Is it time to abolish the Air Force?

Kamakazi010654 wrote:
Jonman wrote:

If you want to get down to the nitty gritty, the reason the DoD signed off contracts to develop the F-35 is that the airplane that they ended up getting was not the airplane that they thought they were getting. For myriad reasons, most notably because they thought that it would be cheaper to develop one airplane that could do three jobs than it would be to develop three airplanes.

I think this is something that gets forgotten when the F-35 gets taken to task so harshly.

It is NOT like the Air Force/DoD/Congress all sat down and said "Hey lets spend billions of dollars on a crappy plane." If they could have actually achieved the goal of making an airframe that would have been 90% as capable in the roles it was replacing, for a little bit more than an F-16 (which if I remember correctly was the goal), it would have been a giant win for both the US and its allies.

It seems a bit obvious that we may not get that, but that is sort of how it is in new technology, this is just a very very very large example of it.

Yes but they don't have to continue to throw billions of dollars at a project that has been determined it cannot meet the original goals. They know now what it can and can't do and yet they still choose to pour billions more of our money into it. That is not an unpredicted outcome, that is just wastefulness of our money. I have no sympathy.

As far as the OP, the Air Force won't disbanded because of drones and satellites. That is where the future is and the Air Force did a good job of marketing and forcing themselves into the role of the 'tech' systems. Satellites and weaponized Space is the most important area to control over the next 50 years.

Tanglebones wrote:
Infyrnos wrote:

You guys are all missing the most important point. If you abolish the Air Force, who is going to manage the Stargate?

IASA:

If you want to trust a bunch of drones with a Scarren dreadnought bearing down on you...

SpacePPoliceman wrote:
Tanglebones wrote:
Infyrnos wrote:

You guys are all missing the most important point. If you abolish the Air Force, who is going to manage the Stargate?

IASA:

If you want to trust a bunch of drones with a Scarren dreadnought bearing down on you...

Well, space programs do have a long history of bringing in scientists from enemy powers..

IMAGE(http://media-2.web.britannica.com/eb-media/45/6845-004-9BFC7E37.jpg)
IMAGE(http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/farscape/images/b/bd/Harvey_2.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20070108032454)

An even worse idea: I don't think von Braun vowed to destroy the Earth out of spite.