Originally appeared at ZeroHedge
The US Air Force has revealed a new stealth fighter prototype it says has already secretly built and flown, according to Defense News.
So move over F-22 Raptor, or better yet, maybe its time for the Air Force to rethink its unreliable F-35 Lightning II program because there’s a new stealth jet that could potentially dominate the skies by 2030.
Air Force acquisition head Will Roper recently spoke with Defense News and said the jet, built under the Air Force’s Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) program, could enter production “pretty fast.”
“We are ready to go and build the next-generation aircraft in a way that has never happened before,” Roper told Defense News in an exclusive interview ahead of the Air Force Association’s Air, Space and Cyber Conference in mid-September.
Roper said, “We’ve already built and flown a full-scale flight demonstrator in the real world, and we broke records in doing it.”
As the NGAD program is classified, not much is known about the secretive jet. Roper wouldn’t give additional details on the aircraft to Defense News or anyone at the event.
The disclosure of the Air Force’s sixth-generation prototype could be perfect timing for the Air Force to request more funds from Congress as a modernization wave is sweeping across the military, said Mackenzie Eaglen, a defense budget analyst with the American Enterprise Institute.
“If you can quickly get to something and show progress through product, it just changes the whole dynamic for the Hill,” she said. “[Roper has] got so many headwinds, it seems this would be a likely avenue to show conceptual success for his ideas.”
The announcement also follows years of troubling stories about just how “f**ked up” the F-35 program is. Readers may recall:
- F-35 Program Is “F***ed Up,” Puts American Pilots In Severe Dogfight Disadvantage
- US Stealth Jets Can’t Shoot Straight, New Pentagon Report Warns
- Bombshell Report: Pentagon Mismanaged $2.1 Billion In F-35 Stealth Jet Parts
- F-35 Crash That Grounded Fleet Caused By Manufacturing Defect
… the list goes on and on.
Nevertheless, there is hope for a new stealth jet, and it appears the Air Force is moving quickly on its futuristic projects. Recently, the Navy’s Rear Adm. Greg Harris recently told a virtual audience that the service is looking at F/A-XX or next-generation air dominance family systems.
Six generation stealth jets could become a reality at the end of this decade.
Looks like Gripen without tail:))) oh these Americans stealing from Scandinavians again. But can’t wait to see what are the new features.
It’s an artists (piss?) impression of something at exists somewhere but will probably spend 75% more time within a hangar than out of it.
*7th.
So it can be assumed that the Americans have realized that what they have at present (having sunk huge amounts of resources into) isn’t really good enough.
Interesting news to say the least: I wonder if the Air-Force developed it out of distain for how troublesome and overpriced the F-35 turned out to be. Probably just wanted to make and use a fighter that isn’t weighed down by so many cost overruns, system glitches, failures and deficiencies amongst other reasons.
So now it’s not the builders who build the planes anymore, the Air Force does it directly, it must be so because this morning I saw a flock of these sixth generation planes, followed by another seventh generation flock close by.
US Chair Force greasing the skids for another boondoggle, this one in the trillion ZOGbux category. That is what will make it ‘next gen’, not because of some performance breakthrough, but because of another set of digits in it’s budget aka corporate welfare account.
Revealed? Where? Can’t see any video.
Anything to pour more taxpayers money into the zio terrorist jewish pockets
They should first make sure their 5th gen wont fall out of the sky on a weekley basis…
Boeings got the first real deal 6th gen unmanned jet,built in australia,usa can’t accept the truth(period)
Sure sign of a defeated complex where nowadays are built to scam rather than excell 1 on 1 combats! Wasn’t like that last century,but you know too many cia kweers only breed inferior men and record debt: