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Boomer. I can see you are a F-18E/F advocate. While the F-18E/F will have many virtues, limited stealth and state of the art avionics. You still have to look at the fact that the basic design of the F-18, including the F-18E/F draws its orgins from the Northrup F-17 Cobra. Which ironicaly was designed to be a day time light weight fighter, not a carrier strike fighter. The F-18E/F while an improvement over the tried and trued F-18A/C, still has several vices as a carrier aircraft. Its lacks endurance, it has poor transonic performance, and though it has better bring back to the boat trap capability, it still falls short of the F-4J Phantom in that regard.
Stealth works great untill you have a tally ho. This is one reason while stealthy aircraft still work in conjunction with electronic warfare aircraft like the EA-6B and the cover of darkness. The F-22 is so revoultionary in that it combines its stealthy attributes with a true fighter plane performance.
The F-18E/F will rely on the USAF's use of the F-22 to provide air dominance to complete its mission against a viable air to air threat, such as India or China. It is the first example in the history of the US Navy, that air superiority will be counted on by another service. This is a far cry from the power projection doctrin of an era gone by.
I would say this about the F-18E/F in conclussion. It is a great aircraft in todays low risk air to air enviornment, with our current war on terrorism. It is very surviviable against surface to air threats, and if it is any thing like its little brother, the F-18A/C will be very reliable.
But it also illustrates that the US Navy can no longer be a self sufficient power projection force from the sea. It will need tanking support and fighter support from the USAF to succeed in its mission against a modern foe, such as China or India.
Because the F-18E/F cannot dominate its foe any time, any place, in any situation, like other carrier fighter aircaft, one cannot consider it the greatest carrier fighter.
In my opinion, the greatest attribute of the F-18E/F is that it will work under the protection of the F-22, we hope.
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Actually I'm not an advocate or at leaste didnt start out that way, I USED to be an F-14 fan like everybody else. I thought at the time the SH was a big waste of money because you were really only getting an update of the Hornet. I have since learned that the SH has much more stealthiness than anyone here will ever admit to. That it has a low speed AOA capability well beyond the F-16 and approaching that of the F-22 ( might even match the F-22 if the TV were dissabled ). And a low speed turn rate better than anything other than again the superb F-22.
Been following the ATF program for the better part of two decades so I'm familier with the F-22 as well.
I'm very aware of the lineage of the Hornet and its progenitor WAS one of the LWF candidates. But since the F-14 team wanted nothing to do with the strike role ( which the F-14 was fully capable of doing from the start ) what the Navy and McD were forced to come up with was a comprimise between fighter and striker which evolved into the F/A designator once they figured out that with advancing avionics Hornet could do both missions with the same black boxes. The Hornets DO have range problems, but when you put two engines in a small airframe that's what you end up with, there just isnt any room for a lot of fuel. One of the drivers of the SH was that the baby Hornet had completely run out of interior room for avionics expansion. Transonic performance is marginal due to having two small engines to strech fuel economy as much as possible with the Hornet airframe. A good comparison to the Hornet is the Fulcrum, similar size, similar mission ( other than the CV part for Fulcrum ). The MiG has MUCH better kinetic performance due to it's more powerfull engines, it also has no range to speak of as it only carries about as much fuel as the F-16 ( the old Hornet by the way carries about as much fuel as the F-15A which few people complain about range wise ).
As far as "any time any place" is concerned, the Tomcat could only do that till the Flankers and Fulcrums turned up. Unless you plan on a lot of gunfights with the F-22 the SH will be using the same weapons ( AMRAAM ), so it comes down to first look first shot, in fact I believe I read that the F-22 wont be getting the 9X for a long time, the SH already has the X. And the F-22 is about the only thing that can out snapshoot the Hornets, Super or otherwise.
The Navy painted itself into a box moneywise and while a navalised F-22 would have been great the Hornet was the only direction they could afford.
The Honets also give the Navy tremendous flexibility with regards to strikers vs. fighters on any particular day.
Fighting For Justice With Brains Of Steel !
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FA.2 Sea Harrier
