The F-35’s Terrifying Bug List

http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2016/02/f-35s-terrifying-bug-list/125638

by bootload • 10 years ago

121 174 10 years ago

defenseone.com

spoiledtechie• 10 years ago

Wanna know why? Because of the good developers don't actually work for the military.

fnordfnordfnord11• 10 years ago

That's just untrue.

DrJokepu2• 10 years ago

I guess then Grace Hopper wasn't a good enough developer for you?

dominotw• 10 years ago

Isn't that back when people generally believed that American wars are for greater good of the whole world tho?

engi_nerd6• 10 years ago

Your statement is offensive because it's a blanket generality. Maybe if you had said "the government has difficulty attracting top engineering talent because of any number of reasons, including workplace culture, comparatively low pay, etc"...Then that's a point worthy of discussion.

fma• 10 years ago

F35 is made by Lockheed Martin, a private company, not the US government. The only people involved from the government side would mostly be management paper pushers or engineers who do IV&V work (independent verification and validation). Basically just check boxes that say LM completed XYZ and passed testing.

gjkood• 10 years ago

Do you think that none of the best scientific minds in America worked on the Manhattan project?

TheOtherHobbes• 10 years ago

The original point may or may not be true.

But I don't see how trying to compare the F35 to a project from 70 years ago is relevant.

madengr• 10 years ago

Yes, they are working on sexting apps and ad injection.

bluejekyll• 10 years ago

I've worked with some especially brilliant engineers that came out of the military. In point of fact, the attention to security concerns is generally impressive.

ralfruns• 10 years ago

How can they claim the F35 "shares many—if not necessarily all—of the same close air support capabilities as the $18.8 million A-10" if it doesn't have a functioning cannon yet [1]. I thought the A-10 is basically a airframe built around a cannon.

[1] http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/air-space/strike/20...

gherkin03• 10 years ago

How can they claim the F35 "shares many—if not necessarily all—of the same close air support capabilities as the $18.8 million A-10"

Probably through a lot of box-ticking.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/box-ticking

engi_nerd6• 10 years ago

That article is more than a year old and doesn't accurately reflect the current state of the gun. Here's the current state.

F-35A test aircraft AF-02 has completed initial test firings of the internal gun on the F-35A variant, both on the ground [1] and in flight [2]. The F-35B and F-35C carry their gun externally, in a centerline gun pod [3]. The gun pod has been tested over the past several years [4] on the ground, and will be tested on those variants later this year.

The 2017 date in that article you posted refers to when the cannon on all variants will be integrated with the mission systems software.

So just as it is disingenuous to say "the F-35 cannon testing is complete" it's also not completely accurate to say "it doesn't have a functioning cannon yet." The engineering reality is more nuanced than that.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFoJ93Kb5z0

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEAhFZG022M

[3] http://aviationintel.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/20120222...

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTDomgJooJU

poof1316• 10 years ago

It’s all smoke. Using the F-35 for CAS is ludicrous. Using 4th and 5th generation aircraft in place of AC-130s [1] and Super Tacanos [2] not only costs more, but is incredibly less effective for the soldiers on the ground. CAS and the F-35 shouldn’t be used in the same sentence.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would have cost significantly less (1/4 the total?) if the military hadn’t forced square fighter jets into the round hole of CAS (add up $10k / hr vs $600, plus airborne tankers, plus carriers, plus increased supply costs). Not only did this cost multiples more, provide less effective support to Americans risking their lives on the ground, it damaged the fleet of fighters for other tasks in the future. How many flight hours where burned “in country” on already aging platforms? I know I got some.

Senior military aviation leadership boxed themselves into a corner burning up the fleet in ways it shouldn’t have and betting on a do-it-all turd called the F-35. The cannon could fall of this thing and it would be better for everyone. Dog-fighting is dead and people will scream F-4 / Vietnam, but I’d rather have an extra aim-9x than a fucking gun pod in this day and age [3, 4]. So the plane sucks for CAS and the gun pod is irrelevant for BFM. But don’t worry, the plane is so magical who knows. Just know you’re being sold a bill of goods when leadership talks about CAS and the F-35.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_AC-130

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_EMB_314_Super_Tucano

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_Douglas_F-4_Phantom_...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AIM-9_Sidewinder#AIM-9X

popmystack• 10 years ago

How disingenuous can you people be?

greedo27• 10 years ago

AC-130 is only used at night, limiting it's ability to perform CAS. Even at night, it can't perform CAS in contested airspace. Neither could a Super Tuc.

outworlder2• 10 years ago

Does it really matter if the cannon is working or not? The A-10, despite its age, is more survivable, cheaper to build and run, can operate out of anywhere (those engines high up ingest less foreign material) and has a much longer loiter time.

One could argue that today's combat landscape is not ideal for the A-10 and that it wouldn't survive against modern air defenses. Which is a very good point. But, if you are going against modern defenses, what do you need a cannon for? Specially an external one which will ruin your radar signature.

gozur8810• 10 years ago

The "A" version cannon is internal.

But no, it doesn't matter whether or not the cannon works. It's not what you'd use to engage targets on the ground. Or the air, for that matter.

gozur8810• 10 years ago

The A-10 is obsolete because it's an air frame built around a cannon. The cannon is heavy, and the ammo is heavy. For all that weight the ammo runs out somewhere between 12 and 20 seconds.

The most efficient way to destroy things on the ground is with guided missiles and bombs. An F-35 with a brace of SDBs is going to do a lot more damage than an A-10, both because smart bombs are much more effective on a pound-for-pound basis and because it can get on station much more quickly. A strike aircraft with modern optics it can fly above AAA and shoulder launched SAM range and still engage moving targets on the ground.

The troops like the A-10 because it's loud and impressive and makes them feel like they haven't been forgotten.

Politicians like the A-10, too, because by staving off the ax once again they can make it look like they're doing something to support the little guy on the ground.

The Army brass likes the A-10 because they suspect when the shit hits the fan the Air Force will decide the multi-role aircraft all belong in some other role and abandon the Army altogether.

But none of that has any bearing on the effectiveness of the air frame itself. Not many people realize the A-10 only carried out 20% of the CAS missions in Afghanistan. The A-10 was the bee's knees when it was new and we were worried about thousands of Soviet tanks pouring through the Fulda Gap. But it's not 1985 any more.

Gustomaximus3• 10 years ago

The troops like the A-10 because it's loud and impressive and makes them feel like they haven't been forgotten.

Even if this is entirely true, moral goes a hell of a long way on in the army as does the fear this creates with the enemy.

That said I was of the understanding the A-10 was very effective for supporting troops in areas like Afghanistan and similar low tech ground wars. The real issue the Air Force are tasked with protecting the country in the case of a 'real war' with more modernized opponents like China or Russia. In this case and A-10 is old tech and wont deliver much in terms of defense capability hence their lack of interest in maintaining/upgrading it.

dsfyu404ed• 10 years ago

Being loud and impressive should count twice since it counts against the guy on the other side.

The A10 is still good at CAS that's what it was designed to do. 1 A10 caries a much, much larger bomb load than an F35. If you have air superiority you need a good bomb truck a lot more useful than a stealth fighter.

What were the other 80% of CAS missions carried out by? What % of aircraft deployed were A10s? That 20% figure needs more to back it up.

fnordfnordfnord11• 10 years ago

The A-10 was the bee's knees when it was new and we were worried about thousands of Soviet tanks pouring through the Fulda Gap. But it's not 1985 any more.

Nobody in Chair Force command ever liked the A10. And the A10 is performing CAS as a secondary role, not the one it was originally intended for; and it is worn out and obsolete, and does need replacement. The F35 just isn't the tool for the job and it won't ever be. The Super Tucano is much closer, but I'm still skeptical of it too.

tim3333• 10 years ago

The A-10 is obsolete because it's an air frame built around a cannon

Gulf war 1: Destroyed more than 900 Iraqi tanks, 2,000 other military vehicles and 1,200 artillery pieces for the loss of four A-10s

Syria 2015: Single A-10 takes out 116 ISIS fuel trucks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ37y0yeSgc&feature=youtu.be...

It still has it's uses. Also consider the costs - if you're using a high flying F-35 and laser guided bombs they'll cost I don't know $20k each and it can only carry a few so the cost of taking out fuel trucks would quite likely be more than the value of the trucks. A big old cannon can probably do it quicker and much cheaper.

gherkin03• 10 years ago

I'm curious: how do the F-35's development troubles compare to other recent fighters, like the F-22 or Eurofighter? Are they objectively worse, or are the memories just fresher?

DrJokepu2• 10 years ago

The F-16 used to be called "lawn dart" for a reason.

gherkin03• 10 years ago

Was that due to development problems, though? This article claims the nickname comes from the fact that it's a single-engine fighter:

http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,154457,00.html

The F-16 is known in Air Force circles as the "lawn dart" for its tendency to plunge back to Earth when its single engine flames out, and in most years, engine failure causes more accidents than any other factor.

greedo27• 10 years ago

The F-14 was a huge hangar queen too; requiring an inordinate amount of work between flights. It had a terrible set of engines until the F404 arrived.

F-22 was a mess with it's oxygen system.

F-15s mysteriously broke apart in mid-air, though this was unexpected wingbox fatigue late in their lives.

The Navy had the "Gutless Cutlass" Vought F7.

The USAF had the F104 nicknamed the Widowmaker; IIRC, more Luftwaffe pilots died flying this type than any other aircraft.

gozur8810• 10 years ago

The technical problems are par for the course. What's different about the F-35 is cost - they failed in the quest to be the new F-16 to the F-22's F-15.

For decades the US has pursued a high-low strategy, meaning a small number of very expensive, very high performance aircraft and a large number of inexpensive (but still good) aircraft. Where the F-35 went off the rails is on the "inexpensive" part. We would have been better off buying more F-22s for air superiority and keeping the F-16 for strike missions.

noselasd• 10 years ago

Report is here: http://www.dote.osd.mil/pub/reports/FY2015/pdf/dod/2015f35js...

doodlebugging• 10 years ago

This is the loudest fighter plane in our inventory. You can hear this thing coming at least a minute before it gets near you and for several minutes after depending on flight direction. I can tell from the sound which of our planes is passing near and this one, the first time I heard it, was clearly not one with which I was familiar. Beautiful plane but obviously a troubled build history.

With all the problems noted over the last few years I'm surprised that anyone wants it. The F-22 has had its problems and production was cut at a very low number (I think I read that they wanted to shift gears and go with the F-35). The complexity of these two planes could make them more of a liability in a conflict.

It makes more sense to me (as a taxpayer) to spend the defense dollar on things that can be built quickly and for minimal initial cost so that many can be built to replace those lost to attrition in conflict. They should also be purpose-built for specific missions just as we built planes in WW2. We have the technology and we don't need a fleet of flying super-computers that can't fight their way out of the battlespace. Planes are great support tools for infantry and armored units who actually win the wars by taking and holding territory from the enemy. They won't win wars by themselves. Sorry 'bout that, Air Force.

greedo27• 10 years ago

Aircraft that "can be built quickly and for minimal initial cost" don't exist. Modern fighter aircraft are complex, expensive machines. The engines alone are a significant portion of the cost. And if you think the F-35 has supercomputers, you're sorely mistaken. Even the F-22 has old, decade old CPUs.

The world has moved on since WW2, and the idea of cheap hordes of aircraft, or spinning up the Arsenal of Democracy to build them in wartime just won't fly.

Ask the Syrians how well their simple Mig-21s and Mig-23s did in the Bekka Valley in 1982 when they ran up against the Israeli's flying F-15s and F-16s. Turkey shoot doesn't even begin to describe it. If you bring a biplane to a modern dogfight, you'll end up a splat mark on the ground.

engi_nerd6• 10 years ago

And if you think the F-35 has supercomputers, you're sorely mistaken.

People don't realize this. Your smartphone is vastly more powerful than pretty much any single CPU found in the avionics of a fighter. If you really dig around old press releases you can figure out some of what these aircraft use, but I'd rather not specify. But, think about when the F-35 systems were largely designed: the period from 2000 to 2005.

mjewkes• 10 years ago

(for those unfamiliar) With roughly even strength, Isreal destroyed 82 Syrian aircraft + 30 SAM batteries while suffering only 2 damaged aircraft (that flew home).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mole_Cricket_19#Batt...

poof1316• 10 years ago

Yeah, but if I bring a fleet of trucks launching SA-20s [1] or a fleet of Mig-21s (and drones) with advanced upgrades [2] functioning as missile trucks, who knows. You’re really battling the missiles and BVR targeting capabilities. The plane is increasingly a delivery platform and missiles are far cheaper then jets.

I agree with the parent in that a diversified set of aircraft focused on specific missions and more easily produced and upgraded with new tech is critical (no ones saying build bi-planes). And sure we can say 4th-gen beats 3rd-gen and now 5th-gen beats 4th-gen, unfortunately adversaries often don’t follow the script. F-35 seems to be more a danger to national security than a help.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S-300_(missile) [2] http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?121375-MiG-21-...

jfoutz2• 10 years ago

That would be a pretty interesting fight. It looks like the 400mph rc jet engines cost about $4000. decent drone packages are around $1000. let's be crazy and say $100,000 per drone. around $104,000,000 per F-35.

i'm not sure how well an F-35 would stack up against 1040 400mph targets. the F-35 is much much quicker, but only has, what 200 bullets? something in that range.

Or, take it up a notch. blow $10,000,000 per drone. give them an air to air missile or two. that puts it at a much more reasonable 1 v 10. I get 10 shots, you get 4.

You're not wrong, but i think you're missing a classic military lesson, quantity has a quality all it's own.

neurotech13• 10 years ago

The "supercomputer" claim is based on the F-35 having a multi-processor avionics system.

A good example of the "cheap" fighter is the Korean F/A-50. This jet has some of the Beyond Visual Range capability of the F-16, at 1/3 the cost. It doesn't have the range or the weapons capacity.

A well trained T-38/F-5 aggressor pilot can nail an F-16 or F-22 in a dogfight, within visual range. The Stealth F-35 will have the ability to engage an enemy aircraft without ever being detected, and that "minor" detail justifies the cost. In previous conflicts, once the opposing aircraft locate each other on radar, the adversaries would be forced into the merge, or risk being shot down at long range.

pippy• 10 years ago

Turkey shoot doesn't even begin to describe it. If you bring a biplane to a modern dogfight, you'll end up a splat mark on the ground.

Kind of unfair example, the Israelis had a lot of time to prepare for that battle. On top of that the Syrians knew they didn't stand a chance given their resources.

Given any situation you have to fit the resource to meet the need. The United States deploys the EMB 314 Super Tucano to great effect, which is a WW2 style fighter fitted with modern electronics. The F35 in the modern context simply doesn't make sense, as it's simply over engineered and doesn't fit current individual needs.

grecy2• 10 years ago

With all the problems noted over the last few years I'm surprised that anyone wants it

What makes you think anyone wants it?

Buyers of things like this don't buy because they want to, they buy because they're told to.

My friend at DMO (Defense Materials Organization) in Australia spent 2 years of his life on a huge team that recommended the Australian Defense Force don't buy any Abrams tanks for a whole bunch of very valid reasons.

Australia bought a bunch of them anyway, in direct contradiction to the organization who's very purpose it is to make these kinds of purchasing decisions.

caf• 10 years ago

It was Defence Materiel Organisation. "Materiel" being a specific term for military supplies, distinct from "material".

flashman• 10 years ago

Australia's also committed to buying 72 - seventy two! - F35s, as part of the block buy program mentioned in the article. Sure, it arguably helps keep prices down, but the ongoing integration and support costs for foreign buyers pose a lot of challenges.

rwallace• 10 years ago

I'm curious, what were the reasons? What was the better alternative? I've read plenty about the shortcomings of the F35, but this is the first I've heard about shortcomings of the Abrams.

yareally• 10 years ago

They should also be purpose-built for specific missions just as we built planes in WW2.

Even in WW2, all the major nations had aircraft that were multipurpose. Even the famous P-51 was built to be multipurpose. The difference between then and now is process/planning to build those aircraft hasn't kept up with their complexity. Also there's a lot more consideration of pilot safety and environmental extremes than the typical propeller fighter/bomber of WW2.

lawnchair_larry• 10 years ago

It doesn't really matter how effective it is in combat. The project is a wealth transfer first, and a "job creator" second. The only foreign purchases will be either from countries that the US bullied into making some orders, or countries that receive "aid money" from the US, much of which is disbursed in the form of de facto gift cards for the military contractors who are too big to fail, and too friendly with well-connected people in the public sector.

Edit: See grecy's comment for a perfect example. They're a vehicle to siphon taxpayer dollars, not a vehicle to fight wars.

WalterBright2• 10 years ago

Reminds me of the super battleships built prior to WW2. Too expensive to risk in combat, and highly vulnerable to cheap stringbag airplanes.

tim3333• 10 years ago

I think the Brits have a military need as they need as the Navy's aircraft carriers can only take short takeoff aircraft, the Harrier is no more and they need something to stop the Argie's taking the Malvinas next time they're in the mood.

jrochkind13• 10 years ago

Most people don't realize that the bulk of U.S. foreign military aid is in the form of required purchases from U.S. defense industry companies. We don't give them money for military goods to spend how they like, we give them... F-35's, maybe.

(Although Israel, one of the very largest recipients of U.S. military aid, actually has an exemption to this rule, we actually give them cash they're allowed to spend on their own local military industry. I bet they don't buy any F-35s)

kevin_thibedeau• 10 years ago

These sort of war machines aren't designed for economic parsimony. Their sole purpose is to dump tons of money into the MIC. Partly to line the pockets of the higher ups and partly to maintain the massive jobs program it has become. Defense superiority is really secondary or tertiary. The gold plated requirements list forces the sort of complexity that keeps the contract gravy train running. The real trick of managing a defense program like this is finding how much you can go over budget without getting cancelled.

Gustomaximus3• 10 years ago

The Russian model is more like this in that they build an advanced model and then a 'monkey model' that is simpler and easy to mass produce quickly. The rationale being wars are either over very quickly or grind out over the long term. If the latter occurs they should theoretically be able to scale up faster then their opponent who is still producing their most advance machinery.

I read this in a great PDF doc a while back written by I think an ex Russian officer who talked about this and other strategies like their officer heavy army to allow quick expansion through bringing in civilians. I've not been able to find it again if anyone is familiar.

pwc• 10 years ago

Sounds like the book might have been Inside the Soviet Army:

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

http://militera.lib.ru/research/suvorov12/index.html

WalterBright2• 10 years ago

The F-35 is so expensive too few can be built and none will be risked in combat, and if they were lost in combat, they could not be replaced.

I have no idea what the next major conflict might look like, and nobody else does, either. (WW1 and WW2 both showed large swings in fortunes with even minor technological improvements.) But it's hard to see how the F-35 could play a role in it.

ihsw2• 10 years ago

Yep, that's the Su35. They started with the Su27, overhauled everything to the point of absurdity, and then rolled back overly complicated features.

Now the RuAF has a fantastic multirole fighter that rivals the F35 but years before the F35 sees a combat debut.

partiallypro• 10 years ago

Believe it or not, the F-35 is built to save costs in the long term. It has a huge upfront cost because what they are trying to do hasn't really been done in a modern airforce. Parts standardization to kill off massive maintenance costs of fleets (which are astronomical) and making a JSF will different variants for different branches is also much cheaper.

The F-35 is buggy, because its unprecedented, I honestly don't think it gets a fair shake, and I wish people would look at the long term cost savings vs the short term boondoggle (and it is certainly that.) Fleet maintenance is astronomical, the F-35 is build to address that; if you spread costs out of 30 years, the plane doesn't look quite as expensive. Since the government doesn't use GAAP accounting, all costs are realized up front instead of being depreciated out.

I really don't buy your story about being able to hear the jet a minute before it hits you. By the time you hear a jet flying directly to your position you are either already dead, or the plane is just about to pass over you. In your instance it sounds like the plane was no zeroing in on your position, but was just incidentally passing by...which is entirely different.

fnordfnordfnord11• 10 years ago

Believe it or not, the F-35 is built to save costs in the long term.

I don't believe it. Sure, that's how they sold it, and I understand the supply chain problems they want to avoid, but I don't believe a word of it.

Most anyone who heard an F35 and is posting publicly about it must have heard the plane in transit over land where they aren't permitted to cause sonic booms, and could have even been traveling very slowly.

na857• 10 years ago

Believe it or not, the F-35 is built to save costs in the long term.

Any cost savings have been annihilated by hideous budget overruns. The F-35 will be a money-loser without exception.

All this is aside from the fact that saving money on something that doesn't fucking work is pretty asinine.

Can they fire the gun yet without crashing the system?

Can the pilots actually use the VR helmet without getting motion sickness?

Has a smaller helmet been made so that the pilot doesn't get stuck against the inside of the canopy trying to look over his/her shoulder?

massemphasis4• 10 years ago

Unbelievable. Fighter jet industry is only six or seven decades old at most. The navy on the other hand has been around for hundreds of years. What does the airforce think they can do the navy hasn't already tried?

The F-35 program is the biggest scam in history. The people in charge of it need to be put in jail.

dTal• 10 years ago

Believe it or not, the F-35 is built to save costs in the long term. It has a huge upfront cost because what they are trying to do hasn't really been done in a modern airforce.

coughSpaceShuttlecough

[okay this was glib, but there are some real parallels there, including trying to be all things to all people]

paulddraper• 10 years ago

"They won't win wars by themselves. Sorry 'bout that, Air Force."

Aircraft (and aircraft carriers) were devastatingly effective in the WWII Pacific theatre. (Okay, this wasn't the Air Force, but I'm focusing on the aircraft part.)

It's true for both sides. Japan nearly destroyed the US's ability to contend at all in that theatre. The US turned the tide at Midway.

You're right they don't win wars "by themselves", but I think you're undervaluing their strategic value in wars fought on certain geographies.

jacquesm3• 10 years ago

In WWII pilot lives were cheap and planes were relatively simple to fly. To fly an F35 the investment in the pilot is huge. Add to that the fact that deaths on 'your own side' are no longer as acceptable as they were in the past during conflicts mean that many can't be built to replace those lost to attrition.

The more war goes 'remote control' the more this will cease to be an issue, and this is a dangerous trend precisely because it removes one of the last impediments to scaling up the export of war. As soon as the losses to own troops drop to near zero because all of it is done through robotic means all bets are off, and it does not even require a 'skynet' in order to achieve it. All it takes is some more telepresence and that's pretty much a solved problem at this stage. The difference is that in the air we now have this and for other branches it is still being worked on but within a decade or two we should see robotic infantry.

greedo27• 10 years ago

Telepresence works fine in the civilian world, where you don't have someone jamming your GPS and comm links. It fails dramatically when you're fighting someone with decent technology. Definitely not a "solved problem." Look at how the Iranians managed to capture an RQ-170...

If the US tries to fight a near-peer opponent like China or Russia, GPS will be jammed, satellites will be either blinded or destroyed, and both UHF and VHF comms will be either jammed or severely degraded. Just recently a US Army General was bitching about how advanced the Russians were with their ECM/ECCM in Ukraine. The Russians are extremely good at this.

massemphasis4• 10 years ago

Its engine is relatively tiny for its required power output. Being a turbofan, that thing has to be seriously noisy. Forget radar stealth if you can just use acoustic radars and sensors.

theoh• 10 years ago

"Planes are great support tools for infantry and armored units who actually win the wars by taking and holding territory from the enemy"

That's a pretty loaded perspective on the nature of war. Occupation of territory isn't necessarily the objective and it's a crude sort of "victory" which is not appropriate for many current conflicts.

dudul• 10 years ago

That's ok. They'll release a hotfix on steam a few weeks after the release. Plus a couple of DLCs to improve the in-flight experience :)

jessaustin• 10 years ago

After the report came out Monday, Lt. Gen. Chris Bogdan, of the F-35 program executive office, issued a statement to cast the report’s findings in a rather more flattering light.

Perhaps a posting to the Joint Chiefs is out for Gen. Bogdan, but fortunately Lockheed is keeping a senior VP's chair warm for him. One expects we'll see this luminary on the political bloviation shows in five years' time explaining why we must support our brave allies in ISIS against the savage onslaught of the Tehran-backed Zoroastrians, and oh-by-the-way buy a couple hundred more of these flying coffins.

nfriedly2• 10 years ago

Off topic: I love it when websites are 'mobile first' without ever testing on a mobile browser. Every single link has a "new window" icon that's stretched to the entire width of my screen: http://s18.postimg.org/q551s8byh/tmp_14731_Screenshot_2016_0...

civilian• 10 years ago

It's the same on desktop chrome. :3

rubberstamp• 10 years ago

but..but the ad looks cyber perfect

shred45• 10 years ago

Actually, It just kind of looks like that. I'm really not sure what is going on.

http://imgur.com/LCSA2mx

nfriedly2• 10 years ago

I'm not sure if that's better or worse... I think worse.

fnordfnordfnord11• 10 years ago

Same on FF desktop version.

omginternets• 10 years ago

DefenseOne has a pretty terrifying bug where the page reloads with a frequency of about 2-3 Hz ...

hackuser3• 10 years ago

Most of this sounds like typical teething pains for an exceptionally complex project just reaching version 1.0.

“Each new version of software, while adding some new capability, failed to resolve all the deficiencies identified in earlier releases,”

Doesn't that describe every software update ever released for any system?

ilurkedhere• 10 years ago

Aren't fighter pilots obsolete at this point?

Much of the complexity in the craft is centered around keeping the poor bastard flying it, alive. Then there are pretty tight limits on how much acceleration the human body can receive. Pilot-less craft don't have those limitions, so I figure they should be much more maneuverable and less expensive.

ihsw2• 10 years ago

The tech simply isn't there yet.

Conventional fighter jets have more speed, travel and strike range, and more maneuverability. They will outflank drones every time -- I'm not kidding, they stand absolutely zero chance against fighter jets.

You could send a couple dozen Reaper drones out and a pair of Su27/F15s would shoot them out of the sky before you can say "Hellfire."

Not to mention modern anti-air defense systems would chew through them like candy.

What are they good for then? Cheap, high-altitude, medium-range (~1500KM), endurance (>24hr) missions.

JoeAltmaier• 10 years ago

Military drones started with the CIA - I listened to the retired director that initiated the effort, on NPR. They used drones in countries who either didn't have radar or had forgotten how to connect it with weapons systems, which included "almost everywhere". They wanted a sustained (24 hour) observation platform in the field, and drones filled the bill.

I'm sure they might ultimately get to fighter-jet performance, but at a much greater cost and reduction in mission time.

The F-35’s Terrifying Bug List

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