be the F-111. Calling it the B-111 would have been much more appropriate.

I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

There is one thing I really don't understand about dogfighting. As the blogpost describes, they're always trying to get behind the enemy aircraft. But why on earth don't they add guns and other weapons systems that can fire backwards?

Re:I don't get it

[Lynchenstein]

It may have something to do with the fact that when a missile is launched backwards from a fast moving aircraft, it'll be flying backwards for quite a bit.

Re: I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

Time to target is much less because of relative speed

Re:I don't get it

[RDW]

The Russians had this back in the 80s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Re:I don't get it

[Cassini2]

The American's and the British had it in WWII on the bombers. Before that, I'm sure someone can find an example of a planes from the 20's, and maybe even from WWI that had an omni-directional gun turret.

A big issue in the early fighters was that they couldn't figure out how to fire forward. The ammunition was unreliable, and if you tried to fire through the propeller blades, it would shoot off the propellers. In the early years, this was solved by adding "wedges" to the props such that if the ammo hit the prop, it wouldn't destroy the propeller.

The early aircraft would have also investigated alternative designs, including omni-directional gun turrets, and sending a guy up in the air with a rifle or sub-machine gun.

Re:I don't get it

[serviscope_minor]

The solution to firing forwards was the interruptor gear, initially, then later sticking the guns out on the wings. Also some aircraft then were in the pusher configuration. Some such as the DH2 did have a gun with a mount which allowed pointing the gun, but the pilots found that fixing the gun forwards was better.

I didn't know about the crazy deflector wedges until today!

The turret concept was referred to as a turret fighter. They had a brief period of polularity pre and early WWII with fighters such as the Paul-Boulton defiant, but in practice they turned out to be not all that great. They could of course fire backwards, but they couldn't fire forwards without wrecking the aerodynamics. They fared better as night fighters, where dogfighting was much different than as dogfighters.

Re:I don't get it

[KGIII]

The deflectors were done by some witty Brit and then he crashed - and lived, by the way. I think he was shot down. The Germans found out it when they examined his downed craft and realized it was brilliant but they wanted better. Enter Focker (spelling) who was a Dutchman and working for the Germans at the time. He figured out the interrupter gear and that lead to "Bloody April" as I recall.

I'm lazy and just got back a little while ago so, to the others suggesting they fire missiles backwards, that's do-able and whatnot but doesn't seem to work that well in reality. They did so with mounted rifles in WWII (and WWI) but those were projectiles fired with force and not projectiles that carry their own propellant. As I recall, getting a missile to reliably ignite and stay lit, while flying backwards at Mach 1 or higher, is not an easy task. It turns out, it's more complicated than GI Joe has led some folks to believe.

I like WWI documentaries too - not just WWII and science/physics. I am not a historian. In fact, I don't even intent to know the above information. It just kind of happened. Eventually, you see, hear, or read it enough times and it sticks with you.

The Century of Warfare
The World at War
WWII The Complete History

Those are good series. I believe YouTube has all of 'em and I want to say all of them were BBC.

Re:I don't get it

[david_thornley]

There were WWI two-seater aircraft with defensive machine guns that could sweep a large area of sky. Actual turrets were going to be much too heavy for the aircraft of the time, but I believe there were at least some with ring mounts that were pretty close to omni-directional.

Going into WWII, the British had the Boulton Paul Defiant, a fighter whose armament was four machine guns in a turret. Having a manned turret made the thing overly heavy with worse performance than its contemporaries, it had half the armament of a Hurricane or Spitfire, and it was less accurate in general. Bomber turrets were in general not all that accurate; I believe one problem was firing across a high-speed crosswind. The US relied heavily on having tight bomber formations with a whole lot of heavy machine guns in a small volume of sky. The individual guns weren't accurate, but there were a lot of them, and they made a bomber box unhealthy for German fighters. (An ideal bomber destroyer would be heavily armed and armored for a fighter, and hence relatively slow and unmaneuverable and unable to deal with large numbers of long-range US escort fighters.)

Modern missiles can lock on at wider angles from the shooter's front, I believe, and that's a step. Designing air-to-air missiles so that they can effectively fly backwards or with a Mach 1.5 crosswind has turned out to be difficult.

Morten 'Dolby' Hanche??

[Harold Halloway]

What on earth does one have to do get the nickname 'Dolby'? Reduce noise? Perhaps he only got 5.1 out of 10 in his last assessment...

Re:Morten 'Dolby' Hanche??

[awol]

Maybe he was just blinded by science.

Re:Morten 'Dolby' Hanche??

[Anonymous Coward]

poetry in motion?

Re:Morten 'Dolby' Hanche??

[Anonymous Coward]

Dolby is Norwegian for the guy who takes it from the rear.

Re:Morten 'Dolby' Hanche??

[Anonymous Coward]

It absolutely is not.

If anything here's a breakdown of the potential Norwegian meaning.

Dol - No meaning
By - City

The natural conclusion is that it is "Dolby" as a whole. Probably based on the brand.

Re:Morten 'Dolby' Hanche??

[vux984]

I dunno, but I can tell you that it doesn't take much.
- Harold "Froot Loops" Wolowitz

And Windows 10 can run Windows programs

[Anonymous Coward]

The question was never if the F-35 can dogfight. The question was: can it dogfight better than other, cheaper options? And the answer to that remains a resounding "no!"

Re:And Windows 10 can run Windows programs

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeap, if you can get three F-16s or three SU-27 or three SU-30 or two F-18s for the price of one F-35, the question becomes, how well would an F-35 handle a situation where the F-35 is outnumbered. Of course it does not mean that a situation like that is nearly always the case and that you always need to dogfight, but with those prices, it is expectable that relying on F-35s alone/mostly means you are going to be out numbered and that will raise the possibility of dogfighting.

If i got to decide, i'd get F-18 super hornets instead of F-35s.

Re:And Windows 10 can run Windows programs

[mbkennel]

The F-35 is primarily a ground attack aircraft (and on that measure its sensors & targeting is excellent) with reasonably good air capability. Being roughly equal to F-16 {a great dogfighter} on that criterion, plus stealth, is pretty good. With modern missiles, dogfighting is usually a mutual kill scenario. You want to avoid getting in that circumstance, and in practice, being able to get in close enough to launch bombs and missiles against an adversary's SAM sites is a much more valuable capability than the ultimate dogfighter. This isn't Battle of Britain 1941.

The central technological problem in the F-35 program was attempting to accomodate the lift-fan version (B) in the same structure as the conventional (A and C) versions. And then there's the corporate welfare.

Note the DoD was sufficiently pissed off that Northrop got the bomber and not Lockheed & Boeing (f-35 contractors), and that program seems much more tightly managed.

Re:And Windows 10 can run Windows programs

[Hognoxious]

This isn't Battle of Britain 1941.

It never was.

Re:And Windows 10 can run Windows programs

[Anonymous Coward]

The F-35 is primarily a ground attack aircraft (and on that measure its sensors & targeting is excellent) with reasonably good air capability. Being roughly equal to F-16 {a great dogfighter} on that criterion, plus stealth, is pretty good. With modern missiles, dogfighting is usually a mutual kill scenario.

Except it sucks at those roles.

The F-35 has a total munitions capacity of four.

That's four missiles or four bombs.

Now, granted, you can also mount weapons on external hardpoints, but as soon as you do that, the F-35 loses its stealth advantage.

And that's ignoring the hilariously short range of the F-35 due to limited fuel. Which can be resolved by external tanks, which - again - negates the stealth advantage.

A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[Bing Tsher E]

In related news, recent findings show that a Basset Hound can dogfight. Not very effectively, and the dog seldom wins the fight. But evidence has been uncovered of basset hounds fighting other dogs.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[Anonymous Coward]

In related news, recent findings show that a Basset Hound can dogfight. Not very effectively, and the dog seldom wins the fight. But evidence has been uncovered of basset hounds fighting other dogs.

If you had read the post he said that it could very effectively.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[hey!]

Indeed, but that's just one opinion; we know that others who have flown the plane have a different opinion. So who should we believe?

Probably both of them, depending on the situation and who you're asking. The problem is that this isn't how the F35 was sold. The F35 was sold as being clearly superior to anything else in the world at everything, except for air superiority where the F22 would edge it out. To do that it should perform so well that no competent pilot would imagine it to be anything less than unquestionably superior to a plane that was put into service 40 years ago, because the rest of the world has caught up and passed the 1983 benchmark.

It'd make more sense to compare the F35 to the SU-30, which has been in actual service for twenty years. If you want to show the F35 is going to deliver on its promises, put it up in an actual head-to-head empirical test against Indian SU-30MKIs. And do it under rules that are intended to compare the aircraft against each other rather than show the progress of the F35 against its previous iterations. Does anyone really believe that would go well?

We're at the point where the reality of the all-things-to-all-services strategy should be setting in. Maybe the F35 will be able do all those things, but it will never be quite as good as a modern purpose-built aircraft. Probably the Marines will be happy with it once enough since probably the biggest compromise-driver is STOVL. It'll be a clear upgrade from their Harriers. But it won't be the kind of world-beater we were promised because at best, if everything works as it is supposed to, it'd be a world beater for 2008. The rest of the world has known this thing was coming ever since 1993, and our most capable adversaries have been preparing.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed, but that's just one opinion; we know that others who have flown the plane have a different opinion. So who should we believe?

By "others" are you referring to the one test pilot from the last year's report everybody has been quoting since? The pilot that flew a test flight configured plane set up for higher margin of safety during test flight? While this Norwegian is reporting experiences from a plane with actual combat tuned flight control system.

I don't really care if this is a good jet or not, but find it strange how people dismiss evidence that contradicts what they have been led to believe previously.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[hey!]

How am I dismissing the Norwegian's evidence? He said that the F35 has a better angle of attack, and that he can point the nose faster than an in F-16. That's good news, but it's not a head-to-head empirical evaluation against a modern fighter, which no advocate for the program would be anxious to do.

And we would do well to be extra-skeptical of good news from this program. It was deliberately structured so that programmatic failure would be catastrophic both to national defense plans, and to careers across three services. As long as there is any possibility of success, no matter how remote, there will be tremendous pressure to produce good news and suppress bad news. Remember the major general who was fired last year for telling A10 pilots that saying anything positive about the A10 would be viewed as "treason"? He wouldn't have been dismissed if he hadn't been caught. And what are we to make of the Marines declaring this aircraft "combat ready"? Do you believe that's true, except by some carefully crafted definition of "combat ready" that doesn't mean what most people would think when they hear "combat ready"?

So while we haven't reached the point where military officers are just making shit up, we have gone far past the point where they're being misleadingly selective with the truth. I don't think that this Norwegian guy is lying; I expect everything he claims is his honest opinion. But we're way past the point we should be talking about opinions. Forgive me if I don't take someone having a positive opinion as proof the program is turning the corner. I've been hearing that same refrain for the last ten years. By now it has reached "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" status.

I'm not unreasonable. I can be convinced that the F35 program will be a brilliant success. If the aircraft actually becomes usable (by which I don't mean declared "combat ready but we aren't ready to use it in combat yet") in the next two years, then since we don't have any other alternatives I say it's successful enough for now. And if you want to claim it's better than anything else around, I'll accept any actual head-to-head testing against modern aircraft under realistic conditions as proof you're right.

Now I'd like F35 advocates to be just as reasonable. Under what conditions would they consider the program a failure? And (slightly different question) at what point should we stop putting resources into it and develop alternatives? If you can't answer those questions then your advocacy of the program isn't based on rationality.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[bytesex]

Under what conditions would they consider the program a failure?...

You assume that a fighter is an end-product. That updates don't happen and that circumstances don't change. So, why it *that* the question?

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[Anonymous Coward]

Marines wanted a new A-10, can the f-35 deliver in that front? Marines did not want a "100 miles off us" plane, they need a plane that is capable of doing same shit that the A-10 is capable. Can a f-35 fly if half its wing gets blown out?

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[Anonymous Coward]

(same ac) Funny thing is that i believe this plane is far too expensive for us (us being Norway), and we shouldn't have chosen it. That I still believe. But still I like to base the opinion on current best facts, and I believe this pilot to be competent and sincere, and he gives it a good review on exactly what is supposed to be it's "big weakness" and topic of ridicule - dogfights. And as far as I know the only contrary report is from a test flight configured plane last year. And yes, I agree it might not be good enough to just be significantly better than F16 in a dogfight (which is what he is saying, there is no "slightly" coming out of reading that), but a lot of people have claimed it would lose a dogfight even to F16 (assuming the F16 even saw it before the fight was over), on very thin and now thinner, evidence.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[hey!]

I understand it's a process, but the process is a decade behind schedule.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[KGIII]

Hmm... Now, it has been a while (about 30 years) and I am not a pilot - but I did serve in the Marines. I don't recall seeing any A-10s in use by the Marines. Perhaps you mean Harrier? As near as I know, the USAF flies the A-10. It might even be past tense, I seem to recall reading that they were going to drop it.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[Anonymous Coward]

Wanting a plane like the A-10 does not require operating an A-10.

But no, the Air Force will have the A-10 for another decade at least.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[sysrammer]

Looks like the program was saved. A lot of public pressure on congress, especially from grunts.

--
"You're welcome."

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[KGIII]

I couldn't imagine that they'd go through with canceling it without a replacement at hand but I never saw any follow-up articles about the outcome. As I recall, there was a hearing and then an investigation, and then was supposed to be another hearing - that one never made the rounds at my various online news haunts. Between the A-10 and the Spooky, well... We've got some aircraft that can loiter and lay down some serious firepower as needed.

One of the things about the A-10 is that it is pretty much just a giant bad-ass gun with wing. I do mean bad-ass. I don't remember the specs on that bit of kit but is fantastic. I kind of want to play with one. How could I not want to? At any rate, I don't think the Marines want them so much as they want someone else to have that capacity. I seem to recall a topic being that the Marines could take over the program and I believe they declined to do so. I'm not positive as to why they'd decline but I'd speculate that it's not really a part of their core mission and would dilute "scant" resources.

Re:A Basset Hound Can Dogfight

[sysrammer]

The major criticism of the A10 and the AC130 variants is that "they are vulnerable without air superiority". To me that's sort of a "well, duh" comment, as our ground troops are also vulnerable without air superiority.

"Spooky", that takes me back. The original C47. I knew that the AC130 had a different name and couldn't recall it: Spectre. Then, I saw Spooky is still used, and Ghostrider. A new one is coming out with a nice lead-spitter on it.

Fun fax from the wiki...

Development

The five-barrel 'Equalizer' cannon was developed in the late 1970s, based on the mechanism of the GAU-8/A Avenger cannon, but firing a new NATO series of 25 mm ammunition. The GAU-12/U cannon is operated by a 15 hp (11 kW) electric motor, in external mounts supplied by a bleed air driven pneumatic system. Its rate of fire is normally 3,600 rounds per minute, with a maximum of 4,200 rounds per minute. For use in the AC-130 gunship, the fire rate is limited to 1,800 rounds per minute in order to conserve ammunition and reduce barrel wear.
Uses
An AV-8 Harrier II; the two pods on the belly of the aircraft hold the cannon (port side, visible hole) and ammunition (starboard side).

The current principal application for the Equalizer is the AV-8 Harrier IIs of the United States Marine Corps, Italian Navy and Spanish Navy. The Harrier II carries the Equalizer system in a pair of pods mounted on the fuselage sides, with the cannon in the port pod and 300 rounds of ammunition in the starboard pod, fed through a bridge at the aft ends of the pods that also contains the drive system for the gun.

And this circles around to something that you mentioned, about the Marines declining the A10. The AV8 has a serious auto-cannon itself. Perhaps most importantly to the Marines, it can be carried aboard a carrier (or smaller ships).

Improving the Cockpit View in F35

[Anonymous Coward]

The part about the cockpit view being better in the F-16 was interesting. There are probably good reasons for the current cockpit configuration in the F-35, but it seems like some sort of panoramic rear view camera should be possible, perhaps hooked into that fancy "third generation" helmet that he mentions? Having to lean forward a bit to look around the seat when looking back at the aircraft's six sounds like a disadvantage. What if high g-forces make that difficult in some situations?

Re:Improving the Cockpit View in F35

[Anonymous Coward]

The pilots aren't supposed to be using their eyes (as primary input) to look for targets, they're supposed to be using their sensor suite. But that's not how pilots have been trained, and years of habit are hard to break.
The next generation of pilots, that grew up on video games, and learned to fly in the F-35, will do much better.

Re:Improving the Cockpit View in F35

[Anonymous Coward]

but it seems like some sort of panoramic rear view camera should be possible

The F35 already has cameras in all directions and they are linked into the helmet. The problem is that even the latest/best modern digital cameras don't have the tracking abilities / selectable resolution of the human eye. It probably wouldn't be enough up agains something like a Rafael which has much more accurate IRST, however against the Russians aircraft it's probably enough.

Fighter pilot translation

[Anonymous Coward]

The original article did not really say the F-35 can't dogfight, it stated that it suffered from energy deficit compared to the F-16. This article points out that it also benefits from less restricted angle of attack than the F-16. These are not inconsistent observations. I've fought the F-16 many times, and flew it once. The F-16 has significant AOA limits (limited by the FBW system). What does that mean? It means that the F-16 can carve a great turn and has a sweet 9G initial pull, but if you can live past the first couple turns the Viper is going to be AOA limited and you can pretty much have your way with it. I flew Navy jets (F-14/18) which have no AOA limit. Even with an energy deficit, the ability to "point the nose" has significant advantages, particularly today with high off-boresight weapons like AIM-9X. That being said, in 2016 I would expect to have a jet that has both AOA and thrust/weight advantages over a jet from the mid 70's. This sets up a classic rate vs radius fight. The F-16 has a rate advantage, the F-35 has a radius advantage.

For a (somewhat inaccurate) automotive analogy, the F-16 has more HP and torque, but suffers from understeer. If you enter a turn at the right speed you are fine, but enter too fast and no matter how much you turn the wheel you don't get any more turn out of the car. The F-35 allows oversteer. You can turn harder and the rear will start to swing around. You may loose 30MPH in the turn, but you will turn.

Re: Fighter pilot translation

[Type44Q]

Mod up: greatly informative.

Re:Fighter pilot translation

[jabuzz]

My guess is it depends on the F35. If you happen to be trying to dog fight an F35B then you will as the Argentinians found out in the Falklands War trying to dog fight Harriers that er you can't dog fight an F35B because they will just go into hover. Aka I have someone on my tail, just let me slow right down curtsey of not having a stall speed because I can hove if required and you will fly right passed me at which point your screwed.

Re:Fighter pilot translation

[Anonymous Coward]

F35 can't do that at speed, unlike the Harrier. The Harrier has "viffing" (vector in flight) capability. The F35, while it has vtol, can't viff.

Air Force getting the short end of the stick

[Dorianny]

The discussions on the F35 often center around its capabilities as a fighter. I think it is important to remember that neither the Navy nor the Marine core want a plane that is primarily a fighter. Most previous jets in service for the Navy and Marine's have been designed as fighters for the Air Force and have been repurposed. The Air Force already has a air-superioirty fighter in the F22. With the F35 the Air Force for the first time has had to make some concessions and the result the Navy and Marine's are getting a jet that is vastly more capable for their needs than the repurposed fighters they have had in the past

Re:Air Force getting the short end of the stick

[jtayon]

The tragedy of the multi role aircraft: expansive jack of all trades, master of none

USAF, marines, navy wants a single platform for 3 uses:
- air superiority;
- infantry support;
- projection.

it requires an aircraft that can do every missions for a cheap price.
Else if the enemy can counter your weapons with 10 times cheapest option it means you lose one of your advantages.

Think of how russians/chinese provided cheap missiles coupled with radar station to the viet cong in 1970 that countered the expensive jets of USAF for a while.

Since 10 years, IED that are cheap have been killing and breaking far more soldiers than any warplanes. Infantry units with their logistic are still the major forces deployed.

Maybe it is time we all read books and evaluate if military aerial superiority doctrine is indeed the right/cheapest way to solve conflicts.

Our conflicts are resource based (oil, water, food). Maybe a better economy making resources more evenly shared would prevent conflicts better than pure strength. Not only between nations, but also inside nations. Maybe trying to avoid wars is the best way to not lose wars.

It is just a question of costing and pricing peace. Is peace affordable? Would it be in our local selfish interests? Does it beats conflicts? When should we consider conflicts unavoidable? Will the possible conflict of the future require planes or peace keeping? Can we afford the costs of either supporting or letting refugees die as consequences of conflicts?

I think the actuality of refugees (like in Syria) are showing that some indirect costs are widely underestimated.

It is time to consider conflicts as something else than a mutual eradication doctrine. It is nice scenario in games, but there is only one planet we all depend on and which physical space we share, hence the consequences of our conflicts also impact our countries.

Maybe it is time to ask all governments a clear economical analysis of conflicts, because I don't believe any expensive weapons will be a magic wand to solve the problem.

Re:Air Force getting the short end of the stick

[Tablizer]

The discussions on the F35 often center around its capabilities as a fighter...neither the Navy nor the Marine core want a plane that is primarily a fighter.

But if you suck in that area, the enemy will force you to be a fighter.

Re:Air Force getting the short end of the stick

[david_thornley]

What you need to evaluate combat effectiveness is some idea of what sort of war you're going to be fighting. Great Power militaries have been designed to fight high-intensity wars against other Great Power militaries as long as we've had Great Powers. Major wars have gotten a lot less likely for several reasons, but there's still very good reasons for NATO to want to be able to fight Russia if necessary.

If we tailor our forces to fight Russia, and we wind up in a low-tech Middle East war, we're fighting inefficiently and people in the Middle East will suffer. If we tailor our forces to fight low-tech conflicts, and we have to fight Russia, we're in pretty deep doo-doo.

Pinch of salt

[Hognoxious]

If it can't dogfight, would they say so?

If it can dogfight, would they say so?

I'm rather surprised that anyone - especially ones who should know better - is saying anything.

BRB, door.

Re: Pinch of salt

[Type44Q]

It's a given that our [likely adversaries] are already well aware of the F-35's flight characteristics regardless of what a highly-respected Scandinavian NATO pilot publicly reports...

like driving backward, with extra dimensions

[raymorris]

> always trying to get behind the enemy aircraft

Sort of, but not exactly. Imagine a giant sphere with the opponent in the circle . If you're anywhere in the rear half of the sphere, you have positional advantage . If you're in the front half of the sphere, the other guy does. (Ignoring gravity and energy, for sake of simplicity) . Of course it's not just one sphere 3,000 feet in diameter, but an infinite number of spheres of various sizes. So basically half the battle space is "behind" and half the battle space is "in front", not just the line DIRECTLY behind.

If you're 10 degrees left of directly behind and 20 degrees above, you can fire on him. With a front cannon, you point your aircraft in his direction and fire. With a rear-facing cannon, you'd need to point your aircraft such that the enemy is DIRECTLY behind you in order in aim the cannon at him. That's exactly where you don't want him! You'd never maneuver to try to put him directly behind you when he's firing from anywhere in the "behind" half of the air space.

One may think "a rear cannon and a front cannon both have to be aimed, so they're the same". There are two differences. An obvious difference is that maneuvering the aircraft to aim forward is easier than maneuvering to aim backward for the same reasons that driving forward is easier than driving backward.

Just as important, the pilots aren't only maneuvering for aim, changing which direction the aircraft points. The aircraft are also moving through the sky. You're trying to "lead" the opponent with your aim, aiming where he WILL be later, when the butllets get there. In other words, you're aiming in front of your opponent. With both aircraft moving in roughly the same direction, with turning with roughly the same arc, shooting in front of you will naturally tend to shoot in front of the other guy . Shooting behind you will tend to shoot behind him , where he's already been rather than where he's about to be.

Seeker missiles don't have to be aimed as precisely as cannons, but they should be shot in the right general direction , so the same ideas apply. It's just less crucial.

Boondoggle

[zwarte piet]

nuff said

ps, yes I oversimplified to focus on one thing

[raymorris]

Ps- if there are any fighter pilots in here, or people good at fighter sim games, yes I know that I greatly oversimplified and left out 90% of the relevant factors. I did so in order to focus on one or two relevant factors without distractions.

Re:Blm

[LostMyBeaver]

Honestly, is the the right news groups for topics like the one in this thread? It doesn't contribute anything to anything and frankly if the people here are still stereotyping and actually establishing their universal beliefs based on these stereotypes, said people are really not contributing anything valuable to human kind.

Let's make this simple. The world has a lot of people. There are a lot of religions, races and nationalities... and if I understand an article I read a few years back, there are actually more than two naturally occurring genders, 17 if I recall the number correctly.

In every race and gender and nationality etc... there are every type of people. In my experience there is nothing within nature that decides whether a person is more or less of anything due to race, gender, etc...

Now, there are idiots, assholes, morons, schmucks, criminals, criminally stupid, evil, etc... in every category which seems to be proven by some of the contributors of this thread. It appears that society contributes greatly to deciding what kind a person one will be. I have learned that at least within America, there is a far higher likelihood that members of every genetic category will voluntarily choose to be the crap left over at the bottom of the barrel. On the other hand, like every other country on earth, America has an group of people which achieve excellence as well.

If you're the type of person who seems to think that race, gender, etc... define us and believe that the actions of the few define the many, then you actually do fit into a category yourself which you would truly find to be far worse than the categories you're placing others in. The good news is, most of these people usually end up removed from society in one way or another. The bad news is, it seems that at least some of them run for president.

Real Life translation

[Anonymous Coward]

You in an F-XX (how does it even matter), they in a Mig-31 and of course 100KM away an S-400 on standby watching it all, I think you ought to eject
before your aircraft falls out of the sky. Should you make it to the ground alive, they also have the biggest dogs, the Ovtcharka: http://i.imgur.com/MGubg.jpg . These dogs are used in the military, the prison system and also for hunting wolves and bears. They'll come looking for your ass with dogs like that. Run motherfucker, run :-)

Re:Real Life translation

[Anonymous Coward]

I had a good look at that dog pic I posted myself just now. Check those strong broad heavy legs and paws and wonder with me if dogs and bears can't breed!

Re:Real Life translation

[Anonymous Coward]

That dog is too slow to hunt wolves and too small to hunt bears. Russian wolfs are tiny compared to a timerwolf so I suppose the wolf-hunting title could still apply in Russia. But in North America, those dogs would be wolf bait. Based on my experience I would give them 12-24h to succumb to wolfs if left unattended in the northern Canadian wilderness - or Alaska. I've known people who left their (very large, 150lbs) dogs out at night only to find a couple large red spots in the snow the next morning.

Hunting wolfs requires two different dog breeds. Firstly, several small, fast, high endurance animals that will pester and slow down the wolf. Second, large but slow kill dogs that will administer the final blow. Even then, if you do not have a 2:1 kill dog to wolf ratio you are going to lose some dogs. Wolfs are stronger then all breeds that are fast enough to catch them - that's evolution for you.

Re:Real Life translation

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't have enough fingers and toes to count the number of dog breeds that are both stronger and faster than wolves.
Look up the Saluki and most of its two dozen or so descendant variants, including the borzoi specifically.

Somewhere on Youtube is a nice video of a borzoi butchering two wolves on its own.

Basically people got sucked in by John Boyd

[NotSoHeavyD3]

and his fan boys. Boyd of OODA loop fame was posited as a fighter expert like small quick simple planes as fighters for dogfighting which has influenced fighter design for awhile. Here's something I have in common with him though, neither one of us has ever shot down another plane in combat even once.(I love mentioning that.) Anyway the problem with all of this is they forget one of the first fighter experts, Oswald Boelcke, of Dicta Boelcke who actually managed to shoot down other planes and influenced the Red Baron. (Both got killed in WWI so have to mention that.) His opinion was pretty much dogfighting was for suckers and the best thing was to shoot down the other bastard before he knew what the hell hit him, either from above, the back, from the sun, or all of the above. Or as I like to say it "Shoot him in the fucking back!"

Re:Basically people got sucked in by John Boyd

[rbrander]

If you want to destroy the other guy from a position of safety, you were done decades ago: nuke him. Preferably from Orbit, of course, to complete the popular phrase, but in any event we didn't lack for distance weapons of great accuracy.
The point of having a close-up battle capability is that sometimes you can't do that. You must have personal presence at the battlefield, to gather information, not hit friendlies, perhaps captive, or because your enemy has in fact surprised you and carried the fight to your doorstep. It would be a poor military that cheerfully assumed it was so superior it always got to pick the distance of engagement, like a thick-walled castle that had zero security if somebody gets inside.
Boyd did all kinds of writing about the preferability of hitting your opponent before he gets out of bed or knows you exist; that's always your obvious best battle. (So did Sun Tzu.)

The problem with the F-35 is not that it can or cannot dogfight; it's that it can't dogfight several times as well as earlier aircraft, despite costing several times as much. I'd rather fight $200M worth of F-35's than $200M worth of Boyd's F-16s.

Re:Basically people got sucked in by John Boyd

[Rei]

You must have personal presence at the battlefield, to gather information, not hit friendlies, perhaps captive, or because your enemy has in fact surprised you and carried the fight to your doorstep.

Hence the other key aspect of the F-35, the sensor suite.

despite costing several times as much

On the other hand, the F-35 is designed to reduce ongoing costs - both maintenance (though that remains to be proven), and basing / supply line costs.

Re:Basically people got sucked in by John Boyd

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with the F-35 is that drone fighters and bombers will likely be in use not long after it drags its sorry arse into service.

Re:Basically people got sucked in by John Boyd

[mcswell]

"Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge." Would too! I saw one in Willow.

Re:Basically people got sucked in by John Boyd

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, what's wrong with the F-35 is that it arguably can't dog fight for its self and it can't carry enough weapons far enough. If there were lots of drone fighters then the F-35 makes sense as a way of getting a close range (single radio hop/line of sight) human into the loop of a bunch of drone fighters and bombers. The F35's (or F-22's) stealth might actually make sense in that case since a) anything that is detected has little to no chance and b) the drones under control of the F-35 do the things it can't do.

F-35 as A-10

[Anonymous Coward]

Marine corps wanted a plane for infantry support. A new A-10.

So, the A-35 can be a "fighter" as they say, but can it really do the work A-10 is doing?
Can it give actual close air support to troops on ground? Loiter over enemy positions, firing armor piercing ammo to tanks and APC-s? What good the 4 internally carried missiles are doing in that situation? A-35 will be visible to all radars if it will arm itselt with war stuff on its wing pylons.

Re:F-35 as A-10

[Noble713]

Marine corps wanted a plane for infantry support. A new A-10.

So, the A-35 can be a "fighter" as they say, but can it really do the work A-10 is doing?

In the "balloon goes up" exercises/scenarios that we use to train our forces in the Pacific, the Air Tasking Orders almost never feature A-10s in support of the Marine MAGTF. Our fixed-wing close air support is almost always AV-8Bs or F/A-18C/Ds, with the occasional Navy Super Hornet. We process dozens of immediate Joint Tactical Air Requests daily during the major phases of ground combat (not to mention any pre-planned targets), and we do it without ever having access to sections of A-10s. Part of the reason we are able to do this is because our aviators are heavily trained for CAS, and everyone is taught on the same tactics/techniques/procedures for smooth integration of fires. USAF aviators are primarily A2A guys and they don't speak the same language as the Army troops they are supposed to support.

That said, the F-35 can't carry much internal ordnance, and currently can't fit the *Small Diameter* Bomb in its weapon bays. For the money that we are spending, I don't think we are getting a good value at all. I think the USAF and USN should have shared a multirole design, basically a stealthy F-18. The Corps should have procured its own VTOL jet. After reading on WarIsBoring how the VTOL jet concept has never Worked As Designed (launching from austere airfields after the Navy flattops depart), I'm honestly wondering if we should adopt a compound helicopter and eliminate the Corps' fixed-wing CAS platforms entirely. A Compound Heli would have the speed and range necessary to escort Ospreys (AH-1s can't keep up), but we can operate them from LHAs/LHDs/LPDs easily, and carry more birds too.

Can it give actual close air support to troops on ground? Loiter over enemy positions, firing armor piercing ammo to tanks and APC-s?

Why do so many people on the Internet associate CAS with slow-turning gun runs? Must be the pro-A-10 PR that has burned this image in people's minds. Close = "must coordinate with the ground commander to avoid killing friendlies". That's it. Some people will argue that dropping bombs from fast jets, accurately, isn't always an option. This is largely because our air-ground communications assets/methods are woefully archaic. It's why DARPA, the Air Force, and the Marine Corps are pushing such rapid progress on PCAS: http://www.darpa.mil/program/p...

What good the 4 internally carried missiles are doing in that situation?

You never know when you might encounter "leakers", enemy aircraft that have slipped past the Combat Air Patrol. ALL fighters carry some kind of ordnance for emergency self-defense.

Re:F-35 as A-10

[Maury Markowitz]

> Why do so many people on the Internet associate CAS with slow-turning gun runs?
Because every article on the A-10 puts considerable attention on the gun. Because it's cool, and big, and heavy and BIG IS BETTER!

Which is a bit sad, because it's not a terribly effective weapon on today's battlefield. Against T-54/55's it's certainly credible on the sides and turret roof, but that's about it. It can pen under 60mm from 1000m range, but a T-64 has 45mm in the turret roof and considerably more than than everywhere else, including the sides and rear. Against applique, composite or reactive armor,or against anything newer than the 1970s, it's not particularly useful. If you do need to penetrate anything newer than that, you'll need at least a CRV7 and much more likely a Hellfire or Brimstone. All of those have less dispersion (or zero), higher pen, and weight a whole lot less.

Now of course the GAU is very effective against anything lighter than that, including APC/IFVs, arty, logistics, what have you. But those don't need a GAU to kill, something like a BK27 is just as useful and weights a little over 1/3rd as much, not including the ammo can or feeds. That 180 kg represents four Hellfires, which is a lot more dead tanks than the GAU.

My basic point is that if you lay out all the various targets you might face in CAS and rank them on a line from soft to hard, there is a point somewhere on that line where the GAU stops being effective. And the vast majority of those targets lie on the softer end of the point. Now you could slide that point up or down with different weapons. But to slide it up you have to a LONG WAY before you add even more more target it can hurt. But if you slide it the other way, you might remove only one target while still leaving overall numbers unchanged.

Dogfighting died decades ago

[TRRosen]

Air to air is useless. A missile can out maneuver any plane. The fact is 99 % of all air attacks today already have complete air superiority.

Re:Dogfighting died decades ago

[sysrammer]

You must be new to this planet.

Re:Dogfighting died decades ago

[TRRosen]

You must be new to this century. Nobody in the armed forces wants fighters or piloted planes in general. They serve no purpose in modern warfare.

Re:Dogfighting died decades ago

[Anonymous Coward]

Your sentiment has been expressed by the military many times before, yet the lessons of actual combat rear its ugly head and says otherwise.

Australia and the JSF

[CanadianMacFan]

There was just (March 6) a good documentary on Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Background Briefing radio show about where the JSF was right plane for Australia. http://www.abc.net.au/radionat...

Quite the interesting show and it seems like there are lots of problems still with the plane. Like how it still doesn't like the heat so that the weapons bay doors have to be opened every ten minutes when it's hot out. On the ground or in flight! The problem with the weight of the helmet still hasn't been taken care of so pilots can still be killed. The training simulators that pilots have been using haven't actually been verified to be accurate.

Re:Australia and the JSF

[sysrammer]

"There was just (March 6) a good documentary on Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Background Briefing "

Thanks, I'll have to check that out. Fwiw, bugs like this will be worked out. If the basic engineering is sound (or, I guess, even if not :), bugs will be fixed and components will be upgraded. I don't think anyone expected today's old airplanes to be still flying today. Upgrades have allowed this for the old planes. Time will tell if the F35 platform will be as durable.

Wohoo!

[Anonymous Coward]

Look at all the arm-chair generals out there!

Nothing but a bunch of video-game pilots out there.

Re:Blm

[sysrammer]

Honestly, is "the the" right news groups for a screed on the topic which you have just presented?

Comparing with int'l version

[Anonymous Coward]

I suppose his point of reference for the comparison has been the international version of the F16.

You know, the one with reduced strength, export grade dogfighting capability.

and suddenly...

[Anonymous Coward]

everyone here is a freaking combat aircraft freaking expert.
Ahh the magic of the F-35.
I was hoping someone here would bring up you know...the software, this being /. and all

Umm, no.

[Maury Markowitz]

From the original article:

"The 2015 report criticized the F-35’s lack of power and maneuverability compared to the F-16 during high angle of attack exercises. The F-35 “was at a distinct energy disadvantage in a turning fight,” the author wrote, also noting that “pitch rates were too slow to prosecute or deny weapons.”

In contrast, Hanche wrote the F-35 is capable of a significantly higher angle of attack than the F-16, providing the pilot greater authority to point the nose of the airplane wherever he wants."

These two statements are in no way related. The first two issues are about energy loading and pitch rates. The second is about angle of attack. They are in no way related other than grossly. While it is true that high-alpha maneuvers are useful in obtaining snapshots, as a general indication of maneuverability they are not very informative.

That someone writing for DefenseNews isn't aware of, or at least doesn't comment on, this key difference in statements is rather worrying.

That's not what the report said at all!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not what the report said at all!

Did anyone actually READ this report all the way through? 1. The entire exercise had to be G-limited. This alone gave the F-35 the ability to keep up with other planes as the other pilots could not pull higher then the G-limits specified. 2. The high AOA was followed by a lot of buffeting, that's really bad!

Those are just 2 high points from the article.

The F-35 still can't dog fight.

The F-35 still can't provide CAS

The F-35 still can't intercept

The F-35 still only has a 600mi CR.

C'mon, people! A mediocre fighter for that much $

[martinfb]

Seems to me that we the taxpayers have been duped - again. Paying so much money for a (still incomplete, mediocre) fighter so far over budget and past deadlines, that action to curtail things like this need to be in place. Perhaps put a hard limit on cost (with a reasonable buffer for overruns); with a caveat that those companies pay back for failing to deliver. Those companies CEOs should bear the full brunt of the payback, and the saved deep overruns can be used to acquire and pay those companys' employees. CEOs can suffer for their underhanded, unsubstantiated bids. CEOs: if you are so worthy, then why are we paying for this crap?!