[Eaglefixer]

1: Aircraft usually take about three models before the goals are met. Remember the P-51. Took the dog model to achieve ultimate goal.

2: Having been on both sides of USAF program offices Chasing the latest capability is a rat hole for $$$. One Army program went on for a dozen years and was canceled. Never fielded a single item.

[tanknetter]

1: Aircraft usually take about three models before the goals are met. Remember the P-51. Took the dog model to achieve ultimate goal.

Tends to be true, although with the Mustang a lot of very good pilots (including Bud Anderson) said that they nailed it with the Malcolm Hood B/C model.

Lots of people like to cite the F-111 as such a problem child. Yet for the USAF it left service as a superior aircraft to the replacing it (F-15E). In it's USN role the original specs (high speed missile barge for the AIM-54 - which it WOULD have been good at) changed so much (due to the Vietnam air combat experience, which stressed ACM) that a whole new ground-up design was required. And I like to argue that the F-111B would've been an exceptional replacement for the A-6 Intruder.

I don't think it's time to give up on the F-35 yet. Any potential new-design replacement would require a decade and a half to two to get to IOC. In the meantime the USN NEEDS stealth at sea capability, and the F-35C is the only game in town. The USN needs a replacement fixed-wing STOVL CAS platform, and the F-35B is the only game in town (ok, I guess the Marines COULD by the RAF's Harrier GR.9s as a stopgap to augment their aging and attrition-prone AV-8B fleet).