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To all those saying that dogfighting is an antiquited doctrine: I agree with you, but the F-35A is supposed to still do that, regardless of how archaic and impr
by NamTaf 11y ago
To all those saying that dogfighting is an antiquited doctrine: I agree with you, but the F-35A is supposed to still do that, regardless of how archaic and improbable such a situation is supposed to occur.
Because it's supposed to be able to dogfight, compromises in its other capacities have been reduced. Now we find out that, as everyone knew, it can't dogfight. So why even design it to do a mediocre job of dogfighting when they could equivalently eliminate that design constraint and allow it to do its other roles better?
The simple fact is that the military has tried to bite off more than it can chew by asking that the F-35 can do everything at once. Because the F-35A is slated to replace the F-16, other sacrifices have been made to make it sort of approach being kind of nearly as capable as the F-16. As a result, it is doing its other roles worse than what would be the case if the military instead accepted that one size does not fit all and removed that requirement.
Frankly, it doesn't matter how unrealistic the idea of dogfighting is. The military said 'make this thing able to dogfight at least equivalently to the F-16' so LM have gone away and made specific design decisions to try to achieve that. It's now fallen short of that target, and in doing so has also compromised other capabilities.
- akssri 11y agoIt's probably okay. They can always induct more F-22s if need be. That said, I think they're letting their allies (like Japan, Australia) down. These countries aren't allowed to import F-22, and they're stuck with the F-35 (or some European plane), which will probably be easily beaten by the newer Sukhois.
- jonathankoren 11y agoDogfighting was supposed to be archaic and improbable in 1968 as well, since who was going to get close and maneuver when you had guided missiles? Then the losses mounted, and they created TOPGUN. What really makes dogfighting unlikely, is the fact that United States hasn't fought anyone with airplanes in 40 years. From everything I read, the F-35 is shit for two reasons. First, the Pentagon hadn't learned it's lessons from all the other times they tried to make one fighter for every service which almost always has failed. (The F-4 being the notable exception.) And Second, the Marines insisted on a damn VSTOL aircraft. Really, it's the Marines's fault. If ignored them (and really you should, because they're just insisting on duplicated effort), then you'd have much narrower, and thus maneuverable, airframe. The reason why the airframe is so wide, is because it must accommodate a lift-fan than isn't even installed in the Air Force and Navy versions. Even when the lift-fan is installed, the extra weight, and the need to take off and land vertically, causes the Marine version to have less range and less armaments. If you had cut the Marines out, you would have gotten the <a href="http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/amazing-photos-of-chinas-newest-stealth-jet-show-growin-1657003826">J-31</a> http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/amazing-photos-of-chinas-ne.... It's really a shitty plane, and what really pisses me off about it, is that this seems to be incredibly common place anymore. Read the <a href="http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/broken-booms-why-is-it-so-hard-to-develop-procure-a-1698725648">perpetual http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/broken-booms-why-is-it-so-h... cluster fuck around the KC-X</a>. You can't read these things without wondering if the Pentagon doesn't actually know how to buy anything, and they're getting taken for a ride by overly complex (and thus very lucrative) contractors. I don't think the Pentagon knows what it's doing. Actually, I don't think anyone involved knows what they're doing.
- ydcvjk 11y agoHN markdown/html editing is borken. Your links are too.
- TeMPOraL 11y agoHN never had markdown/HTML formatting support.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- Already__Taken 11y agoLooking at those images[1], every defence manufacture has clearly had everything they know stolen haven't they. fixed links [1]: http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/amazing-photos-of-chinas-newest-stealth-jet-show-growin-1657003826 http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/amazing-photos-of-chinas-ne... [2]: http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/broken-booms-why-is-it-so-hard-to-develop-procure-a-1698725648 http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/broken-booms-why-is-it-so-h...
- stupidcar 11y agoWorth remembering when people talk about how the US military budget is bigger than everyone else's put together. It doesn't mean quite as much when everyone else is just waiting for you to pour trillions into R&D then stealing the result.
- zipwitch 11y agoEvery time I hear "dogfighting is obsolete" or "the F-35 will kill its opponents at range with missiles", I wonder. What happens when two stealthed 5th Gen fighters with good ECM try to kill each other with missiles?
- lmm 11y agoOne kills the other with a missile. Countermeasures turn the marginals into misses, they don't turn off a solid kill shot; likewise stealth is better thought of as reducing the effective range and SNR of enemy radar, not making you invisible.
- jessaustin 11y agoAre you sure you aren't describing a dogfight?
- Symmetry 11y agoDropping the engagement range from 100nm to 50 doesn't make a dogfight. The strength of radar returns go down with the 4th power of distance so it takes a lot of work to decrease detection ranges substantially.
- jessaustin 11y agoForgive my unfamiliarity with the topic, but are these planes really using radar during a battle? I would have thought that anti-radar missiles would be standard equipment?
- Symmetry 11y agoThis is where things start to get complicated but yes, planes use radar. In many cases, though, it's provided by an AWACS that sits back out of missile range. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_E-3_Sentry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_E-3_Sentry
- wsc981 11y agoSo why even design it to do a mediocre job of dogfighting when they could equivalently eliminate that design constraint and allow it to do its other roles better? From what I've read, the F-35 was supposed to excel in all roles. It's supposed to be a bomber, fighter, be useable from flight decks as well as airports, etc...
- mcv 11y agoPhysics be damned. It'll work eventually if we just keep throwing money at it.
- TheOtherHobbes 11y agoIt's working just fine as a (barely) flying side of pork. Not so much as a military aircraft. It seems no one is wondering what happens now - which is unfortunate, because there are serious strategic implications.
- NamTaf 11y agoI understand that. That's the exact problem. To me, the F-35 issue represents a case of politicising the systems engineering process. All of the defence contractors are really good at implementing systems from requirement specifications. In this case, the requirement specification has been added to and added to by political desires until it represents an object that simply can't pass muster. Lockheed has some incredible engineering talent, but even they cannot implement a system that has specifications simply unachievable by current technology. Something has obviously gone horribly wrong with the requirements capture stage of the program. The program sponsors (the military) have clearly asked for an impossible task. That's been bundled up in a specification and passed to engineers, who despite their best efforts are simply unable to make all the components play nicely together. Now we have a broken system because the subsystems just can't fit together. The textbook example is the VTOL aspect - a sleek and aerodynamic fighter can't afford to have a whopping great rotating turbofan in its guts, yet the requirements are both there. If this isn't taught in systems engineering classes in 10-20 years as a case study on what not to do, I'll eat my hat.
- tomswartz07 11y ago
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]