Comment Re:Drone It (Score 1) 843
That's pretty much the same sentiment they had just before the Vietnam war. And then took a big bloody nose from the inferior Migs.
Very true, but just because missiles weren't ready to take over in Vietnam doesn't mean that they aren't ready today.
Vietnam also suffered from a lot of other problems. For one ROE - aircraft had to make visual identification before engaging, which basically negated any advantage the US aircraft even had. That and the general limited warfare thing which turned the whole theater into a meat grinder. Nobody was seriously bombing the bases the enemy aircraft were based at.
Vietnam was a LONG time ago now, much longer ago today than WW2 was back during Vietnam. People were quoting Vietnam this and that in the first Gulf War, and it wasn't remotely like Vietnam.
That said, unless the air force has some tricks up its sleeves that nobody knows about, the long-range missile capabilities of the US aren't really all that much better than anybody else's, which seems a bit crazy when they are relying on blowing up the bad buys before it comes down to a dogfight.
After the debacle with the F-22 and the F-105 I can't believe they bought another single engine fighter.
Well, the whole idea of the F-35 was that it was supposed to be the cheap replacement for the F-16, and hence the single engine. The problem was that they just tried to do too much with it, because heaven forbid that it isn't the absolute best in every category. By the time they really get it operational everybody will be using drones for this sort of thing anyway. Think about it - the mission of the F-35 is to be the bulk of the force, but not the aircraft you send in on the most critical air superiority missions (that is the role of the F-22). I'd think that would be the sort of thing you could easily use a drone for - take off, drop bombs, come back, and if AWACS spots enemy fighters either engage if you greatly overpower them, or just run and let the F-22s deal with them. Just have lots of ground crew taking care of the drones and you could basically have those things up in the air most of the time.
I also don't think that dogfighting is the real threat here. I already mentioned long-range AA missiles, but SAMs are a big threat too. Russia has those SA-10s which as far as I understand are VERY capable. I have no idea how well stealth defeats them, but they're really bad news for aircraft in general. Maybe they're counting on cruise missiles taking them out.