USAF realises F-35 is not what they set out to make

[Vassenor]

I mean so far your complaints seem to be that the Joint Strike Fighter isn't as effective as a dogfighter. When it's not supposed to be since it's a Strike Fighter.

Is this is supposed to be something different, why did they cancel the F-22? Idc what they do with the F-35 if it's not going to be replacing the F-22, but considering they didn't name the F-35 the A-35, I get the idea that's exactly what they're doing. That is something I do not like, I see the F-35 as a regression from the F-22, because it is. It's slower, has less range, less maneuverable, and has a number of problems that have not yet (but probably will be) solved. If it's gonna replace the A-10, sure ig but why not use an existing, (mostly) combat-proven platform that's better in numerous ways and can carry the same amount of ordinance anyway?

F-22 has a combat range of 590 nm, F-35 has a combat range of 760 nm.

[The Federal Government of Iowa]

Is this is supposed to be something different, why did they cancel the F-22? Idc what they do with the F-35 if it's not going to be replacing the F-22, but considering they didn't name the F-35 the A-35, I get the idea that's exactly what they're doing. That is something I do not like, I see the F-35 as a regression from the F-22, because it is. It's slower, has less range, less maneuverable, and has a number of problems that have not yet (but probably will be) solved. If it's gonna replace the A-10, sure ig but why not use an existing, (mostly) combat-proven platform that's better in numerous ways and can carry the same amount of ordinance anyway?

they cancelled it for "budgetary issues" lmao

Maybe if they fixed their waste spending issues they could afford to defend the US properly, eh? XD
Unfortunately, what's been done has been done. It'll cost a lot of money and time to get the F-22 in production again, ah well. Time to move on to that 6th generation toy they've been playing with. WHEN DO I GET TO SEE IT, USAF? HUH? YOU HEAR ME?

[The Federal Government of Iowa]

Is this is supposed to be something different, why did they cancel the F-22? Idc what they do with the F-35 if it's not going to be replacing the F-22, but considering they didn't name the F-35 the A-35, I get the idea that's exactly what they're doing. That is something I do not like, I see the F-35 as a regression from the F-22, because it is. It's slower, has less range, less maneuverable, and has a number of problems that have not yet (but probably will be) solved. If it's gonna replace the A-10, sure ig but why not use an existing, (mostly) combat-proven platform that's better in numerous ways and can carry the same amount of ordinance anyway?

F-22 has a combat range of 590 nm, F-35 has a combat range of 760 nm.

F-22 can go faster. S P E E D

[Philjia]

I mean so far your complaints seem to be that the Joint Strike Fighter isn't as effective as a dogfighter. When it's not supposed to be since it's a Strike Fighter.

Is this is supposed to be something different, why did they cancel the F-22? Idc what they do with the F-35 if it's not going to be replacing the F-22, but considering they didn't name the F-35 the A-35, I get the idea that's exactly what they're doing. That is something I do not like, I see the F-35 as a regression from the F-22, because it is. It's slower, has less range, less maneuverable, and has a number of problems that have not yet (but probably will be) solved. If it's gonna replace the A-10, sure ig but why not use an existing, (mostly) combat-proven platform that's better in numerous ways and can carry the same amount of ordinance anyway?

The F-35 is meant to replace a large number of planes. In the case of the USAF, it's mostly meant to replace the F-16. The article in the OP explains that the head of the USAF is now considering getting something cheaper to replace the bulk of the F-16s for normal operations instead.

[Vassenor]

F-22 has a combat range of 590 nm, F-35 has a combat range of 760 nm.

F-22 can go faster. S P E E D

And how often is the F-22 maxed?

[The Federal Government of Iowa]

Is this is supposed to be something different, why did they cancel the F-22? Idc what they do with the F-35 if it's not going to be replacing the F-22, but considering they didn't name the F-35 the A-35, I get the idea that's exactly what they're doing. That is something I do not like, I see the F-35 as a regression from the F-22, because it is. It's slower, has less range, less maneuverable, and has a number of problems that have not yet (but probably will be) solved. If it's gonna replace the A-10, sure ig but why not use an existing, (mostly) combat-proven platform that's better in numerous ways and can carry the same amount of ordinance anyway?

The F-35 is meant to replace a large number of planes. In the case of the USAF, it's mostly meant to replace the F-16. The article in the OP explains that the head of the USAF is now considering getting something cheaper to replace the bulk of the F-16s for normal operations instead.

Ok, looks like that other person and I were both wrong on that one.

[Senkaku]

Is this is supposed to be something different, why did they cancel the F-22? Idc what they do with the F-35 if it's not going to be replacing the F-22, but considering they didn't name the F-35 the A-35, I get the idea that's exactly what they're doing. That is something I do not like, I see the F-35 as a regression from the F-22, because it is. It's slower, has less range, less maneuverable, and has a number of problems that have not yet (but probably will be) solved. If it's gonna replace the A-10, sure ig but why not use an existing, (mostly) combat-proven platform that's better in numerous ways and can carry the same amount of ordinance anyway?

F-22 has a combat range of 590 nm, F-35 has a combat range of 760 nm.

and both can get murked on the ground by long-range Chinese missiles lol

[The Federal Government of Iowa]

F-22 can go faster. S P E E D

And how often is the F-22 maxed?

How often does it go Supercruise? idk, probably every time because supercruise doesn't guzzle fuel like the F-35 would on afterburner (which I don't think it could even on afterburner) to reach the same speeds, and faster is better.

[Vassenor]

And how often is the F-22 maxed?

How often does it go Supercruise? idk, probably every time because supercruise doesn't guzzle fuel like the F-35 would on afterburner to reach the same speeds, and faster is better.

And yet it still has a shorter range.

[Mousters]

F-22 has a combat range of 590 nm, F-35 has a combat range of 760 nm.

F-22 can go faster. S P E E D

F-22 Mach 1.95
F-35 Mach 1.4 but flying at that speed causes "issues"

[Punished UMN]

Let's not beat around the bush: the A-10 is probably cheaper compared to procuring a whole new fleet of budget CAS aircraft for its roles (at least it was the case a few years back) and *clearly* cheaper than foisting its roles onto the F-35.

And what is the cost for replacing the A-10 with a fleet of turboprop missile trucks like the A-29 vs the cost of keeping the A-10s flying as their airframes reach life expiry?

Your assumption here, which is not entirely without merit, but is a little exaggerated, is that new technology will increase combat effectiveness exponentially. In earlier decades, that would absolutely be true, and while there have been major technological breakthroughs in military technology, improvements in capabilities have not kept pace with improvement in technologies, and in some places, improvements have slowed to a crawl so as to bring into question just how much more efficient the military technology is getting. As the technology gets more and more advanced, you get diminishing returns from those advances.

[The Lone Alliance]

Dick Cheney ordering all the manufacturing equipment scrapped sorry.

Why? The F-22 is a fantastic aircraft.

So the US would be forced to invest in the F-35.

It's the same reason the US ordered every F-14 shredded and destroyed. As long as F-14s remained there was a chance that the US would decide that it would be cheaper to pull them out of retirement and modernize them, that means less F-35 sales, so we had to destroy the entire fleet of F-14s to "Prevent Iran from getting spare parts".

[Vassenor]

And what is the cost for replacing the A-10 with a fleet of turboprop missile trucks like the A-29 vs the cost of keeping the A-10s flying as their airframes reach life expiry?

Your assumption here, which is not entirely without merit, but is a little exaggerated, is that new technology will increase combat effectiveness exponentially. In earlier decades, that would absolutely be true, and while there have been major technological breakthroughs in military technology, improvements in capabilities have not kept pace with improvement in technologies, and in some places, improvements have slowed to a crawl so as to bring into question just how much more efficient the military technology is getting. As the technology gets more and more advanced, you get diminishing returns from those advances.

No, my assumption is that the A-10s are going to get progressively more expensive to stop the airframes from falling apart due to fatigue, and that at some point replacing them will be cheaper than keeping them flying.

[Vassenor]

Why? The F-22 is a fantastic aircraft.

So the US would be forced to invest in the F-35.

It's the same reason the US ordered every F-14 shredded and destroyed. As long as F-14s remained there was a chance that the US would decide that it would be cheaper to pull them out of retirement and modernize them, that means less F-35 sales, so we had to destroy the entire fleet of F-14s to "Prevent Iran from getting spare parts".

So why hasn't the Super Hornet been junked for the same reason, given that the Navy is currently buying more?

[Rusozak]

Why? The F-22 is a fantastic aircraft.

So the US would be forced to invest in the F-35.

It's the same reason the US ordered every F-14 shredded and destroyed. As long as F-14s remained there was a chance that the US would decide that it would be cheaper to pull them out of retirement and modernize them, that means less F-35 sales, so we had to destroy the entire fleet of F-14s to "Prevent Iran from getting spare parts".

Man, I remember that. Had a send off ceremony and everything, got to watch on television and hear the death screams of the last airworthy American-owned F-14 have its engines burned out.

[The Lone Alliance]

So why hasn't the Super Hornet been junked for the same reason, given that the Navy is currently buying more?

Because there would be no way to build enough F-35s to replace the entire naval air arm without leaving entire carriers without any planes, and ask the Japanese how good a carrier without any planes work.

The F-18 and the Super Hornet were chosen to be the stopgap plane between the F-14 and the F-35 back in the 90s, the teething problems with the F-35 has caused the navy to have no choice but to buy more Super Hornets because they need planes now and the F-35 still is having problems.

Man, I remember that. Had a send off ceremony and everything, got to watch on television and hear the death screams of the last airworthy American-owned F-14 have its engines burned out.

Yeah really it was sad all together, ultimately though even if some people wanted to bring the Tomcats back and could it'd likely be too much of a pain in the ass to overhaul them at this point.

But by destroying them they took that option completely off the table, even if the navy wanted too now they can't, now they have no choice but to buy Super Hornets and F-35s or wait another 20 years for another plane to pop up, and giving how poorly the navy has been doing the past few decades in plane development (The "A-12" failure was infamous) it's highly likely that after the F-35 it'll just be drones.

[A-Series-Of-Tubes]

F-22 can go faster. S P E E D

F-22 Mach 1.95
F-35 Mach 1.4 but flying at that speed causes "issues"

Are the issues better, or worse, than your F-22's oops-we-forgot-the-ordinance issues?

[Nevertopia]

F-22 has a combat range of 590 nm, F-35 has a combat range of 760 nm.

and both can get murked on the ground by long-range Chinese missiles lol

this is the current problem with advancing armaments like fighter jets, tanks, cruisers, etc. The development cycles can be so long and harrowing that by the time its out, theres already cheap countermeasures against them. Like right now the US is having problems figuring out what to do with their navy because a hard counter to their ships is to just have a bunch of speed boats loaded with a single torpedo each and zerg rush the damn things as Iran figured out. In terms of cost efficiency, theres no contest.

[The Lone Alliance]

and both can get murked on the ground by long-range Chinese missiles lol

Like how the US opens up every air campaign with a bunch of long range tomahawk missiles on air defenses, launching sites, and airfields to do just that.

this is the current problem with advancing armaments like fighter jets, tanks, cruisers, etc. The development cycles can be so long and harrowing that by the time its out, theres already cheap countermeasures against them. Like right now the US is having problems figuring out what to do with their navy because a hard counter to their ships is to just have a bunch of speed boats loaded with a single torpedo each and zerg rush the damn things as Iran figured out. In terms of cost efficiency, theres no contest.

The tactic of "Zerg rush with Small fast boats with torpedoes" has been around since the invention of the torpedo, that's not exactly a new technology there and there weren't many countermeasures back then either.

The only countermeasure to such an attack is to not stick your capital ships close to shore, or have enough guns on your ship that you can chew up the small boats before they reach launching distance, currently the US was attempting to make the littoral combat ship to be a way to fight against such vessels but there's been flaws finding the right missile for them, eventually looks like they're settling on giving them the naval strike missile to deal with said Iranian torpedo boats.

Kind of costly but at least it has more range than using hellfire missiles at point blank range on them.

[Vassenor]

and both can get murked on the ground by long-range Chinese missiles lol

Like how the US opens up every air campaign with a bunch of long range tomahawk missiles on air defenses, launching sites, and airfields to do just that.

this is the current problem with advancing armaments like fighter jets, tanks, cruisers, etc. The development cycles can be so long and harrowing that by the time its out, theres already cheap countermeasures against them. Like right now the US is having problems figuring out what to do with their navy because a hard counter to their ships is to just have a bunch of speed boats loaded with a single torpedo each and zerg rush the damn things as Iran figured out. In terms of cost efficiency, theres no contest.

The tactic of "Zerg rush with Small fast boats with torpedoes" has been around since the invention of the torpedo, that's not exactly a new technology there and there weren't many countermeasures back then either.

The only countermeasure to such an attack is to not stick your capital ships close to shore, or have enough guns on your ship that you can chew up the small boats before they reach launching distance, currently the US was attempting to make the littoral combat ship to be a way to fight against such vessels but there's been flaws finding the right missile for them, eventually looks like they're settling on giving them the naval strike missile to deal with said Iranian torpedo boats.

Kind of costly but at least it has more range than using hellfire missiles at point blank range on them.

We need to bring back the Kamchatka.

[Nevertopia]

and both can get murked on the ground by long-range Chinese missiles lol

Like how the US opens up every air campaign with a bunch of long range tomahawk missiles on air defenses, launching sites, and airfields to do just that.

this is the current problem with advancing armaments like fighter jets, tanks, cruisers, etc. The development cycles can be so long and harrowing that by the time its out, theres already cheap countermeasures against them. Like right now the US is having problems figuring out what to do with their navy because a hard counter to their ships is to just have a bunch of speed boats loaded with a single torpedo each and zerg rush the damn things as Iran figured out. In terms of cost efficiency, theres no contest.

The tactic of "Zerg rush with Small fast boats with torpedoes" has been around since the invention of the torpedo, that's not exactly a new technology there and there weren't many countermeasures back then either.

The only countermeasure to such an attack is to not stick your capital ships close to shore, or have enough guns on your ship that you can chew up the small boats before they reach launching distance, currently the US was attempting to make the littoral combat ship to be a way to fight against such vessels but there's been flaws finding the right missile for them, eventually looks like they're settling on giving them the naval strike missile to deal with said Iranian torpedo boats.

Kind of costly but at least it has more range than using hellfire missiles at point blank range on them.

lol thats awesome. Imagine what theyd be able to do with Drones instead. Swarm tactics seems to be the big winner for next gen warfare, but Im out of my depth on this topic.

[A-Series-Of-Tubes]

Drones of all kinds are the shit. If you need command on the ground/water then you have a tank that is all armor and speed, or a ship that's small and fast (armor optional), and maximize those qualities in exchange for no offensive weapons at all. Your designers are going to have an irresistible urge to add a machine gun in case infantry get past your drone swarm, or just one AA missile system in case you run out of aerial drones to destructively intercept any missiles big enough to trouble your mobile command center. Nope. No offensive weapons at all. If you run low on drones you retreat. If the enemy somehow takes out a whole flank of your drones at once, you've lost, you try to retreat. Any armaments your armored/fast human supervisor tank/craft has will at best kill a few of them, which doesn't matter a damn. A few more, a few less, what matters is that you survive.

I used to think it was kind of dishonorable to shoot soldiers who were plainly running away. Then I thought it was dishonorable to make war with such superior weapons and battlefield control that kill ratios above 50 to 1 were expected. Then the Gulf War happened. Colin Powell agreed with me, but not many others did: it is dishonorable to kill someone who is trying to run away.

But that's how it's going to be now: any commander, on any side, tasked with defeating a clearly-defined enemy force, uses whatever they've got to kill as many of the enemy as possible (unless they individually or collectively surrender) and with zero battle casualties. We could go lower, with torture weapons, killing even those who surrender, or blinding enemy soldiers, but hopefully this is the balance we have struck, to keep from total war where it is acceptable to target the enemies civilians.

Offense entirely with drones, while commanders stay as far away as communications at the speed of light permit.

Command from space, you're all thinking. As low as possible (low ping) I'm thinking. But the lower the faster. Let's say your Space Force Technical 2 (we're not sending officers, oh no, it probably breaks some treaty they signed without asking us) needs to spend an hour over the battlefield to direct details of the drone operation to capture Kim Jong-Un at a military demonstration, remove his trousers, insert a lubricated rubber For Sale sign up his rectum, document the proceedings and then retreat to a carrier off the coast.

From 60 degrees from Zenith West, to the same East should get the operator a clear look at the drones the whole time, and by rough calculation the speed of light time would never be better than 30 milliseconds (ie directly overhead). Which sounds OK except you have to double it: information has to get from the drone to the operator, before the operator (and their computers) can act on it. We can't make the drones smart (really at all) because the essence of the strategy is that operators should never be lost, nor their mobile HQ ... but we lose lots of drones. Self-destruct is all very well, but after thousands, and tens of thousands lost, sooner of later one gets captured. They can only have generic microprocessor hardware, interface software, and basic "self destruct if on fire" kind of reflex software. OK now encryption is bothering me.

Moving on: completely automated satellites that handle data transmission or satellite phone, deal with the limited time overhead problem by "handing off" to a sister satellite, and any of them can only communicate with a ground station that is over the horizon, by relaying the signal to one of their sisters who can see the ground station. Our "death from space" operator can do that if they're not able to finish the operation in an hour. But if they use a trailing satellite the delay between stuff happening down there and the drone being able to intelligently respond, will be 120 ms. From the days when I still had any interest in having my virtual ass shot up, down, and sideways, 120 ms is a tangible disadvantage. If the operator still hasn't finished an hour later, it will go up again, to about 240 ms. "Fly immediately to <carrier position>"

The math is not kind. You can get really low latency (lag, ping) in a low-low Earth orbit, like the space station, but our overhead time is just a few minutes, and soon after that the trailing satellite will also pass the horizon of the battlefield so we'll have to relay. And all this assumes our series of satellites are on an orbit passing over the battlefield. Alternatively, we can stay permanently overhead (this is crazy, btw, you have to resupply and relieve a human in space, at GEO) but the speed-of-light round time is now 240 ms.

Well I hate deadlines. Deadlines stress me, my productivity goes down, the deadline becomes less realistic, bodgey shit happens and I have to explain to some honcho from the Asia-Pacific office who just turned up on the 'factory floor' why I am working with electronics while visibly damp and wearing no shoes. That wasn't how I lost the job, btw. The point is that combat, even from a distance and with no personal risk, must be stressful as fuck. You can cope with orders like "about ten minutes from now, sooner is better, get back to me right away when it's done". But orders like "fully complete the task in 28 minutes from now, or the whole mission will fail" must increase the pressure to the point accidents are almost inevitable. "OMG, I inserted the For Sale sign the wrong way 'round, you can't read it at all! Where's the Abort button? The Shitting Myself button?? NO SIGNAL?"

"Confirming mission completed ... well done Technical Sergeant. What have you got on video?"

Yeah, so even with a horrendous lag of a quarter of a second, at least there's no deadline on starting and finishing the mission. Space command, by a human, of multiplex drone attacks, is going to cost a space ton. But we knew that already ...

"Sir, target got back into the car. He shut the door, but then he opened the back door on that side, and got in."

"There is a non-combatant female in the car, confirm?"

"Yes sir. Just one. The woman he picked up in Baotou."

"Hold the mission. Woman is a civilian."

"Yes sir. Twelve minutes to optimal horizon."

"Confirmed"

...

"Sir? Five minutes to optimal horizon, thirteen minutes to hard horizon."

"Understood, Technical Sergeant ... woman is wife of senior government official."

"Yes sir."

"Await further orders ... no, change of orders. Abort mission!"

"Abort mission sir?"

"Confirmed. Further orders: get your ass down safely, you're a witness to some red-hot video!"

"Yes SIR!"

[Husseinarti]

Drones of all kinds are the shit. If you need command on the ground/water then you have a tank that is all armor and speed, or a ship that's small and fast (armor optional), and maximize those qualities in exchange for no offensive weapons at all. Your designers are going to have an irresistible urge to add a machine gun in case infantry get past your drone swarm, or just one AA missile system in case you run out of aerial drones to destructively intercept any missiles big enough to trouble your mobile command center. Nope. No offensive weapons at all. If you run low on drones you retreat. If the enemy somehow takes out a whole flank of your drones at once, you've lost, you try to retreat. Any armaments your armored/fast human supervisor tank/craft has will at best kill a few of them, which doesn't matter a damn. A few more, a few less, what matters is that you survive.

I used to think it was kind of dishonorable to shoot soldiers who were plainly running away. Then I thought it was dishonorable to make war with such superior weapons and battlefield control that kill ratios above 50 to 1 were expected. Then the Gulf War happened. Colin Powell agreed with me, but not many others did: it is dishonorable to kill someone who is trying to run away.

But that's how it's going to be now: any commander, on any side, tasked with defeating a clearly-defined enemy force, uses whatever they've got to kill as many of the enemy as possible (unless they individually or collectively surrender) and with zero battle casualties. We could go lower, with torture weapons, killing even those who surrender, or blinding enemy soldiers, but hopefully this is the balance we have struck, to keep from total war where it is acceptable to target the enemies civilians.

Offense entirely with drones, while commanders stay as far away as communications at the speed of light permit.

Command from space, you're all thinking. As low as possible (low ping) I'm thinking. But the lower the faster. Let's say your Space Force Technical 2 (we're not sending officers, oh no, it probably breaks some treaty they signed without asking us) needs to spend an hour over the battlefield to direct details of the drone operation to capture Kim Jong-Un at a military demonstration, remove his trousers, insert a lubricated rubber For Sale sign up his rectum, document the proceedings and then retreat to a carrier off the coast.

From 60 degrees from Zenith West, to the same East should get the operator a clear look at the drones the whole time, and by rough calculation the speed of light time would never be better than 30 milliseconds (ie directly overhead). Which sounds OK except you have to double it: information has to get from the drone to the operator, before the operator (and their computers) can act on it. We can't make the drones smart (really at all) because the essence of the strategy is that operators should never be lost, nor their mobile HQ ... but we lose lots of drones. Self-destruct is all very well, but after thousands, and tens of thousands lost, sooner of later one gets captured. They can only have generic microprocessor hardware, interface software, and basic "self destruct if on fire" kind of reflex software. OK now encryption is bothering me.

Moving on: completely automated satellites that handle data transmission or satellite phone, deal with the limited time overhead problem by "handing off" to a sister satellite, and any of them can only communicate with a ground station that is over the horizon, by relaying the signal to one of their sisters who can see the ground station. Our "death from space" operator can do that if they're not able to finish the operation in an hour. But if they use a trailing satellite the delay between stuff happening down there and the drone being able to intelligently respond, will be 120 ms. From the days when I still had any interest in having my virtual ass shot up, down, and sideways, 120 ms is a tangible disadvantage. If the operator still hasn't finished an hour later, it will go up again, to about 240 ms. "Fly immediately to <carrier position>"

The math is not kind. You can get really low latency (lag, ping) in a low-low Earth orbit, like the space station, but our overhead time is just a few minutes, and soon after that the trailing satellite will also pass the horizon of the battlefield so we'll have to relay. And all this assumes our series of satellites are on an orbit passing over the battlefield. Alternatively, we can stay permanently overhead (this is crazy, btw, you have to resupply and relieve a human in space, at GEO) but the speed-of-light round time is now 240 ms.

Well I hate deadlines. Deadlines stress me, my productivity goes down, the deadline becomes less realistic, bodgey shit happens and I have to explain to some honcho from the Asia-Pacific office who just turned up on the 'factory floor' why I am working with electronics while visibly damp and wearing no shoes. That wasn't how I lost the job, btw. The point is that combat, even from a distance and with no personal risk, must be stressful as fuck. You can cope with orders like "about ten minutes from now, sooner is better, get back to me right away when it's done". But orders like "fully complete the task in 28 minutes from now, or the whole mission will fail" must increase the pressure to the point accidents are almost inevitable. "OMG, I inserted the For Sale sign the wrong way 'round, you can't read it at all! Where's the Abort button? The Shitting Myself button?? NO SIGNAL?"

"Confirming mission completed ... well done Technical Sergeant. What have you got on video?"

Yeah, so even with a horrendous lag of a quarter of a second, at least there's no deadline on starting and finishing the mission. Space command, by a human, of multiplex drone attacks, is going to cost a space ton. But we knew that already ...

"Sir, target got back into the car. He shut the door, but then he opened the back door on that side, and got in."

"There is a non-combatant female in the car, confirm?"

"Yes sir. Just one. The woman he picked up in Baotou."

"Hold the mission. Woman is a civilian."

"Yes sir. Twelve minutes to optimal horizon."

"Confirmed"

...

"Sir? Five minutes to optimal horizon, thirteen minutes to hard horizon."

"Understood, Technical Sergeant ... woman is wife of senior government official."

"Yes sir."

"Await further orders ... no, change of orders. Abort mission!"

"Abort mission sir?"

"Confirmed. Further orders: get your ass down safely, you're a witness to some red-hot video!"

"Yes SIR!"

tl;dr

[Fartsniffage]

Why? The F-22 is a fantastic aircraft.

So the US would be forced to invest in the F-35.

It's the same reason the US ordered every F-14 shredded and destroyed. As long as F-14s remained there was a chance that the US would decide that it would be cheaper to pull them out of retirement and modernize them, that means less F-35 sales, so we had to destroy the entire fleet of F-14s to "Prevent Iran from getting spare parts".

The tooling and documentation for F-22 production hasn't been destroyed. It's stored at Sierra Army Dept.

[Saiwania]

So was Pierre Sprey ultimately proven right if the F-35 is discontinued or slowed down, as it appears to be the case soon if not now?