Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
Russia, China, North Korea, Japan, South Korea and India are all working to develop 5th generation planes.
Further to the whole f-35 vs f18 debate, and I'm an airforce Layman, Bindair comes across as move well versed in this stuff then I am.
fifth generation is more then one single element. Its a combination of avionic design, stealth, multiple targeting mode, situational awareness and ability to mass communicate.
If effect for one thing is that its a plane that no longer needs an AWACs in its digitial battlefield because all of the planes are interlinked and offer the wide high definition radar range that the AWACs used to offer. The argument being that if your AWACS or controlling radar gets blanked, in a pre fifth generation fighter your pretty much pooched and have no awareness of anything except what's immediately around your fighter. In a fifh generation fighter team, because your interoperability makes up your situational picture, your a self contained awacs and fighter group in one.
So for example in a 4.5 and below aircraft, you wait to hear from your controller who spots an aircraft 100 miles away and he vectors you over to it.
With a 5th generation fighter a fighter crew using the new AESA radar spots a cluster of enemy fighters, instantly every f35 in the air is aware and that situation is displayed since all of the fighters are networked together, then the commander on the scene can make the best decision on how to engage that.
In concert with that, the Stealth package does give advantages in concert with the above in that you can use that + the situational advantage + the network advantage + the 0 requirement for a controlling aircraft such as a AWACS.
In terms of the engines on most fifth generation fighters they give a much smaller heat signature then the current 4.5 and below, so its more diffficult to lock on to them from any aspect, whereas the Superhornet still gives off a pretty significant heat signature from the rear + no real stealth from the front makes the plane more vulnerable.
I'm not saying that the F-18 Super is a bad or terrible fighter, it does have the AESA radar system which gives it decent situational awareness as an individual plane, but it lacks the interoperability, the better defensive capabilities etc of a fifth generation plane.
One USAF senior pilot stated that a plane like the Super hornet gives you great situational awareness of the guy in the fifth generation fighter that kills you.
I don't think that I would have any trouble with the government opening up a open competition as long as the key deciding factor is based around capability of the plane and its efficiency in a small airforce as oppossed to a low budget alternative.
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None of whom we are going to go to war with, or will ever be in any position, even with the purchase of a handlefull of F 35's to go to war with.
We are a country that has choosen not to be a world military power, rightly or wrongly, these planes in no way change that, we will only ever go to war as part of a US led coalition in an attempt to curry political favour, we can do that with a couple of old phantoms just as effectively.