Doesn’t happen that often, for me. But there he is on the signature page.
Performance wise, the jet cannot be beat. But there’s blood in the water on the defense budget, with looming decisions on horizontal and vertical cuts. Without presidential intervention, the Raptor line will soon shut down, and as many as 95,000 jobs and $12 billion in economic activity are at stake.
SecDef Gates was not a fan of continued F-22 procurement, and famously lopped off USAF heads in order to get their attention when the service continued to lobby for new aircraft above the 183 already purchased rather than concentrate on getting more UAV-borne ISR for the Iraq fight. That was back before the impacts of Petraeus’ surge had rippled through Iraq’s body politic, and before a new president had been elected dedicated to withdrawing most US forces within 16 months – a goal that is now at least potentially possible without a shocking bloodbath and international humiliation. Afghanistan will get more forces, but the outlook there is dim without a fairly significant reduction in strategic goals. The new emphasis on counter-insurgency forces must rightly be considered in the context of small-scale support of fragile countries where we are offered willing access rather than forced entry operations on a massive scale – the appetite for that sort of thing has waned over the years.
The nation-breaking capabilities of the leviathan forces offers us a unique blend of foreign policy options, and makes bad actors world wide factor US interests in their strategic calculus. But once again, we appear to be preparing for the next war by fighting the last one.
And priorities have shifted.
Update: Speaking of last wars.
And based on that, so should go the FCS, F-35 JSF, Navy Dreadnoughts and some other things. The difference here though is that F-22 is fairly mature now. For the USAF F-22 and new buys of F-16s are good enough. The Just So Farcical Buick of Stealth is nothing more than hype ready to suck down a lot of dollars.
The U.S. is going to look ridiculous trying to maintain air domination on some expeditionary effort 20 years from now when the first Raptors get scheduled for retirement.
Operation Useless Dirt doesn’t provide real defense for the nation. The deterrence of air power does and allows for any low intensity conflict to operate.
The Brits of course were the first bad people to do Next-waritis. They developed the Spitfire between WWI and WWII.
From the link in your last, (“Condoms Stimulate, Raptors Don’t?”)
OK, if you say so, but it’s gonna have to be an AWFUL BIG condom…so as to promote safe flying, I think.
It will be utterly astounding if the far left allows 10,000-100,000 jobs to be lost in the Defense Industry while even Ted Kennedy fights to save them, during a war, to prevent, deter or win the next one.
ELP /
On tgt. W.O.air superiority everything else goes away as I’ve ranted about here before. BTW, did you happen to notice where they relocated the main fuel tank on the USMC VSTOL version of the 35 to make way for the lifting fan aft of the cockpit? Right UNDER the seat is all–only the most exposed area of the aircraft to AAA on CAS–or any kind of tactical msn–roll-in to tgt.
Lex, what are your thoughts on the JSF program? I am doing a term paper for my technical communications course advocating the buy of more Super Hornets vice the skyrocketing cost of the JSF program. From my research, the Navy is very happy, it seems, with the “Super,” despite some of its drawbacks, and the blue sky boys like the F-22, and would probably be delighted to field the F-16 for many years to come. Same goes for the A-10, with its unique capabilities. The Marines are banging the loudest drum for the JSF as they really have no other option for the missions they see themselves performing. Just wondering what you might think about this issue.
PS: That is a great “moderation”/spam warning.
Virgil, as they say, the USMC would rather spend a man than a dollar. Not any more. This way they do both at once.
From a purely selfish standpoint, I hope it doesn’t get cut. I love my job. I’ve been working on this a/c for over four years now and its been a real pleasure.
I’ve worked on various a/c and although the C17 was always a favorite of mine, this aircraft could very well surpass it for me.
WOTN/
Never under-estimate how much elements of the far left (the non-blue collar intellectuals who are always parading their fealty to the working man) hate and despise all things military–besides, all those laid off blue collar workers can walk right across the street and get better-paying jobs in the “Green” industries that Obama promises will invigorate America and provide “meaningful” employment, right?
(And the war-mongering Yankee Air Pirates who would fly those aircraft can all enroll in “re-education” camps to rid themselves of their imperialist, sexist, racist, killing instincts)
Now, the real question: How did you escape my blogroll/typelists (corrected) for so long?
Virgil: I find the article “On Sheep, Wolves, and Sheepdogs” by LTC Grossman to best describe the differences in the basic human psychology towards violence.
Unfortunately, we have Wolves in Shepherds clothing feasting on the Sheep we call the electorate. And no matter how logically I can rationalize the sheep mentality, I still am astounded at the illogic they verbalize.
Preserving Jobs to Protect the Nation: F-22 Raptor…
A Source of Our Military Successes and our Homeland Security is by maintaining our Military on the cutting edge of Military Technology. In today’s world where technology often outpaces production, we cannot afford to be on the sidelines while our……
Somethings gotta give on all this but I only agree to condom stimulation (there’s a pun there- somewhere) of the economy only if Democrats wear them stretched over their heads….
Chris,
You could be considered a genius for making that case. LOL. Not at you.
Bou,
You got a pretty loud engine there with some serious heating problems; would you like to live at the 180 with a pattern full of Lightening’s doing FCLPs? Ask hubby.
b2
Lex, this whole business of preparing for the last war troubles me.
Because Iraq IS the last war.
Let’s get serious. The Iraq campaign verified something that a lot of students of American military history had realized for a while…that the American public is not willing to support a war for much longer than three years. During the Civil War, World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam, and now Iraq, the American public was initially enthusiastic. But after three years of fighting, they started to look for either victory or disengagement. If the voters see neither, they will eviscerate the party in power…as they did in 2006 and 2008.
And counterinsurgency is, by its nature, a prolonged process. It requires patience that Americans lack, and a forebearance that is alien to our national psyche. We are a Jacksonian people…we like our wars violent and short.
Shifting the emphasis of DOD to counterinsurgency is shifting scarce resources away from fighting techniques that we CAN use to those we WON”T use. It represents a willingness to throw away our advantages and fight the way our opponents want.
Not a good recipe for victory.
Does anybody see John McCain’s signature on the list?
I can’t read half the signatures on there. I wish they were typed under their scribbles.
McCains’s is not on there. Among others John Kerry, Barbara Boxer and Chris Dodd’s are….