Says Congress Should Consider Restarting Production Or Developing A Replacement

Congressman J. Randy Forbes (R-VA) has written an editorial for the Wall Street Journal saying that Congress should restart production of the F-22 Raptor, or find its replacement.

In the editorial, which was posted on the Congressman's website, Forbes said that the decision by then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates to end the program after 187 airplanes were built was a mistake.

Forbes writes that the U.S. Air Force fleet is the smallest and oldest it has ever been, while Russia and China have been fielding and exporting new fighters and sophisticated air defenses to countries like Iran. The Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Welsh warned last year that new airplanes in development in those countries "will be better than anything we have today."

While the price of resurrecting the F-22 would be high, Forbes said it would "be nothing compared with the costs of losing air superiority in future conflicts. When the Air Force considers future procurement, policy makers and the public ought to know how much it would cost to resurrect the Raptor. That is why language in the House Armed Services Committee's annual defense-policy bill directed the Air Force to assess the costs of resuming manufacturing of the F-22, or some updated variant.

The F-22 was conceived in the 1980s. It was the first "fifth generation" fighter that Forbes says "still outclasses everything else in air-to-air combat."

(Image from file)

FMI: Full Editorial