It appears that the US House of Representatives have come up with an overall spending budget for the first time in years. For the Defense sector, they are going to increase spending but are putting that increase in a special fund to cover costs of overseas military spending, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, etc. There appears to be no increase in spending for acquisition of new aircraft beyond that of the sequester spending. This budget will need to be reconciled with the US Senate budget.
Buried in the POGO article was a link to this from a guest respondent:
Submitted by Another Guest (from Australia) at: March 25, 2015
Col Michael W. Pietrucha, USAF, wrote a 24 page article in Air and Space Power Journal, "The Comanche and the Albatross: About Our Neck Was Hung". He has got a good point why the F-35 must be cancelled now. The F-35 is based on a belief that radar low observability will remain effective against future air defence threats. Although true for the F-117 against Iraq’s Kari system in 1991, stealthiness is unlikely to remain so against an adversary that has two decades to prepare for US stealth fighters, which have much higher infrared, visual, and emitter signatures than did the F-117. Outside China and Russia, no massive threat from an advanced integrated air defence system exists. Moreover, China is a poor example of a threat to cite if someone is trying to justify a short-ranged fighter with limited payload flown from island bases within range of overwhelming missile attack. Losses of US aircraft have mainly been helicopters since the Vietnam war and fixed wing losses were not shot down. Only Russia and China can pose the kind of anti-access, area denial (A2AD) environment that justifies a massive investment in stealth. These facts make the risk calculation involved with prioritising stealth over performance, range, and weapons loadout inherently suspect—and the F-35 might well be the first modern fighter to have substantially less performance than its predecessors. Col Michael W. Pietrucha's Proposal. • Maintain a limited number of F-35As (those already purchased) as a replacement for the capabilities lost upon retirement of the F-117; (To me the limited number of F-35As need to be sent to AMARC and to be recycled) • Create a modernised Tactical Air Force fleet consisting of a high-low mix of modernised F-15 and F-16 legacy fighters, light attack aircraft, and multi-purpose jet trainer / attack aircraft; • Recover some “sunk cost” of the F-35 program by using advanced systems to modernise older fighters, in effect fielding fifth-generation systems in fourth-generation airframes; • Restore the Air Force’s SEAD/EW (Suppression of Enemy Air. Defences - Electronic warfare) fighters and crews; • Expand the service’s global reach capabilities by providing deployable Tactical Air Force assets that can operate from short, rough airstrips on a logistical shoestring • Increase the number of absorbable cockpits to the point where the Air Force can augment the inventory of fighter/attack aviators to meet requirements; • Invest in affordable, exportable “light combat aircraft” derived from Air Education and Training Command’s T-X program; • Allow the Air Guard to maintain its position as the operational reserve and “relief valve” for experienced fighter/attack aviators while recapitalizing its portion of the CAF; and • Build a Tactical Air Force that can meet the nation’s demands for air-power capabilities even in the face of increasing fuel costs and decreasing budget.