A F-22 Raptor crashed during flight testing near Edwards AFB, killing the pilot, RIP. http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123141485
Dave Cooley, the pilot, was great guy with a ton of fast jet experience. I had the pleasure of working with him at Edwards a few years back doing some F-22 testing. He was a stand up guy and will be missed greatly. My thoughts go out to his family.
Gates Calls for Cuts to High-Tech Weapons Programs Defense Secretary Robert Gates announces a broad range of cuts to weapons spending, saying he plans to cut programs ranging from a new helicopter for the president to ending production of the $140 billion F-22 fighter jet. FOXNews.com Monday, April 06, 2009 powered by BaynoteDefense Secretary Robert Gates on Monday recommended a broad range of budgetary cuts to high-tech weapons programs, including production of the F-22 fighter jet, in a move that won mixed reviews from lawmakers on Capitol Hill. Gates said his $534 billion budget proposal represents a "fundamental overhaul" in defense acquisition and reflects a shift in priorities from fighting conventional wars to the newer threats U.S. forces face from insurgents in places such as Afghanistan. He called for production of the F-22 jet to stop at 187 jets. There are 183 in the U.S. military now, so just four more would be funded as part of the fiscal 2009 supplemental budget if President Obama approves the recommendations. The planes cost $140 million each. Lockheed Martin has already warned that ending this production would result in the loss of over 90,000 jobs. Plans to build a new helicopter for the president and a helicopter to rescue downed pilots would also be canceled. A new communications satellite would be scrapped and the program for a new Air Force transport plane would be ended. To fight new threats from insurgents, Gates is proposing more funding for special forces and other tools. "In many ways, my recommendations represent a cumulative outcome of a lifetime spent in the national security arena -- but above all, questions asked, experience gained and lessons learned from over two years of leading this department, and in particular, from our experience in Iraq and Afghanistan," Gates said. He said his recommendations would "profoundly reform" the way the Defense Department does business. "We must re-balance this department's programs in order to institutionalize and finance our capabilities to fight the wars we are in today and the scenarios we are most likely to face in the years ahead, while at the same time providing a hedge against other risks and contingencies," he said.
Gates wants to destroy the USAF - same as Rumsfeld. The USAF has not obtained large blocs of fighters, since the Reagan administration. Give them a few years, and they will cut back large #'s of F-35's. How can the U.S. maintain air superiority with 140 airplanes ? The other airplanes will be in test, training, and maintainance etc... It would have made better economic sense, to simply buy more F-15's, and equip them with AESA radar, instead of spending billions on a limited buy of F-22's.
Ralf- The problem was, the original buy was for 722 aircraft, and the unit price would have come way down. When you limit production, unit costs soar. There were originally supposed to be 132 B-2s, not the 22 or so we eventually produced. Once the unit price rises, the weapon system becomes an easy target for budget cutters. Gates has been, and will continue to be, a disaster. Taz Terry Phillips
to cut back now, when CHINA is building up!!! is just plain silly in imho!!! Thats why , I supported Bush
D- China finally understood that 10% of a crummy GDP does not produce much of a military capability. 10% of a huge GDP, however, can produce a world class military capability. They are building a world class military capability while Gates is concentrating on fighting terrorists. Terrorists will never shut down the US military. China in the future might have that capability if the current investment rate continues. Taz Terry Phillips
I think the major powers, at least right now, realize that other tools of national power (e.g. financial, informational) other than military are more likely to yield a most positive result. When big powers fight, everyone loses. That said, with the rise of supra nationals such as Al-Quiada and the Somali pirates, there will remain a need for conventional military arms. F-22, maybe nort so much -- Spec Ops, definitely. Looking at current taskings, you'd think we'd have a new inflight refueler by now (Johnny Mac pooched that for us) and we need C-17s a lot more than we need F-22s. The F-15 is getting long in the tooth and we do need a dedicated air-to-air...or do we? In an age of constrained resources and long range fire and forget AAMRAMs a multirole fighter like the F-35 makes more economic sense, at least based on current projections. Heck, we did pretty well with the F-4 for a lot of years. Some folks will say that the F-22 is just a place holder for the follow on unmanned fighter - not encumbered by lifesupport systems or human physiologic flight restrictions. But for now, the AF is still run by Creech's fighter pilots.
I had the honor to see Gates speak at College Station this week. I liked him before and I like him even more now. Glad he stayed on with Obama.
Isn't there a risk that the current batch of fighter planes going to be made obsolete by drones? The 9.5g limit placed on manned aircraft has to be a limiting factor in dog fighting and evasive maneuvers.
Rob- I cannot stand Gates and believe he, Cheney, and McNamara were the worst SecDefs/SecWars we ever had. Brad- The technology is coming along, but there is a big difference between a Predator/Reaper flying an essentially 2D offensive role against ground targets and performing a 3D air to air mission. We will get there, and the ability to pull 25 or 30 "g"s will definitely be an advantage, as will be the lack of life support equipment, and the ability to lose aircraft without having to mount a SAR effort. Taz Terry Phillips
Rob- Sorry, missed one. Rumsfeld and McNamara tied for number one, Cheney next, then Gates. All have been politicians, not leaders, and none listened to their military advisers, but went off to enact their own agendas. We paid for it every time, and I believe we will pay for it again in the future. Taz Terry Phillips
Sorry, but we don't need a 140 million dollar airplane. Not so sure we need a 40 million dollar airplane. Surely the gov't can find something else to spend the money on - something more useful than a jet fighter we can't really use since we don't fight 'that way' anymore. I don't want to lose jobs, but I don't like pissing into the wind, either. I know history has proven when you let your guard down, you get attacked, and I am sure we will be attacked at some point in the future, somewhere, but I really don't think we will see an impending invasion from anyone on the continental United States. Not militarily, anyway.
I dont really care for the F-22 as it has limited storage for weapons. Hang weapons off the wing and you are now no better than a current F-15 or F-16. As they lose there stealth factor and cannot maneuver as hard. The F-35 is not even close to being proven as it is still in development. With the F-15 and F-16 production lines still operating we could easily build fresh airframes that can fill the gap until a true fighting drone is available and operational The F-15 is still capable and has lots of development still avaliable as the Korean AF has an AESA radar and F-110 engines. It would not be too expensive to produce a F-15 G/H that has modern aviaonics, sensor and weapon systems as they have been already tested on the F-15 prior to being used on the F-22/F-35's. As for the F-16 the UAE operate the E and F model that is far more capable than the newest F-16 in the USAF inventory. A few tweaks to the F-16E/F will make it even more capable. The added plus with the current F-22 operating in a pure air - air combat platform. It will allow the F-15 and F-16 to go in inflict there damage and still be able to fight its way out. The F-22 and F-35 are at an disadvantage when it comes to the SEAD (Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses) as to be effective the "Ironhand" pilots need to force the SAM radars to become active and track them. A stealth aircraft doing this shows there hand as there is a small radar return in stealth mode and large one the second the weapons bay opens up. Now your enemy can sacrifice a radar sight but allow a computer to figure out what it takes to track the stealth aircraft, rendering stealth useless.
Rob- The F-15 and F-16 are early fourth generation fighters. The F-35 and F-22 are fifth generation fighters. Less need for SEAD if the radars cannot see you. Russia and China are working on fifth generation fighters now and the Europeans are flying late fourth generation fighters more capable kinematically than the F-15/16. The block 50 and 60 F-16s are very capable, but still nothing like an F-35 and the block 60 aircraft are less capable kinematically than other block F-16s because of increased mass. Upgraded F-15s are 1970s airframes and F-16s are upgraded 1980s airframes, both of which are very maintenance intensive (expensive to run) compared to fifth generation aircraft. The F-111 and F-117 were retired because they were expensive to maintain, not because of any lack of capability. The same thing killed the B-58 and SR-71 and will kill the F-15/16. We can try and do the same thing we did in 1942, where our aircrews fought superior aircraft until industry caught up with the Axis Powers. Different this time where instead of developing a $50K P-47 or P-51, we are talking about lengthy, $B development programs. Incidentally, the time between a fifth generation fighter's (or even an F-117's) weapons bay opening and the weapons dispensing and bay closing are measured in milliseconds. Not enough time to normally see the return, much less develop a track for the aircraft. Taz Terry Phillips
When I asked several US military pilots at air shows, they say they are training more for the air-to-ground than air-to-air missions. Not conclusive across all, but the small sampling I heard led me to believe it is true.
Terry, While a stealth A/C does not have a large radar return it still has a small return. AESA and MESA radar technology along with computer software will render Stealth useless in very short time. As the software can detect a small return and determine that it is flying to fast to be classified as a small bird. Once the computer has determined that it is a threat it radar return is amplified and now shows up on the screens of the radar operator. Another weakness that has been found with the F-22 is the fact that even in super cruise it can be tracked by the sensor on an AIM-9X allowing the aggressors at Nellis to sneak up on Raptors until the officers in the pentagon ordered the aggressors to stop using this tactic. As for Maint. cost the F-22 is sky high for a fighter A/C in operation with very low operating hours. There have been several situations where the stealth coatings have delaminated, one if them took out an engine in flight. Flight control computer sensors have been taken out by voltage spikes. 1 of these voltage spikes caused to loss of the Raptor at Nellis AFB. Another raptor was grounded after the gyros went stupid at Edwards causing the A/C to go into a 20G maneuver bending the tail section of the airframe. There are 25 raptors that have to go thru extra inspections because the rear section of the fuselage was not heat treated properly and need to be inspected for cracks regularly. Boeing has shown a concept for a 4++ Generation version of the F-15 By mating the sensors and avionics of the Raptor and Lightning II along with Low Observability tech the Eagle is still very capable and is a tested and proven airframe. The Raptor has yet to prove itself in battle and as scott.mac has stated the majority of pilots are training more for air - ground and less air - air. In a red flag exercise often times F-15 and F-16 pilots are one day flying Combat Air Patrol the next doing strike missions. As for the Soviets and Chinese developing 5th gen fighters. It will cost them a lot of time and money to develop them only to have the tables turn 10-15 years from now where pilots will be sitting in a room half way around the world flying drones that can pull 15G's and fight other A/C or delivering bombs for 1/4 the cost and not risking the life of the pilot. We dont need these $100 million+ fighters that might or might not do the job only to be mothballed in a short time. Fresh updated proven A/C can fill these gaps until UCAV's are operational
Rob- Normal teething troubles for a new aircraft. Easier to fix than the slab failures on the F-111A during Harvest Reaper that cost us half the aircraft we sent to Viet-Nam. Luckily, two of my friends survived an ejection and they found and fixed that problem, along with several others over the years. 14 years later we had an MC rate of over 92% during Desert Storm for the F-111F. The F-22 will evolve into an even more reliable system, as will the F-35. F-15Es are already $60M aircraft. Start adding low observables to the airframe and all-new avionics and you are already pushing the $100M price-tag for an aircraft that will never be capable of what the F-22 or F-35 can do. UCAVs are a long way from filling that gap, even if eventually they will offer "g" capability two to four times the current 9 "g" limits for manned aircraft. Afraid I have to disagree with you on this one. Plus we have never flown UAVs or UCAVs in a severe electromagnetic environment, but only against third world or even less capable forces. With a vehicle completely dependent on outside sources for sensor input, pilot input, and weapons delivery, a breakthrough in electronic combat capability could negate your entire fleet. Forgot to mention I am an electronic warfare officer in my profile. You pay your money and you take your chances. Gates' problem is he sees us only fighting counter-terrorist missions in the future against unsophisticated antagonists. For those of us with a vision of who we might be fighting in the future, planning your force structure against a low tech enemy and fighting a high tech enemy with the same force structure is a recipe for disaster. Taz Terry Phillips
This is the Boeing "Silent Eagle" concept, where they have tried to change the radar signature bu moving the hard points and weapons inside the airplane like the F-22. I'm not a big fan of it unless they were to make "new build" airplanes. After being involved in some aspects of the F-22 testing for 5 years, I'm a big fan of the airplane and it's capabilities. I don't think the price tag is too high if it gets us air superiority. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Don- We did similar work on an F-111F, which was glued together from a badly damaged F-111D and F-111F, making it an extra F-111F, but with stealth features added. The reduction in radar cross-section was significant, but still left a pretty good signature. This is what you would expect from any airframe designed before we had 2-D stealth codes (F-117A) and 3-D stealth codes (B-2/A-12/F-22/F-35). The F-15 and F-16 are no different. The F-111 was actually the first aircraft fielded with radar absorbing materials, fitted inside the engine intakes. Most of that RAM was long ago covered with aluminum strips to prevent the RAM from fodding and engine. Rob- I respect your educated opinion. Taz Terry Phillips
