LOA,
Thanks for picking me up on that - I included the F-22 as a 'failed' programme not on capability grounds (it's an awesome technical exercise) but on affordability and sustainability.
F-22, in my personal view, stands alongside the Typhoon as an example of what I consider to be the last of the 'gold plated dinosaur' combat aircraft projects. These were characterised by going for performance at just about any price, massive programme delays (if anyone thinks F-35 is late, try an analysis of the F-22 timelines) and simply eye-watering cost. The result is a programme that was cut from 1,000 aircraft to 138, and became unaffordable even for the USAF at the height of the Bush spending bulge.
Another characteristic of these programmes was a tendency to home in on one single role (in both cases AD) and make a series of decisions that reduced the aircraft's ability to undertake other roles.
The end result is programmes that consume huge proportions of national defence budgets (Typhoon is a really good example) to deliver just one capability. These were never affordable in any real sense - the world economic crisis has just exposed the problem, not caused it. And that is why I think, in the final analysis, the F-22 'failed' - it's just not a sustainable model.
F-35 is different because if is aiming to cover multiple roles with a common basic airframe and (more importantly) common avionics fit. It was also held down to a single engined single seat solution - cost driven. As I've often said, these decisions can (and in free society, must) be questioned - but in my view, the wider analysis by the DoD back in the 90s was right.
Best Regards as ever
Engines