It seems to be expensive, but what would have been the alternative to JSF or to the F-35?
The trillion dollar budget was postulated by some already long beforehand. Bill Sweetman wrote that into his book ten years ago already: http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Fighter-Lockheed-Martin-Strik...
Unfortunately, with this being what it is, nobody believes the companies' presented combat aircraft prices.
Just a while ago, the French Dassault Rafale doubled in price, some time after winning a huge fighter order competition in India, and it's a plane that's been operational already for fourteen years!:
http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-dna-exclusive-100-price...
Maybe two or three different aircraft could have been developed, and it would have been faster and cheaper in total - since each design could have been more straightforward, more specialized for its mission. Who knows? This is far from obvious to me. Pierre Sprey advocated this line. But even his favorite optimized light weight fighters were adapted to multiple roles and replaced many more specialized aircraft.
Another alternative would have been to develop nothing really new, just keep operating old airframes, maybe manufacture some minor updates (F-15, F-16 and Super Hornet are being manufactured). They don't have stealth, though some versions have some minor stealthiness. Russia and China are developing at least reasonably stealthy aircraft (PAK-FA, J-20, J-31). The F-22 is not manufactured but AFAIK the tooling is preserved. But it's a more specialized aircraft anyway. I think doing nothing would not have been a politically possible path.
Everybody complains but there aren't that many better directions. Some countries could at least buy European or Russian generation 4.5 fighters if they want to avoid JSF, but that's mostly it.
The trillion dollar budget was postulated by some already long beforehand. Bill Sweetman wrote that into his book ten years ago already: http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Fighter-Lockheed-Martin-Strik... Unfortunately, with this being what it is, nobody believes the companies' presented combat aircraft prices. Just a while ago, the French Dassault Rafale doubled in price, some time after winning a huge fighter order competition in India, and it's a plane that's been operational already for fourteen years!: http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-dna-exclusive-100-price...
Maybe two or three different aircraft could have been developed, and it would have been faster and cheaper in total - since each design could have been more straightforward, more specialized for its mission. Who knows? This is far from obvious to me. Pierre Sprey advocated this line. But even his favorite optimized light weight fighters were adapted to multiple roles and replaced many more specialized aircraft.
Another alternative would have been to develop nothing really new, just keep operating old airframes, maybe manufacture some minor updates (F-15, F-16 and Super Hornet are being manufactured). They don't have stealth, though some versions have some minor stealthiness. Russia and China are developing at least reasonably stealthy aircraft (PAK-FA, J-20, J-31). The F-22 is not manufactured but AFAIK the tooling is preserved. But it's a more specialized aircraft anyway. I think doing nothing would not have been a politically possible path.
Everybody complains but there aren't that many better directions. Some countries could at least buy European or Russian generation 4.5 fighters if they want to avoid JSF, but that's mostly it.