No one caught that one?

There must be a balance of utility, capability, economy, flexibility, adaptability, reliability, in any weapon system, and adequate numbers to truly be successful over a longer term.”

I can’t say I disagree with the above, but we’ve had a rather ‘long-run’ with the aircraft we have already. The F-15 was fielded over 30 years ago, and even the later models are 20 years old. As the aircraft reach their intended service lives and beyond they become increasingly difficult to maintain, which is reflected in increased cost and man-hours, and decreasing reliability. At some point these older fighters simply are too old to be useful and must be retired. And even if you replaced every single component on the F-15 fleet (at an enormous cost), there is simply no way to modernize the aircraft to have the capability of the F-22.

Also, the US has dominated air warfare due in large part to superior technology and training. The countries we have faced have been using equipment from the Former Soviet Union (FSU), quantity over quality versions. Our recent adversaries were using the FSU equipment and failed miserably, so the next generations of potential adversary aircraft do not follow the FSU model, and are extremely advanced by comparison. The newer aircraft could erode the United States’ quality advantage rapidly. Defense planners must look to the threat in 2010 and beyond to forecast requirements.

You just summed up Naval Aviation in one page!

And its not a good story to tell. Even with “Airspeed”.

But hey, we got great diversity programs now…………

re- “a lot cheaper than the Raptor-and they are still superior to just about all the other fighters out there world wide”

That’s a “Spinney-esque” statement, in some circles considered reasonable, however we wouldn’t have the F-16 or the F-15 with this kinda logic. Remember the fighter wars of the early ’80’s?.

To me it just smells of work 1/2 done, a “good enough” mentality and “misery loves company”…The Navy has made it’s bed witht the SuperHornet, why should the USAF? The sky would be black with big wet $$$ wings.

IMO, y’all are still sniffing around the edges of the P-3 dilemma and downstream impacts. Recommend think hard on it. There’s a lot of Ostrich heads in da sand…..Especially those schooled only in TACAIR, who also happen to be in charge. Rather, take the ‘holistic” approach.

Shifty,

If you can re-wing a plane- fighter or Buff size you can fly it forever if you take care of it (PMS) and re-engineer/upgradeother stuff (avionics, wep sys, flight controls, etc.) to prevent obsolescence and enhance capability every decade or so. Doing this on tactical fighter and attack aircraft is more problematic. Usually designed as throway jets in the 50’s/60’s/ 70’s it is very hard and cost prohibitive to replace center barrell type structures vice load bearing, huge aircraft grade aluminum wings found on less glamerous aircraft. Consider a cross type structure vs a single beam. Sorta like doing a backbone transplant on a live trout. Lots of variables going back to basic design.

Re the Buf- I’ll bet the USAF would have canned the -52 years ago if they could have bought more B-1’s or B-2’s. This is a case where mission trumps acquisition – rare. But if you consider that thes aircraft are at our core nuclear strategy like SSBNs/ICBMs we can see how important they are.

In certain ways the USAF is better than Naval Air when it comes to recapitalization of it’s assets (I hate to admit it). Look at the A-10C program- $1.8 B well spent I’d say. Ask the Army.

On the other hand, we in the Navy put all our eggs in the H-60 and Hornet product lines (save ILS dollars..) and divested ourselves of diversity, recap or otherwise. In order to buy our current crop of SuperHornets Navy bean-counters scorched the fiscal earth and robbed every program to fund those acquisitions. Every program was stripped by the “Black-led” TeamHornet sanctioned by “Teflon Johnson”, and some- like the S-3, with 20 years left in the airframe, were terminated with prejudice. Plus, as Mike M. points out above Hornets ARE wearing out- fast.

Want more?- IMO the V-22 program is the A-12 program- executed…$$$$$$.

Whew. Glad I got it all out before this slides to the next page.

b2

How many worn-out F-16s will turn up? How many used-up Hornets? Quite aside from the cost of patching up the P-3 fleet – or the ultimate cost of replacing SH-3s with SH-60s, and the S-3s with nothing at all.

We’re on the verge of being like the British in the 1960s…unwilling to keep our dues in the Superpower Club paid. Not an appealing prospect.

Hawaii Air National Guard is probably flying those early prototype aircraft that the test pilots flew in all the early tests and trials and now since they were the “not quite test to destruct” models, the regular air force pilots insisted that rather than scrapping these clapped out birds or forcing “real” air force pilots to fly them they should be flown by the usual crew that get worn out equipment except this time they selected the Hawaii Air Guard because this way, when the wings fall off, the planes will fall into the sea and be unrecoverable so the powers that be can claim they were lost due to pilot error…

OK, OK, TFIC but isn’t it a wonderful conspiracy theory? And it easily qualifies as one of the longest run-on sentences I’ve ever written.

Curtis