500th F-35 has been delivered to the US Air Force

[Beijingwalker]

It will be a blessing for Pakistan if India buys F35 without TOT and source code.

They can fly airshows at least

 

[rafale]

Now what does that tell you about American jets versus Chinese? The American jets are built to last.

It tells us nothing but that American Defense procurement and project management is woefully inadequate and bonkers.

For F-35 to last 77 years, you will need substantial additional cost and upgrades. Just see how many iterations F-15s and F-16s have gone through to keep them worthy past 40 years life time.

None of their major defense acquisitions have been happening on time, a far cry from the 1950-1960-1970s when there were many more contractors and they would deliver an amazing product on time (such as F-16s, F-14s, B52s, C130s etc)

Contractors in USA are just money making pit and run by accountants who will prioritize immediate shareholders return and profits over delivering anything.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

If you can afford that ever increasing price tag, good for you.

Hmm...an upgrade option to support cutting edge weapons is not a bad thing.
You thinking it just proves backwards thinking.

They can fly airshows at least

That's not totally the plane's fault. The article says:

reasons behind this poor performance are cited as a shortage of engineers able to work on the F-35 in Britain's forces, plus a global shortage of F-35 spare parts.

You are just desperately grasping at things.

Well, a lot of the modern air forces around the world are still flying the F-16s built in the previous century. And, guess what? No one is complaining.

Remember China has as "Us against the entire world mentality"

 

[Beijingwalker]

It tells us nothing but that American Defense procurement and project management is woefully inadequate and bonkers.

For F-35 to last 77 years, you will need substantial additional cost and upgrades. Just see how many iterations F-15s and F-16s have gone through to keep them worthy past 40 years life time.

None of their major defense acquisitions have been happening on time, a far cry from the 1950-1960-1970s when there were many more contractors and they would deliver an amazing product on time (such as F-16s, F-14s, B52s, C130s etc)

Contractors in USA are just money making pit and run by accountants who will prioritize immediate shareholders return and profits over delivering anything.

They can fly those craps for 77 years and we won't wait for them

 

[j_hungary]

It tells us nothing but that American Defense procurement and project management is woefully inadequate and bonkers.

For F-35 to last 77 years, you will need substantial additional cost and upgrades. Just see how many iterations F-15s and F-16s have gone through to keep them worthy past 40 years life time.

None of their major defense acquisitions have been happening on time, a far cry from the 1950-1960-1970s when there were many more contractors and they would deliver an amazing product on time (such as F-16s, F-14s, B52s, C130s etc)

Contractors in USA are just money making pit and run by accountants who will prioritize immediate shareholders return and profits over delivering anything.

LOL, the F-35's lifespan of 77 years is not the same as the very first F-35 built in 2008, which would still be in service in 2085. F-35 production life is projected to last until 2035-2040, meaning those airframes would remain in service until the 2060s-2070s, which would extend the platform's lifespan to 77 years.

Also, not all F-15 and F-16 are upgraded; usually, it depends on airframe life, unless you rework the entire airframe. Most F-16s were being MLU'ed during their 20 years of service.

 

[harpy1]

They should not be trying to antagonize the Russians. They have handled them very badly.

UK is not a war machine and certainly never will be capable of fighting Russia along with the rest of the little weak euro states.

They all think they are mini USA's.

United Kingdom is still formidable military power by any ones standard bar USA or China or Russia

They have 80 F35 delivered or to be delivered
140 euro fighter typhoons

Two 80k tonne super carriers
Five nuclear armed subs carrying thermo nuclear ballistic missiles enough to wipe out all of Asia or mid East
WHopping 80 billion dollars defense budget

 

[Pakistan Space Agency]

You guys can stick to them for a hundred years, no problem.

52-years and still going strong.

Pakistan would like more but the Americans have been denying us just to appease Hindu Extremist India.

 

[Pakistan Space Agency]

They can fly those craps for 77 years and we won't wait for them

View attachment 148912

What is that JXX?

 

[RescueRanger]

Meh, even the Eurofighter is enough to deal with the Russians.The Russian Navy is honestly shit; the Brits had nothing to worry about. I mean, if they can't take Snake Island off 140 miles from their base in Crimea, how do you think they can do anything thousand miles away from Kaliningrad........

^ this.. Russian Airforce is kaput.

 

[Ali_Baba]

Well, MOD insisted that the F-35 was to have the capability to use MBDA stuff, which accounts for almost half of these delays. I mean, if you look at the Australian transition from F-18E/F to F-35, it just took 16 months because we are using all the American package that carries from the Superhornet (JDAM, CAIM-9X, CAIM-120, and so on) the RAF took almost 3 years (And the IOC of F-35B does not help)

The mistake MOD made here is not to start the conversion early, or simply overestimating their capability. Think now the RAF either needs to go without these capabilities or maybe order an American package for the interim.

The UK MoD is know for gold plating projects and for requesting strange changes to projects that make the projects none viable. The apache procurement is an example of that, chinooks etc. I won’t list them all..

 

[Fatman17]

United Kingdom is still formidable military power by any ones standard bar USA or China or Russia

They have 80 F35 delivered or to be delivered
140 euro fighter typhoons

Two 80k tonne super carriers
Five nuclear armed subs carrying thermo nuclear ballistic missiles enough to wipe out all of Asia or mid East
WHopping 80 billion dollars defense budget

You missed India. Bro are you OK

 

[clutch]

Britain's billion-pound F-35s not quite ready for, well, anything​

Stealth jets can't fight, can't fly much, and can't shoot UK missiles, says NAO​

Dan Robinson
Tue 15 Jul 2025

The F-35 stealth fighter is not meeting its potential in British service because of availability issues, a shortage of support personnel, and delays in integrating key weapons that are limiting the aircraft's effectiveness.

The various problems are highlighted in a reality check from the UK's National Audit Office (NAO) that offers a contrast to the typically measured tone of official government communications when it comes to the state of the country's armed forces.

Its report calls on the Ministry of Defence (MoD) to address these problems in the F-35 fleet: firstly to increase the effectiveness of the aircraft but also to demonstrate the program is delivering value for the huge cost it represents to the taxpaying public.

Britain currently has 37 of the F-35B variant of the aircraft, which is designed for short take-off and vertical landing (STOVL) operations like the Harrier it effectively replaces in Royal Air Force (RAF) and Royal Navy service.

The NAO, a public sector spending watchdog, starts by noting that the F-35 offers capabilities "significantly superior to any previous UK aircraft," not just because of its low radar observability, but due to its advanced sensor suite including an electro-optical targeting system and long-range infrared target sensors, which are combined to provide the pilot with an integrated picture of the space surrounding them.

However, the report finds the MoD has not been able to deliver on its own targets for aircraft availability – the proportion of time each aircraft is ready to fly – despite these targets being lower than those for the global program.

It claims that last year, the UK F-35 fleet had a mission-capable rate (the ability of an aircraft to perform at least one of its seven defined missions) about half of the MoD's target. The full mission capable rate (the ability of an F-35 to perform all required missions) was only about one third of the MoD's target and significantly lower than for F-35B aircraft operated by other nations.

Some reasons behind this poor performance are cited as a shortage of engineers able to work on the F-35 in Britain's forces, plus a global shortage of F-35 spare parts.

In fact, the UK Lightning Force faces "major personnel shortages across a range of roles," which the NAO says are not likely to be resolved for several years, although it notes the MoD is recruiting to fill some of these gaps.

According to the report, the MoD has previously underestimated the number of engineers and other staff required to support F-35 aircraft during operations.

This was highlighted during Operation Fortis, the UK-led carrier strike group deployment to the Pacific in 2021, when an aircraft was lost after a protective engine blank was erroneously left in one of the air intake ducts. This led to the aircraft not being able to generate enough thrust for take-off and ditching in the sea immediately after leaving the flight deck of HMS Queen Elizabeth.

As reported by Navy Lookout, the US Marines F-35 squadron that was onboard the carrier at the same time had 25 personnel for each jet, while the British squadron had only 14.

Just as worrying are the ongoing delays in getting key weapons integrated with the F-35 so that they can be used in operations. The report states that the original support date for the Spear 3 air-to-surface cruise missile and the Meteor medium range air-to-air missile was December last year, but the F-35 is not expected to get these until the early 2030s.

These delays have been caused by "poor supplier performance," the NAO says, referring to the US defense firm responsible for the F-35, Lockheed Martin. However, it also criticizes Britain's MoD for "negotiating commercial arrangements that failed to prioritize delivery" and the low priority given to Meteor by the global program.

This means that UK F-35s are currently only capable of operating with the Paveway IV laser-guided bomb and US-made missiles such as the AIM-120D.

Part of the problem is that support for many of the key weapons British forces wish to use was planned for the Block 4 upgrades to the aircraft's systems software, and these have been massively delayed. Much of the blame for this lies with Lockheed Martin and the Joint Program Office (JPO), the agency within the US Department of Defense (DoD) responsible for overseeing the F-35 program.

It was originally expected that this would be fully delivered by 2022, but the NAO says that in 2023 the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that it would not be delivered until 2029, and now the JPO doesn't expect Block 4 to be completely delivered before 2033.

There has been a certain suspicion that the US doesn't see supporting European-made weapons as a priority, especially when F-35 operators are then forced to buy American kit instead.

Small wonder, perhaps, that Britain is pushing ahead with a program for its planned next-generation fighter – currently codenamed Tempest – that does not involve any US defense companies but partners with Japan and Italy instead.

However, the NAO report claims that UK F-35 program officials are concerned slow progress towards the country's stated total goal of 138 aircraft could "jeopardize the UK's position within the global program."

It says that despite being the UK's only Tier 1 partner nation on the F-35 program, Australia had received 72 aircraft by the end of 2024 against a public commitment of 100, Norway had fulfilled its commitment of 52 F-35s by April of this year, and Britain's tardiness on issuing further orders "has been noted by partners."

The UK government has, however, recently disclosed that it intends to procure a new tranche of F-35 aircraft which will comprise a dozen of the F-35A version, which operates from an airfield, along with another 15 F-35B, although delivery of these is not expected until the end of the decade.

Adding another variant of the F-35 is unlikely to help with the engineer shortage, since there are significant differences between the two versions.

Meanwhile, the MoD is also behind in delivering the Aircraft Signature Assessment Facility, which is needed to check that the F-35's much-vaunted stealth technology is doing its job and has not been degraded by the harsh conditions of operating at sea.

This was originally delayed for "affordability reasons" and is currently not scheduled for delivery until the next decade.

The NAO report offers a number of recommendations for the MoD, including that it should consider what structural changes it can make to more effectively deliver on the F-35 program.

We asked the MoD for its response, and a spokesperson told us: "The program continues to operate within its approved budget and the UK will have two squadrons of F-35 fighter jets ready for deployment by the end of this year." ®

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[Beijingwalker]

What is that JXX?

J-XX are names applied by Western intelligence agencies to describe programs by the People's Republic of China to develop multiple fifth-generation fighter aircraft.

J-XX - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Well, a lot of the modern air forces around the world are still flying the F-16s built in the previous century. And, guess what? No one is complaining.

....and old US Boeing 747's for the unimportant people

President Xi arrives in Xinjiang for autonomous region's founding anniversary event​

I still can't believe he does these massive photo-ops in front of a Boeing plane instead of a Chinese Comac. This is only going to raise eyebrows in future history books.

Nope, wouldn't want to be seen getting out of this instead eh?

 

[Beijingwalker]

....and old US Boeing 747's for the unimportant people
View attachment 148931

President Xi arrives in Xinjiang for autonomous region's founding anniversary event​

Civilian planes don't get upgraded that fast and they don't carry up to date weapons.