F-16 Replacement

[Cliff]

It would mean fewer total pilots if F-22 aces flew both, augmenting their under 20 Raptor hours per month. Suspect they could more safely practice some air-to-air maneuvers/TTP in the LAAR as well. Just one squadron of 24 LAAR might be shared by three squadrons of F-22s. Maintainers for the 24 LAAR are essential regardless, so it is a sunk cost no matter who flies them.

The other issue, Cole, is training- F-22s focus on air-to-air, and they need to with the limited numbers. F-35s make more sense since they will be primarily A-G. That said, I would love to be in either an F-22 or F-35 squadron and have a squadron of LAARs to fly! The pooling idea could work, but again I think is not fiscally workable unless the economy improves a lot.

We are producing F-35s that surpass anything China is producing and will beat PakFA in BVR. Suspect EODAS and AIM-9X coupled with helmet mounted displays would do just fine in WVR, as well. Why do you guys never mention that half the day is at night when WVR won't matter too much anyway.

NVGs allow day-style tactics at night... WVR still matters based on technology like EW that makes BVR missiles less effective, and numbers (lots of targets so you will have to use IR missiles and perhaps the gun). Just because it's night doesn't mean you will never go to the merge.

I buy the argument that F-22 and F-35 will run out of missiles, but doubt the "quantity has a quality of its own" numbers will kill too many of our stealth aircraft as they are heading home to rearm. We and allies will get their numbers down rapidly enough to matter. You don't need to win the air war in a week when the longer blockade lasts for months.

A longer conflict would be tough for us as well... we are going to have very limited numbers of platforms. If I lose 10 F-22s that is 10% of the combat coded force... Our kill ratios will need to be in the 20 to 1 neighborhood to win.

See above for discussion on F-35 missile numbers.

Agree 1000% but sickened when things like FCS unmanned ground and air vehicles that could lead dismounted troops through IED fields/roads are not given the same emphasis as air/sea power. We fixed the HMMWV problem with MRAP/M-ATV but not the dismount problem.

My understanding was that FCS was canceled to buy things like MRAP... I think if FCS had counter-IED tech that was extremely effective it would being the force right now... I don't think money has been as big an issue as you think, at least not in the Gates years. The impression I get from my Army peers is that they have gotten most of what they have asked for...

Since the advent of the F-15/F-16 have we or allies lost more than one fighter in air-to-air? Don't believe so, and F-22/F-35 stealth is a leap ahead beyond either with threats not currently being able to duplicate that stealth.

Just one, the Navy F-18 in Desert Storm. Then again, we haven't fought anyone who could be termed a near-peer competitor numbers or tech wise. It's a little silly to me to argue that we should stop trying to keep our advantage in an area that helps us so much...

The Navy has ample stationing in Hawaii and elsewhere adn plenty of back-up carriers. The USAF needs few C-17s and little time to move fighters to Guam/Hawaii/Alaska/Diego Garcia/North Australia/and South Korea/Japan after missile threat is gone.

The Navy doesn't have a lot of extra... see here.

South Korea has only Strykers able to rapidly reinforce it, and double hulls won't solve all their survivability problems and lack of firepower. Have more confidence in the ability of a C-17 to airland or JHSV to sealand in South Korea or on the east side of Taiwan with mountain-masking prior to their hard-to-miss border crossing or amphibious assault preparations then have confidence in EFVs, amphibious/maritme prepositionings ships, and airborne forces launching a forcible entry after the PLA already controls Taiwan.

I agree about our ability to see the enemy moving, and that the ability to move by air helps, but again how many C-17s/5s do we have, and how many can we lose to SAMs/Naval SAMs?

Again, I'm not saying it's a crisis... just that we're accepting a lot of risk. The problem is deterrence... if folks think that they can beat us, then our ability to deter them is hurt. We are at about the minimum level now...

You are very right about the allies, but remember that there is not a formal NATO-style agreement among the nations in the Pacific... so the ability of an agressor to divide and conquer is there. China is not trying to win... yet. They are trying to get to a point where they can deter us or make it too costly for us to continue, forcing us to let them do whatever it is they set out to do. Finally, I am not saying lots of our folks in F-22s will be shot down.... I am saying they won't be able to kill all the threats before they can get to and kill folks on the ground or on ships.

I think everyone in the US military has forgotten the hard-learned lessons about air superiority from World War II... which was really the last time we faced a peer competitor Air Force. A lot of things we depend on (just in time supply, ISR, drones, sea and air LOCs) depend on having air superiority. Hopefully our accepting risk in this area isn't challenged in conflict.

Finally, one point that I sometimes make to folks- 5,767 US Military folks have been killed since 2001 in Iraq and Afghanistan - 9 years.

Al Qaeda killed 2,819 folks using 4 airliners in 102 minutes. Think about what someone could do with actual military aircraft...

I don't point this out to say that one is worse than the other, or to be flippant, only to show that the consequences of losing air superiority are pretty severe.

Thanks for the good points, hopefully I made some intelligent contributions.

V/R,

Cliff