R. David Steele wrote:
I am seeing you folks get the nomenclature wrong. The "A"
version is AF, the "B" version is Navy and the "C" version is
Marine and V/STOL

Not according to Lockheed Martin. From the variant descriptions linked from
http://www.lmaeronautics.com/product...35/design.html

"The F-35A for the U.S. Air Force matches or exceeds F-16 performance
levels"

"The F-35B for the U.S. Marine Corps and the U.K. Royal Air Force and Royal
Navy employs a short-takeoff/vertical-landing (STOVL) capability. "

"U.S. Navy carrier operations account for most of the differences between
the F-35C and the other JSF variants."

The Air Force and the JSF program office agree with this terminology. See
page 8 of this JSF program brief:

http://www.jsf.mil/Program/Briefings...gram_brief.pdf

or this article from Airpower journal:

http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/a...03/phispr03.ht
ml

BTW: for folks wondering about the benefits of conventioanl carriers, this
article hits the key one: radius of action for the STOVL version is 450 nm,
for the CV version it's over 700nm. That's a 55% increase.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...craft/f-35.htm

Which is apparently out of date and incorrect. It seems to have been taken
from the original DoD press release, which was in error. (or at least has
been overtaken by events).


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"If brave men and women never died, there would be nothing
special about bravery." -- Andy Rooney (attributed)