Nohover
Of course sometimes one does just has to press-on and try something, because despite what people say, it might work.
Well it might, and I defer to those who know about such things.
However, as one of
the backroom boys and girls without whom nothing would leave the ground
(cripes, and could that mean a taxpayer also?) I have an interest.
The 'Elephant in the living room', regarding JSF, being; seeing as how we are getting big carriers anyway, why not just go for the C version? Now the argument that the cat trap boys spend all their time practicing landings, to the expense of all else, seems a good one. But now I'm are wondering, how difficult are RVLs going to be? Will they be spending all their time practicing equally complex procedures? Just to get airborne in a less capable plane. Just as an aside, isn't it about time cat landings were de-skilled, oops I mean automated?
Now of course that elephant is really only hiding another, much bigger one. The one pointed up in my Spey Phantom post, which recalls how Britain spent shedloads of money screwing up, what was at the time, the worlds greatest fighter plane. That sorry tale was also supported by technical argument, which history has shown to be mainly b
cks, most especially that the RAF M models must have Speys too, (the RAF wanted standard), so that they also could operate off the carriers! Total nonsense of course, the M model didn't have nose gear extension, or catapult bridle attachments.
Well that's all a long time ago, things are done much differently now. Maybe, but that remaining elephant is the one about how defence spending always has to buy a big slice of jobs in Britain. Well, post Thatcher, we are not 'permitted' to support British industry in any other way. But it just might be time to confront that elephant, and then maybe what's best operationally might come first, for once.
My take on a complicated subject.