The co-designer of the F-16 on why the F-35 is a failure [video]

Are you the Jack Tucker who lived on Barry Ave. If so I am Drew at 3x4x Barry Ave.
You can find my phone public listing in Big Bear City, CA.92314

O.K. folks I have time to actually weigh in. While I am no big fan of the work of Pierre Sprey, (I worked both on the F-17 and the F-20 as a Northrop sub, and firmly believe a> the F-17 was the superior airframe in the 'light fighter' competition (Note it's class dominance after the McDonnell Douglas rework into an FA-18) and b> the F-20 outperforms the F-16 in almost all tests while delivering this level of performance at less than 80% the total cost of ownership. In short Northrop's loss was for political not performance reasons.)

HOWEVER, everything he says about the F-35 is spot on.

Read the book, "BOYD".

I wonder what the great Colonel Boyd would say about this.

The F-16 was the "Light Wt" fighter, and a long time in development from the prototype competition. The F-18 started out as the losing F-17. The F-35 cost & time problem has been making all of the electronic gadgets work together. As far as ground support, the Army's AH-56A Cheyenne helicopter was a fantastic weapons platform. It lost to Air Force Politics of the ground support mission. There are You-tube videos now on the Cheyenne, and the weapons capability. Lockheed had 30 & 60 passenger transport versions of the Cheyenne. The Cheyenne 20mm main gun could hit a dinner plate sized target at 2 miles, while flying by/going away.

$1B for a plane that feeds toxic oxigen to the pilot.....an expensive way to die !

This is obviously one man's highly prejudiced and biased opinion which renders it of little credibility. His off hand remarks dismissing stealth technology seem a bit far fetched as well in which he exalts old technology as able to defeat stealth masking so easily. I highly doubt that. If a defensive surface to air missile system throws enough "darts" into the air one of them will eventually hit something. That was proven in Vietnam with the SA-2.

Unmanned is the way forward with a specialist team remotely flying, whether fighter, bomber or surveillance, regardless of what the designers mourn about.

One of the major "design points" of this hunk of junk is that parts are made in 47 states. The Marine version can't do the vertical thing because it incinerates every potential landing surface. Bob McNamara be doing barrel rolls in his grave.

The basic argument is sound. A 'jack of all trades', whether military aircraft or kitchen utensil, ends up being unsuitable for any one task. It's time to renew the concept of building aircraft for specific functions and optimizing the design to meet the functional requirements. THAT's how you control cost and ensure air dominance.

F35 is Yak141 "Freestyle" with fancier avionics.

Watching this interview I had a thought about defense minister McNamara a long time ago promoting the F111 and commonality.....that didn't work out !
And then the price tag 200 million + ! for an F35....

Sprey has valid points about "Jack of All Trades" aircraft. His past criticisms of the F-4 and F-15 are nothing more than NA/GDyn v MD jealousy.As a former USAF Crew Chief, the F-16 was well known as an over-engineered Widow Maker.

Well I guess We should ask general Westmoreland for his opinions on Afghanistan, LBJ for his opinions on Iraq, and JFK for his views on NASA, FDR for his views on gov. assistance, etc.

This guy is so proud of himself as though he is a fighter jet god, when in fact every design that made the f-16 what it is today was NOT his decision and he actively opposed the very things he takes credit for. His views are null and void.

He certainly is a legend in his own mind. It took years for the F-16 to become the fighter it is. Out of the gate, the F-15s and others in Red Flag had it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Around the C model the roles reversed. The only valid point Mr. Sprey has is the F-35 trying to be everything to everybody. This causes people to compromise and the definition of compromise is people argue until no one his happy. Add in politicians and bureaucrats making decisions instead of engineers and generals and you have the F-35.

He certainly does have some valid points, at least in my opinion. Look how many aircraft have been pushed into production that were simply not able to do the job that was touted for them. It's a common scenario, especially when a multi-service capability is desired.

"The co-designer of the 1976 Dodge Dart on why the 2006 Lamborghini Aventador is a failure."