The Marine Corps said it is capable of deploying Lockheed Martin's F-35 to the Middle East, if necessary. The F-35B variant was declared combat-ready by the Marines in July and set for deployment to Japan in 2017. But as tensions rise over Islamic State terrorist activity in the Middle East, deployment plans could change.
"If a contingency arose, and I've got an IOC squadron, I could put six or more F-35Bs on the USS Wasp and sail into harm's way and do the job and basically do what our nation needs to do with a fifth-generation aircraft from a seabase, the first one ever," Marine Corps Deputy Commandant for Aviation Lt. Gen. Jon Davis told USNI News.
Based on the history of USMC-Air leadership one could say they continue to mislead the public over the F-35. Curious how they assume the F-35B is combat capable off the boat when there isn't any evidence to indicate such a thing.
USMC-Air has a way to walk-back at least some of their bullshit.
"The aircraft has the capability to deploy anywhere right now — including the Middle East," 1st Lt. Sarah Burns, a public affairs officer, wrote in an email to IBD. "With that said, the Marine Corps is maintaining a very deliberate timeline to ensure the F-35 introduction into the fleet is done safely and responsibly, thus unless absolutely necessary, the aircraft will not deploy until 2017."
So the flip side is that they admit it could be unsafe and irresponsible to deploy the F-35 for combat at this time.
Let us summarize some F-35, Joint Strike Fighter, and Joint Affordable Strike Technology history.
Almost 14 years after the F-35 program was awarded to Lockeed Martin, the aircraft was shown to be uncompetitive against an old 2-seat, F-16 carrying two external tanks.
The F-35 is unlikely to survive against emerging (and some existing) ground-to-air and air-to-air threats.
Its whole software information technology, networking plan and maintenance methodology are a shambles.
The Joint Strike Fighter requirement was based on an old 1990's study by RAND which would allow this F-16 and F-18 replacement to have a bit more survivability in battlefield interdiction efforts like Desert Storm. Ground threats that the JSF was meant to take care of would be mostly short to medium-range surface to air missile systems like the SA-3, SA-6 and SA-8.
Inspiration for the JSF requirement air-to-air capability was based on events like January 1991 where two bomb-laden F/A-18s from VFA-81 shot down two Iraqi MiG-21s, and then went on to hit their assigned ground target.
Since the Soviet Union fell, it was decided that future threats would be old ex-Soviet air defense systems in countries that had a 2nd or 3rd-rate military.
In the 1990s, your U.S. / NATO street cred as a fighter pilot was to have been in a training "fight" with the ex-East German, Soviet export variant MiG-29s flown by a reunified Luftwaffe. It was THE threat that everyone deemed to be what we would have to face. You can look back at history and verify that yourself. Anyone that was around then, that is what you saw. Post Soviet Russia was in such dire straits that it was taken off the board by the short-sighted as an aircraft industry threat. Communist China wasn't a big part of the conversation. The fact that today's Pacific Rim is growing various, credible threat air defense systems was not considered back in the 1990s, except, by a few (PDF).
And if there were big threats? The JSF requirement assumed any big threats would be taken care of by several hundred combat-coded F-22s with side-looking AESA radars and infra-red search-and-track capability. We all know how that turned out.
The various Operation: Deny Christmas ops in the 1990's panned out the belief that all we would face in the future were broken down air defense systems. For example, a two-seat F-16 shot down an Iraqi MiG-25. Most of the aircraft shot down in the former Yugoslavia never knew what hit them. AMRAAM capability became that of legend: around about a 50 percent probability of kill against aircraft that at the time had no credible situational awareness or self-defense systems.
The JSF had to be affordable. Post Cold War, there would be smaller DOD budgets; DOD was downsizing at a large rate. A joint-service strike aircraft was needed. How to get there? Design trade-offs for cost vs. performance were developed like the faulty "CAIV": cost as an independent variable. Foreign development money would help launch the JSF project. Foreign sales would help bolster the program.
The other affordability belief is that you would need less kinds of aircraft in a strike package. A smaller number of modern strike fighters with precision weapons could do the work that took a larger number of aircraft, and do it with less exposure to enemy threats. For example, a JDAM dropped from high altitude can contempt-of-engage trashfire, anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) and small-to-medium-range battlefield surface-to-air missiles. Against many kinds of threats, JDAM deleted the JSFs reason to exist. "I can touch you, but you can't touch me", in near any weather. Today, the U.S. Navy has such confidence in the F-35C that they are only ordering 2 aircraft in the latest budget and redirecting funds for stand-off weapons that can be launched off of the F-18 Super Hornet: advanced-HARM and LRASM.
Besides the bad idea of CAIV, the Marines (and the foreign sales effort marketing with the U.K), meant that the joint, base airframe assumptions had to work around a STOVL design requirement. The land-based variant and aircraft carrier (CV) airframe designs had to work within the STOVL design needs.
A few things about the STOVL design. First, it is an over-rated joke in the way wars are fought. Second, every good idea that would go into designing the airframe and performance requirement for a new joint tactical aircraft would be crippled. The odd weapons bays that had to work around the STOVL power-plant (especially for the Lockheed design); the wider, draggier airframe, the extra airframe weight, no twin-engine possibility and so much more, made sure that this would be a high-risk project.
Today, the Joint Strike Fighter combat requirement which is the foundation of today's F-35, is obsolete. Even if the aircraft had no development problems. Worse, if it isn't a big threat, today's F-15, F-16 and F-18 designs can handle the work and do it better-cheaper. America may need an advanced in-production tactical strike fighter, but the F-35 is not it. The solution to all this is to take all the money wasted on the F-35, which is the wrong tactical strike aircraft, and invest it in the right kind of tactical strike solutions. In some cases that may involve no flight pay. For that, at least JAST was a good name as the word "aircraft" wasn't in its title (PDF). The F-35 is not credible for combat. It is taking away money best used somewhere else.
The USMC Air leadership wants to waste $51B of our money for no credible reason. Either the rest of the USMC has to clean house, or the DOD and Congress will have to do it. Either way, USMC Air leadership is helping to make America less safe in future wars.
-DOT&E Report: The F-35 Is Not Ready for IOC and Won't Be Any Time Soon
-Time's Battleland - 5 Part series on F-35 procurement - 2013
-Summary of Air Power Australia F-35 points
-Bill Sweetman, Aviation Week and the F-35
-U.S. Government Accounting Office (GAO) F-35 reports
-F-35 JSF: Cold War Anachronism Without a Mission
-History of F-35 Production Cuts
-Looking at the three Japan contenders (maneuverability)
-How the Canadian DND misleads the public about the F-35
-Value of STOVL F-35B over-hyped
-Cuckoo in the nest--U.S. DOD DOT&E F-35 report is out
-6 Feb 2012 Letter from SASC to DOD boss Panetta questioning the decision to lift probation on the F-35B STOVL.
-USAFs F-35 procurement plan is not believable
-December 2011 Australia/Canada Brief
-F-35 Key Performance Perimeters (KPP) and Feb 2012 CRS report
-F-35 DOD Select Acquisition Report (SAR) FY2012
-Release of F-35 2012 test report card shows continued waste on a dud program
-Australian Defence answers serious F-35 project concerns with "so what?"
-Land of the Lost (production cut history update March 2013)
-Outgoing LM F-35 program boss admits to flawed weight assumptions (March 2013)
-A look at the F-35 program's astro-turfing
-F-35 and F-16 cost per flying hour
-Is this aircraft worth over $51B of USMC tac-air funding?
-Combat radius and altitude, A model
-F-35A, noise abatement and airfields and the USAF
-Deceptive marketing practice: F-35 blocks
-The concurrency fraud
-The dung beetle's "it's known" lie
-F-35's air-to-air ability limited
-F-35 Blocks--2006 and today
-The F-35B design is leaking fuel
-F-35 deliveries
-ADF's wacky F-35 assumptions
-Gauging performance, the 2008 F-35, Davis dream brief
-Aboriginal brought out as a prop
-Super Kendall's F-35 problem
-LM sales force in pre-Internet era
-History of F-35 engine problems
-Compare
-JSF hopes and dreams...early days of the Ponzi Scheme
-The Prognostics
-2002--Australia joins the F-35 program
-Congressional Research Service--Through to FY2013, F-35 has received $83.3B in funding
-F-35 choice gives Dutch a shocking high cost per flight hour
-More indications that the F-35 is a failed program
-From the year 2000. Very insightful. The JSF: One More Card In The House (PDF)
“It will affordable because already there are 3,000 aircraft on the order books.”
—27 June 2002, Air Marshal Houston, Defence press announcement, Australia joins the F-35 program—
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