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The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is the newest fifth-generation fighter produced by the United States, but interestingly, it is not necessarily the highest-performing when compared on certain metrics, like speed, to other legacy fighter aircraft. Its 5th-gen predecessor, the F-22 Raptor, also a LM Skunk Works design, remains the apex predator of the Tactical Air world and is significantly faster than the F-35.
There are also a number of 4th-gen airframes, such as the F-15 Eagle, and 4.5-gen F-15EXs, which are significantly faster than the F-35. Looking back to even older aircraft and adversary fleets, the Russian MiG-35 can zoom past the Lightning as if it’s standing still with its incredibly powerful engines. The reason is that compromises were made to make the F-35 stealthy and multirole-capable at a reasonable price point.
There are three variants of the F-35, each maxing out around Mach 1.6, or 1,200 mph (1,930 kmh), on paper. The design differences between the F-35A conventional fighter, F-35B ‘jump jet,’ and the F-35C naval variant are fairly significant in terms of aerodynamics, weight, and power, despite the planes having 70% to 90% commonality.
How The F-35 Stacks Up
Comparing the F-35 to the premier fighter platforms of most air forces actually reveals that it is the slowest fighter jet by comparison. Even within the Arsenal of the United States and its allies, the Lightning II is far from a ‘hot rod.’ Despite its shortcomings and performance, the aircraft has replaced the F-15 and F-16 as well as the Eurofighter Typhoon and is increasingly expected to do so in the future as more legacy platforms are phased out in favor of the stealth fighter.
Below is a table comparing numerous Western and adversary platforms from Russia and China to provide a snapshot of how these fighter jets compare and to baseline performance. This data is compiled from a composite of manufacturer and government public databases available online:
In a close engagement between fighter jets where speed and power are paramount, the F-35 would lose many of those scenarios. This comparison, however, is disingenuous as it represents a tactical playbook that would almost never be followed.
Although legacy aircraft, including even the obsolete F-14 Tomcats flown by the Iranian Air Force, technically have the upper hand in an air-to-air battle, the technology on board the F-35 renders that advantage powerless.
Why Isn’t It the Fastest?
The defense procurement program that created the F-35, managed by the Joint Program Office (JPO), has since become the single most expensive military contracting endeavor in American history. Despite the incredible investment in the program, the F-35 is by no means the highest-performing warplane in the sky compared with other airframes on key metrics like top speed, service ceiling, and maneuverability.
The F-35 was never intended to be the highest-performing fighter in the US Arsenal. The Lightning II was envisioned as a replacement for the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon. The F-16 has been the lightweight fighter of the U.S. Air Force for several decades, following its creation in the wake of losses suffered by fighter squadrons in the Vietnam War. The key modernization is the stealth design feature of the F-35.
The performance of the F-16 paled in comparison to its fourth-generation contemporaries, like the McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle or the Grumman F-14 Tomcat. Looking ahead to the modern era, it is once again vastly overshadowed by the F-22 Raptor and advanced variants of the F-15. Similarly, the role of the F-35, the strategic doctrine of the U.S. Armed Forces and its allies, and its tactical deployment do not demand superior performance.
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The Stealth Advantage
Last year, a German Luftwaffe pilot in a Eurofighter Typhoon famously went head-to-head against an American F-35A flown by a USAF pilot. The results were not surprising, as the incredibly powerful and highly maneuverable Typhoon dispatched the F-35 without much difficulty. That is with one caveat, under real-world conditions, the F-35 would likely have destroyed the Eurofighter from beyond visual range without ever being detected.
Closing to the merge, as it is referred to by military aviators, or engaging in a dogfight, is essentially a worst-case scenario for the F-35. Its role on the battlefield as a sensor node dictates that it would not likely ever need to engage in a turning fight against other fighters. If there is an air-to-air threat on the battlefield that the F-35 is not capable of destroying with BVR missiles, the strategic playbook dictates that the threat would be neutralized by a more powerful platform such as the F-22.
One of the most powerful technological features of the F-35 is its ability to target adversaries for friendly platforms beyond the range of those hostile systems and equipment. What that means is that the F-35 can ‘paint’ a target with its onboard radar and a friendly aircraft or land-based, or even shipborne system, fires a missile which then ‘hands off’ tracking to the F-35 systems to intercept the target and destroy it. This also completely negates the need for it to be a superior dogfighter.
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Quarterback Of The Air Force Of The Future
The shift from 4th-gen to 5th-gen warfare is often described as moving from a ‘dogfighter’ mentality to a ‘digital quarterback’ mentality. In the era of the F-15, F-16, and F-14, tactical doctrine was built around centralized control and visual-range dominance. With the F-35, success is measured by the pilot’s ability to manage a massive stream of data.
Fighter pilots of the 20th century were trying to achieve a superior position using energy and altitude management, where they would be able to launch a missile or engage with their guns and destroy the enemy in a dogfight. The advent of long-distance air-to-air missiles made radar and sensor management a higher priority, especially onboard the F-14 and later the F-22, but the F-35 takes us to an extreme new level.
Modern strategy treats the F-35 as a distributed sensor node. It is not just a fighter; it is a vacuum for data that sits inside the enemy’s denied airspace. Instead of just shooting missiles, the F-35 identifies the best ‘player’ to take the shot. F-35s share data automatically and silently. If one F-35 sees a target, every other F-35 in the ‘daisy chain’ sees it instantly from the same angle. An F-35 can use its stealth to get close to a target, track it, and then hand off that targeting data to an F-15EX or a Navy Destroyer miles away. Those platforms fire the missiles while the F-35 remains silent and invisible.
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Eye In The Sky
The strategic problem with 4th-gen doctrine is that it relies on a massive, non-stealthy Boeing 707 airframe (the E-3) broadcasting a high-powered radar signal. An AWACS is like a lighthouse in a dark ocean. It sees everything, but its signal reveals its exact location to every enemy. The Russian and Chinese stealth fighters are specifically made to hunt these high-value targets and are equipped with long-distance missiles that are expected to target these platforms from over 200 miles away, making them incredibly vulnerable on the battlefield tomorrow.
The F-35 uses sensor fusion to create a ‘God’s Eye View’ of the battlefield. The F-35, as well as other 4.5, 5th, and 6th-gen platforms like it coming in the future, does not replace the AWACS in a one-to-one capacity. Instead, the information-gathering system is distributed among the various platforms in the new data networked fleet. Instead of one giant eye 100 miles away, you have four small eyes ten miles from the target.
Unlike an AWACS, which must ‘ping’ a target to see it, the F-35’s AN/ASQ-239 Barracuda system can detect enemy radar emissions and radio signals passively. It can locate an enemy without ever emitting a signal that reveals its own position. Through MADL (Multifunction Advanced Data Link), a flight of four F-35s creates a private, high-speed internet. If one F-35 sees a target with its infrared camera and a second F-35 sees it with radar, the computers fuse that data. The result is a more accurate track than an AWACS could provide, shared instantly across the flight.
Six infrared cameras around the jet allow the pilot to ‘look through’ the floor of the plane. It automatically tracks every missile launch and aircraft at 360 degrees. The F-35 can map enemy radar locations (SIGINT) and jam them simultaneously, creating a ‘bubble’ of safety for less-stealthy 4th-gen jets (like the F-16 or F-18) to follow behind.
