Brooks,
you can jump around each and every word that I say, yet, the point is this:
in no way are you going to hear about what the USAF is testing _right now_.
Forget about this.

So, all this semantic about the silent sentry is useless: you can't know
what are they doing. The USAF is, just for example, testing hypersonic
vehicles already since the early 1990s. Several different (manned and
unmanned) types were developed and tested in flight. Yet, nothing was ever
officially acknowledged or confirmed. There are more MiG-29s operational
with the USAF than in most smaller air forces that fly the type. Guess what?
Nothing was ever officially acknowledged and confirmed about this either.
Stuff like AIM-9X is far further in the R+D process than reported in the
last two years: actually, when I compare what I read in some papers and what
do I hear via private channels, the F-22 is at least one year ahead in
testing to what is currently reported as planned or being underway too. And
this despite the fact that the avionics - all of which is functioning via
the same system - is frequently suffering total failures, so that some of
the test-pilots had to carry their cell-phones in the cockpit, to call the
base and ask which way to fly back when the system crashes.

But you guys here wonder how it comes the F-22 is not reported to have been
tested against silent sentry and such stuff?

Don't wonder, but wait for the news. That's my opinion. We all don't know
what are they currently doing, nor really in which world are they living: we
only get to hear about few tid-bits when it's - actually - too late. So, you
can - at best - GUESS if they have (or not) tested the silent sentry.

Re other stuff: I still haven't found a place where I should have said the
USN is, "seriously interested in preserving the F-22", but as said, we'll
solve this problem too.

I said the USAF and the USN have realized that currently available
air-to-air assets are not up to the task any more. Worst yet - at least in
the case of the USN - even the newest fighter (which proved to have been the
wrong solution in anything but pilot comfort and flying safety) - is not up
to the task. So there is now an urgent need to field the AIM-9X, and then to
get the AIM-120D, so to compensate for short range, slow speed, and lack of
manoeuverability of the F/A-18E/F. That, however, is only to cover a part of
the problem: the type is going to remain unable of fighting the "outer
battle" the way the F-14 could do, and especially against modern threats,
because even longer-ranged missiles (or, what's more important: weapons with
wider envelope) cannot compensate for deficiencies of the aircraft. At the
time the potential enemies are fielding large numbers of superior aircraft,
armed with almost equal weapons and supported by similar network in the
background, this eliminates quite a few of USN's options: you can't start a
war, for example, fighting somebody only with a single carrier carrying one
squadron of F/A-18E/Fs and three squadrons of F/A-18Cs - except you're
fighting a bunch of terrorists in Asian mountains or the African bush.
Anything else is not going to function with assets at hand.

Something similar can be said for the USAF: there is a large gap in the
quality between such an asset like B-2 and the F-15. One can start a war and
deliver the main blow with B-2s, but the gap is closing - if it's not
already closed - on the F-15. On the other side, despite their immense
capabilities the B-2 have proven not to be able to completely shut down the
enemy air. Consequently, you have a situation where there is a need for a
measure in between: what a better PR for F-22 one needs? Given that the F-22
is an endangered species, and the JSF is - still - not fix (but also never
to offer a similar capability), there is now so much "good PR" for the
Raptor. If the USN is then also releasing signals that it needs a
longer-ranged solution - that better, for both services (and without the USN
being "interested in preserving the F-22": they're interested in saving what
they can of their own assets, first and foremost).

So, in the context of the original message to which I responded: it is not
surprising that billions were spent for wrong systems in other fields.
Something similar was done in such a well-known arena like air-to-air too.
Worst yet: currently there are attempts to save what can be saved, but all
of this is rather a reaction than a proper action.

Just give me a call if I have to explain this for the fourth time too.

Tom Cooper
Freelance Aviation Journalist & Historian
Vienna, Austria

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Author:
Iran-Iraq War in the Air, 1980-1988:
http://www.acig.org/pg1/content.php

Iranian F-14 Tomcat Units in Combat
http://www.ospreypublishing.com/titl...hp/title=S7875

Iranian F-4 Phantom II Units in Combat
http://www.ospreypublishing.com/titl...hp/title=S6585

African MiGs
http://www.acig.org/afmig/

Arab MiG-19 & MiG-21 Units in Combat
http://www.ospreypublishing.com/titl...=S6550~ser=COM

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