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Home Front: WoT

7 Things The Marines Have To Do To Make The F-35B Worth The Huge Cost

2014-06-03

Wow.
After years of passing more conventional capabilities by, I think it is time for the Marine Corps, and the "Gator Navy" for that matter, to get serious about getting the very most out of their soon to be fielded, extremely expensive and controversial F-35B force. At $150 million a pop, they need to be more than nicer Harriers.

With the fielding of the F-35B, the Navy almost doubles its theoretical "first day of war," fixed wing capable, carrier force. This means that more ships capable of operating high-performance, low-observable, multi-role fighters, can be in more places at a single time. This enhancement to America's naval power projection capability will complicate the war plans of any potential peer state belligerent, and will result in a highly relevant strategic boost for the US, especially in the dawning age of Air-Sea Battle and the Obama Administration's attempted "pivot" towards the Pacific theater.

Posted by:Squinty

#6 The A-10 is much better a close air support than the F-35 but you can't launch a warthog from an amphibious assault carrier. Either or is a false premise; they don't do the same things. Budgets not withstanding, you need both.

Posted by: Squinty 2014-06-03 21:34

#5 I think the suggestion was more along the lines of buying up a boatload of A-10s instead of one of the F-35. I understand the military branches wanting to be independant but we are in budget crunch time and it just doesn't make sense for all to get the super-shiniest toys. They should worry abou their core tasks and let the Air Force or Navy worry about the F-35B.

Posted by: rjschwarz 2014-06-03 15:05

#4 They should secretly replace the F-35 serial numbers with those of A-10's. I'd wager that's a good swap.

Emotionally, I agree with you. However anybody in Congress who thinks that you can replace the A-10 with the F-35 is smoking something. The F-35 lacks comparable capabilities (e.g. GAU-8 Gatling gun) while having a higher operating cost.

The A-10 is a significantly cheaper aircraft to maintain, costing about $17,564 per flight hour. In contrast, the F-35A nearly doubles that with a hefty $35,200 per flight hour. Accounting for this difference are facts like the A-10s 1:5 fuel consumption ratio.

Close air support heavily depends on the aircrafts loiter time. Loiter time is defined as the ability to cruise at slow speeds over a small area. Loiter range is, in part the function of range the greater the range, the longer it can spend over an area of interest, where ground support may be needed. Compared to the F-35A, which has a range of about 1,200 nautical miles (the B version is even less), the A-10 out flies its potential successor by about twice the distance, reaching a distance of 2,240nm. That additional range allows the A-10 to loiter above areas of battlefield activity further from its takeoff origin without the need to refuel.

The A-10 was built to be survivable. The A-10 however needs a long runway.

This is why the "7 things ..." article appealed to me. You can't just plug the F-35 into the A-10 role. The F-35 is good at very different things so if you are stuck with the F-35 you better change the game plan to optimize the F-35's value.

Posted by: Squinty 2014-06-03 14:37

#3 They should secretly replace the F-35 serial numbers with those of A-10's. I'd wager that's a good swap.

Posted by: Silentbrick 2014-06-03 09:43

#2 If the F-35 was deployed 5 years ago and only cost $100 mil a pop, they would be a great fighter.

Now they are so over priced that the loss of half a squadron would bankrupt the Marines.

Posted by: DarthVader 2014-06-03 01:17

#1 I understand they've spent $400B for the program so far. Somehow the military needs to save a bunch of money over the next few years. Who thinks they're going to order the full 2000 planes?

Posted by: gorb 2014-06-03 01:04

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