6 ms·

So what? It wasn't meant to be used for dogfight. It is a strike fighter with some A2A capability, to be used in combination with F-22 if the airspace is highly

So what? It wasn't meant to be used for dogfight. It is a strike fighter with some A2A capability, to be used in combination with F-22 if the airspace is highly contested. When a small number of F-22s is escorting a large number of F-35s, their advantage of IRST and networking capability together with long-range, LOAL AIM-120D (and with European, and later potentially U.S. users too, even more capable MBDA Meteor), will ensure they will clear our most bandits long before getting to the WVR range, where F-22s will be able to take over the job.

commandar 11y ago
This is all well and fine assuming you have enough F-22s. We don't. There's an infamous RAND study involving a conflict over the Strait of Taiwan: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/rgs_dissertations/2011/RAND_RGSD267.pdf http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/rgs_dissertations/... The tl;dr of it is that even assuming F-22s could score a perfect 1:1 missiles fired to kill ratio while perfectly evading all enemy missiles, the simple fact of the matter is that they'd get overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemy aircraft and run out of munitions. And then the airfields get destroyed and it doesn't matter how good your air superiority fighters are if they don't have anywhere to operate out of.
- anovikov 11y ago
  Also, fulldome IRST means it won't need much of a dogfight. It can direct missile from any angle.
dogma1138 11y ago
Eh? The US has about 100 F-22's which are used primarily for national defense. The bulk of the F-35's were supposed to go to the Navy which is the defacto offensive air force of the US armed forces which cannot fly F-22's off their carriers which means they'll actually need a fighter which is capable in CAP / A2A roles. But we'll see what comes out in the end of that, the 1st country which will get the F-35 as early as late 2015/early 2016 is supposed to be Israel, they are getting their own version which will include a different engine and their own avionic package. And the IAF doesn't care about BVR despite having what is arguably the best A2A BVR/WVR missile currently in service the Python-5, their doctrine is go for the gun kill and that anything else doesn't count. That said you can find similar reservations in pilots going from Gen 2 jet fighters to Gen 3/3.5 fights like from the Mirage 3 likes to an F-16 losing quite a bit of agility in the process. The F-16 at the time was the 1st negative stability FBW Jet and quite a few pilots took it to town complaining that it's too unresponsive too sluggish and you don't fly it but rather the computer flies you. That same issue would've probably been sensationalized just as much as the F-35 if it would've happen today, well the Aircraft will get better and pilots will learn how to use it's flight characteristics, so how much of an improvement needs to be done to the F-35 is yet to be seen.
- anovikov 11y ago
  What does it mean 'used for national defense'? As an air defense fighter? What is the point of that? Air defense fighters don't need to dogfight: no fighter can cross the ocean. Outdated second-line fighters like rusty F-15As are best here, they are fast and have a lot of range with drop tanks, guided by ground based radar, and now also with SBIRS (which can supposedly track almost any kind of aircraft, strategic bomber for sure) it can do the job.
  - dogma1138 11y ago
    Yes the F-22 is used solely as an Air-Defense fighter. While it's true that fighters can't cross the ocean, Russia doesn't need to cross any ocean to get to the western seaboard. Open a map, look at Russia, then look how far Alaska is, the distance between the landmasses is less than 100KM apart in some areas, they can reach Alaska and Washington, and with air refueling most of the eastern sea board. The F-22 is currently deployed 4 AFB's, Langley(Virginia, basically covering DC) , Elmendorf(Alaska), Hickam(Hawaii) and Holloman(New Mexico). They move some of them some times to allied bases mainly in Japan and the Gulf to show some muscle to reassure their local allies. But for all intents and purposes the US don't have any deployment plans for the F-22 in an active war zone as an offensive fighter. The US Air force for the most part is not used for offensive roles it hasn't been done so for a long long time basically pretty much since it was split from the Army int the 1st place. It did play a small role in Korea and in the early days of the Vietnam war because the navy back then wasn't really catching up with the AF and getting into the jet age properly. With the exception of some hey look we found a use for 2bln dollar air planes the US Airforce hasn't done much for the past 20-30 years. They only run support missions since the navy doesn't run it's own tankers and well NKAWTG... The brunt of air missions conducted by US armed forces are done for the navy, USAF as stated only does support missions whether it's running tankers or CAS with it's A-10's, once in a while they'll take their B2 or B-52's for a spin :)
    - anovikov 11y ago
      No they can't reach anything but Alaska with fighters. And aerial refueling in Russia is a joke, not even all strategic bomber crews can do it, for any tactical aircraft only test pilots can, and not all even have aerial refueling eqipment. For all but very few special missions involving only strategic aircraft, you can forget aerial refueling. If you think F-15 can be somehow lacking for air defense role you are really stretching the reality. In any potential conflict situation i.e. looming war with China, U.S. can easily take all of F-22s and deploy to Asia and American security will not be impacted at all.
nl 11y ago
The US is selling the F35 as an air superiority fighter to all its allies. No one else could buy the F22, so now counties like Japan and Australia are likely to lose regional air superiority.

commandar 11y ago

This is all well and fine assuming you have enough F-22s. We don't. There's an infamous RAND study involving a conflict over the Strait of Taiwan: http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/rgs_dissertations/2011/RAND_RGSD267.pdf http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/rgs_dissertations/... The tl;dr of it is that even assuming F-22s could score a perfect 1:1 missiles fired to kill ratio while perfectly evading all enemy missiles, the simple fact of the matter is that they'd get overwhelmed by the sheer number of enemy aircraft and run out of munitions. And then the airfields get destroyed and it doesn't matter how good your air superiority fighters are if they don't have anywhere to operate out of.

anovikov 11y ago
Also, fulldome IRST means it won't need much of a dogfight. It can direct missile from any angle.

dogma1138 11y ago

Eh? The US has about 100 F-22's which are used primarily for national defense. The bulk of the F-35's were supposed to go to the Navy which is the defacto offensive air force of the US armed forces which cannot fly F-22's off their carriers which means they'll actually need a fighter which is capable in CAP / A2A roles. But we'll see what comes out in the end of that, the 1st country which will get the F-35 as early as late 2015/early 2016 is supposed to be Israel, they are getting their own version which will include a different engine and their own avionic package. And the IAF doesn't care about BVR despite having what is arguably the best A2A BVR/WVR missile currently in service the Python-5, their doctrine is go for the gun kill and that anything else doesn't count. That said you can find similar reservations in pilots going from Gen 2 jet fighters to Gen 3/3.5 fights like from the Mirage 3 likes to an F-16 losing quite a bit of agility in the process. The F-16 at the time was the 1st negative stability FBW Jet and quite a few pilots took it to town complaining that it's too unresponsive too sluggish and you don't fly it but rather the computer flies you. That same issue would've probably been sensationalized just as much as the F-35 if it would've happen today, well the Aircraft will get better and pilots will learn how to use it's flight characteristics, so how much of an improvement needs to be done to the F-35 is yet to be seen.

anovikov 11y ago
What does it mean 'used for national defense'? As an air defense fighter? What is the point of that? Air defense fighters don't need to dogfight: no fighter can cross the ocean. Outdated second-line fighters like rusty F-15As are best here, they are fast and have a lot of range with drop tanks, guided by ground based radar, and now also with SBIRS (which can supposedly track almost any kind of aircraft, strategic bomber for sure) it can do the job.
- dogma1138 11y ago
  Yes the F-22 is used solely as an Air-Defense fighter. While it's true that fighters can't cross the ocean, Russia doesn't need to cross any ocean to get to the western seaboard. Open a map, look at Russia, then look how far Alaska is, the distance between the landmasses is less than 100KM apart in some areas, they can reach Alaska and Washington, and with air refueling most of the eastern sea board. The F-22 is currently deployed 4 AFB's, Langley(Virginia, basically covering DC) , Elmendorf(Alaska), Hickam(Hawaii) and Holloman(New Mexico). They move some of them some times to allied bases mainly in Japan and the Gulf to show some muscle to reassure their local allies. But for all intents and purposes the US don't have any deployment plans for the F-22 in an active war zone as an offensive fighter. The US Air force for the most part is not used for offensive roles it hasn't been done so for a long long time basically pretty much since it was split from the Army int the 1st place. It did play a small role in Korea and in the early days of the Vietnam war because the navy back then wasn't really catching up with the AF and getting into the jet age properly. With the exception of some hey look we found a use for 2bln dollar air planes the US Airforce hasn't done much for the past 20-30 years. They only run support missions since the navy doesn't run it's own tankers and well NKAWTG... The brunt of air missions conducted by US armed forces are done for the navy, USAF as stated only does support missions whether it's running tankers or CAS with it's A-10's, once in a while they'll take their B2 or B-52's for a spin :)
  - anovikov 11y ago
    No they can't reach anything but Alaska with fighters. And aerial refueling in Russia is a joke, not even all strategic bomber crews can do it, for any tactical aircraft only test pilots can, and not all even have aerial refueling eqipment. For all but very few special missions involving only strategic aircraft, you can forget aerial refueling. If you think F-15 can be somehow lacking for air defense role you are really stretching the reality. In any potential conflict situation i.e. looming war with China, U.S. can easily take all of F-22s and deploy to Asia and American security will not be impacted at all.

nl 11y ago

The US is selling the F35 as an air superiority fighter to all its allies. No one else could buy the F22, so now counties like Japan and Australia are likely to lose regional air superiority.