Defence analyst Pierre Sprey on the F-35 (2012) - the fifth estate
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- Опубліковано 26 гру 2016
- Our 2012 interview with Pierre Sprey a defence analyst who spent 20 years working at the Pentagon and helped designed one of the most successful jetfighters ever, the A10 Warthog. He is a confirmed critic of the F-35.
For more on the F-35 watch our 2012 documentary Runaway Fighter : • F-35 - Runaway Fighter...
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About the fifth estate : For four decades the fifth estate has been Canada's premier investigative documentary program. Hosts Bob McKeown, Gillian Findlay and Mark Kelley continue a tradition of provocative and fearless journalism. the fifth estate brings in-depth investigations that matter to Canadians - delivering a dazzling parade of political leaders, controversial characters and ordinary people whose lives were touched by triumph or tragedy.
Fun fact: In all F-15 documentation,Pierre sprey is mentioned once,where he bursted into a meeting and suggested a replacement for the F-15,called the F-XX. It was more of a list of things to remove from the F-15
Some of them are:
1.Missile and bomb racks
2.Bulletproof glass for the cockpit
3.Large fuel tanks
4.a secure radio
5.Navigation equipment
And what he wanted to replace it with is a GAU-8 and a radio from a hardware shop.
and also cup holders
As said eloquently in Robocop
"I'd buy that for a dollar" 💵
Man designed the A-10 it was his pride and joy and he also hates it. Obviously i know he didn’t design it
@Miranda Lockey He had no influence or imput on the A10 either. The people who designed and built the A10 never even met or heard of him until Sprey started claiming he designed it.
@@mirandalockey7334 he don’t work for the a10 he works for an advisor to an advisor to an advisor and so on till you get to the seceretary of defense who had no involvement in said project 😑
Pierre Sprey DID NOT design the A-10, or F-16 because he never worked at the companies that built them. He was a defense analyst; he made the requirements for the planes to fulfill, not the actually planes
@@avae5343 Expensive does not equal failure.
You are showing massive ignorance,. So in the future please stop talking about what you do not understand. The specification is what the design is based up (you are so ignorant). Most people involved in the design only work on a small piece of the design. The people that come up with the requirements are the ones that most influence the design. Screw up the requirements and it costs a fortune to fix. Screw up some aspect of the design and it costs a lot less. You obviously have never done any design.
@@cliffordnelson8454
I never said that defense analysts weren't important.
Pierre Sprey lied to the public by claiming to be the designer of the F-16 and A-10 so more people would listen to him. The absolute MOST he could have contributed to the F-16 and A-10 programs were requirements, and that would be fine if that's what he said he did. But that's not what he claimed. He claimed he was the designer.
Every time he showed up on TV before the F-35 he was honest and said he was a defense analyst, it was only after he went around trashing the F-35 that he changed his position to that of F-16 and A-10 designer
He lied about his job to get attention and he was wrong with nearly every one of his predictions.
P.S. grow up, if the majority of your argument is name calling then it isn't a good argument
@@avae5343 The USAF DID NOT SAY IT WAS A FAILURE.
What one general actually said was that there could be interest in an ultra cheap fighter. the news then twisted his words and gave the article a click bait title to fool people like you.
@@starexcelsior1135 They are not just important, they are critical since you screw up the specification and schedule you end up with a royal mess like the F-35
Crediting Pierre spray with designing anything is just straight up lying
He designed his own lies
@@testpleaseignore true
Typical strategy: When "we" can't address the argument someone is making, "we" attack that someone himself. Pierre Spray was one hundred percent correct in everything he said about the F-35, one hundred percent.
Remember kids, when a half bald old man that told the military to make the F-15 basically a p-51 mustang fighter jet with slightly better guns and more maneuverable with less fuel tells you that the plane he tried to bring to the ground because he thinks dog fights look cool (even though a soviet era missile can shoot down a plane from a much farther range than what a pilot can shoot with his eyes) is bad, remember that the dude is totally right and is the god of fighter jet engineering.
except he was wrong.
Who is this god father you speak of?
Amazing Sprey goes on to say what a turd the F-15 was. That's an amazing 105-0 record the f-15 posted in air to air victories
Of they will to clean the f-15
Against the F-16 or a plane like it it is hopelessly out of its depth.
@@elta6241 HAHA! F-16 would not stand much of a chance against an F15 beyond visual range, and even worse agains F35...
@@dmitchellhomes This is the problem with people who think wars are fought technologically. The vast majority of BVR technology simply doesn't work in combat, especially radar guided missiles, and the plane that wins is the one that can be produced in greater numbers and can be kept in the air. The F-16 wins hands down.
@@elta6241 WRONG!!! almost every F15 kill was BVR.
Just for refrence this guy wants us to use m48's insted of m1' (tanks)
@Anonymous Bosch The M-48 was a piece of outdated junk all the way back in the 90s lol
Sprey did not design any A-10s, F-15s, F-16s or whatever he claims to build. The closest he was to an airplane was as a statistician. He was never an engineer/designer. The fact he has got away for it for so long is amazing.
He is not getting away with it anymore......he's dead.
@@jerryg53125 many people still think he’s legit, i would say that’s getting away with it
He designed all of them
@@blu3_enjoy He did not design anything, he is a pathological liar.
@@blu3_enjoy send me the documents that say so
"In dogfighting its hopeless" Fun fact: The F-35 is also hopless at Napoleonic linear combat.
It's hopeless on hand to hand fightimg smh 😤 worst failure in US aircraft history 0/10 because angry old man said so
It’s ALSO terrible at launching broadside cannons so therefore it can’t fight against coastal or naval structures… very bad vehicle, can’t do anything right :(
@@pandemoniumcrow cant withstand bows and arrows i dont want it
It's actually good at dogfighting
It may not be designed for dogfighting but I'd still feel more comfortable in it than whatever wooden mockups the Russians are trying to scare us with
"most successful jetfighters ever, the A10 Warthog." The A-10 Warthog is not a fighter. It is not a heavy bomber. It is not a helicopter. It is not a troop transport. It is a Close Air Support Attack aircraft. It would be nice if the Fifth Estate had any knowledge at all about what they report about.
i bet you correct spelling and then miss the poinht.
@@sdufg Nope. I never correct spelling. I just point out that people like you are grammatical midgets that need to take remedial classes in English before anyone considers you to be intelligent, thoughtful, and worth the time to read your sentences.
@@michaelrunnels7660 Its a tough life for folk like you..
I think this guy knows more than you mate
@@tbrowniscool He knows literally nothing.
If he knew something his ideas would be entertained by the air force.
Also he has never designed a plane in his life. That's a fact.
Pierre Sprey has nothing to do with the design of the F16 and A10, since it has never been part of the engineering teams of GD and Fairchild. He was a government official. And he criticized the F15 as much as the F35 today! The plane that has 104 wins versus 0 defeat!
104 wins? Let fight a real army like Russia, watch those wins be under 10.
104 wins aganist 50 years old fighter jets lol
@@Reality_Based_Fantasy this comment aged exceptionally well.
@@cosmo4698 did ukraine use f15?
@@Reality_Based_Fantasy 2 years later and your comment is a laughable joke
This guy is like the high-school quarterback that never wants to admit he's no longer in the game......
Except this guy was never in the game to begin with.
Yep. His entire life is one giant fraud. He's never designed, or even been involved with any team, that's ever designed anything. Ever. He did work for like a year as a statistician, but otherwise is just a fraud.
he did not design the planes he claimed to. was not even in the bench
Very well expressed assessment.
He sounds optimistic..... i think he might be standing outside of his home with rock in his hand waiting for f 35 flyby
Lmao! Good one.
Amazing to see this guy spew narrow minded, dogmatic criticisms for 40-50 years at any idea that he didn't have a part in originating.
@Zorro Laplaya I never said anything about the F-22, or F-35, and I didn't say he wasn't right about specifics. I said he has a narrow minded, dogmatic view. Which he does.
There is a big difference between a design concept and a production combat aircraft. Yes, there are many compromises. Yes, budgets, politics, and agendas all conspire to change the production product. The US Airforce needs planes, they cannot fly ideas and notions into combat. The views of Pierre Sprey have ignored these realities since at least the early 1970s.
In this very video, he criticized the F-15, said he and Boyd gave up on it, the Air Force put too much extra stuff on it and got it all wrong. Well that has been a pretty successful career for the F-15, considering they gave up on it and it's all wrong. That's just one example, this guy even criticizes his own baby the F-16 for growing too complex and losing performance. The reality is none of these aircraft get into production without these changes, good or bad. And his criticism never once addresses that fact.
@Zorro Laplaya "F22 was considered obsolete 10 years ago" That is objectively false. There is no existing aircraft that completely outstrips the F-22 in performance and will not be one for decades.
The F-22 is being removed from service 🤡🤡
@@moriyokiri3229 Yes, in maybe 20-25 years.
@1:30 that being said, the F-15 has had a sterling combat record to date, so I can’t say the USAF was incorrect on the design metrics.
Adrian Shephard during Desert Storm the Iraqi Air Force possessed the fourth most powerful Air Force in the world - and the pilots had been battle hardened during the decade long war with Iran. Not exactly a pushover.
Adrian Shephard for an East bloc supplies Air Force, that was a pretty good fleet. The Fulcrums were pretty much Warsaw Pact state of the art for the day. The F1s were also the Apple of Sprey’s eye for that period. So yes the Iraqi Air Force was pretty formidable and a capable representation of a Warsaw Pact power
Adrian Shephard 1) it was a formidable Air Force for the day 2) as I recall Iraq was soundly defeated in that conflict and 3) the f-15 was a 60s era bird designed to counter those fighters.
@Adrian Shephard Iraq was not 20+ years under sanctions when they invaded Kuwait in 1990. Gulf war 2 wasn't even 20 years under sanctions. Sorry but You could have put modern Fulcrums and MIG 25s into that conflict, the outcome would not have changed. You could even put some of the best Russian pilots into those airframes, the outcome would not have changed. Same with Serbia. Russia had some effective A-A ordinances and radar systems, but they were not as reliable as what was put into the F-15 and the Russia air-frames have some of the worst Radar RCS. Real easy to spot, track and target lock. Even though Russia has some great stunt pilots, judging from Rimon 20 in 1970, Georgia 2008 and the current run in Syria, they lack the battle harden skills of their predecessors AND IT SHOWS. Russian experts train every single air-force in the arab world and (Sorry) the lack of combat experience shows. Their air to ground sorties in Afganistan were seriously problematic. So you can talk about how the US coalition mostly fights third world countries, that is still significant combat to gain experience from (the Israelis have even more experience). What significant conflicts has Russia engaged in since WW2? It doesn't even compare. Doing twirling circus stunts at airshows has no bearing on being an effective combat pilot. The F-15 is 105-0 mostly because of the Israelis and what they did with it. They were not flying the most upgraded model of that plane.
@Adrian Shephard But Pierre Sprey says the Mig 21 is a better fighter than those oversize and complicated fighters like the F-15 and if I am not mistaken the F-15 accounted for several Iraqi jets while the F-16 didn't account for any.
A real master of spewing meaningless words, anyone defending him should look at his past criticisms of the f15 and the abrams.
It hurts ehhh? Hahaha hes speaking facts! The F-35 crashes more than 14 times!!! 14 times!!! A super duper airplane that even didnt fight crashes out of nowhere?? How is this succesfull? 150M airplane.. it cant even fly in the rain? Boyyyy taxpayer money goess BOOOM!
@@InterMovies 1,000 F-35s made. Sprey's comments aged like milk 🤣🤣🤣
To add insult to injury, the price of an F-35A went down from $109 million to $78 million. Oof.
@@bluestorm9977 Bullshit, it became more expensive because of constant repairs and faulty designs.
Maybe it became cheaper because you guys invading a other country and stealing their resources.
that Pierre Sprey must have been the best misinformation spy that's ever been sent to Russia:)
That is dump thing i ever heard do you woke up after f22 F35 been shot down then said what happen
@@abdullahiabdulkadirmohamed7511 Speak proper Enlgish you barbarian.
@@Yku30 f22 is an old stealth aircraft and air force start facing out so don't make like a god who doesn't make wrong things
@@abdullahiabdulkadirmohamed7511They have never been shot down
Turned out to be a be a badass plane
When and where .still falling from the sky as a rock.
@@EPICSOUNDTRAXwhat military jet has made it through its developmental years without mishaps?
@@Cerberus_the_Legend Come on a quarter of a century passed while it had been in development...
In Europe alone, F-35 has now been selected by 8 countries including the latest Switzerland. Factory has passed 700 fighters built. Flyaway cost for latest production lot slightly less than 78 million USD for the popular F-35A version.
Finland decided to buy the F-35A on December 10 this year.
Still a dud and still superexpensive. These cost numbers are artfully calclated to hide the true costs of having this useless flying coffin in your airforce.
@@wkgurr As apposed to what? Dated f-14s?
@@wkgurr It's cheaper than other 5-th gen airplanes.
@@wkgurr How is it a dud? What information do you have that no one else does?
Sprey cannot be sure of the specifications of the plane since most of its parameters are classified. One clue is when he estimates how long it can stay airborne, "..an hour, maybe an hour and a half". Only a few people know whether it is a good investment.
You can estimate by looking at the engine size, body frame and then estimate fuel tank size. It's pure physics. Remember, they are not reinventing the 'engine'.
Forget it about Sprey and classified myass, bro : game is over, even the USAF top officer admits it's a failure :
"US admits F-35 failed to replace F-16 as planned, needs new fighter jet
The United States Air Force announced the need for a new multi-use fighter jet to replace its aging F-16 fleet, while stressing that it would not feature the same high-price tag and technological prowess of the F-35.
The announcement, made by Air Force Chief of Staff General Charles Brown came as a surprise to defence analysts, given that the F-35 was pegged as the modern fifth generation aircraft that would replace the F-16.
Instead, Air Force Chief Brown suggested they would develop a “fifth-generation-minus” fighter jet."
Maybe you would argue General Brown cannot be sure of the specifications of the plane since most of its parameters are classified...
@@alainprimates1017 Brown's only problem with the F-35 is price.
@@alainprimates1017 Do you know the difference between failure and potential Success?
Did you know the f35 got a 76/1 kill ratio against f16s?
Why misrepresent the facts and rely on ....trt..... for military analysis
@@avae5343 Dude, they ended up making a better, high end jet. One which can get a kill ratio of over 70x.
Its a success by every metric as military ordinance almost never fulfills the exact role it was originally intended for.
This Guy is definition of a traitor. Look him up a real scammer
yeah just like julian assange traitor for telling the truth that's the american policy now
@@paulzhang1310 what truth has spray ever said
Listening to Pierre Sprey’s injudiciousness. I feel like I’m receiving a lecture on colour from a blind man.
This is an investigative documentary program but no one thought it odd Sprey did not design the A-10?
Ad hominen attack. Yeah really sharp debating tactic bud. Now what did he say that was wrong? How come Maj Scott Ritter in 2021 talked about how garbage the F35 was. Oh right I guess he didn't design the A-10 neither so must be wrong.
I heard him and a pilot go at it and the pilot said you don’t have to dog fight with the F35 he said it would kill any plane before they knew he was there???🤯🔫🛩
Research Russian air defence systems..lol
@@motsigman What like the S-400?? lol they can be beaten. especially with the F-35
@@motsigman this is from the future. Lol
@@motsigman laughs in Ukraine
@@motsigman esshh about that...
I knew Sprey was stupid, but that stupid? Wow...
I have to call bullship on his last comment. This F117 was shot down not because they figured out how to shoot down a stealthy airplane it was shot down because they got lucky when the bomb Bay doors got stuck open.
ua-cam.com/video/nGaqByxE3Mc/v-deo.html there is no issue about the bomb bay doors pılot told everything he succesfully hit his target and when on the way back he got shotdown with s125
not a bomb bay issue but he grossly underestimates the work that had to be done to take the aircraft out. It was more a success of military intelligence and planning rather than the success of one era of tech over another.
@@littlefatso ok, but they wre able to lock on because the bomb bay doors were stuck open. But for that 1 factor would they have been able to lock on and shoot it down? Probably not.
it wasnt the pilots or the planes fault, it was when 1) weather restricted EW aircraft (no EW cover), 2) NATO mission planners kept using the same air corridor
Stealth is not invisibility. It is low observability.
And you use a computer to monitor the difference in speeds between a fly and a jet, then you just track that said low Observed aircraft and use guided missiles to shoot it down.
Indeed and the low frequency long wavelength radars he was talking about doesn't have the resolution to provide targeting solutions.
@@RvGJK And what radiation method are you going to use to track a missile to the stealth target. Just because you found the plane doesn't mean you can hit it! Missiles don't like unstable target locks. As Nippon Senken Yamato, lower (not low) frequency radars lack targeting resolution and the size of the antenna array needed to effectively receive it is half the size of the missile itself. You're dealing with a radio wave about 2 Meters in size.
Nippon Senkan Yamato That’s why the Russians and Chinese have low and high frequency combined radars. The chances of them not being able to detect this aircraft given it is twenty five years old is zero.
@@elta6241 doesn't matter if the high frequency radar that is supposed to guide weapons still can acquire a lock, which it can't until the F-35 or F-22 is close enough
I've never understood why Pierre Sprey hates the harrier so much. The OG sea harrier is pretty much his ideal "red bird" concept of a lightweight tight turning (1 circle as it gets) fighter with limited range and IR only missiles entirely focused on air to air. Admittedly the Harrier kind of turned against him since the FA2 Sea Harrier was multi-role and had AMRAAMS
The mention of a Mirage beating a harrier is funny since the mirage III and 5 are the only fighters the harrier has dogfighted with and it beat them 9-0. Admittedly the Mirage 2000 is much better than the FA2 in a dogfight but it's a moot point since the harrier's AMRAAMS would turn the mirage into burning wreckage before it got even close to using its Super 530s
Probably because the Harrier is VTOL. He hates complexity.
It's most likely cuz it's British so he couldn't claim he designed it lol
6:39....Longer wavelength= less resolution= less accuracy.
10:18..The downing of the F117 was in great part down to luck., because only 1 was shot down. if 2 or more were shot down, then it would be a different story.
@Marc Michaud exactly!!
@@michaelwong4303 You only heard about the one that crashed in Serbia not the others that crashed in Croatia...
Good day
@@Nick-wh4jt thanks. Please tell me about the other one in Croatia. I like to know more.
As an air force veteran with encyclopedic knowledge of all tactical aircraft, I am only impressed by how this guy tops his own ignorance and stupidity in every minute of the video.
He managed to get everything wrong. That is impressive, while the presstitute lapped it up like a kitten.
F35 is overrated POS he's not wrong there
@@chrisklitou7573 Literally every specific claim he made is demonstrably false.
@@LRRPFco52 F35 has bad agility, less weapons capacity, slow speed
That's all true
@@chrisklitou7573 All erroneous. F-35 has more agility when compared with a combat-configured Viper, and comparable maneuverability when the Viper is slick, with far superior low speed handling, as well as better high-speed handling, with far more yaw, AOA, and resultant nose-pointing authority than the Viper.
This is according to scores of former Viper pilots who have converted to the F-35A.
Even restricted to internal stores, the F-35 carries more fuel than the Viper can carry internally and externally, with the same A2G weapons load common to a Viper, with far superior probability of kill with its A2A weapons that they Viper will ever have. The Viper's real world A2A kill record is 78:2, and doesn't stand a chance against F-35s in all the training they have done together.
Because of the F-35's 18,500lb internal fuel capacity and lower drag, it has a much greater combat radius than the Viper as well.
Former Viper pilots who now fly F-35 say they cruise at 50-90kts faster than the Viper, and can reach or maintain supersonic speeds in the F-35 that you can't in the Viper when combat-configured.
With a standard Viper combat load, you can do small supersonic dashes into the Mach 1.2-1.5 region, then have to decelerate before you burn your fuel state down rapidly, whereas in the F-35, it loves to cruise at .9 Mach and can spend a lot of time in the 1.2-1.6 Mach region without much of a sweat, since it has less drag and an engine that has the same power in mil as the Vipers with GE IPE engines in full burner (28000lb). When the F-35 wants to accelerate, regain energy, or push through Mach into supersonic region, it has 43,000lb of thrust in max AB.
So, why have countries with a lot at stake (Finland, Norway, Denmark, Israel, Germany, ...) bought the F-35?
You have to understand that despite many articles calling this country choosing F-35 as more of a political decision, these articles failed to understand that modern warfare is no longer WW2 dogfight style warfare, F-35 was design for war where drone, laser, and beyond visual range hypersonic missile are a thing, and F35 was design for beyond visual range combat, so speed is no longer matter in modern warfare
It's Pierre Sprey. He believed the F-15 should've been a radarless gun plane. Of course, everyone with even a little bit of knowledge on military aircraft ignored him and the F-15 went on to become the most successful fighter of all time with 104 air to air kills and no losses. He also claimed he designed the A-10 and F-15 despite not being the designer of the A-10 and F-15. And he also said using the US should use the M60 tank instead of the M1 abrams. Don't take anything he ever said seriously when it comes to anything military related.
“I know I make the same wrong critiques about every successful military jet in the last 60 years, but listen to my same old critique and hate on this successful military jet.”
This did not age well 🤣
Nah this dude was always a massive clown.
ua-cam.com/video/gmuVYVREGgE/v-deo.html&ab_channel=Spookston
Even though he's a warthunder youtube, he gives good sources and explains exactly why the pentagon wars is retarded, and why sprey is retarded
It aged pretty well because that plane was remade and resigned a million times and probably cost 1 billion per plane 😂😂😂😂
Still falling from the sky as a rock .
@@EPICSOUNDTRAX 1,000 F-35s have been made and 14 countries use it so far. So...
Age very badly. F35 is very maneuver extremely well
The helmet of an F-35 pilot costs $400,000.
In the meantime we have teachers with underfunded programs to get their students ahead.
The helmet, as in the thing on the pilot's head, does not cost $400,000. The HMDS system costs $400K.
@@davidrice4165 Not really though hey.
@@ricardomurillo5205A healthcare system that costs trillions of dollars more than it should do for what it provides is far more responsible for strained budgets in education and elsewhere than the cost of a fancy head mounted display system in an F-35.
@@trolleriffic health care can be inefficient yet unconditional for the welfare of society. Fancy government toys are just show, propaganda and an extravagant meaningless expense for our welfare
So stealth is a scam...
no its not a scam but it might not be worth the money with electronic jamming and new ways to detect stealthy jets
Yes
@@Karl-Benny Stealth buys you time over target, thats all.
Stealth is effective against airborne pulse doppler radar in the microwave frequency. But against other low frequency high power radars, it has many issues to be resolved.
@@herohero-fw1vc Stealth is about breaking the kill chain, and it does not matter which link you break. Stealth jets can be detected, but it is very difficult to find their exact location, track them, and almost impossible to guide a missile to them. This is before you account for the fact that F35 can see the adversary is hunting for them and choose to engage that radar, or avoid it long before the adversary can see the F35. Russians have decided to look for stealth jets using infrared sensors, but again these are short range, and lack accuracy, and also do not do not give an accurate enough track to guide a missile. The whole idea of the sensor and fusion suite in the F35 is about giving the pilot all the situational awareness they need to make the right decision a large majority of the time, some targets should be engaged, some targets avoided. I mean it does not make sense to risk a $100M jet to bomb a portable restroom, so the targets should be chosen accordingly.
A day in the life of Pierre Sprey, circa 2017:
Pierre Sprey has come downstairs. Pierre Sprey has entered the kitchen. Pierre Sprey has forgotten what it was that he came downstairs for. Pierre Sprey is confused and tired. Pierre Sprey has just wet himself.
And then he died!
Gen 4++ French Rafale managed to replace 7 planes on french Air Force !
Which planes mate ??
@MrTherealpad It can literally do every one of those plane's jobs better than they could as well. Do a side-by-side analysis of each mission set, and the Rafale exceeds the practical performance of each of those.
@M D ahah...
@M D more like the fa 18 super hornet is a reasonnable alternative to the superior rafale as an omnirole platform.
@M D really? Hahaha
It's 2019, Canada still has not made a decision on a next generation plane. The air force is really an air show for museum pieces. Now they are scrounging for parts from Australian Hornets.
almost 2021
Why don't they go for the Advanced Super Hornet or the F-15EX rather than the F-35?
@@jonnnyren6245 Canada never buys the best. But what looks politically good and must have contracts to produce parts for the plane. The f18s were state of the art but that was the cold war era. Investing in the military doesn't win votes.
@@jonnnyren6245 Thing is f-35 is ideal for Canada.
@@janko7245 its not. They have to deal with fast flying planes the get visit form the Tu 160 more often then everybody else and the F35 is to slow. I am suprised the dont for go for the F15 that is perfect to get rid of the Tu 160, fast enuff better longrange rader, better in climbing better weapon loadout for that job. Way more range since external drop tanks. So i dont get why they dont buy the new F15.
Pierre Sprey is about as knowledgable on modern air warfare as Bill Kaysing was on the Apollo program.
According to google as of 2023 an f35 costs UP TO 109 million each. If you use a long enough wavelength radar you can detect a flea at a million miles away bit you will also detect every other piece of matter as well
Na koji su nacin avion 5 generacije 2-3 skuplji od aviona iz Rusije ili Kine u startu?A zna se da je avion najjeftiniji u cijeloj prici?
Unit cost je nesto 90 mil za A verziju, 110 za B/C verziju. Doduse samo klot avion
Cijene f35 će da opadnu tek onda kad krene masovna proizvodnja i prodaja, a najavili su da će poslije 3000 aviona napravljenih cijena spasti na 45 miliona(kad je projekat tek počeo) a sad se zna da sve i da naprave 3000 aviona, cijena jednog će biti 70,80 miliona. Da Sukhoi-a 30 recimo naštancaju 3000 komada, jedan bi koštao 24 miliona. Ne gledaš samo pojedinačni unit cost, nego koliko je ukupno novca uloženo u projekat.
A i tačno vidiš da je F35 - A jedini koji je jeftin, pošto je najveći broj f35ica upravo iz te branše, a F35C i B, specijalizovani za marince i US mornaricu, daleko manje traženi medju diplomatskim partnerima, su itekako skuplji od a modela. Po ovome što sam čitao avion će da ima bruka softverske sposobnosti, ali je slab letač,što je malo čudno za borca.
please upload the full interview. in the documentary, there was a lot less pierre spray, and in this video too there was some cutscene.. can you please upload this interview exclusively? wanna see his opinion without any cutscenes
Soumalya Barai good luck that doesn't push their political agenda
SpenserRoger
they anti f35?
@@SpenserRoger ua-cam.com/video/RwA4RaaJSeI/v-deo.html
@@SoumalyaBarai nah the CBC tends to support one government party over the other.
@@Unterwelten ya, cool. He's actually pretty wrong about the purpose of stealth and the f35
Basically, yes ground radar and missiles guided by ground radar can track the plane and shoot at the plane, however the frequencies used by radar homing missiles say those fired by another plane have a much more difficult time tracking the plane do to its stealth. Basically the radar that can track it wont fit on missiles or planes very well. Also stealth is still great at decreasing the distance ground radar can see it.
There's a good video or two debunking many of these "turkey" claims about the J
jet. If you search for it you should find it but if not I can link u to it.
I don’t condone celebrating someone’s death, but this guy has plagued the opinions of average people for far too long. He created an army of people that would advocate the uselessness of the f-35 after a hard day of working at McDonald’s. You can even see some of these specimens in the comments.
the comment section is almost as dumb as Pierre Sprey himself
"It's a terrible airplane"
"The plane is astonishingly unmaneuverable"
"In dogfighting it's hopeless"
"A mig-21 or Mirage would just hopelessly whip the f-35"
"Stealth is a scam, it simply doesn't work"
Low frequency radars can see stealth fighters, yes. But the real question is, can you really track and get a missile grade lock on them? No. To believe that a mirage or a mig-21 could even get in close quarters to dogfight the f-35 is laughable. I guess America should just remove the radar, electronics and stealth since it doesn't matter, right? All that matters is to fly with multiple missiles on your wing, be as big as a city block on radar, have no electronics and just be maneuverable with guns as big as a car.
The fifth estate truly dropped the ball here. This guy was just a parasitic draw on military funding for his entire military research career. To boot he did nothing in the development of the A-10.
Pierre is from the old school and refuses to admit that new ideas and innovations are a big part of military strategy.
Except he's right. The F-35 is trash.
www.extremetech.com/extreme/320295-the-us-air-force-quietly-admits-the-f-35-is-a-failure
@@stevedixon4179 no its not. read again
@@stevedixon4179According to?
Pierre Sprey was a turkey
Nothing more uncommon then common sense and becoming less and less common everyday
Pierre Sprey is a "reformer" he believes that we should use m48s instead of m1s. another member of the reformers thinks that the m113 should be a plane.
in short dont listen to pierre sprey, the reformers are the scientologists of war
so much for that common sense
@@avae5343 USAF has also announced the creation of a stealth areal refueler, so what's your point?
@Zorro Laplaya No, 20 to 1 and kill the death ratio isn't a failure, stop giving in to Russian nationalist propaganda. Especially one's from a Russian propagandness like Pierry.
Pierre has the last laugh. USAF reportedly buying F15ex and possibly new F16s. Composites must make these birds hotter.
I think the EX is same structural composition as the original. Only tailplanes are composite
F-15ex is designed to support f-35 and f-22 by carrying a lot of missiles and knocking things out at long range so the stealth fighters don’t waste missiles and don’t give away their position. It’s not meant to replace the f-35.
@@cvashel In that case what's the point of having the F-22 and F-35? (which the Russians can paint quite easily anyway).
@@TheMentalblockrock they can’t seem to do it when the Israelis fly their f35s over Syria lmao
@@TheMentalblockrock painting is much easier than shooting down. Russian planes have irst which can spot stealth planes (but they still need to look in the right piece of sky) but infrared can’t measure range so they can’t make an effective firing solution from far away.
Turkey really did luck out...
Miss you Pierre, God Speed.
You folks at The Fifth Estate really dropped the ball here.
explain how they dropped the ball?
@@poseidon5003 The many disparaging and nonsensical comments against Pierre is scary. Reminds one of how easily people are propagandized. Like how many people fell for the recent “pandemic” and the (fake) vaccine.
@@tug-mug You're delusional
Calling pierre sprey a "defence analyst" is like calling a hardstuck copper on Rainbow6 siege a Navy SEAL
20 to 1 kill ratio at red flag. What a failure
@M D Could you explain?
@@svenheuseveldt7188 Military Exercise that was peer-to-peer (both sides want to/can win). F-35 had a very impressive kill ratio against is Gen 4 Peers.
Without him knowing this, he made a big psyops contribution to the program since the russians (RT) picked up on this story, ran it and spun it for their liking. The plane it's not designed to function as a regular 4th gen
Check out Disk Loading’s Wikipedia for a plot of vertical lift aircraft. The Dusk Loading for the direct lift F-35 is considerably worse than the tilt wing V22-Osprey Disk Loading. This means that the F-35 has to land on a prepared surface which is not always possible with a single engine aircraft under combat conditions. Otherwise, when landing on an unprepared surface you risk kicking-up dust, dirt, trash which can cause pilot blindness or flame-out due to ingesting thrash into the engine.
I want to hear what this guy thinks a 'good' fighter is.
The rafale
A good fighter is a fighter designed for a specific department with specific needs . That's his whole point . The moment you make a jet fighter for three different departments with three different needs , you end up with a bad fighter for all of them .
f16
@@Democracyphobia Not necessarily.
Last I heard, the F-15, F-16, and F-18 which anti-F-35/F-22 peoples love so much were performing just fine at multiple roles.
Designed completely according to Boyd's energy maneuverability theory, day only, no radar, short range missiles and iron bombs.
Basically useless.
He doesn't really say much in this video. Simply says it's a bad plane over and over and mentions tiny wings. Refers to the planes need to get in close to "see the enemy", indicating that it can't identify enemies from a distance.
Pierre Sprey got a lot wrong in this interview. At the time much was made of wing length/size. We now know more about the lifting body design within the F-35. The internal weapons bay is also a great feature. Personally while an unpopular opinion I'm happy Canada did not purchase 65 of the first jets. So much needed to be perfected and I'll be happier with Block IV software. I'm also happier with 88 aircraft. The sad thing within all of this is Canada would do well with some Gripen E's as the Gripen E is a fine aircraft and efficient. My preference is 88 F-35 A's Block IV and 45 Gripen E's which would contain some great harsh weather features Canada needs. The ability to build fighters in Halifax during war time is another plus for the Gripen E.
You have it all wrong and at an ever escalating cost that all vassal states will help foot the bill for the empire. 100 hours maintenance for 1 hour airtime. It will spend more time on the ground than being useful. Easy target for something that can actually fly like the SU-35, which has already defeated the junk stealth on the F35
@@NoBody-pw3kf I got that from a highly technicel source although examining the underside of the aircraft will tell you it is a lifting body, just look.
You should know that LM has promoted the F-35 as a lifting body aircraft design. It is also very clean underneath until a heavy load of weapons is added.
@@thorinbane the su-35 wouldn’t even see the f-35 before it was hit 37 miles away by aim-120
In 2023 Canada paid $14b for 88 F-35As, approx $150m for each and not the $200 (which would be$250m in 2016 terms), that Sprey claimed Canada would pay.
What is the kill ratio of the F 35 in red flag .It's 4-1 is that correct?
Depends on the perameters- at most it was 19:1.
All propaganda. They said the same thing about the F22. The ones that keep saying it’s a failure are the ones that didn’t make any money from it. The logistics that go into a war machine of this magnitude have never need done before etc. It takes time to smooth everything out.
And how many were built??? 195, why stop if it was soo good?
How many do you need? When something’s good you don’t need more of them you need less of them.
You crack me up :-) ROFL! Have a nice day
@@ThyMajesticOne do the math and you'll figure out that answer real quick. That's a lot of money. Also, many countries dont have a combined airforce of 100 planes, fighters, bomber, attackers etc. You really dont need that many. Especially a plane as pricey as the f22 and f35
@@SeekerHead Dream on
This guy is so wrong, this is a cringe watch
if this guy was around in the 30s he would be begging the US to buy more battleships. reformers are so retarded
Oh, the oversight!
7 years later , spot on .
The opposite of spot on
@@BorntoYeet 30% operational only . The rest are out of action .
@@baits9301Dawg, you didn’t even get the operational rate right💀. Stop slobbering on Sprey’s balls, he’s already dead (thank goodness).
He sounds logical
Actually, everything he said in this video has been debunked.
@@commonsenselogic High wing loading? Limited weapons load in stealth configuration? No range?
@@thomass4471
All of this has long since been debunked.
ua-cam.com/video/-HVY6Fdc2CM/v-deo.html
Fast forward to the 35th minute. That's where the debunking starts.
@@commonsenselogic I'm still watching it to see where any of the things i've mentioned have actually changed? Those things I mentioned CANNOT be fixed without compromising it's main selling point. The high wing loading will only get worse if you put external stores on it. The stealth will be compromised if you put external tanks on it to increase it's range. See where I'm going.
@@thomass4471
At about 54:00 is where the high wing loading BS starts to get debunked. If you didn't get it, which you have to not want to, the high wing loading argument is based on that old school wing loading formula when only the wings produces lift. Modern engineering designs lift from the body. As said clearly in the video, if you don't account for body lift of an F 16 it will also have a high wing loading. I've heard estimates of from 40% to 60% of all lift of a F 35 comes from its body. So the calculation will be way off if you don't account for it. Which is how the "high wing loading" nonsense came about.
BTW, all planes have increased drag by mounting objects externally. Not just the F 35. However, it can carry almost 4 times the fuel as an F 16. So you won't really need external fuel tanks. And even if you put external weapons it will still be more stealthy than non stealth planes.
This guy did this interview and then time made an absolute fool of him
Pierre Sprey is a "reformer" he believes that we should use m48s instead of m1s. he thinks that the m48 is safer than the m1. another member of the reformers thinks that the m113 should be a plane.
in short dont listen to pierre sprey, the reformers are the scientologists of war
@@raymondhuang277 you just watch Spookstons video too 😂
The U.S. Air Force Just Admitted The F-35 has failed he was proven right
@@alliwanttodoisdoit5495 WRONG!!! the USAF just stated the F35 is expensive, and needs lots of maintenance, same things were said about F15, and F16 in the 80's. Back when F-16 were crashing right and left because of design problems.
@@dmitchellhomes they are not even close to the complexity of the eff thirty lemon
Tucano prop plane is enough for counterinsurgency.
The only reason people listen to Pierre Sprey is because they have no idea what he's talking about because if they did they would realize he has no idea what he's talking about
Well according to all the war games we've done, the countries that have bought the plane, and the investment in technology that our adversaries have been doing stealth is in fact not a scam. He was also wrong about the extent of the cost ballooning. In fact purpose-built air superiority fighters such as the eurofighter and Rafael have basically exactly the same upfront cost as the f-35.
Some of what he said was useful; it is definitely true that all the inter-service competition hampered the plane. The f-35 also is severely hampered by its low payload (mostly with regard to air to air missiles), and inability is super Cruise. But he was clearly much further in the failure camp than was rational.
The f35 has a bigger payload than the f16 and can carry more individual missiles than the f15
Well, I would say that Rafale and Gripen are very good "multi-role" fighter jets, the latter most like the F-16 but at the beginning of it's life cycle. The Typhoon is more meant to serve the role of the F-22.
The UK should bring back the EE Lightning. It was the ONLY aircraft that could intercept Concorde and get in position to shoot down a U2 at 80,000 feet.
@@TheMentalblockrock You just taught me something new. I had it confused U2 with the Blackbird and the first super cruising Lightning was something I never read up on. Cheers.
@@TheMentalblockrock your joking right?
@@kekdermott3055 I'm serious! Stealth is basically now bunk so might as well bring back 1950's super jets.
@@TheMentalblockrock lighting isn't even that super its really overrated nevermind that its a 1950' point interceptor I doubt it would survive anything from the 1980's much less today. And on top of that stealth works so I don't know were your coming from saying its fake
Airplanes are made in the ground but tested in battle fields. These airplanes have not seen real combat. As a result, we can't say is a great airplane. Great plane is the F15 Eagle.
Blob B su would loose and look silly, since it was designed to kill it
U dont think the creators of thr f35 and f22 have tested their 5th generations jets against their own proven 4th generation planes. It might not be real combat but that doesnt mean they cant Replicated
Pierre Sprey is a turkey...
Eating his words now.
US gov't has done this before with P-38 Lightening. Ineffective in air to air combat. It was not the solution. But, it was a great political solution.
The description of this video immediately invalidates it. Claiming the a10 to be a jet fighter is proba ly the dumbest thing ive heard in ages
Remember this is the guy who said the M48 is better than the M1 Abrams.
The Royal Dutch Airforce, wich has 14 F-35's at this moment, has already problems with this thing. During a thunderstorm a few weeks ago, almost all the instruments in the cockpit failed!! The pilots had to turn back to base immediatly, before they could have crashed!!
"Our" government has ordered 42 F-35's in total. That will turn out to be a HUGE disaster.👎👎👎😮😮
Yeah, that's not true. www.defenseworld.net/news/27887/Damaged_Inert_Gas_Tubes_found_on_Dutch_F_35_Fighter_Jets#.YK-aqPlKguU
@@michaelhaney9432 Well, whatever the cause was, those F-35's aint gonna work!
Us have 450 already
Well, Indian piolet shot down an F-16 with Mig-21.
sounds like the bradley from pentagon wars
The Bradley IFV killed more tanks in Desert Storm than the Abrams, just like the F-111F killed more tanks than the A-10 did, with the F-111F flying only 2400 sorties vs the A-10s almost 10,000 sorties.
ua-cam.com/video/gmuVYVREGgE/v-deo.html
@@LRRPFco52 F111 was a beast during the gulf war
He is talking about Russian Nebo-M radar that is really something exceptional.
The Frank Dux of aviation. This guy nearly cost Canada (at least set them back a decade) the greatest jet ever. Canada nearly got stuck with a non stealth 4th generation fighter for the next 40 years. Luckily, Trudeau had enough smart people around him to show him how stupid he was in 2015.
Kony 2012 man!
dear god the uk italy spain australia have all built aircraft carriers for this and the helmet is 400 grand jesus murphy he is spot on just an omnishambles
they should have buy some old good rafale ;)
@@TheMegamyGamer The lifetime cost of a single f-35 is the same or cheaper than the rafale. It's also better than the rafale in almost every catagory.
@@michaelhaney9432 the good that the USA air force call him a faillure and have decided to go back on F-22 lmao
Sprey is a hack
If Pierre Sprey had his way US fighters would look like Da Vinci's flyng machine, but lighter.
the only thing stealthy about the f35 is its price
This guys predictions are coming to light
@Blob B so are the 870 reported problems of the F35
@@eyzhd4264 I used to have a professor whose job was to find potential risks on F-5 Tigers. Mind you, the aircraft were second hand, were over 40 years old already and weren't the early production models either. Well guess what, he was identifying some design flaws, potential problems, reporting them and some of them even had new parts designed and produced to replace the faulty ones.
What makes you think that your number holds any shred of relevance at all? What makes you think the F-22, F-15, F-16 and so on don't all have loads of reported problems that simply aren't fixed because they don't hold enough significance to do it?
@@eyzhd4264
You do know that he and your argument is about 5 years late.
@@commonsenselogic oh really? You do know that Japanese f35 pilots still got their headaches because of the airframe this year, you do know f35 can still only handle 4.95G's, and that one got easily spotted by a S300 inside syria, and that actually none of the 870 problems have been solved, dont talk without any evidence to your argument, thanks
@@eyzhd4264
Where's your evidence? You have nothing but anti F 35 talking points.
Everything Spray said has been debunked. Including being unmanuverable. I've seen video's debunking that. Keep in mind that I've been following the program for 6 plus years.
If the plane was that bad Israel wouldn't have increased their order.
well, obviously UA-cam experts>guy who actually worked on military planes
This guy didn’t work on any planes
Hes worked as a defence analyst, he works with concepts. He has no idea what he is talking about in regards to engineering or aircraft design. He was also part of a group of analysts known as the reformers (www.airforcemag.com/article/0208reformers/).
Another way to put it is that you are defending the "aircraft knowledge" of a guy who thought the F-15, arguably the greatest fighter of its generation and still not a slouch, was also a turkey.
@@avae5343 The guy who thought the f16 shouldn’t have radar? The guy who said the f15(with its ~200:0 win ration) was bad is right is he? How do you figure that
And by the way, sprey wasn’t a pilot either
@@avae5343 Because American youtube warriors cant stand the truth that they are paying tax and losing money on technology that only works in Goatistan and some 3rd world countries. Thats why they are mad and they dislike everything Pierre says
@@dakadaka7455 Stealth works against a country's peers perfectly fine.
It hides you for long enough to fire first.
The purpose of this plane is to give Lockheed a monopoly in the fighter market and obliterate the competition. Once Lockheed has the monopoly it can ask any price for its fighter jets.
and it still doesn't work.
when a big thing coming out , there should be some people to say these things about it cause they need media attention
This guy was behind the f16 program . Everything he is talking about is legit . The moment you try to make a three service airplane you re screwed . There is no airframe that can satisfy three services all at the same time. Just look at the A10 , the harrier , the f15 and the f16 to understand what he is talking about .
ok jaxawn
@@Democracyphobia "Boyd, defense analysts Tom Christie, Pierre Sprey, Chuck Myers, test pilot Col. Everest Riccioni and aeronautical engineer Harry Hillaker formed the core of the "Fighter Mafia" which worked behind the scenes in the late 1960s to pursue a lightweight fighter as an alternative to the F-15. The group strongly believed that an ideal fighter should not include any of the radar-guided missile systems, active radar or rudimentary ground-attack capability that found their way into the F-15."
- Cunningham, J. "Rediscovering Air Superiority: Vietnam, the F-X, and the 'Fighter Mafia'". Air & Space Power Journal - Chronicles Online Journal. United States: Airforce
I dunno, whatever he is talking about sounds dumb to me.
@@littlefatso except that just last week, the Air Force admitted the F35 still doesn’t meet the requirements, basically confirming Pierre’s statements.
Now we are making upgraded versions of F15 & 16 to ensure air superiority.
@@x7Samuraix One dude said it, legit one dude.
He is correct about the troop support role, but he hasn’t seen its unlocked performance, obviously!
Also cost of operation is accounted that is what make difficult to operate
I believe Lazerpig
This guy is a poor commentator because he makes generalizations but doesn’t provide data for what he claims. He says the data is in publicly available reports. If he were any good he would backup his statements with fact and not tell me to go find the data. Does he want me to stop listen g to the video so I can go look up the data? Tell me where to find the data, or give me the data yourself like a good commentator.
It's 2020, and now it's a TRILLION DOLLARS!
Good call, it's MAIN & ONLY MISSION is to be a CASH COW for the DEFENSE CONTRACTOR
it turns out that running a program for 50 years and using inflation-adjusted dollars makes things sound really expensive.
@@infinitelyexplosive4131 50years later trillions of dollars later, and it STILL has not delivered on any of its promises!
Still USELESS!
@@mmb811 now it's trillions, plural? Where did the extra trillion+ come from?
It was Lockheed vs Boeing. Id say either way they were gonna screw em over in the long-run.
Maybe its time US look to non-US aviation manufacturing. Made and designed in Japan maybe?
At least then, the Japanese would never outsource classified parts and electronics plus it would boost an allys economy and morale. They may even order their own JP next gen fighters with US blessing. Win-win.
@@infinitelyexplosive4131 well its nearing a cool trillion now and having it scheduled for active duty by 2035 plus seeing how its supposed to be in service for another 25-35 years thereafter, it is very likely that the final tab may rack up another trillion by then.
I doubt US military will be foolish enough to fall for a similar bait and switch. The future of combat is low-earth orbit, cyber (network/infrastructure) and - dare I say - biological. So wasting that much on another "Next-Gen" fighter is pointless.
Israel has been successfully using the F-35 all over the middle east, including territories with massive Russian air defense presence. They even did several experimental flights over Iran, just to see what happens. The Iranians didn't detect them.
The F-35 works fine, at least the "I" version.
(This said, Israel isn't trying to use it for close air support. That whole bit does sound a bit silly.)
Israel has to get it. If they don't buy it they don't get aid. Israel has gotten more aid per capita than all highly indebted poor countries combined.
How did Israel have the range to fly it Iran? Please share...
@@williamdiep2415 the big IAF base west of Jerusalem to Isfahan is 988m. the estimated range of an F35A is 1,379 miles
Lots of American in denial in the comment section 😂
You might be able to see a stealt fighter with ww2 technology but it is hard to get weapon lock on Stealth fighter.
what
Well gosh darn it, he was right.
No he wasn't. Honestly, Sprey is a moron. He has no idea what he is talking about. He's a member of a group calling themselves "the reformers" are entrenched in the idea that modern war is just WW2 but with better equipment, so the US, instead of throwing men with high-tech equipment at problems, should throw men with low-tech at problems.
Sprey literary said the f22 was bad until its specs got declassified, showing it was great. He then did a massive u-turn, calling the f22 genius and taking partial credit for its creation.
@Zorro Laplaya Uhhh, the F22 is still the best air superiority fighter out there. Most air combat takes place at BVR (beyond visual range), meaning aircraft have to rely on radar to detect, lock, and fire upon enemy aircraft. This is where stealth gives the F22 a massive advantage. The detectability of an aircraft can be partially determined by a planes RCS, or radar-cross section, where the lower it is the less detectable an aircraft is on radar. A Rafale's RCS is around 1 m^2, a respectable number when compared to other 4th gen fighters. However, the F22 has an RCS of around 0.0001 m^2, making it far less detectable than a Rafale. In the majority of cases, the F22 would be able to detect, fire on, and destroy a Rafale before the Rafale could even get a whiff of the F22's radar signature. And before you start going on about how he was still right about the F35, the RCS of that aircraft is around 0.0015 m^2, less stealthy than the F22 but still able to dominate an engagement against 4th gen fighters. Also, the low RCS of both the F22 and F35 make them more survivable against SAMs, the other main threat that threatens aircraft these days.
If you want to look at a military program that is truly a failure, I encourage you to check out the Navy's own LCS program.
Edit: Also, once it was proved successful, Pierre Spray turned around and praised it, even claiming he helped design it. If the F22 is a failure, wouldn't he still be wrong?
Edit 2: Here's some sources on the RCS: faculty.nps.edu/jenn/EC4630/RCSredux.pdf www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/stealth-aircraft-rcs.htm
He was not
This guy was on point 9 years ago.
I also happened to read the new man. What a shame to the USA.
Pierre has never been on point, he was wrong about the f15, the f16 and he’s wrong about the f35
@@jb76489 Sprey is an idiot... although he was right on some parts of his analysis. F-35 is expensive, it will not replace the A-10. Where he was so wrong though is thinking the F16 is a better jet, look at the kill rate from red flag last month... F-16 the loser. for those morons who think the F35 has "problems" look at the F16 history by comparison, they lost quite few F16's in testing, and the F16 did not become really good until a decade or more of development. F-35 is similar, still getting better, and that will continue into the future, then all the technologies invented for the F35 will work their way into both past and future platforms.
@@dmitchellhomes And then you start talking about costs:mission ratio and then your entire comment just collapses in on itself. Not to mention the Navy isn't even too thrilled about the F-35 program and are in need of light aircraft for CAS. Knowing that the USA doesn't even engage with major countries and fight desert guerilla fighters with 70's SAM tech....F-35 is a gimmick
@@JABelms huh? Navy "CAS" missions? WTF are you talking about? The Navy rarely flies close air support missions, and none of the recent past Navy jets F18, F14, or even the A6 were good in that role. CAS is mainly an Army/AF thing, and to a lesser extent Marines. CAS is a role when you are talking about a ground war or intervention, It's hard to beat the A-10 in that role, as that plane was specifically designed and built for that mission, and that is about all it can do, although in the gulf war the A-10 did get an air to air kill of an iraqi helicopter.