The F-35 and the Infamous Transonic Acceleration ‘Spec’ Change:

Part 1: The Basics

Flashback...

About two years ago, F-35 critics were agog over the news that the F-35 was reducing its “Sustained G” and “Transonic Acceleration” Key Performance Parameters. As (the once-but-no-longer-promising-and-now -‘Punk’) ‘Journalist’ Dave Majumdar reported on FlightGlobal.com:

Turn performance for the US Air Force's F-35A was reduced from 5.3 sustained g's to 4.6 sustained g's. The F-35B had its sustained g's cut from five to 4.5 g's, while the US Navy variant had its turn performance truncated from 5.1 to five sustained g's. Acceleration times from Mach 0.8 to Mach 1.2 were extended by eight seconds, 16 seconds and 43 seconds for the A, B and C-models respectively…

Soon thereafter, I posted a short series where in the first part it was highlighted that the only truth one could conclusively draw from the Sustained G Spec change was that the F-35s would have slightly reduced sustained turn bank angles than planned. Anything else, including the relevance/significance of the change, would be speculation without additional knowledge.

We then explored what such a bank angle reduction MIGHT mean by performing parametric ‘what if’ exercises based upon certain assumptions. What we discovered was, is that the most important unknown appears to be aircraft total loaded weight and that the “baseline standard used [in developing the F-35 Spec] for the comparison was a clean Lockheed F-16 Block 50/52 with two wingtip Raytheon AIM-120 AMRAAMs”. 

In other words, the Sustained G spec was based upon an F-16 in a lightly loaded, and operationally-limited and therefore very non-typical ‘lightweight’ configuration. When an F-16A was loaded in a manner similar to the F-35’s ‘stealth’ weapons load, we found the F-35 may very well be significantly better than the F-16 in the ‘sustained turn’ category: It all depends on how heavily loaded each aircraft is relative to the other. 

For fun, we also showed that for the ‘spec’ F-35A to ‘turn like an F-4’ the F-4: 

1) had to be a late-model F-4E ‘slat bird’, 

2) had to be given every benefit of the doubt wherever there was any performance ambiguity, AND

3) it had to be loaded so lightly that it could only have a little over 8 minutes of fuel on board to achieve its maximum Sustained G turn performance. 

I also note here, once again, that ‘Sustained Turn’ is not now seen as important of a maneuverability parameter in the post-‘All Aspect’ missile era as it was before the all-aspect attack guided missile: Sustained Turn was more important when it was essential to get right on your enemy’s tail for a ‘kill’ while keeping him off yours.

Flash Forward: Today

I had left the transonic acceleration spec changes alone at the time it was ‘all the news’ because when I finished the ‘Sustained G’ posts, all the F-35 haters, anti-defense weak sisters, faint-of-heart, and the Joe Public mouth-breathers had pretty much moved on to complaining about something else. Also by the time I finished the Sustained G discussion, I didn’t really have the free time to quickly distill an explanation about transonic acceleration—or at least do so such that most people could understand the phenomenon if they put a little effort into understanding. After all, you can’t really simplify transonic acceleration with the same ease that you can with ‘sustained G’ because the former is about dynamic ‘change’ while the latter is about representing different states of equilibrium: nice and easy ‘steady state’ conditions.
A while ago though, I was reading a comment thread ‘someplace’ where there was ‘someone’ mixing claims about acceleration performance with top speed performance for the F-35C and complaining about the F-35 having to ‘dive’ to get to its top speed. I’m pretty sure he was referring to a comment made by a test pilot at PAX River (Naval Air Station Patuxent River)--also a while back--who talked about having to “accelerate, turn, unload, and accelerate” repeatedly within PAX’s range space to get the F-35C up to its top sustained speed of M1.6 using a ‘modified Rutowski’ procedure. I believe the commenter was incorrectly translating the ‘unload’ into a need to dive, versus the need to preserve speed during turns, just to make going through the exercise worth the effort within the limited range airspace allotted. This poor person’s mental flailing-about on something he clearly did not understand (alternatively, I suppose he could have been disingenuously misleading others--whatever) got me thinking again as to how we could best give some perspective as to what the announced changes to the transonic acceleration performance of the different F-35 variants might actually ‘mean’ without having someone pulling a synapse and then mentally limp right past the ‘Eureka!’ moment. Having thought about the subject for a while now, I now don’t think it’s too ‘hard’ of a write-up to produce – It’s just a tedious one.

Terminology Housekeeping

Because the media and others tend to use a shorthand to describe Key Performance Parameters (KPPs) as ‘specs’ or ‘Specifications’, we shall reluctantly do the same. KPPs are selected based upon their relevance to top level program requirements such as survivability, lethality, supportability, etc. The KPPs are the basis, as former F-35 PM Tom Burbage noted in 2012, “from which lower level detailed engineering specification are derived and Lockheed's job is to meet as many of those specifications as possible within the laws of physics”. In other words, KPPs are a vehicle used for deriving detailed engineering requirements from top-level operational requirements. They are initially established before the first design iteration comes out and it is not uncommon for them to be adjusted as more information about operational requirements and/or understandings of technical feasibility are refined. Though we will treat KPPs as requirements for the sake of simplicity, we need to understand that they are not immovable goals (or thresholds) that must be individually or collectively met, but instead are guideposts that show the way toward defining and then meeting engineering requirements that will support overall top-level program requirements. I’ve touched on this subject before, and this link still leads to the DoD Manual for the Operation of the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS) which, with the references listed within the document, describe how requirements are determined and used, including the role of KPPs in the requirements process and the required steps/approvals to change KPPs.

Drag, Thrust and Acceleration

If you know all this already, go ahead and skip the discussion about aerodynamics. If you know his stuff and read this part anyway, you will see there will be a lot I’m leaving out or perhaps oversimplifying. But I do so on purpose. Once again we’re conveying enough information to get an idea across, and not enough to go design an aircraft. These are just the ‘basics’, on the ‘basic concepts’ needed to understand what we’re going to discuss.

Drag: Subsonic and Beyond!

The most important things to remember about ‘drag’ for this discussion are that not only does drag increase due to friction the faster an object moves through the air, but that the ‘nature’ of drag changes as the object moves through the air at ever increasing speed. The airstream over the object begins transitioning from a ‘compressible flow’ to an ‘incompressible flow’. This occurs even before the object reaches Mach 1, as it enters the ‘transonic speed region’, with some surface areas of the object going ‘Mach’ (Critical Speed) before other areas on the object (aircraft). The transition from subsonic to the supersonic region is typically described as .8 Mach to Mach 1.2. [Note: Above Mach 1.2 is considered ‘supersonic’ until much higher Mach Speeds where the nature of the flow changes again and is then viewed as ‘Hypersonic’ with the object moving through a ‘Plasma’ flow beginning at around Mach 5.]

This change in the interaction between the aircraft and airflow results in a change to the relative contributions of various contributors to total aircraft drag:

Figure 1: Drag Contributors, Subsonic vs. Supersonic

Remember, not only do the relative contributions of the drag components change going from subsonic to supersonic, but the resultant drag for nearly all the ‘contributors’ increase as well. For example, here is a reconstruction of a typical straight wing drag profile, expressed in terms of drag coefficient (Cd): a dimensionless value used in calculating total drag (force). 

Figure 2; 'Straight Wing' Drag Coefficient increases through transonic region

From Figure 2, it is obvious that the wave drag contributors, particularly the contribution due to the effects of the wing wave drag, are the overwhelmingly dominant factors. I’m going to risk oversimplifying wave drag somewhat here and just note that wave drag is composed of two contributors: Wave drag due to volume (cross-sectional area for some fixed length), 

and wave drag due to lift . One of the earliest advances in overcoming wave drag was the recognition that there were two contributors, which allowed designers to methodically attack the wave drag problem. (Though the occasional spark of genius didn’t hurt)
The graphic above is scaled to reflect all values as a percentage of the maximum value. From this example we see that at Mach 1, the drag coefficient is but 75% of the maximum value reached around Mach 1.1, and that by Mach 1.6 the total Cd is less than 50% of the peak value. If we wished to calculate the total drag
force at any given speed, we could plug in the Cd value into the ‘Drag Equation’:

Figure 3: Drag Equation

The only mysterious-to-some element in this equation should be the Cross-Sectional Area. This is the cross-sectional ‘slice’ of aircraft area presented to the air stream, and is perpendicular to the airflow passing over the aircraft. As the equation indicates, given the drag coefficient and cross-sectional area of any aircraft, drag increases as airspeed increases and when air density increases (density altitude decreases). Keep this equation in mind as we go forward: we will be relying on and referring to it from this point forward.
While we do not know what the Drag Coefficient is for any of the F-35 variants at any of speed, we may have a general idea of what the ‘shape’ of the probable curve for each looks like. Here is a reconstruction of a typical swept wing aircraft drag profile, also expressed in terms of drag coefficient:

Figure 4: Swept Wing 'Drag Rise' Curve

Note the effect of using the swept wing configuration. It delays the rapid onset of drag rise and also pushes the peak drag coefficient to higher Mach numbers. Remember also that this graph is scaled against peak drag coefficient at around Mach 1.55, with horizontal gridlines spaced at ‘25% of peak’ increments.

Figure 5. F-35 'Straight Wing', Extracted from a photo at www.JSF.mil 

The F-35 wing is a straight wing with swept leading edges. I suspect the F-35’s drag curve may be shaped something like a hybrid of the sample straight and swept wing curves shown, with a bias towards the straight wing drag rise curve shape. The acknowledgement that the F-35 can go some distance above Mach 1.2 without afterburner (to be shown in ‘What we know or think we know’, Ref #2 in Part 2 coming up) is a good indicator of the F-35A's drop in drag coefficient after Mach 1.1 as shown in the straight-wing graph vs a peak at Mach 1.55 as shown in the swept wing example.

Why Straight Wing?

In case someone is asking the question, a simple NASA graphic drives home the point that a [swept] wing is ‘the way to go’ if a primary design concern is to reduce drag coefficient below about Mach 1.8. But there are other concerns, when it comes to fighter aircraft (such as 'maneuverability' and 'g-loading') that a straight wing provides certain advantages--such that a 'compromise' is often sought by sweeping the leading edges on an otherwise straight wing.

Figure 6: Straight vs Swept Wing Decision 

Thrust and Acceleration

To accelerate at any speed, the thrust must be greater than the drag opposing the thrust. Jet engine thrust also decreases as the aircraft speed increases, because the difference between the aircraft velocity and the velocity of the engine exhaust becomes smaller as the aircraft accelerates. This isn’t a complete explanation, but it is the conceptual ‘bottom line’ and I don’t want to get wrapped around variability of air mass and internal engine drag among other things. For a more detailed discussion on the topic, NASA’s K-12 site has a pretty good overview (some high school math and physics employed).

In closing Part 1...

The most important point to remember going forward is the obvious one: At a given altitude, when airspeed is lower, the thrust is higher and drag is lower. Therefore, acceleration is greater. 

Figure 7. (Updated/Corrected 21 Mar 15)

As the aircraft moves faster through the airstream, the thrust/drag ratio decreases (Figure 7). Therefore the rate of acceleration will becomes less and less as the aircraft approaches the end of an acceleration run through the transonic region. If we can reduce drag and/or increase thrust between the beginning and the end of an acceleration run, then the rate at which acceleration (rate of increasing speed over time) will be lower (still accelerating, just doing so at an ever-slowing rate) as the jet passes through the transonic region. (Paragraph corrected/revised 21 Mar 15)

In Part 2, we will have a go at a top-level analysis of F-35 transonic performance.

Pournelle CAS Fail

Surprise! Old Army Vet and SF writer thinks like a 'Grunt'. 

Jerry Pournelle's 'abolish the AF crap' is bad enough (based upon some 'conversations' he once had and a selective picking over of Carl Builder's [1] Masks of War), but the uncritical regurgitation of the standard 'Army' A-10 fanboi theme was too much.

If you've read much of Pournelle's work, you'll often find a lot of brute force military action up close and personal (very 'Army'). So in a way this is kind of to be expected. But one would think an accomplished SF writer would have a little more imagination than having the AF keep flying low and slow in an obsolete aircraft, Pournelle strikes me now as just another old cynic without a clue.

I know where he could find one or two, but if he got this far (he's in his 80s fer cryin' out loud) without being able to conceptualize a near term future with a better way to perform CAS or understand the reasons for the different services, given how the recent advances in the application of force provide evidence that we can become more precise, lethal, while lowering attrition on the good guys, then there's little hope of little old me making the geezer see the error of his ways. I won't even go into his throwaway lines about unmanned vehicles, except to observe he hasn't a clue about where they are in their evolution and where they need to be to replace most manned combat aircraft.

I read all of Robert Heinlein's work that I could get my hands on until he had his near stroke and wrote that POS titled 'The Number of the Beast'. I waited for and picked up a copy the first day it was out. I was enjoying it until right in the middle it took a hairpin turn from soft Science Fiction right into pure effin' fantasy. Sorry, parallel universes are one thing--parallel universes with an Oz (literally) is another. I now suddenly find myself not interested in ever picking up another Pournelle work after this demonstrated lack of thoughtfulness much less imagination.


[Note 1] I'm a huge fan of Builder. His writings and analytical methods as well as his insight into many things was awesome--like a Glenn A. Kent without the military experience and extra insight, But he had blind spots like everyone else, especially when it came to the 1960s-70s Army.  I learned much about the blind spots (among many good things) from one of my mentors who worked with and was a friend of Builder pre-RAND: the late great Gene Ostermann (whom most have never heard of, but probably should have).

Reuters & Lockheed Martin: Pick a Headline, Any Headline

Separate the Hacks from the Pros

'Reuters': Hacktastic 

I did my usual Google for F-35 news this AM and spotted a Reuters article about LockMart's quarterly earnings. Fine. What caught my eye first was the graphic:

  
I noted the title only in passing.

This evening I repeated the search, and saw the same graphic, only there was also a different headline attached:

 I went looking for the first headline and found it at Business Insider with a short blurb instead of an article (source of the first graphic above) but still attributed to Reuters:

:
Here's a bigger shot of tonight's article:

So what gives? Did a new quarterly report revision/update come out?

Nahhhhh.........

It just took Reuter's editorial staff a little time to decide how the wanted to report the news. How is everyone else reporting it?...

 

I see sides drawn here. 

The electronic rags the 'bizness' types follow seem to take the positive bent. The yellow journalism ratholes pick the negative. 

Note that while "sales rose", "earnings were weak", but the LM folks 'beat' the estimates (which is what you always want to do), and the F-35 has 'higher' demand. 

Note: There is an unusual factor involving an accounting change due to tax law changes (surprise) that moves money from one column to another and shifts the earnings downward. It's affecting a lot of companies. [sarc] I'm certain Reuters explains it rationally in their 'revised' article [/sarc]

Full disclosure: To the best of my knowledge I own ZERO Lockheed Martin Stock, but some may be in some fund or another that is managed for me.  

Loyal Babblers, Pawns, Fellow Travelers, and the Old Guard Losers of the ‘Military Reform Machine’

How to tell who the Faux Military Reform Players are and the name of the ‘Show’… Since they won’t give you the REAL program.

Like many, I frequently begin the day perusing the web over coffee. One of the things I often check for these days is ‘breaking news’ about the F-35. My main interest in keeping on top of the F-35 story has little to do with my past or current associations with the program (contrary to the Crack Circumstantial Ad Hominem Suicide Brigade’s belief). I expect soon I will be shifting to the next big ‘target’ of anti-defense crowd: the Next Gen LRS program just because it will BE the big target like the F-35 today.

Usually, the legionnaires of F-16.net manning their remote keyboard outposts around the globe have the ‘latest and greatest already posted’ before I’m even awake, and I need go no further to find a trailhead for the day’s trek through F-35 Newsdom. Sometimes though, I’ll just ‘Google’ “F-35 News”. Early yesterday just the other day that tactic yielded a ‘jackpot’ of sorts. I’ve been working on a “transonic acceleration” post in the little free time I can find, and will have it up eventually, but I’ve had a post on the back-burner even longer looking for just the right platform on which to roll it out. Today, er Yesterday, I mean TWO THREE FOUR days ago was “THE DAY”… (Delay explained in blub at end of post)

Brad Plummer
'Serious' (Just not when
it comes to "Defense") 

The Great Google spit this article out right at the top yesterday that morning. It’s a pretty vapid lamentation, written by some tech-deficient ‘writer’ named Brad Plumer. The article is titled “This military program lost 100 times as much money as Solyndra — yet no one talks about it”. The article has since begun descending to its rightful place in the deepest depths of Google anonymity. It is also hardly worth mentioning anything in detail about the ‘piece’: Brad does a lousy job trying to draw an analogy between the F-35 program cost increases to Obama’s Poster-Child-for-Crony-Capitalism, aka “Solyndra!”, and he loses all credibility when he reveals he based his overwrought title on an Atlantic ‘piece’ by James Fallows (introduced in some detail to regular readers here), opening with:

James Fallows has a long, excellent essay in this month's Atlantic….

That is our first clue….that Brad doesn’t have one.

I say Brad’s title was “overwrought” because, to quote ‘Brad’, “Fallows estimates that taxpayers could end up losing 100 times as much money on the F-35 as they did on Solyndra”. Annnnd…to quote Brad quoting Fallows:

Total cost overruns, losses through fraud, and other damage to the taxpayer from the F-35 project are perhaps 100 times that great, yet the "Solyndra scandal" is known to probably 100 times as many people as the travails of the F-35.

Setting aside unsupported allegations of ‘fraud’, in what reality do “estimates” and “perhaps” translate into a definitive statement of fact, ESPECIALLY when drooled out of Fallows' pie-hole? To be fair, ‘Brad’ probably had an editor write the title – writers often suffer the editor's imprimatur. If so, then Brad’s editor is a worthless producer of Bulls***. Brad is a worthless producer of Bulls*** for writing the rest of the worthless ‘article’. From his portfolio of writing, it appears Brad has his own agenda for using Fallows ‘piece’ in his interpretive dance-cum-journalism routine. If so, that makes Brad an “Opportunist” and a “Fellow Traveler”. In the ‘Reformer’ sense he is merely a “Pawn” but he could with time work his way up to "Loyal Babbler" if he minds his manners (more on these characterizations later). But Brad’s electronic effluence is only the quick first stop on this journey.

Next Stop: Fallows’ Epic Cultural Hit Piece

James Fallows: Boy Speech 

Writer for the second worst 

President in my life-time 

has parlayed that gig into 

quite a career promoting 

bad ideas. One of Thomas 

Sowell's 'Intellectuals: 

Believes Inconsequential 

Knowledge should have

Consequential application.

So we follow Brad’s link to Fallow’s Atlantic ‘editorial’, where he re-sows some ground in his ‘fallow’ field of left-wing fantasy. This one is ostensibly about an America ‘disconnected’ from its military. He could have titled it ‘An Aging Leftist Regrets His Kind Do Not Enlist’. There’s all kinds of falderal inside the margins. Here’s a short list of Fallows’ most typical foibles that I would feel remiss if I let go by without pointing the reader to them.

1. Fallows expresses a wonderment that the percentage of people who are immediate relations to a (I presume living) veteran has dropped:

Among older Baby Boomers, those born before 1955, at least three-quarters have had an immediate family member—sibling, parent, spouse, child—who served in uniform. Of Americans born since 1980, the Millennials, about one in three is closely related to anyone with military experience.

Yeah, Total War for 5 years (1940-45 counting the call-ups in 1940, 0r 1941-1946 counting the time it took to return home – your choice) and an active ‘draft’ that ran right up to the early 70s will artificially raise the average until a few years past those factors fading won’t it? Want to feel more connected to the ‘Military’ Fallows? Move to a Red State. Then shed every silly Fascist urge you may feel a) to champion America’s return to a military ‘draft’ or b) that doing so would be ‘good for America’.

2. Fallows weaves a tale of cultural media (film, electronic and print publishing) ‘shifts’ in attitudes towards the military and how it is portrayed by the media. He provides enough cultural comparisons between days of yore and now to make the point but yet does so without ever observing that the shift is entirely due to today’s media and entertainment industries being controlled by the Left, not to mention carries the Left’s water on all things anti-military. But of course, if he did, he would be tacitly admitting his own complicity in attempts to ‘manage reality’ wouldn’t he?

3. Fallows drags up the ‘Missed-It-By-This-Much-Darn-You-Gary-Hart-Libido Reformer’: William S. Lind. Lind’s (keeping with the 'hyphenizin') much-debated-at-one-time-and-still-generally-seen-as-‘derivative’ Fourth Generation Warfare ‘shtick’ is used thusly: l

The most curious thing about our four defeats in Fourth Generation War—Lebanon, Somalia, Iraq, and Afghanistan—is the utter silence in the American officer corps. Defeat in Vietnam bred a generation of military reformers … Today, the landscape is barren. Not a military voice is heard calling for thoughtful, substantive change. Just more money, please.

Perhaps the (asserted) utter silence in the ‘officer corps’ is more due to the widespread knowledge that the cockup ain’t with the military Mr. Lind, but with the ‘political class’ of which you and Fallows belong. The political class these days behave as self-annointed Archons of ‘truth’ with presumptive rights to define reality for the rest of us. The ‘Political Class’: the ones that Goldwater-Nichols’ed the military a generation ago. In Lind’s case here, he attempts to obfuscate what has really been occurring since the latest President took office: a retread of the Left’s canned ‘Vietnam’ strategy. That is the one that illustrates there is no military ‘Victory!’ the American military can secure that the Political Left will not turn into a political defeat if given the chance.

Full disclosure: There's a lot of Lind's stuff I like (see here). It's just that none of it has to do with 'defense'.

Oh, and Lind’s old meal-ticket Gary Hart (as part of his political rehabilitation?) makes a return from exile in an appearance later in Fallows’ dump.

Lind’s contribution actually seems a little out of place, as much of Fallows’ complaints seem pointed at the politicians and ‘Mericunizm in general. But the cognitive dissonance of lamenting a lack of ‘military reformers’ when ‘political reform’ is what is needed is…. palpable.

Fallows’ and Lind’s problem in selling this ‘stuff’ is that there is too much information and too many sources to get the information from for the gatekeepers to control the ‘message’ like they did the first time they hit the scene. Too bad for them.

Franklin C. 'Chuck' Spinney.

Good with 'Cost', lousy with 

'Value' 

Fallows, as a ‘Loyal Babbler’, continues to roll out nearly all the still-active Old Guard Faux-Reformers from his National Defense days. (If you must read it, please check it out at your local library or buy it used will you?) Besides Lind, he treats us to a mention of Chuck Spinney, whose fabulous (as in ‘fable’) “Defense Facts of Life: The Plans/Reality Mismatch” briefing book got him a TIME magazine cover once. Too bad his analysis sucked then and it still sucks now. I keep a marked-up copy of a ‘Westview Press’ edition in a binder because if I marked up the original the way it needed to be, I couldn’t read it. You could pick about any page number and I’d tell you where he was most ‘wrong’ on it, but IMHO most of his ‘sins’ derive from three fatal flaws. The first is a total lack of understanding of ‘complexity’ (origins, drivers, effects), The second was complete discomfort with not knowing the unknowable before it can become knowable. That boy had a textbook “High Motive for Certainty” and probably does still. The third was Spinney’s analysis relying on assuming the U.S. economic conditions at the time (particularly the high inflation rates) were “the” reality relevant to future spending, and then using them in his ‘projections’. From where I’m standing, Spinney suffers from a life-long and over-inflated concern for ‘costs’ with, like most of the ‘Reform’ blowhards, a vestigial (at best) grasp of the greater concept we call ‘value’.

Full Disclosure: I have a ‘bias’ when it comes to ‘Cost Analysts’. I do combat and logistics operations analysis (mostly the latter these days). It’s a side gig that I get ‘called in’ on now, but it once was my main job. One of my great professional frustrations has been when I have to closely deal with cost analysts for any length of time. They’re usually good people (like most people) and they do a job I would never want to do. The problem is they seem to rarely have the depth of technical experience needed to understand all the cost drivers they attempt to characterize, and I end up spending an inordinate amount of time every occasion I do deal with them just 1) keeping them for declaring something they’ve done in the past as ‘equivalent’ or 2) getting them to understand a nuance to a cost driver that took me or somebody else years to distill properly. Almost invariably, I’ve found myself presenting and standing behind my technical analysis including the explicit, and clearly-defined caveats, but having to explain some ‘hidden’ or overly abstract cost element on something that the cost analysts accepted and treated as somehow ‘real’ without bothering to caveats. It is almost as if the cost estimates become real dollars in their minds, and it is an affliction that is too often shared by some managers—it’s not a good ‘synergy’ when they get together.

Ricks: Long Time 'Go To'

Guy for getting the 'Reformist'

Propaganda out to the public.

There’s also a cameo appearance by semi-retired ‘Loyal Babbler’ Thomas E. Ricks. But more significantly, there is a ‘Reformer’ presence that isn’t explicit but it is clearly sitting there to anyone familiar with the subject. This unattributed ‘Reformer’ presence is of particular interest and will be used to wrap up this dissection of Fallow’s Fallacies. It is important because it can be clearly shown as the basis for the fallacious representation of reality: using gross oversimplification to dupe the unaware. It didn’t require particular insight to tickle out the fraudulence, as some of it has been used before by the ‘Reformers’. Specifically, there is not one but two presentations containing the same data (a graphic and a similar representation adapted for the embedded video) sourced from POGO (or were sourced TO POGO by Fallows? –whichever direction, the link is there). The data was used by CDI/POGO’s point man, Winslow Wheeler, a few years ago for much the same purposes, and I caught it that time as well.

Winslow Wheeler: CDI
Ringmaster at POGO

Wheeler and CDI/POGO fingerprints are all over Fallows’ craptastic article. As a bonus, Dina Rasor, founder of POGO and now running the high-grade idiocy collector and low-grade information dissembler called ‘Truthout’ (won’t link to it. Yeccchhh!), links to the Fallows video from their Buzzflash feed. 

The only guy missing from this Old Guard Faux Reform ‘all-star’ production seems to be Pierre Sprey.

Here is the graphic from the Fallows piece:

 Source: The Atlantic

This is a fraudulent (intentional or not) mishmash of unsourced (but largely traceable) numbers posing as ‘facts’ that is used in such a cavalier manner by Fallows et al. The acquisition costs are meaningless without knowing the fiscal year dollars involved, and comparing aircraft that do not perform the same mission is folly anyway. This chart is a typical 'fool the innumerate' propaganda that regularly comes out of the Faux Reform camp. The interesting thing to me here is the perverse representation and comparison of operating costs across aircraft types, especially the bit about:

“…the efficient A-10 Warthog has the lowest per-flight-hour cost, because it needs so little maintenance—yet the military plans to phase it out. The F-35, which was supposed to bring new efficiency to plane design, costs five times as much per plane and three times as much preflight hour.”

One must presume the target audience has no idea of the differences in the full-up capability between the two airplanes, among many other factors (perhaps a topic for the future?) that make such a comparison ludicrous.I slapped some of this ‘operating cost per flying hour’ horses*** down when Wheeler trotted it out the first time.  

POGO conveniently provides an updated version of the data Wheeler misrepresented at the time and it, along with all of the other operating cost data now shown by Fallows deserves the exposure it is about to receive. No direct link, but here's a screen capture showing how to get it:

The data Wheeler and Co. use is (ostensibly) from the Air Force itself. We have no reason to suspect otherwise. However, we have very good reason to call out the representation of the data as “highly-misleading”. This ‘data’ seems to be subject to annual exploitation by POGO/CDI now. Emerging (not fully 'conditioned' yet) Loyal Babbler Mark Thompson used it in March 2013 at Time’s 'Babbleland'. Wheeler and Pierre Sprey (Hey, he made it to the dance after all!) also rolled out the same meme in early 2014 (Google “Chuck Hagel’s A-10 Legacy”- I won’t link to that place if I don’t have to), where they did a Kaleidoscope-on-reality in a number of ways via the now-standard Reformer non-sequiturs. The only value of the article here is that it identifies the AF Comptroller’s office as the source. 

 Again, I have no problems at this time with the numbers Wheeler/POGO use: just the nefarious way in which they use it. 

The Numbers in the Fallows’ Atlantic ‘Cost’ Graphic

Now that we have identified just how widely and frequently this cost ‘scare tactic’ is deployed, let’s return our focus on this specific invocation: Fallows’ using sketchy O&S cost numbers that even if they were ‘correct’ are used in a way designed to mislead the public.

First, the only operating cost data shown above in the Fallow's graphic that we can trace to the same source and characterized in the same way as Wheeler’s 2011 hit piece is the B-2 and the V-22 (Note: The only rational explanation for the V-22 numbers that Fallows uses are if they are for the AF Special Operations Command CV-22s in 2011). The rest of Fallow’s numbers could have been randomly pulled from anywhere EXCEPT ‘an official source’ with the same provenance/ timeframe as what Wheeler used. Here's some of the big stuff missing from Fallow's graphic:

Dear James Fallows and the Atlantic: Sharing Numbers without Context is NOT DATA

As the inclusiveness of cost accounting has broadened over the decades, the Faux Military Reformers strived to exaggerate weapon system cost increases in an attempt to misshape public perceptions on ‘Defense’ and ‘Defense Spending’ in particular. One of the tactics of the Leftist Anti-Defense ‘activists’ has been to present the Operations & Support (O&S) Costs of a weapon system in terms of ‘Cost in Dollars Per Flight Hour’. When costs are presented in this manner, the unwary Public is left with the perception that it costs the Taxpayer these dollar amounts EVERY time, and for every hour these systems operate. In reality, these amounts include dollars that are spent whether the aircraft fly or not, dollars that have no direct connection to the weapon systems or their operation, and dollars that would be spent if there were no weapons systems present just to have the ability to support a weapon system. The dollars sourced from POGO contain every operational cost element listed in the graphic below as noted:

Everything except the Kitchen Sink. Well...actually that's in there too.

If you get the Excel spreadsheet from POGO, there are other cost numbers you may be interested in. 

Since Fallows’ Atlantic piece, another arm of The Atlantic media machine has spit out a screed titled "The F-35 Has to Phone Home Before Taking Off" (really), repeating out-of-date information as if it were somehow relevant to the F-35 ALIS system's current state. This was done when with only a modicum of journalistic inquiry, the issue could have been shown to be past.

Patrick Tucker, who wrote the piece had to reach past all current news, pushing newer well known developments out of the way to retrieve his moldy chunk of information ‘cheese’. From the ‘Reformer POV’ the author would be a ‘Pawn’, and perhaps the Pawn was moved by Fallows, the Atlantic’s Loyal Babbler’?

Update 8PM: Tucker has added an update from the JSFPO: 

Joe DellaVedova, Public Affairs Director F-35 Lightning IIJoint Program Office contacted Defense One about this story. He says that while previous versions of ALIS did not allow for a human override, ”this has been corrected in the latest fielded release (ALIS 1.0.3).”
He adds: “ALIS continues to mature per its development roadmap and we currently have it installed aboard the USSWasp today to support of an operational test and evaluation of the F-35B air system which will happen this spring. There is also a more portable, modularized version of the ALIS Standard Operating Unit server for shipboard and expeditionary operations that is currently in final integration and test. This version will support the U.S. Marine Corps initial operating capability later this year.”

Sounds like...

...to me!

Kudos to Mr Tucker for not playing a 'Pawn'.  

Why I took the time to lay this all out.  

It’s kind of anti-climatic, but this entire sequence of events was perfect for making the following point:

The Old Guard of Military Reform are feeling the end is nigh. They have been operating within a certain framework for years now:

Indirect (Dotted Lines) Influence on Lawmakers and Strong Parallel Coordination With Fellow Travelers

But this is not the model under that they wish to operate. In this model, they have no ‘insiders’ in elected government and it irks them (Just read some of their published ‘work’) They yearn for the heady days of the 70’s and ‘80s when their crazy ideas about weapon systems being 'too complicated', 'too costly' were actually considered within the halls of government (Desert Storm knocked them off their game for an election cycle or three). This is the model they USED  to operate under:

The Old Days: When Reformers had a Toe-hold with the 'Ins' (May they NEVER return) 

The 'Reformers' want this arrangement to return, so they don’t have to spend so much time distorting reality and duping the Hoi Polloi. They’d like to just have to whisper in some politician’s ear, and party with their Loyal Babblers again. There’s been some rumbling by some politicians lately about ‘reform’ again. If one or more of the Old Guard hasn't been 'working' them already, I’d be amazed.

We covered everybody I wanted to cover in the system except the 'Foot Soldiers'. those are basically Old Guard 'wanna-bes', whose primary interest isn't just providing a conduit for the 'Reform' Message, but instead want to generate the Message as well. Not a lot of those guys around these days thank goodness, Although Thomas E. Ricks, through his activities at the fake defense 'Think Tank' the Left has set up called Center for a New American Security and 'serious' writings for the self-perceived serious 'Foreign Policy' audience seems to want to fill the shoes of a loyal 'Foot Soldier' in his semi-retirement.    

Why this took so darned long

The Excel spreadsheet POGO offers had some 'delimiting' problems when I grabbed a copy. On top of that, The original post I did on POGOs numbers was based on what Flight Global had at their site, and their 'interactive graphs that were....aren't anymore. An interesting thing to note about the AF Comptroller numbers (as represented by POGO) is that they are subject to correction. For instance, in my first post, I wondered why the WC-135W had a spike in one year's $/FH:

2011 POGO Data: 2006 Spike in Cost for WC-135W 

In this year's version of the data, the 'spike' is gone, and the numbers are completely different. take a look at the data, I may point out some things I noticed in some detail in a later post. Quick observations are that if the F-16C/D O&S cost trend continues, it will pass the F-35's estimated $/FH by about 2020, and the low density aircraft have the most sensitivity to support costs, groundings and airframe losses--and it shows in the data:

Chart added 11 May 15 to illustrate point made concerning estimated F-35 O&S Cost vs F-16 O&S cost trend

   

Tyler Rogoway on F-35 Fuel Trucks

Sometimes,.... when it’s really, really hot..., you don’t want to heat soak your fuel trucks. So What? 

Hat tip:KamenRiderBlade at F-16.net 

Tyler Rogoway writes for a living. He’s got to write about something, and the latest ‘something’ is all about telling the American, nay, The World’s Low-Information crowd that not only the Air Force has found out that in really, really hot, weather, it doesn’t want to 'heat soak' the fuel trucks servicing your F-35s, but also that this development is, apparently in Rogoway’s opinion, a ‘BAD!’ thing.

His ‘article’ is about what we've come to expect from him, and the entire treatment of the subject matter is an excellent example (yet one more in a line of many) of how F-35 critics will highlight something they don’t understand as being a flaw or deficiency. The next step will be to add that one little mis-characterization to a litany of previous mis-characterizations, and then use them in their totality to continuously criticize and condemn the aircraft, program, technology,and hell, when you get right down to it, even the ‘National Defense Strategy’ that drives the selection and fielding of weapon systems in the first place.

The ardent F-35 critics generally fall into two camps: Those that do so while really understanding NONE of it, as I suspect in Rogoway’s case, or alternatively, those who do so as an intentional manipulation of the facts to distort reality for nefarious purposes (P.A.C.E. anyone?). I am indifferent as to what brand of delusion drives the contrived criticisms, but believe while the latter is incurable, there is always hope for disabusing the former of their delusions through information. (Kreuger-Dunning Effect notwithstanding, there is always hope). I could go into Rogoway’s GAWKER piece and dissect it into itty-bitty chunks of tautological floatsam, but to me the comment thread is far more interesting.

Rogoway’s façade of being a disinterested observer slips somewhat, and probably reveals more about where he is ‘coming from’ than he really would have wished. To his credit, he did not immediately wash these exchanges down the memory hole like a lot of people would have.

I’m now going to place one of my favorite quotes here for later reference. I think I will be pointing to it later in this post:

Novices in mathematics, science, or engineering are forever demanding infallible, universal, mechanical methods for solving problems. 

–J.R. Pierce 

------------

Here we go. My observations in [square brackets] and boldface emphases in Rogoway’s responses are mine. No typos are corrected. The selected (because it was more succinct than another) exchange of interest is:

‘Dastim’ to Tyler Rogoway 

Having decades of experience with LockMar's military products (Submarine sonar), I can honestly say this is par for the course. It is VERY common for a new weapons system to have faults out of the gate and the more complex/expensive they are, the more faults possible. Moving forward they prove themselves invaluable but the start is always ugly. When they took the submarine sonar contracts in the early 90s we had a plethora of problems, some mission limiting, but in the end, their systems proved to be the best in the world. Be patient, this shit is far more complicated than most of you have any idea about.

[Other than not being a ‘fault’, but an emergent requirement based upon the press release wording, the need for fuel not to exceed some very high temperature when it is loaded is almost certainly driven by the aircraft using the fuel system as a heat sink for its environmental control system (ECS). If the fuel is already hot, it will not be an effective heat sink, will it? This again, is not a ‘fault’, but at worst it is an “operational requirement”. All aircraft have specific operational requirements, and there’s no requirement that they all be the same that I’ve ever heard of. So What? If one is familiar with advanced aircraft or avionics systems design, one might speculate--and then ask for confirmation either way—that perhaps the additional heat controls placed on the fuel that is loaded and the effect on the ECS cooling system is related to the closely controlled gaps and openings on the F-35 outer mold line (OML) in order to meet LO requirements. For whatever reason, the requirement can be perceived as problematic only if it will require some onerous workarounds to overcome. Clearly this isn’t about an F-35’s systems intolerance of normal military operating temperatures and requirements, though the ‘stories’ written to-date might lead one to believe it were so. This has to be about fuel temperatures after the fuel has been heat-soaked for hours (or days), and reducing the heat soak by either reducing the amount of heat absorbed directly (paint the truck tank a light color) or indirectly (shelter the truck to prevent direct sunlight from beating down on the fuel tank). Not being a panic-prone F-35 hatercritic, I would also wonder if then perhaps the F-35 might also expect fewer problems with very cold fuel in arctic climes? Dastim’s point about complexity is well founded and well made, but it is only half the story. Combine an aircraft in development experiencing the normal issues one would expect if one knew what they were doing, with the apparent legions of technically deficient souls who have NO understanding of the challenges AND BENEFITS that make those challenges worth the effort in pursuing advanced technology systems, and you get a technically illiterate response...such as:]

Tyler Rogoway to ‘Dastim’ 

You sir are a part of the problem. Major systemic issues led to the F-35 being in the place that it was, including ridiculous sell job on concurrency and laughable cost goals and timelines. We cannot sustain the best fighting force in the world like this, it will economically break us.

You may feel just at home with this sort of nonsense and after writing well over 200 pieces on this program I am insulted when you say myself and others probably have no idea what we are talking about. We need a new approach with fresh minds that will come up with new ways so that this sort of program never happens again. And finally, the F-35 program, the largest weapons program in history, is not new sonar arrays for submarines.

[Rogoway’s first paragraph, aside from the abstract, unsupported, and unwarranted accusation made against his commenter, is a series of claims made without supporting evidence and with the presumption that they are indisputable facts when in reality they are a series of claims that are not only debatable but have been and are continuously debated. Rogoway, apparently happens to believe these claims are true. This is his first logical fallacy: “Begging the Question”. He layers on top of this fallacy, via assertions of “ridiculous”, “sell job” and “laughable” (without falsifiable support) the additional logical fallacy of “Appeal to Ridicule”. The second assertion that he has written “well over 200 pieces on this program” in defense of his knowledge base is clearly a Fallacious Appeal to Authority, and it is one built upon another fallacy: The Non-Sequitur. Just because someone ‘writes’ about something, particularly ‘opinion pieces’ it “does not follow” that they must understand, much less be an authority on what they are writing about. How we judge someone knows or knows not what they are talking about is based upon the CONTENT and the 'verifiability' of the writing. Rogoway digs deeper with a rhetorical ploy you don’t see every day: Righteous Indignation (“I am insulted”) over his being ‘doubted’. Rogoway begins his fadeout with more ‘Begging the Question; (‘need fresh minds’) with another Non Sequitur (‘so it will never happen again’). Rogoway’s last sentence is a throwaway line but he should have thrown it farther. As he slung it, “the F-35 program, the largest weapons program in history, is not new sonar arrays for submarines” misses Dastim’s point: It takes time to develop and field complex systems. If Rogoway is willfully ignoring this point, his assertions that ‘one of these is not like the other’ could very well be thought of as a Composition Fallacy in his denial.]

------------

I wonder... 

If Rogoway cut down on his logical fallacies to nil, would the next 200 articles on the F-35 gain him the  'cred' he thinks he already deserves? Personally, I think he won't get any better until he realizes he is one of those Novices' old J.R. warned us about. (Told you I would refer back to J.R.)

I worked a 12 hour day today (now 'yesterday'-yikes), so I don’t feel like taking down his Magnum Opus of Circumstantial Ad Hominem that occurred in his exchange with ‘ashkelon’ tonight/this morning.

But here's some food for thought, 

What happened the last time a bunch of naysayers, some 'expert', but all OUTSIDERS who were looking in at a revolutionary weapon system program and then made all kinds of criticisms they just knew 'had to be true'?
Answer: Hilarity ensued.

U.S. Navy ‘Non-Receptive’ to the F-35?

 Where did that come from? 

Source of original photo: US Navy 

Where did the idea that the “Navy” has been less than enthusiastic about the F-35C come from? I think I know, and can trace it back two or so years to a single statement made by the incoming CNO in an article for the USNI ‘Proceedings’. That single article gave such hope to the anti-JSF crowd that it gained far more audience and credence that it would have ever otherwise received, certainly more than it ever deserved.

Today, with the successful-to-date F-35 sea trials of the CF-3 and CF-5 aircraft operating off the USS Nimitz these past two weeks, the story has become one of a ‘surprising’ reversal of opinion (or beginnings thereof) by the Navy—at least as far as the media would lead us to believe.

I submit, that to the contrary it can be shown that what Navy enthusiasm there is for the F-35C is probably pretty much what it has always been, with perhaps a few more opinions among Wizened within the competing NAVAIR tribes lately changed for the better.

The life cycle of the whole ‘Navy chill to the F-35’ meme can be tracked easily—all the way back to its origins. The first FIVE citations/quotes are from the same publication taken over time. I do not mention the publication’s name for a couple of reasons. One, it doesn't matter. The media followed pretty much the same path getting here no matter what the sponsor. Two, I am partial to the reporting at the source and do not want to unfairly highlight this one little misadventure among a larger body of greater work. [I've numbered the steps involved in developing the meme to make it easier to discuss and reference if needed]

Ready? We begin…. 

Published this week, our source informed us that:

1. …The Navy has been much less enthusiastic about the F-35 than its two sister services, the Air Force and Marines. That seems to be changing now that the F-35C has successfully landed and taken off repeatedly from an aircraft carrier….

There was an embedded link in the statement that took me to last year:

2. “That’s the message Orlando Carvalho, new head of Lockheed Martin’s iconic aeronautics business wants to send the US Navy, the service most skeptical of the F-35."

There was an embedded link in THAT quote that took me to earlier last year:

3. “Speaking for the Navy,” added the Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Jonathan Greenert, “I need the fifth-generation fighter, and that [F-35] provides it, so we’re all in — but it has to perform. It has problems; it is making progress.” 

“I do not at this point believe that it is time to look for an exit ramp, if you will, for the Navy for the F-35C,” continued Greenert, who in the past has damned the Joint Strike Fighter with similar faint praise.

This passage had an embedded link to an article with this bit:

4. By contrast, the CNO sounded more resigned than excited about the Navy piece of the $240 billion F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, the carrier-launched F-35C. We have to have it, but “the question becomes how do we buy and how does it integrate into the air wing,” Greenert said. “If we bought no Cs, I think that would be very detrimental for the overall program.”

This passage contained one link to a 2012 article presenting this passage:

5. …Chief of Naval Operations Jonathan Greenert’s recent article in Proceedings announces in public what many have already known in private: The U.S. Navy is not wholly committed to the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program. Admiral Greenert’s controversial — and, potentially, hugely consequential — article raises several interesting points, among which is the contention that advances in sensing capabilities and electronic and cyber warfare will increasingly degrade America’s stealth arsenal. 

This is not news. What is news, however, is the head of the U.S. Navy signaling a tepid commitment to the military’s largest acquisition program, not to mention the many allied and partner country participants. 

There were three links embedded to sources in the above to the ‘sources’ that follow. These are the first references external to the publication we’ve been citing so far:

6. A link to Admiral Greenert’s “Limits of Stealth” script in his now infamous “Payloads Over Platforms” article in USNI’s Proceedings as incoming CNO (2012), which, I note here, does not even mention the F-35. His shtick did not impress me at the time. Still doesn’t. But as we have seen in getting back to this point in time, his later comments appear to reflect a somewhat more ‘informed’ POV now. The 'CNO' is NOT 'the Navy' BTW.

7. A link to the ‘corrected final’ copy of the 2010 “The Final Report of the Quadrennial Defense Review Independent Panel”, A report that a word search of finds no mention of the “F-35C”, nor just the ‘F-35”, nor the words “Stealth” or “Low Observable”. Why it was even linked, I cannot tell.

8. A link to a Heritage Foundation paper titled “Thinking About a day Without Seapower: Implications for US Defense Policy”. It also has not a single mention of the “F-35”, ‘C’ model or otherwise, or “Low Observable”. It does mention the word “Stealth” three times:

Developing a Long-Term Research and Development Plan. After numerous studies and a half-dozen shipbuilding plans, Navy leaders have correctly concluded that the United States needs a larger fleet—not simply in numbers of ships and aircraft, but also in terms of increased network capability, longer range, and increased persistence. Navy leaders recognize that the U.S. is quickly losing its monopolies on guided weapons and the ability to project power. Precision munitions (guided rockets, artillery, mortars, and missiles) and battle networks are proliferating, while advances in radar and electro-optical technology are increasingly rendering stealth less effective. Policymakers should help the Navy to take a step back and look at the big picture to inform future investment portfolios. Congress should demand and uniformed leaders should welcome the opportunity to develop long-range technology road maps, including a science and technology plan and a research and development plan for the U.S. Navy. These plans should broadly outline future investments, capabilities, and requirements. The possibilities include:

• A next-generation surface combatant,
• A sixth-generation fighter, and
• Low-observable capabilities beyond stealth…

And....

Building a Modern Congress–Navy Partnership. …
...To relieve additional pressure on the already strained Navy shipbuilding budget, Congress should seriously consider funding the design and construction costs of the Navy’s new replacement ballistic missile submarine outside of Navy budget controls. These national assets are employed as part of critical strategic missions. Without additional resources, the defense industrial base and the nation’s conventional advantage at sea could be sacrificed to recapitalize the strategic force. Alternatively, Congress should consider whether this extremely expensive leg of the nuclear triad should be maintained in the face of decreasing stealth, shrinking nuclear stockpiles, and limited shipbuilding funds….

Note only two of the three ‘stealth’ references relate to low observable aircraft, and those stake out a claim similar to that which Admiral Greenert has since backed away from after he assumed the CNO responsibility. In any case, the Heritage Foundation report comes closest to representing the “Navy’s” coolness towards Low Observables in the form of one of the co-authors: a retired Navy Captain and ship driver. Not quite "The Navy' .

Strip away the journalistic overlay of 'what it all means' and there's no 'there' there. So much for the Navy being ‘cool’ towards the F-35C.

Now if you want to talk about the F-18E/F/G ‘community’ (read ‘tribe’) being cool towards the F-35, well………..DUH!

Just wait until the F-35 starts smacking the F-18 tribe around in training. It will be worse.

That’s called ‘Tradition’.

F-35C Makes First Carrier Traps

Hat Tip:  'Raptor_Claw' at F-16.net.

Today, the first two carrier landings by F-35Cs were accomplished. One more check box checked.
The first trap (landing, catching the cross deck pendant, or 'wire') caught the 3rd (of 4) wires --exactly as it is preferred.

U.S. Navy Video:

Screen captures from this event show some interesting things going on. I'd say the pilot positioned the jet about as well as any man or UAV software could have done it. The objective is to catch the '3- Wire', and the optimal touchdown area is 95%+ between the 2nd and 3rd wire. The pilot could not have bought hardly any more area to measure hook behaviors after touch down:


F-35C First Carrier Landing Pic 1

Notice the main wheels are not yet touching the deck (you can see the stripe in the middle still under the left main tire).



F-35C First Carrier Landing Pic 2

Here the wheels are just beginning to touch the deck but are not showing signs of weight on the wheels. It looks like the first curls of tire smoke are starting to come up.




F-35C First Carrier Landing Pic 3

This screen cap is just (barely) after the previous one, A little more tire smoke, and the weight is not yet on the wheels very much. The tailhook is about even with the 2-Wire.



F-35C First Carrier Landing Pic 4

Weight is coming on to the wheels now and it appears the hook is down on the deck as well. Notice the 2-Wire in the center where the hook went over/across. It appears the hook bottom may have hit the wire top, or at the most barely nicked the wire. I think it hit the top because of what we see in the next screen cap.



F-35C First Carrier Landing Pic 5

There is a lot going on in this picture. The hook is about to engage the 3-Wire. The nose gear is still in the air and the 'mains' have run over the 3-Wire: you can see the wave in the pendant propagating outward. Now look back at the 2-Wire. It has very a slight displacement forward that has propagated outward (compare to previous pic) , but is laying flatter than I would expect if the hook had impacted it directly. I guess we might find out someday.

A Good Day for the Program, the Navy, and the Taxpayer eh?