Originally Posted by
LivingInMEM
Kass - those were direct questions, not confrontations. You have to plan using an ORM model - risk to reward. Of course, aircraft like the F-22 cost exponentially more than MQ-9's, but the risk (cost) of not being prepared for the war that the F-22 is designed for is exponentially more than the risk of not being prepared for the war the MQ-9 is designed for. The nation that only prepares for today's war will be woefully unprepared for tomorrow's war, and our nation has been guilty of that on numerous occasions.
For the record, I am not a proponent of the F-22 per se, I am a proponent of a robust air superiority capability (and 189 F-22's are not it). If yo had read any of the F-22 specific threads, you would have seen that I was more a proponent of upgraded F-15's and a smaller contingent of F-22's. Air superiority is not a "nice thing to have", it allows your offensive strike aircraft to operate at will, your ISR aircraft (so important now) to operate at will, and your ground forces to operate at will with no threat of attack by enemy aircraft. Air superiority is an incredible multiplier, so to say that the money could have gone towards better uses - I disagree.
The day before Katrina, it would have seemed a wise use of resources (for someone who could not evacuate) to buy water, food, and generators. Two days after Katrina, it wouldn't have seemed like such a good use when people with guns came and took all of the food, water, and generators. The day before, someone would have said "do you know how much more food and water you can buy instead of a $600 gun and $150 of ammunition?" Afterwards, they would "I wish we still had that smaller stockpile (minus the $750) instead of nothing at all." Same goes here - NO, I do not agree that the resources would be better used for a more imminent threat because I think 5-10 yrs down the road as well as towards tomorrow - even though I am currently actively fighting the war of today. We need to maintain a credible threat to keep potential enemies from piling on or using our distraction to pursue their national goals. And we need to make sure we don't roll from winning today's war into losing tomorrow's. These capabilities can't be built overnight.
Well, sometimes tone gets lost in text so I understand. I like the idea of having stealth fighters we can use to dominate a major battlefield, but I think we would have to sacrifice a lot in the form of funds for other equally important aircraft and weapons to get a all the F-22s we wanted. What is the point of having a sharp spear if the shaft it is on is weak and the person holding it isn’t able to lift it? Defense funding is a balancing act and we can’t afford to have unlimited amounts of the best equipment. Look at body armor for example. Our soldiers go into battle having good armor, but not the best. It is a compromise because the military would rather have a lot of troops with good armor than a few with the best.
It is similar to the B-1A program or even the XB-70. Large supersonic bombers that would be able to attack Russia well before any of their bombers could come within range of our allies. We were able to build them and demonstrate their capability, but in the end, the cost of the aircraft could not justify their use. We determined the ICBM and submarine programs were more cost effective.
The F-15 has a fantastic service record and is still a match for any plane out there. I think we would be better off if we created a new version (not an upgrade). It would probably be much cheaper and therefore we can build more. In the past, we have seen that when it comes down to it, it is the operator/s at the controls of the weapon platform that really make the difference.