F-35 loses dogfight to Mig-21 and F-16

Eh. It's a multi role aircraft. Which means it can do a lot of things, but none of them super well.

That said, is it a large waste of money? Yep. Do we still need to be building a nex generation multi role jet? Yep.
 
I'll believe it when I see it. That being said, obviously the F-35 was not built with the same priorities that the Viper was. The F-16 is a purpose built dogfight machine. It is quite incredible in terms of raw performance. Obviously it has rolled into other missions in the past few decades, but at its heart, that is the primary design point that Col. Boyd and others had in mind when they put ink to paper. Not so with the F-35. Also, not so with the F/A-18A-D or E/F. Any of those are at a thrust/weight disadvantage to a Viper. While maybe there is more to the story that isn't written, I tend to lump anything about the F-35 in the media these days as some form of propaganda paid for by someone with an agenda.....whether that be pro or con.
 
First point- this is hardly the only article about the dog fighting flaws of the F-35. Just Googke "F-35 dog fighting performance". You won't get much that is positive.
Second- yes, we have advanced beyond the 1960s. But so have our enemies. The Gulf War was a wake up call for the CHICOMS. I'm willing to bet they know as much about the strengths and flaws of the F-35 as we do, but thy are probably more willing to objectively evaluate them.
Third- this project is much like what the Bradly fighting vehicle turned into as famously portrayed in "The Pentagon Wars". I won't bore everyone with the acronyms but the procurement system changed partly as a result of that project and was suppose to avoid fiascos like this.
It would have been cheaper and more effective for each branch to get their role specific airframe- the Air Force has different requirements than the Navy. The Marines and their vertical take off crap?? Please. If they really need that get a small number that for that role.
The whole thing reminded me of the Arthur C Clarke story I attached.
 
Soku39 said:
I mean the thing did cost a trillion dollars. It's not like any of the hate is unfounded.
Click to expand...

Your replacing over 2000 fighters in active and guard service within our military alone... A full generation jump over the fighters it's replacing.

And those fighters developed in the 60s-80s cost ridiculous amounts of money in their own time (111/Tomcat/Eagle being great examples). A brand new Blk 60 F-16 is almost 100 million a copy in today's money. The Silent Eagle is over 100 mil a copy, and those won't be survivable much after the next ten years without massive ecm and sead/dead support meaning a whole but load of other planes we need to buy... We need to jump to 5th gen like it or not, we just did it in the most ass way possible lumping a 4.5 gen harrier replacement into a 5th generation program for the AF and Navy.

Wanna know the real thing you should be outraged at, we only bought 180 Raptors and then we killed not only production but the tooling and machining to build more... We built over 2000 F-16s for our Air Force alone to fly for nearly 40 years and we are under 500 (most built in the 90s) still working because they've been extended in service life by pulling parts of retired ones parked in the desert.... The Raptors, are almost half way through their expected service life and there are no new ones coming and no old ones to steal from. A decade from now the Raptor fleet will be all but out of options without literally inventing a refit from the ground up. When that happens then you'll see why building airplanes that seem expensive now pays off in the long run.
 
///AMG said:
I'll believe it when I see it. That being said, obviously the F-35 was not built with the same priorities that the Viper was. The F-16 is a purpose built dogfight machine. It is quite incredible in terms of raw performance. Obviously it has rolled into other missions in the past few decades, but at its heart, that is the primary design point that Col. Boyd and others had in mind when they put ink to paper. Not so with the F-35. Also, not so with the F/A-18A-D or E/F. Any of those are at a thrust/weight disadvantage to a Viper. While maybe there is more to the story that isn't written, I tend to lump anything about the F-35 in the media these days as some form of propaganda paid for by someone with an agenda.....whether that be pro or con.
Click to expand...

That and the people screaming that "F-35 can't hang with a Blk 50 GE motor viper in a one circle fight" are ignoring the fact that neither can anything other than Raptor, it's what that plane was built to do.

The Aggressor pilot I worked with said it blew his mind the first time the lost a fight to a Mirage in a Viper, then he just realized to not play that plane's game.

And last time I checked the amount of AOA numbers they were putting up out of a non thrust vectored aircraft was pretty sick.
 
Here's what the Block 50 can't do: Go downtown in a SA-20 threat ring and deliver combat power in any meaningful way.

I feel like the DoD has done a poor job at explaining why the F-35 is needed. In its place, the "too big to fail" narrative has taken hold. It's far from the perfect platform, but anything else would be 10+ years away.
 
Lawman said:
Your replacing over 2000 fighters in active and guard service within our military alone... A full generation jump over the fighters it's replacing.

And those fighters developed in the 60s-80s cost ridiculous amounts of money in their own time (111/Tomcat/Eagle being great examples). A brand new Blk 60 F-16 is almost 100 million a copy in today's money. The Silent Eagle is over 100 mil a copy, and those won't be survivable much after the next ten years without massive ecm and sead/dead support meaning a whole but load of other planes we need to buy... We need to jump to 5th gen like it or not, we just did it in the most ass way possible lumping a 4.5 gen harrier replacement into a 5th generation program for the AF and Navy.

Wanna know the real thing you should be outraged at, we only bought 180 Raptors and then we killed not only production but the tooling and machining to build more... We built over 2000 F-16s for our Air Force alone to fly for nearly 40 years and we are under 500 (most built in the 90s) still working because they've been extended in service life by pulling parts of retired ones parked in the desert.... The Raptors, are almost half way through their expected service life and there are no new ones coming and no old ones to steal from. A decade from now the Raptor fleet will be all but out of options without literally inventing a refit from the ground up. When that happens then you'll see why building airplanes that seem expensive now pays off in the long run.
Click to expand...

I believe I was in Highschool or College when the decision to was made to only buy ~ 200 F-22s. That decision was baffling to me then, and is still baffling to me now. As for the other points were those planes not better than the ones that preceded them?

Edit: @Blackhawk I'm halfway through Pentagon wars and it is utterly amazing. It's like watching a documentary about C-130H AMP, and here we are in 2015 with C-130s that can't shoot GPS approaches, in a plane where the army is like "hey, can you pick us up at podunk airport in Missouri/Mississippi/wherever that is only served by GPS approaches?' And we're all like "sure, as long as the weather is good."
 
Last edited:
Soku39 said:
I believe I was in Highschool or College when the decision to was made to only buy ~ 200 F-22s. That decision was baffling to me then, and is still baffling to me now. As for the other points were those planes not better than the ones that preceded them?

Edit: @Blackhawk I'm halfway through Pentagon wars and it is utterly amazing. It's like watching a documentary about C-130H AMP.
Click to expand...

Depends how you define "better than."

Look at the social back lash of the Super Hornet program. According to many it was not better than the Tomcat in speed and dogfighting/BVR and that it wasn't anywhere the strike aircraft the old Intruders had been.... Now days you would be laughed at for saying that by any Navy TACAir guys. That Mach 2 performance or Massive payload to range disadvantage the Hornet had was well worth the huge jump in other capes.

That's exactly what we are doing with F-35. A dismal difference in bleeding edge dogfighting at one particular performance regime against the best non-Raptor dogfighter out there is what people are screaming about....what they aren't saying is that on day 1 of a a war with any country with a modern AD system (Syria etc or worse China etc), we are gonna need the F-22/35 because Viper/Hornet/Strike/etc are counting on that airplane and Raptor to knock down the door.
 
Soku39 said:
I believe I was in Highschool or College when the decision to was made to only buy ~ 200 F-22s. That decision was baffling to me then, and is still baffling to me now.
Click to expand...

Yup, and if you read the arguments from the folks railing against buying more Raptors, they all say, "we'll be buying F-35s instead, and they'll be less expensive!"
 
Lawman said:
That's exactly what we are doing with F-35. A dismal difference in bleeding edge dogfighting at one particular performance regime against the best non-Raptor dogfighter out there is what people are screaming about....what they aren't saying is that on day 1 of a a war with any country with a modern AD system (Syria etc or worse China etc), we are gonna need the F-22/35 because Viper/Hornet/Strike/etc are counting on that airplane and Raptor to knock down the door.
Click to expand...

I'm a C-130 guy, believe me when I say I'm in complete agreement. That doesn't however mean that program wasn't mismanaged. Again, I'm just a 27 year old 1 Lt, this all way above me, but from the ouside looking in, it screams waste.
 
ATN_Pilot said:
I don't know jack about fighters. What I do know is that I'm not willing to spend a trillion dollars on anything.
Click to expand...

Most people who throw around the $1 Trillion dollar phrase do not actually understand what is in that number. It's relatively easy to sound out of context when you're using "predicted" inflation costs out to 2060, etc. Particularly, no one understands the length of the program, life cycle. It is expensive, but relative to other fighter programs isn't not that out of touch if you consider all of the factors.
 
ATN_Pilot said:
I don't know jack about fighters. What I do know is that I'm not willing to spend a trillion dollars on anything.
Click to expand...

The good news is, many of our current leaders are just as sick of scope and cost creep as the public/Congress is. I've heard directly from multiple 3 and 4-stars that one of the areas in need of the most improvement and control in the USAF is acquisitions. The Asst Chief of Nuclear Operations even told us "I don't want a fancy top of the line bomber to replace the B-52. I want a $500/mln a piece bomber." Doesn't need all the gadgets, it just needs to serve the core mission and replace a massively aging fleet.

(Forgive me @Hacker15e for spreading koolaid I learned at SOS.)
 
So the USAF is responding to this:

JPO Response to ‘War is Boring’ blog item -- "Test Pilot Admits the F-35 Can't Dogfight."

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/test-pilot-admits-the-f-35-can-t-dogfight-cdb9d11a875?source=latest


"The media report on the F-35 and F-16 flight does not tell the entire story. The F-35 involved was AF-2, which is an F-35 designed for flight sciences testing, or flying qualities, of the aircraft. It is not equipped with a number of items that make today's production F-35s 5th Generation fighters. Aircraft AF-2 did not have the mission systems software to use the sensors that allow the F-35 to see its enemy long before it knows the F-35 is in the area. Second, AF-2 does not have the special stealth coating that operational F-35s have that make them virtually invisible to radar. And third, it is not equipped with the weapons or software that allow the F-35 pilot to turn, aim a weapon with the helmet, and fire at an enemy without having to point the airplane at its target.


"The tests cited in the article were done earlier this year to test the flying qualities of the F-35 using visual combat maneuvers to stress the system, and the F-16 involved was used as a visual reference to maneuver against. While the dogfighting scenario was successful in showing the ability of the F-35 to maneuver to the edge of its limits without exceeding them, and handle in a positive and predictable manner, the interpretation of the scenario results could be misleading. The F-35's technology is designed to engage, shoot, and kill its enemy from long distances, not necessarily in visual "dogfighting" situations. There have been numerous occasions where a four-ship of F-35s has engaged a four-ship of F-16s in simulated combat scenarios and the F-35s won each of those encounters because of its sensors, weapons, and stealth technology.


"The release of this FOUO report is being investigated. The candid feedback provided by our test community is welcomed because it makes what we do better. The disclosure of this report should not discourage our warfighters and test community from providing the Program Office and Lockheed Martin with honest assessments of the F-35's capabilities."

-------------------------------


Q&A from Maj. Gen. Jeffrey L. Harrigian -- Director, F-35 Integration Office, Headquarters U.S. Air Force, the Pentagon, Washington, D.C.


Q: There have been reports that F-35 test pilots have been beaten by F-16s in dogfight training exercises. Is this accurate, and is it correct to say that the F-35 is not as versatile as the F-16?


Maj. Gen Harrigian: “Both operational and developmental test continues for the F-35. It is too soon to draw any final conclusions on the maneuverability of the aircraft. The F-35 is designed to be comparable to current tactical fighters in terms of maneuverability, but the design is optimized for stealth. This will allow it to operate in threat environments where the F-16 could not survive.”


---------------------------------
 
Soku39 said:
You forgot the guys that say tally-ho on the radios.

But ya, as if this thing will ever have to dogfight.
Click to expand...

Yup.

I really know nothing about dogfighting or what criteria the author used to make his declaration.

Otherwise, it might be another "737-200 SLAMS 320 in awesomeness!" written by a simmer.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top