Arcanum,
whether we end up with maritime AEWACS or not is but a morsel of my argument, my point is that we are sacrificing some very elementary capabilities for this thing; I would imagine we could operate the full spectrum of capabilities, including E2s, if we were getting F18s. Think about it hard, the RAF is ditching 60 Typhoons, which will probably be working quite well by 2018, for the sake of a small number of F35s, which will definitely be delivered broken. New Chinooks, Sentinal, Merlins, possibly Puma, and possibly some A400s have all been given the chop to try and keep this programme affordable...and now I'm being told that we're going to take a far less capable, more expensive version of it that can't take our weaponry and is by far the most risky. What dipsh*t is making these decisions!?
HAS NOBODY LEARNED ANYTHING FROM THE TYPHOON! We could all be raging around in copious squadrons of strike eagles right now, which could be relied upon to go out and win a war! Look at the trouble that's caused us!