The future of Japan air force

Japan current status

This is what I found on latest statistics on Aircrafts.
80 F2
213 F15J
155 F4J
77 F1
Total 331.

Sooner or Later Japan needs to replace their fighters, the only problem is what kind of fighers they are going to choose. Or what kind of aircrafts are available to them.


There are few options for replacement
1.F22
2.JSF
3.F3
4.F15 or F16(New)
5.European Fighters

Reasons for new aircrafts

F15J are limited and aging in Japan. Most of the F15 are over twenty years old, so for next ten to fifteen years they will also need to replace.

F2 are undispute a good fighter, but unit cost of F2 exceed 108 million. That is about 30 million more than a block 60 F16. F2 also have maintentain and radar problems, so it is failure due to cost and performing not up to expectations. As a consquence, JASDF make a huge reduction in order. So future order seems to be in doubt.

F1 and F4 are aging, so no doubt they need to replace soon.


In the other thread we already cover the issue of purchase, so I will only compare the F22 vs F35 seem they are the best options now.

JSF VS F22

The Raptors' main task is to get air superiority. While the JSF main task is to attack ground targets, I would bet Raptor will win the air to air combat with the JSF. Eventhrough Raptor also use as air to ground bombs and some missiles. The JSF is a cheaper multi-role platform. They are like aircrafts such as F15 and F16.

Positives for JSF
1.cheap
2.better Air to Ground capability. Anti-ship is important for japan.
3.Still have decent Air to Air capability, and should be eoungh to defense against most and everything else that the Asia nations have.
4. ready to export.

Positives for F22
1.more capable than JSF especially in Air to Air.
2.better at penetrate the air defence.
3.Longer range.

Negatives for JSF
1.may need to wait until 2011-2015 at earlies.
2.too many others countries will be operate JSF such as Australia and maybe Korea.

Negatives for F22
1.may get downgrade version.
2.very expensive.
3.Don't know if US will ever release it.

F3

Positives
1.Self reliability.
2.Great help to the Japans' engineers and tech industry.
3.Gain more experience in making next generation Fighter.
4.Export possability.
5.Have a option to built Multi-platform.

Negatives
1.Costly.
2.May fault to meet expectation.
3.Probably rely heavyly on US, so not much different from import or built license planes.
4.Could buy better aircrafts with all the money spends.

Actually, it may be a good idea for Japan to built their indengous fighter program since Japan will learn a lot of technology. Eventhrough F2 never are a great success but it did served a milestone for Japan indengous program. The biggest problem is this new F3 program maybe very expensive to start with, and Japan will rely heavyly on US help. So will it make sense for Japan to start their own, since the F2 is a failure. I would rather think Japan might be reluctant to do it again, but if they do have the courage. They should start as soon as possible.

New F15 or F16

Since Japan have operated similar fighter such as F2 and F15, new version F15 may be good idea. But since Korea and singapore go to this platform, Japan may decide not to do the same. They might feel the need for something better, they have more funds to use. Secondary, they have the options to buy more F2 or F2upgrade. These new version of aircrafts eventhrough more powerful than early version, but they are at least one generation behind F22. And they are not as good as Tyhoon or Rafale in many areas, the biggest problem is they are probably limited upgrade available from this old platform.

Europe fighters

Political impossible. But what the heck, I will do a comparison.

Tyhoon Vs Rafale VS JSF Vs F22

1.Rafale is better in the air to ground area, mainly on account of its heavier load carring ability than Tyhoon.
2.Dogfight- either of them will have edge. Although the lack of Rafale thrust gives EF2000 a small accerleration advantage, but sustained turn rates are about the same.
3.The EF2000 thrust advantage is much more at the supersonic speeds, but Rafale have the better RCS so Tyhoon might have detect Rafale later than Rafale could do.

4.In BVR, F35 is better than both the Tyhoon and Rafale.
5.F35 is more stealthy than other two.
6.The F35 was never intended to be maneuverable, so Rafale and Tyhoon will way better in dogfight. The Rafale and Tyhoon both have canards to help in maneuverability and more unstable airframes.

7.The F22 will have better agility, speed, stealth, if it come to dogfight, it is hard to say.

I think it is rather unlikely for Japan to choose Rafale or Tyhoon over JSF or F22, because the political situation is not allow. Even without the political problem F22 will better choice than Tyhoon and Rafale. JSF will be also more reasonable choose done to the fact in today world Stealthy and BVR is much more important.



In conclusion

The most important fact of the matter is that the Raptor was never built for export, so some modification needs to carry out before export. But it really depends on what Japan's needs, a cheap muli-role platform or Air superiority fighter.

If F2 ever is a great success, Japan do not need any new fighters anytime soon. But now I honestly think Japan needs F22/F3 and F35 , because their F15 fleets is aging, and they need a good air to air fighter to replace such as F22 or F3. The aging F4 and F1 fleets lead them to need an Air combat with good Air ground capabilities, and this fall on the F2 and F35.

first i think japan will buy f-35 in big quantity rather than f-15,f-16,eurofighter or rafale because it has more advance and more stealhty.if japan choose other ac
than f-35 n f-22 i doubt how can japan face new ac that china have like su-30
or maybe su-35 that have good rather n maybe same ability with the ac fighters.n i think japan will buy f-35 first n they will get f-22 after US approval
n raptor will be buy in small quantity(30-40) to support f-35 in any attack.about
f-3 i think they will start after they buy f-35 n f-3 will be based on f-35

KYli said:

But now I honestly think Japan needs F22/F3 and F35, because their F15 fleets is aging, and they need a good air to air fighter to replace such as F22 or F3. The aging F4 and F1 fleets lead them to need an Air combat with good Air ground capabilities, and this fall on the F2 and F35.

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I heartily agree. The JASDF needs new jets to keep up with its neighbours, that's for sure. And it's a good time to buy, as there are so many alternatives on the market. I think the JSF and Raptor are probably the two mostly likely candidates as well.

Though I don't see why the current "climate" would prohibit Japan from buying Typhoons from say the UK, if they decided they were a good buy. We have good relations with Japan (and the US, obviously). Saudi Arabia is supposedly buying some of the RAF's allowance so it's not as if Japan would have to buy them from the whole of Europe direct.

FuManChu said:

I heartily agree. The JASDF needs new jets to keep up with its neighbours, that's for sure. And it's a good time to buy, as there are so many alternatives on the market. I think the JSF and Raptor are probably the two mostly likely candidates as well.

Though I don't see why the current "climate" would prohibit Japan from buying Typhoons from say the UK, if they decided they were a good buy. We have good relations with Japan (and the US, obviously). Saudi Arabia is supposedly buying some of the RAF's allowance so it's not as if Japan would have to buy them from the whole of Europe direct.

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Saudi Arabia is totally different from Japan. Many middle east nations do tend to buy military hardware from both European and US even china and Russia for political reason. Japan has been rely on US after WWII, so it would be rather shocking for them to buy anything european. South Korea and Singapore both have more free will than Japan, both choose the US offer instead of Rafale eventhrough Rafale should be much better choice. This say a lot of political pressure from US, if Japan choose to do otherwise. It also make logical sense, because Japan is more familar with US weapon. So both easiler to maintain and used for Japan. Also Tyhoon and Rafale are good, but F22 are better. Unless US offers F15(Japan should seriously consider Rafale If this ever happen), I would think F22 and JSF are better chioce.

Japan made a mistake with the F-2. It cost 4 times more then a normal F-16C/D Block 52! Instaed they should have gotten second-hand F-16s to fill the gap, then put some money on the JSF project and by a lot of those in the future. That would have been a good plan.

DPRKUnderground said:

Japan made a mistake with the F-2. It cost 4 times more then a normal F-16C/D Block 52! Instaed they should have gotten second-hand F-16s to fill the gap, then put some money on the JSF project and by a lot of those in the future. That would have been a good plan.

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F2 do not cost four times more than F16C/D. F2 cost about 108 milion a piece. F16C/D jets cost around 70-80 miliion with package including spare parts, maintenance, training. Depend on how you caculate it F2 is about 30-40 miliion more than F16.

although quite expensive,this give experience to japanese
to produce ac.they need to challenge china to be big power in asia
so they must have their own made ac.china had grown fast in producing
wether ac or ship.

Eventhrough Japan did gain experience from F2 project, at the end it is not as signficant as you might think. At that time, if Japan choose to buy license built F15(k) such as Korea did now, Japan still would gain valueable experience at a cost that is much less. Japan tried to have many modification on F2 which is base on F16, but the most important componets still come from US. So it is not a great achievement on self reliability as many might think. Beside F2 encounter lot of problems, the radar did not fuction as it should be. Even today Japan still have maintenace problems, so they was forced to downside the order. The whole thing just went over budget.

I would agree both Japan and China are ambitious to be big power in Asia, but the fact is Japan do not have decent military industry. Well, their commercial industry is very advance, but it is not the same. You need a lot of time to gain certain knowlegde to built military hardware. Japan now seems more rely on US, they just want to buy from US and built it on Japan. That is not good enough for a big power, but a good way to save money, go for the best without the risk for failure such as F2 did.

Japan do have great success in their submarines and destroyers, they built thier platfrom and put US weapons on them. But these should not be consider fully indengous, because it is still heavyly rely on US.

Even China have bulit many more planes and ships recently. Japan Navy and Air Force still have edge over China.

I agree that it is a great idea for Japan to built their F3, but they should be more committed.

I agree that japan can't beat china in military industries.china is big country with
a lot of funding on military and you know how many company that can produce
military hardware.china also have a lot natural resources.
japan only shimaguni country(island) with small natural resource and funding.
fortunately us willingly make them their ally and give tot like aegis.
i dont think japan can beat these chinese in military industries,but
they can give challenge to china

KYli said:

Saudi Arabia is totally different from Japan.

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I meant that Japan could try to justify it by saying they were buying from the U.K. and not "Europe". It is highly unlikely that they would buy the Typhoon, but I can't believe that Japan would never buy anything from us just because we're geographically part of Europe. We're not the U.S., but we have a close relationship nonetheless.