JSF, Let Me Count The Ways...

[Kurt Plummer]

Knowing how much I /just love/ the F-35...

From this article-

The Link

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ARNOLD AIR FORCE BASE: Arnold Engineering Development Center officials just completed aerodynamic testing on two variants of the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter to support flight testing of the plane later this year.
With this latest test, the AEDC staff surpassed 8,000 hours of JSF testing in the center's propulsion wind tunnel facility in support of the system design and development phase of the program.
>>

You cannot flight test STOVL in anything but full scale because the flow modeling is too complex to predict and the power thresholds for balanced thrust posts just not predictable.

>>
High-speed force and moment data gathered from a conventional takeoff and landing, or CTOL, and short takeoff/vertical landing, or STOVL, F-35 models will go into a database. That information will be added to computer-aided analysis for performance analysis and flight control design and validation before flight testing can begin.
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Irony of ironies, Lunchmeat have bragged for ages about how 'common' to the CDA variants their PWSC/SDD configured versions would be. Yet with working 1:1 prototypes, they are doing it all in a tunnel.

>>
"This is the final high-speed test for our CTOL and STOVL aerodynamic performance and stability control databases on our 1/12-scale model," said Kim Kohrs, an F-35 stability and control analyst with Lockheed Martin.
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With a scale model.

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"We've done various testing of low speed and high speed unpowered force and moment testing for CTOL and STOVL through the years. This test is our last entry to conclude those databases."
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Puhleeze. It may be the last entry in the prediction calcs. Until you have actual flight-test data, all the CFD and tunnel/drop test data in the world doesn't mean much. Not least because you ONLY NOW have a production configured airframe with auxilliary systems located where they need to be. And operational weapons bays/wing stations.

>>
"This test, along with aerodynamic testing on the Navy's carrier version later this year, will finish up all of our scheduled F-35 wind tunnel testing during the system development and demonstration phase." said Marc Skelley, Air Force project manager in AEDC's 716th Test Squadron.
>>

Which is really just Lunchmeat desperately trying to look 'ready for instant production go!' so that Congress doesn't shift rightwards (delay rampup funding) the schedule in a way that increases the cost of a jet that is already 200% of it's initial promised price. And will become closer to an 500 percent of this by the time R&D costs are factored into an airframe which started out as a 30 million dollar promise. Was bought as a 45-50 million dollar guarantee. And is now 'around' 112 million dollars per unit.

Another 'nice to know' element being the fact that the CTOL jet (the one which is easiest to certify) is NOT the produciton configured one but rather the airframe design before all the emergency weight savings measures were implemented. i.e. Even overweight by upwards of 2,500lbs, it will likely make it's D/IOTE peformance benchmarks sufficiently to be cleared into production _because_ it is a CTOL (long runway, no STOVL margin or Rhodan sized wing to pork up drag quotients and the like).

But neither it nor it's 'derivatives' will be to the final service configuration, as built. Which is why Lunchmeat is throwing everything they have at making it seem like 'as goes one, so goes them all'. Since the 'real McCoy' won't be flying until like 2008 and 2009 for the USCM/USN versions. And they can't afford to wait while the cost keepsa creepin'.

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The CTOL F-35 is the Air Force variant that will replace the F-15 Eagle and A-10 Thunderbolt II and complement the F-22 Raptor. The U.S. Marine Corps is due to receive the STOVL F-35 variant to replace the AV-8B Harrier and F/A-18 Hornet. The United Kingdom's Royal Air Force and Royal Navy also will fly the STOVL variant.
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Well, asside from the /HIGHLY IRRITATING/ attempt to reshuffle the deck with the F-35 as the new face card a standin for the either the Albino or Mudhen Eagles now that they have destroyed the Raptor program economics (With all of 2 missiles and 2 JDAM internally? Riiiiight...).

And the equally DUMB notion that you need a stealth asset to perform Hog-CAS (where the likelihood of things-under-wings is nearly 100% and loiter means more than LO but not airframe exposure @ cost in terms of finding targets for all EIGHT GBU-39 you will likely have available, even internally).

The politics here are ones of 'stand together or die alone' vis a vis the RAF purchase of the JSF. In all likelihood, this was part and parcel of the 'trade' whereby the U.S. whored it's LO lead on the guarantee that the F-35 would be the FOAS/FJCA followon in a much larger purchase than was originally stated to be likely given the UKs 'two deck' requirement for 60-100 jets.

Of course, it's still surprising that they intend to make their landbased version STOVL capable to support the RN carrier commitment ala the Harrier joint force. Because frankly the sortie percentages just don't support even a RAF controlled contribution and the GR.9 Harrier still has a lot of life in it (given the F-35 is seen as a SHAR replacement in the FADF role).

The STOVL loses almost 30% of it's fuel and is heavy with a small wing besides. Even if you further assume that the jet won't suffer a major RCS penalty with all those SDLF and side nozzle doors (which I do not) the penetration radius will not be up to par for the modern threat matrixes we are seeing in terms of 'First you stand out to sea 200-300nm to avoid the coastal defense AShM/mine/sub threat, -then- you go inshore another 300-400nm to find a target, unsupported, (the RN have no tankers)'.

I suppose if you are buying stock and counting beans this has some relevance but in truth, it comes off highly unprofessional if not an outright insult in either the writing or the strategic planning intelligence of those who look at such things for cues to economic prospects and RMA modernization.

Long live the JSF! In the frosty depths of...


KPl.

 

[swerve]

Tell me about it . . .

We should be building CTOL carriers & buying either Rafale or F-35C.

BTW, the one and only (& not yet flying) F-35 still isn't a production configured airframe. AFAIK it's externally the same as the production version, but there are significant structural differences.

Although I rarely find myself telling someone their JSF cost is too high, that $112 mn incorporates assumptions about future inflation which may or may not be right, & so could (just possibly ) be too high. It also includes fixed costs, so it's dependent on the number bought, & would go up if the number is cut.

I prefer a price in current day money, when one is available. A programme cost in 2006 $ can be derived from the SAR by multiplying the 2002 cost by a suitable inflation index. If you use the GDP deflator (a bit lower than the US defence budget inflation index), which has conveniently risen almost exactly 10% since 2002, so making the arithmetic very easy, you get a forecast programme cost of $94.3 mn in 2006 dollars.

The average 2006$ flyaway cost is currently predicted at $55 mn, & average unit procurement cost excluding fixed costs at $76 mn. But those are dependent on the mix of models: the F-35A predicted flyaway is ca $51.7 mn, the others about $66 mn ($47 mn & $60 mn in 2002 $). And I've never heard of a project where the price was accurately predicted 10 years in the future.

 

[Kurt Plummer]

Swerve,

>>
We should be building CTOL carriers & buying either Rafale or F-35C.
>>

GAO and CBO were predicting 60-70 million dollar PAUC numbers as early as 1997. /Congress/ refused funding in 1994 when the USAF tried to do another endrun under 'just a technology demonstrator' LWF style as a 28-32-35 million dollar wonder jet.

Mike O'Hanlon was saying 65 for the A-CTOL and 77 for the C-CVTOL in 2000.

Yet when they made the production award announcement (why kid ourselves) for SDD in October 2001, the best that Roche and the Chief Marine In Charge could manage was an undertone whispered "45-50 million, next question..." that refused to say which variant or in what considered dollars.

Don't tell me that these folks don't know a pig in a poke when they see it. This is pure A-12 'pass the buck not the blame' in action until the known-it-all-along pricetag is matched to a no-other-choices-left mandate of treasure for treasures sake.

_Most Especially_ when the USN and USMC agreed 'on their own' to chop their combined orders to less than half that of their original buy, in 1998.

>>
BTW, the one and only (& not yet flying) F-35 still isn't a production configured airframe. AFAIK it's externally the same as the production version, but there are significant structural differences.
>>

Oh please.

That's THREE different airplanes sharing the same name! Something they also knew about when they had to redesign the wingroot lapjoint THREE TIMES before they got the loads inboard of the root to match those outboard with the silly idea of Tomcat style landing gear (long stroke, HUGE cutouts) and the 2,000lb JDAM well. Now they've chopped up the electronics routing so bad that the USMC version is not even /capable/ of GBU-31 carriage internally and gotten away from a 3,400-4,100lb weight overage by chopping into the STOVL models around-the-boat margins which of course means _gas_.

Heck, I wouldn't be surprised, with the F135 blowtorch SFC, if they didn't have worse radius in the B than they do in the Harrier II. 'External CAS loads' or no.

This is what STOVL bought us.

This is what refusing to mandate that the LM protottypes include things like production landing gear, a weapons bay, wingfolds and full fuel.

>>
Although I rarely find myself telling someone their JSF cost is too high, that $112 mn incorporates assumptions about future inflation which may or may not be right, & so could (just possibly ) be too high. It also includes fixed costs, so it's dependent on the number bought, & would go up if the number is cut.
>>

I have no mercy for LunchMeat (Baloney Inc.). They 'bought in' to the ATF tech base and then got the rug swept out from under (predictably) when Congress heard it wouldn't be exported and numbers were forceably dropped every year that our grand and glorious legislators refused EMD funding for it.

They then 'releveraged' their massive debt into the JSF with the same con men promises of a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow yet are are now looking at a U.S. buy less than half that of the original 3,000 promised, even as the Euros may at last be positioning themselves for a consortia program that completely leapfrogs Gen-5 into Gen-6 as a no-training required, half-manned flyaway cost, EADS UCAV that makes the JSF logistics look like yesterdays news in terms of both MMH:FH and total flying hours DCO.

DO NOT TELL ME that, with the USN/USMC 'independent decision' to halve their buys a **Historical Fact**. And the USAF having begun to mutter about only needing 1,100-1,200 airframes (vice the 1,763 that Congress wants to stabilize FMF numbers) within a year of Iraq starting that the highly Harvard Business School grads in LMs bean counter division could not see the writing on the wall for their business case taking a toilet dive!.

They and the services, with Congress as a now passive-again conspirator, are engaged in an Antideficiency Act Violation so huge it makes the Mafia and Drug Lords COMBINED look like chumps just off the vegetable truck. 191 billion becomes 276 billion _PLUS_ another 347 billion over the life of the program?!

**Utter Nonsense.**

Nobody makes that kind of financial misstep without knowing about it well in advance. And they have as much as admitted to being tagteamed twice in a row by utterly untrustworthy service/legislative is evident by the fact that LM are now so desperate as to 'hint at ongoing studies' for F-35 UCAVs. '3% cheaper'? Baaaah. Talk 50% cheaper to buy and 70% cheaper to operate and maybe I'll listen Saber Warriorists.

IMO, they should all hang by their genitals until they reach high falsetto as an object lesson in what happens when you screw with the Public Exchequer.

It would cost _less money_ to hand back the funds for ALL the Tier partners. Shovel out another 35 billion for restart on J-UCAS (this time keeping the manned uber alles USAF bigots slimey fingers off of it) and then invest another 30-40 billion in a _common basing mode_ capable UCAV that can, with 1,500 aircraft, serve both USAF and USN needs.

Don't laugh, we now have 'Joint Training Commands', this is the next step.

Our manpower shortfalls and deployment problems would vanish overnight if airpower was common as a cruise missile with landing gear.

And in an era of NCW where the definition of capability is the number of apertures and the number of hours that they spend developing 'Corporate Memory' looking for bad guys over a blank slate battlespace, the UCAV is also the only asset which will provide _persistent presence_ within a tactical (.85 Mach, 5.5G evasives, to 1,100nm with 2hr loiter) format.

>>
I prefer a price in current day money, when one is available. A programme cost in 2006 $ can be derived from the SAR by multiplying the 2002 cost by a suitable inflation index. If you use the GDP deflator (a bit lower than the US defence budget inflation index), which has conveniently risen almost exactly 10% since 2002, so making the arithmetic very easy, you get a forecast programme cost of $94.3 mn in 2006 dollars.
>>

I believe in listening to the Admiral now running the JSF SPO tell me that 1,600 airframes is the base cutoff point before we hit the slippery slope of falling returns just as we did with the F-22.

Then adding up the procurement numbers which have been _constant_ since 2003 or so which state:

USAF 1,100 F-35A.
USMC 240 F-35B.
USN 170 F-35C.

1,510 airframes.

I then take a gander at the arrogant little wretches in Oz and Blightey who have the audacity to 'demand' that we not only hand over the LO specs and software source codes for the TTNT architecture so they can copy them for their own use. But also that we guarantee their pricing baselines with a given inventory number of our own purchases.

While we are _fighting a war_ which is sucking up BILLIONS.

Which is why _Congress_ is now insistent that the USAF 'needs' 1,763 airframes, no matter what.

Which is why _Congress_, when they see the numbers on foreign UCAVs and JSF Tier partners running like rats off the Titanic, will finally drop the JSF like a hot damn rock.

>>
The average 2006$ flyaway cost is currently predicted at $55 mn, & average unit procurement cost excluding fixed costs at $76 mn. But those are dependent on the mix of models: the F-35A predicted flyaway is ca $51.7 mn, the others about $66 mn ($47 mn & $60 mn in 2002 $). And I've never heard of a project where the price was accurately predicted 10 years in the future.
>>

Which should be the basis of a RICO charge by the U.S. Attorney against the entire DOD, Lunchmeat and the Standing Defense Committees of both Houses with budgetary authority over the JSF. I'm sorry but until we make people FEAR the legal consequences of mispending the public fisk to which they owe a greater-than-average-fraud fiduciary responsibility, this kind of gross and DELIBERATE corruption will continue as 'just the way business is done'.

The way I see it, so long as people have a vested interest in the way platforms are designed, the best design will always be compromised by their JOB PROTECTION insistence of presence onboard it. As soon as you crush the Pilot's Union that the THREE AIR FORCES FOR ONE NATION axis of evil represents (some _6,000_ core force aviators in the USAF alone), you can start to think about a true Revolution In Military Affairs.

And that is what this nation needs. Because the little boys with their gold-plate toys are NOT winning the war we are fighting. Even though there is not a threat aircraft or SAM system in sight.

And such is the first and only definition of an effective military. That they win the wars they are given.

CONCLUSION:
The AF allowed itself to be BOHICA'd on the F-22, 'ignoring' the types inherent A2G capabilities while declaiming or suppressing the point to point radius advantages that created a 3.5hr to 800nm platform able to reach out and touch someone three times a day with 8 small diameter weapons.

Compared to the JSF which, as a subsonic wonder, could at most manage 1.5 sorties to the same distance.

All to ensure that, instead of 550 or so F-22s, produced at optimum rates of 60-70 airframes per year, and a HUGE force of 'followon robobombers' to fulfill the COPCAS force of loitering weapons cabinets and sensor platforms; they allowed the Raptor numbers to be degraded to 450, 380, 276 and now 183. Merely to ensure that their own JOBS would be secured in the F-35-or-nothing followon.

Ignoring the fact that, by the time the 335th F-22 was built, it would have cost a mere 74 million dollars (double that of the F-15 Albino and worth every penny). The F-35 deserves no better treatment 'PAUC vs. Flyaway' (R&D + or just manufacturing costs) than what they did unto the Raptor as we cut the legs out from their treasonous actions and replace 'their choice' with the only effective one which should have /ever/ been considered for the JSF's stated mission.

A role which was never 'multirole'. But always _bomber_ oriented. Just like the F-16/18/A-10/AV-8B. A role for which a common basing mode would have dictated both the R&D figures. And the inventory buy economics.

And the reason we should do this has nothing to do with my personal spite for the entire MIC conspiracy and their devil take the hindmost attitude towards MONEY THAT IS NOT THEIRS' TO WASTE.

It is simply because we can no longer afford both Iraq and the JSF. And the air assets we have in Iraq are not sufficient to help win the battle. And with another 1-2 year rightwards schedule shift likely, DEWS will beat the F-35 to service, making all airpower into throwaway assets we had better be able to afford to lose while winning.


KPl.

 

[Big-E]

I then take a gander at the arrogant little wretches in Oz and Blightey who have the audacity to 'demand' that we not only hand over the LO specs and software source codes for the TTNT architecture so they can copy them for their own use. But also that we guarantee their pricing baselines with a given inventory number of our own purchases.

While we are _fighting a war_ which is sucking up BILLIONS.

Which is why _Congress_ is now insistent that the USAF 'needs' 1,763 airframes, no matter what.

Which is why _Congress_, when they see the numbers on foreign UCAVs and JSF Tier partners running like rats off the Titanic, will finally drop the JSF like a hot damn rock.

Do you not think that we can trust our friends in AU and the UK to keep safe the source codes? Is it an unreasonable request to give it to them? Do you think it's fair for us to rip off Aussies on F-18 repairs? You might not have any faith in them but I do. As long as it's not F-22s I'm not worried.

If you want to bitch about fly away costs then you need to go to the people who keep cramming so much hardware onto this airframe. You know I would be happy to fly an F-35 with F/A-18/E avionics and sensors. It doesn't have to have all this CRAP they are jamming into it. They had the airframe down years ago and could have inducted it intsead of wasting money on SuperBugs.

 

[Kurt Plummer]

Big-E,

>>
Do you not think that we can trust our friends in AU and the UK to keep safe the source codes?
>>

No.

If they want in as priveleged production partners, with a discount and a cut of the 'other export' sub contract action, fine. If they want to own what they didn't have to PAY to develop? Not acceptable. LO is like any other secret, leveraged inversely proportionally to the number of people who know it. And the JSF is worthle$$ as a fighter if it doesnt' come with the full options extras package.

EADS and Thales, both of whom 'have an interest' in BAe and the former GEC have been on to the Brits for the better part of five years, claiming that they had better bring something from our 'special relationship' to the high table of Continental defense procurement and that something had better be LO and NCW.

Or they would be left standing at the _Beggars Table_ of scraps from a closed shop environment.

Janes has reported, this multiple times. The Wall Street Journal has reported
this, multiple times.

The Brits have next to nothing in the way of Aerospace, having pissed it all away in a flurry of mistakes deriving from Sandys and 'economy measures' of the 1950's and 60's. They are an Island Empire whose long ago gained wealth exists like Komodo Dragons. 'Diplomatically' charming their way into a market where they are /invited/ to bite down on a helpless corporation and then watching it writh as the infection of poor management and deliberate technology bleeds it out and before disembowling it, still alive, until there is NOTHING left. GUESS WHO have been buying up U.S. defense giants like the former Lockheed Sanders? That's right, The City.

>>
Is it an unreasonable request to give it to them?
>>

Yes.

Wars have always been won by superior intel. Now that the blingword is
'infowarfare' on a digital network sharing basis, the ONLY way to stay ahead is to keep the encrypts and data security _strictly in-houses_.

2020 will not be a world where CNN pirating in on Predator broadcasts will be acceptable behavior.

>>
Do you think it's fair for us to rip off Aussies on F-18 repairs? You might not have any faith in them but I do. As long as it's not F-22s I'm not worried.
>>

Two different and unrelated questions.

Don't even /attempt/ to make me feel guilty for another nations mistakes in buying into HUG+ on an airframe that was not correct for Australia's needs when they bought the damn thing. If they can't take car

Not when it is MY MONEY which is going to guarantee a fixed purchase price for their export. AND they want the technology leveraging besides. That's the really infuriating thing you see, we have given up an X percentage of our own fleet buy, raising the prices astronomically, while pretending that 'good will and a common operating standard' will mean diddly dip to the places in the world which are buying the JSF. When the reality is that the replacement numbers purchased DO NOT make up for those lost from our own inventory. Nor are we likely to see another major war in Europe (at all) or the South West Pacific which Oz or Britain can substantively help out with.

To demand that we give them aircraft (which OUR tax dollars are paying for) at a fixed price by maintaining a fleet inventory purchase which _our own people_ have said we don't need, you are effectively making Americans pay for their jets and your jets AT A LO$$ FOR BOTH.

Given that they have gotten all snide with the 'our way or the highway', AND that the JSF is a piece of crap airframe design compared to the mission needs we face, it would be better _for U.S._ if we said "Fine, pack up your dollies and GO."

As to the second part. Frankly, the ownership of the representative technology is not nearly as important as ownership of the production means and software encodings by which it works. The first gives them a big shot in the arm for /their/ next major defense development effort. The second makes U.S. vulnerable to IW exploitation (hacking, jamming, trojan/worm, you name it) which is something we can no longer afford now that the positions have reversed.

It is not the Russians who are 'overly dependent on external cue and vectoring' in their warfighter paradigm. It's _U.S._.

>>
If you want to bitch about fly away costs then you need to go to the people who keep cramming so much hardware onto this airframe.
>>

Disagree.

Stripline antennas only work as a cost leveraged item if they are imbedded in a LO airframe. If you go back to blades and buttons you lose the discrete signature advantage in both lobe shaping and direct RCS.

The USN baseline for the ultrabug FLIR was the AAS-46, not the ASQ-228 ATFLIR. The USAF baseline for EOTS is the Sniper. But it integrates it within a LO enclosure that effectively means there is no pod requirement.

The U.S. effort through the URR and other developmental programs was what gave us the AESA technology which the F/A-18E/F only exploited in Blk.II after what, 120 airframes (none of which, I might add, can be upgraded short of a new fuselage)?

OTOH, the F/A-18F in particular comes with something which the JSF _never will_ and thats a viable combat controller option inherent to the ACS. The JSF cannot function as a two seater because the inlet trunking is the ONLY thing which the forward fuselage bulkhead (on which the nose hangs) can penetrate while still 'closing off' a centerbody holed with weapons bays and lift fans and all the other crap.

The JSF mission concept was flawed from the start because the Marines didn't need independent fixed wing airpower NOT compatible with the USN big decks. They needed something which could replace (within the same cost and hangar/deck footprint) the AV-8B and AH-1W. They needed an ASTOVL which could do _CAS_ in which you will /never find/ large scale radar threats.

Similarly the USN didn't need a jet which could, like the A-6 before it, put 10 airframes on-deck with radius almost twice that which the **REQUIRED SUPPORT MISSIONS** could achieve. And they knew this from when the ATA-12 blew up. Particularly not one which might take all of 7-10hrs to get to that radius point 650-700nm downrange, loiter for all of 20-40 minutes and come home.

The USAF, sponsor of the MMTD program, didn't need a 2,000lb munition lift capacity because they KNEW, from Desert Storm, that the best way to beat an enemy is to saturate him with small munitions and not /try/ to find the 'key nodes' for C2 and ADGE. Since the only effective weapons systems that Saddam had were Al Hussein/Al Abbas and we never did shut those down. And because, once the 'real war' DID start, it didn't last long enough to warrant the 100 BILLION dollars spent over six months and 30 days 'prepping the mission' (the Iraqi general who said "Centcom bombed my division for thirty days and I lost five out of 60 tanks, the VIIth Corps blew by me an in 30 minutes I lost the rest...").

>>
You know I would be happy to fly an F-35 with F/A-18/E avionics and sensors. It doesn't have to have all this CRAP they are jamming into it. They had the airframe down years ago and could have inducted it intsead of wasting money on SuperBugs.
>>

The anti-engineers sandbox argument only works:

1. You are early enough in the program not to have all that vested technology bias already collagen-pumped in. In this case, the F-35 exploits the F-22 technology coalbed so I'm not sure that such an effort would have worked in any case. Unless you kept Boeing (and their vastly different PWSC contender) in for a second round of downselect pressuring on a cost:capability bias in which the U.S. Fed handed out GSE supplied equipment baselines owned at the national level.

2. The baseline mission system works better than anything else for the job. While sometimes this is not a foreseeable argument it most definitely was in this competition because the DARPA UDS (UCAV Demo System) effort was set to endphase in late 2006 in preparation of the UOS (UCAV Operational System) followon. And 'higher powers' in the five walled asylum, once they got their Congressional pork barrels in a row, got the program director fired and the mission reroled from SEAD with light bombs to ISR as an asset four times as large. Before 'taking over' and reroling the platform again as an AF controlled J-UCAS strike truck effort. Which subsequently was system bloated into the X-45B and C. Before being 'cancelled due to costs'.

I further personally believe it was /known/ that the JSF would be at least a year late (GAO was warning of 'excessively optimistic developmental technology hurdles' on the JSF as far back as 1997 and I have talked to those who say that the lockheed configuration weight issue was known before the CDA flyoff).

And so the only conclusion you can possibly reach is that there was a deliberate and treasonous conspiracy to destroy the better solution, crib killing it before it /could/ compete with the JSF as a viable alternative. One AF General being quoted as saying "We wouldn't even be considering this thing if it wasn't for the range...". While IGNORING the fact that the A#1 driver for air to win the ground war is _to be there_ when a target pops up.

ARGUMENT:

1. THE WAY IT'S DONE SON.
This is your battlespace awareness of TCT (Time Critical Targets) sitting at your airbase four 9 hours a day while orchestrating a nominal '1.5 a day' sortie plan as part of a conventional strike warefare ATO with a 500nm asset flying a 3-5hr sortie:

.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................

If the targets only appear 'randomly' every 2hrs or so and you are 'dedicated' to hitting fixed points (easily struck by cruise) with which they KNOW BETTER than to ever associate (buildings not being known to 'duck') you will never see those threats which, whether conventional or irregular, _all use guerilla tactics_ to operate in short bursts of operational intensity between highly C3D protected hides.

2. JSF MITL MORONIC.
OTOH, this is your battlespace awareness flying a 7-10hr evolution in a 700nm asset ONCE per day with a four ship of two sections each spread 10 nm apart and 'sharing' EOTS/APG-81 target generation. I say once because the pilots will be dead tired and utterly worthless for the rest of the day when they get back and will only loiter in the given target area for about 40-60 minutes, even if they have the KC gas to support a resweep.

.................................................................
.................................................................
....................Target 1..................................
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..........F-35....F-35....F-35....F-35..................
.................................................................

3. UCAV INTENTIONAL OPPORTUNISM.
This is what happens when you _trust your standoff sensors_ (25-40nm for EOTS, depending on target type and 60-80nm for APG-81 or XTRA) sufficiently to abandon the all-men-row-the-mission-boat concept that is inherent to having too few weapons and too much mission saturation to be safe any other way.

........................Target 2..............................
....Target 1........UCAV............UCAV................
....................Target 1.........Target 3..............
.....UCAV............UCAV..................Target 4/5..
......................................................UCAV....
.................................................................

Because the UCAV can stay onstation at 500nm for upwards of TEN HOURS because it both abandons the draggy features of a 'fighter'. And employs a propulsion concept which requires only 2/3rds the baseline internal fuel; it FINDS those target fleeting TCTs which otherwise, manned airpower might miss altogether. _Because they weren't there_ when it did the flyby.

Now throw in the likelihood that, by the time 2020 rolls around and the JSF has been in service for all of 5-7 years, we will see major weaponized DEW advances which make penetrating airpower all of a dice toss on 'step on the snake' flash of light insta-kills, and you see that not only MUST we move away from a system which is fixed-target interdiction centric (dating to the 8th AF). But we must make sure that we can afford to keep on winning when we lose major numbers of platforms _in a single day_. Weeding out these DEWS by essentially recording the flash as they destroy airframes.

CONCLUSION:
The thing that gives me some ironic hope is that I /think/ the USN has maybe seen the light. They know that the S-Hornet is not competitive. They realize that they can't afford to board the JSF in numbers sufficient to supply a significant force contribution to their own doctrine (From The Sea, Forward, _begins_ at 400nm inland). And they realize (as the primary purveyor of cruise) that spending 90% of your time in transit-autopilot can only be competitive if you both carry enough bombs to compensate for numeric deficiencies. And stay long enough to find targets to use on them. SDB is a given to the first answer. And the USN is always going to suck hind teat when it comes to sortie numbers off the pointy end compared to land based anything. So they need something which can effectively replace the Bug-1 'in kind' and at the same time not destroy their forward operational effectiveness by either NOT BEING THERE. Or making the deck crews just go nuts trying to sustain the ops tempo. Given as they had time to 'break out the kiddy pool' in OEF while F-14's chased Tomahawks upwards of 700nm inland, it is obvious that a UCAV which can go 400nm further and _stay for 2hrs_ is the key to making a 10-12hr operational cycle work with constat low-peaks of activity as you swing into the wind and shoot a few replacements or catch those robots coming home. Never Tired but very Thirsty.

Such is what the JSF will _never achieve_ so long as there are babies onboard. And the USN is so tired of looking up at the halo of the USAF in terms of 'who has the most targeting pod video' that they may actually do the right thing. And if they do, the Blue Suiters will have no choice but to follow or be embarrassed when 90-120 airframes sitting atop a pair of 10,000ft runways can't match 30-50 airframes firing off a postage stamp 200 miles out to sea.


KPl.

 

[rjmaz1]

Everyone argues but we're pretty fucked now. If we knew what we knew now the JSF would be much different or not exist at all.

The US cannot afford two 5th generation fighters anymore.

The JSF should have from the word go used a bog stock F-16 cockpit and avionics. Development costs would have been slashed by half, big big savings all round.

Navy want a medium weight strike aircraft, the airforce and marines want a light weight short range fighterbomber. A light weight aircraft cant do the job a medium weight aircraft. Nor can a medium weight do the job of a lightweight aircraft specially when it comes to VTOL weight is BAD!!

They cant change the past so we are pretty much fucked we all dont have enough money to buy our aircraft in the numbers we want. If the JSF never existed we would have ALOT of money spare and would have enough aircraft.

Close air support and most of the JSF missions for the airforce and marines doesn't need stealth it needs A-10 like strength. Only the navy version needs alot of stealth.

Which is why i would have made a naval F-22 which would have been EXACTLY what the navy wants in terms of a long range strike fighter with speed, sure it would land too fast but it could be modified to work. This allows the aircraft carriers to operate one aircraft only.

Then I would have made an F-16 size aircraft with VTOL that is CHEAP and carries weapons externally. Best part i would have made it strong, armour around all the important stuff so it can take a bit of ground fire. Atleast this aircraft could do close air support well which is one of the most important missions in this day and age. The next version down the track would then have the advanced radar.

But WHAT IF!!! we're stuffed now too late for the JSF to be canceled unless something majorly goes up.

If the JSF is canceled, the Navy has no stealth aircraft even though its too short ranged to be of much use. The marines are stuffed as the harriers will be falling out of the sky in the next 10 years. Because of that it will be difficult to cancel.

The airforce is fine though, they could order more F-22's to perform the stealthy missions of the JSF and upgrade the F-16's to perform the non stealthy stuff.

If the JSF is canceled thought UCAV will be required for Navy for its strike mission, and the airfoce will probably buy some too.

 

[Big-E]

Big-E,

No.

If they want in as priveleged production partners, with a discount and a cut of the 'other export' sub contract action, fine. If they want to own what they didn't have to PAY to develop? Not acceptable.


The Brits have next to nothing in the way of Aerospace, having pissed it all away in a flurry of mistakes deriving from Sandys and 'economy measures' of the 1950's and 60's. They are an Island Empire whose long ago gained wealth exists like Komodo Dragons. 'Diplomatically' charming their way into a market where they are /invited/ to bite down on a helpless corporation and then watching it writh as the infection of poor management and deliberate technology bleeds it out and before disembowling it, still alive, until there is NOTHING left. GUESS WHO have been buying up U.S. defense giants like the former Lockheed Sanders? That's right, The City.

You make it sound like these countries have nothing invested in this project.

It's no secret that the British defense industry is in dire straights, not just aerospace, naval and ground-warfare as well.

Sanders had gone commercial long before it was sold. If there are no defense orders what do you expect them to do, die?

Yes.

Wars have always been won by superior intel. Now that the blingword is
'infowarfare' on a digital network sharing basis, the ONLY way to stay ahead is to keep the encrypts and data security _strictly in-houses_.

2020 will not be a world where CNN pirating in on Predator broadcasts will be acceptable behavior.

Giving them the source code is necessary if they are going to make any modifications to her. You can't expect them to buy the whole package and not have the right to do that. Expecting them to ship it back to the states for system upgrades is retarded.

Giving them the code has nothing to do with Predator broadcasts.

Two different and unrelated questions.

Then seperate them when you address it, you did everything else.

Don't even /attempt/ to make me feel guilty for another nations mistakes in buying into HUG+ on an airframe that was not correct for Australia's needs when they bought the damn thing. If they can't take car

What are you talking about? There were no alternatives at the time. The F-15 was discounted because the version offered did not have a ground-attack capability. The F-16 was deemed unsuitable largely on the basis of its having only one engine. So did you want them to pick something that couldn't hit ground targets or did you want them falling out of the sky with only one engine? They had to replace the Mirage with something and they got the best thing available.

Not when it is MY MONEY which is going to guarantee a fixed purchase price for their export. AND they want the technology leveraging besides. That's the really infuriating thing you see, we have given up an X percentage of our own fleet buy, raising the prices astronomically, while pretending that 'good will and a common operating standard' will mean diddly dip to the places in the world which are buying the JSF. When the reality is that the replacement numbers purchased DO NOT make up for those lost from our own inventory. Nor are we likely to see another major war in Europe (at all) or the South West Pacific which Oz or Britain can substantively help out with.

To demand that we give them aircraft (which OUR tax dollars are paying for) at a fixed price by maintaining a fleet inventory purchase which _our own people_ have said we don't need, you are effectively making Americans pay for their jets and your jets AT A LO$$ FOR BOTH.

I'm not following your math. If we didn't have foriegn orders the price would be astronomical to the indicated numbers. If we had stopped trying to cram the airframe we could have done it at cost. It is our fault the price is going through the roof. We promised them one thing and delievered another. We are going to end up giving them a stripped down version to meet the cost requirements. If you want to blame the reduced US orders on someone you can blame SecDef. It's not AU/UKs fault we are incompetent.

Given that they have gotten all snide with the 'our way or the highway', AND that the JSF is a piece of crap airframe design compared to the mission needs we face, it would be better _for U.S._ if we said "Fine, pack up your dollies and GO."

Using AU as an example. They currently have to make a decision wether to keep their F-111s in service or not. They need to augment their strike force and were expecting F-35s rather soon. Our delays and cost overuns are not helping them fill their strike gaps. They have every right to tell us their way or the highway... they've got stuff to do. They can't wait on us to make up our minds. They need to know now if they need to go in another direction to find another replacement. With all the delays and cost overuns I wouldn't blame them if they took their bussiness elsewhere.

As to the second part. Frankly, the ownership of the representative technology is not nearly as important as ownership of the production means and software encodings by which it works. The first gives them a big shot in the arm for /their/ next major defense development effort. The second makes U.S. vulnerable to IW exploitation (hacking, jamming, trojan/worm, you name it) which is something we can no longer afford now that the positions have reversed.

It is not the Russians who are 'overly dependent on external cue and vectoring' in their warfighter paradigm. It's _U.S._.

You know, it's not like we are going to give them an exact copy of our own F-35. Out of the millions of lines of code ours will be encoded with different safeguards in place that a potential enemy will not have access to from a foreign sale. Do you not think they haven't thought of this?

Disagree.

Stripline antennas only work as a cost leveraged item if they are imbedded in a LO airframe. If you go back to blades and buttons you lose the discrete signature advantage in both lobe shaping and direct RCS.

The USN baseline for the ultrabug FLIR was the AAS-46, not the ASQ-228 ATFLIR. The USAF baseline for EOTS is the Sniper. But it integrates it within a LO enclosure that effectively means there is no pod requirement.

The U.S. effort through the URR and other developmental programs was what gave us the AESA technology which the F/A-18E/F only exploited in Blk.II after what, 120 airframes (none of which, I might add, can be upgraded short of a new fuselage)?

OTOH, the F/A-18F in particular comes with something which the JSF _never will_ and thats a viable combat controller option inherent to the ACS. The JSF cannot function as a two seater because the inlet trunking is the ONLY thing which the forward fuselage bulkhead (on which the nose hangs) can penetrate while still 'closing off' a centerbody holed with weapons bays and lift fans and all the other crap.

The JSF mission concept was flawed from the start because the Marines didn't need independent fixed wing airpower NOT compatible with the USN big decks. They needed something which could replace (within the same cost and hangar/deck footprint) the AV-8B and AH-1W. They needed an ASTOVL which could do _CAS_ in which you will /never find/ large scale radar threats.

Similarly the USN didn't need a jet which could, like the A-6 before it, put 10 airframes on-deck with radius almost twice that which the **REQUIRED SUPPORT MISSIONS** could achieve. And they knew this from when the ATA-12 blew up. Particularly not one which might take all of 7-10hrs to get to that radius point 650-700nm downrange, loiter for all of 20-40 minutes and come home.

The USAF, sponsor of the MMTD program, didn't need a 2,000lb munition lift capacity because they KNEW, from Desert Storm, that the best way to beat an enemy is to saturate him with small munitions and not /try/ to find the 'key nodes' for C2 and ADGE. Since the only effective weapons systems that Saddam had were Al Hussein/Al Abbas and we never did shut those down. And because, once the 'real war' DID start, it didn't last long enough to warrant the 100 BILLION dollars spent over six months and 30 days 'prepping the mission' (the Iraqi general who said "Centcom bombed my division for thirty days and I lost five out of 60 tanks, the VIIth Corps blew by me an in 30 minutes I lost the rest...").

You only brought two of 12 additional features they are trying to cram onto the frame. Well your tirade has me wondering if you remember the original comment. It was not wether you thought the design was flawed, that everybody knows. You need to blame Lockheed Martin and the DoD for letting this charade continue, not Australia/UK.

The anti-engineers sandbox argument only works:

1. You are early enough in the program not to have all that vested technology bias already collagen-pumped in. In this case, the F-35 exploits the F-22 technology coalbed so I'm not sure that such an effort would have worked in any case. Unless you kept Boeing (and their vastly different PWSC contender) in for a second round of downselect pressuring on a cost:capability bias in which the U.S. Fed handed out GSE supplied equipment baselines owned at the national level.

2. The baseline mission system works better than anything else for the job. While sometimes this is not a foreseeable argument it most definitely was in this competition because the DARPA UDS (UCAV Demo System) effort was set to endphase in late 2006 in preparation of the UOS (UCAV Operational System) followon. And 'higher powers' in the five walled asylum, once they got their Congressional pork barrels in a row, got the program director fired and the mission reroled from SEAD with light bombs to ISR as an asset four times as large. Before 'taking over' and reroling the platform again as an AF controlled J-UCAS strike truck effort. Which subsequently was system bloated into the X-45B and C. Before being 'cancelled due to costs'.

What do you mean the argument only works if it's still early in the program? I was bitching about this years ago! It's not my fault nobody listened to me.

Using F-35 as a test bed for all these other advanced projects is a waste compared to them vesting interest in the individual UCAV and F-22 projects. If they had used the research money for making the F-22 the all around bad boy instead of the too light too late F-35 we would of had one kick-ass downgraded version for foriegn sale on the cheap.

I further personally believe it was /known/ that the JSF would be at least a year late (GAO was warning of 'excessively optimistic developmental technology hurdles' on the JSF as far back as 1997 and I have talked to those who say that the lockheed configuration weight issue was known before the CDA flyoff).

And so the only conclusion you can possibly reach is that there was a deliberate and treasonous conspiracy to destroy the better solution, crib killing it before it /could/ compete with the JSF as a viable alternative. One AF General being quoted as saying "We wouldn't even be considering this thing if it wasn't for the range...". While IGNORING the fact that the A#1 driver for air to win the ground war is _to be there_ when a target pops up.

Forgive me if I don't appluade your efforts to try and drive me out of a job. I enjoy flying and I don't think UCAV will be as good as you think it will. There is something to be said for someone actually being in the cockpitt.

ARGUMENT:

1. THE WAY IT'S DONE SON.
This is your battlespace awareness of TCT (Time Critical Targets) sitting at your airbase four 9 hours a day while orchestrating a nominal '1.5 a day' sortie plan as part of a conventional strike warefare ATO with a 500nm asset flying a 3-5hr sortie:

.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................

If the targets only appear 'randomly' every 2hrs or so and you are 'dedicated' to hitting fixed points (easily struck by cruise) with which they KNOW BETTER than to ever associate (buildings not being known to 'duck') you will never see those threats which, whether conventional or irregular, _all use guerilla tactics_ to operate in short bursts of operational intensity between highly C3D protected hides.

2. JSF MITL MORONIC.
OTOH, this is your battlespace awareness flying a 7-10hr evolution in a 700nm asset ONCE per day with a four ship of two sections each spread 10 nm apart and 'sharing' EOTS/APG-81 target generation. I say once because the pilots will be dead tired and utterly worthless for the rest of the day when they get back and will only loiter in the given target area for about 40-60 minutes, even if they have the KC gas to support a resweep.

.................................................................
.................................................................
....................Target 1..................................
.................................................................
..........F-35....F-35....F-35....F-35..................
.................................................................

3. UCAV INTENTIONAL OPPORTUNISM.
This is what happens when you _trust your standoff sensors_ (25-40nm for EOTS, depending on target type and 60-80nm for APG-81 or XTRA) sufficiently to abandon the all-men-row-the-mission-boat concept that is inherent to having too few weapons and too much mission saturation to be safe any other way.

........................Target 2..............................
....Target 1........UCAV............UCAV................
....................Target 1.........Target 3..............
.....UCAV............UCAV..................Target 4/5..
......................................................UCAV....
.................................................................

Because the UCAV can stay onstation at 500nm for upwards of TEN HOURS because it both abandons the draggy features of a 'fighter'. And employs a propulsion concept which requires only 2/3rds the baseline internal fuel; it FINDS those target fleeting TCTs which otherwise, manned airpower might miss altogether. _Because they weren't there_ when it did the flyby.

Now throw in the likelihood that, by the time 2020 rolls around and the JSF has been in service for all of 5-7 years, we will see major weaponized DEW advances which make penetrating airpower all of a dice toss on 'step on the snake' flash of light insta-kills, and you see that not only MUST we move away from a system which is fixed-target interdiction centric (dating to the 8th AF). But we must make sure that we can afford to keep on winning when we lose major numbers of platforms _in a single day_. Weeding out these DEWS by essentially recording the flash as they destroy airframes.

CONCLUSION:
The thing that gives me some ironic hope is that I /think/ the USN has maybe seen the light. They know that the S-Hornet is not competitive. They realize that they can't afford to board the JSF in numbers sufficient to supply a significant force contribution to their own doctrine (From The Sea, Forward, _begins_ at 400nm inland). And they realize (as the primary purveyor of cruise) that spending 90% of your time in transit-autopilot can only be competitive if you both carry enough bombs to compensate for numeric deficiencies. And stay long enough to find targets to use on them. SDB is a given to the first answer. And the USN is always going to suck hind teat when it comes to sortie numbers off the pointy end compared to land based anything. So they need something which can effectively replace the Bug-1 'in kind' and at the same time not destroy their forward operational effectiveness by either NOT BEING THERE. Or making the deck crews just go nuts trying to sustain the ops tempo. Given as they had time to 'break out the kiddy pool' in OEF while F-14's chased Tomahawks upwards of 700nm inland, it is obvious that a UCAV which can go 400nm further and _stay for 2hrs_ is the key to making a 10-12hr operational cycle work with constat low-peaks of activity as you swing into the wind and shoot a few replacements or catch those robots coming home. Never Tired but very Thirsty.

Such is what the JSF will _never achieve_ so long as there are babies onboard. And the USN is so tired of looking up at the halo of the USAF in terms of 'who has the most targeting pod video' that they may actually do the right thing. And if they do, the Blue Suiters will have no choice but to follow or be embarrassed when 90-120 airframes sitting atop a pair of 10,000ft runways can't match 30-50 airframes firing off a postage stamp 200 miles out to sea.


KPl.

Yes, Yes.... I see clearly you advocate UCAV. You need not call me SON, it is rather offfensive unless you are my father. Which you are not as he is dead. I don't need a lesson on sortie ratios and pilot fatigue. I deal with it daily. I don't know why you decided to turn your JSF thread into a UCAV thread but congratulations, that's what it is.

 

[Trackmaster]

Kurt

A wordy and obscurant post does not win the argument.

Australia and the UK have concerns about investing $ in a project where they are expected to accept being patted on the head and told to mind their own business.

Thankfully Australia has a recent record of straight talk to US defence contractors. Refer to Defence Minister Nelson's comments about Boeing and their poor performance with the Wedgetail project.
Defence in Australia has been asked to come up with an alternative to the JSF.
It may only be 100 air frames, but it should push up the price a point or two.

 

[Big-E]

Kurt

A wordy and obscurant post does not win the argument.

Yes Kurt, please learn some brevity...

 

[Grand Danois]

BAE already has access to the software for the F-35 as they are building some of the most sensitive parts for the F-35. Much of the LO technologies are already mastered in Europe. So what!

Sovereignty issues are about who (if any) should have right to do their own maintenance and upgrades.

OPSEC may be compromised from leaking of sw, but leaking of actual technology? Marginal.

MY tax money is also being sunk into this program. Have we been promised a fixed price? Don't think so.

 

[scraw]

Don't even /attempt/ to make me feel guilty for another nations mistakes in buying into HUG+ on an airframe that was not correct for Australia's needs when they bought the damn thing.

So it's our fault when we (frequently) balls it up but if we try to get the best deal possible (the horror!) we're "arrogant little wretches".

That's a pretty funny assessment of each partys role when negotiating a contract (or anything for that matter).

 

[scraw]

Defence in Australia has been asked to come up with an alternative to the JSF.
It may only be 100 air frames, but it should push up the price a point or two.

That's basically an extension of the rule all pie in the sky (exist on paper only) designs must be partnered by a existing solution, hence F100 vs. Baby Bourke etc.

Given how badly we do defence procurement down here it's a good idea.

 

[Retired-Oz]

Young Kurt

I’m assuming your young Kurt because of what I see as a lack of understanding of the military relationship between Australia and the USA “and many other countries”.
Australia has alliance obligations as part of the “US block” and as such we need to ensure that we have the equipment to live up to those obligations. I don’t think it’s any secret that many American service personnel are attached to, or spend training time in Australia or on Australian ships and submarines. Those ships and submarines perform functions within both the Asian region and other global area’s as part of that block.
You may be greatly surprised at the level of technical cooperation between our two countries. There are a number of Australian initiated projects for instance that have received US funding as an aid to completion. Some of these projects may have a substantial impact on the capabilities of US military platforms.
As to the JSF. With the aid of standoff weaponry, it has been looked at as a replacement for both our F18A’s and the ageing F111. However, as a small country by population, we do have a limited amount of money available and would not be able to buy them at “any” price. We may end up having to go elsewhere to achieve the number of platforms required.
AS to the source codes, we tend to expect more flexibility from our equipment than the US (remember we will have one type only) and it would be an almost certainty that we would want to make some change to the planes capability sometime in the future. Usually much more cost effective to do it in house. From an Australian perspective, to compromise US security is to compromise our own.
From my personal perspective, long live the alliance!

 

[swerve]

BAE already has access to the software for the F-35 as they are building some of the most sensitive parts for the F-35. Much of the LO technologies are already mastered in Europe. So what!

Sovereignty issues are about who (if any) should have right to do their own maintenance and upgrades.

OPSEC may be compromised from leaking of sw, but leaking of actual technology? Marginal.

MY tax money is also being sunk into this program. Have we been promised a fixed price? Don't think so.

I'm with you & Big-E on the technology access issue. One of the things often forgotten about on one side of that debate is that it cuts both ways. If we want to integrate a British missile onto F-35, under the terms the US Congress has been trying to impose, we'd have to supply Lockheed Martin with all the information about that missile & ask them to do the integration, even though they may be developing a competing product. We won't be allowed to do any UK-specific upgrades: we'll have to ask LM to do them. We won't even be allowed to do all the maintenance. These are not the terms under which the UK joined the project.

If Kurts suggestion that US numbers will be cut to 1510 is right, then the predicted unit programme cost (PUAC) changes to $90.2 mn in 2002 $, or $99.1 mn in 2006 $. The Pentagon is still publishing figures based on buying 2458, although I agree with him, that doesn't look realistic.

 

[Archer]

Please refrain from personal 'attacks'.

 

[Big-E]

Please refrain from personal 'attacks'.

 

[old faithful]

well said archer!! Kurt, you are worried about giving Australia TOT for JSF...the aircraft you hate so much? What about joint facilities at Nurrunga,Pine Gap,Northwest cape? These are joint facillities Kurt,and the USA has much more to lose from "leaks" from these than from JSF tech....you obviously love the sound of your own voice....are you a pollitician? (let me count the ways!!!,ive been on the net for hours Kurt,and im still bloody counting!,any chance of keeping it a bit shorter mate?)

 

[Kurt Plummer]

RJMaz1,

Everyone argues but we're pretty fucked now. If we knew what we knew now the JSF would be much different or not exist at all.
>>
The US cannot afford two 5th generation fighters anymore.
>>

The F-22 is a generation 4 aircraft. The F-35 breaks the rules of Generation 5 by NOT being 'cheap LO'. I also think that we expect too much from what a 'fighter' traditionally is supposed to be. Dropping bombs and dogfighting is pretty much within the spec. But doing so at 700nm radii _with a turbine_ is not. Jets with 8-10,000lbs of fuel (heck, the Gripen only has 5.5Klbs, less than an F-16!) can afford to be 21-25,000lb class empty weights with a 35-40,000lb typical mission gross. Which is within the norm of a 60 million dollar fighter.

It's when you expect to penetrate so deep into a threat S2A matrix that you both _have to_ have 20,000lbs of gas /and/ have LO to conserve the number of times you spend burnering away from S2A as much as A2A threats that things get out of hand.

The F-35 is closer to a B-17 than an P-51 and that alone should be telling as to the materials leveraged into the airframe.

>>
The JSF should have from the word go used a bog stock F-16 cockpit and avionics. Development costs would have been slashed by half, big big savings all round.
>>

I frankly am less than impressed with the argument that avionics composes 2/3rds of 'modern' fighter costs. As such, it's not RTIC nor the onboard avionics that are driving the jet but overall mission assumptions of what a 'fighter' is. vs. what you can expect to do with it at the point where it's employed.

Without supercruise, no manned asset will ever be useful beyond 500nm radii and that in turn dictates more of the structural and propulsion commitments that drive real (by weight) costs issues, IMO.

In any case, NCW doesn't support the use of dated avionics networking, just as stealth doesn't benefit from conventional radar. Given that the APG-77 and CIP driven processing conglomerate were 'already paid for'; I'm not sure that going back a page to the F-16 (even the E) would have meant all that much. Certain LM Georgia was _not about_ to give LM Fort Worth any more reason to assert division dominance over the rest of the F-22 tech base which the F-35 (configurationally and by engine) so clearly exploits.

>>
Navy want a medium weight strike aircraft, the airforce and marines want a light weight short range fighterbomber. A light weight aircraft cant do the job a medium weight aircraft. Nor can a medium weight do the job of a lightweight aircraft specially when it comes to VTOL weight is BAD!!
>>

The Navy A(F)-X and MRF vs. the USAF CALF were not necessarily at odds because of mission requirements. But rather due to the specifics of navalization penalties. It's hard to compare using previous lightweight fighters because frankly even the YF-17 demonstrator had less legs than the YF-16. But if you go back to the F-4J vs. C/D, _with equal fuel/ordnance loads_ both the USMC and USAF were able to get 500nm out of a turbojet driven airframe. But as soon as you try to bring the Rhino aboard, the combination of catweight limits and poor directional stability at low speeds meant that the outboard tanks had to go. And with only a centerline (which itself had serious speed and G issues for jettisoning), the 300nm squid Phantom was never any better than the EKA-3 it was flying behind.

In this case (with all of the mission fuel internalized for LO) the F-35C is simply a DIFFERENT AIRPLANE in terms of required boarding speeds vs. wing area and controllability issues. With a 620 square foot wing (actually bigger than an F-15C's 608sqft) your drag is gonna go right through the roof. And so your threshold KPPs will drop, even as your costs for all that added structural weight (and heavier gear, and wingfolds, and anti-corrosion measures and 'seasafe' RAM) will climb.

>>
They cant change the past so we are pretty much fucked we all dont have enough money to buy our aircraft in the numbers we want. If the JSF never existed we would have ALOT of money spare and would have enough aircraft.
>>

I think you failed to read a part of what I said: If we dropped the F-35 now, proceeding solely with established programs like the F/A-18E/F and F-22 (reexpanded to a useful production total of around 450-550 airframes) while reactivating the J-UCAS program, we would _spend less_ than if we continued to proceed with the F-35 **knowing** that we were bleeding customers due to rising cost and schedule delays.

Indeed, it may well be that Congress will finally WAKE UP and smell the burning pork when they realize that the 'cheaper solution' is not only not the best one for the job. But also dependent on export numbers which will simply never be achieved.

>>
Close air support and most of the JSF missions for the airforce and marines doesn't need stealth it needs A-10 like strength. Only the navy version needs alot of stealth.
>>

Myself, I've never been fond of the A-10. It was less of a smart solution than the A-7 which it replaced for NATO missions (in the weather, after hours, striking _grouped_ BAI 2E/F2F targets rather than making individual gun runs on tanks). And it has only gotten older, not better, as the decades have passed.

With this in mind, the fact remains that /today/ air is the best armor against trashfire and loiter + smart weapons is the best way to _be there_ when the target appears to be engaged. A Maverick costs around 110,000 dollars for the only version still readily available, and the A-10 can only carry two. A full load of Combat Mix (939 PGU-13, 234 PGU-14) ammo runs about 35,000 dollars and depending on the rate the gun is set to (2100 or 3900) you are looking at about 35-70rds per kill or 16 kills per drum.

By comparison the GBU-39, which has a standoff range /even from a 300 knot loiter/ of over 7 times that of the Maverick and almost 11 times that of the gun, will only cost 25,000 dollars in mass production. And a UCAV could carry 8 of them.
The difference being that their are VERY FEW instances in which more than a single kill is required to utterly disrupt if not destroy the combat effectiveness of any target set we now face in the CAS scenario.

With this in mind, I would go the other way around. The common factor _should be_ the Basing Mode. So that at least one out of four AF squadrons per wing can be trained to deploy into a carrier environment. And by doing so, can enable longer cruises and better retention, simply by not forcing such long periods of privation upon ONE service element.

>>
Which is why i would have made a naval F-22 which would have been EXACTLY what the navy wants in terms of a long range strike fighter with speed, sure it would land too fast but it could be modified to work. This allows the aircraft carriers to operate one aircraft only.
>>

Ainh. The F-22 as a VG airframe was a non-event, IMO.
http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/planes/f22/f22-natf.jpg
Even ignoring the '2 planes 1 name' secondary development costs (the same economic problem as besets the JSF); there are simply far too many surface breaks to retain effective signature baselines IMO and not enough (composite thermal limit) justification in the Mach 2+ regiment to be worth the mechanical reliability problems (telescoping fuel lines, flexible electrical bundles, huge titanium wing pivots). Frankly, given the F-22 looks a lot more like the F-35C than the F-35A; I'm not sure what they thought they were doing with the NATF. Specifically, I believe they could have made the Raptor come aboard without going to the extent of full-VG aspect change (they might have had to 'adjust' sweep from the 42` to say 36` of the Hornet and fit a different set of high lift devices but that's only a couple Mach points at most). One of the nice things about twins being that you've almost always got a centerline keel to help take the loads of CVTOL. And the power loadings and wing areas are generally more complimentary without 'scaling'. But 'as shown' the NATF would have porked the F-22 production line economics with the different configuration.

In any case, so long as the threat retains a constant baseline signature, it is better to use lookin/shootin with weapons like the AIM-155 AAAM or to move towards a turbo-AAM than it is to attempt to dash forward and lop heads off. This because the USN has always favored standoff A2G to conserve their more limited air wings whereas the USAF is new to the notion that you send the bullet where the plane should not go.

Nowadays, the advent of ADSAM/ADAAM (shooter/illuminator) tactics has rendered most of even the 'might as well' (supersonic A2A means weight which makes the MANPRINT penalty rather negligible) factors of manned A2A unimportant. As for strike, it's certainly a better idea than sending a subsonic asset but with bucketloads of cruise and hypersonics on the way, the USN choice to revert to ground support and away from the VAW type deep interdiction mission actually makes some sense. The only problem here being that what works out on a calculator still doesn't get you the most airtime for your targeting pod video and that video is what buys airplanes the next year in Congress. Of course, at the time the NATF was under active consideration, the 1,000lb JDAM addition had not been made to the Raptors mission spec (as I recall, this happened in 1994-95 and the navalized F-22 was truthfully dead by no later than 1992.).

>>
Then I would have made an F-16 size aircraft with VTOL that is CHEAP and carries weapons externally. Best part i would have made it strong, armour around all the important stuff so it can take a bit of ground fire. Atleast this aircraft could do close air support well which is one of the most important missions in this day and age. The next version down the track would then have the advanced radar.
>>

You see, to me, if you are going to put a manned asset overhead on the basis of doing 'interactive' CAS (mixed force elements at danger close distances) you have already bleeped the duck and thus NEED to have a second man to help sort things out and keep the comms under control while /one of you/ points the sensors and shoots. In this, even given the absence of mini-IAMs (at the time, though the USAF was running MMTD); you still have HUGE advantages in going with helo-class ATGW like the developed AGM-114C/F Hellfire and 70mm CRV-7 with both unitary and multidart warheads. ALL of which give you a huge edge both in terms of how far downrange you can reach (compared to LGB, Maverick or Guns) and numbers carried, for cost (Hellfire, back when ASTOVL was active, was only about 60 grande per unit).

With standoff inherent to altitude (the baseline Hellfire is a 4nm weapon, the AGM-114K is a 6nm weapon. The JCM is a 10nm weapon. From 20,000ft, these distances TRIPLE) and LOAL lockons (no need to put the nose below the horizon to lockon) and 2 crew to run a _lower hemisphere_ optimized targeting suite, you get the effects of an attack helo without the sortie lag or vulnerability of a 150-170 knot airframe, stuck in the heart of the small arms envelope.

As such, even ASTOVL was too ambitious IMO, because it would have created another 'fighter' design point for which high energy performance was more important than sensors and standoff munitions plus the crew to use them. The Marines (who should have been the first customer for this class, bringing _16_ jets to their assault decks instead of 8+8 on Harriers and Snakes) are a CAS exponent. If a jet shows up, they'll shoot it. But even back then, they had IHawk and LAV-AD to do the majority of the Force Protection mission.

>>
But WHAT IF!!! we're stuffed now too late for the JSF to be canceled unless something majorly goes up.
>>

'Something Majorly' /has/ happened. It's called Iraq. It's called a hidden budget crisis inherent to infrastructure problems (health care and social security). It's called the rise of Directed Energy Weapons as the ONLY means to assuredly counter low-trajectory ballistic threats. It's the certainty that if Iran is allowed to stand up a nuclear force, we will HAVE TO be able to suppress it with something 'rather faster' than subsonic airpower. And preferrably (if we choose to preempt) non-nuclear itself. It is the certainty that small wars can be won only with omnipresent airpower sufficient to lockdown an entire nation. Airpower that, as characterized by the Predator, cost all of 3-4 million dollars per unit. It is the FACT that we have /all/ (export customers included) been lied to regarding the price of a 'cheap' fighter which now exceeds that of conventional Gen-4 jets. And which furthermore, _isn't needed_ by those who can either wait on the U.S. forces to reduce the radar threat. Or switch to throwaway/standoff assets like KEPD, SCALP, Storm Shadow and...UCAVs.

>>
If the JSF is canceled, the Navy has no stealth aircraft even though its too short ranged to be of much use. The marines are stuffed as the harriers will be falling out of the sky in the next 10 years. Because of that it will be difficult to cancel.
>>

The U.S. Navy could bring a UCAV online in less than 5 years if they chose to do so. All the baselines are in place. JPALS, L16, Bug-Fs with ACS missionized crew stations. And it's not even like there isn't any historical precedent-
http://www.kitparade.com/features01/tdrdronetc_1.htm
http://www.stagone.org/

>>
The airforce is fine though, they could order more F-22's to perform the stealthy missions of the JSF and upgrade the F-16's to perform the non stealthy stuff.
>>

There is an irony inherent to the prediction that 'by 2050, there will be one fighter, the USAF and USN will alternate days flying it and the Marines will get it on the weekends'. Namely that while there will always be a need for aircraft which can break a war out of 2 Dimensional linearity to exploit the 'deep attack'; this nation does not need, nor can it afford multiple airpower exponent services, each preaching their own view of 'how it all works'.
As such, rather than continuing with programs like Golden Eagle and CCIP to update aged airframes and the _human_ infrastructure which they support. We should have the /balls/ to start block retiring entire mission sets. Starting with every F-16 with a block number under .50. And every A-10. And every Albino.

Because once you get past the program termination fees (maintaining spares and training pipes) you start to see REAL gains inherent to spare budget by which to expand both existing Gen-4 purchases. And make a 'big move' towards bypassing Gen-5 to get to Gen-6 which is Cheap Loitering Standoff weapons cabinets.

Given that economies of scale still do apply, the USN cannot afford to be the odd man out with effective airpower bought in microforce numbers. And their N-UCAS is almost certain to be seen as exactly that.

IMO, what makes the USAF 'secure' is the predominance of BMC2 and refueling agencies available to them to make forward control of UCAVs through satellite networks practical. The USN will have to either 'invent' this (RQ-4 as a pseudolite comms relay) or stick with fighter-controllers which they will be hard pressed, even in the superbug, to bring far enough forward from the sea to make a difference in SWA theaters.

In any case, we can't look at this as a small step process. It's like kicking a drug. You have to take the BIG LEAP to get past the initial chemical addiction before you can work on the psychological dependency. And that will never happen if the USAF sticks with the JSF. As the USN /adds/ another procurement line inherent to the UCAV. They can develop it. They can make it work _for them_, leading to another F-4/A-7 type 'blue suiters buy what they could not match' scenario. But the USAF will have to get onboard at some point. And the only way to make this happen, realistically, is to look at dropping the bogus F-35 program economics (1,600+ airframes, just to break even!). And start looking at what a loitering asset with 4 times as many bombs, can do in a force structure of perhaps 200-300 airframes for the naval services. And 500-700 for the USAF.

>>
If the JSF is canceled thought UCAV will be required for Navy for its strike mission, and the airfoce will probably buy some too.
>>

The USAF has 6,000 pilots. That IS their 'voter base' by which, as an expertise driven force conglomerate, they can demand money to sustain their competencies with bleeding edge technical capabilities as well (quantity buys quality, another perversion of the force doctrine). That said, it will be a cold day in hell before the AF is given control over the UCAS effort again so much will depend on how quickly they can edge the USN into submission on the N-UCAS. Vs. how fast Congress wakes up and realizes it's time to bail on a pork project that is no longer going to generate the kinds of export numbers necessary to fund all their local state politics on 'mass production'.

CONCLUSION:

The UCAV is the way to go. For much the same reason that the RQ-4 flew like 2-3% of the OIF sorties yet generated 70% of the targeting. Because each sortie LASTED longer, and had NO BABY ONBOARD to get cranky and need a nap, a smaller force leveraged a larger one. Now, there can be no doubt that we _need_ a large force of independent EO apertures to saturate threat rear areas in both high intensity and OOTW conditioned fights. But it doesn't have to be fast or equipped with new generation sensors or indeed in _any way_ 'fighter like'. So much as simply able to get to a target area, slowly but surely, and STAY. To deliver multiple standoff weapons.
If we buy a bunch of them they need to be cheap _as a single upgradeable variant_ and most experts agree that a basic UCAV could fulfill that role for 10-15 million without sensors. And 25-30 with them. If you add another 5 million per airframe for navalization, you are STILL less than half what the JSF is going to run us.

Meanwhile, the USAF is in blatant Contempt Of Congress for failing to bring it's force structure planning into compliance with a decree that, by 2010, 1/3rd of our deep strike force would be uninhabited. Given that the JSF will /also/ NOT be here by 2010 and in any case is a worthless interdiction platform due to speed and absolute radius/loiter issues; the opening for a change is there.

All's that has to happen is a 2008 landslide for Democrats by which 'in making their own mark' (Payback's A Bleep) they destroy Republican backed existing programs to endorse their own. Essentially, it will be the B-1 vs. Cruise Missile debate all over again. And for much the same reasons, the UCAV should win against all manned comers.

KPl.

 

[Magoo]

Obviously has WAAAYYYY too much time on his hands me thinks...far more time than I can justify to read his posts anyway.

Ever thought of running for office Kurt???:eek

Magoo

 

[Kurt Plummer]

Grand Danois,
>>

BAE already has access to the software for the F-35 as they are building some of the most sensitive parts for the F-35. Much of the LO technologies are already mastered in Europe. So what!
>>
BAe is exploiting an American techbase (purchased U.S. Companies) in the EODAS and some of the EW suite areas. The majority of the BAe physical contribution to the airframe comes from aft of the wings. Unlike a cow, this is 'not the best cut'.
If LO was mastered in Europe, Europe would be building it. Unfortunately, you don't have the _production technologies_ (which is different from the theoretical understandings of the concepts) to make your own. And so you seek, like the Russians once did, to steal what you are at least a generation behind on.
The REAL problem being that we fail to see Europe as we once saw Russia. A major technologic and economic threat /regardless/ of 'same ethnic background' and 60 year old 'shared affections'. If we did, we would realize three things:
1. The U.S. was not made great by knucking under to two-bit city states that can't even get it together enough to ratify a common constitution. If you want the /capability/ we will share it because we know you won't point it at our backs and pull the trigger. If you want the technology, develop it on your own. Because while there are relatively few murderers in the international diplomacy. The world is full of thieves. And the only way to guard against technology exploitation and proliferation, is to force someone to have pride in it as being THEIRS.
2. The Brits ARE Europe. Not a branch office of the States. This means that, ultimately, all their interests are centered on the Continent as being their most immediate and long term consequential source of benefits and punishment inherent to not being a 'team player'.
3. There can be only two reasons for Britain to want access to LO and software codes. One is that they are looking to become FACO as 'licensed distributors' of JSF technology to NATO. Much like the old Fokker/SABCA lines did with the F-16. The other, given that the JSF is likely to fall flat on it's face, is that of stealing the technology so they can proudly bring a trophy to the EADS high rather than beggars table.
>>
Sovereignty issues are about who (if any) should have right to do their own maintenance and upgrades.
>>
BULL-
>
DID has reported the friction and threats to the F-35 program created by the USA's ITAR restrictions on military technology transfer. These restrictions were a barrier to allied participants' wish to be full participants in the project, and to be able to maintain their aircraft without always having to go hat in hand to the USA. Stealth technologies like the F-35's radar-absorbing paint, software source code underpinning the aircraft's equipment and weapons integration, and agreements on follow-on development of after-market capabilities that British firms could manufacture and market without requiring US permission were the key issues for the UK - but as DID's reporting shows, the UK is not alone in its concerns.
>
http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/mt/mt-search.cgi?search=ITAR&CaseSearch=on
>
And-
>
His belief that after 9/11, the USA needs to tighten weapons technology controls rather than loosen them. In a response to then-Secretary of State Colin Powell, Rep. Hyde reportedly wrote: "Your department's proposal would suspend virtually the entire US government system of scrutiny and control... It is not obvious to us why suspending this system now makes sense in the post-9/11 security environment."
Britain's lack of specific laws that prevent transfers of military technology to third parties. In the absence of firm laws, reliance on the future goodwill of Britain's industry, Cabinet, and Parliament is not seen as enough. DID has covered the EU push to lift the ban on military exports to China. Even though Britain eventually came around and helped lead the effort to shelve the proposal, initial participation by some British personalities and firms in the push to lift the ban gave Rep. Hyde a great deal of ammunition on this front.
The specific nature of some of the potential recipients. We mentioned China, above, but a greater concern might be France, with whom Britain has significant defense technology ties via corporate cross-ownerships and some projects. Given France's "anything goes" defense export policies, an ITAR waiver that clears items to Britain without oversight could be seen as creating a potential clearing-house for technology transfer et. al. via other joint projects. The question of whom an ITAR waiver risks admitting is thus a live one.
>
http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/2005/12/uk-warns-usa-over-itar-arms-restrictions/index.php
And-
>
Other issues remain live. For example, Britain is seeking full independent maintainability and control over its F-35 fighters - and one of the most critical and contested areas lies in the plane's massive software source code. Since software will run so many aspects of the F-35's operations, access to the source code is necessary in order to debug many flaws, and may be required to integrate new weapons.
At the same time, the plane's dependence on software makes protecting the securtity of that source code an absolute must. To have even parts of it fall into hostile hands could be a disaster of the first magnitude. On the American side, there is also the quasi-protectionist angle of not wishing to have others copy the software and develop spin-off products in future that are based on US work. Even attempting to scrutinize that would be a challenge, however, and creates intrusiveness, approval, and friction problems of its own.
On the other hand, with $2 billion invested as a "Tier One" partner, Britain may justly feel that a full partner should not have to go hat in hand to the USA every time a change is required.
>
http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com...tain-to-pull-out-of-f35-jsf-program/index.php
You need only look at matters from the 'between lines' aspect of-
>
Peter Goon, a former RAAF flight test engineer, said that would mean the difference between it appearing as a "marble and a beach ball" on enemy radar. The problem with the fighter, Dr Jensen says, is that it can be relatively easily detected from the rear.
A Federal Government source conceded yesterday that the stealth capability definitions had been changed, but maintained that the "design requirements" for the fighter to "avoid detection" had not.
Signs that the stealth capability had been lowered first emerged last year, when key performance indicators on the US Defence Department Joint Strike Fighter
website changed. The manufacturer of the aircraft, Lockheed Martin, insisted repeatedly to the Herald that the reported shift was an error. Australia's Defence Department also maintained there had been no change.
But those assurances have proven false. When the Herald contacted the US Defence Department Joint Strike Fighter program office in Washington, a spokeswoman said the latest table on its website was correct. "There is no reason to pull it from there," she said.
A Lockheed Martin spokesman said yesterday: "We will have to defer to our clients, the US Government, if that is their decision."
The downgrading in the stealth capability is only one issue that concerns Dr Jensen, who has a doctorate in applied physics and used to work at the Defence Science and Technology Organisation.
>
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/not-so-stealthy-the-15b-fighters/2006/03/13/1142098404532.html
>
Mr EDWARDS—I have one more question. I want to refer to what the Australian
ambassador had to say on, I think, Wednesday in the United States. Basically Australia’s
ambassador in Washington expressed strong concerns about possible delays and cost blow-outs
of the proposed JSF. Some of those concerns centred around whether or not Australia would get
access to the full secrecy details of the US JSF. It appears that the Brits have been able to
negotiate something in terms of this secrecy transfer while at this stage Australia has not.
We are due to sign up for this aircraft. We have already invested something like $300 million
in it. Does it concern you that we do not or may not have access to the full capacity of this
aircraft—the full the capacity that the United States will? Does it concern you that we are about
to commit to the most expensive purchase in the history of Defence in this nation at the same
time we are still looking at what is a paper aircraft? I would appreciate your comments in
relation to those matters.
Prof. Babbage—My view is that it is very important that we gain access to the capacity to
modify and adapt this aircraft for our special needs. There are going to be times when we are
going to need to use this aircraft differently to the way the United States will be using it, it seems
it me. We need to be able to modify some aspects of it. We need to be able to maintain it, repair
it and that includes some pretty sensitive issues. I do not think we have to have all the source
codes and the deep source codes behind the fine bit of equipment. We need to be able to modify
the sensor’s software so that if we want it look for something else or report in a different format
to fit in with something else on one of our Wedgetail aircraft or something like that we can make
that happen.
I am not in a position to brief you on where the negotiations are at—you may want to ask
others that—but I am aware that these are issues that are under way. I am moderately optimistic
that there will be a successful conclusion on gaining the critical IP access that is required. On the
costing matter, that is something that has to concern us all. The biggest risk is if the US program
were significantly cut in my view.
>
http://www.aph.gov.au/Hansard/joint...JSF Australia wants access to LO maintenance"
>
To understand that the 1 BILLION dollars we have invested in 'anti tamper' mechanisms has _failed_ to secure LO. And the requirement inherent to the LOCLOEXCOM to maintain security of stealth technologies is what is _directly at stake_ here. Given the amount of money we FORCE /our/ companies to expend on securing such technology. And the fact that all the stealth you /think/ you are paying for would be for NOTHING if you broke the bubble on materials and maintainability security, it's no freakin' wonder that we don't want you to 'know how to repair and modify' your aircraft.
Two Billion is less than ten percent. Oz isn't even giving that much, only about 300 million. You are our friends but NOT OUR EQUALS. And /nothing out there/ comes close to matching what we bring to the table. This is, pure and simple a case of someone whining and the U.S. not telling them _fine, just leave_. Until they came back as beggars.
>>
OPSEC may be compromised from leaking of sw, but leaking of actual technology? Marginal.
>>
The reality is that it is nearly impossible to secure databases once they are opened and member partners would steal because that's the nature of industrial espionage. This is just the furtherance of that effort, 'on behalf of corporate interests' by the governments involved. A way to make it legal on paper so that when they are caught there is a fallback "But you said it was okaaaay...." agreed position to separate bad acts from the national leadership.
If Oz wants to maintain their jets, FINE! Right up to the point where they enter an Ami-only area or building restricted to observables. If Britain wants to be in on the avionics updates (which we publish _quarterly_ for EW related issues and biannually for overall OFP, /vastly/ more often than any other nation), FINE! Britain can send techs to the U.S. whose SOLE access will be in a joint program office lab or depot environment where ALL data _stays on site_ except when transfered directly to the UK.
Do not ask for what you cannot build. And then ask for the secrets to build it. And then demand that /we/ purchase a certain number of aircraft so YOUR bottom line remains the same. It's just layer upon layer of hubris to think that you deserve to be more than 'valued customers with employee discounts'.
Because this jet is NOT the right one for the U.S. and selling it is a risk to national capabilities that we should NOT have to be undertaking for the benefit of 2nd World not World Power wannabe nations.
>>
MY tax money is also being sunk into this program. Have we been promised a fixed price? Don't think so.

>>
Of course it is. It's implicit to the notion that the U.S. is THE major airframe purchaser and that by signing up as an early Tier partner instead of an FMF one, you get to play along with the TAA and subsystems work. Last I read, there were 10 Australian companies in on the JSF. The conditional modifer is that you come through with SDD so that 'your percentage of our percentage' is a given. If our percentage (inventory buy) drops. Your percentage of both fuzzy-dice assembly and your own Technical Assistance program goes down to. This is what the Kokoda paper hinted at with their '3/4/5' squadron purchase. And it's why the Ozzian Ambassador was actually so flippant as to 'insist' that the U.S. maintain a significant inventory purchase. Because it would be the difference between a 68-76 million dollar airframe. And a 100 million dollar one. For his country.
The problem with all of this is that the midgets think that if they each yell like a giant they will get their share and 'nobody will notice because it's such a big program'. When in point of truth, what _keeps the program large_ is the sheer unification of manufacture around a single prime and best-bid set of subs /in the U.S./. It is idiocies like the Eurofighter consortium which blow costs completely out of proportion with 'equal participation'. And the fuzzy dice level of program technical lookin and manufacturing assist, especially in the key areas of propulsion, avionics and LO, is not the kind of offset that it is often assumed to be.
The more you demand to be heard as giants. The more the rest of the midgets will clamour for 'equal rights' and the more JSF will become 'socialized' like a labor union with everybody getting chunks of a pie that SHRINKS because it is not competitively dealt.
And that's not even including the U.S. side of the politics whereby Congress expects to give money to make money and so have a high bias towards 'keeping it in the family' in a way that they /never/ showed respect for with the F-22.

KPl.