The F-15EX fighter is a smart idea: take the popular F-15 and make it more of a 21st-century fighter. But no stealth? The idea behind the F-15EX is a good one, at least on paper, that is. Upgrade a tried-and-true platform to make it a 4.5 generational aircraft that fits between the Air Force’s F-22 and F-35 and older F-16 and F-15 Strike Eagle.

The F-15EX, also known as the Eagle II, is an advanced variant of the F-15 fighter aircraft being developed for the United States Air Force (USAF). It is designed to replace aging F-15C/D models and enhance the USAF’s air superiority capabilities. While opinions on the F-15EX may vary, I can provide you with some general information on the aircraft and its potential strengths and criticisms.

Strengths of the F-15EX:

1. Performance: The F-15EX boasts impressive speed, maneuverability, and altitude capabilities, allowing it to excel in air-to-air engagements.
2. Payload and Range: It has a large weapons payload capacity and an extended range, enabling it to carry a wide range of munitions and operate over longer distances.
3. Advanced Avionics: The F-15EX incorporates advanced avionics and sensor systems, providing enhanced situational awareness and mission capabilities.
4. Cost-Effectiveness: Compared to more modern stealth fighters like the F-35, the F-15EX offers a lower procurement cost and potentially lower maintenance costs, making it an attractive option for the USAF to augment its fleet.

Critiques of the F-15EX:

1. Stealth Capability: The F-15EX is not a stealth fighter, meaning it may be more vulnerable to detection by advanced enemy air defense systems compared to stealth aircraft like the F-35.
2. Future Relevance: Some critics argue that investing in non-stealth platforms like the F-15EX may not align with the future of aerial warfare, which is expected to rely increasingly on stealth and networked capabilities.
3. Opportunity Costs: Critics also question whether investing in the F-15EX diverts resources and funding away from the development and procurement of more advanced and future-oriented platforms.

But think tank analysts have wondered whether time, money, and resources should go into the F-35 program instead. Now a government watchdog has criticized the acquisition practices of the F-15EX and this critical eye has identified lessons learned for the other acquisition programs in the U.S. military.

What’s Good About the F-15EX

The F-15EX has a new survivability system that is designed to improve performance against Chinese and Russian fighter-interceptors. It has a digital flight control which the 48-year-old F-15 did not have. The original platform has proved its mettle in the Middle East, and it has especially demonstrated much success with the Israeli Air Force. Now the F-15EX has shown the capability it can fly with other airplanes in the Northern Edge exercise in the spring of this year.

There Is Some Bad News

That’s the good news. The bad news is that there is also a scathing report written by the watchdog Project on Government Oversight, or known as POGO, that criticizes the defense acquisition practices of the F-15EX program. The nonprofit’s Center for Defense Innovation analyst Thomas Christie believes that the Air Force chose to not “test before you buy,” and is instead combining the wrong acquisition phases at the wrong time. This means the Air Force is acting to “merge the plane’s development and its operational tests,” according to Christie.

This practice is damaging because it is allegedly leading to less transparency and speeding up the program without the added realism of adequate testing. Christie said in his last report that the Air Force should find flaws with a series of prototypes that employ different testers. This ensures that all the mistakes and kinks are ironed out before it is deployed.

“Why? Because development tests are done by engineering test pilots, on behalf of the developer, to uncover any deficiencies in meeting engineering specifications, then to cure and retest those deficiencies as quickly as possible. These aims are often incompatible with operational testing, which is necessarily done on behalf of the combat user, by tactical pilots evaluating the combat suitability of the fully production-ready, deficiency-free plane under stressful, realistic, non-engineering conditions,” the analyst said.

Christie thinks the F-15EX program is using semantics such as describing itself as “Middle Tier Acquisition” to confuse oversight efforts by Congress and the Department of Defense. The POGO watchdog group believes these evasive buzzwords allow the F-15EX to “begin production before the ωεɑρσռ is operationally tested or before the design and development are even completed.”

A Fair Critique? 

Christie and POGO might be acting too alarmist for a few reasons. The F-15EX is reportedly testing successfully – so far. It will likely not go the way of the shocking cautionary tale of the failed Army Future Combat Systems. The personnel staffing the F-15EX are probably not acting maliciously. But the use of vague descriptions could confuse Congress and regulatory practitioners in the Department of Defense.

POGO is correct to be concerned with future programs because the F-15EX is setting a concerning precedent with merging the development of the airplane with testing instead of a phased testing approach before the fighter is purchased. If something goes wrong with the F-15EX, such as schedule creep and cost overruns, POGO could say I told you so.

<Source: https://www.19fortyfive.com/>