Guest Post by Steve Candidus
File this one under the title – ‘Some things never change’.
In the early stages of WWII the US Army Air force had a medium bomber called the B-26 Martin Marauder.
It was known as a ‘hot’ airplane with high performance and a perchance for coming back to the ground in the uncontrolled high speed way rather than the nice slow speed safe way.
In fact, it got the nicknames of, “The Widow Maker, and The Baltimore Whore” and since some of its pilot introduction flights were performed in Florida, they used to say “One a day in Tampa Bay”.
Hardly complimentary tags.
Then-Congressman Harry Truman visited the Martin Company in Maryland to determine what the problem was.
To his surprise they already knew quite well what was wrong. They had made a mistake in their wing loading calculations. The wings were simply too small for the aircraft – hence the nickname “The Baltimore Whore” as it had no visible means of support.
When Truman inquired as to when the needed fixes would be implemented they informed him that they had no intention of fixing the airplane. They didn’t have to. They had a contract.
The story goes that Harry T. didn’t even wait to get back to Washington DC, and that he placed a couple of phone calls and by the time he got back to DC Martin’s contract for the B-26 had been summarily cancelled.
All of a sudden, they saw the light and decided they had better fix the wings.
The B-26 went on to have a remarkable career with the US Army Air force and had one of the lowest loss rates of any aircraft of its type.
Fast forward to 2017. Martin is now a part of Lockheed/Martin and their F-35 Lightning II spends more of its time in the hanger than it does in the air. You know, where an airplane is supposed to be. In the air…
Its reliance on over-the-horizon long-range detection makes its importance of a stealthy design open to debate. In order to detect an enemy aircraft it has to turn on its radar. That’s like shining a flashlight in the dark. The enemy can see exactly where YOU are.
Stealth also depends on the type of radar that is looking for it. The Russians have simply added a number of different radar wavelengths. The old longer wavelengths will detect most modern stealth designs and it’s far easier to just add more frequencies to their search radar than it is to change the aircraft as built.
The Russians have also developed infrared detection to a fine science.
Infrared is something that was probably more advanced in our planes half a century ago than it is now. It’s just not jazzy enough for the generals and admirals. It has to have more flashing lights, buzzers, and cost a lot more to suit them.
With all of the cost overruns, design flaws, and software problems, the F-35 is still unreliable. They can’t even seem to make an oxygen system that works properly. They had that figured out in the 1930’s!!!
Now we find out that they are rusting prematurely. How does aluminum rust?
On top of it all, this supposedly low cost multi-service groundcraft (remember the multi-service F-111 – McNamara’s flying Edsel?) actually costs two or three times more than any adversary it would need to fight. It is almost double the cost of the Russian Su-35 and has less than half of the big Sukhoi’s operational readiness rate. That equates to having four Su-35’s for each F-35.
The Su-35 can carry more air-to-air missiles (twelve for the Su-35 versus four for the F-35 – some with a range of 190 miles), and Russian doctrine is to fire them in salvos.
The big Sukhoi’s are more maneuverable than the Lockheed/Martin’s too. They would be a tough adversary one-on-one, but four against one is asking a lot of our pilots – assuming they haven’t already passed out from oxygen deprivation due to the aforementioned faulty oxygen systems.
That means it will always be outnumbered. Two or three planes in different positions will be able to overpower it even if all of its systems worked, and they still don’t.
Maybe they figure they don’t have to fix it. After all, they have a contract.
What we need is for a modern day Harry Truman that has the you-know-what’s to have their contract cancelled.
Joe and Jane US taxpayer deserves better and so do our pilots.
Meet the new Martin Company – same as the old Martin Company.
It’s time to stuff this turkey.
Just for fun, one of the instructor pilots for the old Martin B-26 in Frederick, OK was soon to be comedian George Gobel. He was proud to have spent the war in Oklahoma saying, “That’s evidentially where they needed me or they wouldn’t have sent me there.” And as he used to brag: “No Japanese aircraft ever made it past Tulsa”
Steve Candidus is a writer and a history buff that works as a product and application specialist of large AC electric motors in Spring, Texas.
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/did-russian-missile-really-hit-israeli-f-35-22926
Zara,
Maybe it ingested another turkey. They can’t fly very far or very often either…
Hope ya liked it. I did a fast re-write on an old essay to see if Admin would want it.
Steve C.
Spring, Texas
Many in our military did not want the F-35 from its relatively early days. What an immense tragedy to see some of the best of America die helplessly because of this plane or any other foolish decision. Greed and the blindness of pride are playing major parts leading us to possible destruction. However, many Globalists don’t care, they have arrangements for future years in southern latitudes, or, if that not possible, brief time as mole people dwelling underground until it is safe to come out. News for the latter, you will not get your desired order out of that chaos.
Here’s the deal, the purpose of military spending in the US is to get truckloads of money in the pockets of the crony-capitalist military-industrial contractors like Lockheed-Martin, Boeing, etc. Building high quality, advanced equipment was never part of the deal.
When you understand that you understand the F-35.
And employ a lot of people.
Read Bastiat
So true Trapped in , there is a reason all the government contractors are known in the DC beltway (495) area as BELTWAY BANDITS !
Truman lived at a time when victory was the country’s sole objective. Now it’s maintaining the lifestyle of the Privileged Few.
Greetings,
Gosh, let me think here for a minute. Hmmm, who else had very costly and difficult to maintain weapons systems? Oh yeah! That would be the NAZI’s. Think about how much effort they put into the V1 and V2. Those resources could have been used to produce weapons with a proven track record instead of just blind firing missiles towards London and Antwerp.
In this case, the F stands for FUBAR. Or maybe failure. Or fiasco. It’s so bad there seems to have been malicious intent behind its F’n design. Must have been the Russians.
Enjoyed the post. Thank you, Steve.
The problem is the contract is not with the American people it is with bought congresscritters and regulators hired from the upper echelons of the military. That funny game where americans come 2 nd to money
I have a retired AF crew chief buddy who laments the disasters of the F16. He described how parts would wear out, be sent back to be refurbished, and wear out again. Here’s some USAF humor he fed me.
Mx officer goes to the morning meeting
crew chief vs pilot – early step
Revenge of the Crew Chief
[img]https://tse3.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.fHJ5DD-97T0pmOeYSSe1HAEsCd&pid=15.1&P=0&w=317&h=167[/img]
https://finance.yahoo.com/chart/LMT
Pretty spectacular, huh?
. . . and a perchance for coming back . . .
I think you meant to say penchant. Otherwise, good overview of the F-35 deficiencies. However, the flaws in the F-35 are not amenable to a relatively straightforward technical fix like the B-26, and the root cause of the debacle is not technical at all.
“perchance versus penchant”
I always give credit to my dad whose talent for writing I fortunately did inherit and point to my mom’s talent for good spelling that I unfortunately I did not.
I do know the correct word here, but I obviously misspelled it and spell check corrected it to the wrong one.
I am very fussy about my words and grammar so I very much appreciate you pointing out the error as posted.
If you ever see any other such errors in anything that I post PLEASE point them out. Do not let me get away with it.
I wish I had someone else to proof read. Another writer will oftentimes find such errors that your own eyes will not.
I am glad that you liked the article. I will strive to do better grammatically next time.
And ‘thank doG for spill cheeck’…
Steve C.
Spring, Texas
Kind of surprised that even back in the 40s companies were so devious and immoral …. and it IS immoral to put soldier’s lives at risk via shitty equipment when a solution is known, and available.
Someone should have been jailed. That company should have been banned from ever getting another military contract.
Here’s what I don’t understand about the F35 ….. why the fuck are other countries buying this piece of flying shit?? They don’t have internet access?
Nice article, keep ’em coming.
Somebody signed a contract…
What do you think “foreign aid” is all about? It most certainly is NOT about food for the starving, clothes for the destitute, etc. It is giant piles of cash handed over for the EXPRESS purpose of purchasing arms and other military “needs” from connected American countries. NOBODY is spending their OWN money on this piece of shit. They are all spending OUR hard earned and then STOLEN, tax dollars. There’s your answer.
Joint strike fighter concept is a failure from the start.
All service branches have different requirements for their ideal aircraft for their role.
What you end up with is the equivalent of a mediocre flying platypus that no one is happy with.
I’ve had program managers from Northrop brag about their involvement. No product focus, just meet contract requirements and bill accordingly.
Just remember; the actual planes aren’t the most expensive program part.
Operation support, sustainment training and program management will be in excess of 1.12 trillion