The F-35 Is a'Rathole,' Congressman Says. He's Right.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

The new head of the House Armed Services Committee has called the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter a“rathole” and wants to halt funding for it. Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., suggested the Pentagon should“cut its losses” and invest in a range of jets.

But is that even possible? As usual, the truth is complicated.

In a webcast conversation with the Brookings Institution on March 5, Smith said the F-35“doesn’t work particularly well” and is too costly to keep up, per the Washington Post:

“I want to stop throwing money down that particular rathole,” Smith said.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/article/the-f-35-is-arathole-congressman-says-hes-right/ar-BB1epBmI?li=BBnb7Kz

[msongs]

1. uh oh somebody from new england is not gonna like this nt

[ret5hd]

2. Still gloating?

[Blue_true]

7. His state would likely get work from whatever replaces the F-35.

The particular Defense plant has a long history of working on components of military fighter, surveillance and transport planes.

[Kid Berwyn]

3. Lucian K. Truscott IV details the "flying Swiss Army knife"

Even by Pentagon terms, this was a dud: The disastrous saga of the F-35

The military-industrial complex spent $2 trillion building a "flying Swiss Army knife." Now it's been shelved

By LUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT IV
Salon.com, FEBRUARY 27, 2021

Excerpt...

The F-35, on the other hand, can't fly at twice the speed of sound. In fact, it comes with what amounts to a warning label on its control panel marking supersonic flight as "for emergency use only." So it's OK to fly the thing like a 737, but if you want to go really fast, you have to ask permission, which promises to work really, really well in a dogfight. What are pilots going to do if they're being pursued by a supersonic enemy jet?

The F-35 will carry four different air-to-air missiles, six air-to-ground missiles and one anti-ship missile, but the problem is, all of them have to be fired from the air, and right now, the F-35 isn't yet "operational," which means, essentially, that it's so unsafe to fly the damn things, they spend most of their time parked.

Take the problem they have with switches. The developers of the F-35 decided to go with touchscreen switches rather than the physical ones used in other fighters, like toggles or rocker switches. That would be nice if they worked, but pilots report that the touchscreen switches don't function 20 percent of the time. So you're flying along, and you want to drop your landing gear to land, but your touchscreen decides "not this time, pal" and refuses to work. How would you like to be driving your car and have your brakes decide not to work 20 percent of the time, like, say, when you're approaching a red light at a major intersection?

But it gets worse. The heat coating on the engine's rotor blades is failing at a rate that leaves 5 to 6 percent of the F-35 fleet parked on the tarmac at any given time, awaiting not just engine repairs, but total replacement. Then there's the canopy. You know what a canopy is, don't you? It's the clear bubble pilots look through so they can see to take off and land, not to mention see other aircraft, such as enemy aircraft. Well, it seems F-35 canopies have decided to "delaminate" at inappropriate times, making flying the things dangerous if not impossible. So many of them have failed that the Pentagon has had to fund an entirely new canopy manufacturer to make replacements.

Continues...

https://www.salon.com/2021/02/27/even-by-pentagon-terms-this-was-a-dud-the-disastrous-saga-of-the-f-35/

[Budi]

4. Was the F-35 a pay to play for State & Contractor favors ?

That's where a deep dive investigation on the failed F-35 waste should begin looking.

A lot of money was made on this bs deal.
Shady af & I hope they tie profits to greased hands, because it was known long ago the thing wasn't intended to actually perform as it was sold.

TRILLIONS OF FKING Tax Dollars for political favors.

[keithbvadu2]

9. The planning for the manufacture of the F-35 was ingenious.

The planning for the manufacture of the F-35 was ingenious.

They spread the jobs around many, many Congressional districts.

[hunter]

5. 90% of this very expensive crap is designed to fight the Cold War better.

Just as the Maginot Line was designed to fight World War One better.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maginot_Line

It didn't work. France fell.

The modern world economy is so damned brittle any world war would collapse it and billions of people would die, here in the U.S.A. in equal proportion.

I think we should strive to keep this world economy healthy, pushing it as best we are able in some sustainable direction.

[Tommymac]

6. I've been pushing for this for years. We Don't Need it - it's a battleship.

A dinosaur designed to fight the last war.

Take the money and provide free college education for all so we can get young, innovative, dare I say hip, aerospace engineers to design effective and cost-efficient weapons systems meant for 21st Century tactical battlefields.

[aikoaiko]

8. Maybe so, but sometimes military stuff takes a while to work out the kinks.

The M-16 rifle was a big problem for years and so was the Osprey plane.

But somethings have kinks that can’t be worked out.

[EX500rider]

10. If it was as bad as these stories make out...

South Korea, Israel, Japan, Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Singapore, UAE etc. would not be buying them.

[WarGamer]

11. It was a horrible waste of resources.

Just like the Littoral warships.

Aerial Combat will be 100% UAV in the next few years.

At this point, humans are an encumbrance to the capabilities the Engineers are able to build into the aircraft. The human brain is too slow and the body too fragile.

[Xolodno]

12. Russia's answer to this plane...

...the Sukhoi 57 had the plug pulled on it. It's not going to even break a 100 planes. They see limited use for it and no other country seems interested in buying it...or being able to afford it.

They seem more focused on the MiG 41, an interceptor designed for hypersonic missiles. Which lines up with their military doctrine of defense.

Upgraded 4th++ generation planes are more than a match for any air force in the world. This plane is over kill.