my opinion is that it's too costly, for what you get. They look cool, i'm sure they are awesome jets, but come on. 187 of them? at 350 billion a pop? that require 30 hours of service which cost 44,000 for every hour they are flown, which hasn't been 1 single hour of combat?
again, you dont measure these things by the fact that they havent flown in combat. they are designed to shoot down other planes. we have been fighting wars against people without planes. if we fought a nation with a proper air force, these things would crush their fighters easily. it is important that nations that do not like us are aware of this.
lol, You are right, we should stop advancements so that if an actual war breaks out, we have nothing for air-to-air.....
Just to give you an example Red, My first shirt here at Nellis, E-8, is about 5'11 and at least 230. Some would consider him fat..... He ran his 1.5 mile in 9:30.. For his age, he scored in the 90's on his test. The Air Force has actually been in the processes of weeding out all the waste in the force. He is not one of them... You might want to stick to things you are 100% clear on rather than going off "perception".
[ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_active_United_States_military_aircraft]List of active United States military aircraft - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame] Oh lord what would we do without 1 less version of a military aircraft..... I mean it's not like we have a stable or anything....
You really do not know much about aviation maintenance. I cannot go into detail about the cost, but the F-16 and F-15(which I work on) cost near the same. The thing that makes the F-22 a bit more expensive on the cost per sortie is the fact that if a panel has to come off for maintenance, the special paint has to be reapplied. Also, the parts are a bit more expensive, which makes sense for the type and age of aircraft it is. For example, an average cost for an F-16 sortie is around 30k….
interesting article. Wasteful Defense Spending Is a Clear and Present Danger - WSJ.com I just find it funny when people talk about how stupid, and inept the government is, but not when it comes to defense, no sir.
Who said there was no waste in defense? Show me... Please I and others stated the importance of these over prices aircraft. Cost of each is another issue, though their worth on the battlefield is priceless with the type of things they can do vs. our enemies..... You really think that we assume there is no waste in the defense budget? Get real kid.