RIP Raptor

Being somewhat of an aviation dork, I felt a bit sad when I heard the news that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates had pretty much killed off the F-22 program in the name of saving some cash. I can definitely see where he's coming from, but the major media outlets' responses following the decision has been somewhat curious. A quick look around and you have stories from say Newsweek, MSNBC, CNN, etc all saying the F-22 is essentially worthless because it's not being used in the "war against terror".

I think that's a little short-sighted. Actual wars are hell, no matter if it's proxy wars between two superpowers or unconventional conflicts between people who take religion a wee bit too seriously and people who wish they had oil instead of drinkable water. Saber rattling is always better than actual wars. But if you have enough of a deterrence to prevent even that, then hey why the hell not? In that regard, the F-22 is a heck of a deterrence. Yes, I know everyone just WISH we have live targets to shoot at with our fancy stealth jet, but the world isn't perfect. Throwing away a program that costs however many billions in R&D money is a bit of a waste, especially when them commies (China) are gearing up for more regional conflicts and the ex-commies (Russia) is shooting for a return to former glory. They didn't restart their Bear patrols for nothing!

Ok fine, the Tu-95 bears are pretty cool, for a prop bomber :)~

But I do see the merits of the argument - at the moment, F-22s are pretty useless except for when our Air force needs to tell the world, OURS IS BIGGER AND BADDER THAN YOURS. But then I see Newsweek start arguing that the upcoming F-35 is also useless, and that there's absolutely no point in updating our air force - that's just stupid. Didn't some F-15 literally disintegrate in the air during a high G maneuver a while back, and the entire fleet had to be grounded? Isn't the current fleet of fighters children of the 80s, having being designed a decade or two earlier? Do they understand that modern fighter development takes decades, not months? Do they not know how children of the 80s tend to turn out? (oh wait, I am one. Oh well, more evidence for my argument)

This sounds a bit like the isolationist thinking prior to World War II.

But now that we've killed the F-22... can we bring the (Y)F-23 back? Pretty please?