New videos leaked from the US Air Force's F-35 demo or stunt flying team show the jet making head-spinning turns that older jets could never hit.
But despite the F-35's impressive moves and ability to win dogfights, Berke said he'd stay on mission and try to score kills that take better advantage of the jet's stealth.
"I want to avoid getting into a dogfight, but if I had to I'm going to be able to outmaneuver most other aircraft," he said.
Results from the US Air Force's realistic, challenging Red Flag air combat exercise — and it looks like the F-35 slaughtered the competition.
Aviation Week reports that the Joint Strike Fighter killed 15 aggressors for each F-35 downed. The F-35 achieved this remarkable ratio in a drastically increased threat environment that included radar jamming, increased air threats, and surface-to-air missile batteries.
"In the past, the non-kinetic effects were not fully integrated into the kinetic fight," Col. Robert Cole, the Air Force Cyber Forward director, said in a statement.
But now F-35s take on cyberthreats and electronic warfare in addition to enemy surveillance and conventional, or kinetic, threats.
The improvements continue. Few countries can match our technological/industrial base, and match that with the economic resources to support the huge cost to develop and maintain platforms like this.
The more we push ahead, the better, as we'll leave our few competitors behind. Next, the unmanned fighter plane.
But...how is it on maintenance? How many F-35's do you need to put four in the air? If it's F-22's, you need six, because of maintenance issues.
ReplyDeleteyeah, it's a problem with the software controlled systems in MCAs. every time you turn them on they do something different. signals processing on the e3a was always a thrill because sometimes there was a bit of dust on the discs. I recall picking up new syresses chock full of new software which the comp pukes dutifully loaded on my aircraft. wow. interesting. once, the apy-1 locked on to the moon every sweep and designated it a threat. fuel pumps were an initial issue and one never new until the ops check was finished. but then, it was the ops checks that were doing them in.
DeleteI imagine the walls of F35 hangars will have mats of scalp and hair from techs beating their brains out.
and what if the red team is filled with F-22 capable aircraft ahd blue is F-35s? who says red team has to play by blue teams rules. give the aggressor squadron pilots F-22 capability and tactics instead of T-38s and fucktardistan tactics. that is more real then the pissant role playing to make something look good. Admiral Crowe had a statement about the ability of the F111B to defend the fleet at a point in sea trials for the Navy acceptance of MacNamara's accountants wetdream inspired aircraft. try to remember what he said and take it to heart.
ReplyDeleteNeed to ither build a LOT more or do much better than 15:1 kills. Because when things go REALLY south the USAF will have to deal with a LOT of adversay air craft AND Air Defenses.
ReplyDeleteI find it a bit hard to believe it was a 15-1 difference. Since they both use the same air-to-air missile I would think the first one to fire the missile once they were inside the 300 mile locking range of the missile.
ReplyDeleteThe missiles aren't going to lock on to an F35/F22 at the same distance they would on a 4th gen fighter. A stealth fighter can kill a non stealth fighter before the nonstealthy even knows the stealth fighter is anywhere in the vicinity.
DeleteThe F-35 is still a steaming POS. Period. Software driven steaming POS. Overpriced, obsolete by latest standards, grounded by bogus gremlins and engineering flaws just to name a few. Kelly Johnson should arise from his grave and smite all the bloviating engineers and ITs. What a sham......
ReplyDeleteIn past wars, the USAF has generally issued ROE's that required visual identification of targets. That greatly reduces the effective range of air-to-air missiles, and it guarantees dogfights. I would like to know what ROE's were used in the exercises, and what would be used in a new war.
ReplyDeleteI recall about 10 years ago that the USAF chief of staff was horrified to exclaim that in an air exercise with Indian Spads they ate our F-15's lunch and stole their pocket money.
ReplyDeleteIt was all the usual scam by the usual liars. I don't believe a word out of any weapon and haven't since I sat in a warzone protected by an FFG7 who could not throw any kind of missile on its single launcher because the hold back didn't work which meant each missile would just immediately fall back into the magazine.
Protected by what? We used to laugh out loud and I sure did when those same ships blew off their engine exhaust stack and Close in Weapon every time they returned their single solitary worthless gun mount to stow position and it fired another round just to clear the bore.