Lockheed's Dubious Claim: Stealth Fighter Will Get Stealthier With Age

you beat me to it.

The need for large fleets of piloted, military aircraft is no longer justified, in most cases.

Not in the current status quo. Since the Cold war it was deemed that the likelihood of air to air combat was almost zero. The thinking in the 1980's was that long term peace was finally at hand.

So, Congress defunded a lot of the development or scaled it back. Now our aircraft are very old. F-16s date back to the 1970s as doe the A10. The F-15 is getting long in the tooth and these are our staple aircraft. The aircraft frames are now nearing two or three times the number of operational hours that they were designed for.

F-22 production was cut short and the F-35 will probably suffer the same fate. The US Air Force is on the decline and the latest cuts just accelerate the problem as maintenance costs climb.

Although the Cold War is over, Russia and China are now updating their fleets and pouring huge sums of money into militarization. We are severely cutting our funding, which is rapidly closing the gap between us and other nations.

These changes are not going unnoticed by other nations and Russia has been engaging and challenging our own air and sea space as of late. China is doing the same to enhance their projection of power.

Noted.

But do we yet know who the next threat is?

Sorry, my livelihood no longer comes from the threat of "global thermonuclear war".

Complex. Unfortunately, I do not have an hour to explain it.

A lot is about the projection of power and not so much the absolute use of it. The rising threats are very much the same threats of 50 years ago.

Well, why not? I've gotten stealthier with age.

I've noticed, for example, that young women never take a second glance at me anymore...