The (un)certain future of the F-35B November 21, 2010
Posted by David Cenciotti in Italian Air Force, Italian Navy, Military Aviation.Tags: Aeronautica Militare, aircraft carrier, Cavour aircraft carrier, conventional takeoff and landing, CTOL, Department of Defense, DoD, F-35, F-35B, Israeli Air Force, ItAF, Italian Air Force, Italian Navy, Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force, Joint Strike Fighter, JSF, Landing Helicopter Assault, Landing Helicopter Dock, LHA, LHD, Lockheed Martin, low-rate initial production, LRIP, Marina Militare, Marine Expeditionary Unit, MEU, Military Aviation, Naval Aviation, RAF, Short Take-Off Vertical Landing, Spanish Navy, STOVL, USAF, USMC, USMC Harriers
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Just a few days ago I wrote that, should Italy be forced to choose a single F-35 variant because of budget costraints (as happened in the UK), the hypothesis of selecting the F-35Bs for both the Aeronautica Militare (Italian Air Force, ItAF) and the Marina Militare (Italian Navy, ItNy) should be seriously taken into consideration (for more details read here: “F-35, STOVL, Joint Force: will Italy follow the British path?“). However, on Nov. 11, 2010, an interesting article available on DefPro titled “Deficit Commission: Cancel Marine Corps Version of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and Several Other Weapons” explained that a bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform had just issued a series of draft proposals to cut government spending; among which, one of the most interesting is to cancel the Marine Corps version of the F-35. This option would not only cancel the Marine Corps version of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter “because of its technical problems, cost overruns, schedule delays, and the adoption by the services of joint combat support in current wartime operations” but would leave Italy, that saw the F-35 as the ideal Harrier replacement, without aircraft for its Cavour aircraft carrier. Should the F-35B be canceled, the Italian partecipation in the JSF programme would be at risk since the carrier was tailored to this aircraft and could not be converted to accomodate the F-35C carrier version. The only alternative to the F-35B would be to extend the service life of the AV-8B, more or less the same option available for the USMC. However, I think that the STOVL (Short Take Off Vertical Landing) version of the 5th generation aircraft will not be scratched for many reasons:
1) the F-35B is going to replace not only the USMC Harriers but also the F/A-18 to cover the full spectrum of modern warfare scenarios with its own resources: not only CAS (Close Air Support) but also air superiority and strike missions. The Marine Corps needs a fixed wing aircraft operating from a LHA (Landing Helicopter Assault) or LHD (Landing Helicopter Dock) to support a MEU (Marine Expeditionary Unit) in regional crisis and a STOVL is the only viable option.
2) the entire America class amphibious assault ships were designed to accomodate, operate and support the F-35B and, to increase the number of accommodated aircraft, it will not feature the well decks that are used to house landing craft on the Tarawa and Wasp class amphibious assault ships.
Fortunately, to reassure the Italian Navy (the Italian Air Force and, especially, USMC….), on Jun. 19, 2010, Lockheed was awarded 3.5 billion USD contract modification from the U.S. Department of Defense to manufacture 31 F-35 Lightning II stealth fighters in the fourth lot of low-rate initial production (LRIP). “The contract also funds manufacturing-support equipment, flight test instrumentation and ancillary mission equipment. Including the long-lead funding previously received, the total contract value for LRIP 4 is $3.9 billion. Under the contract, Lockheed Martin will produce 10 F-35A conventional takeoff and landing (CTOL) variants for the U.S. Air Force, 16 F-35B short takeoff/vertical landing variants for the U.S. Marine Corps, four F-35C carrier variants for the U.S. Navy and one F-35B for the United Kingdom. Additionally, the Netherlands has the option to procure one F-35A”.
Even if the British F-35Bs funded in LRIP 3 and 4 when the MoD was expecting to order the B model will be most probably sold to the USMC, the contract awarded by the US DoD gives those air forces interested in the STOVL version of the JSF (Italian Navy, Italian Air Force, Israeli Air Force and possibly the Spanish Navy and the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force) a reason to be highly optimistic about the future of the F-35B.
Lets hope it stays as is. Like I said before, A’s and B’s for the Italian AF and Navy.
Maybe Italy could build a small coventional carrier and fly the ‘C’ version too! (Only a dream)
(Smile)
In case the F-35B VSTOL variant is cancelled, the 244 meter long “NUM 550 Cavour” ship can be rebuilt in drydock (18 months schedule, 500 million euros cost) with a longer, 215-220 meter flight deck.
That could support “Sea Gripen” variants, equipped with a single EJ-200 turbine engine from the italian Eurofighters.
The swedish JAS-39 Gripen fighter-bomber is a very small supersonic aircraft, about the size of the AMX, but twice as powerful and needs half as little place to take off and land. (Gripen can land and take off from CVN Nimitz without using catapult launch and arresting wires.)
The Gripen normally uses the american F-404/414 jet engine, but she has been designed to accept the Eurofighter EJ-200 turbine as an alternative, so that neutral Sweden’s aircaft manufacture cannot be blocked by any american export emberago!
The navalized version of the “Gripen NG” aircraft with an F-414 jet engine is already being offered to Brazil’s and India’s Navy for flat-top carrier use, as a 21st century heir of the famous “A-4 Skyhawk” light attack jet.
Sea Gripen can launch from carrier ships with catapult or without catapult, using a “skijump ramp”. In the latter case useful combat load is 35% reduced compared to a steam catapult assisted take-off.
Hi Tamas,
interestic theory but, in my opinion, a bit too simplistic as it doesnt take into consideration that:
1) you have to modify a brand new ship and this is never easy nor quick
2) I don’t know where did you take those figures about costs and lapse for the modification works but, provided that they are right, I think that with ever shrinking budgets, the MoD would not be willing to spend more money for an unplanned modification of an aircraft carrier
3) the Gripen doesn’t foresee any involvement of the Italian industry in the program and having already signed to contribute 904 million USD to the production sustainment and follow-on development (PSFD) phase of the program and having already committed 1 billion USD at the development stage of the JSF I think that (with the budget problem always in mind) a 4th generation aircraft has no chances of equipping the Italian Navy.
If the F-35B fails, the only options is the AV-8B+ “extended life”.
Best Regards,
David
Hello,
There is no reason to extend the life of “Harrier” family planes. Those planes are inherently dangerous to fly, because the pilot has to manually handle both the throttle and the trust vector level with a single hand. The other hand is on the flight control stick.
Pilots often make errors when transitioning a Harrier from vertical lift to horizontal flight or vica versa and the plane falls to the ground. This can mean expensive repairs or even a fireball! The Harrier family is not supersonic, so it cannot defend the carrier ship against high speed missile or airplane attacks.
Furthermore the AV-8 life cannot be extended because of material weakness of the fuselage. Italy is currently petitioning the USMC to lease them at least 4 extra AV-8 planes with some flight hours left in them, because the italian STOVL fleet is low on flight hour reserves.
By the way, there is already some talk of the Gripen getting a “very-STOL” version if the F-35B is cancelled. (Originally the Gripen aiframe was designed by the British Aerospace company under codename P.112/P.116 for a “VSTOL mini-Eurofighter project”. The swedish bought the plans and the wind tunnel test models and used them built the Gripen as a traditional STOL plane. In the Gripen NG it is possible to return to partial-VSTOL features, as suggested by the original BAe P.116 design.)
The Cavour 550 is the smallest sized aircraft carrier in the world that can be theoretically converted for Sea Gripen use.
The Gripen is a “eurocanard” plane, just like the Eurofighter and could offer a lot of pilot training commonality for airforces operating both types. Italy will not be able to afford entirely Eurofighter-based military flights forever, because the twin engines consume a lot of fuel!
The F-35 is also thirsty on jet fuel with its single very large 20-ton thrust turbine engine. Previously Italy used to have the F-104S and the F-16 planes for affordable single engine jetfighter operation and that capability is now missing. I think Gripen would be ideal to subsitute the F-16 / F-104 and replace the AMX.
BTW, Italy’s SELEX-Galileo supplies the AESA swashplate radar for the next generation Gripen E/F model. (The Pentagon vetoed american AESA radar sets and the french vetoed Thompson radar exports, because they see a market conflict between Gripen and the Rafale, Super Hornet exports. Previous generation Gripen C/D flies with the Sea Harrier’s Vixen radar, a very good mechanical antenna based set.)
The Harrier problems (being subsonic, being an obsolete concept, etc) are very well known. However, I was talking about the hypothesis of a cancelation of the F-35B program that would leave the Italian Navy with a few available options, the most likely one being to extend the life of the AV-8Bs.
Dealing with the other statements:
The Gripen can’t be a replacement for the F-104 and F-16, since Italy already has a substitute for them: its Eurofighter Typhoons! Even without the Tranche 3B, Italy will have 95 F-2000s that are considered enough to provide the Air Defense in the next decades.
Even if F-35B is canceled, Italy has already invested in the F-35 and the Lightning II (in the A version) will be the replacement for both the AMX and Tornado in the air-to-ground role. Did you know that the F-35 FACO (Final Assembly and Check Out) facility is in Italy? All the Italian and Dutch F-35s will be assembled in Italy with a large (extremely large) involvement of the Italian industry. Compared to that, the fact that Selex supplies the radar for the Gripen is almost insignificant.
Concluding, what I’d like to explain you is that, in my opinion, the Gripen is probably a very good machine, but it has no chances of flying with the Italian armed forces in the future…. What you should understand is that we are not discussing about decisions that were made yesterday. The plan according to which Italy will have a front line fleet made of Eurofighters and F-35s was drawn years ago and neither the Gripen nor any other aircraft can alter it now for many operative, logistic, economic and political reasons.
BTW, the Gripen NG is not “4gen”, as you claim! It has “NORA project” network-centric warfare (swedish Ericcson datalink is extremely advanced) and exceptional crew cabin ergonomics, which gives it 4.5gen.
Sweden also has its very own produced AWACS plane, better than the Hawkeye, which networks with the Gripens. Also the very small size and “plastic” composite build of the Gripen gives it “poor man’s stealth” capability. It cannot be seen with the naked eye beyond 5km and F-16 block 40 radar cannot see it from more than 5km. (This was proven in NATO excercises over Sardinia.)
If you are speaking of economic crisis, the Gripen is a good choice. It was built on a limited budget, without any major cost overrun or significant time delay. That is quite unique among modern warplane projects!
Sweden is a country with a small population, so they are not as rich as their high “per capita” income suggests. They are doing step-by-step Gripen upgrades on a few tens of millions euro budget per project period at the SAAB company.
I think Sea Gripen would be better for Italy than turning the Cavour 550 ship into a purely helicopter carrier when Harrier service life runs out.
Sorry Tamas, but if the Italians were ever to go with a ‘conventional’ carrier they would naturally pick the only 5th generation fighter, the F-35 C.
> The Gripen can’t be a replacement for the F-104 and F-16, since Italy already has a substitute for them: its Eurofighter Typhoons! Even without the Tranche 3B, Italy will have 95 F-2000s <
Right now Italy is on the verge of a national bankruptcy, Argentina-style and Rome may soon depend on Germany and the Eurozone to bail the country out, like they did with the Greeks.
In such economic conditions it will be impossible to maintain a 100-plane Eurofighter backbone equipped Italian Air Force, because the huge operating costs of the twinjet EFA are well known to all of us! Eurofighter is 3x as much cost per flight hour compared to the F-16 or 4-5x times of the Gripen.
All in all, Italy made a big mistake when they discarded the light fighter side of the fleet. Subsonic AMX and Aer-346 cannot replace the F-104/F-16 capability and the Eurofighter is too costly for the long term exclusive use.
F-35 will not be a light fighter either, as it has the largest single jet engine ever installed in a warplane. It's excessive noise, delicate stealth skin and high fuel thirst will make the JSF almost as costly to run as the Eurofighter.
In contrast, SAAB and Gripen are now attacking the world market with an economic crisis era message: they can give you a supersonic 4.5gen fighter for Vespa price and it costs peas to run, either land-based or navalized. That is not something an almost bankrupt country can ignore.
In this regard a mixed fleet of heavy Eurofighter and light Gripen canard planes can offer big savings.
Dear Tamas,
thank you for your interest in proposing the Gripen to Italy :) however, I would suggest you to study much more some difficult topics before writing things that are uncorrect if not wrong.
>Right now Italy is on the verge of a national bankruptcy, Argentina-style and Rome may soon depend on Germany and the Eurozone to bail the country out, like they did with the Greeks.
I’m pretty sure you’r not an economist and most probably you haven’t studied the Italian or European economy in depth. Even if the economic conditions are not ideal they are comparable (actually I should say better) than those in many other European countries (not only the so-called PIGS ones). Your sentence denotates your poor knowledge of economics or, at least, of the Italian economy. I’m pretty sure your beliefs are based on stereotypes, on chunks of information coming from foreign magazines or newspapers, and not on an educated guess based on the actual knowledge of the European economy. I’m not an expert so I will not spend much time trying to explain the differences between Italy and Argentina (or Spain, Portugal, Ireland, etc.) so I think it is better to suggest you to read the following article, published yesterday on the main independent Italian economic newspaper (you can use Google Translator to translate it in your language):
http://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/commenti-e-idee/2010-12-07/quei-dieci-motivi-italia-195927.shtml?uuid=AYxgQtpC
All the rest that you have written is a mixture of good points, personal hypothesis and absolutely wrong statements (“Subsonic AMX and Aer-346 cannot replace the F-104/F-16 capability” is totally nonsense, as the AMX is used as a light bomber and the M.346 is a trainer, while the F-104S/ASA-M and the F-16 were/are interceptors).
Best Regards,
David
> if the Italians were ever to go with a ‘conventional’ carrier they would naturally pick the only 5th generation fighter, the F-35 C
Hello Rocco! Italy cannot afford to build a new flat-top carrier in the foreseeable future. NUM-550 Cavour is the italian carrier, but she is not wide enough to fit the larger wingpsan F-35C variant in the underdeck hangars, in suitable numbers.
Cavour is 244 meters long, the max. flightdeck lenght extension architecturally possible is just 225 meter. That is not enough for F-35C operation without catapults. Sorrowfully Cavour has no steam source (nuclear reactor or oil boilers) to power catapults, because she is turboshaft engine powered. Electro-magnetical catapult driver technology is at least 7 years from operational use.
Adding locomotive boilers into the hangar decks to produce steam would leave little floor area to store the F-35C planes. (Sensitive stealth skin necessitates closed deck JSF storage.)
In theory, Cavour could be put in dry-dock and cut in half to add a lenghtened mid-section to fit catapult steam boilers without space penalty. The french did such a cut-and-lenghten job with their own carrier to safely fit the Rafale and the large Hawkeye AWACS.
However, the french result was poor with regards to cost, hull hydro-dynamics and reliability of the rearranged machinery. I don’t think Italy would finance such a major, yet dubious rebuild of the Cavour 550.
To summarize, if the F-35B is cancelled Cavour will likely become a helicopter-only ship as soon as the Harriers exhaust their flight hours. Neither EFA, Rafale nor F-35C can help her without cat launchers. The only available non-cat fixed-wing options are the Sea Gripen or maybe ex-US T-45 Goshawks.
I think Eurojet powered Gripens would be a good choice for the italian sky-jump ramp and maybe even for the land-based airforce to augment the big Eurofighters. The Wikileaks diplomatic cables show F-35 sale success in Norway was more about american political pressure rather than technical merit versus the Gripen.
Tamas, I said ‘if’ they were to cancel the F-35B. The Cavour will never be streched and the ‘Sea’ Grippen will never be built.
As David said the only option would be extend the life of the Harriers.
@Feher Tamas… I guess you make the right points here… Not only about the Italian economy (sorry Italian friends here..but you will get a painfull surprise next years), but also about the Sea Gripen (NG) as a better solution for Europe and also Italy…then the F-35B or F-35C. There is even a EJ-200 Thrust vectoring prototype that could be of interest here.
At this time I discussed this same matter on our Dutch defence forum…even the future for the Italian Cavour without a F-35B is talked about. Where we also look at the replacement of our F-16 and the very manipulative way our Air force and JSF-lobby tries to get their way with the more and more expensive and technical very complex F-35. Also by investing a lot of money in its development before any decision is made in our Parliament. A classic way of political manipulation (I personally witnessed it when I worked in Parliament on our Armed Attack helicopter project).
What our best Italian friends forget also is the future and developments in the world. As I hope we stay good friends with the US fact is they are one of our biggest economic competitors in the world. Which get even stronger now more new world powers like China and India want their part of the wealth. And the US is almost bankrupt and tries to survive by using its still big armed forced…to control parts of the world. I never understand how you can depend your defence and security on your economic competitor. It is if Fiat would let his R&D departments being guarded by employees of Toyota. But a lot of people still life in old Cold War/WO2 times and feelings and see America only as our beloved allies and family. That is far beside the true these days..and the Americans themselves are very aware of that seeing their leaked US Cables. But very willing to keep us believe the old romantic way..
So…it would be good I guess if the EU countries start to cooperate more and create their own independent defence and also industry. So we can stay friends with the US, but then not dependent on their terms, but on same level..like a healthy friendship. That I think is also an important reason not to buy the F-35 and choose an European alternative like the (sea) Gripen NG. I guess those very creative and skilfully Italian designers can easily change the Cavour into a STOBAR configuration for that reason. So also we here in the Netherlands can be proud of her. And maybe even decide to order one for ourself…when our politicians finally rediscover that our nation is married and fully dependent on the sea, and all it brings.
Greetings to beautiful Italy and Hungary!!,
Ronald Elzenga
defence expert
Netherlands
Dear Ronald,
even if I almost totally disagree with your comment, I thank you very much for your time. Some points you and Tamas raised are theoretically right, but absolutely utopian in the short term. As you’r a defence expert, you should know that changing an aircraft carrier like Cavour is neither easy nor economically affordable for a country with 2 aircraft carriers and a shrinking budget. Dealing with your statement about Italian economic situation, I think that a journalist or an expert should back his opinion with data, facts, information (“proofs”). I’m not an economist (nor are many of the readers of this blog, you comprised) however, replying to Tamas, I tried to explain the reasons why I think Italy’ s economic conditions are comparable, if not better, than those of UK (just to name another G8 nation in troubles). You should do the same, otherwise, some “prophecies” deserve no answer.
Best Regards,
David
Dear David,
Thanks for your reaction…some remarks back from me.
I would not speak about theory or utopia too quickly. Because for not so long ago someone would be called totally crazy when saying the Brits would cancel their F-35Bs…as being the inventors of the Harrier and STOVL…but the reality is they did recently. Or if someone would say the regimes of Tunisia or Egypt would get in big trouble (as I did last years)..but they are.
You are absolutely right it will not be easy to change the Cavour (The Giuseppe Garibaldi is to small for that I guess) with some kind of an angled deck..for STOBAR operations. But it has been done in the past so many times with other carriers. And also your San Giorgio class decks are redesigned. And don’t forget the F-35B will…when it survive…be an very very expensive plane..both to buy as also to maintain. I guess the money saved by buying the much cheaper sea Gripen NGs…within a large EU project, where also countries like mine would buy them (we talk about more then 500 planes then)…. would left enough money to give the Cavour some kind of angled landing deck. But again all will depend on if Italy would like to keep an airwing at sea…or accept, when the F-35B will be out of order…only (armed) helicopters. For the future of the EU and our collective welfare..I hope they want to keep that..and not buy a few very expensive F-35Bs but with other EU countries decide to go for an European alternative…and buy Sea Gripen NG. But I worry that wisdom is not yet arrived…
The economy of Italy. I did not say the economy is worse then that of the UK (which is bad at the moment after silly adventures in Afghanistan and Iraq). And I hope it will not happen. But I have no good feelings about it after years of anaylising and the latest developments. But I guess it is out of this discussion to go inside the details. Let’s keep the focus on the military…
Best Regards,
Ronald
Some interesting developments…..when India chooses the Eurofighter maybe it is willing to develop the navalized version of de EF with Britain, Spain and Italy….Then all three countries will have a solution for their carriers and can standardize their airforces on the Eurofighter. The (sea) Gripen NG could be a cheaper alternative…with more fighters for the same money…as numbers also count in conflicts.
http://defense-update.com/wp/20110210_naval_typhoon.html
http://defense-update.com/wp/20110209_typhoon_tvn.html