Reuters
Newest U.S. Stealth Fighter ‘10 Years Behind’ Older Jets -- Dave Majumdar, Daily Beast
America’s $400 billion, top-of-the-line aircraft can’t see the battlefield all that well. Which means it’s actually worse than its predecessors at fighting today’s wars.
When the Pentagon’s nearly $400 billion F-35 Joint Strike Fighter finally enters service next year after nearly two decades in development, it won’t be able to support troops on the ground the way older planes can today. Its sensors won’t be able to see the battlefield as well; and what video the F-35 does capture, it won’t be able to transmit to infantrymen in real time.
Versions of the new single-engine stealth fighter are set to replace almost every type of fighter in the U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps inventory—including aircraft specifically designed to support ground troops like the A-10 Warthog. That will leave troops in a lurch when the F-35 eventually becomes the only game in town.
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My Comment: The problems for this fighter jet just keeps on climbing.
Could join a long list of weapons designed to do almost everything and end up not being good at anything.
ReplyDeleteMy impression of this situation as an electrician, is that the Marines, Army, Navy, and Air Force are like separate construction trades and the F35 is like a leatherman Multi tool that is supposed to replace all of the various hand tools in all the trades. One package that contains all the inferior tools of the trades. Useful as a novelty or quick go to tool but not designed to replace a professional tool kit. The kind of tool someone would build and test in a laboratory that would fall to pieces in the real world.
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