There was a major change when the design went from a canard to a more conventional design, but we were told that the change was driven by predicted performance and structural efficiency across the required three variants. Yes, the wing was part of it, but only a part.
That's interesting. Could you tell us more? How did the canard affect performance?
So is it true that the MDD submission was canned because (a) it had a lot of foreign (i.e. BAE) design and (b) it was more likely to provide serious competition to Lockheed?
The X-35 was better than the X-32. No need for a conspiratorial view.
Macs' big mistake was that they didn't think the customer was serious about not wanting a separate lift engine.
Separate lift engine?