Israel believed the F-35 stealth would be effective for 5 to 10 years...IN 2012!!!!

Foxtrot Alpha blog while slamming the President for another one of his silly statements stumbled upon a stunning truth. Check this out.

A report in 2012 from Aviation Week on Israel’s deal to update its own air force with the F-35A claimed the Israeli military anticipated the stealth technology of the plane to only have a short lifetime of “five to 10 years.”

Story here. 

Yeah.

They buried the headline.  Maybe they consider it old news but the reality is stark.  In 2012 the IDF reckoned that stealth had maybe another 5 to 10 years before it became irrelevant on the modern battlefield.

Do the math.

Then think about what's been said on this blog.

We've beat the drum telling you that Raytheon, SAAB, the Russians, the Chinese and others have stated that they're able to detect stealth aircraft.

Now we add this to the mix and it all adds up.

I know what you're saying.  If stealth is a non-issue then why are they building stealth jets.  My response is that they're not going for all aspect stealth like we are.  They're going for reduced signature.  Both of the peer nations being discussed are building planes that are HIGH PERFORMANCE, and reduced signature...not full stealth!

We missed the memo.

The future of airborne warfare will be dominated by electronic warfare, not stealth.

Which brings me back to another side issue.  What happened to those two reports of interest?  Remember the report comparing the F-35 to the Super Hornet?  What was the outcome and why hasn't it been made public? The other report was to determine how many Growlers the tri-service needed to maintain credible electronic warfare capability.  We never heard the results of that one either.

Stealth is already dead.  The Israelis know that.  How they're gonna work around the problem will be interesting.