shargrin?

I do hope we don’t end up wishing we had pulled out of NATO.

Even without the export ban, there was no real international demand for the F-22. The cost was so high that none of our close allies could even remotely afford it, especially after the end of the Cold War and prior to the rise of China as an expansionist global power. Back when F-22 production was terminated in 2009, everyone was cutting (or at least not increasing) military spending. If Japan or Australia had really pushed to buy the F-22 it would have been possible to produce an export model with the more sensitive items stripped out. They didn't want it.

F22's maintenance burden was vastly higher than the F35, which is still quite expensive.

Costs are also somewhat weirdly calculated, by just taking hours flown / cost. Maybe we could fly the jet a lot more for a modest increase in cost, & the numbers would look much better. But we don't fly that much, especially given the teething issues (such as the oxygen supply issues) we've had. There was a really great report I think based on GAO or maybe direct from GAO that covered f35 expenses very closely, comparing across services over time, that really was interesting to see; haven't found the link again though alas.

The F35 is also a far more advanced sensor & communication system, I believe. F22 was a more conventional stealth where the pilots got the mission, got on the air, & kept minimal emissions to the target & hopefully back; the f117 I think had similar characteristics. This isn't nearly as general purpose a role.

> that spending is a large part of our exports and economy.

I'm seeing annual US exports at $2 trillion, with military exports at $56bn, or 2.8%. That is definitely material, but hard to call that "large part of"

The price is starting to look right, too. I'm still shocked by this.

I'm most interested in what the unit economics here are. Inefficiencies in Western manufacturing are seem like they could be significant since the big threat in the short term seems to be a WWI style blow up by UN security council countries.

The US is basically broke and seems to be struggling industrially. It won't be able to ignore economics if it has to conduct a war against an industrial power.

Aren’t the 6th gen European fighters likely going to be exported too? Granted that is not here and now.

The Korean Boramae is also likely to be exported. But there, granted it’s more a 4.5gen plane unless/until they iterate further.

Two different international coalitions are now trying to design 6th-generation fighters that will be available for export, but the earliest they could possibly be available is 2035. So, for at least another decade the F-35 will be the only survivable 5th-generation fighter available for purchase in US-aligned countries.

There are still a few other 4th-generation fighters in production, some with modernized systems, but at this point they're only suitable for a limited set of defensive or low-intensity missions. Russia and China supposedly also have operational 5th-generation fighters now but it's unclear whether those actually work, and they can't build enough to even supply their own forces let alone exports.

> victory through attrition

Basically, but also looking like increasingly transient victory through attrition that's going to backfire on US alliance in long term.

TLDR - Convince western bloc to burden share development cost of joint program, burn partners by retaining near exclusive control over deployment and development. See drama that US has control over mission data files, that can only be generated at Eglin AFB, aka non US operators have essentially no sovereign control over their F35s. In the meantime, partners stuck on F35 platform because multi generational gamble commitment killed their own aero industry and there's no alternative short/medium term.

There's a reason almost every non-US F35 operator that can, is developing their own fighter, or partnering up in programs to to develop non US associated fighters (history US joint programs tech sharing drama entirely different shitshow) - actual long term operators of F35 have come to realize getting captured by F35 US/Lockmart SAAS is highly problematic. Borderline treasonous if we're being honest.

US can probably fix this by openning up program, or wait for other programs to fail technically/economically. Seeing how US can barely wrest F35 from Lockheed contracts, and how behind other western programs are, the latter probably more likely.

> service records should be required to be made public

We’re still talking about military aircraft?

> all these billions we are sending out to all these wars

We are sending these billions to domestic defence industry, that will sending older equipment to various wars, and we are keeping the newer stuff