I've struggled mightily to explain why the F-35 is such a bad buy for the USMC in particular and the US military in general.
I've never questioned the STOVL operating concept. Never doubted the tech that is stuffed inside the F-35. I have questioned its level of agility and speed, but mostly I've questioned its COST!
Paralus said it better than I ever have in a comment that I'm turning into a post. His comment follows....
Sol hasn't been a basher of the F35, but he has been a basher of the cost of it. And it is a factor that nobody who has posted in this thread who still supports the F35 has addressed...ever. They are still partying like it's 1999.And make no mistake. The current JCS is building the force that will go to war in the future.
There has been a sea change in how this country views national defense, both in terms of whether we should become entangled in foreign adventures AND whether we should pay for it. The defense budget has been nearly sacrosanct since the early 1950's. But that changed with the Sequester. It opened up, for both political parties, opportunities to question whether we should or are even able to be the world's only superpower. Just five years ago, this was unthinkable, yet now it is routine. And for the most part, the answer people keep coming up with is, "no".
The service chiefs haven't realized it, the defense contractors haven't realized it, a huge portion of the blogosphere hasn't realized it yet, but smaller defense budgets via the Sequester AND an unwillingness by the American public to involve ourselves in foreign entanglements spell out the future: the good times are over.
Yes, our defense budget is huge, but a lot of that is personnel costs, tricare, veterans benefits, pay increases during OEF/OIF, etc. There are no longer any blank checks being floated to the services any more.
And what are the service chiefs offering as ways to save money? cutting personnel and BRAC.
The Navy is talking about reducing the number of carriers down to below 9. The Army is talking about reducing the total personnel below 400,000. The Air Forces wants to retire more teen-series fighters and A-10s. Amos wants to turn the USMC into a slightly beefier version of the Royal Marines. They don't get it. Once the services dump all those people, the service will NEVER, EVER get them back.
what the fuck good is the US Navy with 200 ships and 7 carriers?
what the fuck good is a US Army with 380,000 men?
what the fuck good is a USAF with 1500 fighters?
what the fuck good is a USMC that can only conduct commando raids and evacuate US citizens?
Because the question once we go down to those force sizes, we have to honestly ask whether the US can actually perform the missions we assign it. Can we reinforce South Korea? Can we defend Taiwan? Can we deploy to take out Iran?
Once we open up the Pandora's box of 'why do we need forces of this size', we release the evil spirits of "why do we even need forces?"
"Why do we need to protect Taiwan or the Philippines?"
"Why do we need to protect Israel?"
"why should we keep the Straights of Hormuz open?" and eventually
"Why do we need anything besides a military just big enough to protect the USA?"
and then you will see an explosion of international arms races because because people will realize the US cannot impose its will any longer so they no longer have to worry about whether they can invade their neighbor. The only countries that will be safe are the ones with nukes which means you will see widespread nuke races.
So, ask yourselves, do you want the F35 so much that you are willing to see a US Military so anemic that it can't project force abroad? what good will the F35 be then? Why would it even be worth projecting force abroad if we don't have the forces big enough to do perform the mission?
so, I ask the delusional schmucks here who don't get it yet, is the F35 that good that it is worth trashing US force sizes?
Or maybe, just maybe, we need to start looking at an 80% solution instead of the F35 so we can afford to keep forces large enough to actually perform the missions we expect of it?
I'll be even more direct:
ReplyDeletehow many BCTs is the F35 worth?
how many aircraft carriers or nuclear subs is the F35 worth?
how many A10/KC10/F15C wings is the F35 worth?
in the Dark Age of the Sequester, you can have force size or you can have gold-plated platforms, but you can't have both.
That goes for the Navy and the LCS (they seem to have answered the question by freezing levels at 24 ships) and the Army with the GCS/AMPV/JLTV. How many carriers are your other toys worth? How many BCTs will you sacrifice for new armor?
"People, Ideas, Hardware - IN THAT ORDER! Platforms don't fight wars, people do."
Business as usual is over. We have to look at everything we have done for 60 years and ask how we can do it different.
Force structure, composition, procurement. If we want to be relevant, we have to do things differently and do it better so we stay relevant.
A lot of good points but it's also important to remember that the F-35 is just the poster child for what's happening, not the entire problem. Procurement costs are spiralling out of control everywhere: look at what a Zumwalt "destroyer" (bigger than a WWII heavy cruiser) costs, the Army wants a GCV that's bigger (and I bet more expensive) than an Abrams . . . the list goes on and on and every time force structure, people and readiness are sacrificed for the newest, shiniest toys.
ReplyDeleteThe F-35 is the most visible, and in many ways the most important, example of killing force structure to pay for huge, over-complicated platforms, but it is just the latest in a long string of procurement failures.
exactly. I'll be honest, I've been following the F35 since it was JAST, then JSF and was always pumped about it. But the costs and performance shortcomings have convinced me it is a program not worth it.
DeleteIt really is just the canary in the coal mine. There are a raft of programs that are problematic either because they were started back before the Sequester or the costs have ballooned out of proportion. Can we design anything that doesn't turn into a contractor boondoggle?
Even programs that are well-managed like the GCS have to be reviewed. Can we afford the GCS as a from-the-ground-up 100% gold-plated platform? Or does the CBO recommendation of picking an Off-the-Shelf platform like Namer or Puma make sense?
Now that the Navy is freezing the LCS at 20+ ships ( I doubt they'll even built that many), is it better to just look at a MEKO license-built for a US platform?
We have to look at successes like the Oliver Hazard Perry FFG class, A-10s, F-16s and develop the acquisitions discipline to prevent design committees from developing design-creep monstrosities.
C'mon, we're Americans. We can design anything and build it better than anybody. Let's not just accept the shit the Lockheed Martins try to foist upon as the standard.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteUsing the class people assign to ship and then comparing it to the weight of the ship is so very 1960s. No one has classed ships appropriately for quite some time. The Burkes certainly aren't destroyers in anything except name either considering their weight either. It just easier and nicer to call cruisers as destroyers, destroyers as frigates, frigates as corvettes or patrol craft, and corvettes as patrol craft. It makes them seem smaller and more reasonable.
DeleteAs far as the OHP/LCS issue, the LCS format as it currently stands stems mainly from looking at the OHP success which largely has to do with a smaller ship with a helicopter. Nothing else about the OHP is of much use nor has ever been of much use. It is a ship that has lived and survived via its aviation capabilities. And that is why the LCS ended up so aviation centric.
If you just want to replace the OHP with a comparable ship, you aren't going to do better than licensing the French/Singapore Formidable class.
And if you want crap like the F35 issues to stop, then you are going to have to be more socialist and get the government directly involved in design like they were in the past. You are going to have to resurrect organizations like the Navy Ship Board, etc, to oversee, drive, and design the equipment the US uses. You are going to have to have the US government take ownership of US military designs, cause through the machinations of the military industrial complex and free market capitalists, the US military is sitting in both works as far as procurement is concerned. We don't own anything, we pay for all the R&D, and we pay for the production but at retail rather than wholesale pricing. Its a gold mine for the defense contractors who get all their costs and risks guaranteed by the US government and still get all the upside.
http://navy-matters.blogspot.com/2012/05/carriers-its-air-wing-that-matters.html
ReplyDeleteI guess the critics will say this guy has no clue what he is talking about but numbers are numbers, number of air wings and platforms on US carriers keeps getting smaller and smaller, the trend won't stop with F35, it will just increase!
The question will be asked one day why are we buying carriers so big and expensive when the wings are getting smaller????
Just one example among many that US needs to address....
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeletesend me an e-mail. if you want back in you have explaining to do.
Deletei will
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteI work everyday so I was away from my computer, came back and saw 14 comments, I thought, cool, will be interesting debate. Kind of disappointed to see so many comments deleted, I am guessing that it wasn't very polite or constructive...
ReplyDeleteMore money wasted, little to no accountability and no debate or discussion about what is needed or could be disposed off....
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2013/09/13/Nuclear-Waste-Agency-Racks-16B-Cost-Overruns
I guess the mind set of some people here is that the private contractors/military leadership are always right, never waste money and should never be questioned, as long as it's for "defense" of America, it's all good.....
Sorry, folks if my comment is a bit off-topic.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with the F35 being cost prohibitive. It's LockMart's fault why they want to price their product that way. I still don't have the idea why they want to build LESS. You make your price so high, you will build less. You make your price low and you will build MORE. I think somehwere in LockMart, some yo-yo is thinking "Let's price this HIGH and get these muppets to buy MORE".
Another thing, if this F35 takes off (no pun intended) you could see the future in commercial aviation. No more runways.
Financially, it doesn't matter to LockMart if the F35 enters full rate production or not. They make a lot of their money on the R&D and early build planes. If the F35 gets cancelled short then that just means another FXX program starts up that they can make money from.
DeleteAnd STOVL has no future in commercial aviation. Its purely a military need/requirement. And even there, it is not long for this work. LHAs/LHDs could pretty reasonably be built with EMag Cats and EMag BAR for a minimal difference in cost. Certainly less than the cost required to make STOVL aircraft. So, sooner or later some bean counter will realize it and will tell the USMC to plan for a future without STOVL.
Here goes:
DeleteEveryone who follows procurement these days seems to think that Lockheed martin is some sort of evil monster that wants to destroy the US/Western militaries with the F-35.
That isn't true at all. Mr. Kram, as for the F-35s cost, the cost is dropping every LRIP contract. According to estimates, which have been accurate so far, an F-35A should cost 75 million, and a F-35B should cost 83 million, and an F-35C should cost 80 million.
that is more than what everyone (stupidly) though in 2002 when the X-35 won, but that's what happens. Costs go up.
Now, the F-35 is not some 4.5 gen jet that is an "evolution" of a 70s era design or a Eurocanard. It is a 5th generation stealth fighter with AESA radar, EO-DAS (essentially 360 degree IRST with missile tracking and IR laser countermeasures) a built in EO targeting pod, essentially a Sniper XR pod in the chin, and "sensor fusion", and a helmet counted display.
It can carry 4 AMRAAMS internally, or 2 AMRAAMs and 2 2,000lb JDAMS (2 1,000lb JDAMS in the F-35B, due to the lift fan) or 2 AMRAAMs and 2 AIM-9Xs. In addition to the internal stores, which DO NOT compromise it's stealth, it can carry weapons on 6 under-wing pylons, and 1 belly pylon.
On the F-35B and C, the belly pylon will carry a 25mmm canon in a stealth pod.
Now, the JSF program was incredibly optimistic from the start, especially the VSTOL provision. If that wasn't in the requirement, the program would be on schedule.
The helmet is being fixed, with the new helmets being built by Elbit coming into the test fleet this fall. Software fixes have been deployed on the older ones, and the marines were flying and landing the B model at sea a few weeks back, so I guess it works.
Lockheed wants to make as MANY F-35s as it can, just like it wants to make lots of F-16s.
As for Mr. ats (nice car), tell my where those LHDs are getting the power for those EMALS systems with no nuclear reactor?
Where is the emals going to be installed? At what cost?
Everyone here isn't an F-35 fan, but what is the alternative?
Continued production of F-16s, F-15s, and F-18s? All of those jets are 70s era. Sure, you can pop in an AESA radar and other goodies, but that will degrade performance.
A brand new F-16 Block 50/52 costs about 45 million. An F-16 can't internally mount a targeting pod as there is no room. However, you can add an AESA radar, and a IRST system.
A F-15 SE is still essentially a prototype, but will cost about 100 million dollars according to Boeing. So it's actually more expensive than an F-35 will cost.
A BRAND new Super Hornet block 2 costs 67 million USD. A Block 3, with CFTs, weapons pods, built in IRST and targeting chin will probably cost about 5-10 million more. That's F-35 money there. And no matter how much RAM you put on a Super Hornet, it is STILL not a designed from scratch stealth jet.
Plus, those harriers will never be stealthy, and are subsonic.
if what you listed was the actual cost of the airplane right here, right now...then the USMC would be getting its MPC. but we both know its not. its dramatically higher and you're clouding the issue by using PROJECTED full rate production numbers. if what you posted was the real price then S. Korea would have bought the airplane.
Deletethey didn't.
Here's some simple math...
DeleteIf an F-15 SE will fully paid development costs and manufacturing depreciation costs 100 mil, how in the world do you think the F-35 which has still has significant development costs and requires completely new manufacturing will be less than it...
And the same applies to the SH cost comparison.
There is no way, no how, that the F-35 is coming in cheaper than 100 mil.
As far as powering emals, the existing LHA-6 design has more than enough electrical power for it. While capacitors may be exotic tech to you, they have been pretty mundane for decades.
See, a rational argument? wasn't so hard, was it?
DeleteGotta link to those cost estimates? Because I have seen no estimates in that range.
let's look at alternatives:
It is slower, less maneuverable and doesn't have the legs for the Pacific, so it really isn't good as an A-to-A fighter. Yeah, some might say with 360 awareness and being able to see THRU it's body with the helmet, it doesn't need to be maneuverable. Maybe you don't for off-bore angle firing, but you do need to be maneuverable to dodge incoming missiles, right?
So that makes it more appropriate for strike missions. Stealthy, right?
I have yet to hear of a good reason why strike missions, in an era of S-400s, need to be manned? What does it do that a cruise-missile or drone can't?
Nor have I heard as to why, with the plans hacked by the Chinese (assuming it isn't disinformation and or false data planted by the US), and with new low-freq radars being fielded by Russians and Chinese in aircraft and SAM systems, why the F-35 is going to be 'stealthy'? I know I am not privy to classified data about US Stealth technology, but neither has anyone in this blog. Maybe the F35 has such technology but I have yet to hear about it or even heard it alluded to in public.
well, with this nifty little piece of tech, those IR guided missiles will be blind: http://www.aviationweek.com/Article.aspx?id=/article-xml/awx_09_12_2013_p0-615904.xml
DeletePretty cool huh?
Those low-frequency radars are completely untested, and that kind of tech was know to Lockheed designers back in the early 2000s, so I am guessing they were/ are accounted for.
Remember, stealth doesn't equal invulnerable, it means you are VERY hard to detect. It gives you extra time to get close and deliver weapons.
David,
ReplyDeleteDefense budget is no longer is unlimited. Nearly all countries are experiencing budget cuts. Yet the costs of the hardware are going up. LockMart, Boeing ... they are operating as if anyone and everyone still have money to spend.
I understand that the manufacturers need to recoup their investments. But to what cost? How much is the true manufacturing cost is a single F35A, as an example, and how much is the fly-away cost?
My point is: Make your product AFFORDABLE so customers can AFFORD to purchase your product.
well, the customer, the US DoD asked for a jet that could do X, Y, and Z.
DeleteIt had to be stealthy, supersonic, take off from a carrier, and have a VSTOL variant. Lockheed delivered, but all those requirements sure as hell aren't going to be cheap.
Welcome back David!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.aviationweek.com/Article.aspx?id=/article-xml/awx_09_12_2013_p0-615904.xml
If the F35 is so great, why is this being installed to defeat AAMs and SAMs? I thought the whole point of 360 degree situational awareness was to shoot first and not be targeted?
I am no expert on LRIPS, PUCs, fly a costs, etc...but the costs don't look so rosy. They would need to come down significantly just to buy it and then cost to operate a not coming down close to F16/F18 levels....
http://www.airforcemag.com/MagazineArchive/Pages/2009/August%202009/0809issbf.aspx
http://www.aviationweek.com/awmobile/Article.aspx?id=/article-xml/AW_08_05_2013_p30-602514.xml&p=2
the jammer is being installed the same reason chaff and flares are installed on jets today.
DeleteIf an IR missile gets a lock, the NG laser system will blind it. Any extra protection is a good thing. Besides, stealth is to deal with radar guided AA weapons. An IR guided weapon doesn't care how stealthy a jet is, just how hot it is.
And unlike with flares, as long as the jet is producing power, the laser system will work.
Plus,l since it's a laser, it can be easily modulated to deal with changes to seeker heads, unlike flares.
Also, it will smoothly integrate into the existing EO-DAS system.
Could this be retrofitted onto the teen series jets?
probably, but not with major airframe changes.
oh, also, the linked AF mag article is 4 years out of date.
DeleteThe Aviationweek article clearly shows continual cost decreases, and by LRIP 7, the A will be below 100 million a jet (airframe)
Engines are negotiated separately.
Also, each LRIP is less than 38 jets a year. Full rate will be 200 plus.
Now we ALL know the F-35 will probably never drop below 70 million a jet, but neither will the Typhoon or the "I can't win an export order" Rafale.
David you do know that the Rafale won in India right?
DeleteWell, there you have it.
ReplyDeleteNow onto matters that support the Corps' reemphasis of amphibious assault capability, including frontline capability without FFG/DDGs becoming #4 of the 3-vessel ARG per MEU...
How about it Sol. Are you game ?
Lt. Gen. Christopher Bogdan, F-35 Program Executive Officer, is set to address the Air Force Association’s annual conference on Sep 17. Probably he will address F-35 cost. Six months ago, Bogdan said that a $90 million price tag would be acceptable to the Pentagon and to JSF international partners.
ReplyDeleteWinslow Wheeler has reported LRIP costs as:
A -- 2014 $188.5m
B/C -- 2014 $277.9m
@Don, sorry bud but for Pro-F35 crowd, Winslow Wheeler is a big no-no. Just like Sweetman or APA. You can't use any of their numbers, even when they come from LMT, they become tainted with Anti-F35 stink.
ReplyDeleteNico -- sorry back to ya bud -- I'm a dinosaur, one of those who still goes with the 1st amendment, and WW has the numbers based on extensive research as explained in his series of F-35 articles found here.
Deletehttp://nation.time.com/author/winslowwheeler/
My bad, I forgot ELP, never quote him either.
ReplyDeletehttp://elpdefensenews.blogspot.com/2012/01/f-35-production-cut-update.html
Yeah, we are getting every day closer to 200 a year in production. Nice ramp up, no problems there.
F-35 costs are not coming down. Look at the fine print on the "8% cost reductions" and you'll see that LockMart is exempted from the update cost to fix known problems with those airframes: it's a lot easier to cut costs when you freeze production specs even though the airplane specs are changing all the time. LockMart will more than make up that 8% on the retrofit costs, but the F-35 got a PR victory and that's all that matters, not reality.
ReplyDeleteThe F-35 is still insanely expensive. All of the 'low' costs are based on huge learning curve benefits except:
-- the design's not stable. There's still large numbers of engineering changes across all models and this laser jammer is just another example. It is far easier to stick something like that in a pod on non-stealth plane than the huge effort and expense to stick something new onto the outer skin of a stealth airplane.
-- even if the design was stable, there's the F-22 example. F-22 costs came down substantially as LockMart progressed from a chaotic job shop to an actual production line (the same incompetence showed up with the F-35) but then leveled off, showing little or no further improvement. If the F-35 goes on that curve, all the cost estimates are crap.
Bingo! those retrofits to LRIP and production models before the bugs are fixed will add to the cost. Lockheed Martin isn't freezing pricing or doing the government any favors. They are going recoup money later thru adding the updates that should have been included in the first place but aren't because they don't work yet.
DeleteLockheed has fired off a missile at the enemy -- Canada.
ReplyDeletenews report:
Orlando Carvalho, executive vice-president of aeronautics at Lockheed Martin, delivered this cautionary message in Montreal on Friday. He said Canadian companies can keep the roughly $500-million in fighter-related contracts they have, but no more F-35 work would be likely for this country if Ottawa does not embrace the Lockheed plane.
“If, in fact, the Canadian government were to decide not to select the F-35, we will certainly honour the contracts that we have here with the Canadian industry, but our approach in the future would be to try to do business with the industries that are in the countries that are buying the airplane,” Mr. Carvalho said while opening an engine overhaul facility in Montreal.
There's an excellent JSF article in Vanity Fair -- "Will It Fly?"
ReplyDeletehttp://www.vanityfair.com/politics/2013/09/joint-strike-fighter-lockheed-martin
a few key statements:
* a plane that costs at least five times as much as its predecessor will initially deploy carrying one third as much ordnance and no gun whatsoever.
* According to the Government Accountability Office (G.A.O.), which is relatively independent, the price tag for each F-35 was supposed to be $81 million when the program began in October 2001. Since that time, the price per plane has basically doubled, to $161 million.
* on the helmet, which in many ways is the centerpiece of the Joint Strike Fighter -- even if designers can deal with latency and jitter, the resolution of the video is “fatally inferior” compared with the human eye when it comes to confronting enemy aircraft.
* the commandant of the Marine Corps plans to announce that his planes are ready for combat before operational testing proves they are ready for combat.