The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

[LargoWinch]

All right, I am not a military expert or buff. All I know comes from the odd discovery channel show I stumble upon once in a while, which is not much. And to be honest, I do not care much about such things anyway.

Having said that, the below-noted news caught my attention.

Why cancelling a $140 million per airplane program be such a terrible thing? Especially, why is this particular media outlet (in this case DailyTech) focusing on job losses?

That is a good example of the extent of the problem we face: dysfunctional - if not outright corrupt - media.

PS: Please no military-related discussions about thingy X vs. thingy Y.

The Pentagon is ready to end two major programs that will likely cause job cuts among several private contractors

Defense Secretary Robert Gates shook up the private defense sector at the start of the week by announcing that the Pentagon plans to end F-22 fighter jet production and cancel the Lockheed Martin VH-71 helicopter program in the near future. The loss of both the fighter jet and helicopter will likely put thousands of Americans out of work while the U.S. military refocuses on a new type of war.

Continued here.

[Chomsky]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

Exactly. Military spending as social welfare is a massively wasteful endeavor.

[BrianL]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

I'm not sure what you're trying to point out here. Job loss is part of the story, is it not?

We can debate the value of jobs funded by military development; I understand that. But how is reporting the potential impact of the decision media bias? Perhaps I'm just too use to hearing about aviation news stories/job loss due my proximity to Boeing. Anything that creates or destroys Boeing jobs for example gets plenty of coverage in the Seattle area.

[occdude]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

While it is "sad" that people will lose their jobs. What is more sad is the fact that our economy is so reliant on weapons production. I've seen a pie chart that showed US military expenditures to be over 1/2 of ALL other countries expenditures COMBINED.

Welfare often gets the focus on matters of fiscality while warfare gets a pass (I know because I fell victim to this "idiotology" voting for Bush Jr. twice). Whats a true fiscal conservative to do when you want both the military industrial complex and the war against poverty to both go to the scrapeheap?

And why does it cost us 122 million dollars to produce ONE fighter plane? Is that reflective of how unproductive we've become? I remember when fighter planes cost 25 million for an F-15 and we thought that was a lot.


I recently handled a WW2 M1 carbine. I was amazed at the simplicity, common sense operability and durability of this weapon manufactured at a time where we still had some common sense. A farm boy who never picked up a rifle could figure this one out in about five seconds.

It is telling how at a time when we were still mighty, how we produced a nifty little effective rifle compared to today where a 130 million gets you one plane and maybe a tank of fuel.

[BiscayneSunrise]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

Robert Gates (Bush appointee) is fond of saying that the Pentagon spends too much money preparing for wars they may never fight.

The F-22 is the absolute culmination of fighter technology. And just like everything thing that comes out of a peak, it is useless. As weapons get smarter the airplanes needed to deliver them can be less sophisticated. Witness the rise of UAV's.

There was lots of talk in the fighter pilot community that the F-22 would potentially be the last manned fighter airplane. Technophobes were aghast, saying that you would always need a man in an airplane. They said no way would the F-22 be the last manned fighter and they were right. It looks as though the F-15 will be the last manned fighter.

There will still be lots of money spent on the military but the emphasis will be on outer & cyber space and unmanned vehicles.

[GRG55]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

All right, I am not a military expert or buff. All I know comes from the odd discovery channel show I stumble upon once in a while, which is not much. And to be honest, I do not care much about such things anyway.

Having said that, the below-noted news caught my attention.

Why cancelling a $140 million per airplane program be such a terrible thing? Especially, why is this particular media outlet (in this case DailyTech) focusing on job losses?

That is a good example of the extent of the problem we face: dysfunctional - if not outright corrupt - media.

PS: Please no military-related discussions about thingy X vs. thingy Y.



Continued here.

Many years ago a brilliant and prolific American aeronautical engineer, Burt Rutan **, gave a lecture at the Experimental Aircraft Association's convention questioning the validity of much of USA's approach to military aviation, particularly the use of expensive, manned offensive aircraft. He suggested that for much less money the USA could easily develop a small unmanned attack aircraft, and produce it in such large quantities that when launched en masse against an enemy, it would be overwhelming, even if losses were relatively high [think of a locust attack].

If this falls into the catagory of "military-related discussions about thingy X vs. thingy Y", my apologies...


**His firm, Scaled Composites, is based in Mojave, California. http://www.scaled.com/

[Mega]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

Noticed a few things like this, both the JFK & Kitty Hank are layed up & on their way to be cut up.

Noticed ALL the F14's getting chopped up.

In my child hood i watched as the British war manchine was chopped up, our fleet carries etc.........We had to do the Falklands war with Helecopter carries!

Mike

[ASH]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

And why does it cost us 122 million dollars to produce ONE fighter plane?

At one level, you're paying to be the cowboys and not the indians -- to take fewer casualties through superior technical capability. You are paying to stay at least one generation ahead of anything fielded by anyone else, so that there's no contest in the air -- and if there's no contest in the air, the grunts don't have to take as many casualties on the ground because they can have unfettered close air support and casualty evacuation, they can be rapidly supplied, and they can choose to bypass difficult terrain.

At another level, you're paying for our ability to use military force overseas to pursue national interests that fall short of survival -- some would call this empire. Why do we need to have low casualty rates? I don't discount our genuine desire for our boys to make it home in one piece, but one effect of low casualty rates is a greater public tolerance of "elective" conflicts.

He suggested that for much less money the USA could easily develop a small unmanned attack aircraft, and produce it in such large quantities that when launched en masse against an enemy, it would be overwhelming, even if losses were relatively high [think of a locust attack].

It certainly seems this is where we're heading. I'd bet you that the willingness to cease production of the F-22 relates to the projected state of readiness of robotic weapons. It's not that purely robotic weapons are off the drawing board yet (armed drones are more like remote-control aircraft), but it might mean we're feeling confident that they'll be ready by the time a "peer" competitor can emerge. The biggest problem I see with low-cost robotic weapons is taking the human out of the loop for firing decisions. We can definitely make robots that fly -- but I think target recognition and shoot/no-shoot decision making is a harder computational problem than flight control. Also, it introduces some ethical questions, when the "decision" to kill a human being is made entirely by a machine.

[bcassill]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

As expensive as it is, the F-22 is by far the most capable fighter aircraft in existence. One way to think about this is hardware replacement costs to make up for losses when the shooting actually starts. It is much less likely that we'd have to replace an F-22 vs. another incomparable airplane. Compared to some of the more hairbrained things our defense establishment invests in, I would not mind buying a few more of these things just in case.

[seanm123]

Re: The end of the F-22 Program and confirmation of media myopia

The F-22 at 140 million a piece does a great job of chasing down Russian Bombers from the 1950s.