Posted: Dec 26, 2014 5:32 pm
And the hits just keep on coming:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... ce=twitter
One of the real problems with drawing up specs for technological equipment is that the technology advances during the development and production cycle, leading equipment to sometimes be near-obsolete by the time it becomes available. The answer to this is massive flexibility - but the over-arching desire to keep the F-35 airframe as stealthy as possible (despite indicators that stealth advantages are a thing of the past in the fighter world) has made flexibility a low-level concern.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... ce=twitter
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.
“The F-35 will, in my opinion, be 10 years behind legacy fighters when it achieves [initial operational capability],” said one Air Force official affiliated with the F-35 program. “When the F-35 achieves [initial operational capability], it will not have the weapons or sensor capability, with respect to the CAS [close air support] mission set, that legacy multi-role fighters had by the mid-2000s.”
One of the real problems with drawing up specs for technological equipment is that the technology advances during the development and production cycle, leading equipment to sometimes be near-obsolete by the time it becomes available. The answer to this is massive flexibility - but the over-arching desire to keep the F-35 airframe as stealthy as possible (despite indicators that stealth advantages are a thing of the past in the fighter world) has made flexibility a low-level concern.