Do you really think that by posting that it make your criticisms against the F-35 any better? Not.
Let us see...
The Air Power Australia team have produced an unprecedented report which asserts that the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is much less stealthy than the F-22 - and in fact is comparable in radar cross-section (RCS), under some circumstances, to a conventional fighter in clean condition.
Big fracking deal. A clean fighter is next to worthless and am sure Sweetman realize that. But a clean F-35 is
NOT an unarmed attacker when in fact with its avionics the few munitions that it carries make it a deadly precision attacker. The F-117 have no radar and can carry only two bombs.
The APA analysis will no doubt be countered by the JSF team in several ways. They'll argue that the APA team has an agenda. They will argue that the analysis is too crude to reflect reality; that anything it does show is not operationally relevant; and that the true picture is much more complex and (of course) secret.
The APA team does have an open agenda (as does the JSF team) but that does not mean that their data is bad.
Yes, it does, Monsieur Sweetman. APA used only Physical Optics for the J-20, in which they had to acknowledged that it was woefully inadequate when they listed the 'does not' measure as longer than the 'does' measure. In effect, APA simulated measurement took into consideration at best 1/4 of the total radiation sources that as complex a body as an aircraft
WILL produce. Three blind men and an elephant? But why not do the same for the F-35?
On the other hand, the APA analysis is a lot more detailed than the cartoon representations in Lockheed Martin briefings. And more realistic than the claims of total invisibility made on JSF's behalf.
Senor Sweetman. APA's so called 'analysis' is just a better set of cartoons. And no...No one ever claimed that the American 'stealth' fighters are 'invisible'. That word is admittedly casually used for the general public, but for an aviation author like yourself to say that is what the engineers at LM and the USAF actually believe is beyond belief in itself.
The APA team also makes the point that the F-35 doesn't look as much like an F-22 (or the X-35) as you might think. Those two aircraft both reflected a refined version of the F-117 shape - they are basically faceted designs, although they incorporate large radius curves and the lines between facets are smoothed. But the F-35 has acquired some very conventional-airplane-shaped lumps and bumps around its underside, not to mention the hideous wart that covers the gun on the F-35A. It's enough to raise questions.
Mr. Sweetman, raise what questions? The F-35 is not the F-22. Just like the B-25 Mitchell was not the B-17 Flying Fortress, even though both are bombers. As long as those 'lumps and bumps' and that 'hideous wart' does not raise the aircraft above a certain threshold, why should aesthetics matter?
Of course, it's possible to argue that the F-35 meets its stealth requirements (which may or not be the same for all F-35s), and that it will be stealthy enough to survive - combined with situational awareness and tactics.
Herr Sweetman, we have learned much from the F-117. In fact, we have learned that we may have gone overboard in 'stealth' as far as the F-117 goes with its extremely limited capabilities, in technology and weapons. It is understandable in that the F-117 was the world's
FIRST complex body that was
DELIBERATELY designed to be low radar observable from prediction/modeling processes. The F-35 is the result of what we learned from the F-117, the B-2 and the F-22.
Gambit. Do you honestly think PLA can be a real competetion to the US military as American media prjoects it in the short term?
No. But that is not the point. China is not (yet) a credible threat to US but has breach that credibility line for our allies in Asia. Like it or not, the first place to hit any adversary that is either a peer to yourself or a superior is at his peripheral.