Leaderboard

That guy again! He must have thousands of hours in the Viper, but his takeoffs are 20% higher than his landings.

Gents, gents, why argue?.... I'd like to crash my viper into this, ifyaknowwhatimean....

Easiest way to avoid problems as a backseater is to talk with your pilot using only simple, one-syllable words...

You are always at BASH severe at or below 2 AGL for all the penguins.

Those NoDak troops aren't backing down any time soon...

Noted. You're a student. I wasn't talking to you. I don't give a shit how well he can teach TP stalls. He needs some peer mentoring over his little newsletter.

Them too, sneaky bastards up there, plotting.

Dude, you're done and so are your conspiracy theories. Go find some other forum to preach your tin-hat rhetoric.

Once again the USAF sticks it to themselves and other services to fund a pet project. I've just recently briefed a conference on irregular warfare and several LAAR advocates were there (military, GS and contractor). All of them said the fate of the LAAR was tied like the C-27J to the F-35. Until JSF is fully funded the USAF will shut down all other projects not deemed nationally critical (e.g. MQ-9 and RQ-4 production) and re-program those funds. This is an old story as well. While on active duty I watched as several vital and viable weapons systems were shut down before they had adequate replacements (F-4G, RF-4, ABCCC, E-10, EF-111). Yes they were expensive but their replacements; if they had a replacement (think ABCCC, RF-4 and E-10) were either not immediately up to the task or were simply discounted. But the key requirement was the development and production of the F/A-22 - I had several colleagues in the Acquisition world who referred to the F/A-22 as the vampire as it sucked everyone else's programs dry. So now we have the F/A-22 that has not been down range yet, the F-35 which probably won't go down range anytime soon and we as an AF are shutting down F-16 and F-15 guard units, slashing at needed airlift (no more C-17s, reduced upgrades for C-5s) and ignoring the lessons of current conflicts (Afghanistan, Columbia) to go after the top shelf weapons systems over something that is available, safe and cheap (AT-6) ready made for low level conflicts and irregular missions (convoy support, immediate CAS against emerging targets in urban environments). But its coming back around. The Army is getting screwed on the C-27J and LAAR so they may soon go their own way. I expect to see LAAR and C-27J contracts for SOF and Army - which further begs the question: If the USAF cannot actually support the Army, Navy and Marines then what does it actually do? Cyber warfare, Space, strategic air lift and defence? One of our speakers, a Professor from a National Military University noted increased calls for the USAF to go back to being the US Army Air Corps. Don't think for a moment, they won't do it. Warrant Officers now fly Apache - in many ways more complex than current fighters so that argument is lost. The only thing the USAF can hang its hat on is Strategic defence and once the Navy takes over with subs and the army takes over Space command (ICBMS are just big guided mortars after all) then the USAF has nowhere to go. Our leadership really needs to wake up and smell the coffee. Otherwise we'll all be going green and it won't have anything to do bio fuels and bio-degradable paint.