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"If I can't go to a fighter, I'd rather stay in RPAs than fly some heavy jet! I am 100% sure I'll never want to fly for the airlines!"

Charleston is actually -600' MSL, so his math checks.

That article was written like a shitty college essay: search for quotes that support your idea, dismiss the claims of the side you disagree with, and assume the claims of the opposition are fact.

Pancake for President

This concept has been argued on here before. Basically, the Marines don't trust anybody else to provide air support because everyone abandoned them in WWII, so they want their own stealthish fighter for denied airspace. The whole line of reasoning on the F-35B is full of contradictions. The MEU will be hitting the beach and launching F-35s off of a Navy LHC, but for some reason the Navy forgot to send a carrier to take down the IADs first. Pretty unimaginable, especially since the LHC will need the regular contingent of cruisers and destroyers for protection against subs and stuff. Okay, let's assume the carrier broke down or sank enroute, and the Marines still need some jets to kill things with radars; that's why they're stealthish, right? Well, first of all, I'm saying stealth-ish because, since they have no internal gun, they'll be carrying a gun pod. They're also going to have a shit ton of external stores because there are only six of them on an LHC. Six fucking jets. Which means two flying, two turning/on alert, and two broken. So possibly only two jets ready to fight with, best case with no bombs or tanks, ten AMRAAMs amongst them. I'm no fighter guy, but I bet they would have a hard time dealing with, oh I don't know, ELEVEN airborne threats. Well that's what the Navy and Air Force are for right? Then why do we need F-35Bs? Radar-guided pop up threats only? The whole thing is nuts. The Marines would be better off flying Hornets or F-35Cs off the big boat while flying as many Cobras as they want from the helicopter boat. And of course the B-model has had enormous development costs while making the A and C-models fat and worse overall.

So the Air Force wants to cook the books, but sucks at it.

Dudes need to respond to this survey with nothing held back. Especially the high quality guys that are deciding to leave. Also, there's a question in there asking if a $35k bonus would help, so I expect that to be the AF's next move.

Did he get an interview anywhere?

People go nuts with ABU mods. Creasing the sleeves is step 1, followed shortly by sticking shit in the hats to make them stiffer. Then the real insanity begins. "I don't put anything in these shirt pockets, so I'll sew them shut! And on the pants too, that'll be real high speed!" Next is buying a coffee can hat I guess. But the real crazy one, the one that shows you've lost all normal human reasoning, is sewing down the collar all the way around the neck. I've only seen it once, but it was heinous. Looked like one of those shitty 3d video game characters from ADLS.

"Johnny's not really safe in a T-1, but he has a good attitude, so let's just send him to a jet 30 times the size. I'm sure once his brain is filled with some mission knowledge, the basic flying stuff will get sorted."

Two-seater CAS has been tried before and failed miserably. Even a Jedi Knight couldn't make it work.

Why the hell do they put flyers in this program? Or Air Force at all?

Agreed, those guys are douchebags.

People falling on hard times lean more on religion. Religion doesn't cause crime or poverty, but people affected by those things will be more likely to seek religion as comfort. On the contrary, well-off people are less likely to seek that comfort. Churches aren't filled with rich men giving thanks, they are filled with poor men asking for help. This is human nature.

Dude, you're out of your mind.

Great article, I'm glad someone is laying down the obvious math. FYI, the same math works for the U-2 and KC-10 examples as well. That last 1-2% of hypothetical F-35 purchases is threatening to kill a bunch of other extremely useful aircraft.

The few woman flyers I've worked with that had a chip on their shoulders also sucked at flying. The good ones were a non-factor and got along with everyone. Big surprise.

"The Air Force is changing the current process for obtaining waivers from specific height requirements for pilots, a move that James said would give 900 more women the opportunity to compete for those coveted spots over the next five years." Cockpit designers are sexist!

This is all very depressing.

More like Fighter Command and Bomber Command.

Well, according to their tax filings, Venture Humanity Inc. has received about $50k/year and has about $50k/year in expenses, so I have a hard time believing that they've raised $8m since 2001. Especially considering the McGuire event raised a whopping $597. And of course, that $597 was actually a comparative loss considering it took a couple dozen (S)NCOs and officers a couple of hours to raise it. This is why corporate philanthropy is dumb.

Welp, thread's over then.

That is ugly as hell.

I like the car analogy. The F-35 is like the El Camino of airplanes!

So files on the network will take as long to load as Sharepoint? That's great. That also explains why my email boxes take so long to sync.