The F-22 is designed first and foremost as an air superiority fighter. The F-35 was intended to replace half a dozen wildly different aircraft with a single plane. That was a horrible idea right from the outset.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning...
I think for political reasons they don’t have access to Russian or European aircraft and they probably don’t want Chinese ones. This is the first new fighter we have available to them.
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/07/18/f-35-has-freaked-out-iran-an...
Right now the F-35 is simply not ready, but I'm not sure anybody seriously expected it to be? Comparing the timescales, we should check again in 15 years, or if it goes really fast maybe at least 5?
Now specifically the software dev history of the F-35 is an interesting story..