Originally Posted by melmothtw
Au contraire, for the UK the F-35 was intended to be a carrier-borne aircraft capable of air defence of naval and ground forces and self-escorting ground attack (as set out in Staff Target 6464).
If it is unable to perform this mission, then it is defective.
Your approach leads me to suspect that you would have judged SHAR defective and prevented it from ever entering service. Accepting its ability as a bomb truck, do you believe the F-35B's AD capability is going to be significantly better or worse than Harrier in any of its forms?