Ze Germans are coming.

[KamenRiderBlade]

The only thing I can take from this is that most of the EU aren't spending their fair share on Defense while expecting the US to keep the rest of the EU safe forever.

[uclass]

The only thing I can take from this is that most of the EU aren't spending their fair share on Defense while expecting the US to keep the rest of the EU safe forever.

Correct, the only NATO members currently doing so are the US, UK, Greece and Estonia.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/j ... e-spending

[uclass]

Given you don't seem to be able to read that graph or grasp its significance, nor the three graphs I originally posted, here are the tallied up running totals from just that 10Y graph period alone, that you posted again immediately above, the one which you want to keep using as fake 'evidence' no real problem existed in the German budget. That it's just an unnecessary obsession with neutral spending.

Total of Surpluses 2006-2016 = 1.1% of GDP

Total of Deficits 2006-2016 = 10.1% of GDP

i.e. budget spending bias out of balance by a factor of 10 to 1.

Stop strawmanning. Note when the budget went into deficit. 2008, banking collapse yes? Either side of that German has balanced budget whilst roughly 60% of the Luftwaffe was out-of-service.

And I note how you keep trying to down-play, discount and ignore the fact that there was a significant debt growth problem, and that Schauble's job was to remove the risk of foreseeable financial ruin to come if German public spending was not stringently disciplined. It's one of the major reasons they're in comparatively better shape and have more options than most of the rest of Europe.

Not really, UK and US debt are at around 89% and 103% of GDP respectively and Germany is at only 72% debt, yet both the US and UK are meeting NATO spending and availability commitments and have operable air forces.

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united- ... ebt-to-gdp
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united- ... ebt-to-gdp
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/germany ... ebt-to-gdp

And like I said before, Germany aren't really in brilliant shape at all because of wider Eurozone debt problems affecting the Euro's standing against the global reserve currency. Britain has faired better and currently has a higher GDP per capita.

http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/weo ... C&grp=0&a=

Country Subject Descriptor Units Scale Country/Series-specific Notes 2014--------------2015
Germany
Gross domestic product, current prices (National currency). 3,874.437---------------------3,371.003

Euro dollar exchange rate will affect the local price of most technology items and any imported US tech to be used in say a stealth fighter design.

And it's really cute and nice and such, that you want to ignore and discard the 80.3% of debt to GDP in 2010, in the middle of that graph's period.

Peak of Debt to GDP was in 2010 @ 80.3 % of GDP

And it was the same for the UK and 95% for the US yet they both managed to meet the NATO military spending criteria and maintain a working air force. And you know, the military isn't the only thing you can cut when you need to reduce spending.

But current Debt to GDP is 71.6 of GDP, and with national debt falling at about -3% per year, to a more sustainable range. And that occurred even after Germany has just had consecutive recessions since 2008. A flabbergasting result! That's good budget management in a period of EU wide crisis. Not a result that deserves a blaggard's condemnation in any way, shape or form.

Nope, it's outright stupidity for tying your currency to that of weaker economies and then sitting back and watching as they borrow way more than they can possibly repay and then continuing to lend to them after they tell you a dozen or more times that they can't possibly pay it back.

Consecutive recessions? Yes, that's brilliant budget management too. But to cut a long story short, these problems still exist, and as soon as the budget is in question, Germany will cut military funding and any project will suffer, especially an expensive one, and let's face it, developing a new stealth aircraft is not cheap. The last 10 years have demonstrated this fact.

The fact they managed debt and deficits better than most is one of the reasons Germany is now in comparatively much better public finance and budget shape, and thus has far more options than most of Europe to respond adequately to an emerging military threat.

I guess the relevance of that is lost on you given your own UK Central Bank had to print 400 billion pounds over the same period.

Either way we maintained our commitment to NATO and an operable air force and still stabilised debt and fostered strong growth without multiple recessions, whilst also fighting two 10+ year wars.

UK Debt
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united- ... ebt-to-gdp
UK Growth
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united- ... wth-annual
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp
German Growth (PPP not $ value, $ GDP growth is massively negative in 2015)
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/germany ... wth-annual

But again all this proves is that if things get rough, Germany will scrap military commitment and tend to the budget, which is exactly the gist of my original statement that you chose to take issue with before supplying us with 20 tons of straw.

I can see why given your contrived arguments, that you'd want to keep pretending the other two graphs I supplied, namely German spending and debt, were in your words, "irrelevant" to the issue. And contrived this on-going farce of obsessive objectionism to relevant budget facts, and your misrepresentations and tirades against the budget data, and its reality, as it does inconveniently impose on your narrative. And it does explain the deceptive BS you've come out with for it erodes the extremes of your position. It must be galling for you to have contrary data presented, and a reasoning offered to elucidate the reasons why that data came to be as it is. It could cause you to knee-jerk a hyperbole based response.

Think I've dealt with your points above. Other nations faced the same debt problems and still maintained NATO commitment and military functionality, whilst also fighting 2 wars. This just proves my original point, Germany will aim to balance budget at the expense of the military, rather than other spending areas, so in light of the Mediterranean debt crisis, their commitment to a likely expensive aircraft development project cannot be relied on, especially given the current shortfalls in Luftwaffe and Bundeswehr maintenance already alluded to.

Most people would have no trouble realizing why the three graphs included are relevant, rather than just the one, over recent 10 year period, which you prefer to highlight and which still fails to match your claims btw.

But the numbers I posted here show you're claims are clearly wrong, even about that one graph you want to keep posting!

Most people would have been bored to tears by your relentless strawmanning and topped themselves by now.

Winning!

Sorry 'uclass', data is not your plaything, it's there to inform. Not you obviously, as you don't want to be informed, and I get that. But the data supplied is relevant because it is of course, actual German budget data. When discussing the German budget spending on defense, German budget data actually does matter, which is why I presented it, so the fuller picture is better appreciated by the ignorant.

And chronic defense under-spending is not (or was not) exactly unique to Germany, in 2013-2014. As I see it, the UK's own serial deep military spending cuts were setting it up to do the very same thing. [and btw, thanks to UK for spiffy HMAS Choules Bay Class Amphib, great ship for RAN to snag in 2011 due those military sending cuts to rein in UK spending and persistent deficits - nice!]

It's OK, it don't matter even, we can pretend it away.

Yes but the UK maintained it's NATO defence spending commitment and ran a functional air force, whilst also fighting two wars that Germany sat out, and built two aircraft carriers, 6 destroyers and several SSNs and still managed to stabilise debt, achieve strong growth and maintain a strong currency. Even Charlie Sheen would be impressed.

[element1loop]

Nope, it's outright stupidity for tying your currency to that of weaker economies and then sitting back and watching as they borrow way more than they can possibly repay and then continuing to lend to them after they tell you a dozen or more times that they can't possibly pay it back.

Which is precisely why Germany pushed for Eurozone agreement to limit deficit spending as much as possible, but almost no one else did which is why Germany has much less public debt load, and Greece has a comparatively large and strategic military, that it can't possibly afford to pay for on its own (as does Israel).

When you get into a currency union, like the USA or Australia for instance, some states like Tasmania say, are a money drain, and others like NSW, QLD and WA, are, during booms, money spigots. Except all three are now very indebted due to deficit spending by left Governments in the booms, also (same as in Europe, and California). So Tasmania actually has to pull is weight more now, because we're all comparatively broker, like the UK, and USA comparatively are also.

That's how it works in a currency union. For some reason you can't admit it, maybe because the pound blinds you or something. But that's merely ignorance and arrogance. We're bound to other states in a Federation, that are either unproductive or deep in debt, through deficit spending. We can;t control what WA or TAS do with their state budgets and their deficit spending and debt growth either.

The USA is no better, in fact it could be argued the US is in the same pickle as central and southern Europe. Only there's this view that due to a lack of Federation of Europe, as a Republic, or a Commonwealth of States, that Europe is somehow "crazy" for having a currency union, which was intended as critical step to a full political Federation.

And any number of myths hang off that basic red-herring, that Europe is "crazy" to have a currency Union. No, Europe is economically weak for one reason, debt, both public and private, just like the USA, just like Australia. We just avoid the appearance of debt better. The difference with Germany is they tried to slow or stop the credit-card spending spree, and to limit their debt levels.

And in an environment of low threat, which there has been, it was appropriate to do so in all areas, not just in defense (as I see you're trying to angle this towards now). It is a selection of priorities and that's all. Public spending on military readiness, as a priority, was lowered along with other spending areas in their economy. They had bought the hardware but they did not keep it in high readiness. You also seem to want to insinuate Germany was not involved in war, and deployments. If so, that's false.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Ar ... fghanistan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ausl ... eswehr.svg
http://www.defensenews.com/story/defens ... /78359294/

And despite their planned fall in readiness level, they do have the money to change that fast, that was my original point of providing graphs showing the better than average state of their budget situation. And I'm sure they have been doing just that, otherwise they would not be talking about 2% of GDP defense spending, or of building a 5th-gen (personally I think they'd be silly to not buy the F-35 instead, and go from there on other programs).

You simply take a very cynical view and wish to denigrate their decisions and priorities. I don't. In Australia we've minimized defense spending for a very long time (and of don't like that either), wherever we could to grow and develop the economy and infrastructure first, so that when the time came for a bigger military, when it was actually needed, like now, we'd be able to support it at a higher level.

That was about strategic spending priorities for the longer term, and Germany has had to do something similar to get its act together.

Germany will cut military funding and any project will suffer, especially an expensive one, and let's face it, developing a new stealth aircraft is not cheap. The last 10 years have demonstrated this fact.

That's just you being cynical and dissing Germany. They understand the strategic situation and threats posed by Russia and non-state. But I would agree that Merkel and Co is their number one stumbling block, at present, to doing that in the most efficient way they can.

Either way we maintained our commitment to NATO and an operable air force and still stabilized debt and fostered strong growth without multiple recessions, whilst also fighting two 10+ year wars.

[links snipped here]

But again all this proves is that if things get rough, Germany will scrap military commitment and tend to the budget, which is exactly the gist of my original statement that you chose to take issue with before supplying us with 20 tons of straw.

You can paint it any color you want (mostly brown it seems) but Germany had to absorb, integrate and develop another country the size of itself, and it has taken decades of national investment spending.

UK and USA haven't done anything like that. Nothing is comparable in the way you are comparing them. Half of Germany was an undeveloped Soviet basket case. Merkel herself is an East German, her job was to finish the integration of the East with the West. Which is why I mentioned the re-unification factor in the first place.

So your boasting of responsibility and effort sounds hollow when that's taken into account, as does your trenchant condemnation and prejudice (yes, that's what it is).

As of now Germany is a fully integrated and much larger state, it has been fighting and deploying with emphasis on ground forces. So they also need to change gears back to high-intensity readiness, training and availability, like everyone else is. And they'll redirect funding as required from this point. What they probably need to do now is for Merkel and cohort to go away soon.

Think I've dealt with your points above. Other nations faced the same debt problems and still maintained NATO commitment and military functionality, whilst also fighting 2 wars. This just proves my original point, Germany will aim to balance budget at the expense of the military, rather than other spending areas, so in light of the Mediterranean debt crisis, their commitment to a likely expensive aircraft development project cannot be relied on, especially given the current shortfalls in Luftwaffe and Bundeswehr maintenance already alluded to.

The Germans have also been fighting wars and deploying, and they have had a totally unique situation, which you seem to be intent on refusing to acknowledge, that required their spending prioritizations (even on military readiness) to be different to that of the UK, or USA, or anyone else for that matter.

There is friendly and cooperative Germany in Europe right now, and there can be a less friendly and quite uncooperative Germany in Europe tomorrow (you know how they can get), if you don't even try to understand them and accept that their priorities are as valid as your own.

[uclass]

Which is precisely why Germany pushed for Eurozone agreement to limit deficit spending as much as possible, but almost no one else did which is why Germany has much less public debt load, and Greece has a comparatively large and strategic military, that it can't possibly afford to pay for on its own (as does Israel).

Yes and it would have been completely impossible for most nations to have adhered to that following the banking crisis, making it pie-in-the-sky territory.

When you get into a currency union, like the USA or Australia for instance, some states like Tasmania say, are a money drain, and others like NSW, QLD and WA, are, during booms, money spigots. Except all three are now very indebted due to deficit spending by left Governments in the booms, also (same as in Europe, and California). So Tasmania actually has to pull is weight more now, because we're all comparatively broker, like the UK, and USA comparatively are also.

Yes and Germany has to put up with that drain and when the plug is removed again they will cut the military first.

That's how it works in a currency union. For some reason you can't admit it, maybe because the pound blinds you or something. But that's merely ignorance and arrogance. We're bound to other states in a Federation, that are either unproductive or deep in debt, through deficit spending. We can;t control what WA or TAS do with their state budgets and their deficit spending and debt growth either.

The only problem is that the US largely works because the states have similar living costs, similar living standards and similar economies. Whereas the EU is a mismatch of completely random states thrown together, with as much as 6-fold differences in living costs and wages and huge differences in economies and all speaking different languages. But we're diverging here.

The USA is no better, in fact it could be argued the US is in the same pickle as central and southern Europe. Only there's this view that due to a lack of Federation of Europe, as a Republic, or a Commonwealth of States, that Europe is somehow "crazy" for having a currency union, which was intended as critical step to a full political Federation.

And any number of myths hang off that basic red-herring, that Europe is "crazy" to have a currency Union. No, Europe is economically weak for one reason, debt, both public and private, just like the USA, just like Australia. We just avoid the appearance of debt better. The difference with Germany is they tried to slow or stop the credit-card spending spree, and to limit their debt levels.

And in an environment of low threat, which there has been, it was appropriate to do so in all areas, not just in defense (as I see you're trying to angle this towards now). It is a selection of priorities and that's all. Public spending on military readiness, as a priority, was lowered along with other spending areas in their economy. They had bought the hardware but they did not keep it in high readiness. You also seem to want to insinuate Germany was not involved in war, and deployments. If so, that's false.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Ar ... fghanistan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ausl ... eswehr.svg
http://www.defensenews.com/story/defens ... /78359294/

Oh okay, they were in Afghanistan in relatively small number but not Iraq. Yeah and few soldiers here and there in Africa is not a war, it's just business as usual. As for the rest, all straw.

And despite their planned fall in readiness level, they do have the money to change that fast, that was my original point of providing graphs showing the better than average state of their budget situation. And I'm sure they have been doing just that, otherwise they would not be talking about 2% of GDP defense spending, or of building a 5th-gen (personally I think they'd be silly to not buy the F-35 instead, and go from there on other programs).

You simply take a very cynical view and wish to denigrate their decisions and priorities. I don't. In Australia we've minimized defense spending for a very long time (and of don't like that either), wherever we could to grow and develop the economy and infrastructure first, so that when the time came for a bigger military, when it was actually needed, like now, we'd be able to support it at a higher level.

Readiness is not something you change fast, it's something that's required. It's no good saying, "I can change my readiness in a year," if a war breaks out. Military spending is something you can change very fast and the evidence says they will if the budget demands it. You talk like you can achieve a higher level overnight, like the people who think there'll be 52 PAK-FAs in Russian service by the end of 2016.

Germany will cut military funding and any project will suffer, especially an expensive one, and let's face it, developing a new stealth aircraft is not cheap. The last 10 years have demonstrated this fact.

That's just you being cynical and dissing Germany. They understand the strategic situation and threats posed by Russia and non-state. But I would agree that Merkel and Co is their number one stumbling block, at present, to doing that in the most efficient way they can.

Nope, it's me looking at data from Merkel's time in office and using it to predict her future commitment to military spending. It's not cynicism, it's statistical fact.

Either way we maintained our commitment to NATO and an operable air force and still stabilized debt and fostered strong growth without multiple recessions, whilst also fighting two 10+ year wars.

[links snipped here]

But again all this proves is that if things get rough, Germany will scrap military commitment and tend to the budget, which is exactly the gist of my original statement that you chose to take issue with before supplying us with 20 tons of straw.

You can paint it any color you want (mostly brown it seems) but Germany had to absorb, integrate and develop another country the size of itself, and it has taken decades of national investment spending.

UK and USA haven't done anything like that. Nothing is comparable in the way you are comparing them. Half of Germany was an undeveloped Soviet basket case. Merkel herself is an East German, her job was to finish the integration of the East with the West. Which is why I mentioned the re-unification factor in the first place.

So your boasting of responsibility and effort sounds hollow when that's taken into account, as does your trenchant condemnation and prejudice (yes, that's what it is).

As of now Germany is a fully integrated and much larger state, it has been fighting and deploying with emphasis on ground forces. So they also need to change gears back to high-intensity readiness, training and availability, like everyone else is. And they'll redirect funding as required from this point. What they probably need to do now is for Merkel and cohort to go away soon.

That's it snip the links, why include facts when straw will do.

Yes actually the UK has done something like that. Thanks to the EU our population in the last 10 years has increased by twice as much as the previous 40 years before it. And unlike Germany, we didn't get the extra landmass the size of East Germany thrown in with the extra people either. Yet we still managed to meet NATO commitments and not have 60% of our aircraft fleet down and as well as the 6 destroyers, 2 aircraft carriers, several SSNs and two wars, we also provided 10% of the funding for the F-35.

Prejudice? Seriously?

[quote="element1loop"]The Germans have also been fighting wars and deploying, and they have had a totally unique situation, which you seem to be intent on refusing to acknowledge, that required their spending prioritizations (even on military readiness) to be different to that of the UK, or USA, or anyone else for that matter.

There is friendly and cooperative Germany in Europe right now, and there can be a less friendly and quite uncooperative Germany in Europe tomorrow (you know how they can get), if you don't even try to understand them and accept that their priorities are as valid as your own.

Except I just proved their situation wasn't unique and don't forget the rest of the EU was also paying for that ununique situation via EU contribution fees and they failed on their commitments to NATO and their own air force, as mentioned by their own chief of staff.

We expect an uncooperative Germany in Britain and they never disappoint, always trying to enforce their priorities on everyone else whilst exercising a ridiculous immigration policy, both inside the EU's borders and at the EU's border. I don't even think Merkel's popularity is above 50% in Germany right now given the consequences of her immigration policies wrt the Middle East.

[element1loop]

I don't intend to engage in another round of how long is a piece of string, as far as I can see we talk past each other and there's not even fundamental difference other than points of view of the same thing.

This is just a reply to say your links were snipped in my reply for brevity, they did not need to be in my reply, so they aren't, as they are in your comment, hence a very clear label to show that I'd snipped them. Quit pretending you were wronged, I could have just quoted around them altogether, but didn't. Haven't you noticed some in here are getting real fed up with unnecessary full re-quotes?

[uclass]

I think the main difference is that I'm using recent history as a predictor of future behaviour and you're using optimism.

Well now, you complained when I added part of a previous quote you were responding to in brackets in your quote, so pot calling kettle black really. The only difference is that the link you snipped was on point and highlighted the response you provided as nonsense before you even posted it. Hence why you feel we're talking past each other.

[element1loop]

I think the main difference is that I'm using recent history as a predictor of future behaviour ...

Like the recent deep UK multi-year military spending cuts?

[uclass]

Like the recent deep UK multi-year military spending cuts?

The difference, as I've said before, is that the UK is still meeting the 2% NATO military spending commitment and has a well maintained operational air force that's available for deployment and has taken part in all major air operations over the last 15 years. None of the above is true of Germany, which makes one question the long-term resolve of their commitment to developing a new stealth fighter.

[snypa777]

The German AF desire for both more range and payload than an F-35 may be a bit misguided. F-35A has ~160% of the weapon payload overhead of an F-15E which may grow even higher with structural and engine upgrades next decade. It's clearly superior in available weapon payload after fuel allocations, to a Tornado, plus better EW, and designed to penetrate defended air space and find and ID own targets, as well as autonomous simultaneous ISR (as I'm sure you know).

Plus F-35A strike range with a couple of VLO standoff cruise missiles internal will be equally as impressive and much more so again with external carriage of another 4 VLO cruise, combined with tanking, for the pacified A2A and S2A context. I don't see how a Tornado could compare to that. Or don't the Germans realize this? Perhaps the language barrier and bad press that's been repeated about the F-35 prevents them seeing clearly what it is, and evaluating on merit? The F-35A will inevitably replace ~220 F-15E as they time-out and the capability the F-35A has will be superior. Is a Tornado superior to an F-15E? Perhaps the German air force should examine the numbers sans the presumptions and they may be pleasantly surprised.

Not so certain on the F-15E V Tornado comparison apart from those maybe in German service, RAF Tornado`s can find and ID their own targets and hit them with precision, RAPTOR Pods and Brimstone , PW IV etc.
Shared by all Tornados is TFR and low level penetration as it was designed to do.
The F-35, what internal stand off missiles can the F-35 carry in the Storm Shadow class internally? The rest i cannopt argue with but a 160% increase in payload surely has to include external hardpoints?

[element1loop]

The German AF desire for both more range and payload than an F-35 may be a bit misguided. F-35A has ~160% of the weapon payload overhead of an F-15E which may grow even higher with structural and engine upgrades next decade. ... [I moved this following part so I could address this together] The rest i cannopt argue with but a 160% increase in payload surely has to include external hardpoints?

That is 161%, with full internal plus conformal, and 2x600 and 1x480 external, verses F-35A full internal fuel only.

This 161% is a direct comparison of the amount of available max payload still (theoretically) available and exploitable below MTOW, left available for weapons and their pylon weight, alone.

It does not take account of pylon structural limit on the F-15E, as I don't know what those are (haven't looked them up for the general point I was making about the scale of the difference). So it's just the difference in available weapons payloads usable up to the limit of MTOW, rather than the limits of pylon structural limits for each.

I did it that way also, because looking at the F-15 and F-16 production developments, both have had hardpoint structural load margins significantly increased in latter block, as engine performance increased and roles broadened. Same may occur to the already excellent external pylon limits on F-35. But clearly there's unheard of levels of combined external and internal weapon payload already, for a strike fighter.

The percent of available weapon payload used adding 2 x 2,000 lb weapons:

F-15E (Int. fuel + conform + 2 x 600 + 1 x 480 gal) = 13,925 lb weapon payload below MTOW used = 28.7%

F-35A (Int. fuel) = 22,450 lb weapon payload below MTOW used = 17.8%

Those F-35 design 'critics', ten years back (dirge from APA and the blah-blahs from that quarter), were right the F-35 is an outstanding 'bomb-truck'. Far better than any other strike aircraft that I can think of. And the fact that a 29,000lb single can do that, and it's cheap as chips to fuel (~60% the cost an supply burden of fueling Shornet per nm on my rough calc) leaves me a bit stunned, to be honest.

Baked-in lower fuel costs means more training plus more and better weapons, and updates sooner. Want a new nick-name for the F-35, how about the F-35 Surprise? As that's what a lot of people are going to get. Especially long-term detractors of the "design", and its balance and emphasis.

Not so certain on the F-15E V Tornado comparison apart from those maybe in German service, RAF Tornado`s can find and ID their own targets and hit them with precision, RAPTOR Pods and Brimstone , PW IV etc.

My intent is to point out there the F-35A can do the same things as existing (and far better), therefore is suitable replacement for both 15E and Tornado. As you would acknowledge, the F-35A will have better active and passive target finding and locating options from higher range and earlier (and higher alt), plus regional precision strike-grade location and tracking picture. It's not really fairly comparable to either 15E or Tornado, in that respect.

Shared by all Tornados is TFR and low level penetration as it was designed to do.

TFR is of course a LO technology in its own right, to defeat radar targeting, but does F-35 even need it? And are you sure F-35A doesn't already have a comparable low-level TF nav mode capability?

It has passive sensors and laser ranger, and advanced air and ground radar mode in the presence of atmospheric obscurants, and knows its own location precisely, and will have detailed mission files with current theater topographic data in them. So will be able to create several 'aggression' levels of terrain following, if that were needed.

Maybe in 4th-gen external loaded 'mode' the F-35A would use TF (and not necessarily TFR, no need to use radar if your location and topo data are precise enough for basic autopilot TF flying) for some targets, in specific circumstances. Hard to see why it would need to use a terrain following mode, when it can detect and skirt around more dangerous systems, and frustrate and kill popup systems, and use altitude to limit their range and energy, plus provide better view and more reaction time and options.

The F-35, what internal stand off missiles can the F-35 carry in the Storm Shadow class internally? The rest i cannopt argue with ...

Internally, too early to say, of course 'snypa777'. I'm not sure internal even matters though.

Other F-35s will be clearing IADs of sensors and heavy and medium SAM, or ships, minutes before deep cruise attack goes in, So I don't see a heavy VLO optimized external weapon on pylons would be a show-stopper on F-35A for a thoroughly viable LO, Day-1 and Hour-1 role. Especially with its EA. RAAF Brass said F-35A EA is optimized for advanced SAM threats.

F-35A could carry four heavy cruise weapons simultaneously, externally, if you want to pay to integrate and test them. Personally like to see some RAAF external JDAM-ER soonish.

If you have range like JASSM/JASSM-ER and LRASM in later blocks of F-35A you then have a whole lot of standoff and pylon RCS signature reductions results from the standoff range, any way. You'll still be effectively VLO, from a distance, regardless.

Shornets and Growler can already do the same thing with those weapons, and will almost certainly survive doing it. So I don't see any clear-cut impediment to demolishing deep high-value targets in the first minutes with F-35A, and the right cruise weapon, either internally, or externally mounted.

Australia, Norway and Turkey clearly want a non BS-ing VLO cruise weapon, and RAAF already has JASSM so will have a very clear definition of what they require from the internal VLO cruise missile. JASSM's merit is the ability to kill bunkers and buildings, without warning. If I remember correctly Storm Shadow and Taurus were the other missiles RAAF evaluated JASSM against, in that role. The US is only hanging back to get allies to pay for it, then will get involved once the range of available internal cruise munitions solidifies to tested and proven weapons.

In the meantime I half expect heavy external cruise weapons will come first. Think about it:

Do people really not see value in putting a VLO JASSM/ER on a VLO F-35 wing, just because of the RCS of the pylon, with a 500 to 1,000-km stand-off missile? For real?!

The opposition can probably see and track the launch jet with HF, so the pylon doesn't mean much if you launch 500 to 1000 km out, then do a 180 degree course reversal and are covered, by forward F-22A and F-35A.

But people don't gripe so much about using a whole Shornet and its RCS to do the same business, right now?

Why???

But heaven forbid a pylon's RCS might be added to the F-35A for heavy external VLO missiles?!

Something's a bit out of whack if people think a pylon's RCS contribution is going to become an unsurvivable show-stopper, in a heavy VLO cruise missile standoff attack role, in the first hour of the attack.

[uclass]

The F-35, what internal stand off missiles can the F-35 carry in the Storm Shadow class internally? The rest i cannopt argue with but a 160% increase in payload surely has to include external hardpoints?

The F-35A/C can carry JSM and JSOW-ER internally. 4.1m is about maximum length. The F-35B can carry SOM internally I think.

Kind of related info.:

http://defense-update.com/20160304_fcas.html

Defense ministers of France and the United Kingdom endorsed today the plan to launch the development of full scale operational demonstrator of the ‘Future Combat Air System’ Unmanned Combat Air System (UCAS) next year. This phase will prepare for the full-scale development of unmanned combat air system (UCAS) operational demonstrators by 2025. At a cost of €2 billion this demonstration programme, the most advanced of its kind in Europe, will be centered on a versatile UCAS platform that could serve as the basis for a future operational capability beyond 2030.

[duplex]

The F-35, what internal stand off missiles can the F-35 carry in the Storm Shadow class internally? The rest i cannopt argue with but a 160% increase in payload surely has to include external hardpoints?

The F-35A/C can carry JSM and JSOW-ER internally. 4.1m is about maximum length. The F-35B can carry SOM internally I think.

Kind of related info.:

http://defense-update.com/20160304_fcas.html

Defense ministers of France and the United Kingdom endorsed today the plan to launch the development of full scale operational demonstrator of the ‘Future Combat Air System’ Unmanned Combat Air System (UCAS) next year. This phase will prepare for the full-scale development of unmanned combat air system (UCAS) operational demonstrators by 2025. At a cost of €2 billion this demonstration programme, the most advanced of its kind in Europe, will be centered on a versatile UCAS platform that could serve as the basis for a future operational capability beyond 2030.

What happened to BAE Systems TARANIS ?? failed or delayed ?

[gideonic]

What happened to BAE Systems TARANIS ?? failed or delayed ?

TARANIS was never meant to be a final product, just another Tech demonstrator and proof of concept. This UCAS will be the successor of both TARANIS and nEUROn, making use of technology and lessons learned from previous projects.

[duplex]

What happened to BAE Systems TARANIS ?? failed or delayed ?

TARANIS was never meant to be a final product, just another Tech demonstrator and proof of concept. This UCAS will be the successor of both TARANIS and nEUROn, making use of technology and lessons learned from previous projects.

Thanks mate .....