Re: Other JSF options

Kevin Brooks wrote:

"Guy Alcala" <g_alcala@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:4483F69D.C1C0F058@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Kevin Brooks wrote:

"Guy Alcala" <g_alcala@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message

<snip much>


<snip some F136>

Unless you lack the up-front money to make it happen in the first
place.

As I said, it's not a case of lacking the up-front money, it's a
question
of wanting to spend it elsewhere.

Guy, you know better than that. We are spending in a deficit
environment,
which means we literally don't have the money. Adding that money to
the
budget for the F136 means either a congressional mark-up that
increases
the
deficit level, or robbing from another program that we have earmarked
funds
for--some program that the military actually *wants* .

In this case, it was a question of transferring funds from the F136, a
program already budgeted
for, and spending it somewhere else, so the situation is the reverse of
that which you state
above.

Same-same. We are operating in a deficit condition and we wanted to
reduce
the defnse authorization request by reprogramming available funds to
programs more important to *us*.

To some of *us*, sure, apparently not including the program office or the
USMC.

Apparently it was DoD and the USAF/USN which wanted to cut the F136,
while
the JSF program
office thought that wasa bad idea at this stage (i.e., at least until
they
know more about whether
the F135 will meet its specs). BTW, the May 29th AvLeak has a good
article on F135 development
and some of the problems they've been having with it.

yeah, and they will no doubt have their share of problems with the F136
development if it goes through--problems that we will have to pay to fix
as
part of the development cost.

Entirely possible, but then that's the beauty of capitalist competition,
isn't it? "Your engine
isn't meeting specs,and is running over budget? Well, better get it up to
snuff and soon, or we'll
buy from the other guys.

No, no! It is evident from the way this is playing out that should the F136
prove to be the pig in the mud, then the UK and GE-based politicos over here
will cry "Foul!" should the USAF try to dump them. This is gonna be a
corporate and international welfare package.

I doubt it. Oh, BTW, the June 5th AvLeak has an article on the F136 and the
development problems it's been having. Which is to be expected of any engine,
and which is why I think we need to keep them both going at least until they
demonstrate their promised performance, reliability, durability, weight etc.

Oh, and don't expect us to pay to fix it -- we aren't stuck with you
regardless of how poorly you perform."

Yes, we will be. GE and RR will be comfortable in the smug satisfaction that
they have the UK govt ready to do their bidding and apply disproportional
(to their measily contribution level) leverage to keep them in the game.
Just as they have already done.

Kind of hard to do so if the engine's a dud and you've got a better option.

For every congresscritter trying to keep the pork barrel
going in their district regardless of how the thing works, there will be
two others holding televised
press conferences and hearings on performance deficiencies and cost
overruns, to show that they're
fulfilling their role as guardians of the public purse and servants of the
PeeePulll. It may not be
pretty to watch, but it does occasionally do the job.

Nah. The chief-pork-killer himself has already hitched his wagon to the
F136, and he is not likely to flip-flop on it in the future (McCain is not
known for admitting his errors).

ISTM that McCain has hitched his wagon to the idea that you should demonstrate
the performance you claim before we throw tons of money at you and limit our
options, and that it's a good idea to have competition as late as you can, as it
keeps costs down and performance up. Which is the way it's supposed to work in
a capitalist system.

Right now the Army is
sweating bullets over congressional inaction regarding funding the
OPTEMPO
requirements for OIF, but some congress critters want to immediately
make-nice with the UK and help GE in the process by forcing the USAF
to
pursue the F136.

And make sure the F-35 isn't crippled by having an engine that doesn't
meet specs, as well as
increase competition and according to the GAO report, lower over-all
program costs (break-even at
the 1,700th a/c).

I tend to side with the guys wearing the uniforms and "walking the walk"
being the best source for determining where the limited resources are
used

Who are often just as biased because they have some personal investment in
a program (you were the
one saying how hard it would before Moseley to back out now, because he
would be contradicting a line
taken by his former boss, which he supported. We don't know if Moseley
ever held that view himself,
or if he was just being the loyal subordinate).

Actually, he went beyond the usual call of toeing the line. His comments
were his own, and were not *required* to be offered.

Whether he was in agreement or not, you were sayingthat he'd have a tough time
taking back what he said previously, which is a personal investment of prestige
if nothing else.

And the GAO?! Geeze, Guy, you can get those yahoos to come up with about
any
result you want, and I think you know that.

Unlike many on the NG, I don't find the GAO to be all that biased. Sure,
they can go in with a
pre-conceived result, but they've got nothing to teach the services in
that line. And unlike the
military they can be asked to analyze a program by members of either party
(biased for or against),
while the military chain of command lacks that sort of independence. I
have found a few GAO reports
to be junk, but the majority are not, especially when they use the
militaries' own claims and numbers
to refute their arguments.

An old SGM of mine used to say, "Liars figure, and figures lie". The GAO is,
IMO, expert in that arcane field of endeavor.

And the services aren't??!!

You have been angling your

argument in this thread towards the USAF maybe dropping its procurement
number for F-35's, and now you want to trot out a GAO study that promises
break-even at 1700 aircraft?

Sure, 1,700 total production not just USAF, which is to say USN/USMC/UK
(plus spare engines) and
other foreign buyers, as we get a piece of all of that. Cutting and
pasting from globalsecurity.org:

"JSF Program 2006 Developements

"The F-35 program of record for the US and UK held steady at 2,593 for
four years, and those numbers
were reaffirmed in the January 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review. There were
reports in early 2006 that
the Air Force had an internal plan to ultimately reduce the number of
joint strike fighters from
1,763 to somewhere between 1,000 and 1,200."

So, assuming USAF goes down to 1,000-1,200, engine production just for the
definite customers is
1,830 - 2,030 plus spares, before you add in any of the other export
customers (Spain, Italy,
Australia being pretty certain, with lots of other likely buyers) or
possible use on other
platforms. Last time I checked L-M was still claiming a potential demand
for 3,000 a/c, although
AFAIC that's pie-in-the-sky. 2,000-2,500 seems more probable. But I
doubt anyone other than the
most giddy optimist at GD would have predicted 4,000+ for the F-16 back in
1978, so who knows. The
pace of UCAV development and acceptance will likely be the determining
factor.

Uhmm... the USN has also been known to make noises about final production
numbers, and the Brits threatened to pull out altogether. 1700 is not
assured as of yet, though I think it likely that we will acheive that
number.

Last I checked 1,700 included revised USN/USMC numbers.

<snip some of Brits ripping us off>

Gee, and that was my favorite part... I wonder if I can find somebody who
will sell me full rights to my next home for only 6% of the purchase cost,
and then refund that committment twice over? Heck of a deal the UK got
there...

Worth it IMO.

I can still imagine the collective groan that
must have gone up from the state department when Rumsfeld made his
"Old
Europe" remark. It seems the countries he once
implied were the "New Europe" are now part of "Old Europe" again.
Are
we
ready to see Blair replaced by Brown, and
after that who knows?

That is the business of the people of the UK. I don't want them
meddling
in
our politics (though their laughable attempt to do so in the last
election
vis a vis Ohio neatly blew up in their faces), and I don't reckon we
have
any business playing in theirs.

Playing in them, no, but being deeply concerned by the outcome, yes.
Which do you think is likely
to cost the US taxpayer more; ponying up a couple billion for the
F-35/F136, or having a weakened
Blair or a future British PM decide to pull British troops out of
Basra/southern Iraq (and/or
Afghanistan), forcing us to take those jobs on as well?

Hey, Spain did it and we survived. Are you actually equating the F136
with
continued British participation in OIF and OEF?

Kevin, are you actually equating Spanish participation in OIF with the
Brits?

No, not really. And you should not equate the F136 deal with continued Brit
participation in OIF.

As I've stated elsewhere, I'm not. I consider anything we can do which might
help keep the current UK leadership in power worthwhile, but keeping the F136
development going at least until the F135 demonstrates maturity and that it can
meet its specs is a no-brainer to me. Given that its timeline is a couple of
years behind the F135's it benefits from being able to modify the basic design
to meet the needs of the F-35 as actually built, while the F135 was frozen
earlier when the F-35 design still had to undergo some fairly major changes.

<snip>

I figure the F-35 and similar help we
can give the current UK government (like the US101), if it helps keep
them
in power, is cheap at
the price.

Sounds a bit like blackmail to me. I don't want the UK support if it is
that
mercenary in nature (and I don't think it is).

If it were primarily mercenary in nature, they would have demanded far
more from us. Do you remember
how much Turkey wanted from us just to let us bring the 4th ID in through
there? It was a lot more
than a measly couple of billion.

It's not a question of blackmail, it's a question of Britain being a
democracy whose elected leaders
are responsible, first and foremost, for the interests of the people who
elected them.

Ta-da! And so should ours! Now you may LIKE subsidizing UK industry out of
your tax payments, but I am not real fond of that approach. You keep dancing
away from the cold hard facts--they are contributing some 6 whopping
percent, they plan to recoup at least twice what they invest in direct
contracts, and you think we OWE them more??!

Kevin, we're currently spending $8 billion a month on our military in Iraq. We
also have troops in Afghanistan, and the UK, Canadians and a few others are
taking over some of their work, allowing us to decrease our presence there by
3,000 or so. The UK has a two-brigade division in southern Iraq, and has had it
there for three years. How much do you think it will cost us to pick up the
British mission in southern Iraq and Afghanistan if they decide to pull out?

Blair has
been with us in the Balkans (ahead of us, in that case),

Ah, yes, the Balkans... The local where the EC weenie made the public
statement that we Yanks should keep our noses out of that tent, that the
Euros would handle it all quite niclely themselves, thank you...before
switching to the "Where the heck is the bloody US!" cry later. We are just
now getting loose of that tarbaby...

I'm not about to defend the EC about their tardiness inYugoslavia (or ours,
either). The fact is that Blair was ready to do something effective, including
ground troops, before we were.

Afghanistan and Iraq, either because he
really believes that it's the right thing to do; or else because he
believes keeping the special
relationship going is important enough to support the US position even
when he isn't fully convinced
of its wisdom, and he has risked his personal popularity to do so. Name
_any_ other allied leader
who has been willing (and able) to do so against such overwhelming
domestic opposition, over such a
long period of time.

The funny thing is that is is still not our place to set policy to favor any
individual leader of the UK government, now is it?

Oh, come, let's not pretend we live in an utopian fantasy world. We've set
policy to favor/disfavor any number of governments/candidates, up to and
including organizing their overthrow when it suits us. For a democratic ally
like the UK our favoritism should be less obvious and less intrusive because we
still have to be on reasonablygood terms with the opposition if 'our' candidate
loses, but to pretend that favoritism doesn't exist is naive.

Let the Brits sort out their

own politics. You could just as well end up with bowing to them on the
F136
and then seeing Blair get the boot anywho...which would leave your
argument
where?

Still having the F136, which IMO is all to the good.

I am not going to be hiring you to prepare out taxes...you are a bit free
with my money, IMO. :-)

This year, maybe, but think of it as an IRA--the payoff's several years down the
road.

<snip much HV-22 vs. MH-60>

gotta stick with my earlier assessment that the Navy is keeping its
options
open as to buying the HV (when the bad publicity wanes after the USMC has
them in operation a couple of years, you might very well see that HV
procurment pop back into the active budget item list).

I certainly hope so, but short of a major CSAR failure how are they going
to justify that buy just a
few years down the road after having spent all that money buying MH-60s
for the Specops/CSAR
missions, not to mention all the training time?

The great thing about the MH-60's is that they are capable of being used in
other roles by the USN, not to mention that the procurment of another tool
for the CSAR toolbox does not mean that they have to dump all of the
Seahawks.

They certainly need an airframe to replace the UH-46s for VERTREP, and that's a
job that no one in their right mind would use a tiltrotor for.

Guy

.

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