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1. Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks (washedoutgundampilot@poa.st)'s status on Sunday, 11-Jun-2023 11:14:56 JST Woggy's Zeonic Frolicks

   Procurement is not about the function, overall. Weapons acquisition is about the politics. Guys always miss that. It’s a bit like the diff. between paying cash and paying in gift cards.

   Ukes got a gift card from uncle sam, and it’s only honored in a few places. There isn’t much stock available for fighters to begin with, lead time is about 10 years from start to finish. You sign a LOI, hash out the details, and 4 or 5 years later get the first shipped aircraft…of 20. You’ll get maybe 2 or 4 in the span of a year.

   So the real question is what’s available, and who’ll accept your credit? Unless there’s an operator out there with a fighting-ready fleet of F-5s ready to go, it’s not happening - particularly given how small and unsexy they are. Ukraine isn’t paying, why do the ‘smart’ and ‘affordable’ thing by downsizing into a less capable A/c w/ lower payload? Go for broke, get as much fighter as you can get and lock yourself into it for as long as possible. The F18 probably won’t see the level of investment and life improvements the F16 will, since its userbase is far smaller and transitioning to the F35.
   
   RT: https://poa.st/objects/3fe2bcfc-2e8c-486c-85dd-2ca75393a261