{"id":181305,"date":"2016-08-06T22:42:00","date_gmt":"2016-08-07T03:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2016\/08\/06\/combat-ready-my-ass\/"},"modified":"2016-08-06T22:42:00","modified_gmt":"2016-08-07T03:42:00","slug":"combat-ready-my-ass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/2016\/08\/06\/combat-ready-my-ass\/","title":{"rendered":"Combat Ready My Ass"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The US Air Force has <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-lockheed-fighter-idUSKCN10D17D\">declared that its first squadron of F-35s is combat ready<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"color: blue;\">The U.S. Air Force on Tuesday declared an initial squadron of Lockheed Martin Corp F-35A fighter jets ready for combat, marking a major milestone for a program that has faced cost overruns and delays. <\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">\u2026\u2026\u2026<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: blue;\"><br \/><\/span><span style=\"color: blue;\">&#8220;The U.S. Air Force decision to make the 15 F-35As &#8230; combat ready sends a simple and powerful message to America&#8217;s friends and foes alike &#8211; the F-35 can do its mission,&#8221; the program&#8217;s chief, Air Force Lieutenant General Chris Bogdan, said in a statement. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Not so much:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><span style=\"color: blue;\">Dan Grazier, a fellow of the Project On Government Oversight, said, however, &#8220;This is nothing but a public relations stunt.&#8221; He added that it would not be possible to know if the F-35 jets were ready for combat until after initial operational testing.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>That&#8217;s putting it mildly.<\/p>\n<p>As the folks at <i>The Register<\/i> note. &#8220;It&#8217;s got <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theregister.co.uk\/2016\/03\/08\/flying_blind_f35s_radar_software_fails_in_the_air\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">dodgy radar<\/a>, relies on an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theregister.co.uk\/2016\/02\/03\/pentagon_cant_check_f35_maintenance_thanks_to_insecure_database\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">insecure database<\/a>, boasts a buggy <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theregister.co.uk\/2016\/03\/24\/software_problems_bork_f35_fleet_til_2019\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">operating system<\/a>, and a laser targeting system that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theregister.co.uk\/2016\/08\/01\/f35_electro_optical_targeting_system_laser_cant_used_uk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">can&#8217;t be used for training in the UK<\/a>, but the United States Air Force is satisfied that the F-35A fighter is ready for combat.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Also: its ejection seat can injure smaller (less than 165 lb) pilots, and its cannon cannot be fired.<\/p>\n<p>This is a statement that is intended for the consumption of the Pentagon and Congress, and not reflective of the maturity of the program.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The US Air Force has declared that its first squadron of F-35s is combat ready: The U.S. Air Force on Tuesday declared an initial squadron of Lockheed Martin Corp F-35A fighter jets ready for combat, marking a major milestone for a program that has faced cost overruns and delays. \u2026\u2026\u2026&#8220;The U.S. Air Force decision to &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1007,1008,987,1051,1006],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-181305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aviation","category-defense-procurement","category-fail","category-hypocrisy","category-military"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181305"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181305"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181305\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.panix.com\/~msaroff\/40years\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}