For many years, military fans often think of India when discussing "falling planes". However, since this year, the US military has attracted strong attention due to frequent falls of planes. In February this year, the U.S. Navy's F-35B fighter crashed into the South China Sea ; then a series of aircraft crashes occurred, including the National Guard 's F-16 fighter 's 's 's 's MV-22 Osprey rotorcraft crashed during exercises, and the Air Force's E-2D early warning aircraft 's 's , which also caused dozens of casualties. In order to prevent the plane crash from happening again, the U.S. Navy also announced the grounding of aircraft across the Navy. Just now, the US Air Force crashed again.
It was circulated on social media that the F-35A emitted black smoke after the crash
According to CCTV, on October 19th local time, an F-35A fighter of the 388th Fighter Wing of the US Air Force suddenly crashed while performing a routine training mission, and the pilot ejected urgently and escaped. According to reports, the 388th Fighter Wing was stationed at Hill Air Force Base near Salt Lake City, Utah. Local residents saw the flames after the plane crash and notified it to the media. The US Air Force later admitted that the F-35A fighter of the 388th Fighter Wing crashed at the northern end of the base's runway. At present, the US Air Force has sent the pilot to the hospital for treatment and is setting up an investigation team to find out the cause of the plane's crash. However, some local residents posted photos of the F-35A fighter jet releasing oil before the crash on social media, so some speculated that the plane might have had a mechanical failure. It is worth mentioning that according to the official website of the US Air Force, the maintenance brigade under the 388th Fighter Wing has just completed training on handling F-35 fighter emergency accidents.
Although the US military's military expenditure ranks first in the world, more than the sum of military expenditures of several countries, because the US military is powerful and needs to maintain its military presence around the world, frequently organizes various exercises or other military operations, and has serious corruption, the US military's military's military expenditure is not efficient. Taking the US military's fighter jets as an example, in 2018, the US Department of Defense statistics showed that the proper rate of the US military's F-22 fighter jet was only 49%, the proper rate of the F-35 was only 54%, and the overall proper rate was 72.7%. Mattis, then-US Secretary of Defense, issued a death order to keep the proper rate of F-22, F-35, F-18 and F-16, the four fighter jets, , maintained at more than 80%. However, after three years of rectification, the overall proper rate of the US Air Force in 2021 dropped from 72.7% to 71.5%. The proper rate of the four types of aircraft that Mattis issued a death order to forcefully improve did not change significantly.
If the US military is responsible for protecting US territory, then the proper rate of aircraft at this level is completely sufficient. However, today the United States wants to fight against China and suppress Russia and show off its power around the world, then the proper rate of aircraft at this level is obviously insufficient. However, the economic situation in the United States is very serious now. Not only has the inflation rate remained high for more than a year, GDP has also declined for two consecutive quarters. On October 17, Bloomberg predicted that the US economy will experience negative growth in 2023. What's more, the United States is now in debt, and the federal government debt has exceeded the 31 trillion US dollars mark, while the annual GDP of the United States in 2021 is only 23 trillion US dollars. Under this circumstance, the United States is obviously unable to significantly increase military spending and build more new fighter jets, so it can only allow fighter jets in poor condition to perform flight missions and maintain fleet size. Against this background, plane crashes are naturally common.
Photo of the F-35A putting oil before the crash
In fact, in addition to the US Air Force, the US Navy is also deeply suffering from poor proper weapons and equipment rates. On October 18, the US media "Business Insider" reported that the sailors on the US military's aircraft carrier "Lincoln" discovered at the end of September that the drinking water and other domestic water on the ship were very turbid, and there was a pungent smell.Although the U.S. Navy urgently allocates bottled water for the officers and soldiers on board to drink, the bathing water still has an unpleasant smell. And until the time of this news, the U.S. Navy still did not find out the reason for the contamination of the water supply system. Coincidentally, the sister ship of the Lincoln, "Eisenhower", also had similar problems. In February 2021, the US Navy Times reported that due to continuous deployment for 205 days, the sewage discharge pipeline of the Eisenhower broke due to aging, causing the excrement of the officers and soldiers on the ship to flow across the warship , and the entire aircraft carrier was once stinkable. The leakage of sewage pipelines once polluted drinking water, causing great trouble to the lives of the officers and soldiers on the ship. The reason for the water pollution problem of the Lincoln is likely to be similar to the Eisenhower.
388 wing F-35A
In short, the current US military seems to have countless advanced and powerful weapons and equipment, but the maintenance status of these weapons is very unbearable. Even so, the United States still needs to be strong and powerful, and try to bully the weak, so that all kinds of military equipment can be deployed in a high-intensity manner. As long as the United States does not give up its hegemonic policy for a day, accidents such as plane crashes and warship water pollution will not end.
