If he truly will take a stab at the military spending to improve 'government efficiency', that's a pretty solid thumbs up. I just don't hope it gives him the idea to make his own fighter jets but...
If he truly will take a stab at the military spending to improve 'government efficiency', that's a pretty solid thumbs up.
I just don't hope it gives him the idea to make his own fighter jets but cheaper (like SpaceX and Tesla before it). The man is an opportunist so I wouldn't put it past him. Question in that case, is it allowed to run a business as a government official. Which would put the US more in line with say, South Korea where the government IS ran by big corp.
EDIT: It'll probably be called DefenseX since I wouldn't put it past him to have sex at the end of every company name he owns.
If he'd truly take a stab at military spending he wouldn't look at actually well performing 5th generation fighters but rather the obscene material expenditure or elsewhere. This is just...
If he'd truly take a stab at military spending he wouldn't look at actually well performing 5th generation fighters but rather the obscene material expenditure or elsewhere. This is just unnecessary FUD in a time of instability where projecting power is important again.
Right. The wasteful spending is already fucking spent lol. If we killed the F35 now, it would have all gone to waste. And this isn't sunk cost fallacy where we're trying to dig ourself out of a...
Right. The wasteful spending is already fucking spent lol. If we killed the F35 now, it would have all gone to waste. And this isn't sunk cost fallacy where we're trying to dig ourself out of a pit. We're out of the pit. Development was wrought with delays, cost overruns, and waste. But those days are over. The planes are good now. Screeching about the F-35 program is just loser-grade populist low-hanging fruit based on decade-old news headlines that idiots might still remember. It is not the path to effectively trimming our military budget.
Right. There's a lot of waste in the DoD budget, as far as I'm aware. But getting to it requires a gentler touch that looking at the latest procurement project (that is being bought at more...
Right. There's a lot of waste in the DoD budget, as far as I'm aware. But getting to it requires a gentler touch that looking at the latest procurement project (that is being bought at more expensive rates by export customers abroad, ffs) and question that.
I see two ways of saving money that the DoD doesn't automatically do all by itself already:
(1) Re-evaluating whether certain capabilities the DoD targets are actually necessary. Do you want to deter China? Probably. Do you want to be able to do it without your allies, while also being capable of roflstomping Russia? Probably not. The reality is more detailed than that, because there's shades of gray and also because a capability you don't think you need is also essential for a contingency you're not even thinking of right now. But it's not hard to argue that the US military is trying to do too much at the same time.
(2) Make internal processes leaner. Basically, if you can make sure that less red tape and paperpushing happens before you arrive at the same outcome, do it. This is so mindnumbingly boring, I'm sure Musk isn't even thinking of it. And no, you can't just gut entire processes outright because you don't like them. Somewhere, a decade or maybe a century ago, a procurement project went way over budget because this process didn't exist. Find the problem the process intends to solve, check if the cost/benefit is there, see if you can reduce the cost without reintroducing the problem.
But nahh, X-Man probably simply wants to get into the defense space, because at this point where else can he make enough money to become a trillionaire? Ohh, Tesla should upgrade all the DoD's guns with coil guns. You could call them Tesla Coils. That sounds like a trillion dollar idea to me, if the US govt is corrupt enough to play ball.... wait a sec...
Yeah, unfortunately, there's really not a whole lot we can do to easily cut the military budget based on what we ask it to do. Politically, the commander in chief likes being able to park carriers...
Yeah, unfortunately, there's really not a whole lot we can do to easily cut the military budget based on what we ask it to do. Politically, the commander in chief likes being able to park carriers off the coast of multiple conflict areas at once for some good old fashioned gunship diplomacy. You can't do that and fight a war at the same time and provide assurance of defending the homeland without an absolutely massive military budget.
Like it or not, much of the political, economic, and cultural strength of the US comes from the strength of its military, and having a military that powerful comes with a huge price tag, that "get rid of the f35" won't even begin to impact significantly.
This is another point that I think often goes underappreciated, particularly within the US. I meant to at least allude to it, but it certainly deserves explicit pointing out. The US is where it is...
much of the political, economic, and cultural strength of the US comes from the strength of its military
This is another point that I think often goes underappreciated, particularly within the US. I meant to at least allude to it, but it certainly deserves explicit pointing out. The US is where it is in the world, and its people are where they are economically, not in spite of the US military, but because of it. To a substantial extent anyway.
Topologically, the diplomatic shape of the democratic world might as well be a star, with the US at the center: Many countries have very loose connections among each other, but most have close connections to the US, be it for trade, security guarantees, or what have you. That's not a coincidence.
I think part of the problem is that he's targeting people like me, whom only remember the F-35 as "that jet that's taking waaayyy too long to develop and it's predecessor is still good enough that...
I think part of the problem is that he's targeting people like me, whom only remember the F-35 as "that jet that's taking waaayyy too long to develop and it's predecessor is still good enough that the costs aren't justified," as once it fell out of the news cycle I didn't think about it until today.
It's been operational for quite some time, and is the most capable multirole combat aircraft ever built. Musk has no experience in defense whatsoever, and is just repeating things popular...
It's been operational for quite some time, and is the most capable multirole combat aircraft ever built. Musk has no experience in defense whatsoever, and is just repeating things popular (uninformed) military articles were saying five years ago.
His idea of replacing all combat aircraft with drones any time within the next 20 years is just complete fantasy, and people using Ukraine as an example of how modern combat works are completely leaving out the point that both countries are broke and at their absolutely military industrial limit. A war between the US and China would look far different than Ukraine does.
Musk is, as usual, pretending to be an expert on something he hasn't got the first clue about, and relying on his army of midwit fanboys to elevate his wild guess opinion to the standard of "fact'.
Apparently, it is still not fully operational. @R3qn65 linked an article that pointed out that all new planes coming off the line are currently in storage, and the dod and other buyers won't take...
Apparently, it is still not fully operational. @R3qn65 linked an article that pointed out that all new planes coming off the line are currently in storage, and the dod and other buyers won't take delivery, because a necessary software upgrade is not operational; it's already over a year behind schedule and no projected completion date.
The same article implies that the platform's usable lifespan will be significantly less than the projected 30 years.
I'm no fan of Elon, but the f35 sure looks like corporate welfare/MIC run amok.
Those are TR-3 aircraft, which is a technology upgrade package for the planes that bring their electronics up to an increased capability level for the upcoming block 4 deployment. Fighter aircraft...
Those are TR-3 aircraft, which is a technology upgrade package for the planes that bring their electronics up to an increased capability level for the upcoming block 4 deployment.
Fighter aircraft get regular upgrades to increase their capabilities as new technologies are developed, and those upgrades are both retrofitted into existing aircraft, and integrated into new aircraft rolling off the line. TR-3 had software problems that caused the Air Force to refuse to take them until Lockheed fixed the problems. The F-35 has been fully operational and flying missions since 2015 though. The Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps have over 600 of them regularly flying now.
Combat aircraft are never fully "done". They get regular updates throughout the course of their lifetimes. The B-52 is supposed to get a major upgrade in a couple years, and it's first flight was in 1952, it's almost as old as the Air Force itself.
They've been in service arguably since at least 2016 and combat since 2018? They're not some secret aircraft, they have a documented performance, and a shitload of potential orders being filled by...
They've been in service arguably since at least 2016 and combat since 2018? They're not some secret aircraft, they have a documented performance, and a shitload of potential orders being filled by basically all of NATO.
Popularity is no substitute for meaningful performance data. “We’ve managed to log x hours of flying” is a meaningless metric for a project of this cost.
Popularity is no substitute for meaningful performance data. “We’ve managed to log x hours of flying” is a meaningless metric for a project of this cost.
@Eji1700 also asked a similar question. I had asked about a source for "performing well." Someone's response was that it had been "operational" since 2016. I, perhaps too flippantly, reinterpreted...
I had asked about a source for "performing well." Someone's response was that it had been "operational" since 2016. I, perhaps too flippantly, reinterpreted that as the sole evidence of its performance the amount of time it had flown, or "x number of flight hours."
I would hope that that the military and government contractors are accurately and robustly defining and measuring performance; but as there's no accessible data of which I am aware, the only performance metric put forward so far is flight hours. I have grave doubts about competence and intention and integrity around the f35 and MIC in general. If they can't even produce propaganda level numbers, my surmise is that the actual data are horrific.
You're not going to get hard performance metrics of an operational combat aircraft without a security clearance and a need to know. The only information you're going to get is what Congress and...
You're not going to get hard performance metrics of an operational combat aircraft without a security clearance and a need to know.
The only information you're going to get is what Congress and the DoD have publicly said about it, which is generally that the plane is performing well.
Overseeing those metrics and the DoD in general is the job of the Senate and house armed services committees.
I can't point you to a source or anything, although the linked lazerpig has multiple videos on it, but the airframe has been in service for a while and seems to truly outperform the previous...
I can't point you to a source or anything, although the linked lazerpig has multiple videos on it, but the airframe has been in service for a while and seems to truly outperform the previous generations and selling a ton to boot. I don't think it's too much of a stretch. Countries generally do not spend billions on bunk military aviation.
Fair shake, fighter jets are untested in peer to peer war so I can't truly assess their performance with any degree of certainty beyond what we have.
I’m sorry, popularity, even longevity , does not mean good performance. The only non government, non supplier sources suggest nothing but trouble. And just thinking it through, what role can these...
I’m sorry, popularity, even longevity , does not mean good performance. The only non government, non supplier sources suggest nothing but trouble.
And just thinking it through, what role can these things play that can’t be filled by legacy aircraft + smaller uavs and rockets?
Even if it’s true, however, that they are finally performing to spec AND there is a legitimate role to play, it’s at least plausible that operational costs over three decades would surpass scrapping the program for something smaller and more adaptable.
My gut says this is corporate welfare/mic amok endpoint. It’s not new, the USS nc in 1944 was equipped with an exceedingly complex analog targeting computer that managed to hit something <1% of the time.
Elon and I align on little, but today I agree the f35’s only lasting benefit is to its financiers.
Sorry to keep bombarding you with replies, but I have some insight into these kinds of strategic decisions due to my former careers so I want to explain why Elon is wrong. First, there's an...
Exemplary
Sorry to keep bombarding you with replies, but I have some insight into these kinds of strategic decisions due to my former careers so I want to explain why Elon is wrong.
First, there's an absolute ton that a manned fighter can do that a drone can't. Operational drones, as a rule, don't have stellar combat performance. They're very easy to shoot down, they're not very fast, they're not very maneuverable and so on. All of that is intentional of course, because they have a mission profile that doesn't require that stuff, but that limits them to only being able to do certain kinds of missions, while also being the main reason they're so cheap.
Two obvious questions come up based on that explanation:
Why don't we make a drone that performs as well as a fighter? We absolutely could. The problem there is that it would become as, or more expensive than a fighter. Fighters are designed to be survivable for two reasons. Chiefly, they're massively expensive. Losing one is a big blow to a military, so you really don't want to lose them. Secondly (and yes, it's a bit grim that this is secondary), they have a person in them that will likely die or be capture if it's shot down. Making a fighter jet unmanned elimates the second, but not the first. A drone fighter would still be massively expensive, so it still needs to be survivable. That leads to point number two for the answer to this question. Human beings are better combat pilots than computers still. They may not be quite as precise or resistant to g forces, but they can make informed decisions with years of training and experience backing it up. They don't have to check in with their commanders to make those good decisions if their communications are jammed. They can find good targets of opportunity, they can escape from harm, and they can make moral decisions that they're accountable for in a way that a drone can't. That's why human piloted aircraft will fill the "air superiority" type roles for the foreseeable future.
The second question is probably the more important one:
Do we NEED an aircraft with the capabilities a fighter jet?
This is a good question, because we don't truly know the answer to that. We think that yes, we do, because having an aircraft that can go higher, go faster, be more stealthy, and beat enemy fighters has always been an extremely valuable part of warfare since air combat has existed, and we think it still is, but we don't know until that's actually tested in a huge near peer conflict.
In 1961, the F4 phantom was introduced into the Vietnam war as a high speed interceptor and fighter/bomber. Since guided missile technology was introduced, it was thought that a gun on the jet would be unnecessary. The F4 mainly quickly caught up to an enemy aircraft and launched a missile from beyond visual range, the enemy would get hit by something they never even saw, and dogfighting was obsolete.
Once the F4 started being used in Vietnam, pilots would find that enemy fighters would quickly close with them, slow down to get behind them, and kill them with guns. The Phantom was basically defenseless against that without a short range weapon or the maneuverability to avoid getting shot up. Eventually, a gun was retrofitted onto the plane, and every fighter since has had one, including the F35.
The only real education you have when producing doctrine is the previous war. Everything else, theories, performance data, simulations, and wargames are still untested until the rubber meets the road, so the military tends to be very conservative when it comes to massive sweeping changes like that, since the price of getting it wrong is complete defeat. So as far as we know, based on the last large scale wars we've fought, and the capabilities of our potential adversaries, the answer is yes, we still need fighter jets.
I freely admit that I'm not sure of this, and anyone who is is very overconfident in their ability to predict the future. I'm also by no means an expert on it either, although I do have a little experience.
I can confidently say that Elon Musk is absolutely less qualified than I am to answer that question though.
Thata great reply, I appreciate it and am forced to soften my skepticism as a result. I’d like to hear you answer to 3. Do/did we really need the f35 (as opposed to exisiting air craft or a...
Thata great reply, I appreciate it and am forced to soften my skepticism as a result. I’d like to hear you answer to 3. Do/did we really need the f35 (as opposed to exisiting air craft or a platform that’s cheaper) and is what we have a good value?
We need a fifth generation fighter. It didn't have to be the F-35, but China has the J-20, which is who we're predominantly competing with when it comes to state of the art multi role air...
We need a fifth generation fighter. It didn't have to be the F-35, but China has the J-20, which is who we're predominantly competing with when it comes to state of the art multi role air superiority fighters. For what it's worth, it's less expensive than the other fifth generation fighter we have, the F-22, so there's that.
One of the big benefits of the F-35 was that its a multirole aircraft with three major variants with a lot of parts commonality between them. They replace five existing airplanes in the US, and more in allied countries, so the development costs were shared between those departments and countries.
In theory, this makes logistics, training, and maintenance easier than each service having their own custom designed aircraft that does more or less the same thing (The F-16 and A-10 for the Air-Force, two F/A-18 variants for the Navy, and the Harrier for the Marines), and development doesn't have to reinvent the wheel every time.
There are use cases in air combat where a cheaper, less capable aircraft makes sense to use. Those missions are normally tasked to drones, which I expect to be even more common as time goes on.
Don't get me wrong, the program has been plagued with problems. But judged solely as an aircraft, from what we can tell, it seems like a pretty good one all things considered. As far as value for your money goes, well... it's a state of the art fighter jet, and there are few things ever built anywhere that are more expensive than those.
I think this is a pretty biased read of the literature surrounding the F35 - particularly given that you're discounting all positive sources out of a presupposition that they're biased. Here's a...
The only non government, non supplier sources suggest nothing but trouble.
I think this is a pretty biased read of the literature surrounding the F35 - particularly given that you're discounting all positive sources out of a presupposition that they're biased.
Here's a pretty balanced review by a European publication. It details problems with the F35 for thousands of words, and here's how it ends:
The wider picture
Despite the difficulties and problems, the F-35 is, without doubt, the most survivable combat air and ISR platform in service today. If the task is to go and drop a pair of small PGMs through someone’s roof, and return home safely (probably undetected, and certainly unmolested), then there is no better aircraft to achieve that than an F-35. The F-35 also has an unmatched ability to gather up a detailed tactical picture, using its sensors to provide its pilots with unrivalled situational awareness. The aircraft also has formidable electronic attack capabilities, offering another way of overcoming enemy air defences.
They then go on to talk about how the F35 will eventually be outmatched in pure air to air combat... and explain that this is the whole concept behind the US's 6th generation fighter project, which is the one that will use drones and things.
My gut says...
I don't mean this in a mean way, just as a sort of... thought for the future, I guess? One's "gut" only works when one is very familiar with a topic or environment. Especially with something like this that's extremely complicated, I find it can be good to double check whether I know the issue well enough for my intuition to be useful, or if I'm just being anchored to the first emotionally impactful thing I read.
I don't believe that article reaches the conclusion you think it does, and the clever wording belies a bias in my opinion. Your quote says it is "the most survivable combat air ... platform . ....
I don't believe that article reaches the conclusion you think it does, and the clever wording belies a bias in my opinion. Your quote says it is "the most survivable combat air ... platform . . ."[emphasis mine]. That's different that the "best" platform. He also provides no data or references, he just makes the bare assertion. He doesn't even point to Lockheed Martin or Joint operations propaganda to support it. The very next paragraph states
Many believe that even an upgraded F-35 will be inadequate to meet the rapidly evolving and increasingly contested threat environment.
If true, Given the first time we can say it did any performace was 2016, this leaves its service life at swomewhere around a decade. Given the price tag, that's a phenomenal waste of resources, and I don't agree that qualifies as well performing.
The article also points out that there are currently no deliverable f35's avaiallable due to Lockheed's inability to deliver properly operating software. Given that I was challinging the original comment here suggests that the F35 is "well-performing," I'd say this article overall cuts against that conclusion.
Finally, the f35 cost about $40,000 per hour to operate. The F18 is $30k, a reaper drone is like $3k. I don't know, but I suspect that the reaper can deliver a pgm way more safely for the pilot than an f35.
Regarding my gut, that's really all I have to go on. There's no real data about the f35's performance that I'm aware of, and what there is from testimony proceedings and reports by test pilots is bad. Therefore, I'm obviously not operationally cognizant; I'd be somewhat surprised if any tilderino has the necessary clearance to access that information. I do have more than passing familiarity with government largesse flowing to self-centered contractors who fail to provide needed services. I'm most familiar with the fails in mental healthcare, but usa.gov and all the halliburton stuff also comes to mind, and this looks an awful lot like that.
Respectfully, I think your mind is made up and you're not open to changing it, and you're not familiar enough with air warfare to be able to change mine (ex. "most survivable" is an airman's way...
the clever wording belies a bias in my opinion. Your quote says it is "the most survivable combat air ... platform . . ."[emphasis mine]. That's different that the "best" platform.
Respectfully, I think your mind is made up and you're not open to changing it, and you're not familiar enough with air warfare to be able to change mine (ex. "most survivable" is an airman's way to say "best." It's not some sneaky wording trick. The F35 and a reaper drone have such different missions, are designed to fly in such different environments, that comparing cost per flight hour is not a particularly good metric. And even if it were, the F35 is cheaper than the F22, so does that mean that the F22 sucks? No.)
For that reason I don't think continuing the conversation in this vein is productive.
If we could then move to a different vein, you seem to be as strong a proponent of the f-35 as I am a skeptic. I'm curious what in your background led to your interest in the project, and what you...
If we could then move to a different vein, you seem to be as strong a proponent of the f-35 as I am a skeptic. I'm curious what in your background led to your interest in the project, and what you see that leads you to believe that the f35 is a boon for the US and the world? For myself, I'm strongly against government misuse of resources, and especially in the military industrial intelligence complex. The values it dings are for human dignity and the integrity of the environment.
My anger at the military especially was formed when I randomly came across what I can only describe as a travel brochure of some pacific Island dedicated to weapons testing. I call it a travel brochure because it was an expensively produced glossy trifold with lots of smiling faces and touting luxurious accomodation for the testers. It led me to conclude that lots of money was being spent, and further observation has led me to conclude that a lot of the military machinery is only in service of that money, not actual defense.
This is not to say I'm a pure pacifist. I recognize humanity is warlike and that the western way of life, with all its problems, is still probably the best we've got and needs robust military defense to promote peace. We just seem to have forgotten prudence and temperence in the process.
Basically, I think that the time to be angry about the F-35 was in 2012, when the project wasn't really coming together and was having massive cost overruns. In 2024, the F-35 is the best fighter...
Basically, I think that the time to be angry about the F-35 was in 2012, when the project wasn't really coming together and was having massive cost overruns. In 2024, the F-35 is the best fighter jet ever made, replaces multiple legacy platforms, and is cheaper, per unit, than most other fighter aircraft.... none of which come even close to the F-35's performance.
I can't say whether that makes the F-35 a boon for the world. It may be so good that it's ultimately destabilizing - who knows. But it does make it a cost-effective project.
There is graft, corruption, and just plain stupidity in any military procurement process - that's well known, and just as true for the F35 as anything else. But that doesn't mean that the US military is ordering F-35s just for the hell of it. They need fighter jets and the F35 is a good one. For me, it's as simple as that.
I appreciate that. But I'm more curious about why this particular subject grips you, sufficient to engage with me so deeply. This is no complaint, I felt our discussion was tildes-worthy and...
I appreciate that. But I'm more curious about why this particular subject grips you, sufficient to engage with me so deeply. This is no complaint, I felt our discussion was tildes-worthy and rewarding for me. But I assume, though, you would not engage me in the same way on the relative merits of Ernie Irvin to Dale Earnhardt. Why is the f35 so important to you?
Apples to oranges. A hellfire has a 20 lbs warhead. Delivering that warhead to a location as cheaply as possible without any other considerations isn't the goal. If it were, we could just scrap...
The F18 is $30k, a reaper drone is like $3k.
Apples to oranges. A hellfire has a 20 lbs warhead. Delivering that warhead to a location as cheaply as possible without any other considerations isn't the goal. If it were, we could just scrap all of our ground attack aircraft and just use FedEx.
The f35 flies higher, further, faster, with better survivability, better sensors, and capable of doing far more missions than a reaper, which is why we have both reapers and f35s. Some missions can be done by reapers, some can be done by f35s, and some can be done by both but one is a better option than the other for various reasons.
The whole drone versus fighter jet debate makes as much sense as a tank versus infantry debate, or a submarine versus landing helicopter dock debate.
They're both things that fly in the air and which can shoot missiles, but the similarities end there. They're totally different platforms that do totally different things.
Non government, non supplier sources are making things up. Most information about how the f35 is performing, how it stacks up against adversary aircraft and weapons systems, and the technical...
The only non government, non supplier sources suggest nothing but trouble.
Non government, non supplier sources are making things up. Most information about how the f35 is performing, how it stacks up against adversary aircraft and weapons systems, and the technical details of it's performance are classified, which is very normal. People outside the government or manufacturer don't have anything but speculation to go on. If we were at large scale war with another country and we could look at casualty and mission success rates it would be one thing, but that data just isn't available to the public.
Because of that, I'd take any non government, non supplier opinion with a massive grain of salt, maybe even a bigger one that the official line.
The sources anyone has to base their opinions on are going to be anonymous (if they even exist), and thus, unverifiable, because sharing that kind of information is highly illegal and would 100% land you in military or federal prison.
My language was sadly imprecise, but this is after all a casual forum. My intended meaning was the operations staff pf the f35 and suppliers. The government, both congressional commitee members...
My language was sadly imprecise, but this is after all a casual forum.
My intended meaning was the operations staff pf the f35 and suppliers. The government, both congressional commitee members and the gao, have been critical.
I’m sure the military is very wasteful. But I don’t trust Musk in the slightest. It’s probably reasonable to assume he’s just trying to destabilize and weaken the United States military and the...
I’m sure the military is very wasteful. But I don’t trust Musk in the slightest. It’s probably reasonable to assume he’s just trying to destabilize and weaken the United States military and the country in general. Maybe to pick up the scraps, Great Depression - style. Maybe at the instruction of a foreign power. Many of the actions of Trump and his oligarchs appear to be exactly this.
This page has an extensive explanation of the parallels DOGE might have to previous groups like it. It also goes into funding, what other structures it might take, how group members might be...
This page has an extensive explanation of the parallels DOGE might have to previous groups like it. It also goes into funding, what other structures it might take, how group members might be vetted, and what DOGE will be looking into.
I wouldn’t claim to have cleared it up, I’m not sure I have it right. But also, it doesn’t seem like anyone actually knows at this point. However, I’m skeptical that Musk wants his communications...
I wouldn’t claim to have cleared it up, I’m not sure I have it right. But also, it doesn’t seem like anyone actually knows at this point.
However, I’m skeptical that Musk wants his communications to be subject to FOIA requests and government archiving laws. Much better to just be an advisor/consultant with absolutely no skin in the game, or the restrictions of an actual employee. Just throw money around and tell the government what to do.
<noise> We’re well past the point of there clearly being conflicts of interest anyway, so I don’t think the distinction makes a meaningful difference anymore. But it’s good to know nonetheless.
<noise>
We’re well past the point of there clearly being conflicts of interest anyway, so I don’t think the distinction makes a meaningful difference anymore. But it’s good to know nonetheless.
F-35 uses about 5000 pounds of fuel per hour[0], which is roughly 1000 pounds less than a typical transcontinental 737 will use[1]. Sure, a huge waste if we only had good options to both of these...
F-35 uses about 5000 pounds of fuel per hour[0], which is roughly 1000 pounds less than a typical transcontinental 737 will use[1]. Sure, a huge waste if we only had good options to both of these things (like not waging war ffs), but we do not.
If he truly will take a stab at the military spending to improve 'government efficiency', that's a pretty solid thumbs up.
I just don't hope it gives him the idea to make his own fighter jets but cheaper (like SpaceX and Tesla before it). The man is an opportunist so I wouldn't put it past him. Question in that case, is it allowed to run a business as a government official. Which would put the US more in line with say, South Korea where the government IS ran by big corp.
EDIT: It'll probably be called DefenseX since I wouldn't put it past him to have sex at the end of every company name he owns.
If he'd truly take a stab at military spending he wouldn't look at actually well performing 5th generation fighters but rather the obscene material expenditure or elsewhere. This is just unnecessary FUD in a time of instability where projecting power is important again.
Seriously the f35 is one of the few things going well finally and that’s what you want to nuke?
Right. The wasteful spending is already fucking spent lol. If we killed the F35 now, it would have all gone to waste. And this isn't sunk cost fallacy where we're trying to dig ourself out of a pit. We're out of the pit. Development was wrought with delays, cost overruns, and waste. But those days are over. The planes are good now. Screeching about the F-35 program is just loser-grade populist low-hanging fruit based on decade-old news headlines that idiots might still remember. It is not the path to effectively trimming our military budget.
Right. There's a lot of waste in the DoD budget, as far as I'm aware. But getting to it requires a gentler touch that looking at the latest procurement project (that is being bought at more expensive rates by export customers abroad, ffs) and question that.
I see two ways of saving money that the DoD doesn't automatically do all by itself already:
(1) Re-evaluating whether certain capabilities the DoD targets are actually necessary. Do you want to deter China? Probably. Do you want to be able to do it without your allies, while also being capable of roflstomping Russia? Probably not. The reality is more detailed than that, because there's shades of gray and also because a capability you don't think you need is also essential for a contingency you're not even thinking of right now. But it's not hard to argue that the US military is trying to do too much at the same time.
(2) Make internal processes leaner. Basically, if you can make sure that less red tape and paperpushing happens before you arrive at the same outcome, do it. This is so mindnumbingly boring, I'm sure Musk isn't even thinking of it. And no, you can't just gut entire processes outright because you don't like them. Somewhere, a decade or maybe a century ago, a procurement project went way over budget because this process didn't exist. Find the problem the process intends to solve, check if the cost/benefit is there, see if you can reduce the cost without reintroducing the problem.
But nahh, X-Man probably simply wants to get into the defense space, because at this point where else can he make enough money to become a trillionaire? Ohh, Tesla should upgrade all the DoD's guns with coil guns. You could call them Tesla Coils. That sounds like a trillion dollar idea to me, if the US govt is corrupt enough to play ball.... wait a sec...
Yeah, unfortunately, there's really not a whole lot we can do to easily cut the military budget based on what we ask it to do. Politically, the commander in chief likes being able to park carriers off the coast of multiple conflict areas at once for some good old fashioned gunship diplomacy. You can't do that and fight a war at the same time and provide assurance of defending the homeland without an absolutely massive military budget.
Like it or not, much of the political, economic, and cultural strength of the US comes from the strength of its military, and having a military that powerful comes with a huge price tag, that "get rid of the f35" won't even begin to impact significantly.
This is another point that I think often goes underappreciated, particularly within the US. I meant to at least allude to it, but it certainly deserves explicit pointing out. The US is where it is in the world, and its people are where they are economically, not in spite of the US military, but because of it. To a substantial extent anyway.
Topologically, the diplomatic shape of the democratic world might as well be a star, with the US at the center: Many countries have very loose connections among each other, but most have close connections to the US, be it for trade, security guarantees, or what have you. That's not a coincidence.
I think part of the problem is that he's targeting people like me, whom only remember the F-35 as "that jet that's taking waaayyy too long to develop and it's predecessor is still good enough that the costs aren't justified," as once it fell out of the news cycle I didn't think about it until today.
It's been operational for quite some time, and is the most capable multirole combat aircraft ever built. Musk has no experience in defense whatsoever, and is just repeating things popular (uninformed) military articles were saying five years ago.
His idea of replacing all combat aircraft with drones any time within the next 20 years is just complete fantasy, and people using Ukraine as an example of how modern combat works are completely leaving out the point that both countries are broke and at their absolutely military industrial limit. A war between the US and China would look far different than Ukraine does.
Musk is, as usual, pretending to be an expert on something he hasn't got the first clue about, and relying on his army of midwit fanboys to elevate his wild guess opinion to the standard of "fact'.
Apparently, it is still not fully operational. @R3qn65 linked an article that pointed out that all new planes coming off the line are currently in storage, and the dod and other buyers won't take delivery, because a necessary software upgrade is not operational; it's already over a year behind schedule and no projected completion date.
The same article implies that the platform's usable lifespan will be significantly less than the projected 30 years.
I'm no fan of Elon, but the f35 sure looks like corporate welfare/MIC run amok.
That's really not what the article was saying.
Those are TR-3 aircraft, which is a technology upgrade package for the planes that bring their electronics up to an increased capability level for the upcoming block 4 deployment.
Fighter aircraft get regular upgrades to increase their capabilities as new technologies are developed, and those upgrades are both retrofitted into existing aircraft, and integrated into new aircraft rolling off the line. TR-3 had software problems that caused the Air Force to refuse to take them until Lockheed fixed the problems. The F-35 has been fully operational and flying missions since 2015 though. The Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps have over 600 of them regularly flying now.
Combat aircraft are never fully "done". They get regular updates throughout the course of their lifetimes. The B-52 is supposed to get a major upgrade in a couple years, and it's first flight was in 1952, it's almost as old as the Air Force itself.
You have reliable information about those f35s? What does “well performing” even mean?
They've been in service arguably since at least 2016 and combat since 2018? They're not some secret aircraft, they have a documented performance, and a shitload of potential orders being filled by basically all of NATO.
Popularity is no substitute for meaningful performance data. “We’ve managed to log x hours of flying” is a meaningless metric for a project of this cost.
Can you explain your thought process a little more here? Do you suspect that the US department of defense is only using hours flown as their analysis?
@Eji1700 also asked a similar question.
I had asked about a source for "performing well." Someone's response was that it had been "operational" since 2016. I, perhaps too flippantly, reinterpreted that as the sole evidence of its performance the amount of time it had flown, or "x number of flight hours."
I would hope that that the military and government contractors are accurately and robustly defining and measuring performance; but as there's no accessible data of which I am aware, the only performance metric put forward so far is flight hours. I have grave doubts about competence and intention and integrity around the f35 and MIC in general. If they can't even produce propaganda level numbers, my surmise is that the actual data are horrific.
You're not going to get hard performance metrics of an operational combat aircraft without a security clearance and a need to know.
The only information you're going to get is what Congress and the DoD have publicly said about it, which is generally that the plane is performing well.
Overseeing those metrics and the DoD in general is the job of the Senate and house armed services committees.
I don’t see how you focused on x hours of flying when they’ve been in successful combat missions since 2018.
What would you consider a useful metric?
I can't point you to a source or anything, although the linked lazerpig has multiple videos on it, but the airframe has been in service for a while and seems to truly outperform the previous generations and selling a ton to boot. I don't think it's too much of a stretch. Countries generally do not spend billions on bunk military aviation.
Fair shake, fighter jets are untested in peer to peer war so I can't truly assess their performance with any degree of certainty beyond what we have.
I’m sorry, popularity, even longevity , does not mean good performance. The only non government, non supplier sources suggest nothing but trouble.
And just thinking it through, what role can these things play that can’t be filled by legacy aircraft + smaller uavs and rockets?
Even if it’s true, however, that they are finally performing to spec AND there is a legitimate role to play, it’s at least plausible that operational costs over three decades would surpass scrapping the program for something smaller and more adaptable.
My gut says this is corporate welfare/mic amok endpoint. It’s not new, the USS nc in 1944 was equipped with an exceedingly complex analog targeting computer that managed to hit something <1% of the time.
Elon and I align on little, but today I agree the f35’s only lasting benefit is to its financiers.
Sorry to keep bombarding you with replies, but I have some insight into these kinds of strategic decisions due to my former careers so I want to explain why Elon is wrong.
First, there's an absolute ton that a manned fighter can do that a drone can't. Operational drones, as a rule, don't have stellar combat performance. They're very easy to shoot down, they're not very fast, they're not very maneuverable and so on. All of that is intentional of course, because they have a mission profile that doesn't require that stuff, but that limits them to only being able to do certain kinds of missions, while also being the main reason they're so cheap.
Two obvious questions come up based on that explanation:
The second question is probably the more important one:
This is a good question, because we don't truly know the answer to that. We think that yes, we do, because having an aircraft that can go higher, go faster, be more stealthy, and beat enemy fighters has always been an extremely valuable part of warfare since air combat has existed, and we think it still is, but we don't know until that's actually tested in a huge near peer conflict.
In 1961, the F4 phantom was introduced into the Vietnam war as a high speed interceptor and fighter/bomber. Since guided missile technology was introduced, it was thought that a gun on the jet would be unnecessary. The F4 mainly quickly caught up to an enemy aircraft and launched a missile from beyond visual range, the enemy would get hit by something they never even saw, and dogfighting was obsolete.
Once the F4 started being used in Vietnam, pilots would find that enemy fighters would quickly close with them, slow down to get behind them, and kill them with guns. The Phantom was basically defenseless against that without a short range weapon or the maneuverability to avoid getting shot up. Eventually, a gun was retrofitted onto the plane, and every fighter since has had one, including the F35.
The only real education you have when producing doctrine is the previous war. Everything else, theories, performance data, simulations, and wargames are still untested until the rubber meets the road, so the military tends to be very conservative when it comes to massive sweeping changes like that, since the price of getting it wrong is complete defeat. So as far as we know, based on the last large scale wars we've fought, and the capabilities of our potential adversaries, the answer is yes, we still need fighter jets.
I freely admit that I'm not sure of this, and anyone who is is very overconfident in their ability to predict the future. I'm also by no means an expert on it either, although I do have a little experience.
I can confidently say that Elon Musk is absolutely less qualified than I am to answer that question though.
Thata great reply, I appreciate it and am forced to soften my skepticism as a result. I’d like to hear you answer to 3. Do/did we really need the f35 (as opposed to exisiting air craft or a platform that’s cheaper) and is what we have a good value?
We need a fifth generation fighter. It didn't have to be the F-35, but China has the J-20, which is who we're predominantly competing with when it comes to state of the art multi role air superiority fighters. For what it's worth, it's less expensive than the other fifth generation fighter we have, the F-22, so there's that.
One of the big benefits of the F-35 was that its a multirole aircraft with three major variants with a lot of parts commonality between them. They replace five existing airplanes in the US, and more in allied countries, so the development costs were shared between those departments and countries.
In theory, this makes logistics, training, and maintenance easier than each service having their own custom designed aircraft that does more or less the same thing (The F-16 and A-10 for the Air-Force, two F/A-18 variants for the Navy, and the Harrier for the Marines), and development doesn't have to reinvent the wheel every time.
There are use cases in air combat where a cheaper, less capable aircraft makes sense to use. Those missions are normally tasked to drones, which I expect to be even more common as time goes on.
Don't get me wrong, the program has been plagued with problems. But judged solely as an aircraft, from what we can tell, it seems like a pretty good one all things considered. As far as value for your money goes, well... it's a state of the art fighter jet, and there are few things ever built anywhere that are more expensive than those.
I think this is a pretty biased read of the literature surrounding the F35 - particularly given that you're discounting all positive sources out of a presupposition that they're biased.
Here's a pretty balanced review by a European publication. It details problems with the F35 for thousands of words, and here's how it ends:
They then go on to talk about how the F35 will eventually be outmatched in pure air to air combat... and explain that this is the whole concept behind the US's 6th generation fighter project, which is the one that will use drones and things.
I don't mean this in a mean way, just as a sort of... thought for the future, I guess? One's "gut" only works when one is very familiar with a topic or environment. Especially with something like this that's extremely complicated, I find it can be good to double check whether I know the issue well enough for my intuition to be useful, or if I'm just being anchored to the first emotionally impactful thing I read.
I don't believe that article reaches the conclusion you think it does, and the clever wording belies a bias in my opinion. Your quote says it is "the most survivable combat air ... platform . . ."[emphasis mine]. That's different that the "best" platform. He also provides no data or references, he just makes the bare assertion. He doesn't even point to Lockheed Martin or Joint operations propaganda to support it. The very next paragraph states
If true, Given the first time we can say it did any performace was 2016, this leaves its service life at swomewhere around a decade. Given the price tag, that's a phenomenal waste of resources, and I don't agree that qualifies as well performing.
The article also points out that there are currently no deliverable f35's avaiallable due to Lockheed's inability to deliver properly operating software. Given that I was challinging the original comment here suggests that the F35 is "well-performing," I'd say this article overall cuts against that conclusion.
Finally, the f35 cost about $40,000 per hour to operate. The F18 is $30k, a reaper drone is like $3k. I don't know, but I suspect that the reaper can deliver a pgm way more safely for the pilot than an f35.
Regarding my gut, that's really all I have to go on. There's no real data about the f35's performance that I'm aware of, and what there is from testimony proceedings and reports by test pilots is bad. Therefore, I'm obviously not operationally cognizant; I'd be somewhat surprised if any tilderino has the necessary clearance to access that information. I do have more than passing familiarity with government largesse flowing to self-centered contractors who fail to provide needed services. I'm most familiar with the fails in mental healthcare, but usa.gov and all the halliburton stuff also comes to mind, and this looks an awful lot like that.
Respectfully, I think your mind is made up and you're not open to changing it, and you're not familiar enough with air warfare to be able to change mine (ex. "most survivable" is an airman's way to say "best." It's not some sneaky wording trick. The F35 and a reaper drone have such different missions, are designed to fly in such different environments, that comparing cost per flight hour is not a particularly good metric. And even if it were, the F35 is cheaper than the F22, so does that mean that the F22 sucks? No.)
For that reason I don't think continuing the conversation in this vein is productive.
If we could then move to a different vein, you seem to be as strong a proponent of the f-35 as I am a skeptic. I'm curious what in your background led to your interest in the project, and what you see that leads you to believe that the f35 is a boon for the US and the world? For myself, I'm strongly against government misuse of resources, and especially in the military industrial intelligence complex. The values it dings are for human dignity and the integrity of the environment.
My anger at the military especially was formed when I randomly came across what I can only describe as a travel brochure of some pacific Island dedicated to weapons testing. I call it a travel brochure because it was an expensively produced glossy trifold with lots of smiling faces and touting luxurious accomodation for the testers. It led me to conclude that lots of money was being spent, and further observation has led me to conclude that a lot of the military machinery is only in service of that money, not actual defense.
This is not to say I'm a pure pacifist. I recognize humanity is warlike and that the western way of life, with all its problems, is still probably the best we've got and needs robust military defense to promote peace. We just seem to have forgotten prudence and temperence in the process.
Basically, I think that the time to be angry about the F-35 was in 2012, when the project wasn't really coming together and was having massive cost overruns. In 2024, the F-35 is the best fighter jet ever made, replaces multiple legacy platforms, and is cheaper, per unit, than most other fighter aircraft.... none of which come even close to the F-35's performance.
I can't say whether that makes the F-35 a boon for the world. It may be so good that it's ultimately destabilizing - who knows. But it does make it a cost-effective project.
There is graft, corruption, and just plain stupidity in any military procurement process - that's well known, and just as true for the F35 as anything else. But that doesn't mean that the US military is ordering F-35s just for the hell of it. They need fighter jets and the F35 is a good one. For me, it's as simple as that.
I appreciate that. But I'm more curious about why this particular subject grips you, sufficient to engage with me so deeply. This is no complaint, I felt our discussion was tildes-worthy and rewarding for me. But I assume, though, you would not engage me in the same way on the relative merits of Ernie Irvin to Dale Earnhardt. Why is the f35 so important to you?
I decline to answer :)
Apples to oranges. A hellfire has a 20 lbs warhead. Delivering that warhead to a location as cheaply as possible without any other considerations isn't the goal. If it were, we could just scrap all of our ground attack aircraft and just use FedEx.
The f35 flies higher, further, faster, with better survivability, better sensors, and capable of doing far more missions than a reaper, which is why we have both reapers and f35s. Some missions can be done by reapers, some can be done by f35s, and some can be done by both but one is a better option than the other for various reasons.
The whole drone versus fighter jet debate makes as much sense as a tank versus infantry debate, or a submarine versus landing helicopter dock debate.
They're both things that fly in the air and which can shoot missiles, but the similarities end there. They're totally different platforms that do totally different things.
Non government, non supplier sources are making things up. Most information about how the f35 is performing, how it stacks up against adversary aircraft and weapons systems, and the technical details of it's performance are classified, which is very normal. People outside the government or manufacturer don't have anything but speculation to go on. If we were at large scale war with another country and we could look at casualty and mission success rates it would be one thing, but that data just isn't available to the public.
Because of that, I'd take any non government, non supplier opinion with a massive grain of salt, maybe even a bigger one that the official line.
The sources anyone has to base their opinions on are going to be anonymous (if they even exist), and thus, unverifiable, because sharing that kind of information is highly illegal and would 100% land you in military or federal prison.
My language was sadly imprecise, but this is after all a casual forum.
My intended meaning was the operations staff pf the f35 and suppliers. The government, both congressional commitee members and the gao, have been critical.
I’m sure the military is very wasteful. But I don’t trust Musk in the slightest. It’s probably reasonable to assume he’s just trying to destabilize and weaken the United States military and the country in general. Maybe to pick up the scraps, Great Depression - style. Maybe at the instruction of a foreign power. Many of the actions of Trump and his oligarchs appear to be exactly this.
I was under the impression that Musk would not be a government employee, only an advisor. It’s only a subcommittee, not an actual department.
This page has an extensive explanation of the parallels DOGE might have to previous groups like it. It also goes into funding, what other structures it might take, how group members might be vetted, and what DOGE will be looking into.
gotcha, thank you for clearing that up.
I wouldn’t claim to have cleared it up, I’m not sure I have it right. But also, it doesn’t seem like anyone actually knows at this point.
However, I’m skeptical that Musk wants his communications to be subject to FOIA requests and government archiving laws. Much better to just be an advisor/consultant with absolutely no skin in the game, or the restrictions of an actual employee. Just throw money around and tell the government what to do.
We’re well past the point of there clearly being conflicts of interest anyway, so I don’t think the distinction makes a meaningful difference anymore. But it’s good to know nonetheless.
Remember that bag of bushings?
I had to google it but.. yea that is outrageously expensive.
He'd probably just encourage use of tech made by businesses he's friends with, e.g. Anduril's drones
F-35 uses about 5000 pounds of fuel per hour[0], which is roughly 1000 pounds less than a typical transcontinental 737 will use[1]. Sure, a huge waste if we only had good options to both of these things (like not waging war ffs), but we do not.
[0] https://agogs.sk/en/understanding-fuel-consumption-in-modern-military-aviation-a-look-at-the-f-35/
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/17o2dib/comment/k7vpjwe/
I think they were using "fuel" as a verb there rather than actually talking about aviation fuel.
Oops!
I mean, I fully stand by my comment.
Elon Musk is wrong about the F-35 by LazerPig
Archive link: https://archive.is/9ls21
Is there a way to filter words or phrases? Either through the website or the ‘three cheers for tildes’ app.
Beyond sick of hearing about this guy…
Add
elon muskto your tag filters.Thank you so so much
Should this be in ~society ? I mean, fighter jets are planes, but they're not really transport...
I agree, ~society or ~misc would probably fit best