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Comment by EdwardCoffin | Hacker News Reader

Butler Lampson, in his lecture Hints and Principles for Computer System Design [1], has the following anecdote:

I remember hearing from the chief program officer for the software of the new joint fighter the F-35, in the US, five or so years ago. He said "I'm the chief software program officer, and I'm absolutely certain that the approved requirements for the software for this plane cannot be met, and there's nothing I can do about it because there are so many forces being brought to bear on these requirements." (45:45 - 46:18)

[1] https://www.heidelberg-laureate-forum.org/video/lecture-hint... (27 August 2015)

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The Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS) system determined essential to keep F-35 flying and maintained is now scrapped and they start from beginning.

Wow, that’s massive news. Could you share a link to your source please?

Here: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-pentagon-f35/f-35-log...

Thanks! It would be interesting to know whether purchasing countries will get sole authority in flight package definition in contrast to the ALIS where it had to be signed off in US for every sortie afaik.

The US military signs off on every flight?!?! Surely not, but if so sounds like a great business model.

IIRC it was reported like that by some outlets several months ago but the truth is more like US DoD personnel had to sign some keys to get interop with friendly fighters... Communications or some other kind of data sharing, I forget.

No, that was for loading IFF keys for Austrian fighters, a completely unrelated issue.

With F-35, the data packages necessary for operation in given theater are generated in one or two laboratories in USA, and so far there were no guarantees of anyone getting one of their own.

In addition, ALIS was dependant on Lockheed-maintained servers in USA by design, something that made it problematic even for US forces as the amounts of data that had to be transferred were too big for ship-based units - and you needed to sync at least once a month to ensure the aircraft is capable of flying.

Saw/read somewhere same.

“Another scenario theorised by analysts involves the US Government using the F-35’s enabling systems to “punish” a non-cooperative ally, potentially by withdrawing software upgrades or feeding information that would ground the entire fleet.“ https://defence.nridigital.com/global_defence_technology_mar...

There’s more. I just couldn’t find it quickly.

I don't see an issue with that.

While I understand the need (and the benefit) for selling arms abroad, having the ability to defang them if they try to use them against us seems very useful and seems like it could even expand the countries we're willing to sell to.

I think about this every time I hear about Iran flying F-14s

Kind of defeats the market for your product though. Assuming the US govt is going to stay non-rogue for the lifetime of the product you are buying to defend yourself against all threats, might be a tough call.

In fairness if the US went totally rogue their are few nations they couldn't wreck in short order outside of the ones with a credible ballistic missile program and nuclear warheads.

In that hypothetical no-one wins.

I'm sure there is an obscure plan for that somewhere in say the UK MoD filing cabinets.

I know the US war gamed invading Canada as both a training exercise and contingency plan.

Hopefully they've updated the obscure plan in the years since they gave away the entire carrier air fleet to the US marines, and ordered US F-35s to replace them.

Assuming competence in the halls of the MoD these days seems to be naive.

US doesn’t need to be involved directly for the blocking to become an option. Think about cases like India vs Pakistan vs China or Argentina vs UK or Marocco vs Algeria.

Why would anyone buy it then?

Being in and expecting to remain in a close alliance with the United States, presumably?

But "expecting to remain" is highly problematic these days, given the US' current leadership.

You should research Turkey, the main European servicing hub for F35 engines, and also a buyer of SAMs from Russia.

The world is more complicated now than the (relatively) simple alliances of the Cold War.

The point is that that rapid fracturing was unexpected.

No one really thought Trump and Brexit would happen, and Turkey was looking like it might join the EU.

The problems with “we’re all besties forever!” are clear now, but that’s hindsight.

Because it's the most capable multi role modern fighter in production and at less than 80M[1] it's cheaper than any other modern western jet fighter.

[1]:https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/defense/2019-10-30/l...

and they start from beginning

It sounds more like they switch to an existing system that works.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-pentagon-f35/f-35-log...

> works.

I wouldn't be so sure:

"ODIN will be based in the cloud and designed to deliver data in near real time on aircraft and system performance under heightened cyber security provisions, Lord said."

Independently of that "cloud based" ODIN as a replacement of ALIS ("Autonomic Logistics Information System"), the mentioned ALIS doesn't seem to me as what Lampson's source worried about.

I do not want to hear the phrase "cloud computing" anywhere near a fighter jet, unless they're talking and the plane (a computer) flying through clouds.

It's a ground based logistics program for scheduling servicing etc.

Ground cloud, got it.

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