I think, like many times before, the US NAVY has the right idea about what
the F35 really is and how it is best used.
Navy Doesn't Seem to Care That the F-35 Can't Dogfight | RealClearDefense
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Navy Doesn't Seem to Care That the F-35 Can't Dogfight
To the sailing branch, the stealth fighter is a sensor
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the JSF “can’t turn, can’t climb, can’t run,” to quote one infamous 2008 war game report.
But the U.S. Navy — the third-largest purchaser of F-35s — seems unperturbed. Indeed, in recent planning the Navy describes the JSF less as a traditional fighter than as radar-evading, flying sensor and communications node.
The Navy apparently doesn’t care that its F-35C version of the stealth jet — as well as the Marines’ F-35B model — is a poor performer in raw kinetic terms. In the sailing branch’s evolving battle scheme, the JSF will focus onfinding targets … for older F/A-18 fighters and missile-armed warships to shoot down.
To be sure, the F-35 packs lots of high-tech sensors. In the nose — a Northrop Grumman AN/APG-81 electronically-scanned radar composed of a thousand tiny transmitter-receivers. Under the nose — Lockheed Martin’s AAQ-40 Electro-Optical Targeting System, basically a high-resolution, zooming camera.
In addition, the JSF comes with the Northrop Grumman AN/AAQ-37 Distributed Aperture System, a bank of six infrared cameras scattered around the airframe that automatically detects heat plumes from incoming missiles and other threats. Finally, the F-35 boasts BAE Systems’ highly-sensitive AN/ASQ-239 electronic warfare suite, which listens for enemy radar signals.
Vice Adm. Mike Shoemaker, the Navy’s top aviator, called the JSF’s sensor combo a “game-changer.” “Suck[ing] in all that information,” an F-35 can paint “a great, clear picture of who’s good and who’s bad.”
And that can help solve one of the Navy’s biggest problems — identifying targets at long range inside enemy lines so that surface ships and non-stealthy F/A-18 fighters can bring to bear their SM-6 and AIM-120 missiles, which can travel farther than the shooters’ sensors can see.
Indeed, the Navy is building an entire battle plan around the F-35’s sensors and its ability to share sensor data via radio data-link, all while avoiding detection by enemy forces. “The F-35 will lead the way ashore, disabling information nodes and grids, while providing the air-ground task force with unprecedented awareness of opposing challenges,” the Navy explained in itsNaval Aviation Vision planning document from 2014.
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The Navy has a name for this battle plan — “Naval Integrated Fire Control — Counter-Air,” or NIFC-CA. There’s actually a lot more to it than just F-35s, F-18s and destroyers. At its heart, NIFC-CA is actually an expanded version of the Aegis system that equips all of the Navy’s cruisers and destroyers.
It's not an air dominance fighter, it's also not a CAS platform, maybe not even a real bomber like the Strike eagle or Rafale
It's a very useful force multiplier in addition/cooperation with other, cheaper and also more conventional fighter like platforms.
For the US NAVY the combination of AWACS (E2D), ship based radar/sensors, Satellite, GROWLER, the F35 will be the spear of the information and detection bubble, able to deploy near the edge of the danger zone (pun intended ref. to TOP GUN
).
Which again leads to the question, what's in it for us, how can we make it work ?
We might need a couple of squadrons of F35A's but not the wings our top brass is currently dreaming of.
Also makes anyone wonder on why they decided to make it look like a 9G fighter in stead of something a little more relevant and cheaper.