Daryl Hunt
Your Worst Nightmare
- Banned
- #521
Do we need it as a Air Superiority Fighter? No
If it isn't superior to enemy aircraft, will it make it to targets if visually detected?
Since it can fire the Aim-9X just get the nose within about 120 degees of you bad guy for a good kill. 180 degrees for a probable. If the pilot can visually see the enemy then he can shoot them down. Guns are important only to keep the other guy honest. Even ground attacking, the gun keeps the bad guys head down and the bomb does the real killing. Or the Rockets. Or the ........ The guns is just part of your bag.
So if you think the F-35B is helpless visual, you had better hope like hell he doesn't see you at all. He will but you can hope. Then you had better hope you closed without him seeing you. Not going to happen. And you are coming in on his blind spot. He doesn't have one. The F-35B will want to do a head to head fight. The Bad guy won't want to do this.
Case in point. During WWII, the P-38G could not turn with the Zero. Yet the G and H model mowed down the Zero. The P-38 always picked head to head. It's 20mm had a longer range than the cannons on the Zero. Plus, there was no divergence of aiming. By the time the P-38J-25 hit the scene in late 1943, the Zero was just another target. It could now out turn the zero using it's fowler flaps. And it could out climb and out dive the Zero as well. From the front, the P-38 had very little to see. It looked smaller than the zero and even the P-51 so it could begin shooting even before the enemy could see it.
The F-35B also will see the other guy first and begin his tactics. Once they merge, the F-35 is still aware of exactly where the bad guy is. Meaning, the F-35B drives the tactics. And he makes sure you don't fly your own game as well. I used the P-38G as an example. Even though he couldn't dive or turn with the Zero, if you didn't allow the Zero to use his bag of tricks then the bird with the longest range almost always wins.
Closing, the P-38G would begin lighting up around your cockpit causing you to jinx and weave. This enabled him to get within his 4 50 caliber MG range. One huge fireball since the Zero didn't have armor or self sealing tanks. The only way to get a F-35 to play your game is to require only stupid pilots fly them. And that ain't gonna happen either.