Years of delays, cost overruns, and technical glitches with the F-35 have put the Pentagon in a dilemma:
If F-35s aren’t fit to fly in sufficient numbers, then older aircraft such as the F-16 must be kept in service to fill the gap. In turn, having to extend the lifespan of older planes consumes money that could be used to acquire new aircraft and results in aging warplanes that may not be capable of fulfilling their missions on the current battlefield.
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The aircraft has been plagued by a seemingly endless series of bugs, including problems with its stealth coating, sustained supersonic flight, helmet-mounted display, excessive vibration from its cannon, and even vulnerability to being hit by lightning.
The military and Lockheed Martin have resolved some of those problems, but the cumulative effect of the delays is that the Air Force has had to shelve plans for the F-35 to replace the F-16, which now will keep flying until the 2040s.
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The remarkable longevity of some aircraft — such as the 71-year-old B-52 bomber or the 41-year-old A-10 — tends to obscure the difficulty of keeping old warplanes flying. Production lines are usually shut down, and the original manufacturers of components and spare parts have long ceased production. In some cases, they are no longer in business.
What evidence is there that throwing the money that would be spent on keeping proven, currently fairly adequate planes flying would suddenly fix the problems with the F-35.
The promise of cake tomorrow does not feed us today, and today is when we have the need.
The only dilemma is how fledgling colonels and generals can earn their wings once the Pentagon finally pries from the Air Force brass’ cold, stiff, elderly grasp their otherwise-useless Cold-War hardware and its antique mystique.
Ninety percent of the alleged F-35′s alleged trillion-dollar budget goes into massless-drive development, nine percent goes into subterranean bases, nine-tenths of one percent buys the finest politicians’ lubricant for the self-licking ice-cream-cone machine, and the rest goes to Indian-American computer programmers working on a contract on a contract on a contract.
Honestly, it’s a joke.
Be that First Principles guy:
What is it we the United States want to do?
Now that established, what is it you want the military to do?
Now that the ends are established let us discuss the resources necessary and costs.
The goals should be adjusted to the resources and the methods allowed.
Methods: as anything that looks bad in the media results in instant treachery to the soldiers or policemen or spies who do it, they are tossed to the wolves.
Which brings us to reality: you ain’t got shit honey, no one who knows you and that’s all the veterans is gonna pull the trigger for you.
“What is it we the United States want to do?
Now that established, what is it you want the military to do?”
These questions will not be asked as long as the PTB are in control, because the answer to the first question, if asked of the American people, would probably be “Run a fairly free, fairly prosperous mercantile republic with a minimum of fuss and bother to the populace” and the answer to the second question would be “Defend sain mercantile republic from enemies foreign and domestic, and look out for our vital interests overseas” And those answers are the very last thing our “rulers” want to hear.