8 ms·

While all those things are true, if they disclosed ITAR controlled jet turbine technical schematics to potential adversaries, that's a real problem... Having t

While all those things are true, if they disclosed ITAR controlled jet turbine technical schematics to potential adversaries, that's a real problem... Having the most reliable, fuel efficient, high performance engines in current generation military aircraft is a major advantage.

edge17 6y ago
But then why not make them classified instead of ITAR?
- walrus01 6y ago
  While I have never been involved in jet engine manufacturing, probably because those same engines and their repair parts are sold to a number of US allies and temporary-allies-of-convenience who use US/NATO spec aircraft and systems, where having a classified piece of technology would be impossible to maintain chain of custody on. I'm thinking specifically of all the foreign military sales for the F16, F15, etc.
  - goatinaboat 6y ago
    having a classified piece of technology would be impossible to maintain chain of custody on. I'm thinking specifically of all the foreign military sales for the F16, F15, etc Being in physical possession of a turbine blade doesn’t give you the secrets of how to manufacture it, which are extremely tightly controlled.
    - lazide 6y ago
      It does not, but it certainly helps no?
    - lallysingh 6y ago
      Agreed, bit for this crowd I think a better metaphor would be possession of a microprocessor. Having one doesn't tell you much in terms for duplicating the technology needed to make it unless you're already at that level.
    - salawat 6y ago
      It gets you maybe 1/3 of the way there in the sense you have a work product to compare to for your own efforts to figure out how-to. Falls apart a bit if you're trying to nail down chemistry or something like an IC production process though where the equipment itself is built by people who will neither talk nor possibly sell to you. Look into the Soviet konkordski tire counter-intel effort. If I recall correctly, NATO found out the Soviets were trying to get their hands on the rubber formulation for the tires of the landing gear, and counterintelligence worked with manufacturers to leak the formula for the "worst rubber for the job ever". Keep trying to find where I stumbled on that, but it seems to be lost to the all seeing eye of the Internet now. Closest I get is references to Pavlov smuggling the plans for the landing gear assembly out of France. Give me two copies of something that you don't want to tell me how to make, one for destructive analysis, and one to compare against as a finished product, and I can at least filter out some false starts from the get-go.
      - goatinaboat 6y ago
        Falls apart a bit if you're trying to nail down chemistry or something like an IC production process though where the equipment itself is built by people who will neither talk nor possibly sell to you. Turbine blades are like ICs in the sense that the secret sauce is in the materials and the manufacturing processes. You can imitate the exterior shape perfectly and it still be completely useless.
- metalliqaz 6y ago
  They did, with the next gen.
- annoyingnoob 6y ago
  So you can use contractors that don't have a Secret clearance. The government calls a lot of things Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI), its unclassified but its controlled and there are strict requirements on transmission and storage of CUI. See CMMC.
  - kryogen1c 6y ago
    this is made up information. cmmc is not in effect, v1.02 is like 2 months old, and v2 is rumored to come out in a month or two. nist 800-171, which is where the majority of cmmc comes from, didnt even require formal external attestation until like 6 months ago when dfars 252.204-7019 required posting in SPRS to continue doing business with the DoD. ive never seen, nor heard of, anything actually marked as CUI.
    - tediousdemise 6y ago
      > ive never seen, nor heard of, anything actually marked as CUI. That’s because CUI is a recent label. Per DoDI 5200.48, effective March 6, 2020, CUI is is replacing legacy labels such as For Official Use Only (FOUO), Sensitive But Unclassified (SBU), and Law Enforcement Sensitive (LES). [0] [0] https://www.dodcui.mil/ https://www.dodcui.mil/
    - 5555624 6y ago
      > ive never seen, nor heard of, anything actually marked as CUI. It's been around for more than 10 years. See CFR 2018 Title 32 Vol 6 Part 2002 (https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2018-title32-vol6/pdf/CFR-2018-title32-vol6-part2002.pdf https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2018-title32-vol6/pd...) if you want details. DoD implementation ramped up about a year ago.
    - annoyingnoob 6y ago
      I've recently seen documents marked CUI. And yes, I went with the most recent information. However, there are many possible markings, https://www.archives.gov/cui/registry/category-marking-list https://www.archives.gov/cui/registry/category-marking-list. You might have seen documents marked 'Controlled' in the past. 800-171 has been required since 2017. Edited to add link to DoD CUI Training https://www.dodcui.mil/Portals/109/Documents/Training%20Docs/21-S-0588%20cleared%20CUI%20Awareness%20Training%20Nov%202020.pdf https://www.dodcui.mil/Portals/109/Documents/Training%20Docs...
- deleted 6y ago
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alfiedotwtf 6y ago
At this point in time, it seems illogical to assume that Americans adversaries do not have all the detailed plans on building secret planes. In fact, I would be genuinely shocked if they didn’t know everything at this point.
- nradov 6y ago
  If our adversaries actually knew everything then we would see it flying today. Obviously that isn't the case. The Chinese are still struggling to successfully copy previous generation Russian designs, which are themselves a step behind the latest US and European models in terms of efficiency and reliability.
  - dplavery92 6y ago
    >The Chinese are still struggling to successfully copy previous generation Russian designs This is certainly not true. If anything, the Chinese are very successfully copying current generation American designs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31
    - nradov 6y ago
      Nonsense. Those are superficial copies of some aspects of the airframes. It's the engines and avionics inside that count. What is the efficiency in terms of thrust per unit of fuel burned? How many hours can they run between overhauls?
    - trhway 6y ago
      looks like you didn't read your own links - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31#Engines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31#Engines , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20#Engines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20#Engines Look at those round vector controlled engines. It is Russian 4th (mostly 4+ as of today) gen engines. That is the reason Russia hasn't so far been able to build an F-22 competitor - for PAK-FA, out of the 3 key component of the 5th gen, they built body, not bad of a radar, yet they haven't been able to build a 5th gen engine as of today. China has as of today almost been able to replicate that 4th+ gen engine, yet still very far from the 5th gen. Even more - Russia has actually officially given up on building the 5th gen. They decided to go straight to the 6th gen which is supposedly all about AI/networking/sensors/drones/etc. with engines playing only secondary role. Not that they have much hopes to succeed at the 6th gen game too, it is just recognition of reality that the 5th gen F-22 level engine isn't happening in the near future and thus they need a plan B. In some sense that leaves China totally on their own when it comes to the 5th gen, and that means like at least 10 years from the current state, and by that time the air will be dominated by the AI/drones/etc. In that sense AI engineers going to work in China may be more strategically important than the Honeywell drawings :) As an example - the current drone powerhouse dominating the region - Turkey - got their drones built by a returned MIT graduate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sel%C3%A7uk_Bayraktar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sel%C3%A7uk_Bayraktar .
sudosysgen 6y ago
It's not that much of an advantage. The most powerful, highest range stealth plane in existance is already Chinese. The biggest factors in aircraft range and kinematic performance nowadays is doctrine. The US decided vertical landing is more important than range in performance.
- Alupis 6y ago
  You might be forgetting the F-22... and only one of the three F-35 variants has VTOL capability.
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    The F-22 is not in production anymore, clearly the US decided its advantages are not that important. That being said, it might surprise you to learn the J20 is more powerful than the F22 with a slightly longer range and an almost identical dry weight. All of the F35 variants are hampered by the necessity for vertical takeoff. Commonality between the three planes is incredibly high and tradeoffs crossfeed.
    - Alupis 6y ago
      What exactly does "more powerful" mean? The F-22 can supercruise (without afterburners) above Mach 2, and has nearly all the same avionics package as the F-35. Both the F-22 and F-35 have thrust vectoring, and the most advanced stealth coatings, materials, and shaped airframes. If we compare just the F-22 and the J-20, the F-22 has a better TWR, can out-climb, out-run and out-maneuver the J-20, and has a larger payload capacity. The J-20 seems to indeed have better ferry and combat range, however US strategy does not require the same range due to air bases being present around the world and possesses advanced aerial refueling capability - making static range a moot point. I also highly doubt the J-20 matches the F-22 or F-35 in avionics. The F-22 production line was discontinued nearly entirely because - at the time - the DOD, and more importantly Congress, believed the F-35 would be cheaper and replace most of it's disparate fighter/attacker aircraft (which turned out to be far from the truth, unfortunately). However, the US operates nearly 200 of these fighters and plans to maintain them for decades. > All of the F35 variants are hampered by the necessity for vertical takeoff. Commonality between the three planes is incredibly high and tradeoffs crossfeed. This is sort of true, but not entirely. If you look at the three F-35 variants, they are pretty much three different airframes at this point, only really sharing avionics and the shape of the aircraft. It was indeed foolish to think you could build a one-size-fits-all multi-role fighter/attacker to replace purpose-built aircraft like the A-10, F-15, F/A-18 and F-22... but that doesn't make the F-35 a complete turkey.

edge17 6y ago

But then why not make them classified instead of ITAR?

walrus01 6y ago
While I have never been involved in jet engine manufacturing, probably because those same engines and their repair parts are sold to a number of US allies and temporary-allies-of-convenience who use US/NATO spec aircraft and systems, where having a classified piece of technology would be impossible to maintain chain of custody on. I'm thinking specifically of all the foreign military sales for the F16, F15, etc.
- goatinaboat 6y ago
  having a classified piece of technology would be impossible to maintain chain of custody on. I'm thinking specifically of all the foreign military sales for the F16, F15, etc Being in physical possession of a turbine blade doesn’t give you the secrets of how to manufacture it, which are extremely tightly controlled.
  - lazide 6y ago
    It does not, but it certainly helps no?
  - lallysingh 6y ago
    Agreed, bit for this crowd I think a better metaphor would be possession of a microprocessor. Having one doesn't tell you much in terms for duplicating the technology needed to make it unless you're already at that level.
  - salawat 6y ago
    It gets you maybe 1/3 of the way there in the sense you have a work product to compare to for your own efforts to figure out how-to. Falls apart a bit if you're trying to nail down chemistry or something like an IC production process though where the equipment itself is built by people who will neither talk nor possibly sell to you. Look into the Soviet konkordski tire counter-intel effort. If I recall correctly, NATO found out the Soviets were trying to get their hands on the rubber formulation for the tires of the landing gear, and counterintelligence worked with manufacturers to leak the formula for the "worst rubber for the job ever". Keep trying to find where I stumbled on that, but it seems to be lost to the all seeing eye of the Internet now. Closest I get is references to Pavlov smuggling the plans for the landing gear assembly out of France. Give me two copies of something that you don't want to tell me how to make, one for destructive analysis, and one to compare against as a finished product, and I can at least filter out some false starts from the get-go.
    - goatinaboat 6y ago
      Falls apart a bit if you're trying to nail down chemistry or something like an IC production process though where the equipment itself is built by people who will neither talk nor possibly sell to you. Turbine blades are like ICs in the sense that the secret sauce is in the materials and the manufacturing processes. You can imitate the exterior shape perfectly and it still be completely useless.
metalliqaz 6y ago
They did, with the next gen.
annoyingnoob 6y ago
So you can use contractors that don't have a Secret clearance. The government calls a lot of things Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI), its unclassified but its controlled and there are strict requirements on transmission and storage of CUI. See CMMC.
- kryogen1c 6y ago
  this is made up information. cmmc is not in effect, v1.02 is like 2 months old, and v2 is rumored to come out in a month or two. nist 800-171, which is where the majority of cmmc comes from, didnt even require formal external attestation until like 6 months ago when dfars 252.204-7019 required posting in SPRS to continue doing business with the DoD. ive never seen, nor heard of, anything actually marked as CUI.
  - tediousdemise 6y ago
    > ive never seen, nor heard of, anything actually marked as CUI. That’s because CUI is a recent label. Per DoDI 5200.48, effective March 6, 2020, CUI is is replacing legacy labels such as For Official Use Only (FOUO), Sensitive But Unclassified (SBU), and Law Enforcement Sensitive (LES). [0] [0] https://www.dodcui.mil/ https://www.dodcui.mil/
  - 5555624 6y ago
    > ive never seen, nor heard of, anything actually marked as CUI. It's been around for more than 10 years. See CFR 2018 Title 32 Vol 6 Part 2002 (https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2018-title32-vol6/pdf/CFR-2018-title32-vol6-part2002.pdf https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2018-title32-vol6/pd...) if you want details. DoD implementation ramped up about a year ago.
  - annoyingnoob 6y ago
    I've recently seen documents marked CUI. And yes, I went with the most recent information. However, there are many possible markings, https://www.archives.gov/cui/registry/category-marking-list https://www.archives.gov/cui/registry/category-marking-list. You might have seen documents marked 'Controlled' in the past. 800-171 has been required since 2017. Edited to add link to DoD CUI Training https://www.dodcui.mil/Portals/109/Documents/Training%20Docs/21-S-0588%20cleared%20CUI%20Awareness%20Training%20Nov%202020.pdf https://www.dodcui.mil/Portals/109/Documents/Training%20Docs...
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alfiedotwtf 6y ago

At this point in time, it seems illogical to assume that Americans adversaries do not have all the detailed plans on building secret planes. In fact, I would be genuinely shocked if they didn’t know everything at this point.

nradov 6y ago
If our adversaries actually knew everything then we would see it flying today. Obviously that isn't the case. The Chinese are still struggling to successfully copy previous generation Russian designs, which are themselves a step behind the latest US and European models in terms of efficiency and reliability.
- dplavery92 6y ago
  >The Chinese are still struggling to successfully copy previous generation Russian designs This is certainly not true. If anything, the Chinese are very successfully copying current generation American designs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31
  - nradov 6y ago
    Nonsense. Those are superficial copies of some aspects of the airframes. It's the engines and avionics inside that count. What is the efficiency in terms of thrust per unit of fuel burned? How many hours can they run between overhauls?
  - trhway 6y ago
    looks like you didn't read your own links - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31#Engines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_FC-31#Engines , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20#Engines https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-20#Engines Look at those round vector controlled engines. It is Russian 4th (mostly 4+ as of today) gen engines. That is the reason Russia hasn't so far been able to build an F-22 competitor - for PAK-FA, out of the 3 key component of the 5th gen, they built body, not bad of a radar, yet they haven't been able to build a 5th gen engine as of today. China has as of today almost been able to replicate that 4th+ gen engine, yet still very far from the 5th gen. Even more - Russia has actually officially given up on building the 5th gen. They decided to go straight to the 6th gen which is supposedly all about AI/networking/sensors/drones/etc. with engines playing only secondary role. Not that they have much hopes to succeed at the 6th gen game too, it is just recognition of reality that the 5th gen F-22 level engine isn't happening in the near future and thus they need a plan B. In some sense that leaves China totally on their own when it comes to the 5th gen, and that means like at least 10 years from the current state, and by that time the air will be dominated by the AI/drones/etc. In that sense AI engineers going to work in China may be more strategically important than the Honeywell drawings :) As an example - the current drone powerhouse dominating the region - Turkey - got their drones built by a returned MIT graduate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sel%C3%A7uk_Bayraktar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sel%C3%A7uk_Bayraktar .

sudosysgen 6y ago

It's not that much of an advantage. The most powerful, highest range stealth plane in existance is already Chinese. The biggest factors in aircraft range and kinematic performance nowadays is doctrine. The US decided vertical landing is more important than range in performance.

Alupis 6y ago
You might be forgetting the F-22... and only one of the three F-35 variants has VTOL capability.
- sudosysgen 6y ago
  The F-22 is not in production anymore, clearly the US decided its advantages are not that important. That being said, it might surprise you to learn the J20 is more powerful than the F22 with a slightly longer range and an almost identical dry weight. All of the F35 variants are hampered by the necessity for vertical takeoff. Commonality between the three planes is incredibly high and tradeoffs crossfeed.
  - Alupis 6y ago
    What exactly does "more powerful" mean? The F-22 can supercruise (without afterburners) above Mach 2, and has nearly all the same avionics package as the F-35. Both the F-22 and F-35 have thrust vectoring, and the most advanced stealth coatings, materials, and shaped airframes. If we compare just the F-22 and the J-20, the F-22 has a better TWR, can out-climb, out-run and out-maneuver the J-20, and has a larger payload capacity. The J-20 seems to indeed have better ferry and combat range, however US strategy does not require the same range due to air bases being present around the world and possesses advanced aerial refueling capability - making static range a moot point. I also highly doubt the J-20 matches the F-22 or F-35 in avionics. The F-22 production line was discontinued nearly entirely because - at the time - the DOD, and more importantly Congress, believed the F-35 would be cheaper and replace most of it's disparate fighter/attacker aircraft (which turned out to be far from the truth, unfortunately). However, the US operates nearly 200 of these fighters and plans to maintain them for decades. > All of the F35 variants are hampered by the necessity for vertical takeoff. Commonality between the three planes is incredibly high and tradeoffs crossfeed. This is sort of true, but not entirely. If you look at the three F-35 variants, they are pretty much three different airframes at this point, only really sharing avionics and the shape of the aircraft. It was indeed foolish to think you could build a one-size-fits-all multi-role fighter/attacker to replace purpose-built aircraft like the A-10, F-15, F/A-18 and F-22... but that doesn't make the F-35 a complete turkey.