ARmy Rumour SErvice

Originally Posted by wooger

Apologies if this has already been covered, but such a pity that we did not have a government that was willing to make such choices.

"The president's advisers have expressed great exasperation that Congress has allowed billions of dollars to be spent on weapons systems that neither the White House nor the military actually want, says the BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington"

BBC News - F-22

Do you think this may have some bearing on the subject?

Linky

A new unmanned combat aircraft could soon wing its way to the battlefield and land with the precision of a helicopter. The Excalibur recently completed its first flight to demonstrate those abilities using a hybrid turbine-electric propulsion system.

The unmanned aerial system (UAS) could pack a 400-pound payload of four Hellfire missiles, and also deliver weapons or other supplies to warfighters deep in rough territory. Its design allows it to have a maximum speed of 460 mph, but also have the ability to loiter overhead at just 115 mph.

While I am in no way suggesting that this could replace the F-22, it is part of the writng on the wall.

Originally Posted by BBC NEWS CHANNEL

US Senate halts F-22 jet funding

. . . Mr Obama argued F-22 jets, designed in the 1980s for use against an enemy with an air force, were no longer useful.

"I'm grateful that the Senate just voted against an additional $1.75bn to buy F-22 fighter jets that military experts and members of both parties say we do not need," Mr Obama said after Tuesday's vote.

The $1.75bn (£1.1bn) would have funded the construction of seven extra F-22 fighters, in addition to the 187 jets already being built . . . .

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8162106.stm

It will be of (more) concern if they start changing the numbers of F35 to be ordered.

http://www.popsci.com/military-aviat...derbird-colors

Two areas to get into if you want to be part of the future of aviation.

1. UAV
2. Conditioned Based Maintenance.

All other trains are leaving the platform and are not returning.

Im not a fan of Mr. Obama, but he called this one right in my most humble of opinions. Anyone seen a F-22 in a combat theatre yet? If they are, is it plausible to assume that a cheaper airframe could assume the mission anyway?

Bloody thing is gucci as hell, but no place for it on the current battlefield. Now when things with N. Korea go pear-shaped maybe we can talk about it.

187 already built should do the trick!! Greedy bastards.

Originally Posted by wooger

Apologies if this has already been covered, but such a pity that we did not have a government that was willing to make such choices.

"The president's advisers have expressed great exasperation that Congress has allowed billions of dollars to be spent on weapons systems that neither the White House nor the military actually want, says the BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington"

BBC News - F-22

Exasperation, maybe. Surprise, definitely not. Besides, this isn't over yet. The way things work over there is that each house of Congress passes its own budget bill. The Senate voted against the purchase of a whopping 7 additional airframes, the House of Representatives hasn't voted on its bill yet, which may contain the provision that the Senate rejected.

Delegates from each house then convene in a conference committee to iron out the differences between the two bills- at which point the appropriation might rise again. Once the compromise bill passes it returns to the floor of each house- and is voted on again. Once the bill passes both houses it's then sent to the President for signature into law and although he's threatened a veto (with political cover from John McCain of all people) I don't know if he wants to take that gamble.

I've never been a fan of this project. I don't care how many whistles and bells it has, it's too expensive to deploy in the numbers required. Remember, "Even a Spitfire can't be in two places at once."

The wrong aircraft won the fly-off - the YF-23 actually addressed the brief, but the F-22 appealed more to aging fighter jocks dreaming of their youth.

The problem is it's schizophrenic - is it a genuine unseen killer ? - in which case dogfights should be avoided at all costs, as joining a furball means all that money you spent on LPI radar and stealth is wasted. After all, modern Russian IRST systems and AAMs guide very nicely on aerodynamic airframe heating - particularly if you've just supercruised in. Indeed, I wonder how vulnerable it is to modern IR gear looking up at a F-22 silhouetted against a nice cold sky. No amount of technology stops air from decelerating and heating up in close proximity to a moving object.

And then there's the small number of onboard missiles and the inexplicable lack of a US AAM programme which has the range to fully exploit the F-22's capability. That said, the pure missile interceptor is probably too specialised a beast to be worth buying these days. You have to be able to cope with the whole spectrum.

As for dogfighting, the unpleasant truth is that the limiting factor these days is the human. That's why the future of close combat in the air belongs to the machine. They don't fall over from GLOC. It's a couple of decades away at least mind, but it will happen. Maybe we'll see UCAVs before we see autonomous vehicles but that does assume you can guarantee a data link.

Originally Posted by One_of_the_strange

As for dogfighting, the unpleasant truth is that the limiting factor these days is the human. That's why the future of close combat in the air belongs to the machine. They don't fall over from GLOC. It's a couple of decades away at least mind, but it will happen. Maybe we'll see UCAVs before we see autonomous vehicles but that does assume you can guarantee a data link.

10 years ago we had dial-up > Broadband > Wifi > mobile dongle, it wont take long

So after they p1ssed all that money on the F22, what was really needed was a posh F16.

Gates is an impressive chap. He leads this tiny sacrificially military industrial complex lamb to slaughter. Seven F-22s won't be commissioned. Hallelujah a couple of billion is saved.

Ten times that went on R and D alone and the F-22 program cost is estimated at 65 Billion. The 100th F-22 was delivered in August 2007. Last I heard about 190 were already delivered and the odds are they'll never usefully fly in combat.

Unit costs for demonstrably useful Predators is $4.5 million, a Black Hawk is $5.9 million, an A-10 $11.7 million. This compared with $137.5 million for an F-22 and a ratio of 30:1 for maintenance to hours in the air. Refurbishing the entire A-10 force in 07 was budgeted $4.4 billion. This isn't hard math in terms of defense choices. Neither is the corrupt logic of congressional district pork tough to figure.

Lockheed Martin Aeronautics and Boeing Integrated Defense Systems have already drunk deep at the tax payers trough. Meanwhile behind the smoke and mirrors Gates backed by President Barry (remember the "change" guy?) maintains a ballooning pork heavy defense budget largely unrelated to to likely threats at at a time of record deficits.

That the pain Pentagon pork inflicts on the US taxpayer is now dwarfed by the gouging cartel based US healthcare rip or the light fingered US banking sector should not be viewed as comforting.

Dr Strauss (deceased) comments.

Originally Posted by leveller

Originally Posted by One_of_the_strange

As for dogfighting, the unpleasant truth is that the limiting factor these days is the human. That's why the future of close combat in the air belongs to the machine. They don't fall over from GLOC. It's a couple of decades away at least mind, but it will happen. Maybe we'll see UCAVs before we see autonomous vehicles but that does assume you can guarantee a data link.

10 years ago we had dial-up > Broadband > Wifi > mobile dongle, it wont take long

I'm far from an expert, but there are a couple of things that strike me about that.

First of all, I imagine that radio signals can be jammed fairly easily. Until we have a foolproof way of communicating with our autonomous fighters, all the enemy has to do is deploy some sort of ECM.

Secondly, it would be very very difficult to build a machine that afforded the pilot as much spacial awareness as actually being there. Bear in mind that the human brain is a machine vastly more complex than anything we've ever come close to building.