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[Minimalist]

I spotted this on an Australian website.  The significance is that the alleged "liberal media" over here ( which is really controlled by the same bunch of corporate cocksuckers who run everything else ) has failed to report the story.

http://www.news.com.au/technology/innova...7424702476

Pentagon, Lockheed Martin defend F-35 Lightning II’s lack of dogfighting performance

As the "defenders" note in the article:

The F-35A used for the flight testing was built specifically to test the aircraft’s ability to dogfight. It was fitted with a suite of sensors to measure the stresses placed on the airframe as the fighter was thrown about in high-stress combat situations.
But supporters argue the F-35 stealth fighter is not intended to be a dog fighter: It’s not supposed to get into the close one-on-one situation the testing entailed.

RELATED: Is the F-35 already obsolete?
“The F-35’s technology is designed to engage, shoot, and kill its enemy from long distances, not necessarily in visual “dogfighting” situations,” a statement released on behalf of the F-35 Joint Project Office overseeing the contract.

Well, that's interesting because just 2 years ago:

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/can-the...462ccd6745

The Air Force says it will have no choice but to send the sluggish stealth fighter into aerial battle

In the aftermath of the F-22's cancellation, the Air Force was forced to alter its plans and press-gang the F-35—originally meant as a ground-attack aircraft—into service as an air-to-air fighter. It was the only way for the flying branch to keep enough dogfighters in the air.

“Operationally, we have to have it,” says Air Force chief of staff Gen. Mark Welsh. “The decision to truncate the F-22 buy has left us in a position where even to provide air superiority [we need the F-35], which was not the original intent of the F-35 development.”

To be clear, the F-35 has always had some air-to-air capability. But that latent dogfighting ability was mostly meant for self-defense—not for aggressively challenging another country’s fighters in the air.

I feel like a prosecutor questioning a witness.  Were you lying then or are you lying now?

And we are pissing away a trillion bucks on this flying pig.