Does The U.S. Navy Cares If The F-35 Cannot Win In A 'Dogfight'?

 F-35C. U.S. Navy and Lockheed Martin photo.

David Axe, War Is Boring: The U.S. Navy Doesn’t Seem to Care That The F-35 Can’t Dogfight

To the sailing branch, the stealth fighter is a sensor.

In trials off the California coast in January 2015, a 1980s-vintage U.S. Air Force F-16 repeatedly defeated one of the flying branch’s brand-new F-35A Joint Strike Fighter stealth jets in mock dogfights. “The F-35 was at a distinct energy disadvantage,” the unnamed JSF pilot wrote in a scathing five-page brief that War Is Boring obtained.

The test report is the latest proof that the F-35 — which Lockheed Martin is developing for the U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marines and a host of American allies — is an inferior fighter in close combat compared to much older planes. Complex and heavy, the JSF “can’t turn, can’t climb, can’t run,” to quote one infamous 2008 war game report.

But the U.S. Navy — the third-largest purchaser of F-35s — seems unperturbed. Indeed, in recent planning the Navy describes the JSF less as a traditional fighter than as radar-evading, flying sensor and communications node.

The Navy apparently doesn’t care that its F-35C version of the stealth jet — as well as the Marines’ F-35B model — is a poor performer in raw kinetic terms. In the sailing branch’s evolving battle scheme, the JSF will focus on finding targets … for older F/A-18 fighters and missile-armed warships to shoot down.

WNU Editor: The paper work is already being processed to make the F-35B operational .... Marine Corps Will ‘Soon’ Announce F-35 Ready for Initial Operations (DoD Buzz). In the meantime .... the problems with the F-35 (and the negative reportage) continues to build-up .... Lockheed F-35’s Reliability Found Wanting in Shipboard Testing (Bloomberg).