In all your over defense of this overpriced Swiss Army plane, I have yet to see you answer 1)why we would need it considering many of our planes out perform all other nations planes already (contrary to your assertion that "every Russian fighter can out maneuver the F-16", I found that's only partly true against older, non upgraded F-16s ) and 2) how you get around the 'we won't use it much because it's far too expensive to put in danger' argument.
It can't be the best for air superiority if we are too afraid to use them because they cost too much, or if we only have a few, because they cost too much.
What I read (I'm not a pilot) is that air combat is about the kill-loss ratio, where today we expect the losses to be 0.
Again, stealth is NOT 100%, and every method used has eventually been 'cracked'. If it worked every time, I would agree with you. Since it only works until the enemy figures out how, it's not worth $1.3 trillion for ANOTHER stealth fighter, we've already got them.
This plane isn't bullet or missile proof, and will be just as visible and slow when doing real close air support...if it can. I've seen footage of warthogs landing that looked like a whiffle ball they were so full of holes. They're pretty tough.
In 10 years time, I have the feeling that international air superiority will not be our biggest concern. It's good to be prepared, but terrible to bankrupt yourself to meet a challenge that's already met, or a challenge that does not yet, and may never exist. Upgrading our current aircraft would be a MUCH better way to spend that money, and we would get WAY more out of each dollar.
The F-35 may not be in service for 10 years, and may already be obsolete by then (at least it's special systems that make it 'better' than the aircraft we have today). It really seems more like a star wars project, designed to force our 'enemies' to spend themselves into oblivion, but forcing us to the brink in the effort.
Not the "close air support" that the A-10 provides. If this is meant to replace them too, and I think it is, it will have to do what they do, low and slow.

I don't disagree that advanced systems CAN make more difference than slight performance specs, that's no reason to ignore performance, or go backwards. If it's the systems that make the plane perform better, the smart thing would be to put them on the better air frame and have a better plane all around for much cheaper. Simple.

To me, if we spent $1.3 trillion developing and tens of Billions building a fleet of these planes, it's more likely we'll eventually invent a reason to have to use them. Even if we don't, while nice we aren't killing for nothing, we will have wasted that money for nothing, and done it at a time when our debt and poorly used federal funds have the country literally falling apart... that seems more than dumb, it seems criminally insane and treasonous.

That's just the nature of battle, there is no magic bullet weapon. Everything has some weakness. That's why there are so many variations working together. Tanks being support by infantry, infantry being supported by air, and so on. Light vehicles, heavy vehicles. Every aspect is covered. They are all made for different reasons and nothing is left to chance.
It was also a very unlikely hypothetical situation. A squadron wouldn't have to "drop everything and run in". They would be assigned as over-watch or what used to be known as top cover. Which is done in every section of the armed forces. From planes to infantry.

The F-35 is faster, and that is what matters in a beyond visual range combat. As soon as a missile is launched from up to 100KMs away, you will be "running away" because you don't want to take the chance that your ECM and Chaff might have not been effective. You will use every tool available to keep you alive, and one of the best ways is to drag out the enemy missile long enough for it to run out of energy before it can reach you. Since a snaking path is longer than a straight line, the enemy missile will have to fly further.

There really aren't any compromises except for the acceleration and maneuverability which I mentioned in my response to Newt is not really relevant. The other reason is that the F-16 is already at the physical limits of acceleration and maneuverability. Any more and the pilot would die. So the key is senors, weapons and stealth. Unless of course we start using fighter drones as instead of pilots. Then you could probably get away with some additional performance. But otherwise human piloted plane performance was already maxed in the 70s.

The F-35 can do everything better than any other plane. It's weapons are better, it's senors are better, and it's communication and situational awareness is much better. Thanks to the stealth, it has better survivability.

The only area it has some disadvantages in performance are the acceleration and maneuverability. Which is a small disadvantage, it still accelerates incredibly fast, just slower than a lighter plane, which is just physics. But it's not a slouch by any means. Plus the maneuverability is still being worked on, it's all fly by wire and they can do some really magic things with those systems once it's all tuned. They haven't started pushing it to the limits yet from what I've heard. (and honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if this whole "our plane sucks" thing was another tactic of spreading misinformation).

Here's the other thing. The F-16 can out maneuver and out accelerate the F-35. But every Russian fighter can out accelerate and out maneuver the F-16, anyway. Yet the F-16 always comes out on top. Why is that? Superior sensors, weapons, comms and tactics.

The F-35 is the best plane to achieve air superiority, because not many pilots have a death wish. Air combat is about survival, not about kills. Even in the Gulf war, the Iraqi's didn't want to fly against the F-15s because they knew they'd get just get shot down. They never even took off. So imagine how they would feel against a plane that can't be detected, let alone locked onto. A plane that can lock onto you and fire without you knowing. Not a good feeling knowing that at any moment you could explode without warning.

The A-10 is bullet proof, but not missile proof. It's a sitting duck against shoulder mounted IGLA's. Only the cockpit is bullet proof BTW which is great for the pilot, but not so great for the rest of the plane

I agree that the F-35 for the current war is overkill, but electronics and technology keeps getting cheaper day by day, and in 10 years time, even the current enemies will start buying more sophisticated systems. It's better to be prepared. As being reactionary like in WW2 and Vietnam was quite costly to the lives of allied forces. The F-35 will probably be in service for another 30 years, so it needs to try to meet as many requirements as it can for that time period, until the next plane comes out shooting lasers instead of missiles.

Also close air support these days is already done mostly by soft skin planes like the F-16. So not much difference there. Apart from the expense I guess. It's not low and slow either. You have a plane fly at such speed and high altitude the people on the ground never even know about it.


If you feel like it I'll give you a game of DCS World some time. It's a free flight sim (also used to train US national guard and other nations too). It really demonstrates the value of good sensors and weapons over flight performance

Now when it comes to being a waste of money, only time will tell. I guess either way it's win win though, because if there is no conflict that needs this plane it's only a good thing. And if there is a conflict we have the plane ready. But for the time being it really does seem like it's a waste of money. A lot of money, especially in a time of debt.

For sure, I believe that by trying to be all things, it has made compromises in other areas. But perhaps the flexibility is a more important than a few advantages here and there. All of the current US planes are also multi role as well, with the exception of dedicated bombers. So any jack of all trades worries also apply to the majority of the planes that have been in service for the last 30 years. It seems like versatility has been the driving factor for upgrades. So it makes sense a new plane would be designed with versatility in mind.

For things like Close Air Support, I would much rather be in the invisible fast plane, than the bullet proof slow plane like the A-10. You've dropped your bombs before the enemy even know you're there, and before the bombs hit the ground, you're 40KMs away, at an altitude where most ground based missile systems can't hit you(even if they can detect you).

Close air support of that nature of course only happens when you have reached full air superiority, which the F-35 is the best plane for.

It might seem overkill now to have such an advanced plane to drop bombs on people with AK-47's, but you never know how politics can change. Assad might decide to start buying some advanced Russian SAM systems, and that's when a stealth plane will come in handy.

The F-35 can fly both faster, and slower than the F-16, and longer at high angles of attack that would stall most planes. It although can't out accelerate the F-16 though since F-35 is heavier. But having the best acceleration isn't really a factor in modern air combat, where missiles are being thrown at each other from any between 20-100+km's range. As long as you can accelerate good enough, which being a fighter plane it can.

The F-35's afterburner-less supersonic speed is more important in a BVR(beyond visual range) engagement, since that's what allows you to put more distance between you and an enemy missile. The idea being that you fly perpendicular to a missile making it cover more ground and it runs out of fuel and speed so it falls out of the sky before it can reach you. Of course to lock onto a stealth plane you'd need to be quite close in the first place, by which time it would have shot you down, at least that's the theory.

If it comes to a close range scenario, say enemy AWACS manages to detect the F-35s, and direct a bunch of enemy fighters through a set of mountains to sneak up on the F-35s. And a visual range or even dog fight ensues. Then the F-35 would use a short range missile that can turn 90+ degrees and shoot behind itself . Which no other plane can do since all of the sensors are forward facing on all other planes.

But you're of course right, there is always eventually going to be a way of countering the stealth advantage, it's an arms race after all. Most likely it will be countered by some kind of cheap jamming drone swarming, which would make the F-35s sensors useless, and missiles too few, forcing the engagements to happen at shorter ranges.


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What I mean by dog fighting is a one on one engagement where each plane is trying to furiously out maneuver the other. That is a rare occurrence. There is a WW2 era video that explains the tactics used that make the one on one style dog fighting obsolete. https://youtu.be/C_iW1T3yg80?t=530

The planes have a system where as soon as one plane is engage by an enemy, then your wingman, or a spare clean up squadron comes and mops it up, since the enemy makes it self an easy target when engaging a friendly.

No, but the F-16 can out accelerate the P-51, but I don't think the F-35 can out accelerate the F-16, can it?

If the stealth tech worked every time, yes, it would have it nailed. I don't think it does, and even if it does, it's methods will be 'cracked' as soon as they're known and we'll need an entire new plane with new systems. You're right, when it goes as planned. It does not always go as planned, and we don't want to lose an F-35 every time we make a mistake in predictions, do we?

I think it's more like a camouflaged sniper hiding in the trees that's taken over the responsibility for also being an artillery brigade and a front line infantry brigade.
It can't do most of what it's designed to do, can barely do what it's best at, and if it's caught, it can't defend itself.

I really don't think there's a job they have for it that can't be done by the F-15, F-16, F/A-18, F-117, B-2, A-10, etc....meaning there's no need for it at all, and we could have had hundreds of those planes for the cost of the R&D done so far for a plane that doesn't yet work, and costs a mint when it is finally deployed, not just to build but for upkeep too.

I'm pretty sure a lot of pilots in WW2, and Korea, and Vietnam would disagree about dogfighting ending in WW1 and about it being all strategy and not performance. For instance, in WW2, we kicked ass largely because a zero was made of paper and couldn't take a hit while the mustang was a flying tank....or so I've read.

I can sure think of a bunch of other things the fed could have spent $1.3 Trillion on....we could all be traveling in tubes for that much money! The Republican's could make a camp to send all Muslims to on the moon for that kind of money.

That is all well and good, but the F35 is not just a sniper. It's a multi-role aircraft that needs to be an interceptor, a bomber, and a close ground support plane. You can be a 'sniper' and hide long range in interceptor mode, but bombing and close ground support are not going to be as kind to a plane that relies completely on stealth to overcome it's shortcomings in maneuverability, etc.

Additionally, the sheer cost of the vehicle is going to make it prohibitive for our allies to purchase it, meaning that in NATO combat groups, we will have it and our allies won't. It also means that we can't offset the trillion dollar development cost in ally purchases. Of course, it is likely that we won't even try to export it for the risk of having the stealth breached. We didn't export the F22 for similar reasons and it is dead now.

The simple fact is that we have sunk a ton of money into a pit and for little return. There are still huge long term delays in Russian and Chinese stealth programs, so just like the F22, this plane is going to come into production with no real enemies to fight against. Are we going to risk sending these vs last gen or earlier systems when our older planes are still more advanced than those and cost far less?

We aren't going to stop making this plane, we've gone too far. But it is going to be just as much of a waste as the F22 and probably more of a debacle when the enemy does come up with hardware capable of defeating it's stealth capabilities. Once that happens, we have a plane that is worse than the previous generation facing enemies more than capable of taking it out of the sky.

Do a search, it is completely true. The Air Force tried to play it down, saying that the test was only to test current dogfighting methods and that the F35 was designed for future conflict dogfighting which is 'going' to be stealth based and long range conflict only.

The plane is a debacle worse than the Bradley fighting vehicle, more expensive, and we are too far in to back out without embarrassing the big players.

@Asmo
i get what you are saying but i think you are missing the insidious implications that this new system of indoctrination represents.

i think @ChaosEngine's term 'stealth totalitarianism" is rather clever..and apt.

i agree with you on the points of peer pressure and how people can easily be manipulated.we are all,to varying degrees,subjected to a plethora of propaganda and targeted rhetoric,all meant to mold and shape our opinions in order to sustain the status quo while giving the impression that somehow our conclusions are an organic and natural response,when in reality we have been duped.

on that point we agree that this is not actually something new or novel but an old,tried and true method of social control.

what is new about this 'gaming" system,is that it is not taking the more subtle and passive approach of what current and supposedly "free" societies now implement to control public opinions and attitudes in order to either remain in power,sway the public into policies against their own interest,or create an atmosphere of fear to foment opposition.

this new system is actually aggressive.
this system will actively use its own population to do the oppressing,manipulating and controlling FOR them.

it is brilliant in it's simplicity.
it will use very human attributes we all possess in order to enact a better system of control,all the while having the appearance of being a harmless and innocuous social media competition.

but it is anything but harmless.
nor innocuous.
it will and can affect every facet of someones life.from their job to where they will be able to live,to even HOW they live.

think back to the times of east germany and the stasi,or the weimar republic,or even the soviet union of the 80's.

all used elements this new gaming system is representing,but those systems of control,while relying on the public to do much of its surveilling,all had one thing in common that they ALL relied heavily on:fear.

fear of reprisal.
fear of exposure.
fear and suspicion were the driving forces that kept those systems in power and the people in a perpetual state of paranoia.

the dread of the midnight knock.
of jackboots and black bags.

but those systems of control were fragile and once even a little resistance was exerted those systems crumbled incredibly fast.

this new system is far more subtle and devious in my opinion,because it removes the spectre of an imposing and oppressive government that will respond with violence and replaces it with the citizen to do the work for them.

the government does not have to do anything.
your neighbor will,and not because of some fear-based reason but rather for points to propel their own ambitions.their own selfish desires.

the wholesale implications are absolutely terrifying if you really think about it.

i would speculate that within a very short amount of time dissent and criticism of the chinese government will all but have vanished.replaced by a obedient and compliant population.

not because they are afraid of reprisal from the government but rather fueled by their own selfish desires for a better job,better living quarters,more privileges etc etc.

so a seemingly benign system utilizing social media will become of a self-propelled system,where those who do not tow the party line soon face joblessness,homelessness and ostracization.

not because the government strong armed them into submission,but rather their own neighbors.

so you are right.
there is nothing new here,but this system has taken the old forms of social control and brilliantly utilized one of humanities greatest weaknesses:selfishness.

it is the simplicity that makes this so brilliant and yet so horrifying at the same time.

Yeah, this really is beyond horrifying.

"PC is more scary that open totalitarianism"? Nope, here's your real villain: stealth totalitarianism. Fuck over your fellow man in the name of a higher score.

"Chairman, oppressing the citizenry is hard work!"
"Fear not! I have a cunning plan to make them oppress each other"

And by god will it work.... put a number beside a name and people will do anything to make that number go up.

As an example: my wife got a new car recently that shows your average fuel consumption in l/100km. I didn't pay any attention to it until I was playing in the settings and found I could switch the units to km/l. A completely innocuous change, right? Except now it's a number that can go up, and I am obsessed with making it go up everything I drive her car.

I set cruise control at the speed limit and brake as little as possible.

A/C? Not unless I am actually melting!

Corners? You'd be amazed at how fast you can round them if you let a machine control your speed!

Red lights? Er, yeah, I suppose I should stop, but then I'll have to accelerate again!

And that number doesn't even matter! FSM only knows what I'd do if it affected my mortgage rate or something....

In the case of this particular example the airline did cite that reason (I remember the forum buzz about it at the time).

But, I still agree with your point there. I've never been keen on the vapers who like to belligerently assert their "right to vape" everywhere they can without engaging their brains, or a bit of basic consideration.

Doubly so when snus so easy to order online & "stealth vaping" in public spaces is so easy to do.

That said, most of the negativity I've had & seen personally over the subject has been largely moralistic in nature. Specifically either "still bad for you!" or "think of the children!".

This may have been a bad example, but I could dig you up about as many media & campaign group hit pieces as you'd care to read.

Right now it's resulting in some deeply ill conceived legislation. I recognise that some sensible legal regulation is needed, but that is not what's happening at the moment. It seems like a double pronged shafting from the tobacco/pharma cartel and the morality police.

Maybe I'm just too emotionally invested on that one.

As for the other bit's. Your dealing with classic scattershot Slavoj. He writes in a much more ordered way than he speaks, but he is still very much a stream of consciousness when he gets going.
I enjoy "truffle hunting in the forest of knowledge" like that, but I understand why it rubs a lot of people the wrong way.

I this case, I don't think the specific examples are as important as the idea he is expressing (to him or myself).

That said, couldn't said health organisation be seen as pushing a moral position there? I guess your arguing it was beneficial to their business in some way? (not informed enough to have a strong position either way on that, but I think I can see where your coming from)

As for it being more dangerous than overt totalitarianism. The argument would be that you can see and fight overt ideologies, as such they are considerably less of a threat in modern developed countries.

Here I think, it would be "more dangerous" simply in the sense that there is a greater danger of anything significant actually happening.

Naturally the jackboots and piano wire kind is infinitely worse in practice. But there seems considerably less danger of that kind of totalitarianism gaining a serious foothold in most of our cultures than in times past.

The policing of peoples thoughts, language and consensual behaviour on the other hand (epitomised by the PC gone mad crowd). Could perhaps be said to be more dangerous, simply in the sense that it has more potential to do actual damage.

You could accuse that of being a bit hyperbolic, but that's our Slavoj.

So that's why ink cartridges run out so soon. Seriously, i'm annoyed that someone is stealth-using so much of my ink.

Friends of mine have a purebred Border Collie (Charlie) and a Husky/Shepard mix (Ava). Charlie runs like the wind, barely making a whisper. Total stealth mode. Ava is faster, but she doesn't run so much as grab onto the ground and pull the planet around under her. It's really interesting to see the different styles. Charlie is a figure skater, Ava is a tractor pull.

Interesting talk, but I think he puts way too much stock in the idea that going in guns (or rats) blazing is always the more satisfying approach. Back in the old days of Thief many people prided themselves on ghosting through levels and leaving as little evidence of their passing as possible.
I tend to stealth my way through most games were stealth is a viable option and I have never felt cheated because I didn't use some of the more action oriented systems. In Deus Ex I don't think I ever bothered with that social enhancer augment.

Adam Jensen's "I didn't ask for this" attitude actually seems pretty reasonable to me, what little of his life we saw before his accident seemed pretty happy and he didn't seem like the type to sit around thinking "If only I had a cool cyborg body". This seems more like the player is projecting their own insecurities.

And I could easily see a future where prosthetic limbs were more than just for rich people. Technology advances and becomes cheaper, cellphones used to be carried by rich assholes on Wallstreet, now every asshole has one. And not every prosthetic is going to turn you into Superman either, all a cybernetic leg needs to do is allow you to walk and run like a person with a normal leg, leaping tall buildings with a single bound is not a required feature. So most of those repressed cyber citizens are probably not sporting mil-spec hardware.

Because someone is pushing for "new tech" planes, which aren't needed. As far as I can tell, Stealth planes are still visible to people manning AA guns.