Originally posted by YourFather:
It will NOT get axed for a couple of reasons:
1. Axe it, and America will have no plane to sell for the next 40 years, essentially giving
2. Axe it, and they will piss Britain off, big time. They are quite unilateral, but they know better than to piss off they staunchest ally.
3. The war in Afghanistan has produced a wonderful spinoff- the huge military budget increase. There's money enuff for the JSF program now(after goddamned Clinton starved the military. I hate him not for his adultery, but his blatent lack of concern for the military budget)
4. Axe it, and the Marines might just bomb the White House :-) (they need to replace the AV-8B soon)
Now, why take such a cynical view of the JSF program? Granted, it has to fulfil pretty demanding criterias, but during the F-111 saga, computer aided design technology had not advanced to a stage possible to meet the demands from each service. The Services are much more well-behaved this time.(not pushing its requirements unnecessarily) Now, its very possible, and to do it economically too. It will be on budget. That's the most important criteria, and the JSF team has already demonstrated to the services that its possible. IOC date of 2008 is ambitious, considering a couple of still-maturing technologies used on the JSF, but not unfeasible, especially whrn they are using a phased approach to the JSF's introduction. The first JSF's will have more basic capability, with succeeding blocks of JSF being introduced being increasingly capable, until they become the all-up JSF.
I agree. Furthermore, the Netherlands and possible most of the current F-16 operators will take up F-35. I can almost certainly be sure that RSAF will take F35. The only question is - which variant and possible which Block.