F-35 Fighter Too Big To Fail
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Originally Posted By: Astro14
Originally Posted By: Nickdfresh
Hi OneEye, I'm actually a member of a Facebook group dedicated to the T-38/F-5E/F-20 Tigershark. They were very good aircraft and some would argue some of the best pilots fly them - as aggressor pilots in the US military. The F-20 was created as a cheaper, "poor-man's" F-16 but IIRC it wasn't that much cheaper in the end as its cost increased with its capabilities...
I do think the F-5 series is one of the more overlooked aircraft that never found much of a niche in the USAF unfortunately, but maybe should have...
The F-20 was an excellent airplane, but the issue with adding any completely new airframe is the overhead cost. It costs hundreds of millions in overhead: training facilities, training new crews and maintenance people, spare parts inventory, parts rebuilding (intermediate maintenance) capability.
It's more analogous starting up a new car dealership than to buying a new car - as DOD, you've got to buy the entire support infrastructure because outside of you, the DOD, it doesn't exist. That's why foreign nations buy our stuff, we provide all the parts, training, etc. Same is true when they buy French airplanes, or Swedish, or Russian, and it's why so many indigenous airplane projects fail: the overhead costs and development of that support structure is prohibitive.
The F-5 was bought by several nations, so the parts were available and the infrastructure was built. That made the price palatable to DOD, and we bought lots of them as adversary training assets.
That's what killed the F-20, no foreign sales, so DOD had to eat the whole overhead cost if we bought the airplane. When you consider the costs savings of each airplane, it was offset by the big overhead bill, so adding, say 100 F-20s to the inventory cost more than buying 100 new F-16s, even though they cost more than the F-20. The F-20 did cost a lot more once you added the radar and other upgrades that the F-5 lacked.
I agree with most of what you're saying here. But some have taken issue with the USAF seemingly actively suppressing foreign sales in order to keep the individual unit cost of the F-16 down by spurring foreign sales of the Fighting Falcon, and perhaps even some skulduggery by General Dynamics. I think one should note that a lot of the money was spent by Northrop in R&D for the F-20, and not the taxpayer.
Furthermore, the Taiwanese wanted to buy over 100 F-20's, but because the Reagan Admin was working towards closer ties with The PRC and because we refused to sell them F-16's in the late 1980's. We said no. Taiwan eventually developed its own indigenous fighter and later did purchase F-16's and French Rafales. But those hundred or so units alone would have kept the line open.
I think the F-20 might have made an excellent aggressor model, and some even thought the USANG could have purchased them as a second line fighter. But the latter is probably impractical...
Originally Posted By: Nickdfresh
Hi OneEye, I'm actually a member of a Facebook group dedicated to the T-38/F-5E/F-20 Tigershark. They were very good aircraft and some would argue some of the best pilots fly them - as aggressor pilots in the US military. The F-20 was created as a cheaper, "poor-man's" F-16 but IIRC it wasn't that much cheaper in the end as its cost increased with its capabilities...
I do think the F-5 series is one of the more overlooked aircraft that never found much of a niche in the USAF unfortunately, but maybe should have...
The F-20 was an excellent airplane, but the issue with adding any completely new airframe is the overhead cost. It costs hundreds of millions in overhead: training facilities, training new crews and maintenance people, spare parts inventory, parts rebuilding (intermediate maintenance) capability.
It's more analogous starting up a new car dealership than to buying a new car - as DOD, you've got to buy the entire support infrastructure because outside of you, the DOD, it doesn't exist. That's why foreign nations buy our stuff, we provide all the parts, training, etc. Same is true when they buy French airplanes, or Swedish, or Russian, and it's why so many indigenous airplane projects fail: the overhead costs and development of that support structure is prohibitive.
The F-5 was bought by several nations, so the parts were available and the infrastructure was built. That made the price palatable to DOD, and we bought lots of them as adversary training assets.
That's what killed the F-20, no foreign sales, so DOD had to eat the whole overhead cost if we bought the airplane. When you consider the costs savings of each airplane, it was offset by the big overhead bill, so adding, say 100 F-20s to the inventory cost more than buying 100 new F-16s, even though they cost more than the F-20. The F-20 did cost a lot more once you added the radar and other upgrades that the F-5 lacked.
I agree with most of what you're saying here. But some have taken issue with the USAF seemingly actively suppressing foreign sales in order to keep the individual unit cost of the F-16 down by spurring foreign sales of the Fighting Falcon, and perhaps even some skulduggery by General Dynamics. I think one should note that a lot of the money was spent by Northrop in R&D for the F-20, and not the taxpayer.
Furthermore, the Taiwanese wanted to buy over 100 F-20's, but because the Reagan Admin was working towards closer ties with The PRC and because we refused to sell them F-16's in the late 1980's. We said no. Taiwan eventually developed its own indigenous fighter and later did purchase F-16's and French Rafales. But those hundred or so units alone would have kept the line open.
I think the F-20 might have made an excellent aggressor model, and some even thought the USANG could have purchased them as a second line fighter. But the latter is probably impractical...
Originally Posted By: Astro14
Originally Posted By: Nickdfresh
Originally Posted By: blupupher
Originally Posted By: AZjeff
Isn't the "F" supposed to stand for fighter??
...
F-117 was not a fighter. It was an attach aircraft, so should have been an "A" designation (Like the A-10).
No idea why it or the F-35 has an F prefix.
Same with the F-111, it should have been the B-111. Technically it was called the FB-111...
Well, it was designed as a fighter for the USN, so F-111 is not inaccurate. The F-111B was panned by the Navy's Test Pilots because it was a pig, with poor visibility, poor maneuverability, no gun, really lousy supersonic maneuverability and poor landing and deck handling characteristics. It was killed, and from its ashes rose the F-14; with swing wings, same radar, a weight reduction of 20,000lbs, a gun, excellent visibility, excellent maneuverability, and, you get the idea.
When the USAF modified the airplane, in some later models, for SAC use, it was called the FB-111. Derived from a fighter, but working as a nuclear bomber... When the USAF modified it for Electronic Attack, those airplanes were EF-111.
The nomenclature logic held in that airplane...though it really never was a fighter...it was designed as one...
It was designed as a flying Swiss Army Knife that could do everything in the era of McNamara's wonderful world of wonder weapons...
But as stated, ultimately it was an effective platform for the USAF in a bomber role and ECM. Australia also used them for over the ocean patrols IIRC...
Originally Posted By: Nickdfresh
Originally Posted By: blupupher
Originally Posted By: AZjeff
Isn't the "F" supposed to stand for fighter??
...
F-117 was not a fighter. It was an attach aircraft, so should have been an "A" designation (Like the A-10).
No idea why it or the F-35 has an F prefix.
Same with the F-111, it should have been the B-111. Technically it was called the FB-111...
Well, it was designed as a fighter for the USN, so F-111 is not inaccurate. The F-111B was panned by the Navy's Test Pilots because it was a pig, with poor visibility, poor maneuverability, no gun, really lousy supersonic maneuverability and poor landing and deck handling characteristics. It was killed, and from its ashes rose the F-14; with swing wings, same radar, a weight reduction of 20,000lbs, a gun, excellent visibility, excellent maneuverability, and, you get the idea.
When the USAF modified the airplane, in some later models, for SAC use, it was called the FB-111. Derived from a fighter, but working as a nuclear bomber... When the USAF modified it for Electronic Attack, those airplanes were EF-111.
The nomenclature logic held in that airplane...though it really never was a fighter...it was designed as one...
It was designed as a flying Swiss Army Knife that could do everything in the era of McNamara's wonderful world of wonder weapons...
But as stated, ultimately it was an effective platform for the USAF in a bomber role and ECM. Australia also used them for over the ocean patrols IIRC...
Originally Posted By: UncleDave
The F35 has a kill ratio of 15:1 in the last Redflag
Its an upgrade all the way around as well as acting like a smaller rivet joint for the older platforms.
Sprey is always amusing. Everytime a new fighter comes out its panned against the older stuff then technology pushes forward.
UD
Yes, but there are some asterisks to this. I believe 15 enemy aircraft died for every F-35 shot down, but it wasn't necessarily the F-35 shooting them down, but possibly a whole host of allied fighters including the F-22 and British Typhoons networked in. But as stated in the following article, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. They other issue was what were they flying against? A fair representation of a well equipped and trained adversary or an outdated one?:
http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/748...s-from-red-flag
The F35 has a kill ratio of 15:1 in the last Redflag
Its an upgrade all the way around as well as acting like a smaller rivet joint for the older platforms.
Sprey is always amusing. Everytime a new fighter comes out its panned against the older stuff then technology pushes forward.
UD
Yes, but there are some asterisks to this. I believe 15 enemy aircraft died for every F-35 shot down, but it wasn't necessarily the F-35 shooting them down, but possibly a whole host of allied fighters including the F-22 and British Typhoons networked in. But as stated in the following article, that isn't necessarily a bad thing. They other issue was what were they flying against? A fair representation of a well equipped and trained adversary or an outdated one?:
http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/748...s-from-red-flag
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