Salute!
All here from the U.K, and other places must unnerstan the polyticks from one persuasion or the other that wish to use the proles' tax money for their special projects.
The F-35 got a lotta attention due to 1) cost and then 2) some initial problems with parts and engines and mainly logistics problems, not aircraft performance. I do not know what economic school our polyticks went thru, but to develop and field three airplanes on one ticket versus three slightly different planes on three programs is an amazing amount of $$$$. I agree that a dedicated Harrier replacement would have been cheaper than the entire F-35 program, but would only satisfy the need of the USMC. The F-35A and the Navy Cee could have been a straighforward replacement for the Hornet and Viper. Nevertheless, the JSF program did not wind up as the 'vaark program did. The 'vaark was a very good penetration attack plane, and then a super ECM asset. We even had a few of the "G" model to fill in the gap until the Bone came online. If you compare the development costs and the plane's capabilities, the $$ are way less than three separate programs.
The USAF A-7D had many subsytem logistic problems besides the engine problems of the Rolls Spey licensed to Allison. Until we flew to Thailand for actual combat, we would fly without our main radar, projected map, and so forth. Once in Thailand we had access to the "war reserve supply" stuff and walla! We also could get many parts from the USN flying the "E" model from carriers and Subic Bay. Same for the first few year sof the Viper, and for our first full blown inspection we had access to the war time components and one squadron of 24 UE flew over 100 sorties in a 24 hour period, finishing with 20+ FMC birds.
I can go to any operational squadron and show a low FMC percentage if we use things like a broken cover over a certain switch or loss of one mode of the radar or ....... So the folks that want Hornets for 20 more years or billions for a new social program will look for any stat to use. And then there's the bogus cost per flying hour - add in everything you can for development, testing, wages for all the wrenchbenders and aircrew and actual cost of JP-4, then divide by hours flown and whoa! Allowing for inflation, looks to me that the new plane is cheaper per hour than my old, trusty Viper or even my friends' Phantoms.
Oh well, we shall see, but right now I predict a serious slowdown on procurement of the F-35 unless the U.S. polyticks changes in another two years.
Gums sends...