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HighGround

Senior Member
Registered Member
Super Hornets go to the Navy, not the Air Force. Given sufficient AWACS support, the USN Super Hornets can pretty potent. And against all non-Chinese opponents, they are a very formidable force. The problem is that E-2s are insufficient compared to the AWACS and anti-AWACS platforms China has so these same Super Hornets aren't going to fare much better than the IAF on May 7.

Another important point is the question of where the USN aircraft carriers can be positioned. The potency of the carrier air wing would be greater if the carriers are closer to Chinese shores, but then the carriers themselves become very vulnerable to anti-ship missiles. It's a very tough decision to make and I suspect that a good choice just doesn't exist (other than to not fight at all). Finally, the American carriers are a lot less scary than they might seem. Each one can carry 4 squadrons (48-50 planes); which is a lot against everyone else, but pocket change when going up against China.

Super hornets can operate from land just fine. The bigger question would be over who gets to order them around. At the end of the day it's Paparo, but there's many layers of command under him.
 

4Tran

Junior Member
Registered Member
Speaking again to the NGSW System (XM7, XM250) and 6.8 Kickback-

The XM7s been removed from the DOT&E list for continued advanced testing. (
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and
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have their own articles here.)

Hesgeth wishes to see Americans die when their rifles fail in combat, but hey I'm sure they've fixed the issues since the last time DOT&E looked into it yeah? (January 2025)

[In the DOT&E’s annual report issued in January, officials reported that “soldiers assessed the usability of the XM157 [the weapon’s fire control mechanism] as below average/failing” and that rifles equipped with the mounted optic lens “demonstrated a low probability of completing one 72-hour wartime mission without incurring a critical failure.”]

For those who've not been in the know, the XM157s been breaking due to recoil (with the underpowered ammo, not the more powerful 6.8) and while its supposed to "fail clear" ie still work as a scope, most users get to see a big ass red/orange square stuck on the optic instead.*

From actual users, we've seen the ammo count (140 rounds per rifle, 400 per 'Autorifle' XM250) isn't useful in an engagement- the Army Captain who was collecting that data saw a Infantry platoon run out of ammo within 10 minutes of a fight and now you're looking at the only *advanced* testing of the rifle being done when a unit gets them and the time to break them in? Yeah this thing's begging to be the M14 2.0.



*The actual square users have seen, from a post over on r/Army when this was in the loop
Ouch. And I've heard that the best reason to switch to the M7 was that it had a really cool optic. It begged the question of why not to just slap said optic on the existing M4s. But this is just bad.

As for the rifle itself, you didn't even get into the exotic hybrid cartridge. And of course, you're going to get all sorts of reliability issues with the crazy pressure and the two-material casing. As I said earlier, the only explanation for this weapon program is rampant corruption.

Super hornets can operate from land just fine. The bigger question would be over who gets to order them around. At the end of the day it's Paparo, but there's many layers of command under him.
If the USN is forced to fly Super Hornets out of ground bases, then it's probably a conflict they've already lost. Besides, that still doesn't change the fact that they're going to have to operate without adequate AWACS support so they're going to be sitting ducks. I'd also posit that most existing Super Hornets are also starting to get old and decrepit, but since they're engaging in systemic warfare, this is a relatively less important factor.

Paparo seems to be one of the few American commanders who has a functional brain so hopefully he'll nip the dumber ideas before they get going. Then again, he wasn't able to nip stuff like the Marine Littoral Regiments, so he might well get overruled by the chuckleheads above him.
 
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Shocktrooper262

Just Hatched
Registered Member
As for the rifle itself, you didn't even get into the exotic hybrid cartridge. And of course, you're going to get all sorts of reliability issues with the crazy pressure and the two-material casing. As I said earlier, the only explanation for this weapon program is rampant corruption.
Don't get me started-

There's four rounds, all of them are hybrids but:

6.8x51mm Practice [XM1188 Reduced Range] which is designed to be underpowered as 6.8 is *too* spicy for normal 5.56x45 and 7.62x51 ranges
6.8x51mm "Wartime" [XM1186 General Purpose] which is designed to be the war rated 80k psi (+) round for war
6.8x51mm "Peer War(tm)" [XM1184 Special Purpose] which is Tungsten or Tool Steel (Tungsten was the og plan but China makes all of that ofc)

Then a blank round, but guess what! Since the XM157s soooo good, the thing isn't even getting tracer ammo. As for issues with it, the cases (steel rear caps) come off, the AP ammo scratched the mag up- so the Army's issuing steel mags over the polymer ones. The Brass Facts video on it even mentioned there's *ammo quality issues* per bullet which coupled with the handguard means the MOA on the rifle goes from 2 to 10 on a good day.

No, if you want a [universal] bullet- congrats the Chinese 5.8 *does* the fuckin job, and 5.56 can too with some tweaks. Though, even in China the PLA are using bigger rounds because sometimes you actually need a large caliber.
 

SlothmanAllen

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WASHINGTON — The US Navy has awarded contracts to four major aerospace prime contractors — Anduril, Northrop Grumman, Boeing and General Atomics — for “conceptual designs” for a carrier-based autonomous combat drone, according to a Navy document obtained by Breaking Defense.

Additionally,
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is under contract for the drone’s “common control,” according to a slide on Collaborative Combat Aircraft from the Navy’s program executive office for unmanned aviation and strike weapons, dated Aug. 20.

It is unclear how long the companies have been under contract and working on their CCA designs. A Navy official told Breaking Defense that the document’s information concerning the four aerospace primes and Lockheed Martin “is accurate,” but did not provide further information.

I believe this program might be further along then realized. If you remember the FY26 Senate budget documents named a Navy and Air Force Strike Aircraft. In 2021, Boeing was removed from the ship based control system for the MQ-25 and replaced with Lockheed. That was unusual given that the project was already well into EMD. We also have the Lockheed Skunkworks project for which they recently took losses on.

I think this might point to a Lockheed unmanned strike aircraft that is fairly far along in development. Some have thought about a potential replacement for the RQ-180, but I think it might be a different aircraft all together.
 

HighGround

Senior Member
Registered Member
If the USN is forced to fly Super Hornets out of ground bases, then it's probably a conflict they've already lost. Besides, that still doesn't change the fact that they're going to have to operate without adequate AWACS support so they're going to be sitting ducks. I'd also posit that most existing Super Hornets are also starting to get old and decrepit, but since they're engaging in systemic warfare, this is a relatively less important factor.

The USN is perfectly capable of flying aircraft out of ground bases and carriers at the same time. As for age, the majority of Super Hornets are the Blk II variant delivered between 05' and 20'. These are decently new frames, though admittedly, I would expect Naval aircraft to have more wear and tear than ground based aircraft.
 
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