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Exactly this. F-35 is a monumental software challenge, it's essentially AR built to military standards on and run on (relatively) weak computers. Throw in a nee

Exactly this. F-35 is a monumental software challenge, it's essentially AR built to military standards on and run on (relatively) weak computers. Throw in a need to invent UI and UX for that to allow the pilot process massive amount of information from the sensor suite. I think the project warrants more respect just for its audacity. It's basically a moonshot project.

jonknee 9y ago
> It's basically a moonshot project. That's good considering it costs several times more than a literal moonshot ($400b vs ~$110b for Apollo in today's dollars). I would describe it as less a moonshot and more a transfer of wealth to military contractors.
- adventured 9y ago
  The F35 hasn't cost $400 billion and probably never will (maybe over 40 years with upkeep, spread across all branches and ignoring any foreign sales). The number of planes to be ordered will be cut drastically over the next 10-15 years, as with just about every program from the last few decades. The notion that the US Air Force was ever going to actually purchase ~1700 F35s was a bad joke. They might buy 300 or 400 at a high cost. It's not a great comparison to Apollo anyway, as most of the cost of the F35 program will be spread over decades of maintaining the planes, Apollo's cost was far more concentrated to a short period of time. If we had to keep the Apollo program up to those former levels on a perpetual basis, adjusted to today's costs, the cost would be running in the trillions.
  - jonknee 9y ago
    > It's not a great comparison to Apollo anyway, as most of the cost of the F35 program will be spread over decades of maintaining the planes, Apollo's cost was far more concentrated to a short period of time. FWIW the $400b figure is to buy the planes, the Pentagon estimates a further $1 trillion to maintain them.
    - adventured 9y ago
      I understand. I'm saying that will never occur. They're not going to ever actually buy all of those planes, and the maintenance cost will be far lower accordingly. All you have to do is look at the F22 program to understand what's actually going to happen; there are numerous other recent examples of how they tend to slash & burn on ordering however. Ten years out they'll be on to the new new thing, and they'll be slashing the purchase program toward zero accordingly. The planes are costing $93 million per unit currently, they'll buy less than 500-600 of them across all branches of the military, that's ~$60 billion, give or take $10-$15 billion on cost inflation over 10 years. Then reduce the maintenance cost accordingly for that number versus the laughable former numbers (thousands? ha ha ha).
Rotten194 9y ago
It only deserves respect if you believe the military deserves respect. The US spends more on it's military than every other militarily significant country combined -- what are we defending against? Besides a drop in stock price for Lockheed Martin.
- nostrademons 9y ago
  And yet, as a percentage of GDP, we're not that out of line. Maybe 50% more than the average developed country, but about 30% less than Russia, and 40% less than the U.S. spent in 1988 when Reagan was president. http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS?year_high_desc=true http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS?year_h... Think of the military as the backdoor way to get basic science & technology research funded in the U.S. The American public isn't willing to directly fund basic research, but if you frame it as "We're defending you from evil threats out there", you can pay for things like computers, the Internet, GPS, rocketry, satellites, carbon fiber composites, robotics, the colonization of Mars, etc.
  - djjeoejehdjbd 9y ago
    Your data likely only counts the line item budget alloted to the Pentagon under defense spending and doesn't include the hundreds of billions of additional special appropriation given out for our recent middle East adventurism. The military industrial complex is largely fraudulent, only blind patriotism could believe otherwise.
- dctoedt 9y ago
  > It only deserves respect if you believe the military deserves respect. Yes. > The US spends more on it's military than every other militarily significant country combined -- what are we defending against? If women ran the world, I might agree with you; they seem to be more cooperative than men, and they don't seem to be as driven as men to prove their superiority and establish their power. (I know, it's a pair of sweeping generalizations.) And certainly there's room for debate about specific defense expenditures, or whether overall we should cut them back or scale them up. But there are wolves in the world; if you've read even a little history, you'll know that perceived weakness invites predation. A strong military can be a really handy thing to have around — as, sadly, the world keeps having to relearn, often at terrible cost. Like it or not, the U.S. is the ultimate guarantor of the global order on which so much of modern life depends. (And it's "The US spends more on its military ....")

jonknee 9y ago

> It's basically a moonshot project. That's good considering it costs several times more than a literal moonshot ($400b vs ~$110b for Apollo in today's dollars). I would describe it as less a moonshot and more a transfer of wealth to military contractors.

adventured 9y ago
The F35 hasn't cost $400 billion and probably never will (maybe over 40 years with upkeep, spread across all branches and ignoring any foreign sales). The number of planes to be ordered will be cut drastically over the next 10-15 years, as with just about every program from the last few decades. The notion that the US Air Force was ever going to actually purchase ~1700 F35s was a bad joke. They might buy 300 or 400 at a high cost. It's not a great comparison to Apollo anyway, as most of the cost of the F35 program will be spread over decades of maintaining the planes, Apollo's cost was far more concentrated to a short period of time. If we had to keep the Apollo program up to those former levels on a perpetual basis, adjusted to today's costs, the cost would be running in the trillions.
- jonknee 9y ago
  > It's not a great comparison to Apollo anyway, as most of the cost of the F35 program will be spread over decades of maintaining the planes, Apollo's cost was far more concentrated to a short period of time. FWIW the $400b figure is to buy the planes, the Pentagon estimates a further $1 trillion to maintain them.
  - adventured 9y ago
    I understand. I'm saying that will never occur. They're not going to ever actually buy all of those planes, and the maintenance cost will be far lower accordingly. All you have to do is look at the F22 program to understand what's actually going to happen; there are numerous other recent examples of how they tend to slash & burn on ordering however. Ten years out they'll be on to the new new thing, and they'll be slashing the purchase program toward zero accordingly. The planes are costing $93 million per unit currently, they'll buy less than 500-600 of them across all branches of the military, that's ~$60 billion, give or take $10-$15 billion on cost inflation over 10 years. Then reduce the maintenance cost accordingly for that number versus the laughable former numbers (thousands? ha ha ha).

Rotten194 9y ago

It only deserves respect if you believe the military deserves respect. The US spends more on it's military than every other militarily significant country combined -- what are we defending against? Besides a drop in stock price for Lockheed Martin.

nostrademons 9y ago
And yet, as a percentage of GDP, we're not that out of line. Maybe 50% more than the average developed country, but about 30% less than Russia, and 40% less than the U.S. spent in 1988 when Reagan was president. http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS?year_high_desc=true http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS?year_h... Think of the military as the backdoor way to get basic science & technology research funded in the U.S. The American public isn't willing to directly fund basic research, but if you frame it as "We're defending you from evil threats out there", you can pay for things like computers, the Internet, GPS, rocketry, satellites, carbon fiber composites, robotics, the colonization of Mars, etc.
- djjeoejehdjbd 9y ago
  Your data likely only counts the line item budget alloted to the Pentagon under defense spending and doesn't include the hundreds of billions of additional special appropriation given out for our recent middle East adventurism. The military industrial complex is largely fraudulent, only blind patriotism could believe otherwise.
dctoedt 9y ago
> It only deserves respect if you believe the military deserves respect. Yes. > The US spends more on it's military than every other militarily significant country combined -- what are we defending against? If women ran the world, I might agree with you; they seem to be more cooperative than men, and they don't seem to be as driven as men to prove their superiority and establish their power. (I know, it's a pair of sweeping generalizations.) And certainly there's room for debate about specific defense expenditures, or whether overall we should cut them back or scale them up. But there are wolves in the world; if you've read even a little history, you'll know that perceived weakness invites predation. A strong military can be a really handy thing to have around — as, sadly, the world keeps having to relearn, often at terrible cost. Like it or not, the U.S. is the ultimate guarantor of the global order on which so much of modern life depends. (And it's "The US spends more on its military ....")