Slashdot Mirror
US Air Force Declares F-35A Ready For Combat (defensenews.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Defense News: The U.S. Air Force on Tuesday declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for battle, 15 years after Lockheed Martin won the contract to make the plane. The milestone means that the service can now send its first operational F-35 formation -- the 34th Fighter Squadron located at Hill Air Force Base, Utah -- into combat operations anywhere in the world. The service, which plans to buy 1,763 F-35As, is the single-largest customer of the joint strike fighter program, which also includes the U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Navy and a host of governments worldwide. "Given the national security strategy, we need it," [Air Combat Command (ACC) head Gen. Herbert "Hawk" Carlisle] said. "You look at the potential adversaries out there, or the potential environments where we have to operate this airplane, the attributes that the F-35 brings -- the ability to penetrate defensive airspace, the ability to deliver precision munitions with a sensor suite that fuses data from multiple information sources -- is something our nation needs." Carlisle said in July that even though he would feel comfortable sending the F-35 to a fight as soon as the jet becomes operational, ACC has formed a "deliberate path" where the aircraft would deploy in stages: first to Red Flag exercises, then as a "theater security package" to Europe and the Asia-Pacific. The fighter probably won't deploy to the Middle East to fight the Islamic State group any earlier than 2017, he said, but if a combatant commander asked for the capability, "I'd send them down in a heartbeat because they're very, very good." The declaration is another achievement for the $379 billion program -- the Pentagon's largest weapons project -- following the declaration of a first squadron of F-35s ready for combat made by the U.S. Marine Corps in July 2015.
Its unlikely it will ever engage another jet in a combat role, countries we fight are too poor for jets, countries with jets have too much power to attack and know we are too powerful to attack too or our allies.
Its ready to be a glorified bomber, bombing mostly suspected terrorists.
that it could well be obsolete in less time than it took to develop it if computer controlled drones keep advancing at their current rate. There was a story not long ago about a computer flying a simulated fighter outperforming a top gun in a dogfight. Move technology on 15 years and putting a pilot in a fighter could seem rather quaint.
"first to Red Flag exercises, then as a "theater security package" to Europe and the Asia-Pacific. "
They transposed "security theater."
You wish. The truth is that the MPAA has bribed Congress into authorizing military air strikes against anyone who dares to carry a cell phone capable of recording video into a theater. Gotta stop them pirates at all cost, after all.
http://www.defense-aerospace.com/articles-view/feature/5/170838/a-closer-look-at-dot%26e-report-on-f_35-%3Ci%3E(updated)%3C%C2%A7i%3E.html
The Block 2B version of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, which the Marine Corps declared operational in July last year, is not capable of unsupported combat against any serious threat, according to Michael Gilmore, the Pentagon’s director of operational test and evaluation (DOT&E).
http://aviationweek.com/defense/test-report-points-f-35-s-combat-limits-0?NL=AW-05&Issue=AW-05_20160201_AW-05_373&sfvc4enews=42&cl=article_1
http://aviationweek.com/site-files/aviationweek.com/files/uploads/2016/01/DOT%26E%202015%20F-35%20Annual%20Report.pdf
The pentagon must be geting pretty desperate.
"...You look at the potential adversaries out there, or the potential environments..."
Uhhh, potential? That's the best you can do here? Exactly how many metric fucktons of FUD does one need in order to justify over 1,700 aircraft and a $380 billion dollar price tag?
This kind of shit scares me because of what the US might be inclined to get involved in, for no other reason other than to justify this little shopping spree.
The ejection risk is to lightweight pilots ( < 136 lbs / 62 kg). The temporary solution thusfar has just been to ban lightweight pilots from flying it. Ejection is an inherently very stressful act on the body. For lightweight pilots on the F35, it's too stressful.
Only the F-35A has a 25mm cannon at all; obviously systems common to all aircraft have priority. The cannon is new - a lighter and more accurate version of the GAU-12/U. The schedule is for the gun to go online in 2017. It was on schedule last I checked.
As for the GP, I'll let actual pilots of the aircraft respond. And note that that is about dogfighting, an increasingly less relevant portion of an aircraft's activity. The whole philosophy behind the F-35 is to detect and engage targets from further away than they can detect and engage the F-35. Aka, if the F-35 is in a dogfight, it's already done something wrong to begin with.
Fox: "I think we should call it... your grave!" Cast: "Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!"
:)
And by "mission" I mean to siphon as much money from the taxpayer into into Lockheed Martin's bank accounts...