Boeing Wins F-47 Sixth Generation Fighter Contract

News Discussion
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Boeing will build what is widely believed to be the Air Force's last crewed fighter air craft. President Donald Trump told reporters in an Oval Office briefing that the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) is designated the F-47. The aircraft is a sixth generation design incorporating stealth aerodynamics with advanced threat detection and precision weapons systems. The Air Force hopes to begin fielding the new aircraft in the mid-2030s. Each aircraft could cost as much as $300 million. Boeing edged Lockheed Martin for the lucrative contract, which neither company had publicly acknowledged before Friday's announcement.

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/aviation-news/boeing-wins-f-47-sixth-generation-fighter-contract
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We’re all doomed now. Starliner meets 737 MAX.

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$300 million. So a billion more or less for 3 of them. “Fighters” yet. Is there really no other way to do it? Gut reaction to that is “insanity”.

Go ahead, rebuke me. I couldn’t care less.

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Actually, I agree. Where is all this money going to come from? The government is and has been broke. The last Air Force fighter ( F22) production was cut short due to excessive costs.

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I am encouraged in that the U.S. Air Force awarded Boeing the contract to develop the F-47 fighter jet under the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) program. This contract, valued at over $20 billion, signifies a substantial vote of confidence in Boeing’s capabilities. DOD and the Air Force surely conducted thorough assessments of Boeing’s current capabilities and plans to address past challenges before making their decision.

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RAF…surely, you jest!..” DOD and the Air Force surely conducted thorough assessments of Boeing’s current capabilities and plans to address past challenges before making their decision.”

By their fruits you shall know them. Boeing’s “fruit” has been continually abysmal for years now. Cost overruns, poor on time delivery of promised improvements. Its’s demonstrated performance does not match it ‘s glowing rhetoric of promised quality no matter what they touch from airliners to Starliner. Follow their Congressional lobbying efforts to find out how they “outperformed” Lockheed-Martin’s entry for this new “Thunderbolt”.

I guess there is a little, but very little solace in knowing LM’s current debacle of an airplane called F-35 with only 30-35% operational readiness which costs over $300 million a copy might be, could be, hopefully, maybe, possibly replaced by Boeing’s CAD entry somewhere in the distant future with an improvement in daily operational readiness combined with staying on budget, and have a competitive airplane able to handle a future peer manned aircraft adversary.

However, my gut says nah, no-no-nada because not only of past and continued performance, but offering bids on contracts in secret bypassing you and me to weigh in on the debate regarding a need for this airplane, who is allowed to bid, and how this procurement process is proposed to work better than anything previous. In other words, we are spending $20 BILLION dollars WE DO NOT HAVE, doing the same thing over and over expecting a different outcome. Another “fruit “ of an out of control DOD, Pentagon, defense contractors, and ultimately Congress all the way up to the White House ( Red or Blue does not matter). This is not a republic led democracy. It’s simply insanity. We, as a nation, have gotten so used to normalization of deviance, we cannot see or accept abject corruption resulting in good perceived as evil, sweet is perceived as bitter, bids and contracts let and accepted in secret, and Executive Order “trumps “, eliminates, and bypasses the will of the people.

We abhor and preach against normalization of deviance in aviation but blindly accept it in daily life from our government as long as it does not affect us too much. What’s too much? When will we react when we reach too much? And the big question is… how will we react when this corruption is too much?

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They’ll all get attacked by $500 drones on the runway before anyone ever even gets in the things, so at least no humans will be harmed or stuck in space.

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@Love2fly "RAF…surely, you jest!..”. Yes. AF1 just around the corner.

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A new Fighter named F-47 by the 47th president.
Obvious eponymous maxamous.

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Uh, ‘three’ must be prototypes?

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Considering it’s Boeing, I’m surprised they didn’t hold out for F-51…

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At this price they’ll be hidden away in bunkers like the B-2s and never used. Unless, of course, they will be able “fight” enough $4,327 drones with $2,000,000 missiles to protect airbases and aircraft carriers.

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The USA will need to invest in defence, considering every other country on the planet will be enemies with it before long…

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Looks like a copy of the Chinese one…

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“Made in China” will be China’s advantage. Although the F-47 will likely outperform the J-36 or J-50, it will come at a higher cost. China, meanwhile, could focus on mass-producing cheaper fighters, where quantity, like the MiG-21 in the Cold War, prioritized numbers over advanced technology.

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No rebuke needed. You hit the nail on the head. This is a complete joke, especially the number 47.

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They had me at “F-47”.

Meanwhile, the administration is busy cutting services actually used by Americans (I know, but the deficit…) to produce a weapon that, at best, could make a difference in the previous war.

I know how to save the NIH. Rename it “The 47 Institute” and it will be off the chopping block in a minute.

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I thought the last US fighter project was the F-35.

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Built in St. Louis’ former Douglas factory, like the F-18s?