The F-35 is an utter failure; a $391.1 billion waste and liability, projected to further cost over $1.5 trillion over its lifetime. Worse, the F-35 can not even do the job. It’s friend/foe identification system returns 80 percent noise to the pilot. It can’t even fly at night. The most depressing element of the story? No one wants the F-35. During a February 2nd speech to a Washington audience, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jon Greenert described what he’s looking for in the next generation of strike aircraft — and it doesn’t look like the controversial F-35.

“What does that next strike fighter look like?” Greenert asked the packed forum. “I’m not sure it’s manned, don’t know that it is. You can only go so fast, and you know that stealth may be overrated. … Let’s face it, if something moves fast through the air, disrupts molecules and puts out heat — I don’t care how cool the engine can be, it’s going to be detectable. You get my point.”

The F-35 is reliant upon the F-22, it was not even built as an air superiority platform. The F-22 itself has ancient computers. The complexity of the system the US has woven for itself is a critical weakness. This sees the United States with a critical weakness in the international technological arms race. This aircraft flounders, how can it possibly be trusted to ever engage any target? Cost/benefit of engaging in space patrolled by F-35 aircraft will skew. It may become much more manageable to consider engaging in airspace US aircraft are “protecting”. The F-35's deployment will impact geomilitary power dynamics as these dynamics continue to grow more complex. I wish I had paid more attention to the F-35's initial failures and ballooning budget, is it too late to stop this terrible waste? It costs $12.7 billion per year! The F-35 is ancient and inherently flawed. Just start over Congress; I know you are all blinded by money, but do your jobs for real for once. Congress can put a stop to this and open up a fighter X-prize. Imagine a modern fighter with printed parts and modular hyper-fast computers on bleeding edge standards.

Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus said the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) will be “almost certainly will be, the last manned strike fighter aircraft the Department of the Navy will ever buy or fly.”

The F-35 was out of date as it was beginning. The Pentagon must adopt faster procurement cycles. Innovation requires iteration. In the modern technological landscape materials options even can shift drastically, let alone computer systems! If the US government wants to continue waging mechanical combat and maintaining a web of influence over world events, it must then at least be efficient and cost-effective. Fighter aircraft should embrace moores law, and ancient procurement cycles and stagnant specs set decades before deployment ensure new aircraft will be ancient relics upon release.

The F-35 is a massive mistake that will impact US military capability and modify the calculation of all actors engaged in geomilitary power dynamics. A conversation needs beginning on how to shorten procurement cycles and cut out the massvie fat inherent in a military industrial complex approach to technology development. Forget Lockheed and the megacorps of the traditional military industrial complex, clearly they are unable to build computer systems in 2015! Instead let startups compete for the contracts of the future. If politicians insist on waging eternal war, at least be cost-effective about it.