"Lockheed Martin released video of the F-35 joint striker fighter jet successfully performing a weapons test with a guided bomb. The video shows the aircraft releasing Guided Bomb Unit-32, or GBU-32, from its internal weapons bay at 25,000 feet above a military range in California's Mojave Desert on December 6. The GBU-2 hit its intended target of eight stacked cargo containers."
Maybe the wrong video was used, because after the smoke had cleared, the eight 40-footers are still intact. Then again, the pilot could have been aiming at something else. It happens.
"There, at an army firing range (in the sultanate of Brunei), the much-touted Singapore-made weapons were being demonstrated for accuracy, reliability and versatility, at some stage of which both the father(LKY) and son(LHL) participated. Peter Lim reported the prime minister had scored direct hits with the weapons whereas his soldier-son had "wash-outs." The embarrassed general disputed the report claiming that he had tried for a more difficult target behind the target in question."
("The Media Enthralled, Singapore Revisited", Francis Seow, page 117)
So we have a brigadier general who can't shoot straight. We also have a guy who professed a "more open-minded interpretation of the Koran" as Minister for Muslim Affairs. But why is a medical doctor - once a surgical oncologist in private practice at Mount Elizabeth Hospital from 1997 to 2001 - making the decision to buy a US$161 fighter jet? Winslow Wheeler, from the Project on Government Oversight and a longtime U.S. Government Accountability Office (G.A.O.) official, is saying, “The true cost of the airplane — when you cast aside all the bullshit — is US$219 million or more a copy, and that number is likely to go up.”
Sure, Ng had with him the Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF) chief Major-General Hoo Cher Mou at the show and tell in Arizona. Hoo also happens to be the first non-pilot to be appointed as Chief of Air Force. Maybe both Ng and Hoo had extensive experience assembling Airfix plastic kits of model aeroplanes.
Like a kid unboxing presents on Christmas Day, Ng tried on the F-35B's pilot helmet, with the heads up displays and iPad type controls, and mounted a ladder to smell the new leather in the cockpit. Ng concluded, "The F-15s will serve us but we are evaluating the F-35s seriously." Seriously, that has to be the Brompton bike sickness all over again: why be satisfied with a US$31 million F-15 (flyaway cost, 1998) when you can splurge US$161 million on a F-35 with no government oversight committee to bother with?
Posts
Imagine half a million refugees arrive within half a year to our shore. Can we sink the refugee boats with our submarines or with bombs send down from F35s?
ReplyDeleteSingapore in a way is occupied by aliens and it is very possible to invade this tiny little dot with non military people such as refugees.
Can they not do so?
patriot
Pity that Ngiam Tong Dow has been silenced. Otherwise we could plumb him for his views.
ReplyDeleteAs some commentators have said :
ReplyDeleteSingapore has 24 two-seater F-15SG fighter-bombers and 74 F-16s. The last of those F-15SGs arrived last year. It's a configuration unique to Singapore and is the most advanced variant of the F-15.
At this point I don't see how their planners could forsee tossing them. Looks like if they do elect to pick up the F35, it'll be at the expense/death of their F16 fleet.
--
SG is in no serious security threat. Why would they need F35?
---
. Not sure why at this early stage they would buy the F35A, why buy it so soon, as I keep saying, let some other suckers waste their money getting it right THEN buy it....
---
You decide if christmas comes too early for them.
Yes, I agree. Computer technology is always moving forward. Whatever you have now will be obsoleted in a few months time. Therefore, I do not feel the need to keep up with the most advanced features. Whenever intel come up with new processors, I don't buy them. I always buy the less advanced which gives me the most bang for my bucks. And I never need so much processing power anyway.
DeleteThere will come a day when our northern and southern neighbours will make SinCity's military toys look silly by building a nuclear plant in Batam / Bintang and Southern Johore. Any leak that spreads for 50 miles will be enough to give everyone on this island a good dose of radiation therapy. It will serve a dual purpose, provide energy as well as a deterrence...SinCity's F35s are welcomed to take out the facilities.
DeleteIt is easy to buy stuff when you using other people blood, sweat and tears money to buy what...zzz
ReplyDeleteSeriously, can this thing fly,or aim ?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.vanityfair.com/politics/2013/09/joint-strike-fighter-lockheed-martin
It would be better to spend the money back home to increase the wages of lower worker rather than buying more fighter planes. After all if you let in so many foreigners willingly, then the enemy may be already on our shores. What can the fighter jets do? Did they send the fighter jets to Little India last Sunday?
ReplyDeleteThis money spent on these expensive planes could have been directed to universal health care for the elderly. These planes will not enhance our national security.
ReplyDeleteOnly one elderly on this island qualify for lifetime employment and healthcare, so this can only mean plenty of spare cash to keep buying the latest military toys.
DeleteHow to end this obsession with military toys ?
Just one kamikaze pilot to do the right thing. LOL
pressured to 'support' the asian pivot.
ReplyDeletejuz like guam. our flag but their asset here.
like small time gangster who keep "tools" for bruthers.
Of course what they are keeping mum about all these expensive toys is that they come with a lot of expensive freebies as well, no questions asked, no need to ask also for them, one can bet there will a lot of discreetness in the giving & receipt of the freebies.
ReplyDeleteBuy the F35s? It is not only a matter of bragging rights, or expense, it is also about muscle, and the view of one old man. We must always be stronger than our neighbours, if necessary stronger than two of our neighbours combined. Otherwise we will be bullied and cowed by them. Better that we are the bully. Well, this is the gist of our Strongman's stand (see below). So bo pian, must spend and spend on defence...
ReplyDelete‘Without a strong defence, there will be no Singapore,’ Lee said in an interview published by the Sunday Times newspaper. ‘It will become a satellite, cowed and intimidated by its neighbours.’ …
‘If we do not have this strong SAF (Singapore Armed Forces), we are vulnerable to all kinds of pressures from both Malaysia and Indonesia,’ he said.
‘We are not vulnerable? They can besiege you. You’ll be dead,’ he said, adding that Singapore’s business would come to halt if its neighbours cut the sea lanes.
‘If we are not vulnerable, why do we spend 5 to 6 per cent of GDP (gross domestic product) year after year on defence,’ he said. ‘Are we mad? This is a frugal government.’ …
The F35, at US161 million a pop, the FW levy collected a year is enough to pay for 10 of these.
Delete"You’ll be dead" : Obviously not, if somebody can live to 90.
"Are we mad?" : Maybe, depends on who are the we.
"This is a frugal government" : Got to qualify this, frugal on who?
"It will become a satellite" : We are a global city leh.
Guys! guys!... size matters ok?.. ( except handphones )
ReplyDeleteNo sweat, after the $261m (for one) F35 have all missed their 40-foot whale-size containers stacked 4 high with a "precision laser guided bomb", foot soldiers can then be sent in to do the man's job. Yours sons, not theirs. And yes, we want our ten percent just like the mats when they bought their F18s and MiG 29s. "Bitcoins for you, sir?"
ReplyDelete"US$161 million on a F-35"
ReplyDeleteWhere is the money going to come from?
ANSWER
----------------
From your CPF account lor!
Let me offer a plausible explanation of that "wash-out" or WoWo as we then called it in the 60's.
ReplyDeleteThe PM being Artillery trained will never shoot straight. He will aim , calculate the trajectory etc ...... Or is it the other way round ?
By the way, I was made to understand from that latest Singapore movie on NS, that the Wash-out is now called BoBo .
In the not too distant future, we may hear such words dispensed at the OCS graduation ceremony...
Delete" gentlemen, whatever you intend to achieve, never ever become another 'mai hum' or 'kee chiu' officer ! all the training in OCS would amount to nothing, so gentlemen, die die, always bear this in mind ! "
When you can get brompton bike with a fraction of what NPB paid for, when an expensive heart surgery merely cost $8 to a minister, when a $2 AIMgate took on million-dollar projects from Town Councils, when PAP kept hounding WP over a simple cleaning job while themselves charging hefty fees in various PAP towns, when PAP think Yaw has no integrity than Palmer's mango girl, when Vivian Balakrishnan screamed that PAP has more integrity and passionate than WP. Singaporeans have to wonder, is this island not a dark peat full of vicious snakes telling us that politics is about contest of power and they are more transparent than crystal globe? May be it is not a snake peat but a parliament house full of crocodile - tears.
ReplyDeleteI watched the video on the Reuters website. The projectile penetrated the stacked shipping containers. Perhaps they used a test guided missile without explosives.
ReplyDeleteIts a Singaporean thing; if you are good at A, then it must also mean that you are good at B. A good doctor? Then confirm good in military affairs.
@Patriot - no need for refugees, this red dot has already been invaded by gweilo, orang putih, India Indians and pinoys working in Marina Bay Financial Centre Towers 1-3. They come on expatriate packages and love Singapore because it's so cheap and the govt gives carte blanche for them to take displace stupid Sinkies who keep voting the hideous lightning party for the past 48 years
ReplyDeleteHi Anon 1042 pm.
ReplyDeleteNoted and thank You.
Me did state in another comment
that this tiny little dot is occupied
by aliens.
Maybe that comment was posted
at My Singapore News Blogsite.
patriot
Very impressive, but the F16 and F15s are all certified to carry the GBU32; what can the F35 do that the F16 and F15 cannot already do? Of course, its like asking, why buy a Porsche when a Cherry can fulfil the same function - its empire building at the top, if you spend more on defence then you can claim you have no money left to spend on welfare and healthcare. Some blogger thot Singapore is becoming populist as the garmen spent $100m on welfare last year, she shud check the F35's in all-in-cost.
ReplyDeleteAnd spending other people's money is so easy, it also makes friends of unca Sam's defence industry and their lobby networks, plus most important, that age old Lockheed trick of reversing the money flows elsewhere! Die die must buy Lockheed!
The last batch of F-35 A-models cost around $107 million, including the engines, but Martin said the company expected to beat that cost in the eighth production contract to be negotiated early next year.
ReplyDeleteBy the time the new stealth fighter reaches full-rate production in 2019, she said it would cost around $75 million in current year dollars, or less, putting it on par with the cost of current fourth-generation fighter jets.
Boeing Co (BA.N) says its F/A-18E/F Super Hornet costs about $51 million, including engines and radar, but congressional aides say the price is closer to $70 million when sensors, targeting pods and other equipment that is standard on the F-35 is included.
Orlando Carvalho, executive vice president of Lockheed Aeronautics, said Lockheed was aiming to deliver 38 aircraft next year, an increase of two from this year, and hoped to start ramping up production to help drive down costs.
So you saying that Lockheed charges $75m and we going to pay the US garmen $200m plus? I wonder whether the troll just gave us the smoking gun!!
DeleteAnyway, you and your kind are dumb enuf not to buy the F35A, but the F35B model, the shitty vertical take off version that doomed the Harrier Jump Jet and the pilots who lost their lives flying that piece of crazy un0maintainable shit.
For the record and your info, the planes are bot garmen to garmen, not from Lockheed to you, so US government GAO's numbers are the ones that count.
/// Maybe the wrong video was used, because after the smoke had cleared, the eight 40-footers are still intact. ///
ReplyDeleteThe missile scored a bulls-eye (second container from the top and right in the middle of the container). The containers are still intact because these are dummy rounds without explosive for training purpose. Unlike the pyrotechnics used in SAF demo and exercises where petrol are added to oil drums to create more fiery effects.
chee by .... kpkb
ReplyDeletefor fuck sake?