Citat:NAVAIR has released new concept art of the F/A-XX, showing canards, a pseudo lambda/delta wing, and, I think, YF-23-style ruddervators (but they might be stabilizers.) The description also calls for more speed and range than F/A-18E/F Block III.
Citat:-This looks like a notional Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) manned platform. The Air Force and the Navy have parallel programs to develop their own NGAD concepts, which will be a family of systems, including unmanned aircraft and a long-range manned tactical type. This fits the bill. It's very big, stealthy, and has no vertical tails. It also has a hell of a chine line that wraps around the airframe. Its dorsal intake is also a very stealthy attribute. It is hard to tell, but if there is just one and not another intake on the other side, with the spine behind the cockpit flowing into it, it looks a bit similar to the Model 401 'Son of ARES' demonstrators that were built by Northrop Grumman's subsidiary Scaled Composites and are currently undergoing secretive test work. Still, it is likely the design has two intakes, one on each side. An NGAD demonstrator of some sort is already flying. It could be Northrop Grumman's for all we know, but there is likely to be major opportunities surrounding NGAD as the program spins up. Clearly, if they aren't involved now, they really want to be.
-Next, we have the pointy white nose that looks like one of Northrop Grumman's new affordable loyal wingman and unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) concepts. One of these is derived from—you guessed it—the Model 401, while the other is directly based on it. You can read about this family of airframes that Northrop Grumman wants to build for the Pentagon and possibly allied nations in this past post of ours.
Citat:The FY23 National Defense Authorization Act #NDAA fully funds the US Air Force's Next Generation Air Dominance #NGAD, the associated adaptive propulsion programs & other efforts. The Air Force had requested $2 Billion for #NGAD, and Advanced engine development (AETP) efforts.
USAF planira za sada 200 NGAD kao i 1000 komada autonomnih dronova, verovatno nesto kao lojalni vingmen koji ce biti upareni sa F-35 i NGAD.
Citat:"The DAF [Department of the Air Force] is moving forward with a family of systems for the next generation of air dominance," Kendall said in his speech. "That will include both an NGAD platform and the introduction of uncrewed collaborative aircraft to provide affordable mass and dramatically increased cost-effectiveness."
The NGAD platform he referred to here is a sixth-generation stealthy crewed combat jet now under development. The future crewed combat aircraft and the CCAs are part of the Air Force's broader NGAD initiative, which also includes work on new weapons, sensors, networking and battle management capabilities, advanced jet engines, and more, as you can learn more about here.
Air Force leadership has "recently given our planners a nominal quantity of collaborative combat aircraft to assume for planning purposes. The planning assumption is 1,000 CCAs," Kendall continued. "This figure was derived from an assumed two CCAs for [each of] 200 NGAD platforms, and an additional two for each of 300 F-35s, for a total of 1,000."
Citat:The full current proposed budget outlay for F/A-XX for the next five years is as follows:
Fiscal Year 2024: $1.528 billion
Fiscal Year 2025: $2.205 billion
Fiscal Year 2026: $2.634 billion
Fiscal Year 2027: $2.682 billion
Fiscal Year 2028: $2.735 billion
