I wonder what range and payload NGAD has when you see the comment that the F-22 range of “only” 1850nm is to small….
Also note the suggestion of greatly increased F-15EX numbers to rationalise the fleet and replace the F-15E fleet.
https://www.defensenews.com/air/2021...its-successor/
The F-22 will go away, eventually. But not before the Air Force gets comfortable with its successor.
WASHINGTON — Top Air Force officials are now convinced the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor lacks the magazine depth and range needed to carry it
into the next decade as the service’s air superiority fighter of choice.
But the exact timing of its retirement will depend on how quickly the Air Force can put
its sixth-generation fighter into production, said Lt. Gen. Clinton Hinote, the service’s deputy chief of staff for strategy, integration and requirements.
“By about the 2030 timeframe, you’re talking about a 40-year-old platform [in the F-22], and it’s just not going to be the right tool for the job, especially when we’re talking about defending our friends like Taiwan and Japan and the Philippines against a Chinese threat that grows and grows,” Hinote told Defense News in an exclusive May 13 interview.…..
Hinote spoke with Defense News a day after Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. C.Q. Brown disclosed the service’s upcoming plan to phase out the F-22 and streamline the service’s fighter inventory to four main fighter variants. Those four aircraft include NGAD, the Lockheed Martin F-35 joint strike fighter, Boeing F-15EX and Lockheed F-16.
“Right now we have seven fighter fleets. My intent is to get down to about four. With that four, what is the right mix?” Brown said at the McAleese and Associates conference on Wednesday…..
Talk of the F-22′s future was conspicuously absent in Brown’s comments, even though the Raptor currently ranks as the Air Force’s second newest fighter and its premier air superiority fighter. Hinote said the F-22′s retirement would be “event-driven” and interwoven with NGAD’s development, occurring closer to the 2030s than in the upcoming fiscal year 2022 budget cycle…..
It’s unclear how close NGAD is to being fielded, but Hinote said it is proceeding ahead of expectations.…..
The F-22′s limitations, Hinote said, include a small fleet size that contributes to high operating costs and low mission capable rates. It has a relatively short-range — only 1,850 nautical miles with two external fuel tanks — and its weapons magazine is small and lacks depth and range.….
Besides NGAD, the Air Force plans on retaining the F-35 — which Brown said will act as the “cornerstone” of the fighter inventory — as well as the F-15EX and F-16.
The F-15EX was initially purchased to replace F-15C/D Eagles that are nearing the end of their service life, but Brown’s disclosure also portends the eventual sunset of the F-15E Strike Eagle as well.
Hinote said that the service is still studying whether it can modify its F-15Es to an EX configuration or whether it will buy new planes from Boeing.…